I'm fine. Tell you later.
The ER was chaos—a multi-car pileup on the BQE had flooded us with patients, and I hit the ground running before I'd even changed into fresh scrubs.
Three hours later, the rush finally ebbed. I found myself in the hallway outside Bay 4, catching my breath, when Dr. Park emerged from the room behind me.
"Family's ready," he said.
I nodded and pushed through the door.
The patient was a man in his forties with broken ribs and a nasty laceration above his eye, but stable. Lucky. His wife sat in the chair beside him, their teenage daughter pressed against her shoulder. Both had been crying. Mascara smudged under the wife's eyes, the daughter's face blotchy and raw.
"He's going to be fine," I said. "Ribs will take time to heal, and he'll need to take it easy for a few weeks, but there's no internal bleeding. No complications."
The wife's hand flew to her mouth. The daughter made a sound—something between a sob and a laugh.
"Thank you," the wife whispered. "Thank you so much."
I watched them reach for him. The wife took his hand, careful of the IV. The daughter leaned in, resting her head against hisshoulder. He murmured something I couldn't hear, and they both smiled through their tears.
A family. Whole. Still together.
I stepped out before my face could betray me.
In the hallway, I leaned against the wall. Let the weight settle.
Derek Edwards didn't get this moment. His family didn't get to hearhe's going to be fine.They got a body in the morgue and six months of nothing—no answers, no justice, no closure.
Because Kevin Lang drove drunk and killed their seventeen-year-old son.
And his father made it go away.
They deserved to know the truth.
They deserved justice.
And I was the one who had to make sure they got it.
I pushed off the wall. My hands were steady. They always were. The rest of me would catch up later.
The page from Dr. Park came just as I was finishing my notes on the pileup patients.
My office. Now.
I found him behind his desk, expression unreadable. He wasn't alone—a man in a charcoal suit sat in the chair across from him, leather briefcase at his feet, the kind of polished calm that meant expensive lawyer.
"Dr. Rothwell." Park gestured to the empty chair. "Sit down."
I sat. The lawyer turned, and I caught the logo embossed on his briefcase. Gold letters.Rothwell & Associates.
A cold weight settled low in my gut.
"Dr. Rothwell." The lawyer's voice was smooth and professional. "I'm Lawrence Webb, from your father's firm. Mr. Rothwell asked me to handle your case personally."
"My case." The words came out flat.
"The complaint filed against your medical license." Webb opened his briefcase and withdrew a slim folder. "Your father asked me to take point on this personally."
I looked at Park. His expression gave nothing away.
