Chapter 5

Silence stretched in the room, heavy and suffocating, like a physical weight pressing against my chest.

Kayla began to sob. It was a loud, heaving sound-too sharp, too rhythmic. It felt performed.

"How can you say that?" she cried, her voice pitching up. "I tried to help her! I bought her expensive supplements! I did everything! Garrison, tell her!"

Garrison looked at me. His eyes were pleading. Not for forgiveness, but for compliance. For silence.

"Janet," he said, his voice low, reasonable, terrifyingly calm. "You are upset. You are not thinking clearly. The toxicology report showed an allergic reaction. That is all."

"An allergic reaction to arsenic?" I asked, my voice dead flat.

"Stop it!" Mrs. Gardner stepped forward, her pearls rattling with her indignation. "How dare you accuse this poor girl? Look at her! She is fragile. You are vicious."

I didn't look at Mrs. Gardner. I kept my eyes locked on Garrison.

"Is that your final answer?" I asked him. "You deny it?"

He clenched his jaw, a muscle feathering in his cheek. He looked at Kayla, sobbing in his arms, then at his parents, who were watching him with heavy, silent expectation.

"It was an accident," he said finally, the words tasting like ash. "If it was anything, it was an accident. Kayla would never hurt anyone."

He chose her. Again.

He didn't just choose her; he aligned himself with the lie.

"Okay," I said.

I picked up the pen-the cheap, plastic hospital pen, not the silver one he had once given me.

I signed the papers. The scratch of the ink sounded like a scream in the quiet room.

I didn't read them. It didn't matter anymore.

I threw the folder at his chest. It hit him with a dull thud, papers fluttering to the floor.

"Take it," I said. "It is blood money. I hope it buys you everything you deserve."

I turned my back on them. "Get out. All of you."

They left. The air in the room shifted as they retreated. I heard Kayla whisper, "She is insane," just before the door clicked shut.

I was alone with my mother.

The silence returned, but now it was empty. Hollow.

"I tried, Mom," I whispered, brushing a stray hair from her forehead. "I tried to get justice."

I checked my phone.

Two days left. Two days until the deadline. Two days until they won.

But I couldn't wait two days. Whatever patience I had left had just walked out the door with them.

I texted Alex. Tonight.

Later that night, Garrison came back.

It was past midnight. The hospital hallways were dim, bathed in that sterile, sickly blue light.

He stood in the doorway. He didn't come in.

"Janet," he said.

I didn't turn around. I was packing my mother's few personal items into a bag-her comb, her reading glasses, the scarf she loved.

"I know you are angry," he said, leaning against the frame. "But you have to understand. Kayla... she has had a hard life. She didn't mean to cause harm. And my parents... they just want the firm to succeed."

"You are gaslighting me, Garrison," I said calmly, folding the scarf with precision. "You are standing over my dying mother and telling me her murder was a misunderstanding."

"She is not murdered, Janet! She is in a coma!"

"Because of the poison."

"Because she was old and sick!" he shouted. The sound echoed down the empty corridor. Then, realizing where he was, he lowered his voice. "Look. I deposited money into your account. Enough for... for everything. Just stop talking about the poison. If that rumor gets out, the merger dies."

"Is that all you care about?" I asked, finally pausing. "The merger?"

"It is my legacy," he said. "It is our future."

"Your future," I corrected.

I finally turned to look at him.

"You can go, Garrison. Go to your merger. Go to Kayla."

"I will come back tomorrow," he said, straightening his tie, assuming he had won. "We can talk when you are calmer."

"Sure," I said. "Tomorrow."

He hesitated. He looked at me, really looked at me, for the first time in years. There was a flicker of something in his eyes-regret, perhaps, or maybe just pity.

"I do love you, Janet," he said. "In my own way."

"I know," I said. "That is the saddest part."

He left. His footsteps faded down the hall.

I waited ten minutes. I needed the air to clear of his scent.

Then I took out my phone. I blocked his number. I blocked his parents. I blocked the firm.

I deleted every photo of us. Every smile, every vacation, every lie. Gone in a tap.

I walked out of the room.

I passed the nurse's station.

"I am going home for the night," I told the night nurse. "Call me if anything changes."

"Goodnight, Mrs. Gardner," she said automatically.

"It is Ms. Meyers," I said sharply.

I walked to the elevator.

As the doors opened, I saw a TV mounted on the wall in the waiting area. The volume was muted, but the chyron screamed in bright red.

It was a live broadcast.

Garrison was on one knee. He was holding a ring. Not my ring. A bigger one-a rock that looked heavy enough to sink a ship.

Kayla was covering her mouth with her hands, feigning shock, her eyes glittering with triumph.

The headline read: "Gardner Heir Proposes at Charity Gala After-Party."

He had left the hospital and gone straight to her.

He proposed to the woman who poisoned my mother, on the night he stole my inheritance.

I didn't cry. The tears were gone. Burned away.

I stepped into the elevator and pressed the button for the ground floor.

As the numbers ticked down, I felt lighter. Untethered.

The elevator dinged.

The doors opened.

Alex was waiting in the lobby. He held a plane ticket in his hand.

"Ready?" he asked.

"Ready," I said.

I walked out of the hospital, into the dark, cold night.

I didn't look back.

The fire was lit. Now, I just had to let it burn.