Chapter 2 - The Thirteenth Diagnosis
"Open it."
Gideon's voice barely carried across the bedroom.
Rafael didn't need to hear it twice.
He kicked the bathroom door.
Once.
Twice.
The lock broke on the third strike.
The door slammed against the wall.
The adjoining dressing room was empty.
A narrow service entrance stood open at the far end.
"Marco!" Rafael shouted.
The second bodyguard disappeared through it.
Norah remained beside Gideon's bed.
The monitor was still racing.
"His pulse is getting worse."
Mercer moved toward the IV.
Norah blocked him.
The doctor stared at her.
"Move."
"No."
"He's my patient."
"And somebody changed that bag without anyone seeing."
"Which is why I need to treat him."
Norah looked at Gideon.
His face was gray.
She couldn't play detective while he died.
"Get a sealed saline bag," she said.
Mercer's eyes widened.
"You don't give orders here."
Gideon forced out two words.
"She does."
Everyone looked at him.
Mercer appeared stunned.
Gideon swallowed.
"Until we know what's happening... Norah stays."
Rafael returned.
"Marco's checking the service hall. Whoever it was had a head start."
"Seal the estate," Gideon said.
"Already happening."
Norah examined the IV connection.
She had worked at a long-term care facility, but she wasn't a doctor. She knew enough to recognize danger and enough to know what she didn't know.
"We need someone independent."
Rafael nodded.
"I know a physician the boss trusts."
Mercer laughed bitterly.
"Apparently trust is more important than medicine now."
Gideon's eyes moved toward him.
"Today? Yes."
Thirty-five minutes later, Dr. Lena Hart arrived.
She was fifty-two, direct, and unimpressed by the armed men who searched her medical bag.
She examined Gideon.
Reviewed his records.
Then inspected the suspicious drink and IV bag without touching either.
"I want both tested."
Mercer folded his arms.
"For what?"
"Everything."
"That's not a scientific answer."
"No," Hart replied. "It's what you do when twelve physicians have failed to explain progressive multisystem deterioration and somebody starts secretly replacing IV bags."
Mercer said nothing.
Hart ordered new blood work.
Then she asked Norah to repeat exactly what she'd noticed.
Norah did.
The breakfast.
The sediment.
The timing.
The changing appetite.
Hart listened without interruption.
"How long has he been drinking this?"
"Nineteen days that I know of."
"Symptoms?"
"Three weeks," Rafael said.
Hart's eyes sharpened.
"Interesting."
Mercer sighed.
"Correlation isn't causation."
"No," Hart agreed. "But it's worth testing."
Gideon watched the exchange from his pillow.
Norah noticed his attention drifting.
"You need to rest."
His eyes returned to her.
"Everybody keeps saying that."
"Maybe because you're terrible at it."
Rafael looked away.
Hart smiled.
Gideon didn't.
But some of the hardness left his face.
Two hours later, the estate became a fortress.
Every employee was questioned.
Security footage was collected.
Kitchen staff were separated.
Nobody entered Gideon's room without Rafael's approval.
Norah expected to be dismissed.
Instead, Gideon ordered a chair placed beside his bed.
"For me?" she asked.
"For whoever I decide watches my food."
"And that's me?"
"For now."
Norah sat.
"This isn't exactly in my job description."
"You complained?"
"No."
"Good."
His eyes closed.
Several minutes passed.
Norah thought he'd fallen asleep.
Then he spoke.
"Why did you really notice the glass?"
She looked at him.
"I told you."
"You told me what happened. Not why you noticed."
Norah hesitated.
"My mother was sick."
Gideon opened his eyes.
"For a long time?"
"Two years."
"Hospital?"
"Mostly home."
Norah folded her hands.
"When somebody's sick long enough, you start noticing stupid little things. How much water they drink. Whether they finish breakfast. What color their skin is. Whether they hold the railing going downstairs."
Gideon said nothing.
"I couldn't save her," Norah continued. "But I learned to pay attention."
"I'm sorry."
The words surprised her.
They didn't sound automatic.
"Thank you."
Gideon looked toward the window.
"My mother died when I was sixteen."
Norah hadn't expected that either.
"What happened?"
His face closed immediately.
"Different story."
She understood the boundary.
A knock interrupted them.
