Chapter 11 #2
"I'll fix everything." His favorite phrase.
Once, it had sounded like safety. Now it sounded like a threat.
He would fix everything: decide where I would lie, who my doctor would be, which papers would be signed, who would take my documents, what name my child would bear, when they would announce that I was alive, and when they would kill me again, depending on which version served them.
I looked at the monitor and suddenly felt such piercing clarity that even the pain in my abdomen receded.
A man who says, "I'll fix everything," before you have even had the chance to say what you want is not rescuing you.
He is taking the wheel out of your hands, then acting surprised when you crash.
"Give me the intercom," I said.
Graham turned sharply.
"No."
"I won't go outside. But I will answer him."
"He'll bait you into an emotional reaction."
"Let him try. He has plenty of experience, and I have new motivation."
Irene stepped in.
"Lana, you can't..."
"Dr. Foster." I looked at her, and my voice suddenly dropped to almost a whisper.
"If I stay silent now, he'll decide I'm still the woman on the deck, the one he could shove aside and watch drown. I need him to hear that I'm nowhere near the railing anymore."
She pressed her lips together. Her gaze fell to my stomach, then moved to Graham.
"Two minutes. Sitting down. No yelling. If her blood pressure spikes, I'm shutting both of you down."
"Both of us?"
"You and your drama."
Andrew, who had been silent until then, said hoarsely:
"I'll keep an eye on the drama."
Graham watched me for another second. Then he pressed the button.
"Mr. Mercer, your wife wants to respond. I suggest you listen closely. Life doesn't give gifts like this very often."
He switched on the microphone. Not the camera. Voice only. And still, it felt as though Adrian could see straight through me.
"Lana?"
For the first time, something real entered his voice. Not love. Shock. Alive. To him, I was no longer a line of text, a threat, an asset. I was a voice. The voice of his dead wife coming from another man's house.
"Don't say my name as if you still have the right," I said.
The silence at the gates rang like glass.
"You're my wife."
"Yesterday, that didn't help me get into a lifeboat."
He paused.
"I made a mistake."
I closed my eyes.
A mistake.
That was what he called my life jacket on Nikki, my bag on the seat, my scream, the order he gave his guard, the water in my lungs. A mistake. Not a crime. Not a betrayal. Not a choice. A mistake. Like the wrong number in a report.
"A mistake is picking up the wrong glass at dinner, Adrian. You mistook me for someone you could kill and then mourn beautifully."
"I panicked."
"No. People in a panic grab for life. You were grabbing for a narrative."
"I was saving a pregnant woman."
"And what was I carrying inside me, Adrian? Air? Your guilt? Or are you still waiting for Dr. Gordon to issue a report saying I'm hallucinating a fetus in my uterus?"
Someone outside the gates drew a sharp breath. Vivian? The commander? It did not matter. Adrian lowered his voice.
"Don't say that in front of strangers."
"Why? Does it bother you when people hear about your paternity before your attorneys approve the statement?"
"I want to protect the baby."
I laughed. Irene immediately pressed her fingers to my wrist to check my pulse.
"From whom? Me? The river? The folder with my father's name on it? Or your mother, who is already cutting my life into exhibits for a contract?"
"My mother has nothing to do with this."
"She had something to do with it before I ever married you. And possibly before my parents died."
I said it deliberately. Not because I was certain.
Because I wanted to see who flinched. On the camera, Adrian did not move, but Vivian spun toward him.
The commander frowned. The guards exchanged looks.
At my side, Graham gave an almost imperceptible nod, like a chess player watching an opponent's piece cover the wrong square.
"You don't understand what you're talking about," Adrian said.
"Then explain it to me."
"Not here."
"How convenient. My death can be discussed live on television, my mental health through a leaked medical report, my pregnancy at the gates of another man's house, but my parents' deaths naturally require privacy."
"Lana, you're playing with things that are..."
"That are what? Older than I am? More valuable than I am? More dangerous than I am? Go on. I'd love to hear what other category you've invented for the truth."
He was silent. I could hear the wind beyond the gates, the soft hum of medical equipment beside me, Irene breathing at my side, ready to end the conversation at any moment.
I felt sick. Truly sick. My body was beginning to rebel against every emotion, and my hands had gone cold, but my mind was so clear I was afraid to blink and lose it.
"Let Kyle go," I said.
"He stole documents."
"He gave me back a piece of my life."
"He betrayed me."
"Funny, coming from a man who betrayed his wife yesterday, beat a witness today, and will probably classify the whole thing as a corporate dispute tomorrow."
"You've become cruel."
For one second, I was speechless. Not from guilt. From the sheer audacity. He had actually said it with pain, almost reproach, as if my hardness were a crime in its own right and not a burn left by his hands.
"No, Adrian. I've become precise. You haven't seen me cruel yet."
Silence.
Then his voice changed. The attempted tenderness vanished, along with the public grief and almost all the silk wrapping. Only metal remained.
"Come out. Now. Or I'll come in myself."
Graham pressed the button and answered for me.
"Try it."
Vivian stepped toward the camera.
"Mr. Lawson, you are making a mistake. That woman is not worth a war."
I leaned forward, forgetting the warning, the weakness, everything.
"Vivian," I said into the microphone. "You've spent your entire life misjudging the value of women."
She went pale. Truly pale this time. Only for a second. But I saw it. And I remembered.
Graham switched off the microphone.
"That's it," he said. "Enough."
"No, I..."
"Enough, Lana."
This time I did not argue. Because I had no strength left.
Because my abdomen had begun to ache again.
Because the tiny heart inside me might now be beating faster not from life, but from my recklessness.
I sank back against the pillow, and Irene immediately bent over me, cursing under her breath with such virtuosity that under different circumstances Andrew might have applauded.
On the gate monitor, people began to move. The police commander was speaking on his phone. Adrian's guards approached the gates. Vivian stood perfectly still, a black needle against the night. Adrian stared into the camera. He was no longer smiling.
Graham turned to Andrew.
"North plan."
"Got it."
"Find Chisholm."
"They're already looking."
"Get Kyle out before morning."
"Assuming they haven't moved him."
"That's why I said before morning."
I turned my head with difficulty.
"Get him out? You can do that?"
Graham did not look at me.
"We can try."
"I don't want anyone to..."
"Too late. A proper fight has already started because of you. Don't spoil it with nobility."
I closed my eyes. I wanted to cry, but once again there were no tears.
Perhaps my body had decided to conserve water after the river.
Irene gave me an injection. The world began to blur at the edges, sounds softening, the walls of the room receding.
The last things I saw before sinking into a medicated haze were the headlights at the gates and Adrian's face on the monitor.
He raised his phone and typed something.
A second later, a new message appeared on Graham's screen.
I managed to read it before the letters dissolved.
"If you won't come out, I'll take what's inside you."
And that was the first time I truly feared for someone other than myself.
Adrian no longer wanted his wife back.
He wanted an heir.