Estranged Heart

Thirty

Elijah

My eyes hurt when I open them. Lights flicker on and off around me while a horrible stench assaults my nose—blood and death. I’m sitting against a cement wall with my hands tied behind my back and ropes secured around my ankles. I spread my wrists apart as far as I can but the knot won’t budge. Looking up, I spot a narrow staircase leading to a door with light shining around it. The bottom gap is wide enough for me to spot sets of feet.

Two raised voices cut through the door and it isn’t until it’s cracked open that I can make out what they’re saying.

“I need you to finish running all your tests and tell me if he meets any of the matches I gave you,” a familiar female voice says.

“I can’t do that all in one night. I need at least two.” The man sighs, sounding agitated with a tinge of fear in his voice. “These things can’t be rushed. Usually these donors are chosen over time. Where did this guy even come from?”

“It doesn’t matter. You don’t get to ask those questions, and this isn’t our typical donor. This is a man who’s putting all our lives in jeopardy. I need him to disappear as soon as possible, and I also need him to suffer before he does.”

“My life is already in jeopardy. Either they come for me or y’all do. There’s no winning in this for me no matter what I choose. You think I want to be doing this? Working for a bunch of monsters? Killing innocent people?”

“You’re going to do what I ask of you or you’ll be down there with him. Right after you watch me cut the eyes from your little sister’s pretty head.” Her words twist in my chest like a sharp knife. The voice is familiar because I’ve heard it many times, at my restaurant and in Silas’s home. Stacey.

“Okay, but if something goes wrong, don’t say I didn’t tell you so,” he says with trembling words.

“You better hope on your family’s life it doesn’t then,” she threatens. Who is this vile woman? The same one Silas fell in love with? The person I felt sorry for all those times he was sick and she couldn’t make it in to work? It can’t be. She’s nearly unrecognizable.

More light invades the room as she pulls open the door. Her steps are fast and heavy as she makes her way toward me, holding a gun. “Time to get your clothes off and into a gown. You better not try anything or I will make this more painful than it needs to be.”

“Do your worst,” I spit and the gun slams hard against my face, knocking the wind out of me.

“Oh, I plan to. And after this is all over, I’ll tell Silas how you tried to kill him. How you switched his meds to placebos after finding out he had your husband’s heart. I’ll tell him you knew all along and only kept seeing him as part of some sick revenge plan.”

Blood rushes to my ears. “You . . . You’re insane,” I say, my head pounding. “You almost killed your own husband. He could have fucking died. And for what? So you could trick him into loving you again?”

Her nostrils flare, eyes wild. “He does love me. He will always love me. I’ve been there with him from the beginning. You’re nothing but a new hobby for him to explore. Just like the rest, he’s bound to get bored of you eventually.”

“Keep telling yourself that, sweetheart.” I grit my teeth.

Kneeling down while keeping her eyes on me, she plucks a knife from her pocket and cuts the rope around my ankles, slicing my skin in the process. Wincing, I tilt my head back and clench through the pain. What she does to the outside of me is nothing compared to what she’s destroyed on the inside. She’s taken so much from me and yet it isn’t enough, she wants my life too. And I consider letting her have it . . . that is, until Silas lying in the hospital bed flashes in my mind.

I can’t let her poison his mind further. She’ll continue holding him as a prisoner in any way she can, even if that means keeping him unconscious for the rest of his life. He’s a victim as much as Landon was, and she’s been determining his life this whole time. He’s better on her terms and sick again when she needs him to be.

“Stand up, asshole.” She looks down at me, eyes full of spite.

I blink up at her and stay exactly where I am. She kicks my feet and then my legs before slamming the gun to my forehead. “I said get up.”

“I can’t,” I say, resting my head on the concrete with my eyes half closed.

“Try.”

“My head was hit pretty hard. Surely whoever dragged me down here can drag me back up.”

“I don’t have time for your silly games. Get up now or else I’ll—”

“What? Kill me?” I laugh, shaking my head. “Oh, wait, you’re going to do that anyway. What can you possibly threaten me with now? You have nothing. You’ve already taken it all,” I grind out.

“Dan, some help, please. Looks like we’re going to have to take him back up the hard way.” She turns around, looking at the open doorway. “Dan.”

“I’m coming. Give me a minute. I’m still trying to make calls to try and clean up the damn mess you made.”

Sighing, she places her hands on her hips and glances back at me. “Looks like I might have to try and drag your ass up there myself. I won’t make it very pleasant for you either.” She slips the gun into the back of her pants and walks around me, looping an arm under one of mine to spin me around. Once my back is facing the stairs, she leans over me, grabbing both of my arms and drags me back with a loud grunt.

