Chapter 3
Keith turned his back to me, blocking her view of my face with his shoulders.
“He is not responding to deep pain stimuli,” Keith told her, his voice perfectly flat and professional.
The nurse made a quick note on her clipboard and stepped back out.
“A private suite at St. Jude’s costs four thousand dollars a night,” Keith said, his pen hovering over the chart.
“I don’t care about the cost,” I said, my voice barely a whisper against the hum of the ventilation.
“It is not the money, Dominic, it is the exposure,” he replied, looking toward the door.
We could hear the distant clatter of metal trays and the low murmur of nurses shifting schedules.
“They will want to see you,” Keith said. “They will want to bring in their own specialists.”
“You tell them I am too unstable for visitors,” I said.
Keith sighed, his shoulders dropping as he signed his name at the bottom of the intake form.
“I will transfer you to the penthouse suite on the sixth floor,” Keith said. “It has a private entrance.”
“Who called you?” I asked.
“Your cousin Anthony,” Keith said. “He said he was already on his way from the office.”
“Anthony was at the office at midnight?” I asked.
Keith didn’t answer, instead adjusting the plastic collar around my neck to keep my chin high.
“He said he was working late on the new shipping tenders,” Keith said.
The docks were quiet after eight, and Anthony had no business in the terminal building after dark.
“Write the chart,” I said. “Tell them my brain activity is flat.”
Keith stared at the wall for three long seconds before nodding his head once.
The light outside the sixth-floor window turned the color of wet slate as the sun began to rise over the East River.
May you like
Keith stood near the desk, writing slowly on a heavy clipboard.
“I have listed it as a severe concussion with prolonged loss of consciousness,” he said.
