Then Destroyed Me

Chapter 3 The Receipt of Malice

"Acute rejection?" Bianca came closer, the silk of her gown moving over the sterile floor. "Please. A woman can get anything she wants if she cries at the right time. Alessio doesn't check the charts when I sound frightened."

I slipped one hand into the pocket of my robe. Carmen's recorder was still there, small enough to disappear inside my palm. I pressed the button beneath the blanket and heard a faint click.

Bianca noticed nothing.

"He gave me the port tonight," she said. "A welcome gift. He said you wouldn't need it anymore. You made yourself indispensable, Eleanor. That only made you useful. He never had to ask whether you would pay the next price."

Her sweet perfume reached me before she bent over the bed. I had smelled it in Alessio's car, his office, and finally our house. Bianca had never needed to hide how much space she was taking.

"He's tired of you. The sad eyes. The reminders of what you did for him. Your jealousy."

I kept my breathing even and let her talk. The recorder was warm against my fingers. If I survived, Carmen would have a confession. If I did not, the council would still hear it.

"He couldn't throw you out without looking ungrateful," she went on. "He's a man of tradition. So we found a quieter way. The family gets a tragic widow, and no one has to ask why he discarded the woman who took a bullet for him."

She opened her jeweled clutch and took out a syringe. The liquid inside was clear enough to pass unnoticed in an IV line. My pulse climbed before she even removed the cap.

"What is it?"

"A sepsis accelerator. The doctors will say your body gave out after three difficult years. Alessio will mourn our brave Eleanor for a day or two. Then he'll move on."

She drove the needle into my IV line before I could reach the call button.

Cold hit first. Then heat tore up my arm and spread through my chest. My back lifted off the bed before my muscles gave way. Black spots crowded my vision, and the heart monitor changed from its tired rhythm to a rapid alarm.

Bianca watched the red lights flash across the wall.

"Goodbye, Eleanor. Try not to make a scene."

The door closed behind her just as Carmen ran in. She looked from the empty syringe cap on the floor to the IV line and understood enough.

"Code Blue. Get the crash cart!"

Carmen ripped out the IV, sealed the line, and called for help. A crash cart struck the doorframe on its way into the room, but I could no longer pull in a full breath. Above the alarms came the heavy beat of rotor blades.

The emergency helicopter was on the helipad directly over us. The mainland facility had the equipment this clinic lacked, and the helicopter was the only transport fast enough to get me there.