Chapter 3

Everly sat on the hard plastic bench outside the emergency room at New York-Presbyterian Hospital. Her hands were covered in dried, sticky blood.

The fluorescent lights in the hallway buzzed with a harsh, blinding white glare. She stared straight ahead, her eyes locked onto the red "SURGERY IN PROGRESS" sign above the heavy double doors.

Every second felt like a physical weight pressing down on her chest. She pulled her phone from her pocket. Her fingers were stiff and cold. She dialed Carson's number.

The call went straight to a cold, automated voicemail.

Everly slammed the phone down onto the plastic bench. She pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes and let out a low, suffocating sob that burned her throat.

Suddenly, the red light above the doors clicked off. The heavy airtight doors slid open with a mechanical hiss.

Dr. Elias Thornton walked out. He pulled down his surgical mask, revealing a face lined with exhaustion. There were fresh blood splatters on his blue scrubs. He walked slowly toward Everly.

Everly shot up from the bench. The sudden movement drained the blood from her head. Her vision went black at the edges, and she stumbled forward.

Dr. Thornton caught her by the arm, steadying her.

"Mrs. Moss," he said, his voice heavy with finality. "I am so sorry. The delay in getting him here caused massive myocardial infarction. His heart suffered too much damage. Arthur Weber is gone."

The words hit the back of Everly's skull like a sledgehammer. A high-pitched ringing instantly deafened her.

She opened her mouth to speak, but her throat felt like it was filled with wet cement. No sound came out.

She shoved Dr. Thornton aside and stumbled blindly into the emergency room.

In the center of the room, a body lay on a metal table, covered by a thin white sheet.

Everly walked toward it, her legs feeling like lead. She reached out with a trembling hand and pulled the sheet back.

Arthur's face was sunken, his skin a terrifying, ashen gray.

The dam inside Everly's chest shattered.

She collapsed against the edge of the metal bed, letting out a raw, animalistic scream of pure agony. The sound tore from her lungs, echoing off the sterile tile walls. The edges of her vision darkened, the room spun violently, and she hit the floor, slipping into total darkness.

When Everly opened her eyes again, she was staring at a plain white ceiling. She was lying in a private hospital room. A sharp pinch in the back of her hand told her an IV drip was taped to her skin.

Before she could process the pain in her head, the cell phone on the bedside table began to ring. It was a sharp, grating sound.

Everly turned her head slowly. She reached out and answered the call.

"Everly," Marion Moss's voice came through the speaker. Her mother-in-law sounded haughty, cold, and entirely unbothered.

Marion didn't offer a single word of condolence.

"Listen to me carefully," Marion ordered. "You will post a statement on your social media accounts immediately. You will say the incident at the banquet was a misunderstanding. You will state that Arthur died of natural causes due to old age."

Everly's lungs stopped working. The sheer audacity of the demand sent a shock of ice-cold rage straight into her veins.

"I will not cover up a murder," Everly said, her voice a harsh whisper.

Marion let out a dry, cruel laugh.

"You will do exactly as I say," Marion threatened. "Or I will freeze every single cent of the medical trust fund paying for your crippled daughter's treatments."

At the sound of Aria's name being used as a bargaining chip, something inside Everly snapped. The soft, accommodating woman she had been for four years died in that hospital bed. Her eyes hardened, turning cold and vicious.

Everly didn't say another word. She pulled the phone away from her ear and hit end.

She reached over with her right hand, grabbed the plastic IV tube taped to her left hand, and ripped it out of her vein in one violent motion.

A stream of hot blood immediately ran down her knuckles, dripping onto the white bedsheets.

She grabbed a rough paper towel, pressed it hard against the bleeding hole in her hand, and threw the blanket off. She shoved her bare feet into her ruined heels.

A nurse walked into the room, her eyes widening at the blood. "Ma'am, you can't-"

Everly shoved the nurse out of the way. Her eyes were so dead, so filled with raw intent, that the nurse stumbled back and didn't dare follow.

Everly walked into the hospital elevator. She stared at her reflection in the metal doors. Her hair was a tangled mess. She clenched her fists.

She walked out the front doors of the hospital. The freezing, early morning wind of New York hit her face, but it did nothing to cool the boiling rage in her chest.

She flagged down a yellow taxi. She ripped the back door open and slid onto the cracked leather seat.

The driver looked at her in the rearview mirror, his eyes wide with shock at her bloody, disheveled state. "Where to, lady?"

Everly stared out the window at the dark city streets.

"Tribeca," Everly said, her voice like crushed glass. She gave him the exact address of the penthouse Carson had bought for his mistress.