Chapter 8 - THE UNHOLY ALLIANCEJudith hadn't been taken to jail.
The officers who had handcuffed her in my room weren't state troopers at all. They were private security guards hired by Sterling, dressed in stolen state police uniforms to stage a fake arrest and get her safely out of the hospital.
"How much time do we have?" Judith’s sharp, grating voice echoed off the concrete walls.
"Three minutes before the override script completes," Mercer replied, his fingers flying across the terminal keyboard. "Once the forty million moves into the Swiss ledger, the hospital’s backup drives will self-delete. Nora’s death will be ruled a tragic complication of arsenic-induced organ failure."
"And what about Graham?" Judith asked, her tone devoid of any maternal affection. "He let his emotions get in the way. He almost ruined everything."
"Graham is loose end," Mercer said coldly. "The air line in his ICU IV has already been compromised. He won't wake up."
Standing in the shadows outside the doorway, my stomach turned violently. Judith wasn't just willing to kill her daughters-in-law—she was executing her own son the moment he became an inconvenience.
"And the girl?" Judith asked. "Nora?"
"She’s bleeding out in the ER," Mercer said with a dismissive chuckle. "Even if she survived the fall down your stairs, the arsenic dose I gave her through her IV ten minutes ago will stop her heart within the hour."
My heart plummeted into my stomach.
The IV.
When Dr. Mercer had examined me earlier, he had hung a new bag of saline. He hadn't been treating me—he had been administering the final, lethal dose.
I looked down at the scalpel in my hand. My vision was already beginning to blur at the edges. Black spots danced across my eyes. My pulse was hammering in my ears like a war drum.
I had less than an hour to live—maybe less, given the exertion.
I had two choices: I could lie down on the cold floor and wait for help that wouldn't arrive in time, or I could take these monsters down into the dark with me.
I gripped the scalpel tightly, pressed my weight against the steel door, and threw it open.
"You forgot one thing, Doctor," I rasped, stepping into the bright blue light of the server room.
Mercer and Judith spun around in shock.
"Nora?" Judith gasped, her eyes wide with disbelief. "You... you should be unconscious!"
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I raised my right wrist, holding the scalpel over the blue bump beneath my skin.
"You need the biometric key to complete the transfer," I said, my voice steady despite the agony consuming my body. "And if I sever this nerve... the key dies with me."