With a grin on my face, I go slack against her, becoming dead weight. She struggles to get me up the steps with my hands tied, and as soon as she frees me from the ropes, I hook my arms around her legs, tugging her down with me, and we roll around on the ground, my weight overpowering hers. She tries to scream and I elbow her hard in the throat, causing her to choke on her own words.

“You should have stayed working in the doctor’s office,” I mutter to her as I grab the gun, shoving it in her mouth when she tries to talk again. It takes everything in me not to pull the trigger. It’s more than she deserves, though—a quick, easy death. That thought alone is the only thing stopping me.

“You’re going to do what I say now. Don’t think I won’t kill you, because I’m begging for an excuse to watch the life leave those pretty eyes of yours right here and right now.”

Her eyes water and she makes high-pitched garbled sounds around the metal.

“Does that mean you’re going to be quiet when I take the gun out of your mouth?”

She nods, eyes bulging.

“Good.” I pull my hand back and she licks her lips.

“You really think you’re going to make it out of here alive? This thing is bigger than all of us in this building. They probably already have your name, so it doesn’t matter if you kill me, you’re a dead man either way.”

“Maybe I am, and maybe I’m not. And I don’t think they know about me, because that would mean they’re aware of your fuck up. Why else are you so quick to want to silence me?” I cock my head, kicking her foot. “Stand up.”

Looking behind her, she slowly gets to her feet and keeps her hands raised above her head. “You think Dan cares if you kill me? He doesn’t. He’ll probably do it for you and then shoot you next.”

“Oh, I’m hoping for it. Walk up the stairs and tell him everything’s okay.”

She moves one foot in front of the other, her steps picking up when I press the gun to her back. “Faster.”

When she reaches the top and is about to enter the house, I fire the gun, hitting the ceiling, and another shot goes off. Stacey’s body goes still and then she sways back and forth, crashing forward.

“What the fuck,” a deep voice says, footsteps quickly approaching me. As Officer Robinson lowers himself to Stacey’s convulsing body, I rush up the stairs and aim the gun at his head.

“Stay where you are.”

Laughing, his eyes flick up. “Mr. Pena. What do you think you’re going to do with that gun?”

“What I have to do if you keep moving,” I snap.

“Please.” He shakes his head, grinning wide. “You and I both know you’re not a killer. Stop wasting both our time and put the gun down.”

“No. You’re going to listen to me now.” I grip the gun tighter, aiming it at his head. “Get to your feet and walk down into the basement.”

He huffs out a laugh. “And what are you going to do? Call the cops?” He tsks. “Who do you think they’re going to believe when you’re the one who has me down there tied up and with your prints all over that gun? How do you think it’ll look when they find out you’ve been fucking the man who has your dead husband’s heart?” His lips tilt up and I want nothing more than to shoot that smile off his face.

“You don’t worry about that and just do what I ask,” I croak, not sounding as confident this time. He’s right. He’s a cop with the upper hand here, and me spending so much time with Silas lately might come off as suspicious to others on top of all the money Landon left me when he died. Fuck. I wanted these fuckers to pay so badly, I didn’t consider the consequences.

A loud crash startles us both and three men rush inside with bigger guns than mine. “Drop your weapon,” the taller man wearing a face covering says to me, and I lift my hands, letting the weapon slip from my fingers.

Officer Robinson laughs under his breath, and grabs the gun from beside my feet. He aims it at my leg and pulls the trigger, forcing a guttural groan from me. The pain nearly sends me to my knees. “About time you guys got here. You were supposed to be here an hour ago.”

“Sorry, boss,” the one on his left says. “We had to take care of another problem at the other funeral home.”

“What problem?”

“It’s been taken care of, I can assure you. The product is now secure,” the third speaks up.

My gut twists at that and I get a bad taste in my mouth. Product. They’re more than likely referring to a human life and these people are nothing more than merchandise to them. Not fathers, brothers, mothers, sisters, sons, daughters, husbands, or wives. Just something to slap a price tag on and sell for a quick buck.

“Good. I’d hate for there to be another mishap so soon,” Officer Robinson says, turning his eyes back to me. “Now we need to take care of him. He’s been a real thorn in my side.”

“What would you like us to do with him?” the taller one asks.

“Get him to the operating room and help the doc secure him to the table. Doc will be able to get the job done quicker with him knocked out.”

“And her?” the same guy asks, glancing down at Stacey, who’s clutching at her chest and making gurgling sounds.

“Put the body on ice. This is what that little bitch gets for being so damn careless.” He spits her way and I shift my weight to my stronger side, blood soaking through my jeans.

Large arms grab hold of me, dragging me down a long hallway and into a freezing room. Who I assume is the doctor Stacey was arguing with earlier is standing by a metal table, shifting his glasses on his face with shaking hands. “You said the other guy was the last one.”

“Well, I lied.” Robinson shoves a table holding a set of medical tools. “This will be the last one.”

