Chương 3
“Call the hospital,” he said.
Isabella closed her eyes.
When she opened them, the fear was gone.
“Fine.”
Dante watched her.
“Fine?”
“Yes. If this is what it takes for you to calm down.”
There it was.
Not guilt.
Not exactly.
Something older between them.
The habit of treating his anger like a problem to be managed.
It had not begun after the wheelchair.
He had given her reasons.
That fact did not make the pill smaller.
Marcus arranged a private entrance at St. Catherine’s, where Elena had admitting privileges. Dante did not use the hospital his usual physicians worked with. Isabella objected twice, then stopped when he looked at her.
The elevator ride took less than a minute.
It felt longer.
Marcus stood behind the wheelchair. Elena leaned against the mirrored wall, coat buttoned over her dress now, reading the medication chart again. Isabella watched the floor numbers.
Dante watched everyone.
He had spent three years measuring life through other people’s hands.
Hands lifting him.
Hands moving his legs.
Hands fastening braces.
Hands checking skin.
Hands sliding pills toward him in crystal dishes.
He hated that this was the thought that came now.
Not hope.
Not gratitude.
Inventory.
The elevator stopped.
Isabella moved first.
Dante caught her wrist.
Not hard.
She looked down at his hand.
He looked at her.
“Where do the pills come from?”
“You know the pharmacy.”
“I know the bottle they arrive in.”
“Dr. Hale sends the prescription to Bellweather Compounding.”
“Why compounded?”
“You couldn’t tolerate the commercial tablets.”
“When did we decide that?”
She pulled her wrist free.
“We didn’t. Your doctor did.”
The doors opened.
Marcus pushed Dante into the hall.
Behind them, Isabella stayed inside the elevator one second too long.
Then she followed.
At St. Catherine’s, Elena became a different person.
Less intimate.
More exact.
She changed into scrubs while another physician, a neurologist named Priya Shah, was called from upstairs. Blood was drawn. Urine was collected. The pill Marcus had bagged was signed into custody through the hospital laboratory rather than passed quietly to someone Dante employed.
He objected to the paperwork.
Elena ignored him.
“You don’t get to buy your way around chain of custody because you’re impatient.”
Dante looked at her.
“I like you less in a hospital.”
“That’s reassuring.”
It was the first almost-normal exchange of the night.
It bothered him that he was grateful for it.
Dr. Shah arrived at twelve forty-seven with reading glasses hanging from the collar of her scrubs. She introduced herself to everyone, then asked Isabella to leave the examination room.
Isabella stared.
“I’m his wife.”
“And he’s my patient.”
“He wants me here.”
Dr. Shah looked at Dante.
“Do you?”
Every instinct he had built in thirty-nine years told him to answer quickly.
He didn’t.
That pause cost Isabella something.
He saw it.
“No.”
Her face went blank.
Dr. Shah nodded toward the door.
Isabella picked up her purse.
“Of course.”
She left.
Marcus followed when Dante motioned for him to go too.
Only Elena stayed.
The neurological examination took almost an hour.
It was humiliating in the familiar ways and terrifying in new ones.
There was reflex activity in both legs.
More on the left.
Minimal voluntary contraction around the quadriceps.
A trace movement at the ankle.
Weak toe flexion.
Some sensation Dante had trained himself to dismiss because three years of experts had told him that phantom impressions were common.
Dr. Shah repeated one test three times.
“Close your eyes.”
He did.
She touched somewhere below his knee.
“Tell me when.”
“Now.”
Again.
“Now.”
Again.
“Now.”
When he opened his eyes, Dr. Shah had the expression of someone trying very hard not to communicate too much.
Dante hated that expression more than pity.
“What?”
“We need imaging and electrophysiology.”
“What?”
“Tonight I can tell you that the neurological picture does not look like a complete loss of function.”
“That’s what Elena said.”
“I’m more cautious than Elena.”
Elena crossed her arms.
“Thank you.”
Dr. Shah ignored her.
“There are preserved pathways. How much functional recovery is possible, I cannot tell you tonight.”
“Can I walk?”
“I don’t know.”
“Could I have walked a year ago?”
“I don’t know.”
“Could medication stop me?”
Dr. Shah sat on the edge of the counter.
“That question needs to be divided. Medication can cause sedation, weakness, impaired coordination, reduced muscle tone, and in some combinations significant suppression of function. But if you’re asking whether one ordinary pill can keep a neurologically intact person completely paralyzed for three years without causing other obvious problems, no. That would not be a credible explanation.”
The answer should have relieved him.
It did not.
“So Elena’s wrong.”
“No.”
Elena stepped forward.
“What I said upstairs was too broad.”
Dante turned toward her.
Her face did not retreat from his anger.
“That’s convenient.”
“It was fast, and I was alarmed.”
“You told me something I was taking was suppressing my nerves.”
“And I still think medication may be part of what we’re seeing. But not the whole explanation.”
He looked away.
The fluorescent light above the sink buzzed faintly.
Dante had paid for an entire wing of another hospital six years earlier. The plaque carried his mother’s name. He had assumed money bought certainty.
Lately, certainty seemed to be the one thing it could not buy.
Dr. Shah folded her hands.
“Your original injury may have been incomplete. You may have experienced recovery that was not properly recognized or documented. Overmedication could have reduced what function you had. Lack of aggressive rehabilitation could have caused severe deconditioning. There are several possibilities.”
“And fraud?”
She glanced at Elena.
“I’m a neurologist.”
“Not a priest. I didn’t ask you to forgive anybody.”
“I’m telling you what I can establish medically.”
He almost snapped at her.
Almost.
Then he saw the warning in Elena’s face.
Not fear.
Disappointment.
That irritated him more.
He rubbed his thumb across the edge of his watch.
May you like
“What do you need?”
“Records. Original imaging. Follow-up imaging. Full medication history. Physical therapy notes. Nursing notes. Pharmacy records if we can get them. And time.”
