Chapter 5 - ISABEL’S LAST NIGHT
Richard took Maya to a small apartment overlooking Lake Michigan.
Daniel followed them.
“I don’t trust you,” Daniel said.
Richard poured himself water.
“That makes two of us.”
Maya remained standing.
“Tell me about my mother.”
Richard placed a file on the table.
“Isabel Torres entered St. Matthew’s Hospital on March 12, 2017.”
Maya nodded.
“I was there.”
“You were there during the day.”
Maya stared at him.
Richard continued.
“But you weren’t there at 2:17 in the morning.”
Maya remembered.
A nurse had sent her home.
Her mother had supposedly deteriorated hours later.
Richard opened the file.
“Someone visited her.”
A photograph appeared.
Eleanor.
Maya’s face changed.
“She knew my mother.”
“Yes.”
“What did she want?”
Richard looked at her.
“The notebook.”
Daniel frowned.
“What notebook?”
“The one you found tonight.”
Maya stared.
“How do you know about that?”
Richard smiled sadly.
“Because Isabel gave it to me first.”
Silence.
“She told me Charles Sterling had spent thirty years buying people.”
“Judges.”
“Doctors.”
“Police officers.”
“Politicians.”
“She wanted everything exposed.”
“What happened?”
“I got scared.”
Maya looked disgusted.
“You abandoned her.”
“Yes.”
Richard didn’t defend himself.
“I gave the notebook back.”
“Three weeks later, Isabel was dead.”
Maya’s eyes filled.
“And Eleanor?”
“She was there that night.”
Daniel leaned forward.
“Can you prove it?”
Richard produced another photograph.
Hospital security footage.
Eleanor entered Isabel’s room at 2:11 a.m.
She left at 2:38.
Isabel died at 2:42.
Maya stared at the image.
Then her phone rang.
Unknown number.
She answered.
“Maya?”
A woman whispered.
Maya recognized the voice.
Eleanor.
“You want to know what happened in that hospital room?”
Maya gripped the phone.
“Yes.”
“Then ask Richard why he was there too.”
Maya slowly looked at him.
Eleanor laughed.
“He didn’t tell you that part, did he?”
The call ended.
Richard’s face had gone pale.
Maya whispered.
“You were there?”
Richard didn’t answer.
Daniel stood.
“Richard.”
Finally, Richard nodded.
“Yes.”
Maya slapped the file onto the table.
“What happened to my mother?”
Richard looked at her.
May you like
And said:
“She told me Arthur was going to die.”