The doctor’s face pales. “I can’t. Please.” His words are thick with emotion. “You’ll have to get someone else. We had a deal.”

“Yeah, that was before you stabbed one of my guys in the neck and tried to run. You broke that deal yourself. Now do what I ask, or I make a phone call you don’t want me to make.”

The doctor’s chest rises and falls heavily as he looks down at his feet and slips on gloves from his pocket. “Okay. Get him strapped to the table.” He sounds so detached. I guess you’d have to be in order to do something like this time and time again. It’s me or his family. I’d do the same, wouldn’t I? I can’t say either way. No one can until they’re in that position, so who am I to judge him for being selfish—for choosing his loved ones over others?

The three larger men force me onto the table, securing me before the doctor brings a syringe to my neck. “You know I can’t work with all these people in here,” he says, his hand going still. “And I’m going to have to stop the bleeding on that leg.”

Robinson sighs. “Fine.” He gestures for his friends with the large guns to leave the room. “I’m staying, though. I need to make sure you don’t try to pull another fast one on me.”

The nervous man nods, slipping the needle under my neck and pushing down on the syringe. The liquid gushes out between me and the table instead of being injected into me, and a pair of round blue eyes focus on mine as if telling me something his mouth can’t. I hear him loud and clear and blink my eyes, pretending to struggle to stay awake.

“He’ll be out soon. While we wait, I’ll look that leg over.” He moves down to where I was shot, cutting my pants. His face scrunches up. “Just a flesh wound. We should close it up to be on the safe side, though.” Grabbing a pair of tweezers, he removes the bullet, and I do my best to hold still, pressing my teeth together so hard I swear I hear them starting to crack.

The wound gets cleaned and stitched up while Robinson’s eyes never leave us. My clothes are torn off next and I can tell the doc is stalling. What he has planned I don’t know, but I hope it goes better than all my ideas did. One thing I don’t have to worry about is Stacey reaching Silas before I do and causing him more damage than she already has.

Silas. Damn. His wife is dead and it’s because of me. I didn’t want it to be that way but there was no other choice. It was her or me. After what she did to my husband and her own, she didn’t deserve to have her life spared. I felt bad anyway—not for her but for him—for all the lies she told, for him being nearly killed to punish me, and everything in between. I accused him. I made him feel guilty on top of everything else he was going through.

Silas didn’t deserve that. But I was running on emotions and didn’t know what to trust, not after being constantly lied to and led astray. I still don’t. Did he really find me by accident? My husband’s heart might have brought us together but I stayed because of him. With him I was given a break from the pain and grief. With him I had more to focus on than all the bad around me.

Keeping still, I fight the urge to wince as the doctor drapes a paper covering over my lap, the thin material brushing over my freshly stitched leg. Out of nowhere the restraint on my center loosens, allowing me to wiggle my wrists. As the doc cuts off more of my shirt, he leans forward, tugging up the covering to hide the strap and my body even more. As I slip my hand out, I realize he tucked a knife underneath my hips and I wrap my fingers around the handle, keeping my eyes shut.

“You’re taking too damn long,” Robinson yells. “What are you hoping to achieve by taking your time? It’s going to have to happen no matter how slow you go, Doc.”

“I told you. I don’t like to be rushed. It’s hard for me to work like this.”

“Too fucking bad. You’ll have to learn to. I’m not giving you a choice today.”

Vibration comes from my left side and the doc’s hands tense.

“What the fuck was that?”

“I . . . I don’t know,” the doctor answers, not convincing anyone with his shaky tone. “Must be coming from you.” More vibrations rattle the table.

“What are you hiding in those pockets of yours, doctor?”

“Nothing . . . I swear. I only want to do my job and go home.” The doctor pulls his hands away from me and I hear a clicking sound.

“Empty your fucking pockets. Now.” Robinson’s footsteps rush behind my head and a loud whimper echoes around the room. I open my eyes to Robinson pressing the gun to the doctor’s temple with his back to me, plucking a blinking phone from the large white coat.

“What’s this?” Robinson raises the phone, his attention fully on the scared man with frantic blue eyes in front of him. “Where the hell did you get a phone?”

Before he can get an answer, I break free from the straps, and as I sit up I drive the knife into the crooked cop’s neck, twisting it as I continue pressing my hand forward. The gun goes off and the doctor drops to the floor with a loud crashing sound. Looking back at me with wide eyes, the cop sways back and forth, loosening his grip around the gun. I pull out the knife and blood sprays from his neck, his balance suffering as he makes choking sounds.

I swipe the gun from his hand and he crumples to the ground, grabbing at his neck. He’s spasming on the floor, gurgling blood as his eyes roll into the back of his head. The doctor lifts his head and scrambles to his feet, searching for the phone. “I hope they heard it all. I called the cops but I don’t know if . . .”

