Chapter 6 - Shadows of Saint Jude's
The screech of ambulance tires reverberated like gunfire against the sterile concrete walls of the hospital ambulance bay.
Paramedics leaped from the rear doors before the vehicle had even settled into its hydraulic suspension.
Marcus bolted out beside the gurney, his tailored suit soaked in chlorinated water and dark engine soot.
His hands remained clamped onto Clara’s freezing fingers, refusing to surrender physical contact for even a single heartbeat.
Inside the trauma bay, the blinding glare of fluorescent lights washed over Clara’s graying face and soaked pale-blue maternity gown.
Her eyelids fluttered weakly beneath the transparent plastic of the oxygen mask, each inhalation rattling deep within her waterlogged chest.
The electronic cadence of the portable vitals monitor shrieked with jagged, irregular warnings that pierced the cavernous corridor.
“Maternal heart rate elevated to one hundred and forty-two, blood pressure plummeting to eighty over fifty,” the lead paramedic shouted to the waiting trauma team.
“We have acute immersion hypothermia complicated by secondary drowning risk and high-stress gestational trauma at thirty-two weeks,” the medic added without breaking stride.
A wall of doctors and surgical nurses in seafoam-green scrubs swarmed the gurney the instant it crossed the red triage threshold.
“Clear the intake corridor immediately,” commanded Dr. Elena Vance-Kowalski, the chief of emergency obstetrics, snapping sterile latex gloves onto her hands.
Maya Lin ran behind the medical entourage, her soaked black trousers clinging to her calves and water still dripping from her dark ponytail.
She carried Clara’s recovered leather handbag and the sodden velvet wrap that had fallen into the pool during the rescue.
Her heart hammered against her ribs like a trapped bird, the adrenaline refusing to evacuate her bloodstream.
Every time she blinked, she saw Clara’s terrified brown eyes locked onto hers beneath the turquoise depths of the penthouse pool.
Marcus tried to follow the gurney through the double swinging doors of Trauma Bay Four, but two burly hospital security guards stepped into his path.
“Sir, you have to wait in the surgical vestibule while we establish a central line and assess fetal viability,” an orderly said firmly, placing a gentle hand on his drenched chest.
“That is my wife and my unborn son in there,” Marcus roared, his voice cracking with volcanic agony.
“I know who you are, Mr. Vance, but you cannot enter while the trauma team conducts the ultrasound,” the orderly replied with seasoned composure.
Marcus slammed his palm against the reinforced glass panel of the door, watching through the narrow slit as technicians tore away Clara’s wet gown.
Sensors were slapped onto her swollen belly with frantic speed, cold conductive gel smearing across her stretched pale skin.
The mechanical hum of the bedside Doppler ultrasound machine roared to life, filling the observation corridor with amplified white noise.
For six agonizing seconds, there was no sound except the mechanical whir of the machine and Marcus’s ragged, ragged breathing.
Then, emerging from the static like a muffled drumbeat in a distant canyon, came the rapid, hollow rhythm of a fetal heart.
Thump-thump.
Thump-thump.
Thump-thump.
Marcus collapsed forward against the wall, burying his wet face in his forearms as a guttural sob tore through his throat.
Maya stepped up beside him, keeping a respectful distance while watching the doctors through the glass.
“The baby is fighting, Marcus,” Maya said softly, her voice steady despite the shivers coursing through her own chilled body.
Marcus raised his head, his eyes bloodshot, framed by heavy dark circles that had aged him ten years in forty-five minutes.
He looked down at his trembling, blood-flecked hands, remembering the sickening sound of Victoria’s body crashing into the crystal banquet table.
More than that, the chilling words his sister had hissed on the terrace echoed in his skull like a tolling funeral bell.
Ask our father what was written in the trust before you celebrate.
The phrase tasted like sulfur and copper in the back of his dry throat.
“You shouldn’t be here shivering in wet clothes, Maya,” Marcus said, his voice dropping to a fragile, broken baritone.
