Chapter 4 - The Crash Was Supposed to Kill HimMaxwell didn’t look surprised when I told him Nico had confirmed the crash was sabotage.
That irritated me.
“You already knew?”
“I suspected.”
“You suspected somebody cut your brakes and forgot to mention it?”
“I didn’t forget.”
“Then what do you call it?”
“Information you didn’t need.”
I stared at him.
“Somebody sent me a threat because of you.”
His expression hardened.
“Which is exactly why I didn’t want you involved.”
“You hired me upstairs.”
“I needed your medical judgment.”
“You needed a disposable witness.”
The second the words left my mouth, I regretted them.
Something changed in Maxwell’s face.
Not anger.
Pain.
“Is that what you think?”
“I don’t know what to think.”
He looked toward the rain beginning beyond the windows.
“I don’t use innocent people as shields.”
“People say you use plenty of guilty ones.”
“That isn’t the same thing.”
No, it wasn’t.
But it wasn’t exactly comforting either.
I placed the bagged medications on his desk.
“We need these tested.”
“Nico arranged it.”
“And you need an independent neurologist.”
“Already happening.”
“You move fast.”
“I stayed alive by learning to.”
I pulled a chair beside him.
“What happened the night of the crash?”
For the first time since I’d met him, Maxwell didn’t answer immediately.
Finally he spoke.
“I was leaving a warehouse in East Providence. Midnight. Rain.”
“Alone?”
“Driver was sick.”
“Convenient.”
“I thought so later.”
His mouth tightened.
“Coming down Blackstone Hill, brakes disappeared. I hit the barrier at seventy.”
I pictured it.
“Anyone behind you?”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
“Julian.”
My breath caught.
“He says he was following because you were going to the same meeting?”
“He claims he saw the crash and called 911.”
“You believe him?”
“I believe Julian has spent fourteen months making himself indispensable.”
That wasn’t an answer.
“Did he benefit?”
“He controls day-to-day operations while I’m incapacitated.”
“Money?”
“Enough.”
“Power?”
“More important.”
There it was.
Motive.
But something still bothered me.
“Why not just kill you in the hospital?”
Maxwell’s expression turned bitter.
“Because my death triggers succession rules.”
“Who takes over?”
“My sister.”
I blinked.
“You have a sister?”
“Eleanor. She lives in Boston and wants nothing to do with our business.”
“So Julian needs you alive but incapacitated.”
“Exactly.”
A disabled Maxwell preserved Julian’s authority.
A recovered Maxwell ended it.
A dead Maxwell handed everything to somebody else.
For the first time the whole thing made awful sense.
I leaned back.
“So Pierce keeps you weak.”
“And someone keeps watching for signs of recovery.”
“Which means the respiratory incident probably wasn’t an accident.”
“No.”
“And the bath?”
“Another test.”
I frowned.
“A test?”
“If they believe I’m regaining sensation, temperature might reveal it.”
The thought made my skin crawl.
“Whoever overheated the bath may have been watching whether you reacted.”
Maxwell nodded.
Then his expression changed.
“What?”
“My foot moved when you used cold water.”
“Yes.”
“But not when the hot water was burning me.”
I understood.
“Temperature pathways can return inconsistently.”
“Or?”
“Or whatever they’re giving you is suppressing sensation and motor response.”
That possibility was worse.
The injury might not be as severe as everyone believed.
Maxwell could have been kept artificially disabled.
Not completely.
But enough to hide progress.
Two hours later, Nico brought a neurologist through the service entrance.
Dr. Naomi Chen.
Forty-something.
Direct.
Unimpressed by wealth.
I liked her immediately.
She examined Maxwell for nearly ninety minutes.
Light touch.
Pinprick.
Temperature.
Reflexes.
Muscle activation.
Then she sat across from us.
“Your diagnosis is incomplete thoracic spinal cord injury.”
Maxwell’s jaw tightened.
“I was told complete.”
“I know what you were told.”
She opened scans on a tablet.
“These were your original hospital images.”
“Where did you get them?”
“Your attorney.”
She enlarged one.
“You had significant swelling. But structurally, there was never enough evidence to guarantee permanent complete paralysis.”
Maxwell said nothing.
I asked, “Could he have recovered earlier?”
“Possibly.”
“How much earlier?”
“Impossible to know.”
She tested his right foot again.
“Try to pull your toes toward your face.”
Nothing.
Maxwell closed his eyes.
His jaw trembled with effort.
Then his big toe moved.
Barely.
But deliberately.
Dr. Chen smiled.
“There.”
Maxwell opened his eyes.
His expression broke.
Not dramatically.
Just a tiny collapse around the edges.
Fourteen months.
Fourteen months of being told never.
I put my hand over his without thinking.
He looked down at our fingers.
Neither of us moved away.
Dr. Chen continued.
“This is clinically significant.”
“Can I walk?”
Maxwell asked.
“Maybe.”
The single word hit him harder than any certainty could have.
“Maybe,” he repeated.
“With intensive rehabilitation, correct medication management, and no further interference.”
She looked directly at the pills.
“What have you been taking?”
We handed her the bags.
“Lab results tomorrow,” Nico said.
Dr. Chen nodded.
Then she examined the injection mark on Maxwell’s thigh.
“That concerns me.”
“Why?”
“This appears recent.”
“He wasn’t prescribed an injection.”
“Then nobody should have given one.”
She stood.
“I want toxicology and complete bloodwork.”
Maxwell squeezed my hand.
Only then did I realize we were still touching.
I released him.
Dr. Chen pretended not to notice.
After she left, Maxwell stared at his foot.
“Do it again,” I said.
He tried.
Nothing.
“Again.”
Nothing.
“Stop.”
His face hardened.
“I’m not stopping.”
“Your nervous system isn’t a machine you can threaten.”
“I’ve threatened machines successfully.”
I laughed before I could stop myself.
He looked up.
“You laughed at me.”
“You threatened rehabilitation.”
“A reasonable strategy.”
“No, Mr. Rourke.”
I crouched in front of his wheelchair.
“Recovery is going to be slow. Frustrating. Maybe painful. You’re going to fail at movements before you succeed.”
“I don’t fail.”
“You hit a guardrail.”
His eyes widened.
“That was rude.”
“Accurate.”
Then he laughed.
A real laugh.
Low and rusty, like he hadn’t used it in years.
For one strange second, the feared man disappeared.
I saw somebody exhausted.
Lonely.
Hopeful.
Human.
Then Nico entered.
His expression erased the moment.
“We traced the second message.”
“Who sent it?” Maxwell asked.
“Burner phone.”
“Location?”
“Inside the house.”
My stomach dropped.
Nico continued.
“And Delaney wasn’t lying about one thing. Someone used her credentials to send Martha upstairs yesterday.”
Maxwell looked at him.
“Who?”
Nico placed a printed access log on the desk.
The account that had issued the order belonged to someone who supposedly hadn’t been inside Rourke House in eight months.
Maxwell’s sister.
Eleanor.
I stared at the name.
“You said she wanted nothing to do with this.”
“She does.”
“Then why is her account active?”
Maxwell’s face turned pale.
Nico answered quietly.
“Because Eleanor Rourke entered the property through the east gate three days ago.”
Maxwell’s head snapped toward him.
“What?”
“She’s here, Max.”
“Where?”
Nico looked toward the ceiling.
“We don’t know.”
Then the mansion’s lights went out.
May you like
Every room fell into darkness.
And somewhere down the third-floor hallway, a woman screamed.
Related Stories
