Chapter 8 - THE TRUTH COMES OUT
The photograph had been taken three weeks earlier.
I remembered that night. I'd changed Owen's sheets, watered the flowers, and spoken to him about my brother's nursing exams.
I had no idea anyone was watching.
Rocco enlarged the image on his tablet.
A reflection in the window revealed the photographer: a hospital nurse named Laura Bennett.
She had worked Owen's floor since the beginning of his hospitalization.
I knew Laura. She brought coffee for the overnight staff and always remembered everyone's birthday.
The discovery made me feel sick.
"Bring her in," Owen ordered.
Rocco hesitated.
"Quietly, boss. If she realizes we know, she'll disappear."
Within an hour, Laura was escorted into the recovery room.
She looked frightened, but not surprised.
"I didn't hurt him," she said immediately.
Owen's eyes hardened.
"Who paid you?"
She began to cry.
"Nathan. He told me Owen would never wake up. He paid me to report visitors and make sure nobody examined the medication records too closely."
"Did you administer the drugs?"
"No. Dr. Shaw did that himself."
Laura revealed that Shaw had used an experimental sedative designed to suppress neurological activity. Nathan had paid for the treatment through a private medical company.
The medication had kept Owen unconscious while allowing doctors to believe his condition was stable.
But Laura had discovered something else.
Three months earlier, Dr. Shaw had received an order to increase the dosage permanently.
He had refused.
Two days later, his wife received a threat.
After that, he complied.
"Where is Shaw now?" Owen asked.
Laura shook her head.
"He left the hospital, but he wasn't running away. He said he had to meet someone who could make the whole thing disappear."
"Who?"
She swallowed.
"Your mother."
The room fell silent.
Owen's mother had died seven years earlier.
Laura opened her bag and removed a document bearing a recent signature.
May you like
Eleanor Hartley was alive.
And she had personally authorized the payments that kept her own son unconscious.
