Chapter 5 - The Doctor’s Game
The greenhouse smelled of wet soil, rust, and old leaves.
Rain hammered against the broken glass roof.
Nathan stood ten feet from Dr. Reeves, his own gun lowered but ready.
Victor and two guards were positioned outside, invisible from where I stood. Nathan had ordered me to stay in the car.
I had ignored him.
Again.
Dr. Reeves smiled when he saw me.
“Miss Dawson,” he said. “You are far more troublesome than your résumé suggested.”
“Let Mrs. Bennett go,” Nathan said.
Reeves pressed the gun harder against her temple.
Mrs. Bennett’s face was pale, but she was not crying.
“I never wanted the boys harmed,” she said.
Nathan’s eyes flashed. “Then why did you help him?”
“I didn’t know what it was at first.”
Reeves laughed softly.
“She knew enough.”
“I thought it was medicine,” she snapped. “I thought you were treating them.”
“You installed equipment in their rooms,” I said.
Mrs. Bennett looked at me, and I saw tears gathering in her eyes.
“He said it was an air filtration system. He said the boys had an immune disorder.”
“And when they got worse?” Nathan asked.
“He told me it was part of the disease.”
Nathan’s voice dropped. “You watched them suffer.”
“I know.”
The shame in her face seemed real.
But Reeves’s smile told me none of it mattered to him.
“You see, Nathan,” he said, “that is the beauty of illness. People believe doctors. They believe expensive tests. They believe complicated explanations.”
“You killed Rebecca,” Nathan said.
Reeves’s expression shifted slightly.
“I didn’t kill her.”
“But you know who did.”
Reeves looked toward the rain-soaked road outside.
“Your wife was clever. Too clever. She discovered Project Lark before it was ready.”
“What is Project Lark?” I asked.
He turned to me.
“A long-term pharmaceutical investment. A compound that creates symptoms without leaving obvious traces. With the right dosage, you can make a healthy person look chronically ill.”
“You tested it on children?” I said.
“Not intentionally.”
“You poisoned two six-year-olds.”
“I created leverage.”
Nathan raised his gun.
Victor’s voice shouted from outside, “Boss, don’t!”
Reeves tightened his hold on Mrs. Bennett.
“You kill me, and you will never know where the final records are. Or who signed the payments.”
“Vincent,” Nathan said.
Reeves smiled.
“Vincent is a businessman. He understands succession.”
The truth landed like a blow.
Vincent Coleman had helped create the illness to make Nathan look weak, unstable, distracted. If Nathan could not protect his own children, his organization would turn against him. And if the boys continued declining, Vincent could position himself as the family’s “necessary” replacement.
But that still left one question.
“Why keep them alive?” I asked.
Reeves looked at me with cruel amusement.
“Because dead children create sympathy. Sick children create doubt.”
A loud crack exploded through the greenhouse.
For one terrifying second, I thought Nathan had fired.
But it was the roof above us.
A section of glass shattered, falling between Reeves and Mrs. Bennett.
She twisted free.
Nathan lunged.
Everything happened at once.
Reeves fired.
Nathan shoved me down behind a metal planting table.
Victor’s men stormed through the doors.
Mrs. Bennett screamed.
A bullet struck the wall beside my head.
Then Nathan hit Reeves with enough force to send both men crashing into a row of empty clay pots.
Reeves tried to reach for his gun.
I saw it before Nathan did.
I kicked it across the wet floor.
Victor grabbed Reeves from behind, forcing his arms back.
“It’s over,” Nathan said.
Reeves laughed, blood running from the corner of his mouth.
“No. It isn’t.”
He looked directly at Nathan.
“The children aren’t the only thing I poisoned.”
Nathan froze.
“What did you do?” I asked.
Reeves smiled.
“Check the wine cellar.”
Then he began laughing.
By the time we reached the estate, every bottle in Nathan’s private wine collection had been removed for testing.
Nathan barely drank. But when he did, he drank from one particular label—a rare Italian red Rebecca had given him for their anniversary.
The same wine he had opened nearly every night since her death.
The tests confirmed it.
Low-dose contamination.
Not enough to kill him quickly.
Enough to weaken him. Affect his judgment. Cause insomnia, fatigue, and episodes of rage that could be blamed on stress.
Vincent had not only been attacking the boys.
He had been dismantling Nathan from the inside.
That night, Nathan sat alone in the dark office.
I found him staring at Rebecca’s letter.
“You should rest,” I said.
He gave a tired laugh. “I don’t think I remember how.”
“You’re alive. The boys are getting treatment. Reeves is in custody.”
“Vincent isn’t.”
“No.”
He looked up at me.
“Victor got a message from one of our people. Vincent is leaving the country tomorrow morning.”
“Then stop him.”
Nathan’s face became unreadable.
“You don’t know what stopping someone like Vincent means.”
“I know what letting him go means.”
For a long moment, neither of us spoke.
Then Jacob appeared in the doorway, holding Jonah’s hand.
“Dad?” he whispered.
Nathan stood immediately.
Jacob looked at him with frightened eyes.
“Are we still sick?”
Nathan knelt in front of both boys.
His voice broke.
“No,” he said. “You’re going to get better.”
Jonah looked at me.
“Is Emily staying?”
Nathan turned toward me.
The question hung in the room.
I looked at the boys.
Then at the man who had spent millions chasing answers while the danger lived in his own home.
“Yes,” I said.
“For now.”
Nathan almost smiled.
But outside, far beyond the gates, a black sedan waited in the darkness.
May you like
And inside it, Vincent Coleman was already making his next move.
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