Chapter 2 - THE MEDIC THEY DESTROYED
Dr. Lena Ortiz’s clinic looked dead from the street.
That was intentional.
The narrow brick building sat between a closed pharmacy and a laundromat in South Baltimore, its front blinds drawn and its sign dark.
Hannah drove behind it and stopped beside the service entrance.
Lena was already waiting.
She wore sweatpants under a winter coat, her black hair twisted into a careless knot.
Then she saw the blood.
“What did you do?”
“I didn’t do anything.”
“Hannah.”
“I found him like this.”
Lena opened the passenger door.
Nicholas tried to stand.
His body disagreed.
Lena caught one arm.
Hannah took the other.
Between them, they carried him inside.
The back room had once been a minor procedure room. Lena now used it for storage and after-hours emergencies she never officially admitted happened.
Under fluorescent light, Nicholas looked worse.
Lena cut away his trouser leg.
Her expression changed.
“This isn’t a fresh injury.”
“Three days,” Hannah said.
Nicholas looked at her.
“You told her?”
“You told me.”
Lena examined the wound.
“What caused this?”
Nicholas said nothing.
Hannah answered.
“I’m guessing gunshot.”
“It entered and exited,” Lena said. “That’s the good news.”
“What’s the bad news?” Hannah asked.
“The infection.”
Nicholas gave a faint humorless smile.
“I was hoping that was decorative.”
Lena looked at him.
“You joke when you’re dying?”
“He orders people around too.”
“I noticed.”
Lena inserted an IV.
Nicholas watched every movement.
Hannah noticed.
“You think she’s going to poison you?”
“I think trust is expensive.”
Lena connected fluids.
“So is emergency medicine. You’re welcome.”
Hannah nearly smiled.
For the next hour, the old part of her came alive.
She cleaned blood.
Checked vitals.
Helped Lena cool Nicholas’s fever.
Measured his breathing.
Monitored his pulse.
Her hands remembered every movement.
There was no hesitation.
No panic.
No fear.
Only purpose.
Nicholas watched her.
At one point, he said, “You’re good.”
Hannah’s hands stopped for half a second.
Nobody had said that to her in four years.
She taped the IV line against his arm.
“Go to sleep.”
“That wasn’t a compliment.”
“Good.”
“It was an observation.”
“Even better.”
By three in the morning, Nicholas’s fever had begun to come down.
Lena pulled Hannah into the hallway.
“Who is he?”
“I don’t know.”
“That’s a lie.”
“I didn’t know until about twenty minutes ago.”
“And now?”
Hannah looked toward the closed door.
“Nicholas Vale.”
Lena blinked.
Then she laughed.
Hannah didn’t.
Lena stopped laughing.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“The Nicholas Vale?”
“I apparently found a famous basement.”
Lena took a step backward.
“Hannah, do you have any idea who that man is?”
“Enough to wish someone else had been assigned that building.”
“He owns half the private shipping terminals between here and Philadelphia.”
“Legally?”
Lena gave her a look.
“Right.”
“And the other half?”
“People whisper.”
“I’ve heard whispers before.”
“This isn’t some drunk guy behind a nightclub.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
Hannah lowered her voice.
“He knew Joseph Rourke.”
Lena’s expression immediately hardened.
Four years earlier, Lena had been the resident physician in the emergency department when Joseph Rourke arrived without a pulse.
She had also been one of the only people who believed Hannah afterward.
“What does Vale know?”
“Not enough yet.”
Before Lena could answer, headlights swept across the back windows.
Both women froze.
A black SUV entered the alley.
Then a second.
Lena whispered, “Please tell me those are his.”
“I hope.”
The vehicles stopped.
Four men got out.
Then six more.
Hannah had never seen people move like that.
No wasted motion.
No shouting.
Every man knew where to stand before his feet touched pavement.
One stayed beside the vehicles.
Two watched the rooftops.
Three covered the alley.
The tallest walked toward the back door.
Gray coat.
Close-cropped hair.
A scar through his left eyebrow.
Hannah stepped in front of Lena.
“Stay behind me.”
Lena stared at her.
“With what? Your nursing clogs?”
“They’re comfortable.”
A knock sounded.
Three short.
Two long.
Hannah opened the door three inches.
The scarred man looked at her.
“Hannah Brooks?”
She did not like that he knew her name.
“Who are you?”
“Elias Kane.”
The name meant nothing to her.
His eyes moved over her shoulder.
“Mr. Vale?”
“Alive.”
Something like relief crossed his face.
It lasted less than a second.
“I need to see him.”
“You need to leave your gun outside.”
Elias stared at her.
Behind him, three armed men also stared at her.
Lena whispered, “Hannah.”
“No guns around my patient.”
Elias looked almost offended.
“He’s my boss.”
“Then you should want him alive.”
One of the men behind Elias muttered something.
Elias raised one finger.
The man went silent.
Then Elias slowly removed a pistol from beneath his coat.
He handed it backward.
A second gun followed.
Then a knife.
Then another smaller pistol strapped to his ankle.
Hannah stared.
“Anything else?”
Elias considered.
“No.”
“That pause was concerning.”
She let him inside.
Nicholas was awake when Elias entered.
The two men looked at each other.
For the first time, Hannah saw real emotion on Elias Kane’s face.
“You look terrible.”
Nicholas replied, “You took too long.”
Elias laughed once.
Then he crossed the room and gripped Nicholas’s shoulder.
“You’re alive.”
“Disappointing several people.”
“At least twelve I can name.”
Nicholas looked toward Hannah.
“Start with Daniel.”
Elias’s hand fell.
