Chapter 7 - PATIENT E
The hand remained on the edge of the door.
Ethan could not look away from the pale scar circling its wrist. He had carried the same mark since childhood, a thin white crescent beneath his watch. Margaret had always said it came from a broken nursery lamp.
The man stepped into the corridor.
He was taller than Ethan by perhaps an inch and much thinner. His hair had been cut unevenly, as though with medical scissors. A faded hospital shirt hung from his shoulders. His face was hidden behind a clear breathing mask fogged by each shallow breath.
Ava saw resemblance before identity. The shape of the jaw. The gray eyes. The small crease between the brows.
Ethan whispered, “Elias?”
The man tilted his head.
Then he spoke in a voice rough from disuse. “Which one are you?”
The question struck Ethan harder than accusation.
Thomas sank against the wall as sedative gas crept through the corridor behind them. Adrian pushed everyone into the patient room and sealed the door.
Inside stood a narrow bed, a desk, shelves of books, and dozens of photographs. Most showed Ethan at different ages. School ceremonies. University graduation. His wedding to Ava. Company events. Private moments that should never have been visible from outside the house.
The man removed the breathing mask.
His face was Ethan’s face altered by hunger, isolation, and time.
Ava gripped her chair. “Who kept you here?”
He looked at Margaret’s pearl earring in Ethan’s hand. “Mother.”
Ethan’s expression hardened. “She told me you died.”
“She told me you stole my life.”
“My life?”
The man moved closer. Adrian raised the metal tray, but Ava stopped him.
“What is your name?” she asked.
The stranger’s eyes shifted to her. “She calls me Elias.”
“What do you call yourself?”
After a long pause, he said, “E.”
Ava’s chest tightened. A person reduced to an initial was easier to store than a son.
Ethan asked, “Have you been down here for twenty seven years?”
“No.”
“Then where were you?”
E touched the wall. “Rooms. Clinics. Houses without windows. Sometimes here. Sometimes far away. They changed when I learned the exits.”
“Who are they?”
“Father. Kessler. Wren. Mother after Father stopped moving.”
Ethan’s face lost color. “My father died twelve years ago.”
E smiled faintly. “Did you see the body?”
Ava remembered the Blackwood funeral. A closed casket. Margaret standing beneath black umbrellas. No public viewing.
Adrian said, “Jonathan had pancreatic cancer. My father signed the death certificate.”
“My father signed many things,” E replied.
The gas alarm stopped. A red indicator above the door turned green.
Ava looked at the photographs again. “Why were you watching us?”
“Mother brought the pictures. She said Ethan was failing. She said the company needed the stronger son.”
Ethan stepped forward. “She planned to replace me?”
E’s eyes moved across Ethan’s suit, watch, and wedding ring. “She planned to choose again.”
Silence followed.
The original selection had never ended. Jonathan had chosen one infant as heir. Margaret, years later, had preserved the other as a reserve.
Ava asked, “Why now?”
E looked at her legs. “Because of the accident.”
The answer was so unexpected that she felt it before she understood it.
“My accident?”
“Mother said Ethan became disobedient after you survived.”
Thomas lifted his head. “The brakes were meant to fail farther up the mountain. You were supposed to die before reaching the cedar turn.”
Ethan turned on him. “You knew?”
“I learned later.”
“Who ordered it?”
Thomas looked at E.
E said, “I did.”
Ava stopped breathing.
E’s face remained empty. “Mother showed me records. She said Ava was stealing the company and poisoning Ethan against the family. She said if I completed the task, I could come upstairs.”
Ethan struck him.
E fell against the desk but did not defend himself.
Ava shouted, “Stop.”
Ethan’s fists trembled. “He tried to kill you.”
“He was imprisoned and conditioned his entire life.”
“That does not make you alive if the car reached the ravine.”
Ava rolled between them. “And hitting him does not change what happened.”
E looked at her with confusion. “You should hate me.”
“I do not know you well enough to hate you.”
“Mother said mercy is how weak people postpone revenge.”
“Your mother is wrong about many things.”
A sound came from the desk drawer.
A phone was vibrating.
E opened it and removed an old device. One message glowed on the screen.
BRING AVA TO THE EXECUTIVE OFFICE. ETHAN MUST READ THE REPORT.
Below it was a countdown.
Twenty three hours, fifty nine minutes.
Adrian examined the device. “It is linked to the house security system.”
“What happens when the countdown ends?” Ethan asked.
May you like
E looked toward the ceiling.
“The third bed wakes up.”
