Chapter 6 - Helping the Process
Dr. Whitaker returned with the ICU charge nurse and a hospital security supervisor.
Visitor restrictions were entered immediately.
Daniel Whitmore: no access.
No updates.
No calls routed.
No personal items accepted.
Rebecca watched the order appear on the hospital system from Arthur’s tablet.
Her name looked strange beside the word protected.
Protected patient.
She had funded hospital safety initiatives for years.
She had never imagined needing one.
The police arrived quietly.
Not with flashing lights.
With questions.
Arthur gave them the cup.
The prepaid phone.
The home-security feed.
The envelope photograph.
Lupita’s call log.
Rebecca’s documented statement, taken slowly and witnessed by Dr. Whitaker after he confirmed she was mentally alert.
When the officer asked if she could speak, Rebecca nodded.
Her voice was weak.
“My husband believes I am going to die.”
The officer leaned closer.
“What do you believe?”
Rebecca looked at Arthur.
Then at the sealed tea cup.
Then back.
“I believe he has been helping the process.”
No one in the room moved.
Dr. Whitaker’s eyes closed briefly.
Arthur’s jaw tightened.
The officer wrote carefully.
Helping the process.
It was not a medical term.
Not legal.
But everyone understood.
Daniel returned to the hospital at 1:17 p.m.
Security stopped him before he reached the ICU corridor.
Rebecca watched from the internal camera feed Arthur displayed only after asking if she wanted to see.
She did.
Not because she needed fear.
Because she needed proof that the door held.
Daniel smiled first.
Then argued.
Then demanded.
Then said, “My wife is dying, and you people are keeping me from her.”
A police officer stepped into frame.
Daniel’s mouth stopped moving.
Celeste Arden was not with him.
Of course not.
People who wear red coats beside open safes rarely stand near hospital security when the room changes.
Arthur’s phone buzzed.
He read the message.
“Police have located Celeste.”
Rebecca blinked slowly.
“Cooperating?”
“Not yet.”
“Will she?”
Arthur looked at the ICU camera feed, where Daniel was now being escorted into a private security office.
“She likes comfort more than loyalty. Give her an hour.”
It took forty-three minutes.
Celeste’s first statement blamed Daniel.
Daniel’s first statement blamed grief.
Rebecca, lying in ICU, almost laughed when Arthur told her.
“Grief?”
“He says he was overwhelmed by your illness and entered the safe to locate medical documents.”
“The safe in my study?”
“Yes.”
“With Celeste?”
“She was, apparently, emotional support.”
That time Rebecca did laugh.
It hurt so badly the nurse checked her monitor.
But she laughed.
May you like
A thin, cracked sound.
Still hers.
