Chapter 5 - THE DOCTOR’S SECRET
Prescott raised his weapon toward the carriage-house door.
“Everybody down.”
Nora bent over Blythe.
Lawson pulled Jonah’s stretcher behind the stone wall.
The lock turned.
Once.
Twice.
Then the door opened.
A figure appeared.
Prescott almost fired.
“Don’t shoot!”
Odessa’s voice cut through the darkness.
The man outside raised both hands.
“Mason.”
Lawson recognized one of his older security guards.
“Clear?”
“For the moment.”
“Vehicle?”
“Armored SUV behind the carriage house.”
“Where are the attackers?”
“Most concentrated on the main structure.”
Prescott looked back toward the tunnel.
Gunfire echoed.
“We have seconds.”
They moved.
Snow blew sideways through the open door.
The cold hit Nora’s face like glass.
Two SUVs waited with engines running.
Security officers formed a barrier.
Lawson helped lift the twins inside the first vehicle.
“Dr. Yates stays with us,” Nora said.
Prescott looked at her.
“You sure?”
“Yes.”
Lawson’s expression suggested he was less convinced.
The doctor climbed inside.
Nora took the syringe that had fallen from his coat.
She sealed it in a clean plastic evidence pouch from the emergency kit.
Yates watched.
“You don’t understand.”
“You can explain in the car.”
They accelerated before the doors finished closing.
The mansion disappeared behind snow and darkness.
Lawson sat opposite Dr. Yates.
No one spoke for almost a minute.
Then Lawson said, “Your daughter.”
Yates closed his eyes.
“She’s twenty-four.”
“Name?”
“Amelia.”
“Where is she?”
“I don’t know.”
“When did they take her?”
“Four months ago.”
Nora stared at him.
Four months.
“How?”
Yates rubbed both hands over his face.
“She was studying in London. She disappeared leaving a restaurant. I received a photograph the next morning.”
“What did they want?” Lawson asked.
“At first? Information.”
“About me?”
“Your schedule. Medical access. Security patterns.”
“And you gave it.”
Yates’s voice broke.
“Yes.”
Prescott cursed quietly from the front passenger seat.
“Then?”
“They wanted the twins’ treatment records.”
Lawson’s eyes became empty.
That was more frightening than rage.
“What did you do to my children?”
“Nothing at first.”
“At first.”
Yates looked toward Jonah and Blythe.
Both were exhausted.
Blythe’s monitor showed a fragile but steady rhythm.
“They told me to alter copies of their lab reports.”
Nora leaned forward.
“What kind of alterations?”
“Recovery indicators.”
Her stomach dropped.
“What?”
Yates looked at her.
“The twins responded better to treatment than Lawson was told.”
Lawson did not move.
No one did.
Yates continued.
“Six weeks ago, both showed evidence that the leukemia burden had fallen significantly.”
Lawson’s voice came out barely above a whisper.
“You told me they were getting worse.”
“I know.”
“You stood in my house and told me they were dying.”
“They threatened to send me pieces of my daughter.”
Prescott turned around.
“You should’ve told us.”
“You think I didn’t consider it? They sent me video from inside my own apartment. They knew where I slept.”
Lawson leaned across the space.
“And my children?”
Yates began crying.
Not dramatically.
Quietly.
Ashamed.
“I altered the reports.”
“What else?”
“They instructed me to continue treatment longer than I believed was appropriate.”
Nora’s face hardened.
“That could explain the marrow collapse.”
“Yes.”
“Could?”
“I don’t know how much is disease and how much is treatment toxicity.”
Lawson stared at him as though trying to decide whether killing him would help anything.
Nora saw it.
“Not now.”
He looked at her.
“This man—”
“Can answer questions.”
“He harmed my children.”
“And your children are still here.”
That stopped him.
Nora pointed toward Blythe.
“So choose which one matters right now.”
Lawson sat back.
The vehicle continued through snow-covered roads.
Prescott spoke into his radio.
“We’re not going to a Mercer property.”
“Where then?” Lawson asked.
“Northwestern Memorial?”
“Too predictable,” Nora said.
Dr. Yates looked up.
“Lakeview Children’s Medical Center has an independent oncology unit and no Meridian contract.”
Nora knew the name.
“Dr. Abigail Ross?”
Yates nodded.
“She runs pediatric hematology.”
“Would she help?”
“She hates me.”
“Perfect,” Lawson said.
Nora almost smiled.
Prescott rerouted.
Lawson turned back to Yates.
“The syringe.”
The doctor looked at the evidence bag in Nora’s hand.
“They told me to administer it if the house went into emergency lockdown.”
“What is it?”
“I was told it was a sedative.”
“You didn’t know?”
“No.”
“And you gave it to my daughter.”
Yates covered his face.
“I thought they wanted the children unconscious during extraction.”
