Chapter 5 - THE PHANTOM STEPS
The heavy mahogany doors swung open before Sebastian could reply.
Doctor Richard Sterling stepped into the master bedroom.
He was fifty-five, elegant, with salt-and-pepper hair and a tailored cashmere coat over a charcoal suit.
He carried a sleek aluminum medical case in his leather-gloved hand.
He stopped three paces inside the room.
His eyes fell on Clare standing beside the examination table.
Then his gaze drifted to the open medical refrigerator in the bathroom.
Sterling's expression remained perfectly smooth, but his fingers tightened on the handle of his case.
"Sebastian," Sterling said, his voice dripping with professional warmth.
"I didn't realize you had hired an assistant."
"A physical therapist, Richard," Sebastian said.
His voice was calm.
Terrifyingly calm.
Like deep water over jagged rocks.
"She was assessing my range of motion."
Sterling set his case on the desk, right next to the Colt .45.
He looked down at the weapon without flinching.
"You shouldn't let unqualified practitioners manipulate your lumbar spine, Sebastian," Sterling said, pulling a sterile syringe from his kit.
"Mechanical manipulation can cause micro-tears in the remaining scar tissue."
"It could make the phantom pain permanent."
He snapped the top off a glass vial.
The clear liquid drew up into the barrel of the syringe with a soft shhhk.
"Roll onto your side, Sebastian," Sterling instructed, flicking the air bubbles from the needle.
"Let us get your stabilization dose settled."
Clare stood near the hearth.
Her heart was hammering against her ribs, but her eyes were fixed on the physician's hands.
Sebastian did not roll onto his side.
He lay on his back, propped up on his elbows.
"Tell me, Richard," Sebastian asked softly.
"How is my cousin Corrado?"
Sterling's hand froze for a microsecond.
A fraction of a millimeter.
"Corrado?" Sterling chuckled, recovering instantly.
"I haven't seen him since the charity gala in September."
"Why do you ask?"
"Because Corrado's offshore shell company in the Caymans purchased a controlling share of your private research clinic last month," Sebastian said.
Sterling’s smile vanished.
The room seemed to shrink.
"Sebastian, you're experiencing paranoia," Sterling said, stepping toward the table with the needle raised.
"The pain is distorting your judgment."
"I need you to hold still."
"No," Clare said, stepping between Sterling and the table.
Sterling glared at her.
"Step aside, nurse."
"That isn't a peptide complex," Clare said, pointing at the syringe.
"It's neuromuscular blockade."
"You've been dosing his paraspinal muscles with tubocurarine."
Sterling’s face turned the color of wet cement.
His mask slipped completely.
He reached inside his cashmere coat with his left hand.
He didn't draw a stethoscope.
He drew a snub-nosed .38 revolver.
"You should have kept your mouth shut, little girl," Sterling snarled, leveling the weapon at Clare's forehead.
Before Sterling could pull the trigger, a hand like an iron vise clamped around his wrist.
Sebastian.
From the table, Sebastian’s upper body surged forward with terrifying explosive power.
He twisted Sterling’s wrist downward.
A loud, sickening snap of bone echoed through the room.
Sterling shrieked in agony, dropping the gun.
Sebastian grabbed the doctor by his silk necktie, dragging him face-down onto the mahogany floorboards.
"Twelve years," Sebastian roared, his voice shaking the crystal chandelier above them.
"Twelve years I paid you to poison me!"
Sebastian drove his elbow into Sterling's temple.
The doctor went limp, collapsing unconscious onto the Persian rug.
Sebastian breathed hard, his chest heaving, his hands covered in sweat.
He looked up at Clare.
"We don't have much time," Sebastian panted.
"If Sterling is here early, Corrado knows the watch was found."
"Can you stand?" Clare asked, her eyes wild with adrenaline.
"What?"
"The curare wore off six hours ago," Clare said, stepping to the side of the table.
"The nerve is firing."
"Put your feet on the floor, Sebastian."
"Clare, I haven't stood in twelve years—"
"Put your feet on the floor!" she commanded.
Sebastian looked at his bare feet hanging over the edge.
He swung his legs down.
The soles of his feet touched the cold polished oak.
Clare stepped into his space.
She wrapped her arms around his torso, anchoring her hips against his pelvis.
"Drive through your heels," she whispered into his ear.
"Don't look at the floor."
"Look at me."
Sebastian looked into her dark, fierce eyes.
He gritted his teeth.
He pushed.
Every muscle in his thighs burned like liquid fire.
His knees buckled.
Trembled violently.
Clare bore thirty percent of his weight, her spine screaming under the load, but she refused to let him collapse.
"Push, Sebastian!" she yelled.
"Push!"
With a guttural roar from the depths of his soul, Sebastian Lombardi locked his knees.
He stood.
Six-foot-two.
Towering over her in the firelight.
For three seconds, the world stopped spinning.
He was standing on his own two feet.
Then, Clare’s phone buzzed violently on the desk.
An emergency alert from the medical monitoring company in Chicago:
CRITICAL ALERT: UNIT 402 - EXTERNAL POWER CUT TO FILTRATION SYSTEM.
PATIENT OLIVER BENNETT DISCONNECTED.
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A text message followed from an unknown number:
We have the boy. Bring the watch to the Navy Pier grain silo in thirty minutes, or the kid stops breathing.
