Buzz buzz buzz.
Trevor might be efficient, but there was no way this was about a tuxedo.
Dana opened her unit door and leaned over to grab her rolled up newspaper. She slid the elastic off and began to unfurl the pages.
Alex reached for his phone. The texts from Trevor screamed at him.
Trevor: We have a problem. Call me.
Trevor: Alex, it’s important. Are you there?
Trevor: Don’t come to Vice. There are reporters everywhere.
Trevor: Patterson finally surfaced. His paper ran a story about you early this morning, a bad one. You need to see it.
Trevor: Alex? We need to come up with a plan to confront these lies.
Trevor: Are you getting my messages?
One final text from Trevor contained a link to Patterson’s article. Alex clicked on it.
Hotelier Alex Markov’s secret love child…dead!
The Deans.
They’d finally talked. They’d always said they would.
Blackness swirled around Alex’s head, cloaking him in confusion and dismay. In that one second, the temperature in the room seemed to drop. His skin came alive with goosebumps, and for one moment, he thought he could see his breath in front of his face.
All his breath dissipated as soon as Dana turned around, holding up the front page of the paper.
“Alex?” Her eyes were wide with alarm. “What’s going on? The newspaper…they’ve printed some vicious lies.”
“They’re not lies.”
“But…” She dropped the newspaper. Its pages scattered on the floor. “A baby? Dead?”
He stood and walked over to her, holding out his hands. “Let me explain.”
She pulled away.
His Dana pulled away.
Shannon, his constant companion since that horrible day, laughed.You did this to me, Alex. It’s all your fault.
“Dana, please.”
She was a statue, completely unmoving. The only sign she still breathed was the moisture at the corners of her eyes.
“I was just about to tell you.”
“Really? Interesting timing.” She pointed at the newspaper. “Patterson is saying you were responsible for the death of your child.”
Alex sank into one of the living room chairs, defeated. It wasn’t often he allowed himself to visualize the stark room in the King Edward VII Memorial Hospital in Bermuda. He dared never picture the doctor’s face, his eyes so full of sympathy. He did so now and allowed the painful memories to wash over him, taking him back to that awful moment, the one that changed everything.
I’m sorry, sir. We couldn’t save her. And I’m so sorry we couldn’t save the baby.
Baby?