Nora stared at him.
“Extraction?”
Yates looked up.
“They were never supposed to die.”
Lawson went very still.
“What?”
“They wanted everyone to believe they were dying.”
“Why?”
“To break you.”
The words filled the vehicle.
Yates swallowed.
“Crosby said a man who believes he has nothing left behaves predictably.”
Prescott looked back.
“And after they ‘died’?”
“I don’t know.”
“Yes, you do,” Lawson said.
Yates shook his head.
“Think.”
The doctor closed his eyes.
Then his face changed.
“There was a transport plan.”
Nora felt cold despite the heated vehicle.
“What kind?”
“If either child died at the estate, Crosby’s people wanted the body transferred through a specific private mortuary service.”
Lawson’s eyes sharpened.
“They planned to take my children alive.”
No one answered.
Because everyone knew it was true.
Jonah stirred.
“Dad?”
Lawson instantly moved beside him.
“I’m here.”
“Where are we going?”
“To another doctor.”
“I don’t want another doctor.”
“I know.”
“Can Nora come?”
Lawson looked across the vehicle.
Nora froze.
Jonah’s eyes were already closing.
“Can she?”
Lawson answered softly.
“Yes.”
Nora looked away.
The hospital received them through an underground ambulance entrance.
Lawson’s men secured the corridor.
Dr. Abigail Ross appeared in blue scrubs and a winter coat thrown over them.
She was perhaps fifty, silver beginning at her temples.
She looked at Yates.
Then Nora.
Then Lawson.
“If anyone threatens one member of my staff, I will personally throw you out.”
Lawson answered, “Save my children and you can throw me anywhere you want.”
That surprised her.
“Rooms are ready.”
The twins disappeared through double doors.
Nora started after them.
A nurse stopped her.
“Family only.”
Jonah’s voice came from the stretcher.
“She’s family.”
Everyone froze.
Nora did too.
The nurse looked at Lawson.
Lawson looked at Nora.
Then at his son.
“Let her through.”
For the next three hours, the world reduced itself to tests.
Blood samples.
Imaging.
Medication records.
Bone marrow slides transported under guard.
The suspicious IV bag and syringe went to separate laboratories.
Lawson waited.
He did not pace.
That would have been easier to watch.
He simply sat.
Nora sat three chairs away.
At one point she fell asleep sitting upright.
Her head tipped against the wall.
Lawson watched her for several seconds.
Then quietly took off his suit jacket and laid it across her shoulders.
Prescott saw.
He said nothing.
At 4:18 in the morning, Dr. Ross entered.
Nora woke immediately.
Lawson stood.
Ross held a folder.
“I want to be careful because we’re still confirming everything.”
Lawson’s face tightened.
“Tell me.”
“Your children are extremely sick.”
He closed his eyes briefly.
“But.”
His eyes opened.
Dr. Ross continued.
“The current marrow samples do not match the reports you were given.”
Yates began shaking.
Ross looked directly at Lawson.
“I see evidence of profound treatment-related suppression.”
“And leukemia?”
“There is still disease we need to evaluate.”
“Are they dying?”
Ross hesitated.
“They are in danger.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
“I know.”
She stepped closer.
“Based on the records you brought, I expected two children with rapidly progressive, treatment-resistant leukemia.”
Lawson stopped breathing.
“That is not what I’m seeing.”
Nora covered her mouth.
Ross continued.
“I’m seeing two children whose bodies have been pushed far beyond what they could tolerate.”
Lawson’s knees nearly gave out.
“Can you save them?”
“No doctor should promise that.”
“Can they recover?”
For the first time, Dr. Ross’s expression softened.
“Yes.”
One word.
Lawson turned away.
His hand went over his mouth.
Prescott lowered his head.
Nora felt tears spill before she could stop them.
Then Ross held up another report.
“There’s more.”
Everyone looked at her.
“The syringe you recovered contained a drug not listed anywhere in their treatment plan.”
Yates went pale.
“What drug?”
Ross told them.
Nora’s stomach dropped.
Lawson looked between the doctors.
“What does it do?”
Dr. Ross answered carefully.
“In the amount found in that syringe, it could have caused severe respiratory depression in a child as fragile as Blythe.”
Lawson looked at Yates.
The doctor collapsed into the nearest chair.
“I didn’t know.”
Nora believed him.
Lawson did not.
Before anyone could speak, Prescott’s phone rang.
He answered.
His face hardened.
“What?”
Silence.
Then:
“Repeat that.”
He listened.
Lawson watched him.
Prescott ended the call.
“What happened?”
Prescott looked at him.
“The mansion is secure.”
“And?”
“We caught one of the attackers.”
“Who?”
“Not one of Crosby’s regular people.”
May you like
He held Lawson’s gaze.
“It’s someone who works for us.”