“I’m not leaving until the detectives arrive to take my formal statement,” Maya replied firmly, crossing her arms against the air-conditioned chill.
“If I leave, Victoria’s high-priced lawyers will find a way to claim Clara slipped, or that I mistook an accident for a crime,” she added with resolute clarity.
Marcus stared at her, seeing for the first time the fierce, unyielding integrity burning behind her dark eyes.
She was barely twenty-four, an entry-level legal assistant who had come to deliver ordinary real estate deeds, yet she had hurled herself into an abyss to save strangers.
“My family has enough money to buy entire courtrooms, Maya,” Marcus whispered, bitterness lacing every syllable.
“Then they will have to buy me, and I am not for sale,” Maya answered without a moment of hesitation.
The heavy outer doors of the emergency ward hissed open, admitting a tall, weathered man in a trench coat with an gold detective badge clipped to his lapel.
Detective Thomas Miller walked with the deliberate, heavy stride of a veteran homicide investigator who had seen every depravity wealth could buy.
Behind him walked two uniformed officers carrying clear plastic evidence bags containing the recovered pool security hard drives.
“Marcus Vance?” Miller inquired, stopping three feet from the drenched heir.
Marcus nodded once, straightening his spine though his knees felt like hollow glass.
“I need to know how my sister is being processed,” Marcus said, his jaw tightening into steel.
“Victoria Vance is currently in holding at the Central Precinct, booked on suspicion of attempted aggravated homicide and attempted infanticide,” Miller stated plainly.
“Did she say anything during transport?” Marcus asked, his breath catching in his chest.
Miller’s gray eyes flickered toward Maya before settling back onto Marcus with calculating intensity.
“She demanded her lead counsel, Robert Sterling, and told the transport officers that the rooftop pool was private property where no lawful arrest could be executed without a family warrant,” Miller reported.
“Classic Victoria,” Marcus muttered through clenched teeth.
“She also made three calls from the holding cell before her phone was logged into evidence,” Miller continued, pulling a small leather notebook from his pocket.
“Who did she call?” Marcus asked, dread tightening around his diaphragm like an iron band.
“The first two went to the managing partner of Vance Corporate Holdings,” Detective Miller said, turning a page.
“And the third?” Marcus whispered.
“The third was an encrypted satellite call to a private residence in Zurich,” Miller replied, watching Marcus’s reaction like a hawk.
Marcus felt the blood drain from his face until the lights in the corridor seemed to dim around him.
“My father’s chalet,” Marcus whispered, his voice trembling with an emotion far more dangerous than rage.
“Arthur Vance hasn’t spoken to Victoria in six months,” Marcus said aloud, trying to convince himself of a reality that was rapidly disintegrating.
“Well, according to the cell tower ping, the call lasted ninety-two seconds,” Miller noted calmly.
“And forty minutes ago, a private Gulfstream jet registered to Arthur Vance filed an emergency flight plan departing Geneva for JFK,” the detective added.
Maya looked at Marcus, noticing the primal terror that overtook the man’s features at the mention of his father.
“Why would your father rush across the Atlantic if he severed ties with her?” Maya asked quietly.
Marcus looked at the glass window where doctors were administering intravenous steroids to accelerate the baby’s lung development.
“He’s not flying here to save his daughter,” Marcus murmured, the horrific truth finally breaking through the surface of his denial.
“He’s flying here to finish what she failed to execute.”
The monitoring machines inside Trauma Bay Four suddenly shrieked with a shrill, piercing alarm that froze everyone in the corridor.
The regular thump of the fetal heart rate abruptly disintegrated into a chaotic, erratic flutter on the monitor screen.
Dr. Vance-Kowalski’s voice carried through the door, sharp and razor-thin with medical panic.
May you like
“Crash cart to Trauma Four! We have massive placental abruption and severe fetal bradycardia!”
Nurses sprinted through the double doors as Marcus lunged forward, his knuckles turning dead white against the locked security glass.
