Chapter 5 - The Flatline at Midnight
The private surgical wing of St. Jude’s was dark when Ethan’s car careened up the ambulance ramp, shredding its front tires against the concrete curb.
He leapt from the smoking vehicle before the engine had even stopped turning, his weapon drawn, sprinted through the sliding glass emergency doors, and ignored the screaming triage nurses who scattered at the sight of his blood-drenched coat.
He hit the stairwell three steps at a time, taking the flights toward the ICU like a feral beast.
The scent of cordite hit him on the third floor.
*Too late.*
“No, no, no,” Ethan muttered, the mantra tearing out of his chest like a broken prayer. “Please, no.”
He kicked open the heavy fire doors to the surgical floor.
Two men in black tactical gear lay dead in the corridor, their bodies riddled with heavy shotgun slugs. Marco, Ethan’s chief enforcer, was slumped against the reception desk, clutching a bleeding shoulder, a spent twelve-gauge resting between his thighs.
“Boss...” Marco coughed, spitting dark blood onto his lap. “They came up the service elevator... Gregory Thorne... he took her into the sterile vault... room 402...”
Ethan didn't stop to bind Marco’s wounds. He sprinted past the bodies, his shoes skidding through fresh, slick pools of blood, and slammed his shoulder against the magnetic door of Room 402.
The scene inside froze the blood in his veins.
Dr. Gregory Thorne was on his knees beside the bed, a bleeding scalp wound soaking his white coat, frantically pumping the chest of Clare Bennett.
Above the bed, the cardiac monitor was not beeping.
It was screaming.
A solid, unbroken, high-pitched tone cut through the sterile room like a razor blade.
*Flatline.*
“Get the pads!” Gregory roared at a terrified nurse who was trembling in the corner with a defibrillator tray. “Charge to two hundred! Now! Clear!”
The shock lifted Clare’s limp, pale body off the mattress. Her head fell back, the blond hair damp and tangled, her limbs dropping with a lifeless thud.
The line remained flat.
*Beeeeeeeeeeeeep.*
“Charge to three hundred!” Gregory screamed, his voice cracking with desperation. “Clare, don't do this! Breathe, damn you!”
Ethan crossed the room before his conscious mind could process the movement. He shoved the nurse aside, grabbed the edge of the steel bed frame, and dropped his face down next to Clare’s cheek.
She was cold. Colder than the marble steps of his house.
“Clare,” Ethan broke. The word wasn't a command. It was a sob—ragged, ugly, tearing out from the deepest, blackest part of his soul. “Clare, look at me. Please. Look at me.”
“Ethan, get out of the way!” Gregory yelled, charging the paddles again. “Clear!”
Another shock. Clare’s back arched. The monitor wavered, spiked a jagged green notch, and then collapsed back into the flat, agonizing drone.
“Ephedrine, one milligram!” Gregory shouted. “Come on, Clare! Come back!”
Ethan reached down and caught her hand. It felt tiny inside his own, fragile, the fingers bruised and limp.
“You wanted five minutes,” Ethan wept openly, the tears streaming down his face, hot and humiliating, dripping onto her pale cheek. “You asked for five minutes, Clare. I’m here. I’m not leaving. I threw the investors out. The house is empty. The empire doesn't matter. I don't give a damn about the ships! I don't give a damn about the money!”
He pulled her hand to his lips, kissing the cold knuckles, his body shaking violently.
“Don't leave me alone in that house,” he begged, his voice dropping into a broken, ragged whisper against her ear. “I don't know how to live without you. I never learned how to live without you. Please. Just one minute. Give me one minute to tell you I love you.”
For four long, unbearable seconds, the room held only the sound of Gregory’s panting breath and the unbroken scream of the machine.
Then, the monitor choked.
*Bip.*
Gregory froze, his hands hovering over her chest with the paddles.
A silence that felt like eternity stretched across the white room.
*Bip... bip.*
The green line jagged upward, a weak, chaotic rhythm struggling against the current of death.
*Bip... bip... bip...*
“Pulse is back,” the nurse whispered, collapsing against the crash cart in tears. “Sinus rhythm, forty-five beats per minute... rising to fifty.”
Gregory dropped the paddles onto the tray with a clatter, his hands trembling so violently he had to brace himself against the wall. He looked at Ethan, whose face was buried in the sheets next to Clare’s hip, his shoulders shaking with silent, uncontrollable sobs.
“She’s back,” Gregory murmured, wiping blood from his forehead. “For now. But you almost killed her, Ethan. And if Voss makes another move tonight, she won't survive the stress.”
Ethan raised his head. His eyes were red, swollen, but the sorrow inside them had hardened into something prehistoric, terrible, and absolute.
He gently tucked Clare’s limp hand back under the sterile white blanket, leaning down to press one final, soft kiss to her temple.
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“Watch her, Gregory,” Ethan said, his voice dropping into a terrifying, glacial whisper. “Because before the sun rises, Julian Voss will not have an empire left to command.”
***