Chapter 5 - THE DIVORCE PAPERS HE FINALLY SIGNED
Gerald Mercer was arrested forty-eight hours later.
The news exploded across Chicago.
The celebrated surgeon and medical entrepreneur was charged with financial crimes, obstruction, conspiracy, falsification of medical records, and offenses connected to the shooting of Daniel Vale.
His photograph appeared on every local station.
So did Dominic’s.
Reporters crowded the sidewalk outside Lakeview Mercy.
Evelyn entered through a staff garage and refused every interview.
She spent her days where she trusted herself most.
In surgery.
Daniel improved quickly.
By his fourth day, he was walking the hallway while complaining with theatrical misery about hospital food.
“This chicken is a human-rights violation.”
Evelyn checked his incision.
“You were shot twice and underwent emergency heart surgery. Your priorities are fascinating.”
“I survived bullets. I shouldn’t have to survive steamed broccoli.”
Dominic sat by the window reading emails.
Daniel pointed at him.
“He agrees.”
Dominic did not look up.
“I do not.”
“You hate broccoli.”
“I hate listening to you.”
Daniel grinned.
The resemblance between the brothers was strongest when they smiled, though Dominic rarely did.
Evelyn straightened.
“You can probably go home in two days.”
Daniel’s smile faded slightly.
“Home where?”
The question carried more than geography.
The Vale family world was changing.
Businesses were being frozen.
People were disappearing.
Lawyers moved through the hospital almost daily.
Dominic had surrendered documents to federal investigators.
Everyone connected to him was being forced to decide which side of the future they wanted.
Dominic closed his laptop.
“You’ll stay with Aunt Caroline for a while.”
Daniel glanced between them.
“And you?”
“I have meetings.”
“With prosecutors?”
“Yes.”
Daniel’s jaw tightened.
“Are you going away?”
“I don’t know.”
Evelyn quietly left the room.
Dominic followed her ten minutes later.
She stood beside the windows at the end of the cardiac floor.
“You’re avoiding me,” he said.
“I work here.”
“You operated fourteen hours yesterday.”
“That’s not avoiding you. That’s cardiothoracic surgery.”
“You volunteered for two additional cases.”
She turned.
“Did you investigate my schedule?”
“The nurse mentioned it.”
“Which nurse?”
Dominic stopped himself.
“Fair.”
She almost smiled.
They stood silently.
Finally Evelyn asked, “When?”
“Tomorrow.”
“The federal meeting?”
“Yes.”
“And after that?”
“They may allow me to remain free while the case develops. Or they may not.”
“You say that like you’re discussing weather.”
“I don’t know another way to say it.”
“Try being afraid.”
His face changed.
“I am.”
The answer made her look at him.
Dominic stepped closer but left several feet between them.
“I’m afraid Daniel will hate me.”
“He won’t.”
“I’m afraid my cooperation won’t be enough to protect people who had nothing to do with any of this.”
“That’s possible.”
“I’m afraid your father will convince himself everything is my fault.”
“He already has.”
A faint almost-smile.
Then Dominic looked directly into her eyes.
“And I’m afraid I found you three years too late.”
There it was.
The sentence neither of them had touched.
Evelyn looked down at her hands.
“You don’t get me back because you confessed.”
“I know.”
“You don’t get me because my father was worse.”
“I know.”
“You don’t get me because you’re trying to change.”
“I know.”
She looked up sharply.
“Stop agreeing with me.”
“I’m trying not to repeat previous mistakes.”
“That may be the most annoying possible way to do it.”
This time he actually smiled.
Briefly.
It transformed his face.
And Evelyn hated how clearly her body remembered it.
She looked away.
“I was unhappy before I left.”
“I know.”
“No, listen.”
The smile disappeared.
Evelyn continued.
“My father lied. But that doesn’t erase everything I felt in your house. I couldn’t breathe. There were people outside every door. Somebody always knew where I was. Everybody called me Mrs. Vale before they learned my first name.”
Dominic listened.
“I had spent my entire life fighting to become Dr. Mercer. Then overnight I became somebody’s wife, somebody’s alliance, somebody’s protected asset.”
“I should have seen that.”
“You couldn’t. You lived your whole life inside that system.”
“That doesn’t excuse it.”
“No.”
She took a breath.
“But I made a mistake too.”
Dominic said nothing.
“I ran instead of confronting you.”
“You had reason.”
“I had fear.”
“That is a reason.”
“It is not always a good one.”
The words were painful to admit.
“For three years, I told myself leaving was the bravest thing I ever did. Maybe it was. But disappearing completely? Never giving you a chance to answer? Never checking whether my father’s story was true?”
She shook her head.
“That part wasn’t bravery.”
Dominic’s voice was quiet.
“What was it?”
“Survival.”
He nodded.
“And later?”
She looked at him.
“Pride.”
That surprised him.
“After about a year, I started wondering if I had been wrong. By eighteen months, I knew parts of what I believed didn’t make sense.”
“Why didn’t you contact me?”
“Because then I would have had to admit that running didn’t solve everything.”
Dominic leaned against the window frame.
“I would have answered.”
“I know that now.”
“I might have answered badly.”
She laughed.
“I know that too.”
They fell silent.
Outside, October rain streaked the windows.
Inside Daniel’s room, a television played quietly.
May you like
Life continued with complete indifference to the fact that two people were standing in a hospital hallway deciding whether three lost years were an ending.
Dominic finally said, “I signed the divorce papers.”
