Chapter 5 - The Safe House and the Stolen PatientClara knew she couldn't go to the local police. If Richard Sterling owned the county judges, he owned the local precinct too. She needed federal protection, and she needed medical experts who weren't on the Sterling payroll.
Using a burner phone she purchased at a truck stop off Interstate 95, Clara dialed the only person she trusted outside the estate: Dr. Marcus Vance, a pediatric neurologist who had briefly treated Leo three years ago before Eleanor abruptly fired him for asking too many uncomfortable questions about the boy’s declining motor functions.
"Dr. Vance? This is Clara Hayes. Head housekeeper at Sterling Manor."
There was a long pause on the other end of the line. "Clara? I heard about the fire. Is Leo safe? I saw reports that everyone evacuated."
"They tried to kill him, Doctor. And they're trying to finish it right now. I have Arthur’s secret files. Leo was being poisoned with heavy metals. I need you to meet me at St. Jude’s Memorial in Boston in four hours. But we need to get Leo out of the state hospital first."
"State hospital?" Dr. Vance’s voice spiked in alarm. "What state hospital?"
"After the fire, the county social services—conveniently funded by a Sterling charity foundation—placed Leo under emergency protective custody at Newport General. In a private psychiatric ward. Guarded by Sterling private security."
"My God," Vance whispered. "They're going to silence him before he can talk to a pediatrician."
"Not if we get there first," Clara said, her voice hard as steel.
Two hours later, disguised in a stolen nurse’s scrubs uniform she snagged from a laundry bin behind Newport General Hospital, Clara wheeled a heavy gray linen cart down the sterile, fluorescent-lit corridors of the psychiatric annex.
Room 402.
Two burly private guards in black suits sat outside the door, drinking stale coffee and scrolling through their phones.
Clara kept her head down, pushing the cart forward with practiced casualness. "Routine linen audit," she muttered in a flat, monotone voice as she approached the door.
One of the guards lazily waved her off without looking up. "Yeah, yeah, make it quick. The old man wants this floor cleared by midnight."
Clara slipped past them, swiped her stolen electronic keycard, and slipped inside Room 402.
Leo was sitting up in the hospital bed, his small face pale against the white pillows, an IV drip taped to his thin arm. When the door clicked shut, he flinched, expecting his aunt Eleanor or another grim-faced doctor.
When he saw Clara’s face peering out from beneath the surgical cap, his eyes welled up with tears.
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"Clara..." he whimpered, pulling his knees to his chest. "They said I was going away to a special school. They said I’d never see you again."
"Not on my watch," Clara whispered fiercely, rushing to the bedside. She ripped the IV tape from his arm, grabbed a spare wheelchair parked by the corner, and hoisted the boy into it. "We're checking out early, Leo. And this time, we're taking the wheel."
