Chapter 7 - Saint Agatha’s
Snow began falling as we drove west.
Saint Agatha’s Hospital had closed eighteen years earlier after a fire destroyed one wing. The official report blamed faulty wiring.
Now I wondered whether the fire had been intended to erase Haven.
Elena’s disappearance had already reached the media. News vehicles gathered outside Northwestern, and Ashford Medical shares dropped before the market opened.
Someone had leaked the poisoning, the secret pregnancy, and my connection to the Haven trials.
Madison was dismantling my life exactly as planned.
I did not care.
Companies could be rebuilt.
Names could be cleared or abandoned.
Elena had hours.
The hospital appeared through the snow like a corpse.
Its brick walls were blackened from the old fire. Windows had been boarded shut, and weeds grew through cracks in the parking lot.
Detective Reyes coordinated police units at the perimeter.
“No one enters until tactical teams arrive,” she said.
“Elena may not have that time.”
“You go inside without a plan and she may lose whatever time remains.”
Jonas handed me a bulletproof vest.
I put it on beneath my coat.
Detective Reyes swore.
“If you enter that building, I will arrest you afterward.”
“You’ll know where to find me.”
Victor insisted on joining us.
I refused.
“She contacted me first,” he argued. “Madison used my voice because she wanted you to suspect me. That means I matter to her plan.”
“It means you’re a target.”
“So are you.”
I looked at my brother.
For years, distrust had been easier than forgiveness. But Elena’s life now depended on seeing beyond manipulation.
“Stay behind Jonas,” I said.
We entered through a service tunnel identified on old architectural plans.
The basement smelled of mold, rust, and chemicals trapped in concrete.
Patient rooms lined the corridor.
Numbers remained painted above the doors.
Thirty-one belonged to Madison’s mother.
Inside, faded restraints hung from a hospital bed.
Madison’s voice sounded through ceiling speakers.
“Welcome to Haven.”
Lights activated one by one down the corridor.
“Where is Elena?” I shouted.
“Still asking the wrong question.”
“Then ask yours.”
“Why did Elena marry you?”
I looked toward the nearest camera.
“To investigate my family.”
“Partly.”
Madison’s face appeared on an old monitor.
She no longer looked like the polished woman who complained about hospital rooms. Her hair was tied back, and exhaustion sharpened her features.
“Elena came close to you for evidence,” Madison said. “But she made the mistake of falling in love.”
“Where is she?”
“She spent years trying to convince herself you were different from your father.”
“I am.”
“Are you? How many men have suffered because of your orders?”
I had no answer that would satisfy her.
I had built an empire through legal companies and illegal fear. I had never conducted medical trials, but innocence was not the same as goodness.
“I have done things I cannot undo,” I said. “Elena knew that.”
“She believed you could change.”
“Maybe she was right.”
Madison laughed.
“You only changed when the consequences reached your own family.”
A door unlocked at the end of the corridor.
We entered a surgical theater.
Elena lay on a hospital bed connected to a portable heart monitor and oxygen mask.
I moved toward her.
A red laser appeared on my chest.
“Stop,” Madison ordered.
She emerged from an observation room above us holding a rifle.
Dr. Vale stood beside her.
His white coat was stained with blood.
“Elena needs a cardiac pump,” he said. “The hospital’s old equipment cannot support her much longer.”
“Then let us take her.”
Madison’s eyes remained on me.
“First, the ledger.”
“I don’t have it.”
“You’re lying.”
“Elena hid it.”
“She told you where.”
“She has not regained consciousness.”
Madison looked toward Vale.
“Wake her.”
“That could kill her.”
“Wake her.”
Vale injected something into Elena’s intravenous line.
Her body jerked.
I moved forward instinctively.
The laser shifted toward Elena’s chest.
“Don’t,” Madison warned.
Elena’s eyes opened slowly.
They wandered across the room before finding me.
“Damian?”
The sound of my name from her lips nearly destroyed me.
“I’m here.”
Tears formed in her eyes.
“The baby?”
“Alive. A boy.”
Relief passed over her face.
Then she saw Madison above us.
Fear returned.
“Elena,” Madison said, “tell him where you hid the Haven ledger.”
Elena struggled to breathe.
“I destroyed it.”
Madison’s expression hardened.
“No.”
“I burned it.”
“You made a copy.”
Elena looked at me.
In that glance, I understood that she had hidden something much larger than a file.
“Elena,” I said carefully, “where is the copy?”
Her fingers moved weakly over her abdomen, forgetting for a moment that the child was no longer there.
“The baby.”
Madison leaned forward.
“What about him?”
Elena’s eyes closed briefly.
“The evidence is in his name.”
A gunshot exploded.
The monitor beside Elena shattered.
Dr. Vale dropped to the floor with blood spreading across his coat.
The shot had not come from Madison.
It came from behind us.
Victor stood in the doorway holding a pistol.
But the weapon was pointed at me.
May you like
“I’m sorry, Damian,” he said.
Then he pulled the trigger.
