Chapter 4: The Dept of Blood

Zephyrine "Zephy" Vance pov

The rain off the Thames didn’t clatter against the glass in Battersea; it wept against it, a continuous, dismal smear that muted the neon orange glow of the streetlights below.

I sat on the edge of the sagging armchair in our living room, my coat still draped over my shoulders. The air inside the flat smelled of damp wool, boiled cabbage, and the sickly, metallic sting of the oxygen concentrator humming in the corner. After seventy stories of glass and steel in Canary Wharf, this place was supposed to be my sanctuary. My fortress.

Instead, it just felt like a trap closing in.

"Drink it while it’s hot, Zephy," my sister, Tabitha, murmured.

She set a mismatched ceramic mug into my hands. Steam drifted up, bringing the earthy, soothing scent of chamomile and dried mint. Tabitha sat down on the frayed ottoman across from me, her motions quiet, almost ghostly. She was two years younger than me, but her face carried a soft, perpetual weariness that made her look far older.

"How is Diggory?" I asked, my voice raspy. I hadn't used my voice for soft things all day; it felt stiff, broken.

Tabitha tucked a loose strand of fair hair behind her ear, her lower lip trembling just slightly before she caught it between her teeth. "The hospice nurse came at four. She increased his dosage again. She says... she says the nerve pain in his legs is spreading to his lower torso now."

I closed my eyes, the hot ceramic of the mug scalding my palms. Diggory—our father—was rotting away in the back bedroom, his body quietly devouring itself while I spent twelve hours a day making sure Laurent Mercier’s double-shot espresso was served at sixty-five degrees.

"Did the specialized leg braces arrive?" I asked, though I already knew the answer from the pit in my stomach.

Tabitha shook her head. A single, quiet tear spilled over her lower lid, tracing a slow path down her pale cheek. She didn't sob. Tabitha never made noise when she cried; she just leaked sorrow, constant and overflowing.

"The medical supply company canceled the delivery this morning, Zephy," she whispered, her voice cracking softly. "They said... they said Apex Capital put a lock on our credit facility. The payment was due on the fifteenth."

The name Apex Capital struck the small room like a physical blow.

"How much?" I asked, my knuckles turning white around the tea mug.

"Twelve thousand pounds for this month's interest alone," Tabitha said, her voice dropping to a frail, broken murmur. She leaned forward, resting her forehead against my knees, her shoulders shaking as the quiet tears finally turned into soft, shuddering gasps. "Zephy, they called the home phone three times today. They said if we don't pay the principal balance by the end of the month, they’re going to initiate court proceedings to repossess the flat. They'll take Dad's equipment. They'll take his bed."

I placed my hand on her hair, stroking the soft strands while my chest caved in under a crushing, familiar weight. Apex Capital wasn't a standard lending firm. They were financial vultures who preyed on desperate families, hiding behind legal shell companies and loan sharks in sharp suits. I had taken the initial loan two years ago when Diggory’s diagnostic tests weren't covered by the national health service. I thought I could work enough overtime to clear it.

I was wrong. The interest rate was a black hole that swallowed every penny I earned at Mercier Group.

"I’ll handle it, Tabby," I said, forcing my voice into the same steady, impenetrable tone I used to handle hostile board members. "I’ll talk to the agency. I’ll sell my watch. I'll take on extra night shifts."

"You’re already dying, Zephy!" Tabitha cried softly, pulling back to look at me, her blue eyes wide, wet, and desperately earnest. She reached out, taking my cold, trembling hands into her warm ones. "Look at you! You haven't eaten, you barely sleep, your hands are shaking! You can't work any harder than you already do. You're going to collapse, and then what happens to Dad? What happens to me?"

"I don't have a choice," I snapped, the raw edge of my exhaustion slipping out before I could stop it.

Tabitha shrank back slightly, her tears dripping onto our joined hands. She looked so small, so fragile, sitting on that tattered ottoman in the dim light of the lamp.

"There... there is another choice," she said, her voice dropping to a fragile, hesitant whisper. She looked at me with an innocent, desperate hope that made my stomach turn. "Zephy... what about Mr. Mercier?"

I went entirely still. "What about him?"

"You've worked for him for three years," Tabitha pleaded softly, her soft-spoken voice carrying a terrifying, gentle pressure. "You give that man your entire life. You manage his world. He has endless wealth, Zephy. Billions. Twelve thousand pounds is... it’s a rounding error to a man like Laurent Mercier. It’s nothing to him."

"No, Tabby," I said instantly, a cold sweat breaking out along the back of my neck. "No. I do not bring my private disgrace to my employer."

"It wouldn't be a gift!" Tabitha squeezed my hands tight, her eyes wide and pleading, shining with gentle, agonizing sincerity. "A corporate loan! An advance on your bonus! You could ask him for a low-interest agreement, drawn up legally. You told me yourself he trusts you more than anyone in London. If he knew Dad was dying, if he knew we were about to be put on the street..."

"You don't understand," I whispered, the image of Laurent’s dark, intensely analytical eyes flashing behind my eyelids.

If I asked Laurent for money, the balance of power between us would be obliterated forever. He would look at me not as the indispensable, untouchable iron shield of his corporate empire, but as a desperate girl begging for scraps. And worse—after what I had just discovered on his private server today, after finding out he was hiding a terminal neurological condition from the world—bringing my own weakness to him felt like a dangerous blood sacrifice.

"Please, Zephy," Tabitha sobbed quietly, resting her cheek against my knee again. "Just ask him. For Dad. Please. Don't let them take his bed."

The silence in the flat returned, thick and suffocating, broken only by the rhythmic, mechanical hiss-click of Diggory’s oxygen machine in the back room. Every breath he drew was borrowed time. Every day we kept this roof over his head was a miracle paid for in my own blood.

I stared into the dark liquid of my cooling tea, feeling the last remaining pieces of my pride crumble into ash.

"Okay," I whispered, the word tasting like lead on my tongue. "I'll... I'll ask him tomorrow."

Tabitha let out a shaky breath of relief, kissing my knee, completely unaware of the absolute ruin she was asking me to step into.

I stood up, needing to escape the oppressive heat of the room, and walked down the dim hallway toward the small study where we kept our paper records. I needed to pull the Apex Capital loan agreement from the filing cabinet so I had the exact numbers for a formal advance request.

I opened the bottom drawer, pulling out the faded blue folder marked Medical Liabilities.

My hands were still trembling as I opened it. But as I flipped past the hospital receipts and the Apex demand notices, my thumb caught on a heavy, linen-stock envelope tucked deep into the back of the folder—one I had never seen before.

It wasn't addressed to me. It was addressed to my sister.

My brows furrowed. I pulled the letter out. The paper was expensive, heavy, and stamped with a crimson wax seal that made my breath lock instantly in my throat.

I broke the seal and unfolded the thick cream parchment.

The letter wasn't from a debt collector. It wasn't from a bank. It was dated six months ago, typed on official letterhead from the private office of Jean-Luc Mercier—Laurent’s ruthless, predatory uncle.

My eyes scanned the elegant, poisonous script, my blood running colder with every word:

'To Ms. Tabitha Vance,

Pursuant to our private agreement, the monthly interest payments on your father’s debt to Apex Capital will remain artificially inflated until your sister, Zephyrine, delivers the primary access codes to Laurent Mercier’s private server.'

The paper slipped from my numb fingers, fluttering to the floor as the floor beneath me seemed to tilt violently on its axis.

From the living room, Tabitha’s gentle, soft voice called out through the quiet flat.

"Did you find the papers, Zephy?"