Rafael entered carrying a tablet.
"We found the kitchen footage."
Gideon sat straighter.
"Show me."
The video showed Gideon's breakfast being prepared at 6:08.
A cook poured the red nutritional drink from a sealed bottle.
At 6:12, the tray was placed on a counter.
At 6:14, a kitchen assistant walked away.
At 6:15—
The screen flickered.
Static.
Then the timestamp jumped.
6:18.
Norah leaned forward.
"Three minutes are missing."
Rafael nodded.
"Only from this camera."
"Who can delete footage?" Gideon asked.
"Security supervisors. Me. Marco. Two systems administrators."
"Names."
Rafael gave them.
Gideon memorized every one.
Norah pointed at the screen.
"Go back."
Rafael rewound.
"Stop."
6:14:58.
The last clear frame before the interruption.
A reflection appeared in the polished steel refrigerator door.
Only part of a person.
White sleeve.
Dark trousers.
A hand.
And something around the wrist.
Norah leaned closer.
A silver bracelet.
"No doctor here wears that," Rafael said.
Norah's stomach tightened.
"I've seen it."
Gideon looked at her.
"Where?"
She tried to remember.
Kitchen?
Laundry?
Staff corridor?
Then it came back.
"Yesterday."
"Who?"
Norah stood.
"The person who delivered your medication inventory."
Rafael's face changed.
"Name."
"I don't know. I signed for the boxes."
"Male or female?"
"Male. Maybe forty. He said he was from the pharmacy."
Rafael was already calling security.
Norah continued thinking.
"He had a tattoo."
"What kind?"
"Small. Here."
She touched the inside of her wrist.
"What was it?"
"Three lines. Like a crown."
Gideon went still.
Rafael slowly lowered his phone.
Norah looked between them.
"What?"
Gideon's expression had become colder than she'd seen it all day.
"That isn't a crown."
"What is it?"
"A trident."
Rafael closed the bedroom door.
Gideon stared at the frozen reflection on the tablet.
"Eleven years ago, Samuel Vale worked for my father."
"The dead doctor?"
"Yes."
"What does that have to do with a trident?"
Gideon looked at her.
"Vale wasn't only a doctor."
Norah waited.
"He belonged to a man named Victor Soren."
Rafael interrupted.
"We don't know that."
"I do."
"Gideon—"
"She found the glass. She's already involved."
Norah didn't like the sound of that.
"Who is Victor Soren?"
Gideon didn't answer immediately.
Then:
"The man who ordered my mother's death."
Silence filled the room.
Norah looked again at the scratched identification badge.
Eleven years.
A dead doctor.
An old enemy.
And someone inside Gideon's house carrying the same symbol.
Dr. Hart entered before Norah could ask another question.
She was holding a laboratory report.
Her face was different.
Not frightened.
Stunned.
Gideon noticed immediately.
"What?"
Hart closed the door.
"The preliminary analysis came back."
Mercer, standing near the window, turned sharply.
"Already?"
Hart looked at him.
That one glance made Norah's stomach tighten.
"What did you find?" Gideon asked.
Hart approached the bed.
"The substance in the glass isn't part of any nutritional formula."
Mercer's face drained.
Hart placed the report on Gideon's blanket.
"And that's not the worst part."
She pointed to a second result.
"The same compound is in Gideon's blood."
Norah stopped breathing.
Gideon's eyes moved down the page.
"How much?"
"Enough to explain several symptoms."
"Can you treat it?"
"Possibly."
"Possibly?"
Hart hesitated.
"Because there's another compound in your blood. Something different."
Norah looked at Mercer.
He was moving.
Slowly.
Toward the bedroom door.
Rafael saw him.
"Doctor."
Mercer stopped.
Hart turned another page.
"This second substance could only have entered his bloodstream recently."
"How recently?" Norah asked.
Hart looked toward the replaced IV bag.
"Within the last hour."
A phone vibrated.
Everyone froze.
It was Mercer's.
He didn't reach for it.
Rafael did.
He removed the phone from Mercer's pocket.
One message glowed on the screen.
NO MORE MISTAKES. FINISH WOLF BEFORE THE MAID TALKS.
Rafael raised his gun.
Mercer stared at the message.
Then at Norah.
May you like
And whispered:
"You have no idea who you just made angry."
