The heavy oak lid shifted, scraping against brass fittings with a sound that seemed to slice through the suffocating air of the crematorium chapel. The three workers pulled it back, their faces rigid with professional detachment.

The shot echoed through the small ICU room—but it didn't come from Sterling's silenced pistol.

A heavy, unsilenced round shattered the glass window behind Sterling. Blood erupted from Sterling’s shoulder, sending him staggering backward into the heart monitor console.

Standing in the broken doorway of the room was Victoria Vance. Her coat was torn, her hands covered in soot from the basement electrical room. In her trembling hands, she held a snub-nosed revolver she had taken from Julian’s personal glove compartment earlier that day.

"Victoria?" Sterling gasped, clutching his bleeding shoulder, his gun dropping to the floor. "What... what are you doing?"

Victoria’s eyes were wild, unhinged, filled with tears of pure betrayal. "You knew!" she screamed at Sterling. "You knew Arthur wasn't our real father! You knew we were just criminal bastards brought here to take the fall!"

"Victoria, listen to me—" Sterling tried to plead, backing away.

"You used us!" she shrieked, firing another shot wild into the ceiling. "Julian and I ruined our lives for a fortune that was never ours! You were going to take the money and leave us to rot!"

"Victoria, drop the gun!" Emily yelled, trying to step between Victoria and Arthur’s bed to protect her father.

"Get out of the way, Emily!" Victoria screamed, pointing the revolver at Sterling's chest. "He took everything from us!"

Sterling, desperate and bleeding, suddenly lunged forward, grabbing Victoria’s wrist. The two slammed against the wall, fighting over the revolver.

BANG! BANG!

Two wild shots tore through the ceiling tiles. Sparks showered down over the room as wires short-circuited.

Emily didn't care about their fight. She rushed to Arthur’s bedside. His face was turning a deep, terrifying blue; the oxygen monitor was flatlined. She grabbed the emergency manual resuscitation bag attached to the wall, jammed the mask over Arthur’s face, and began manually pumping air into his lungs.

"Breathe, Dad! Please, breathe!" she sobbed, squeezing the bag rhythmically with all her strength.

1... 2... 3... Pump.

Behind her, a final, sickening gunshot echoed through the room.

THUD.

Emily turned her head for a fraction of a second. Sterling lay motionless on the floor, a pool of blood spreading beneath his head. Victoria stood over him, dropping the empty revolver from her trembling fingers. She sank to her knees, staring blankly at the wall as heavy police boots came thundering down the corridor outside.

Tactical officers swarmed the room, flashlights blinding everything. "POLICE! DON'T MOVE!"

"HELP HIM!" Emily screamed through her tears, never stopping the manual pumping of air into Arthur's lungs. "HE NEEDS OXYGEN NOW!"

The SWAT medics rushed forward, pushing Victoria aside, taking over the resuscitation bag, and hooking up a portable generator to the life support systems.

For thirty excruciating seconds, the room was filled with the rhythmic sound of mechanical pumping and the desperate shouting of paramedics.

Then, suddenly...

BEEP... BEEP... BEEP...