Chapter 7: The Uncle’s Price
Marcus paused the video.
Gabriel’s younger face remained frozen on the screen, one hand wrapped around the envelope Victor Thorne had given him.
“How much?” Marcus asked.
Gabriel did not answer.
“How much did my father pay you?”
“It wasn’t money.”
“What was it?”
Gabriel turned away.
“My wife was dying.”
Marcus remembered that Gabriel had been married once.
A woman named Amelia.
She had survived an aggressive form of leukemia and died years later from an unrelated condition.
“My father gave her treatment,” Marcus said.
“He gave her access to an experimental therapy that had not been approved in this country.”
“In exchange for your silence.”
Gabriel closed his eyes.
“I thought Victor wanted my brother’s research delayed.”
“He wanted it buried.”
“I didn’t know anyone would die.”
Marcus almost laughed.
The words sounded exactly like Isabella’s.
Gabriel faced him.
“I told your father where my brother stored the trial records. That is all I did.”
“And when your brother and his wife died?”
“I understood.”
“You still remained silent.”
“I had a sixteen-year-old niece who had just lost both parents. Victor threatened to destroy her life if I spoke.”
“So you protected her by letting her marry his son?”
Gabriel’s shame deepened.
“I did not know you had targeted her.”
“Neither of us gets to use the word protect anymore.”
A notification appeared on the laptop.
The flash drive contained more than one file.
The second item was an audio recording dated three days before the crash.
A woman’s voice spoke first.
Khloe’s mother.
“We have evidence the trials caused twelve preventable deaths. Victor Thorne falsified the reports.”
Khloe’s father responded.
“Gabriel says we should wait.”
“He is afraid.”
“He has reason to be.”
Then a third voice entered the recording.
Gabriel’s.
“If you take this to the federal board, Victor will come after Khloe.”
Khloe’s mother answered immediately.
“Then you protect her.”
Gabriel’s voice cracked through the speakers.
“I’m trying.”
“No. You’re choosing your fear over the truth.”
The recording ended.
Marcus looked at Gabriel.
“She knew.”
“She suspected.”
“She trusted you with her daughter.”
Gabriel placed both hands on the table.
“I have lived with that every day.”
“That did not stop you from judging me.”
“No.”
Gabriel looked toward the stairwell leading back to the hospital.
“It gave me experience.”
A phone rang.
Marcus answered.
The neonatal doctor spoke quickly.
Ava’s oxygen level had fallen.
She needed emergency surgery.
Marcus and Gabriel ran for the elevator.
May you like
Neither noticed the small green light blinking on the archive’s ceiling.
Someone else was watching them.