“What?”
“Tell me where my brother has been for forty-eight hours.”
Elias hesitated.
“Searching.”
“Where?”
“Everywhere.”
“Personally?”
“No.”
Nicholas’s eyes hardened.
“Why?”
“He said someone had to coordinate from headquarters.”
Nicholas leaned his head against the pillow.
Hannah could almost see thoughts assembling behind his eyes.
“What happened the night I disappeared?”
Elias began recounting it.
Nicholas had attended a waterfront redevelopment meeting.
He had left at eleven twenty.
His normal convoy route had been changed at the last minute because of an accident on Hanover Street.
Only five people knew the new route.
Nicholas.
Elias.
The lead driver.
The dispatcher.
Daniel Vale.
The first escort vehicle had been struck at an intersection.
The rear vehicle had been blocked.
Nicholas’s car had disappeared in less than ninety seconds.
His driver had later been found dead.
Nobody had claimed responsibility.
Nobody had demanded ransom.
That meant the point had never been money.
The point had been Nicholas.
Dead.
Quietly.
“Who changed the route?” Nicholas asked.
Elias swallowed.
“Daniel.”
Hannah felt the room grow colder.
Nicholas showed nothing.
“Reason?”
“Traffic cameras showed a tanker collision.”
“Real?”
“Yes.”
“Coincidence?”
“We thought so.”
Nicholas looked at the ceiling.
“Think again.”
Elias nodded.
Then his attention shifted toward Hannah.
He looked at her carefully.
Too carefully.
“What?” Hannah asked.
“You said Brooks?”
“That’s generally how last names work.”
“You were an EMT.”
Her humor vanished.
“How do you know that?”
Elias stepped closer.
“Station Fourteen.”
Hannah’s stomach tightened.
“Yes.”
“Four years ago.”
“Yes.”
“You treated Joseph Rourke.”
Lena stepped into the room.
“Why does everybody know about Joseph tonight?”
Elias ignored her.
“What did he tell you?”
Hannah looked toward Nicholas.
He said nothing.
He was letting her decide.
That surprised her.
She folded her arms.
“He said Daniel sold him out.”
Elias went pale.
“Exact words?”
“Pretty close.”
“Think.”
Hannah hated that word.
Everyone had told her to think after Joseph died.
Think harder.
Maybe you imagined it.
Maybe you misunderstood.
Maybe trauma confused you.
She closed her eyes.
The nightclub.
Blue lights.
Joseph Rourke choking on his own breath.
His fingers locked around her sleeve.
His pupils huge with terror.
Not drugs.
Terror.
She heard him again.
Not as a memory.
As if the dying man stood beside her.
“Daniel…”
Hannah opened her eyes.
“He said, ‘Daniel sold us both.’”
Nicholas looked at Elias.
“Both.”
Elias swore.
Hannah continued.
“Then he said something else.”
Nicholas turned sharply.
“What?”
“I never understood it.”
“What did he say?”
“Saint Agnes.”
Elias took one step backward.
Nicholas became completely still.
Hannah noticed.
“What is Saint Agnes?”
Nobody answered.
“Seriously?”
Nicholas looked at Elias.
“Tell her.”
Elias didn’t seem to want to.
Finally he said, “Saint Agnes was the name of a cargo vessel.”
“Was?”
“It sank five years ago.”
Hannah frowned.
“And?”
Nicholas spoke.
“Officially, it was carrying industrial equipment.”
“Unofficially?”
Silence.
Hannah’s face changed.
“People?”
Nicholas looked directly at her.
“Weapons.”
That answer came too quickly.
She knew lies.
Emergency workers heard thousands of them.
People lied when drunk.
When frightened.
When guilty.
When ashamed.
Nicholas had just lied.
“There was something else on that ship.”
He said nothing.
Hannah stepped closer.
“Joseph died trying to tell me about it.”
Nothing.
“My career was destroyed because of whatever he knew.”
Nicholas’s jaw tightened.
“Hannah.”
“No.”
Her voice rose.
“You don’t get to do that.”
Elias moved slightly.
Nicholas raised his hand.
Elias stopped.
Hannah pointed at Nicholas.
“You pulled me into this the moment those men fired at my van. You don’t get to decide I know enough.”
Nicholas watched her.
Then he said, “There were thirty-two people in a sealed container aboard Saint Agnes.”
Lena covered her mouth.
Hannah felt sick.
“Who?”
“Witnesses.”
“To what?”
“A trafficking operation using port workers, undocumented laborers, women nobody expected anyone to look for.”
Hannah whispered, “Did they die?”
Nicholas’s face hardened.
“No.”
“Then what happened?”
“I stopped the ship before it cleared the harbor.”
Elias said quietly, “Someone sank it afterward to destroy the evidence.”
Hannah looked between them.
“Who was running the trafficking operation?”
Nicholas answered.
“Victor Rourke.”
Joseph’s older brother.
“And Daniel?”
Nicholas’s voice dropped.
“I never knew Daniel had anything to do with it.”
A phone vibrated.
Every man in the room reached instinctively for a weapon.
Elias pulled his device from his pocket.
He read the screen.
Then looked at Nicholas.
“What?”
Elias didn’t answer.
“Elias.”
“We have a problem.”
“Which one?”
“Daniel just called an emergency meeting.”
Nicholas’s eyes narrowed.
“With whom?”
“All captains.”
“For what purpose?”
Elias turned the screen.
Nicholas read the message.
Hannah watched something dangerous enter his face.
“What does it say?”
May you like
Nicholas looked at her.
“My brother is declaring me dead at sunrise.”
