All Chapters of His Heart Stopped.. Mine Was Sold: Chapter 21 - Chapter 30

I spent the next twelve hours turning my home into a trap. Every camera was tested twice. Every microphone was checked for clarity. Every angle was covered, every exit was secured, and every member of Jackson's team received detailed instructions for tomorrow.Valda would arrive at three PM. She would be escorted to my study. She would sit across from me at my desk. And she would talk.If she refused to talk, I would make her talk.At midnight, I stood in the study alone, running through the scenario in my mind. The chair where she would sit. The desk between us. The documents I would show her. The questions I would ask.Seven months of silence had given me one invaluable skill: patience. The ability to wait, to listen, to calculate before acting. I would need all of it tomorrow.A knock on the door. Soft. I knew who it was before I spoke."Come in, Shaznay."She entered in pajama shorts and a loose shirt, her hair down around her shoulders. She looked younger this way. Softer. Less l

Valda's expression did not change when I said the word "poison." She sat in the chair across from my desk like a queen on a throne, her back straight, her chin lifted, her eyes calculating every angle of the conversation."The poison," she repeated, as though tasting the word. "You are direct. I appreciate that.""I have spent seven months in silence. I am tired of being indirect.""Fair." Valda tilted her head and studied me. "But before I answer, let me ask you something. How much do you already know?""Enough.""Enough is not specific." She uncrossed her legs and leaned forward slightly. "If you already know everything, why bring me here? You could have gone to the police. You could have used that will as bait without meeting me face to face." Her eyes narrowed. "You want something else. Something a confession gives you that evidence alone cannot."She was smart. Dangerously smart. Every instinct in my body told me to be careful, to measure each word like a gambler counting cards.

I was dressed and in my study within three minutes. Jackson arrived twelve minutes after my call, breathless from speed but composed as always."Talk," I said."Dr. Deborah Sylvanus." Jackson set his tablet on my desk, showing a personnel file. "Licensed physician. Board certified in internal medicine. Fourteen years of practice. Clean record. No criminal history. No suspicious affiliations.""On the surface.""On the surface. But I dug deeper." Jackson swiped to the next screen. "Three years ago, she took a six-month sabbatical. Told her clinic she was traveling for research. I traced her passport records." He paused. "She spent those six months in Harborough."The air left the room."Valda's city," Shaznay said from the doorway. She had followed me downstairs, wrapped in a robe, her face pale with worry."Valda is in police custody," I said. "But her network is not.""Benjamin." Jackson pulled up another file. "The photograph sent to Shaznay's phone matches a restaurant in central G

I ordered a complete analysis of every medication Dr. Sylvanus prescribed to Shaznay. Jackson's team collected the bottles from the bathroom cabinet and delivered them to an independent lab by midnight. The results arrived at six the following morning.I sat at my desk and read the report twice. Then a third time.The nausea medication was legitimate. Standard prenatal anti-emetic. No contaminants, no foreign substances, no additives. The vitamins were equally clean. Every pill Shaznay swallowed over the past weeks was exactly what the label claimed.Relief poured through me so hard my hands shook against the desk."The pills are safe?" Shaznay stood in the doorway, dressed but still pale from her morning sickness."Completely. The lab confirmed every compound."She closed her eyes and pressed both hands against her stomach. A sound left her throat, half sob, half laugh. "Thank God. Thank God.""Sit down," I said. "There is more."She opened her eyes and crossed the room, settling int

At precisely ten in the morning, I stepped out of a black car in front of the Emmanuel Holdings headquarters for the first time in eight months. The building rose forty stories above the city streets, glass and steel reflecting the morning sun.Jackson flanked my right side. Moses, my attorney, walked at my left. Shaznay remained at the mansion with her mother, watched over by four armed guards and a perimeter that nothing short of an army could breach.I wore a charcoal suit that Mabel had tailored overnight to fit my thinner frame. My shoes were polished. My hair was cut short and styled back the way I wore it before the poisoning. The cane I carried was more for appearance than necessity; I could walk without it, but the slight limp from my right leg made a cane practical for long distances.The lobby was marble and silence. Employees froze when they saw me. A woman at the reception desk dropped her phone. A security guard stepped forward, recognized my face, and stepped back again