Chapter 3 - THE MAN WHO KNEW MY PASSWORD
Grant had once told me that marriage meant never keeping score.
At the time, I'd thought he meant forgiveness.
Now I wondered whether he'd meant access.
He knew my work schedule, my travel dates, and the location of my home office. He knew which passwords I'd used before the hospital introduced stronger security protocols.
He had helped me organize paperwork when I became chief.
He'd even offered to digitize old professional documents so I could spend less time at home catching up on administrative work.
I'd thanked him.
I'd trusted him.
By noon, hospital information security had begun reviewing the access logs associated with my credentials.
I did not ask them to accuse anyone. I asked them to determine whether my account had been accessed without authorization.
The preliminary report arrived that afternoon.
Several documents had been created using my credentials from a device that wasn't registered to me.
One session had occurred at 11:48 p.m. on a Sunday.
Grant had been home that night.
I'd remembered because we'd watched a movie together, and he'd fallen asleep with his head against my shoulder.
At least, I'd thought he'd been asleep.
I asked the security director to preserve the logs and provide them directly to compliance.
Then I returned to my surgical schedule.
A patient was waiting for a complex valve replacement, and I refused to let my personal crisis interfere with the care he deserved.
For four hours, I focused entirely on the operating room.
When the procedure ended successfully, the familiar rush of relief settled over me.
For the first time that day, I could breathe.
Then my phone lit up.
A message from Grant.
We need to stop this before you ruin everything.
I read it twice.
He hadn't asked how I was feeling.
He hadn't apologized for Serena.
He was worried about what I might uncover.
I replied with one sentence.
Tell me what you think I've done.
His response came almost immediately.
You don't understand what you're dealing with.
Before I could answer, Miriam called.
She'd discovered that the fraudulent guarantee had been witnessed electronically by someone who claimed to have verified my identity in person.
The witness wasn't a hospital employee.
It was a notary.
And the notary's name belonged to someone I had known for nearly fifteen years.
May you like
My former chief resident.
Dr. Adrian Cole.
