Chapter 2 - The Suite on the Sixth Floor
The intensive oncology ward at St. Jude Regional Medical Center in downtown Spokane was quiet, bathed in the soft, clinical hum of sterile air filtration systems and cardiac telemetry leads.
By midnight, Phedra was resting inside a private corner suite on the sixth floor.
Two intravenous lines ran into her left arm: one pumping concentrated parenteral nutrition to reverse four months of catastrophic starvation, the other delivering broad-spectrum anti-emetics and electrolyte stabilizers to prepare her fragile system for an emergency biopsy. A heated blanket was tucked securely around her shoulders, and a clean white cotton bonnet covered her bare scalp.
Dr. Kenneth Patel, the chief of adult hematology, stepped out into the waiting lounge where I sat in a plastic chair, still wearing my mud-spattered work boots.
“Mr. Vance?” Dr. Patel pulled down his surgical mask, his expression dark with deep, clinical outrage. “Your wife's baseline blood work is horrifying. Her hemoglobin was five point two when you brought her in through the emergency bay. Her albumin levels indicate severe, prolonged protein-calorie malnutrition. If you had arrived forty-eight hours later, her organs would have shut down from hypovolemic shock before the cancer even touched her bone marrow.”
I clamped my hands between my knees, my fingernails digging into my palms until the skin split. “Can she be saved, Doctor? Tell me the truth.”
Dr. Patel sat down in the vinyl armchair across from me, tapping his electronic tablet. “The preliminary scans show classical Stage 3B Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. Ten years ago, that would have been a catastrophic prognosis. But today? With modern CD30-directed monoclonal antibody therapies—specifically Brentuximab vedotin paired with targeted chemotherapy—we see an eighty-five percent complete remission rate.”
He paused, glancing at the billing codes on the screen.
“The problem, Mr. Vance, is access. The specialized antibody protocols and the ninety-day inpatient isolation care will exceed two hundred and eighty thousand dollars. Her private insurance lapsed eight months ago due to non-payment of premiums by your domestic address.”
“I have the money, Dr. Patel,” I said without a microsecond of hesitation.
I pulled out my phone and slid the certified Canadian wire clearance document across the table.
“Authorize every specialized protocol, every private nurse, and every experimental therapy in this state. The Royal Bank of Canada has cleared an initial three-hundred-thousand-dollar medical letter of credit directly to St. Jude’s billing trust. If she needs three million dollars, I will sell my bone marrow to pay for it.”
Dr. Patel examined the banking clearance, his eyes widening slightly. A profound, respectful warmth replaced the clinical tension on his face. He stood up and offered his hand.
“She’s in the best hands in the Pacific Northwest, Damian. We begin her stabilization regimen tonight. Go get some rest.”
I didn't rest.
I took the elevator down to the main floor, stepped into the 24-hour private consultation alcove, and dialed the direct cellular line of Marcus Vance—my father’s younger brother, a retired senior investigator with the Washington State Attorney General’s Economic Crimes Division, who had severed all ties with Selina and Julian five years earlier.
The phone rang twice before Marcus answered, his voice rough and alert.
“Damian? It’s past one in the morning. Did you make it back from Alberta?”
“I’m in Spokane, Uncle Marcus,” I said, staring through the glass doors into the rain-swept parking lot. “Phedra is in the ICU at St. Jude. She has stage-three lymphoma, and she was locked in a storage shed behind our house, eating scraps off the dirt while Selina and Julian spent ninety-eight thousand dollars of my wire transfers on new cars and a commercial auto shop.”
A dead, suffocating silence hung over the line for five full seconds.
When Marcus spoke again, the calm, easy uncle was gone. In his place was the lead investigator who had sent eighty corporate embezzlers to federal penitentiaries.
“Tell me you didn't touch them, Damian,” Marcus ordered, his tone razor-sharp.
“I didn't lay a finger on them,” I said. “I showed them the wire confirmation for my one-point-two-million-dollar injury settlement. I told them the funds would be released to a domestic legal caretaker in forty-eight hours.”
Marcus let out a slow, terrifying whistle through his teeth.
“You set the bait,” Marcus whispered. “Julian is sitting on seventy thousand dollars in high-interest balloon loans for that auto shop equipment, and Selina has three foreclosure warnings on the original family parcel that she’s been hiding since June. The second they saw seven figures on your screen, they started calculating how to steal it.”
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“How fast can you pull their paper trail, Uncle Marcus?”
“I already have the bank routing numbers from your father’s probate filings, Damian,” Marcus replied, the sound of keys clicking furiously against a computer keyboard audible through the receiver. “Meet me at my office on Riverside Avenue at seven o'clock tomorrow morning. Bring every wire transfer receipt, every Western Union confirmation, and every medical bill Phedra was denied. We aren't just going to take your money back, Damian. We’re going to bury them under the courthouse.”
