The steel needle slid once again into the thin vein in Sophie’s arm. A plastic bag was hung on the pole. Dr. Edwards himself opened the flow regulator, and the cold liquid began running through the tubing.
Sophie’s body, which had only just begun to clear itself of the chemical fog, took the hit. It was like forcing a person who had nearly reached the surface back under water. The moment the first heavy dose entered her bloodstream, the girl’s body arched.
Sleep turned instantly into toxic delirium. Sophie did not open her eyes, but her face twisted in a silent expression of unbearable distress. Her thin fingers clenched the sheet.
Her breathing broke apart, becoming shallow and ragged. Her heart, unable to handle the sudden drop in pressure, began beating fast and irregularly. The monitors reacted at once.
The cardiac monitor started sounding alarms, registering critical rhythm changes. Dr. Edwards watched the numbers on the screen without emotion. “Leave her,” he said quietly to the nurses, who looked frightened as they watched the weak patient moan softly.
“Nature is taking its course. We’re only easing the process. Everyone out.” The staff left the room.
Sophie was left alone with the drugs that were slowly, steadily putting out the last sparks of life in her. Outside, a hard spring rain began. The sky opened, and cold water lashed the pavement and the roofs of cars.
Zemfira sat on an old wooden bench at a bus stop. The thin plastic shelter above her had holes in it, and water dripped directly onto her shoulders, soaking her shawl. She did not feel the cold.
She was shaking from a deeper pain. In one day she had lost everything. She had lost the son who rejected her for the sake of a suit and an office.
And she had lost the girl she had begun to love like her own, the child she had been pulling out of darkness. They had thrown her out like a stray dog and called her a thief. With numb wet fingers, Zemfira unbuttoned her blouse.
She took out the old photograph from the inner pocket. The cardboard was already softening from the damp. Little Rada smiled up at her from the picture.
Laughing eyes. Round cheeks. Zemfira pressed the wet photograph to her chest. She rocked back and forth, unable to contain the grief any longer.
The tears she had held back in front of Roman and Michael finally broke loose. They mixed with the rain and ran down her face in hot tracks. “Forgive me, baby,” she whispered.
Her voice broke into a low wail swallowed by the storm. “Forgive me, my girl. I couldn’t save this one either.”
“I tried so hard, Rada. I rubbed my hands raw, and they still wouldn’t let me. People are cruel, baby. They wouldn’t let me.” She cried the way mothers cry at fresh graves.
It felt to her as if life itself was draining out of her with the rain. And a few miles away, in the bright private suite, the steady beep of the cardiac monitor suddenly changed. The rapid warning tones merged into one long, terrible flat sound.
The green line on the black screen jumped once, then stretched into a perfectly straight, lifeless bar. Dr. Arthur Edwards, standing in the hallway by the glass wall, gave a small, satisfied nod. He slowly pulled back the cuff of his white coat.
His eyes dropped to the gold hands of his expensive watch. “That’s that,” he said quietly, almost with relief. He turned to the pale nurse beside him.
“Record the time.” The expensive French cognac burned Michael Warren’s throat, but it brought neither relief nor forgetfulness. It tasted like ashes.
He sat in his dark home office paneled in oak. The huge apartment was silent except for the muted sound of spring rain against the windows. Michael stared into the bottom of a heavy crystal tumbler.
Inside him, everything had knotted into one hard, painful mass. He had just driven away the woman who had saved his granddaughter. He had defended his territory, his principles, his pride.
So why did it feel as if he had personally shut the last door to hope? From the living room came a soft laugh. Margaret.
She had stayed behind, saying she needed to “support Uncle Mike in this difficult time.” Now she was speaking quietly on the phone, and there was not a trace of grief in her voice. Only the calm satisfaction of someone who had just closed a profitable deal.
The sound scraped across Michael’s nerves. He wanted to be alone. To throw her out, lock every door, turn off every light, and sit in the dark.
He pushed himself out of the leather chair and walked into the large foyer. Margaret sat on the sofa with one leg crossed over the other, typing quickly on her phone. When she saw him, she instantly arranged her face into concern and set the phone aside.
“Uncle Mike, you need rest,” she said softly, standing up. “That woman completely manipulated you.” “Go home, Margaret,” he said dully, not looking at her.
“I want to be alone. Call yourself a car.” She nodded obediently, sensing this was not the moment to push him.
Michael stepped toward the coat rack to hand her outerwear over. Her expensive beige cashmere coat lay draped carelessly over a carved wooden chair. He grabbed it sharply, wanting only to get her out of the house.
He jerked the heavy fabric up. Something slipped from the deep pocket and hit the hardwood floor with a bright metallic click.
Michael froze. He knew that sound. Slowly he lowered his eyes.
There on the dark wood floor, catching the light from the wall sconces in cold sparks, lay the heavy gold cross set with diamonds. The one that had belonged to his late wife. The one Sophie never took off.
The coat slid from Michael’s suddenly weak hands and dropped in a heap. Silence filled the foyer. Margaret sucked in a sharp breath.
Michael bent down. His joints cracked. He picked up the cross.
The cold metal burned his palm. He straightened slowly and looked at the woman standing a few feet away. Margaret had gone so pale that the powder on her face looked yellow and unnatural.
She backed away, lifting her hands instinctively as if to defend herself. “Uncle Mike,” she stammered, her confidence gone. “It’s… it’s not what you think.”
“I found it on the floor in the room and put it in my pocket so it wouldn’t get lost. I was going to give it to you.” She lied badly now, breathless and panicked.
Michael did not shout. He did not grab her or shake her. All the blood had drained from his face.
A low hum filled his ears. The picture he had built in his mind over the last few hours shattered all at once. The pieces fell into place instantly.
Margaret’s eager suspicion. Her talk of theft. Zemfira’s quiet, wounded dignity as she had emptied her bag onto the table. He understood everything. He, the man who thought himself a master strategist, had believed the cheap scheme of a desperate woman drowning in debt.
Because of his suspicion, because of the pride of a rich man used to control, he had crushed the only person who had honestly fought for his granddaughter’s life. He had sent a good woman out into the rain. And he had left Sophie in the hands of people who benefited from her death.
Michael’s stomach twisted with physical nausea. The realization of what he had done hit him like a blow. “Get out,” he said.
His voice was so quiet it was almost a whisper. But the cold threat in it was enough. Margaret, wild with fear, ran for the door in her dress, forgetting her coat. The lock clicked behind her.
Michael was alone. He squeezed the cross so hard the edges of the diamonds bit into his skin. Time.
He had no time. Warren ran outside without even taking a jacket. He threw himself into his SUV, barking clipped orders into his phone to his security team as he drove.
The black vehicle tore through rain-soaked streets, ignoring lights. Michael drove as if the speed of the wheels might hold death off a little longer. He burst into the hospital lobby, nearly knocking over an orderly.
His security men, waiting downstairs, fell in beside him at once. They went up to the VIP floor. The hallway was in motion.
