Dr. Vale’s hand was perfectly steady.
That frightened me more than if he had been shaking.
Caleb moved slightly in front of me.
Vale smiled.
“Still trying to protect her.”
“Put the gun down,” Caleb said.
“I don’t think we’ve reached that stage of the conversation.”
The two security contractors who had accompanied us were nowhere in sight.
I understood why a second later.
One was lying unconscious in the hallway.
The other had disappeared.
Bought.
Threatened.
Or dead.
“Where’s Mara?” I asked.
Vale’s eyes moved toward me.
“She should have minded her own business.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“It’s the only one you’re getting.”
Caleb’s jaw tightened.
“You poisoned me.”
Vale sighed.
“You make it sound so crude.”
“What would you call it?”
“Treatment.”
“For what?”
“Your family.”
Caleb laughed once.
“You’re insane.”
“No. I’m a physician who spent thirty years watching rich men believe wealth made them immortal.”
“Dominic paid you.”
Vale did not deny it.
“How much?” Caleb asked.
“Enough.”
“Was it worth killing a patient?”
“You weren’t supposed to die quickly.”
His tone was clinical.
Almost offended.
“The dosages were calibrated. Symptoms were controlled. Records were adjusted. Your father’s obsession with private medicine made everything easier.”
Every word made me sick.
“You manufactured the illness,” I said.
Vale looked at me almost proudly.
“Not entirely. Caleb had a viral infection fourteen months ago. His liver enzymes were elevated. Fatigue. Weight loss. A real condition.”
“And you turned it into something terminal.”
“With Dominic’s assistance.”
“Why?”
“Because dying men sign documents their fathers place in front of them.”
Caleb’s face changed.
“My father didn’t know.”
“No.”
Vale smiled.
“Victor Romano believed he was preparing the empire for his son’s death. Dominic merely made sure every preparation moved assets where they belonged.”
“Where he wanted them.”
“Exactly.”
“And Sofia?”
Vale’s smile disappeared.
“I wasn’t involved.”
“But Dominic was.”
Vale said nothing.
That silence was answer enough.
I had slowly moved my hand toward my coat pocket.
My phone was inside.
If I could trigger the emergency function—
Vale looked at me.
“Don’t.”
I stopped.
“You think because you worked in hospice care you understand dying people, Ms. Monroe.”
“I understand scared people.”
“Then you should understand me.”
“No.”
For the first time, irritation cracked his composure.
“Dominic owns judges, officers, attorneys. Victor owns everyone else. Do you think there was a good choice?”
“Yes.”
“What?”
“Not poisoning someone.”
Caleb almost smiled.
Vale didn’t.
He motioned with the gun.
“Both of you. Bathroom.”
Caleb stayed still.
“Why?”
“So I can leave.”
“You expect us to wait politely?”
“I expect you to understand that I can shoot your wife before you cross half the room.”
Caleb looked at me.
One glance.
That was all.
But over the past several days, we had somehow learned enough about each other for me to understand.
He was going to do something stupid.
I subtly shook my head.
He ignored me.
Of course.
Caleb suddenly stumbled.
His hand grabbed his chest.
Vale instinctively looked down.
I moved.
I threw the motel lamp.
Vale fired.
The gunshot exploded through the room.
Caleb tackled him.
I hit the floor.
The bullet tore through the wall above me.
Vale and Caleb crashed into the dresser.
Caleb was weaker, but anger made him fast.
Vale struck him across the face.
Caleb fell.
The gun skidded beneath the bed.
I dove for it.
Vale grabbed my ankle.
I kicked backward.
My heel struck his nose.
He screamed.
Caleb hit him with the wooden chair.
Once.
Vale collapsed.
For several seconds, nobody moved.
Then Caleb looked at me.
“You okay?”
“I think so.”
“You?”
“I’ve had better honeymoons.”
I started laughing.
I couldn’t help it.
Terror sometimes came out strangely.
Caleb laughed too.
Then police sirens sounded outside.
Vale’s expression changed.
He tried to get up.
Caleb pressed one foot against his wrist.
“You called them?”
I held up my phone.
“Emergency button.”
Caleb looked impressed.
“Marrying you was surprisingly useful.”
“Wait until you see my pharmacy discount.”
The police found Mara alive in another motel room two blocks away.
Vale had ordered someone to hold her there.
She had been beaten, but not seriously injured.
More importantly, she agreed to testify.
So did Vale.
Eventually.
Dominic disappeared before sunrise.
