Chapter 2 - THE BLINDS
“Fine.”
Clara set the syringe back on the tray.
“I’ll chart your pain at seven.”
Liam’s eyes moved toward her for the first time in nearly an hour.
“I didn’t say seven.”
“No. Your pulse did.”
She checked the monitor.
“One hundred twelve while lying perfectly still. Sweating through the pillowcase. Jaw clenched hard enough to crack a molar.”
Clara shrugged.
“Seven might actually be generous.”
His stare sharpened.
“You enjoy this?”
“Being ignored by a grown man who could answer a three-word question?”
She considered it.
“Not especially.”
The corner of his mouth almost moved.
Almost.
Then another wave of pain struck.
Clara saw it travel through him.
His fingers closed around the sheet.
His breathing stopped for three seconds.
When it returned, it was shallow and uneven.
She did not ask again.
She administered the prescribed medication, checked his abdominal dressing, and adjusted the pillows beneath his injured leg.
“Don’t mistake that for winning,” Liam muttered.
“I don’t compete with patients.”
“You compete with everyone.”
Clara looked at him.
“So do you.”
That silenced him.
By noon, the fever returned.
101.8.
By two, it reached 102.4.
Clara changed his dressing again and watched the angry redness around the wound.
The antibiotics were helping, but slowly.
Too slowly.
By late afternoon, Liam became restless.
He reached repeatedly toward the bedside table for things that were not there.
Once, he asked Leo why the car was still running.
There was no car.
Clara immediately understood.
Fever.
Pain medication.
Sleep deprivation.
Darkness.
The room had remained dim for nearly five straight days.
She turned on another lamp.
Liam opened his eyes.
“Off.”
“No.”
“Clara.”
It was the first time he had used her first name.
She noticed.
She also ignored it.
“You don’t know what time it is.”
“I know exactly what time it is.”
“What time?”
Silence.
Clara checked her watch.
“Five twenty-three.”
She looked toward the heavy curtains covering the windows.
His expression changed.
Not anger.
Fear.
It appeared so quickly she nearly doubted she had seen it.
“Don’t.”
Clara stopped.
Leo’s warning returned to her.
You do not touch the blinds.
“He needs daylight,” Clara said.
Liam’s voice lowered.
“Leave them alone.”
“You’re becoming disoriented.”
“I said leave them alone.”
“And I heard you.”
She walked toward the windows.
His hand slammed against the mattress.
“Clara.”
This time there was nothing weak about his voice.
She reached for the cord.
“Don’t touch those damn blinds.”
Clara turned.
“If there’s a medical reason, tell me.”
His face had gone pale beneath the fever.
“There isn’t.”
“Then I’m opening them.”
“Bennett.”
She pulled.
The blinds rose.
Golden winter light flooded the room.
Liam reacted as though she had fired a gun.
He pushed himself upright.
Too fast.
The monitor erupted.
His injured leg shifted.
His abdominal muscles contracted.
Pain ripped the color from his face.
“Put them down!”
Clara rushed toward him.
“Stop moving.”
“Put them down!”
He swung his good leg toward the edge of the mattress.
“Are you insane?”
Clara caught his shoulder as he tried to stand.
For one terrifying second, Liam Mercer—the man half the city supposedly feared—was completely helpless in her arms.
His injured leg could not support him.
His abdomen was still stitched.
His balance disappeared.
Clara absorbed his weight against her body.
He was heavier than she expected.
“Sit down.”
“Let go.”
“No.”
“Clara—”
“You’re going to rip yourself open.”
She forced him backward.
He fell against the pillows, breathing violently.
A red stain immediately spread across the fresh abdominal dressing.
Clara swore under her breath.
“Congratulations.”
She pulled on gloves.
“You just bought yourself another dressing change.”
Liam was not looking at her.
He was staring beyond her shoulder.
Toward the window.
Clara followed his gaze.
At first, she saw only the rear grounds.
Stone terrace.
Bare trees.
Winter grass.
An iron fence.
Then she noticed the small family cemetery beneath an enormous oak.
Six stones.
One looked newer than the others.
White marble.
A carved angel stood above it.
Clara could read the name even from the second floor.
MARA MERCER.
1992–2023.
Fresh evergreen branches rested across the base.
Beside them sat a small silver wind chime.
Clara looked back at Liam.
His expression had emptied.
Not hardened.
Emptied.
“Your sister?”
“Close the blinds.”
Clara lowered them halfway.
Not completely.
Enough to take the grave from his direct line of sight while leaving daylight in the room.
Liam noticed.
“You never do exactly what you’re told, do you?”
“Occupational defect.”
She peeled away the bloodied dressing.
One of the sutures had pulled.
Not enough to require emergency repair.
Enough to hurt.
Clara cleaned the area.
For once, he did not resist.
Minutes passed.
Then Liam spoke.
“She was thirty-one.”
Clara kept working.
“She lived here?”
“No.”
He swallowed.
