Chapter 7 - A Mother’s Worsening Breath
Before Lily could press Arthur on what he meant by "unfinished business," her phone buzzed frantically in her handbag.
It was the head physician at St. Jude Medical Pavilion.
"Miss Sterling? You need to come immediately. Your mother’s oxygen levels have plummeted. She’s suffered acute respiratory failure."
The world seemed to spin beneath Lily's feet. The blueprint sheets blurred. Her phone slipped from her fingers, clattering against the polished hardwood floor.
"Lily?" Arthur was beside her in an instant, his strong hands gripping her shoulders before her knees could give out. "What is it?"
"My mother..." Lily gasped, terror choking her words. "She stopped breathing. The hospital... I have to go."
Without a second of hesitation, Arthur bypassed his executive assistants, ignored Julian Cross who was waiting with urgent quarterly reports, and guided Lily straight to his private executive elevator.
"Tell the driver to bring the car to the front, code red," Arthur barked into his phone.
Within seven minutes, the black Maybach was tearing through the midday traffic with sirens flashing, cutting through intersections with an escort of private security vehicles. Inside the car, Lily was hyperventilating, her fingernails digging into the leather upholstery.
"If she dies... I have nobody," Lily whispered, tears streaming uncontrollably down her face. "Noah only has me, and I only have her. She spent ten years starving herself so we could eat. She worked three cleaning jobs with failing lungs..."
Arthur reached across the console and took her trembling, icy hands into his own warm, solid grasp. He didn't offer empty platitudes. He simply held on with an unyielding strength that anchored her to reality.
"She is not going to die, Lily," Arthur said with absolute conviction. "I have the top thoracic surgical team in the country boarding a private jet from Baltimore right now. I will buy that entire hospital before I let anything happen to her."
May you like
Lily looked at him through her tears, overwhelmed by the fierce protection in his eyes. "Why are you doing this for us? We are nobody to you."
Arthur looked away for a fraction of a second, his jaw tightening. "Your father, Richard Sterling, was my mentor fifteen years ago. He was the only honest man in this city. And I failed to save him when the wolves tore him apart. I will not fail his daughter."
