Chapter 6 - Mercer’s Last Patient
They found Mercer’s medical bag on the rehabilitation table.
Mercer himself was gone.
Vincent opened the garage records.
“His personal car is still here.”
Dominic looked toward the rain.
“Then somebody used his sedan.”
Arthur shook his head.
“Or he planned the whole thing and wants us to think someone stole it.”
Dominic’s phone rang.
Mercer.
He answered immediately.
“Where are you?”
Mercer was breathing hard.
“Dominic, listen to me.”
“You have ten seconds before Vincent finds you.”
“They took Angela.”
Dominic stopped.
“What?”
“I found her.”
“Where?”
“She called me from an abandoned clinic near Cicero.”
Vincent put the phone on speaker.
Mercer continued.
“She said she knew who changed your medication.”
“Did she name them?”
“No. She was terrified.”
“Where are you now?”
“Outside the clinic.”
Vincent whispered, “Trap.”
Dominic knew.
Mercer knew too.
“I didn’t call police,” Mercer said. “I thought whoever is doing this might have someone listening.”
“You were right.”
A crash sounded over the line.
Mercer gasped.
Then the connection went silent.
“Samuel?”
Nothing.
Dominic looked at Vincent.
“Location.”
Vincent was already working.
“Got it.”
Arthur stepped forward.
“You’re not going.”
Dominic looked at him.
“You suddenly care?”
“I care that somebody wants you dead and you keep volunteering.”
Dominic almost smiled.
“Stay with Clare and Ellie.”
Arthur blinked.
“You trust me with them?”
“No.”
Dominic turned toward Vincent.
“But I trust that whoever is doing this needs Arthur alive until the vote.”
Arthur’s expression darkened.
“Comforting.”
Twenty-two minutes later, Dominic and Vincent arrived at the abandoned outpatient clinic.
Two security SUVs surrounded the building.
Vincent entered first.
Dominic followed with his cane.
They found Mercer in the hallway.
Alive.
Blood running from his forehead.
“Angela,” he whispered.
They found her in a treatment room.
Tied to a chair.
Barely conscious.
Dominic crouched.
“Angela.”
Her eyes opened.
She saw him.
Then began crying.
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“The brace.”
Vincent’s weapon shifted.
Dominic raised one hand.
“Let her talk.”
Angela struggled to breathe.
“They paid me.”
“Who?”
“I never met him.”
“How?”
“Cash. Instructions. Photos of my sister.”
“Lydia?”
She nodded.
“They knew everything.”
“You reversed the retaining plate?”
“Yes.”
Clare had been right to fear everyone.
Dominic felt anger build, but he kept his voice steady.
“Did you switch my pills?”
Angela shook her head immediately.
“No.”
“Think carefully.”
“I didn’t.”
“Who did?”
“I don’t know.”
“Who sabotaged the SUV?”
“I don’t know.”
Vincent stepped closer.
“So your job was just the brace?”
Angela nodded.
“They wanted you to look weaker.”
“Why?”
“So Arthur could force the vote.”
Dominic stared at her.
“Arthur was being forced too.”
Angela closed her eyes.
“They wanted everyone blaming everyone.”
That was the real plan.
Not simply to remove Dominic.
To fracture the entire structure beneath him.
Arthur against Dominic.
Vincent against Mercer.
Dominic against his own staff.
Trust collapsing from every direction.
“Did you see anyone?”
Angela swallowed.
“Once.”
“Who?”
“He came to my apartment.”
“What did he look like?”
“Older.”
“How old?”
“Sixties.”
“Elias?”
“I don’t know.”
Dominic pulled up his uncle’s photograph.
Angela stared.
Then shook her head.
“No.”
Vincent frowned.
“You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
“Then who?”
Angela’s eyes filled with fear.
“He said he knew your father.”
Dominic froze.
“What?”
“He said the Vale family stole something from him thirty years ago.”
Vincent looked at Dominic.
“Name?”
Angela shook her head.
“He never gave one.”
Suddenly Mercer shouted from the hallway.
“Down!”
Gunfire shattered the treatment-room window.
Vincent dragged Dominic behind a metal cabinet.
Angela screamed.
Another round slammed into the wall.
A guard returned fire.
The shooter was outside.
Vincent yelled into his radio.
“West alley!”
Dominic crawled toward Angela.
Her chair tipped.
He pulled her behind cover.
Then he saw blood.
Not from the glass.
A bullet had entered her side.
“No.”
Angela coughed.
Dominic pressed both hands over the wound.
“Stay with me.”
She grabbed his wrist.
“Your father…”
“What about him?”
“He wasn’t trying to kill you.”
Dominic leaned closer.
“Who?”
Angela gasped.
“The man said…”
Her fingers tightened.
“…your father already tried.”
Dominic’s blood went cold.
“What does that mean?”
Angela’s eyes rolled.
Mercer rushed in.
“Move.”
He started treating her.
Vincent returned from the hallway.
“Shooter got away.”
Dominic stared at Angela.
Mercer worked desperately.
Then Dominic noticed something on the floor beneath her chair.
A faded photograph.
It must have fallen from Angela’s pocket.
Dominic picked it up.
Three young men stood outside a Chicago restaurant nearly thirty years earlier.
His father.
His uncle Elias.
And a third man.
A man Dominic had never seen.
Someone had written a name on the back.
MICHAEL ROWAN.
Dominic stared at it.
Rowan.
Clare Rowan.
He looked at Vincent.
“Clare’s father.”
May you like
Then Dominic saw the date.
Michael Rowan had supposedly died ten years before Clare was born.
