Chapter 9 - The Hospital Ledger
Mason escaped before the guards reached the end of the tunnel.
He left Dr. Vale’s bloodstained identification card on the stone floor.
There was a message written across the back.
ASK CLARA WHAT SHE STOLE.
Lorenzo handed the card to me.
“What does that mean?”
“I never stole anything.”
“Mason believes you did.”
“Mason believed everything I owned belonged to him.”
“What happened before he pushed you?”
The question pulled me back to the apartment.
Mason shouting.
Drawers hanging open.
Papers scattered across the table.
My hospital bag waiting beside the door.
“I found a ledger inside his desk.”
“What kind of ledger?”
“It contained names and numbers.”
“Payments.”
“Account codes.”
“I took photographs with my phone.”
“Where is the phone?”
“Mason smashed it.”
“Were the images backed up?”
I stopped breathing.
My phone had automatically uploaded photographs to an online account.
Mason knew my password.
But he did not know I had changed the recovery address months earlier.
“There might be copies.”
Lorenzo gave me a secure laptop.
I logged into the account.
Thousands of old photographs appeared.
Most showed the life I had tried to escape.
Mason smiling at parties.
Mason holding my hand too tightly.
The nursery I had prepared for Lily.
Then I found the images of the ledger.
Lorenzo enlarged them.
Several entries included Dr. Vale’s name.
Others included Bianca and Marco.
At the bottom of one page was a list of payments connected to Saint Mercy Hospital.
Lorenzo called his investigators.
Within an hour, they discovered that Dr. Vale secretly owned part of the hospital through a shell company.
The records for Sofia’s death and Lily’s birth had both passed through departments he controlled.
One entry in the ledger had been circled in red.
PROJECT HEIR.
Beside it was Leo’s expected birth date.
They had planned to harm him before he was even born.
Lorenzo stared at the screen.
“My wife knew.”
“She found the money.”
“That is why they killed her.”
A new file appeared in the cloud account.
Someone else was logged in.
The file contained a live video.
Dr. Vale was tied to a chair inside an abandoned medical room.
Mason stood behind him.
“Hello, Clara.”
Mason smiled at the camera.
“You found the ledger.”
“Bring it to Saint Mercy Hospital.”
“Come alone.”
Lorenzo leaned toward the screen.
“You are not getting the ledger.”
Mason’s smile widened.
“I was not speaking to you.”
He pressed a knife against Vale’s throat.
The doctor began sobbing.
“Tell them,” Mason ordered.
Vale shook his head.
“Tell them what you did to Lily.”
The doctor looked into the camera.
“I gave the baby a respiratory suppressant.”
My body went numb.
“She was alive when she was born.”
“She was alive when I carried her away.”
I gripped the edge of the desk.
“What did you do with her?”
Vale began crying harder.
“I declared her dead.”
“Then Marco took her.”
The room went silent.
Even Mason looked surprised.
“What do you mean he took her?” I demanded.
“I never saw what happened afterward.”
“Marco said the body could not remain at the hospital.”
I remembered the sealed coffin.
The funeral director had told me Lily was too fragile to view again.
I had never seen my daughter after the hospital.
Mason leaned toward the camera.
“Bring the ledger, Clara.”
“Maybe we will finally learn where Marco buried your baby.”
The video ended.
I could barely stand.
Lorenzo caught my arm.
“I am coming with you.”
“He said alone.”
“Mason lies.”
“But Vale might know the truth.”
“You cannot trust him.”
“I do not trust him.”
“I need answers.”
Lorenzo looked toward Leo sleeping in the next room.
Then he looked at me.
“We will give Mason what he thinks he wants.”
At midnight, I entered Saint Mercy Hospital carrying the ledger inside a black bag.
The corridors were dark.
The building had been evacuated after an anonymous bomb threat.
I followed Mason’s instructions to the abandoned maternity wing.
The room where Lily had been delivered stood open.
A single light burned inside.
Dr. Vale sat alone in the chair.
His restraints had been removed.
“Mason is gone,” he whispered.
I stepped closer.
“Where is my daughter?”
Vale looked at the door behind me.
Then he smiled.
“You brought Lorenzo exactly where Marco wanted him.”
May you like
The hospital lights went out.
Gunfire erupted downstairs.
