C4

“You’re bleeding out from the inside, Precious, and I don’t have the medicine to save you.”

The young prison doctor’s hands tremble as he sets the stainless steel tray down onto the rolling desk with a sharp rattle. The bright fluorescent lights of the medical wing hum overhead, casting an ugly yellow glare over the cold tile floor. I sit on the edge of the examination table, my bare toes curled against the ice-cold steel base. The oversized green hospital gown hangs loose off my shoulder, smelling of chlorine and institutional soap.

“Give it to me straight,” I say, wiping a dry speck of dark blood from my bottom lip. “I don’t need you to soften the blow.”

“Stage four,” the doctor says softly, keeping his eyes glued to the printed bloodwork sheets in his hands. “Aggressive pancreatic failure coupled with severe internal hemorrhaging from untreated trauma. You have months left. Maybe less if your wolf keeps fighting the decay.”

“Months,” I repeat, a strange, hollow sound escaping my throat.

“Treatment is technically possible,” he continues rapidly, shifting his feet as if he wants to run out of the room. “Advanced stem-cell therapy and high-grade wolfsbane purifiers could stabilize you. But Iron Ridge Detention Facility will not approve high-cost care without an outside financial guarantee. No family has come forward to claim you. Alpha Lancelot stripped your pack health coverage this morning. No one is paying.”

A sudden, wild laugh bubbles up from my chest, sharp and uncontrollable. I throw my head back, my shoulders shaking violently as the laugh cracks open and turns into jagged, broken sobs.

The doctor winces, taking a step backward and looking away toward the locked door.

“So I die in here,” I choke out, pressing my blood-stained hands over my face. “I rot in a concrete box while Kara wears my stolen life and sleeps in my mate’s bed?”

“I can request basic hospice pain management,” he stammers, not looking me in the eye. “Morphine—”

“Save the morphine for someone with a future!” I snap, my voice dropping into a harsh, razor-sharp whisper that cuts through the quiet room.

My own body is destroying me faster than the prison ever could. I destroyed my own soul for years, hunting for Lancelot’s love, lying to myself, letting Kara drive me into the dirt. Now my blood has turned to poison. This is my karma, sharp and absolute.

“Get back on the gurney,” the guard stationed at the door grunts, stepping forward and grabbing my shoulder. “Visiting time is over before it started.”

“She’s cleared for the secure visitation room,” a smooth, unfamiliar voice cuts through the air from the doorway.

A man in an expensive charcoal suit steps into the medical wing, holding a slim leather briefcase in one hand. He isn’t a prison guard. He isn’t my public defender. He carries himself with the quiet, lethal authority of a high-tier pack enforcer.

The guard immediately steps back, lowering his head. “Yes, sir.”

Two minutes later, I am shoved into a small, windowless visitation room. The air is thick with the scent of old paper and stale coffee. I sit at the heavy wooden table, the metal cuffs biting back into my raw wrists.

The lawyer sits down opposite me, opening his leather briefcase with two metallic clicks. He doesn’t offer a fake smile. He doesn't ask how I am. He simply slides a sleek black digital tablet across the polished wood.

“I do not represent you, Miss Vance,” he says, his voice flat and clinical. “I represent a private party.”

I glance down at the illuminated screen. A video clip plays automatically.

It is low-resolution security footage from an underground apothecary three miles from the pack border. The timestamp reads four days ago—three days before Lancelot’s wedding. On the screen, a woman wrapped in a heavy mink coat pulls down her scarf, revealing Kara’s flawless, delicate face. She hands a stack of high-value pack bonds to a shadowy wolf merchant, receiving a small, amber glass vial in return. Concentrated wolfsbane extract. The exact poison used in her own tea.

My heart hammers wildly against my ribs. “Where did you get this?”

Without answering, the lawyer swipes his finger across the tablet. A series of bank transfer records flash onto the screen, showing Kara’s private account funding the exact off-shore shell company that deposited money into my name to frame me for ledger fraud.

He swipes one more time.

My breath catches in my throat. The room seems to tilt sideways.

It is a high-definition photograph taken six months ago. In the photo, I am wearing a simple yellow sundress, sitting at an open-air café near the river. My hand rests gently over my swollen belly, my face lit up with a soft, glowing smile I haven't seen in years. I was six months pregnant with Lancelot’s child before the 'accident' on the marble stairs.

The photograph itself is physically warped. The glass screen shows the image clearly, but the original photo in the scan was violently crumpled, crushed by a powerful fist, and then meticulously smoothed back out before being scanned.

My throat burns with dry fire. “Why do you have this?”

“My employer has been tracking your movements for over a year, Miss Vance,” the lawyer says calmly, tapping the screen to turn it off. “He knows every lie Kara told. He knows every dollar Lancelot stole from your mother’s estate. He knows the exact date you lost your child.”

“Who is he?” My voice breaks, my fingers digging into the edge of the wooden table. “Why didn't he bring this to the trial yesterday? He could have stopped the verdict!”

“My employer does not care if you are legally guilty or innocent,” the lawyer replies, leaning forward, his cold eyes locking onto mine. “He does not care about justice. He cares that you are useful. And he cares very much that you are dying before he gets his money’s worth.”

A cold shiver runs straight down my spine. “I’m dying in months. I have nothing left to give anyone.”

“You have your vengeance,” the lawyer says simply. “And my employer has the power to pull you out of this cage tonight, clear your name, and hand you the throat of every person who burned you.”

“What does he want from me in return?” I demand, my chest heaving as my wolf stirs weakly in my chest, scenting power.

The lawyer stands up, buttoning his suit jacket. He picks up his briefcase, leaving the black tablet resting on the wooden table between us.

“He wants your absolute obedience,” the lawyer says, walking toward the heavy iron exit door.

“Give me a name!” I yell after him, slamming my cuffed hands onto the table. “Who owns the evidence? Who sent you?”

The lawyer pauses at the door, turning his head slightly to look back over his broad shoulder.

“Mr. Theophilus Zuckerberg Perfection,” the lawyer says, his voice ringing through the quiet room like a death knell. “He owns the land this prison stands on, Miss Vance. He owns the judge who sentenced you. And by eight o’clock tomorrow morning, he will own your life, your body, and your sentence.”