Chapter 3 No.3

By the fourth day, the darkness had become a dull, constant companion. The sharp pain behind her eyes had faded to a low throb.

Dr. Lin said she should walk. Keep the circulation going.

The nurse was busy with a code blue down the hall. Dahlia could hear the alarms. She didn't want to wait.

She picked up the white cane they had given her. It felt light, flimsy. A toy.

She put on the large, black sunglasses over her bandages. She looked like a celebrity in rehab, or a very confused insect.

She stepped into the hallway.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

The sound of the cane on the tile was rhythmic. It was her sonar.

She counted her steps. Twenty paces to the nurses' station. Turn left. Thirty paces to the solarium.

The air in the hallway was cooler. It smelled of coffee and floor wax.

At the other end of the corridor, worlds away, Clive Harrington stepped off the elevator.

He was not in London. The deal had closed early. He was here to see Professor Gold, his mentor from Wharton, who had suffered a mild stroke.

Clive checked his phone. His assistant, Arthur, was listing the afternoon schedule.

Meeting with the board at 2. Dinner with the Senator at 7.

Cancel the dinner, Clive said. His voice was low, a baritone that usually made people stop talking and start listening. I hate that man.

Arthur scurried beside him, typing furiously on a tablet.

Clive turned the corner. He walked with purpose. He always walked like he owned the ground beneath his feet. Usually, he did.

Dahlia heard footsteps. Fast. Heavy. Confident.

She tried to move to the right, to hug the wall. But her internal compass was off. She drifted left.

The footsteps got closer.

She swung the cane out, checking for obstacles.

Crack.

The tip of the cane struck something solid. Leather. Bone.

The footsteps stopped abruptly.

Dahlia froze. The cane vibrated in her hand.

I am so sorry! she gasped. She pulled the cane back against her chest. I... I didn't judge the distance.

There was a pause. A silence that felt heavy.

Clive looked down.

His Italian leather shoe had a scuff mark. He frowned. He looked up at the offender.

A woman. Small. Dressed in a shapeless hospital gown and a gray cardigan that looked three sizes too big. Her face was swallowed by massive sunglasses and layers of white gauze.

She looked like a stiff wind would blow her over.

Watch where you're going, he said.

His voice was automatic. Cold. Dismissive. He didn't even really look at her. He stepped around her, his shoulder brushing the air near hers.

Arthur, trailing a step behind, slowed for a fraction of a second, his gaze lingering on the woman's frame. The height, the delicate chin... it was familiar, but he dismissed it as coincidence and hurried to catch up to his boss.

Dahlia stopped breathing.

The voice.

It wrapped around her spine like a cold wire.

Clive?

No. It couldn't be.

The man walked past her. The scent of him trailed behind. Cedarwood. Crisp rain. And something metallic, like money.

Dahlia stood frozen in the middle of the hallway. Her heart hammered against her ribs like a trapped bird.

It sounded exactly like him.

But Clive Harrington wouldn't be on the fourth floor of a major medical center without an entourage. He would be in the penthouse suite of Mount Sinai, or in London.

She shook her head. Paranoia. The stress was getting to her.

She turned around, tapping the cane rapidly, retreating to the safety of her room.

Clive reached the elevator. He pressed the button.

Something nagged at him.

That voice.

It was soft, terrified. But the timbre...

He frowned. He replayed the moment in his head. The way she held the cane. The messy hair.

Arthur, he said.

Yes, Mr. Harrington?

Go back to the nurse's station. Find out who is in room... He calculated the distance back from where they collided. Room 404.

Arthur looked confused. Why, sir?

Just do it.

Clive didn't know why. He wasn't a man of intuition. He was a man of data. But the data in his head-the voice, the height, the chin that poked out from under the bandages-was forming a pattern he didn't like.

Arthur ran back.

Clive held the elevator door open with his foot. He waited.

Two minutes later, Arthur returned. His face was pale. He looked like he had seen a ghost, or worse, a lawsuit.

Well? Clive demanded.

Sir, Arthur swallowed hard. The patient in 404. It's... it's Mrs. Harrington.

Clive's hand tightened on the elevator door. The metal groaned.

Dahlia?

Yes, sir. She checked in under her maiden name.

Clive felt a sensation he rarely experienced. It started in his gut and burned its way up to his throat. It wasn't just anger. It was something sharper.

She was here. Blind. Alone. And she hadn't told him.

He stepped out of the elevator.

Cancel the board meeting, he growled.