His words are cut off at the sound of shots being fired, and sirens go off in the background. Kicking off the rest of the straps, I climb off the table and yank the jacket off the still body on the floor. The door is busted open and Detective Samuels stands on the other side, eyes watering and full of emotion. “Ollie? Is that . . . is that really you?”

My gaze bounces between him and the doctor, his mouth gapes open in surprise.

“You’ve been here this whole fucking time? I’ve searched all over the damn world, only for you to be minutes away from me?”

Men in uniforms rush around him holding guns, and the detective tells them to hold their fire while he listens to me explain what happened.

“Who made the call?”

“He did.” I nod my head toward the man he addressed as Ollie. “He’s not one of them, he was forced against his will.”

“Is that true, Ollie?”

Ollie flinches when Samuels steps closer to him. “Why do you keep saying my name like you know me?”

“What do you mean? It’s me, baby. Will.”

Ollie’s eyes grow smaller and he steps back. “I don’t know you. I just want to go home to my family, okay? To my mom and Lana.”

Samuels’s face falters and he lets out a shaky breath. “You don’t know what happened? You . . . Of course you don’t. You’ve been gone so long.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m so sorry, Ollie. Fuck, I’m sorry. I tried to get there on time. I was too late. I failed you. I failed them.” Samuels scrubs a hand over his face and paramedics run toward me, asking if I can walk. As they guide me out of the room, the two voices behind me get difficult to hear, but the sharp cry coming from Ollie is hard to miss. I’m guessing he was informed of news he didn’t want to hear regarding his family.

My heart pains, my throat forming knots. They lied to him, didn’t they? They already killed his family and made him believe their lives could be saved if he did everything they told him to. More wretched sounds vibrate around me as Ollie fights against the men pulling him toward a cop car. Detective Samuels struggles not to follow him, the hurt in his eyes palpable as he turns toward me.

“Mr. Pena,” he says as he gets close enough to where I’m being seated in an ambulance. “I have some more questions for you but they can wait until tomorrow. We found all the evidence we need to match your story. Emails, messages, and fingerprints. I don’t know how I could have been so blind.” His mouth closes and he swallows hard before opening it again. “I worked right next to that asshole for two years and he knew . . .” He sucks in a breath. “He promised to help me find Oliver when all this time he was the one . . . It doesn’t matter now. I can’t change what’s happened, but I can make sure we get everyone else responsible, and that Ollie stays safe.”

“Stacey she . . . she tried to kill Silas. I don’t know if he’s okay or not.”

His eyes lift. “So he wasn’t part of this?”

I shake my head, no longer having doubts in my heart. I believe him. The truth was clear in his eyes and voice. Stacey was willing to kill him herself if he tried to leave her. The woman was sick. She’s dead now and I don’t know how he’ll take it. I don’t know if he’s okay. I left him there at the hospital not knowing his condition. He was alive, but alive doesn’t mean okay.

“No,” I finally answer. “She planned to lie to him. To blame it on me. She . . . Silas and I were seeing each other. We met at the flower shop, months after the accident, and one thing led to another.”

“You’re saying you didn’t know his wife worked for your husband.”

I pause, gathering my thoughts. “I knew his name, but I didn’t connect it all until after it came up in conversation when we ran into each other at the lake. I know this sounds crazy but we had this immediate connection I can’t explain. I know how this looks and it’s not . . . Honestly, I’m not even sure what it was.” More than I can explain, and as much as I don’t want to want him, I do. I can’t stop thinking about where and how he is. Wondering if he hates me, or if he will after he knows what all happened—that I killed Stacey. I don’t know what it means that I still want him. What kind of person it makes me. It’s fucked up, isn’t it?

Samuels stares deeper into my eyes, studying me for a long time before speaking again. “We can discuss more about the relationship you two had tomorrow. Get some rest tonight and be ready for a visit from me first thing in the morning.” His tired eyes drift away from me and back to the police car holding Oliver. He has more important matters on his mind. I know the feeling. There’s only one place he wants to be right now and I have somewhere I need to be too.

Samuels says something to the paramedics before returning to the scene of the crime. I’m rolled into the back of the truck, and once strapped in, the door closes and we start moving forward.

“What hospital are we going to?” I turn my face to the man sitting next to me who’s wrapping a cuff around my arm.

“St. David’s, two blocks from here.” The same hospital Silas is at. I won’t have to wait as long as I thought to know if he’s okay. That’s all I need. Once I know he’s okay, we can go back to parting ways. Not because I blame him but because it’s what’s right. What’s logical. My husband’s dead because of him. No, he didn’t kill him himself, but Silas is the reason he’s dead and always will be. How can I keep seeing the man who’s only alive because my husband isn’t?

Weighed down by exhaustion, my thoughts begin to fade with the light above me and I let the rocking of the driving truck lull me to sleep, wanting to delay myself from having to make more hard decisions.