Chapter 3 - One Pill, Not Two
Dr. Grant arrived at eleven the next morning.
I hated him by eleven-oh-seven.
"Again," he said.
"No."
"Again."
"I've done it six times."
"Five."
"I counted six."
"You complained once. That doesn't count."
I stared at him.
Grant calmly adjusted the resistance band around my thigh.
Luke stood near the wall pretending to read messages.
Emma was technically dusting bookshelves.
She hadn't moved from the same shelf in ten minutes.
"Why is she here?" I asked.
Emma looked over.
"I work here."
"You've polished the same piece of wood fourteen times."
"Maybe it's very dirty."
Grant smiled.
"Ready?"
"No."
He began the movement anyway.
Physical therapy wasn't heroic.
There was no dramatic music.
No miraculous moment where sensation suddenly returned.
There was sweat.
Humiliation.
Muscles that refused instructions.
Hands gripping metal bars while my body shook.
And anger.
More anger than I'd known I possessed.
Before the shooting, I could bench press more than two hundred pounds.
Now Grant celebrated when my left quadriceps twitched.
"There," he said.
I looked down.
"I didn't see anything."
"I did."
"Do it again."
"That's not how nerves work."
"Then make them work."
"That's not how doctors work either."
"You're expensive enough."
Emma laughed.
I glared across the room.
"Enjoying this?"
"No."
"Liar."
"A little."
I spent ninety minutes trying to move muscles that felt disconnected from my body.
When Grant finally ended the session, my shirt was soaked.
I hated myself for being exhausted.
Emma appeared with water.
"I can hold a glass."
"I know."
She put it beside me rather than handing it to me.
That small decision mattered.
Most people tried helping before I asked.
Emma had learned the difference between help and humiliation.
I drank.
Grant packed his equipment.
"Tomorrow, same time."
"Day after tomorrow."
"Tomorrow."
"I run companies."
"You yell at people over the phone."
Luke covered his mouth.
I pointed at him.
"You're enjoying this too much."
"Best quarter we've had."
"Leave."
Grant finished packing.
Before walking out, he looked at me.
"You have a long way to go."
"I know."
"But you started."
After he left, I sat silently.
Emma resumed cleaning.
Ten minutes passed.
"Emma."
"Yeah?"
"Thank you."
She stopped.
It was probably the first time I'd thanked her.
Actually thanked her.
"For what?"
I looked toward the doorway Grant had used.
"You know."
She nodded.
"You're welcome."
Then she went back to work.
No speech.
No emotional moment.
That was Emma.
She never demanded more than I could give.
The therapy continued.
Every day.
Some were better.
Some were brutal.
On the ninth day, Grant strapped braces around my legs and positioned me between parallel bars.
"You're joking."
"No."
"I'm not ready."
"You've said that every day."
"I'm serious."
"So am I."
I looked at the bars.
They might as well have been the edge of a skyscraper.
"Hands here."
I obeyed.
He locked the braces.
"Push."
Nothing.
"Again."
My shoulders strained.
My arms carried most of the weight.
"Again."
Pain flashed through my back.
"Stop."
"Again."
"I said stop."
Grant stepped back.
"Fine."
His willingness to quit irritated me.
"Where are you going?"
"You said stop."
"I didn't say we're finished."
A voice from the doorway interrupted.
"You two argue like an old married couple."
Emma.
She carried fresh towels.
Grant laughed.
I did not.
"Come here," I said.
"Why?"
"Apparently I require an audience."
Emma approached.
I gripped the bars.
Push.
Nothing.
Again.
My arms shook.
Again.
For half a second, my body rose.
Only an inch.
Maybe two.
Then I collapsed back.
Grant caught my shoulders.
Emma froze.
I looked at him.
"Did I—"
"Yes."
I looked at Emma.
Tears filled her eyes.
"Don't."
"I'm not crying."
"You are."
"Allergies."
"In December?"
"Very aggressive dust."
I laughed.
Then something happened.
Emma laughed too.
The sound filled the rehabilitation room.
For the first time in two years, that room didn't feel medical.
It felt alive.
But progress came with consequences.
The stronger I became, the more restless I felt.
I started attending meetings downstairs instead of requiring executives to come to my office.
I returned phone calls personally.
I reviewed security operations.
I questioned old accounts.
And that was when I noticed something strange.
A payment.
$86,000.
Consulting fees.
The company listed was Northlake Strategic Logistics.
I had never heard of it.
"Luke."
He stepped beside the desk.
"You recognize this?"
He examined the page.
"No."
"Who approved it?"
Luke checked the code.
"Finance."
"Which means?"
"Adrian."
Adrian Vale had managed portions of our legitimate corporate network for six years.
Quiet.
Efficient.
Forgettable.
Exactly the kind of employee people trusted.
"Bring him tomorrow."
Luke nodded.
That night, Emma found me still reviewing files at two.
"You have therapy at eleven."
"I'm aware."
"You should sleep."
"I'm working."
"You're glaring at spreadsheets."
"That's working."
Emma placed folded shirts inside a wardrobe.
Something fell from the pocket of her apron.
A white envelope.
I noticed the red letters.
FINAL NOTICE.
She grabbed it quickly.
I pretended not to see.
"You okay?"
"Fine."
"Emma."
She sighed.
"My mother's facility increased the monthly rate."