Victor had made one mistake.
He confronted his brother by phone.
Dominic knew the evidence was closing in.
By the time federal agents reached his Manhattan apartment, he was gone.
For the next six weeks, everything changed.
Caleb began treatment at an independent hospital.
His liver function improved.
His heart remained damaged, but doctors became increasingly optimistic.
He gained nine pounds.
Then twelve.
The oxygen machine disappeared.
He walked without assistance.
Then one morning I found him in the estate gym staring at a treadmill.
“Don’t,” I said.
He looked offended.
“I wasn’t doing anything.”
“You were thinking about running.”
“Is that illegal?”
“With your cardiologist, probably.”
He stepped onto the treadmill.
“Caleb.”
“One mile.”
“Half.”
“Three quarters.”
“Half.”
“You negotiate like my father.”
“That is the meanest thing you’ve ever said to me.”
He smiled.
We had been married seven weeks.
We still slept in the same room.
At first, separately.
Then less separately.
Nothing about the contract explained what happened between us.
The way he waited for me before dinner.
The way I memorized his medication schedule.
The way he brought coffee to the library when I couldn’t sleep.
The way we talked about our sisters late at night.
The way he kissed me one evening without a judge telling him to.
That kiss lasted much longer than the wedding kiss.
When he pulled away, he whispered, “Still not in the contract.”
I touched his face.
“Good.”
The fifty million dollars became almost embarrassing to discuss.
Until one afternoon when Victor called us into his office.
He placed a document on the desk.
“Your first payment has been transferred.”
I stared at him.
“Victor—”
“A contract is a contract.”
“Caleb isn’t dying.”
Victor’s eyes softened.
“That was the goal.”
Caleb sat beside me.
“You can keep the money.”
His tone was casual.
Too casual.
I looked at him.
“You think I stayed because of it?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t need to.”
Victor quietly stood.
“I suddenly remember an appointment.”
“You’re leaving your own office?” Caleb asked.
“Yes.”
“Coward.”
“Absolutely.”
The door closed.
I turned toward my husband.
“Do you want me here?”
Caleb’s face tightened.
“That isn’t fair.”
“Answer.”
“Yes.”
“Because of the investigation?”
“No.”
“Because your father likes me?”
“He barely likes anybody.”
“Caleb.”
He stood and walked toward the window.
“I don’t know how to ask someone to stay when they were paid to arrive.”
The anger left me.
He looked down.
“I knew what the contract meant when I signed it. You needed money. My father needed someone beside me. Fine.”
He swallowed.
“But somewhere between you accusing me of surrendering and nearly getting shot at our wedding, it stopped feeling like a transaction to me.”
My chest tightened.
He turned.
“And I have no idea when it stopped being one for you.”
I walked toward him.
“Remember the night you collapsed?”
“Yes.”
“When I picked up that glass, I forgot how much your father offered me.”
He stared at me.
“I haven’t remembered very often since.”
“Lila…”
“I stayed because you were alive.”
His eyes shone.
“And now?”
I touched his chest.
His heart beat beneath my palm.
Stronger than it had been seven weeks earlier.
“Now I’m staying because I love you.”
For once, Caleb Romano had no clever response.
He kissed me.
His hands pulled me close.
And for the first time since I walked through the gates of the Romano estate, I felt something I had forgotten existed.
A future.
The feeling lasted until Victor burst back into the room.
Caleb groaned.
“You said you had an appointment.”
“I lied.”
Victor held up his phone.
His face had gone white.
“What happened?” I asked.
He looked at Caleb.
“Dominic surfaced.”
“Where?”
Victor’s voice dropped.
“At your sister’s grave.”
A security camera at the Romano family cemetery had captured Dominic fifteen minutes earlier.
He had left something on Sofia’s headstone.
A black envelope.
Addressed to Caleb.
Inside was a single handwritten sentence.
IF YOU WANT THE TRUTH ABOUT YOUR SISTER, COME ALONE AT MIDNIGHT.
Beneath it was an address.
An abandoned Romano shipping warehouse on the Hudson.
Caleb read it twice.
Then looked at his father.
“I’m going.”
Victor said, “Absolutely not.”
I said, “Neither are you.”
Both men stared at me.
I picked up the envelope.
“He wants Caleb alone because that’s the only version of this meeting he can control.”
Caleb frowned.
“What are you suggesting?”
I looked at the address.
“We give Dominic exactly what he thinks he wants.”
Then I looked at Victor.
“And we make sure the whole world is listening.”
---