Chapter 10 - FIRE ON THE RIVER
Smoke filled the terminal within seconds.
Willa ran toward Naomi.
Everett shouted after her.
“Willa!”
She ignored him.
A flaming beam crashed between them.
Naomi struggled against the restraints.
“Get out!”
“Stop giving medical advice.”
Willa cut the ropes with a piece of broken metal.
Everett limped through the smoke toward Sterling.
Sterling lay near the burning crates.
“Leave me,” he coughed.
Everett grabbed his coat.
“Tempting.”
He dragged him anyway.
Outside, Allison’s helicopter began lifting from the far end of the property.
Crowley’s vehicles arrived just as Willa, Naomi and Everett escaped through a loading door.
The terminal windows exploded behind them.
Sterling collapsed on the pavement.
Everett watched the helicopter disappear over the Chicago skyline.
“He planned that.”
Naomi coughed.
“Obviously.”
“No.”
Everett looked at the burning building.
“He wanted the terminal destroyed.”
Willa understood.
“The fire wasn’t about killing us.”
“Not primarily.”
“Evidence?”
Everett nodded.
Firefighters arrived within minutes.
So did legitimate police.
And legitimate federal agents.
This time Everett recognized one.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Daniel Voss arrived with FBI personnel.
Voss looked at Everett.
“I attended your funeral briefing this morning.”
Everett replied, “Sorry you dressed up.”
Voss almost smiled.
Then he saw Sterling.
“What happened?”
Sterling looked at Everett.
For the first time, something shifted between the cousins.
Everett had saved him.
Sterling knew it.
“I shot myself,” Sterling muttered.
Voss stared.
“That would be impressive considering the entry angle.”
“Ricochet.”
Everett said nothing.
Sterling was taken to an ambulance under guard.
Naomi went with him for treatment.
Willa stood beside Everett while federal agents secured the scene.
“You saved him.”
Everett looked away.
“He’s blood.”
“He tried to kill you.”
“Still blood.”
Willa understood more than she wanted to.
Family was rarely logical.
Voss approached.
“We received the ledger pages.”
Everett looked at Willa.
“Already?”
Mara’s delayed-release plan had worked.
Voss continued.
“If these records authenticate, this becomes one of the largest medical trafficking investigations in decades.”
“Then authenticate them.”
“We will.”
Willa asked, “What about Grant Allison?”
“His helicopter landed at a private airport thirty minutes ago.”
“And?”
“The aircraft was empty.”
Everett frowned.
Voss continued.
“Pilot was found unconscious in the hangar.”
“Allison switched vehicles.”
“Looks that way.”
Willa asked about Whitfield.
“Missing.”
Of course.
The next seventy-two hours changed everything.
FBI warrants hit St. Ambrose.
Investigators seized archived pharmacy records.
Two hospital executives resigned.
Three freight warehouses were searched.
News organizations published the first ledger pages.
Grant Allison went from celebrated healthcare philanthropist to wanted federal fugitive.
Alan Whitfield’s medical license was suspended pending investigation.
Then Willa received news she had not expected.
The Illinois nursing board reopened Harold Fisk’s case.
Naomi brought the letter.
Willa read it twice.
“They might clear me.”
“They should.”
“I don’t know what to do with that.”
“Try being happy.”
“I’m out of practice.”
Everett watched from across the room.
They had moved to a secure apartment owned under Mara’s name.
His recovery accelerated.
Each day he walked farther.
Each day his voice strengthened.
Each day more of the man Chicago feared returned.
But with Willa, something remained different.
One evening she found him standing alone by the window.
“You’re supposed to use the cane.”
“I hate it.”
“Your leg muscles hate you more.”
He looked at her.
“Do all nurses insult patients?”
“Only difficult ones.”
“Your license currently questionable.”
She folded her arms.
“Keep talking and your medication schedule becomes questionable.”
A faint smile.
Then silence.
Everett looked toward the city.
“Why did you marry me?”
Willa blinked.
“You know.”
“Mother.”
“Yes.”
“Only reason?”
“What other reason could there possibly have been? You were unconscious.”
“That didn’t stop Sterling planning honeymoon.”
Willa laughed despite herself.
Everett turned serious.
“You could leave now.”
The sentence surprised her.
“My mother’s safe. Your bills paid. Sterling’s contract unenforceable.”
“You want me to leave?”
He didn’t answer immediately.
“That isn’t what I asked.”
Willa looked at him.
Nine days earlier, Everett Kane had been a stranger in a hospital bed.
Now she knew the sound of his breathing when he was in pain.
She knew he hated sweet coffee.
She knew he watched doors automatically.
She knew he carried his father’s guilt like a second skeleton.
And she knew she had become accustomed to hearing him say her name.
“I don’t know,” she admitted.
Everett nodded.
“Fair.”
“What about you?”
“What?”
“Do you want the marriage ended?”
His gaze settled on hers.
“No.”
One word.
No hesitation.
Willa’s pulse changed.
Everett stepped closer.
Slowly.
Still weak.
Still healing.
“I heard you at altar.”
Her throat tightened.
“I know.”
“You promised not to laugh at me.”
“That wasn’t exactly a vow.”
“It was to me.”
Willa looked down.
Everett gently touched her hand.
“You were first person in eight months who spoke to me like I was alive.”
She looked up.
The moment became dangerously quiet.
Then Everett’s phone rang.
Mara.
He answered.
His expression immediately changed.
“What?”
Willa watched.
Everett ended the call.
“Allison surfaced.”
“Where?”
“Not Allison himself.”
He turned on the television.
A live press conference filled the screen.
Grant Allison’s attorney stood before reporters.
Beside him was a woman Willa recognized.
Hospital administrator records identified her as Dr. Evelyn Shaw.
She approached the microphone.
“I have evidence,” she announced, “that Everett Kane personally authorized every medical transport now being investigated.”
Willa stared.
Everett went still.
Dr. Shaw continued.
“And I have records proving Willa Hayes was paid to silence Harold Fisk three years ago.”
Reporters erupted.
Everett looked at Willa.
The war had changed.
May you like
Allison was no longer running.
He was rewriting the story.
