เข้าสู่ระบบISLA'S POVMarcus’s thumb hovers over the ventilator power button, the plastic looking smooth and lethal under his skin."Five. Four. Three—""Stop."Gabriel’s voice cuts from the doorway, not loud, but absolute. It hits the room like a pressure drop. Marcus pauses, his smile tight like skin stretched over a skull as he asks if Gabriel brought the Ledger."No," Gabriel replies.The smile vanishes, replaced by a flat, dead look. Marcus threatens that I am about to watch another Bennett die while Gabriel stands there doing nothing. "Two—"."But I brought something better." Gabriel lifts his phone. "A recording. From June 28, 2019. Want to hear it?".Marcus’s hand freezes on the console. The audio fills the sterile hospital room, tinny but terrifyingly clear. I hear Marcus’s younger voice, pitchy with panic, asking Richard Sterling what to do because my father is down with a heart attack.Then comes Sterling’s voice, calm and clinical. "Take the pills. All of them".My mother’s eyes wide
ISLA'S POV4:30 AM.The penthouse is still freezing, the cold radiating off the ten-foot glass walls like an open freezer door. But now, the silence is gone. Sarah Vance has turned the living room into a federal operations hub.Cables snake across the marble floor. Three agents in tactical gear are hunched over laptops, the blue light reflecting off their faces, monitoring encrypted feeds.Gabriel and I stand at the window, shivering in our coats, watching the city wake up below us.Vance presses a finger to her earpiece. "Alpha team, you're green for entry. Beta team, secure the perimeter. We want Hale and Sterling in custody within the hour."Static crackles through the speaker on the table. Then a voice, breathless and sharp. "Alpha team moving on Hale Capital now."One of the laptops displays a live feed. A helmet cam. The image jerks as the tactical team breaches Hale Capital's lobby. Guns drawn. Federal badges flashing under the emergency lights.Employees scatter, coffee cups d
ISLA'S POVThe penthouse isn't just cold; it’s a crypt.We step inside at 10 PM, and while the lights flicker on, the heat stays dead. The climate control has been disabled remotely, the hot water cut at the source. This is Sterling's retaliation for the clinic bypass—a silent, freezing siege.It’s forty degrees inside. My breath puffs out in white clouds, vanishing into the stagnant air.Sarah Vance is already seated in the living room, bundled in her wool coat, her tablet glowing against her face. She doesn’t look up, just keeps writing."Building management says the HVAC failure is 'under investigation,'" she says, her voice flat. "Estimated repair time: seventy-two hours."G
ISLA'S POVFifty-seven minutes remain on the clock. Dr. Walsh is shouting orders now, a frantic conductor trying to lead a collapsing orchestra. Outside, ambulances line up in a jagged row, their red lights sweeping across the lobby glass in rhythmic, silent warnings. They aren't here for us; they are for the critical cases whose hearts might stop if they are unplugged for even ten seconds.In the brutal hierarchy of emergency medicine, chronic MS doesn’t earn a siren. It gets a clipboard and a spot at the bottom of the transport list."We’re three hours away from an available unit," Walsh says, his eyes never leaving his tablet."We have fifty-seven minutes," comes the sharp reply."I know. I’m sorry."Gabriel is already moving toward the ambulance bay, his strides long and purposeful. A private crew is busy loading a stroke victim, their motions practiced and indifferent to the surrounding chaos. He approaches the crew chief, a man with gray stubble and a Northstar Medical Transport
ISLA'S POVThe sidewalk of Fifth Avenue is a river of tourists and business suits, entirely oblivious to the fact that we have just drowned. Gabriel stands at the curb with his arm raised, but three yellow cabs rush past, their "Occupied" lights glowing like taunts.He pulls out his phone, his thumb stabbing at the Uber app. A second later, he stares at the screen, his jaw locking tight as he processes the rejection."Account suspended. Payment method declined," he says, the words scraping out of his throat. "They've locked my credit cards. All of them."I open my wallet and begin counting the paper bills by touch. I have forty-two dollars, three MetroCards with unknown balances, and the debit card connected to the allowance account he set up for me.The app shows $2,486 remaining. That is the sum total of our ammunition."The subway costs two dollars and ninety cents," I say, pulling a card from the leather slot. "We can get to the clinic in twenty minutes."Gabriel stares at the thi
ISLA'S POVThe silence in the conference room isn't just quiet; it’s a vacuum, sucking the oxygen out of the air until my lungs burn.Antonio holds the forensic report like a weapon he doesn’t want to use but will. My DNA. On a document from six years ago. A document I’ve never seen, never touched, never breathed on.Gabriel turns to me slowly. For the first time since this contract began—since the restaurant, the fitting room, the late-night strategy sessions—I see the one thing I thought he was incapable of.Real doubt."Did you know?"The words are quiet, but they land with the force of a demolition ball."Know what?""Were you working with your father to set me up six years ago? Were you part of the original fraud claim?"My breath hitches, getting stuck in a throat that feels suddenly too tight. "What? No. I was twenty-three. I barely understood what I was signing—""But you did sign things. For your father.""Co-signed loans. Not legal filings. I never saw the bankruptcy documen







