Chapter 3 - THE PRICE OF COMING BACK
Santiago’s face changed.
“So you used her.”
Ruby flinched but stayed where she was.
“I took a job near his patient. That was wrong. Sophia didn’t know.”
“What were you looking for?”
“His routines. The medication deliveries. Anything I could legally see as an employee.”
“And did you find it?”
“I found a lonely young woman who kept being discussed like furniture.”
“Don’t change the subject.”
“I’m not.”
He stepped closer.
“My sister was your investigation.”
“For the first week,” Ruby said. “Then she became Sophia.”
The admission cost her. He could see that.
She reached into a drawer and took out a folded sheet.
“Before you decide what I deserve, read this.”
It was a list of medication times.
Beside several entries, Ruby had written observations.
Too sleepy to finish breakfast.
Hands shaking.
Could not stay awake through a movie.
“You’re not her doctor.”
“I know. I’m asking you to get another one.”
“Hale says the medication keeps her stable.”
“Ask Sophia how it makes her feel.”
Santiago took out his phone.
Ruby caught his wrist, then immediately released it.
“Don’t call him first.”
“Why?”
“Because if I’m wrong, an independent doctor will tell you. If I’m right, you’ll have warned him.”
He looked down at her notes again.
Three days earlier, he would have called that insolence.
Now he called a physician who had never worked for the Moretti family.
At the mansion, Sophia waited at the top of the staircase.
When she saw Ruby, she gripped the railing.
Ruby stopped below her.
“I need to tell you why I first came here.”
Santiago began to speak.
Ruby shook her head.
“She gets to hear it from me.”
They sat in Sophia’s room. Ruby spoke aloud and signed, keeping her hands slow.
She explained Emma. Hale. The housekeeping application.
Sophia watched without moving.
Then she picked up her board.
WERE YOU MY FRIEND OR WATCHING ME?
Ruby’s eyes filled.
“At first, I was looking for information. But being your friend was never pretend.”
Sophia erased the board.
YOU SHOULD HAVE TOLD ME.
“Yes.”
A long minute passed.
Then Sophia pointed toward the chair beside her bed.
Ruby sat.
Santiago remained at the door.
Sophia wrote again and held the board toward him.
NO MORE MEDICINE UNTIL SOMEONE EXPLAINS IT TO ME.
“We’ll have it reviewed safely,” he said. “Today.”
She studied his face, searching for the catch.
Then she added another sentence.
DON’T TELL UNCLE VINCENT.
Santiago’s hand tightened against the doorframe.
Their uncle had helped raise them after their mother died.
“Why not?”
May you like
Sophia pressed the board to her chest.
And began to shake.
