Chương 8
Then the smile disappeared.
The fact that it had happened at all felt dangerous.
The nurse unlocked the wheelchair brakes.
Ethan moved instinctively.
Claire stiffened.
He stopped.
“May I?”
She looked at his hands.
Then at his face.
“No.”
The word hurt him.
He nodded.
“Okay.”
Margaret stepped forward.
Claire looked at her.
Margaret stopped too.
The nurse took the chair.
As Claire was turned toward the elevator, she looked back at Richard.
He remained beside the glass.
The storm made him appear suspended above the city.
For years, Claire had believed wealth made people less vulnerable to ordinary fear.
She had been wrong.
It merely gave them more places to hide it.
The elevator doors opened.
Ortiz took the silver case.
Mercer followed.
Margaret walked behind Claire.
Ethan remained near his father.
Claire looked at him once.
He understood.
Go or stay.
His choice.
Not hers anymore.
The doors began to close.
Ethan stepped into the elevator.
Richard did not.
The doors sealed.
Nobody spoke during the descent.
Thirty-eight floors below, Claire was wheeled back into a private hospital suite she had spent eleven weeks trying to escape.
The room still contained evidence of a departure that had almost happened. Her overnight bag sat zipped on the bench. A paperback she had abandoned halfway through was tucked into the side pocket. Someone had removed the flowers that used to crowd the windowsill because Claire had complained that dying flowers made a hospital room feel like it was practicing.
Margaret stood just inside the door.
“I can go,” she said.
Claire looked toward her.
Margaret’s face had lost its polished composure. A strand of blonde-gray hair had come loose near one ear.
It was the most ordinary Claire had ever seen her.
“Do you want to?”
Margaret glanced at Ethan.
“No.”
“Then stay.”
Ethan looked at Claire.
She added, “For now.”
He understood that qualifier too.
Claire’s nurse helped her transfer from the wheelchair to the bed. The movement took longer than anyone expected. Her injured leg had stiffened badly during the rooftop confrontation. By the time she was settled against the pillows, sweat had soaked the back of her shirt beneath the formal uniform jacket.
The nurse touched the red trim.
“You really wore this for your medical transfer?”
Claire closed her eyes.
“I had a reason.”
“I bet it was dramatic.”
“Unfortunately.”
The nurse removed the uniform jacket with practiced care.
Underneath, Claire wore a plain white shirt.
Without the black coat, ribbons, and rigid collar, she looked younger.
Ethan noticed.
She wished he had not.
The nurse dimmed the lights.
“No visitors arguing.”
Margaret said, “We don’t argue.”
Claire opened one eye.
Margaret looked embarrassed.
Ethan almost smiled.
The nurse left.
For a few minutes nobody spoke.
Rain moved softly down the windows.
The storm had passed from violent to merely unpleasant.
Margaret sat in the corner.
Ethan stood near the door.
Claire stared at the ceiling.
She could have asked them to leave.
Instead she said, “There are crackers in the drawer.”
Ethan looked at her.
“What?”
“The second drawer. Hospital contraband.”
He opened it.
Inside were three packets of peanut butter crackers, a granola bar, two wrapped peppermints, and a tiny plastic container of hot sauce.
He stared at the hot sauce.
Claire said, “Don’t.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were about to.”
“I was going to ask why.”
“Because hospital eggs are a crime.”
Margaret made a sound.
It took Claire a second to recognize it as laughter.
Not much.
A small, shocked laugh that Margaret immediately covered with her hand.
Claire looked at her.
Margaret’s eyes were wet.
Claire looked away.
Quiet arrived again.
This was the part novels usually skipped, Claire thought. The time after catastrophe when nobody knew whether a conversation was over because nobody had the energy to leave.
Ethan opened a packet of crackers and ate one.
“You hate peanut butter crackers.”
“I know.”
“Then why are you eating them?”
“I don’t know.”
Claire closed her eyes.
“That’s possibly the most honest thing you’ve said tonight.”
He accepted that.
Twenty minutes later, Mercer returned alone.
“The detective took the case.”
Claire nodded.
“And?”
“She wants you to rest.”
“I dislike her.”
“She seems devastated.”
Margaret stood.
“What happens to Richard?”
Mercer looked at her carefully.
“Mrs. Whitmore, I represent Claire.”
“I understand.”
“That means I’m not going to speculate about your husband’s legal exposure in front of you.”
Margaret nodded.
The answer appeared to embarrass her, though not for the reason Claire expected.
“I don’t know who I am supposed to call,” she said.
Ethan looked at her.
“Your lawyer.”
“We have a lawyer.”
“No. Dad has lawyers. The company has lawyers. You need your own.”
Margaret stared at her son.
That seemed never to have occurred to her.
Claire watched their family structure rearrange itself in real time.
Richard had always been the person who knew who to call.
The absence of that certainty frightened Margaret more than anger did.
Mercer checked his watch.
“Claire, I’m leaving unless you want me here.”
“Go.”
“You’ll call if anyone from Whitmore contacts you?”
Margaret looked uncomfortable.
Claire said, “Present company excluded.”
Mercer glanced at Ethan.
“Especially present company.”
Ethan nodded.
“I deserve that.”
Mercer did not contradict him.
After he left, Margaret stared out the window.
“I told him you were ambitious.”
Claire looked at her.
Margaret spoke to the glass.
“After the first dinner. I told Richard you were ambitious in a way that might be dangerous for Ethan.”
Claire waited.
Margaret turned.
“I thought I was being perceptive.”
“What did you mean?”
“I don’t know anymore.”
“Yes, you do.”
Margaret looked down at her pearls.
Her fingers touched them automatically.
“I meant you already had a life.”
Claire said nothing.
May you like
Margaret continued.
“You didn’t need us. You liked Ethan, but you didn’t need what came with him. I had always believed women who entered families like ours wanted something from them. Position. Money. Access. Protection. You seemed… annoyed by all of it.”
