Will's gaze snapped to the doorway as paramedics rushed in, a blur of navy and fluorescent yellow. Their equipment clattered, the rapid thud of their boots syncing with the hammering of his heart.
"Here! Here!" He scrambled back, hands slick with fear, making room for them to reach Angela.
"Sir, step back," one commanded, voice authoritative yet not unkind.
"Will." The dispatcher's voice was a tether now fraying. "They've got her."
He nodded, though the dispatcher couldn't see. The line clicked dead, severance complete.
"Angela," he whispered, but the paramedics were a flurry of motion over her, blocking his view. A cuff snapped around her arm, the beep of a monitor slicing through the chaos. They continued the CPR and got a pulse back.
"Prepping for transport," someone announced.
"Stay clear," another instructed as they slid a board beneath Angela's limp form.
"Is she—" Will began, but his throat closed around the words.
"Sir, we need you to step back," a paramedic told him, eyes sharp yet empathetic.
He staggered, reaching out to steady himself against the wall while his son clung to his leg. The commotion had awakened his daughter, who had come out of her room and was now crying in his arms as well. He rubbed her hair, every movement mechanical, like he knew he was doing it but couldn’t feel anything. The world tilted, sharp edges and sterile smells enveloping him. He blinked rapidly, trying to anchor himself to the moment.
"Oxygen's on. Pulse is weak, but it's there," a voice cut through the fog of his shock.
"Got a pulse," he repeated to himself, clinging to those words as if they were a lifeline.
The sirens wailed, a relentless echo as more responders arrived. Officers with stern expressions and notebooks entered, glancing between Will and the medics. Whispers of “accident” and “statements” buzzed around him like flies.
"Sir, can you tell us what happened?" an officer asked, pen poised.
"Stairs," Will managed to say. "She fell. My son found her."
"Any idea how?"
"Can't… I don't know. I was sleeping. When my boy cried for help, I ran out and found her like this."
"Okay, take a breath. We'll sort it out," the officer assured him, scribbling notes.
The stretcher’s wheels clicked rhythmically as they rolled Angela toward the door. Will's eyes followed, fixated, as they disappeared into the waiting ambulance, its lights painting the night in urgent strokes of red and blue.
"Sir, we'll need you to come down to the station later," the officer said, snapping Will back to the living room, which was now a crime scene.
"Of course," Will replied, voice hollow, a shell of composure forming around his shattered state.
The ambulance doors slammed shut, a dull thud against the crescendo of the sirens that now began to fade, whisking Angela away, her life hanging by a thread.
"Angela," Will murmured once more, a vow forming amidst the chaos: to unravel the mystery of the staircase, to piece together the fragments of the night, for her. But first, he drove himself and the kids to the hospital, praying and hoping for good news.
Chapter 1
COCOA BEACH, FLORIDA
Three Years Later
I snatchedthe mug from the counter, the bitter aroma of freshly brewed coffee cutting through the morning chaos. My FBI badge, dangling around my neck, swayed with each hurried step, a metallic pendulum keeping time with my rising pulse.
"Kids! Shoes, teeth, backpacks—let's move it!" The words spilled out in a familiar plea, echoing against the indifference of their routine sluggishness.
"Christine, I'm not calling you again!"
