Chapter 4 - No More Warnings
Detective Brooks read the message twice.
“Do not respond.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“You’ll stay somewhere else tonight.”
“I have a shift.”
“You have someone photographing your home.”
Evelyn looked at the image.
“This isn’t a threat made in anger. Someone followed her before Dante entered the hospital.”
Brooks nodded.
“Which means this may have been prepared after he learned who she was.”
Martin stared at me.
“How would he know?”
“I spoke to him in front of fifty people,” I said.
“No. I mean her address.”
Brooks gave him a cold look.
“Hospital employee records?”
Martin’s face changed.
“We need to check our systems.”
By afternoon, the hospital confirmed someone had accessed my personnel file using an administrator’s login.
The login belonged to Martin’s assistant, who swore she had never opened it.
Detective Brooks assigned two officers to the emergency department.
I refused to leave.
Evelyn found me restocking Trauma Two.
“You should go home.”
“So should you.”
“My address wasn’t sent to me.”
“Dante grabbed you, not me.”
“He threatened both of us.”
I placed a box of gloves into the cabinet.
“If we leave, he learns threats work.”
“This isn’t about pride.”
“No. It’s about the next nurse who tells an important man to wait.”
Evelyn studied me.
“You’re terrified.”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
I looked at her.
“Good?”
“Fear keeps you alert. Pretending you aren’t afraid gets you hurt.”
At ten that evening, Ethan woke.
His mother, Rachel Walsh, sat beside him gripping his hand.
Evelyn examined his pupils.
“Ethan, do you know where you are?”
“The hospital.”
“Do you know what happened?”
“Car crash.”
His voice was weak.
“My dad?”
Rachel’s face crumpled.
“Your father is in another hospital, sweetheart. He’s alive.”
Ethan closed his eyes.
“Did I die?”
“No,” I said. “You made us work very hard, but no.”
He managed a faint smile.
Rachel looked at us.
“I heard what happened outside his room.”
“You shouldn’t worry about that,” Evelyn said.
“How can I not? That man wanted you to leave my son.”
“We didn’t.”
Rachel’s eyes filled with tears.
“Thank you.”
At midnight, Evelyn and I walked toward the parking garage under police escort.
The garage lights flickered.
Officer Miller reached for his radio.
“That’s strange.”
A black SUV blocked the exit.
A second rolled down the ramp behind us.
Four men stepped from the shadows.
Then Dante emerged.
He wore a dark coat and no bandage.
Officer Miller drew his weapon.
“Stop right there.”
Dante smiled.
“You brought police to walk you to your car?”
Detective Brooks had warned us not to engage.
I couldn’t help myself.
“You brought six men to talk to two women?”
Dante’s smile disappeared.
Evelyn whispered, “Claire.”
Officer Miller raised his voice.
“Everyone put your hands where I can see them.”
One of Dante’s men rushed him.
The officer turned.
Another man struck him from behind.
He fell against a concrete pillar.
The second officer reached for her radio, but someone grabbed her arm.
Everything happened at once.
Dante moved toward me.
“You embarrassed me.”
“You did that yourself.”
He slapped me.
My head snapped sideways.
Evelyn drove her shoulder into him before he could strike again.
They crashed into the side of a parked car.
Dante grabbed her around the waist.
Evelyn struck his ribs, twisted free, and shoved him backward.
One of his men came at her.
I grabbed a fire extinguisher from the wall and sprayed it into his face.
He stumbled blindly.
“Run!” I shouted.
Evelyn seized my wrist.
We raced between parked cars.
Dante followed.
“You’re dead!” he screamed.
We reached the stairwell, but two men blocked the door.
Evelyn stopped abruptly.
Dante came up behind us.
“No cameras here,” he said.
A red light blinked above him.
I pointed.
“You should look up more often.”
His expression changed.
The garage security system had been upgraded after the first incident. Every level now had multiple cameras with live feeds to the security office.
Sirens wailed outside.
Dante grabbed Evelyn from behind, locking an arm around her neck.
She drove her heel into his foot and dropped her weight. When he loosened his hold, she twisted, hooked his arm, and sent him over her hip.
He hit the ground hard.
One of his men lunged toward her.
I swung the fire extinguisher into his shoulder.
He collapsed against a car hood.
Police vehicles rushed down the ramp.
“Hands up!” officers shouted.
Dante rose and charged at Evelyn.
She stepped aside.
His momentum carried him into a metal cart loaded with maintenance supplies. The cart flipped, scattering bottles and tools across the concrete.
Dante fell among them.
The officers surrounded him.
Detective Brooks entered with her weapon drawn.
“It’s over, Dante.”
He looked at Evelyn from the floor.
“My father will get me out.”
A voice came from behind the officers.
“No.”
Vincent Romano stepped into the garage.
Dante stared at him.
Vincent looked at the injured officers, then at the blood on my lip.
“You disobeyed me.”
Dante struggled against the handcuffs.
“They insulted our family!”
“You attacked doctors in a hospital.”
“They made me look weak.”
Vincent’s expression was colder than the garage floor.
“You did that yourself.”
Dante’s eyes widened.
“You’re going to let them arrest me?”
“I’m going to let you meet the consequences you’ve spent your life avoiding.”
Detective Brooks pulled Dante to his feet.
He shouted as they led him away.
“You’re choosing strangers over your son!”
Vincent did not answer.
May you like
For the first time, Dante Romano’s name opened no doors.
It only echoed through an empty garage while the police took him away.