"By how much?"
"Doesn't matter."
"It clearly does."
"I'll handle it."
"How?"
"More hours."
"You're already working fifteen."
"I can pick up Sundays."
"No."
She looked at me.
"I wasn't asking permission."
"You're going to collapse."
"I'm stronger than I look."
"I've seen you fall against walls."
Her expression tightened.
"You've been watching me?"
That sounded worse than intended.
"I notice things."
"So do I."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
She looked at the medication bottle on my bedside table.
"You've been taking fewer pills."
I paused.
She was right.
I hadn't noticed.
"Grant says movement can help regulate some pain responses."
Emma smiled.
"Look at you, quoting your therapist."
"Don't get excited."
"I'm terrified."
I gestured toward the envelope.
"Let me help."
"No."
"Loan."
"No."
"Advance."
"No."
"Why do you have to make everything difficult?"
She stared at me.
Then laughed softly.
"You really don't hear yourself."
"What?"
"You?"
She folded another shirt.
"Danny Moretti accusing somebody else of being difficult?"
I almost smiled.
Then my expression hardened.
"I'm serious."
"So am I."
"You could lose your mother's room."
That stopped her.
I immediately regretted saying it.
Fear flashed across her face.
Real fear.
Not of me.
Of failing the person she loved.
Emma looked away.
"My mom doesn't know where she is most days."
Her voice changed.
"Some days she doesn't know me."
I said nothing.
"But there's this window in her room. She likes watching birds from it. Every time I visit, she says she remembers the house where she grew up because there were birds outside."
Emma swallowed.
"If they move her somewhere cheaper, she loses that room."
I suddenly understood.
It wasn't about luxury.
It was about a window.
A fragment of memory.
An old woman hanging onto one piece of herself.
"How much?"
"Don't."
"How much?"
"Twenty-seven thousand overdue."
It was less than I sometimes spent on security in a week.
To Emma, it might as well have been twenty-seven million.
"Let me—"
"No."
"Why?"
She looked at me.
"Because I don't want the day to come when you wonder whether I'm here because I care about you or because you saved me."
The room became still.
Care about you.
Neither of us addressed the words.
Emma's cheeks colored slightly.
She turned back toward the wardrobe.
My chest tightened unexpectedly.
"Emma."
"Don't."
I understood.
For once, I listened.
She left around three.
The next morning Adrian Vale arrived.
Gray suit.
Perfect tie.
Calm expression.
"Danny."
"Sit."
Luke shut the office door.
I pushed the questionable payment across the desk.
"What's Northlake?"
Adrian barely glanced at it.
"Transportation consultancy."
"For what?"
"Routing optimization."
"Eighty-six thousand dollars?"
"It's within standard—"
"Who owns it?"
Adrian paused.
Half a second.
Most people wouldn't notice.
I did.
"I'd have to check."
"You approved eighty-six thousand dollars to a company whose owner you don't know?"
"It's handled through procurement."
"Then why is your authorization code on it?"
Silence.
Luke moved slightly behind him.
Adrian smiled.
"I'll retrieve the file."
"Do that."
He left.
Luke waited until the door closed.
"He's lying."
"Yes."
"You think it's theft?"
"Maybe."
"What else?"
I looked at the payment date.
Then something cold moved through me.
The first payment to Northlake had occurred exactly six weeks before I was shot.
I found another.
Then another.
All before the attack.
The company stopped billing us three days after the sniper fired.
I looked at Luke.
He understood immediately.
"Danny..."
"Find out who owns Northlake."
Luke nodded.
"And don't tell anyone."
"Anyone?"
"Anyone."
That evening I tried acting normally.
Emma noticed anyway.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing."
"You're quieter."
"You complain when I yell. Now you're complaining when I don't?"
"You're weird when you're quiet."
I looked at her.
For one moment, I considered telling her.
Then I stopped.
Whatever Northlake was, Emma had nothing to do with my world.
I wanted it to stay that way.
She deserved diner shifts and annoying customers and a mother who watched birds through a window.
Not the things hidden beneath my business empire.
"Go home early tonight," I said.
Her eyebrows rose.
"Why?"
"Because I said so."
"That's usually not convincing."
"Please."
The word surprised us both.
Emma studied me.
"Okay."
She gathered her things.
At the doorway she paused.
"Danny?"
"Yeah?"
"Whatever you're worried about..."
She gave me a small smile.
"You don't have to handle everything alone."
Then she left.
I watched the doorway for a long time.
At midnight, Luke called.
"I found Northlake."
I straightened.
"Who owns it?"
"Shell company. Three layers."
"Keep going."
"I already did."
There was something strange in his voice.
"What?"
"The final beneficiary..."
Luke stopped.
"Say it."
"It's connected to someone inside the family."
My blood went cold.
"Who?"
"I don't want to say it over the phone."
"Luke."
"I'll be there in twenty minutes."
The line went dead.
I stared at the rain outside.
Two years earlier, someone had known my route.
My schedule.
My vehicle.
Exactly which intersection would force us to slow.
Only a handful of people had possessed that information.
For two years I'd believed the sniper had been hired by an enemy.
Now, for the first time, another possibility emerged.
Maybe the bullet hadn't come from outside my empire.
Maybe someone inside it had wanted me trapped in that chair.
May you like
And whoever it was had just learned I was trying to stand.
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