“She hated this house.”
“Why?”
“She said every room had too many ghosts.”
Clara glanced at him.
“Smart woman.”
That produced the faintest breath of laughter.
Then it disappeared.
“She was better than me.”
Clara finished securing the new dressing.
“Siblings usually think that after they lose one another.”
“You don’t know what I think.”
“No.”
She removed her gloves.
“But I know guilt when I see it.”
His eyes hardened instantly.
“Careful.”
“There he is.”
“Don’t.”
“You opened the subject.”
“I said she was better than me.”
“And then you looked at her grave like you put her there.”
The room went still.
Clara waited.
Liam’s voice dropped.
“I did.”
She did not react.
That seemed to anger him more than shock would have.
“You hear me?”
“Yes.”
“I killed my sister.”
“Did you shoot her?”
“No.”
“Strangle her?”
“No.”
“Push her off something?”
His jaw tightened.
“No.”
“Then you’re using the word killed incorrectly.”
Liam turned his face away.
Clara began gathering the used gauze.
He spoke before she reached the trash.
“She took a pill.”
Clara stopped.
“One pill.”
His voice had become strangely calm.
“The coroner said it was supposed to be oxycodone.”
Clara knew what came next before he said it.
“It wasn’t.”
“Fentanyl?”
Liam closed his eyes.
“Enough to kill three people.”
Clara sat slowly in the chair beside him.
“She had surgery on her shoulder. Prescription ran out on a weekend. One of her friends gave her something.”
His throat worked.
“She took it in her apartment.”
He stared at the ceiling.
“She never woke up.”
Clara thought of Tommy.
Of hospital rooms.
Of standing beside someone you loved while machines counted seconds you could do nothing to control.
“That wasn’t your fault.”
Liam laughed without humor.
“You don’t know who I am.”
“I know enough.”
“No, you know stories.”
He turned toward her.
“That pill entered this city on one of my trucks.”
Clara said nothing.
“I had rules.”
Liam’s eyes became cold.
“No narcotics. Not after my father died. Gambling, unions, protection, stolen freight—call me whatever you want for those.”
His mouth tightened.
“But drugs were forbidden.”
“Someone broke your rule.”
“Someone decided the money mattered more.”
“And you blame yourself because you were in charge.”
“I was in charge.”
“That doesn’t mean you handed her the pill.”
“It means my name opened the road that carried it.”
That answer ended the argument.
Not because Clara agreed.
Because she understood.
“What happened afterward?”
Liam looked toward the half-open blinds.
“I shut down every drug route connected to us.”
“All of them?”
“Every one I could find.”
“That sounds expensive.”
“It was.”
“For you?”
“For everyone.”
Something in his voice made Clara study him.
“People resisted.”
“People always resist when morality becomes inconvenient.”
The sentence sounded practiced.
Clara suspected he had used it before.
Perhaps in a room filled with men who had hated hearing it.
“Was that why you got hurt?”
Liam did not answer.
The monitor continued its steady rhythm.
Clara waited.
Finally he said, “You should stop asking questions.”
“That’s not a no.”
“You were hired to keep me alive.”
“I’m starting to understand why that might be difficult.”
His eyes returned to her.
For the first time, she saw something beneath the arrogance.
Calculation.
Not aimed at her.
At memory.
“At Dock Nine,” Liam said quietly, “I was supposed to announce that the old operation was finished.”
“What old operation?”
“All of it.”
Clara frowned.
“You were getting out?”
“Not exactly.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means I was going legitimate.”
She almost laughed.
Then she realized he was serious.
“Construction. Shipping. Restaurants. Property. Everything that could survive daylight stayed.”
“And everything else?”
“Ended.”
Clara looked toward Mara’s grave.
Now she understood why the blinds mattered.
The grave was not merely grief.
It was a verdict.
“What happened at Dock Nine?”
His face closed.
“Enough.”
“Was it an accident?”
“No.”
“A rival?”
Liam stared at the ceiling.
“That’s what everyone believes.”
Clara felt the hairs rise along her arms.
“And what do you believe?”
His hand moved weakly across the blanket.
For the first time, she noticed the old silver watch lying on the bedside table.
The crystal was cracked.
The hands were frozen.
8:11.
Liam looked at it.
Then at Clara.
“When they pulled me from that building,” he said, “that watch was already broken.”
Clara waited.
His eyes hardened.
“I never told anyone this.”
“Why tell me?”
“Because you opened the damn blinds.”
Despite herself, Clara almost smiled.
It vanished when Liam spoke again.
“I don’t think the people who did this came from outside the family.”
Clara looked toward the closed bedroom doors.
Armed men stood beyond them.
Leo downstairs.
Drivers.
Guards.
Men who had known Liam for years.
She lowered her voice.
“You think somebody inside your organization tried to kill you?”
Liam’s expression did not change.
“No.”
Clara frowned.
Then he looked directly at her.
May you like
“I think somebody inside my family did.”
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