Page 71 of What You left in Me

This hospital isn’t big enough for all of this and yet… look at that, everyone found a seat.

I lean back against the low wall and let the wind take some of the heat out of me. Everything hurts. My father is somewhere under a stadium light and a stranger’s steady hands. I refuse to stand in a waiting room performing patience for a clock. I’ll wait here. Concrete at least tells me what it is.

My phone buzzes.

Eric:Trace is bouncing—MVNO nest. I’ll peel it.

Eric:Stills incoming. First one’s hallway cam is grainy. That him?

I open the image and look at it. A desaturated corridor, timestamped. Mid-forties. Hair cut like he did it himself. Scar splitting the left eyebrow hairline. Pitted cheek. Cheap jacket that thinks it’s tough. Hands in pockets the way men do. Eyes not on the camera. Eyes on exits.

Me→Eric:That’s him. Keep eyes on. No engagement. Not yet.

Another buzz.

Eric:Copy. More stills in 10… 9…

I scrub a hand over my face.

Second image arrives. Closer angle.

Waren isn’t alone anymore. Eleanor, pearls, posture, that practiced calm she wears like a uniform, is in frame, chin up theway she makes it when she refuses to give ground. The camera sees what she thinks it hides: the tremor in her hand. She’s talking. Waren’s smiling, the greasy kind that doesn’t touch his eyes.

A third still lands before I can breathe. Wider shot. And there, turning in, close enough to see the set of her mouth…

Ariane.

My heart drops. That’s a new trick. She’s between them, angled like she’s both shielding and on the verge of shoving someone through a wall if she has to. Chin tipped. Shoulders loaded. Her attention pinned to Waren’s mouth like she’s measuring the distance to break his teeth if he says the wrong thing. Good. I want him to say the wrong thing. I want to be there when he learns it.

“What the fuck,” I say to the photo.

I can’t stop looking at her. She looks like she shouldn’t be anywhere near this, near men like Waren, standing in the crosshairs of anything I’m about to set in motion.

My phone vibrates in my hand. I almost throw it because my muscles want to hit something that hits back.

Eric:One more still—phone-cam, not the hospital feed. Someone close. Sending.

The image pops. Crisp. Someone stood within arm’s reach to take it. Waren has his hand braced on the wall near Eleanor’s shoulder like he owns the square foot of air she needs to breathe. Eleanor’s smile is the kind she uses when she’s buying time. Ariane is turned just enough that I can see the line her jaw makes when she tries not to be afraid. Waren’s eyes are wrong. There’s heat in them that doesn’t belong on this floor.

My grip tightens until the phone creaks. For a second, the old part of me, the one built for breaking, stands up and says I need to gonow.

Me→Eric:Track him. If Waren leaves neuro, notify me first. If he talks to anyone else, I want faces.

Eric:Already on it. About that unknown number—still chasing. Spoofed through three layers. Might be unrelated, might be bait. Don’t spook.

Me:I’m spooked when I say I’m spooked. Keep digging.

Wind pushes against my chest. Somewhere below, a nurse laughs in a way that sounds like she needs to. I look at the photo again.Who is this guy?

I slide the phone into my pocket because if I keep it in my hand, I’ll start dialing people I can’t afford to warn. I look at the door back into the stairwell. I could go down there and put my body between Waren and everything he’s looking at. I could walk into that corridor and make a very public problem out of a very private man. There’s a small part of me that wants the scene, wants the cameras, wants the excuse. I shove that part into a corner. The work isn’t noise. The work is precision.

I push off the wall.

My father is under a light. My phone has a number with teeth I haven’t seen yet. A man named Waren just smiled at my family in a hospital corridor. Ariane’s mouth is set the way it gets when she’s bracing to hold something heavy and invisible.

What the fuck is this man doing here.

I have a pretty good idea I’m going to find out.