Chapter 3 3

"Can I see him?" I asked Agent Ramirez the next morning. My voice was hoarse.

She didn't even look up from her papers.

"Agent Brooks is busy with the investigation. He has no time for civilian contact not pertinent to the case."

Civilian contact. That's what I was now.

I hid my face in the cheap hospital pillow.

The tears came then, hot and silent.

He never loved me.

It was all a performance.

My phone, miraculously returned to me, lay on the bedside table.

I remembered sending him a text just last night, before the wedding.

"Can't wait to be Mrs. Brooks. Love you more than words can say."

He hadn't replied.

I'd thought he was busy with last-minute wedding things.

My thumb hovered over his contact.

Maybe if I called. Maybe he'd explain.

It rang. Once. Twice.

"Brooks." His voice, clipped, impatient.

"Ethan, it's Ava."

Silence.

Then, "This number is for official DEA business only. Do not call it again."

The line went dead.

I tried again.

A recorded message: "The number you have dialed has blocked incoming calls from your number."

Blocked.

He'd blocked me.

The pain in my shoulder was a dull ache compared to this.

Days blurred.

More questions. More sterile rooms.

The nurses were kind but distant.

I was the daughter of a drug lord. A pariah.

But I didn't believe it. My father? Scorpion?

It wasn't possible. He was a philanthropist. A senator.

He loved me.