Chapter 7 - The Shot Through the Window

Glass flew across the room.

I hit the floor.

Ethan covered his mother with his body.

Victor's security man dragged me behind the hospital bed.

A second shot hit the wall.

Then silence.

Alarms screamed.

Nurses ran.

Police flooded the hallway.

The shooter had fired from a parking structure across the street.

By the time officers reached it, he was gone.

But he left something behind.

A rifle.

Wiped clean.

And one spent shell casing with two letters scratched into it.

L.P.

Linda Parker.

My mother.

Victor stared at it like it had punched him.

"This isn't a threat."

"What is it?"

"A message."

"From who?"

"Someone who knew your mother."

Ethan came out of Margaret's room.

His face was gray.

"She's okay."

I nodded.

He looked at me.

"Are you?"

"No."

"Me neither."

For once, that was enough.

Police moved Margaret to a secure floor.

Then Victor took me aside.

"There is something I did not tell you."

I almost laughed.

"That sentence is getting old."

He accepted that.

"Your mother contacted me six months before she died."

I stared at him.

"What?"

"She said she had evidence connected to Rachel Quinn."

"You knew my mother?"

"I met her twice."

"And you never told me?"

"I didn't know you were her daughter until you called."

"Why did she call you?"

"Because she was scared."

My chest tightened.

"What did she say?"

Victor looked down the hallway.

"She said somebody inside the Cole family had restarted the old program."

I felt sick.

"What program?"

"The human trials."

Ethan heard the last two words.

"What human trials?"

Victor looked at him.

"Experimental cardiac drugs tested without proper consent."

Ethan went still.

"At Cole Medical?"

"Years ago. And possibly again."

Ethan shook his head.

"I run that company."

"You run the public company. You don't control every subsidiary."

That hit him.

He pulled out his phone.

"I want the full list."

Victor caught his wrist.

"Not on that device."

"Why?"

"Because if someone put a camera in your bedroom, assume your phone is compromised too."

Ethan slowly lowered it.

The hospital lights flickered.

Then went out.

Emergency power kicked in.

Red lights filled the corridor.

A nurse screamed from Margaret's room.

We ran inside.

The bed was empty.

IV line on the floor.

Window still shattered.

Bathroom empty.

A security guard lay unconscious near the service door.

Ethan stared at the bed.

"No."

On the pillow was a folded note.

I opened it.

One sentence.

BRING CLAIRE TO THE OLD CLINIC OR YOUR MOTHER DIES AT MIDNIGHT.

Ethan looked at the clock.

9:17 p.m.

Two hours and forty-three minutes.

Victor took the note from my hand.

"No."

I looked at him.

"That's my answer too."

Ethan stared at us both.

"Then how do we get her back?"

I looked at the shell casing marked with my mother's initials.

"We stop chasing Charles."

Victor frowned.

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"Then who do we chase?"

"The person my mother was actually afraid of.