Page 177

I look at the papers. Then at Alester. “Where did you get that?”

“Money is a talented researcher.”

“That file is sealed.”

“Sealed is not the same as buried.”

Petra steps forward slightly. “Alester, what is this?”

“A reminder,” he says, not looking at her. “For Dr. Price.”

My voice is quiet. “You have no idea what happened that night. My signature is on an assessment,” I say calmly. “My father deteriorated because a senior consultant ignored post-operative warning signs and altered the timeline after he died.”

Petra’s gaze snaps to me.

Alester remains calm. “Can you prove that?”

“You know I wasn’t responsible,” I say.

Alester lowers the page. “Do I?”

“Yes.”

“Convince a licensing board.”

The words are almost bored. That makes them more violent.

He closes the folder halfway and rests his palm on top of it. “One complaint. One reopened inquiry. One suggestion that a physician with unresolved questions around his own father’s death is now showing improper personal attachment to a pregnant patient under a private fertility contract. You understand how quickly that becomes ugly. Even if you survive it, you are suspended pending review. Your name circulates. Hospitals distance themselves. Patients disappear. Your clinic protects itself. Your license hangs in uncertainty for months. Years, perhaps.”

I stare at him.

He smiles faintly. “I would prefer not to do that. Replacing you at this stage would be inconvenient.”

“Inconvenient,” I repeat.

“My patience has limits, Dalton. Do not make yourself one of them.”

For years, that file has existed somewhere in the dark like a loaded gun. I knew it. I knew the version of events inside it could be used if it ever fell into the wrong hands. So I built a career anyway. I worked anyway. I saved lives and kept my head down and pretended that truth mattered because the alternative was too ugly to live with.

Now Alester Chandler has my father’s death laid out on his desk like a leash.

“You know I wasn’t the one responsible,” I say. This time, I don’t say it quietly.

Alester watches me. For the smallest moment, something flickers in his eyes.

Recognition.

Not guilt. Not mercy. Recognition.

He knows. Maybe not everything, but enough. Enough to understand the weapon in his hand is not justice.

It is leverage.

“I know what I can use,” he says.

The honesty is almost obscene.

I nod once, slowly. “There he is.”