“Yeah, that’s me.”
“Dawn said you’d be showing up. Broman had a bit of a setback, regressed on the progress he’d been making. Dr. Marsh wanted to take him for some extensive tests. Dawn is with him, but it’s not worth waiting. He’ll be gone for the next several hours.”
“So, the protocol has made him worse, not better?” Julian asked, tension clawing at the back of his neck.
“No, I don’t want to give that impression. He was improving at a nice pace and he’s lost some of that improvement. But overall, he’s still exhibiting better brain function and response to stimuli than he was when he first got here,” the nurse explained.
“It’s a matter of adjusting the protocol once they figure out why his results declined. Kind of two steps forward, one step back.”
“Exactly.”
Julian thanked the nurse for the information and headed out of the hospital room. Walking down the wide hallway, he glanced at the names outside the doors, wondering if they were all patients undergoing the same protocol as Broman. Too many people whose lives had been stolen as they lay trapped in a coma. He hoped they all made it out—
Julian paused at one door, staring at the name on the plaque.
P. Dumay
Maybe all except one.
Glancing around, Julian expected a guard to be posted at the entrance to her hospital room, but the area was empty except for a few nurses huddled at the nurses’ station. They were pointing at something on the computer screen, engaged in a heated discussion.
Against his better judgment, Julian pushed the door inward and stepped inside, closing it behind him. Across the room, Priscilla Dumay lay still in the bed. Her dark tresses spread out on the peach colored sheets. The room had a warm, cozy feel. Small tables rested on each side of the bed, with lamps emitting a soft light. A sofa was tucked away in the corner of the room, near the window. A soft throw blanket hung from the armrest.
Everything that Dumay had expected to happen while she was in the coma had been stopped. The urge to let the bitch know was too strong for Julian to resist. He grew closer to the bed. Dumay’s chest rose and fell as medical equipment hissed and beeped in the room. If he wanted to put an end to her, this was a good opportunity.
Or was that what she wanted?
Another chance to destroy his life because he couldn’t exercise self-control. As the saying went, fool me once shame on you. Fool me twice …
Julian stopped near the edge of the bed. “You thought you had it all planned perfectly, didn’t you? You would ruin my life and make sure I ended up in prison, get Zak to kill me while you … what? Spent the rest of your days in a medical facility pretending to be incapacitated after emerging from the coma? What was your end game?”
Dragging a hand down the back of his head, Julian took a quick glance over his shoulder, then turned back toward the bed.
“Guess what? Your plan didn’t work. I’m still a free man. I’m still going to be the one to make sure you pay for your crimes. I’m going to be the one to make sure you suffer the loss of your freedom for trying to hurt Mena. You thought I fucked up your life before. Just wait until what I do next.”
Julian walked closer to her. He stared down at the serene face with eyes closed. His heart skipped a beat. He reached a hand toward her face. That face—
“Fuck!” Julian said.
Without a doubt, the woman in this bed was … not … Priscilla Dumay.
Chapter Fifty-Six
Mena spun around in the empty hallway. How had she gotten so turned around? The directions to the private waiting area from the nurse had seemed simple before Mena turned into a maze of intersecting and haphazard halls. Retracing her steps was pointless. She needed to find someone to lead her back to where she’d been trying to go in the first place.
An elevator dinged behind her.
Mena turned toward the sound, hoping whoever was exiting would be a Good Samaritan and help her out. A man in a white lab coat exited and turned down the hallway, heading away from her. Mena hurried toward him.
“Excuse me, sir. I’m lost. Could you help me find the waiting room on this floor?” Mena asked, trying to temper her embarrassment.
The man turned around to face her, his eyes registering the same shock that shot through her body. Mena’s hands flew to her mouth, stifling the scream that almost escaped.
She frowned. “Michael? What the hell are you doing here?”
“I … um …,” Michael stammered, then regained his composure. “I work here.”
“Work? Here? No, you can’t. You work in New York City. You live in New York City. There’s no way you can work in the Aerie Islands,” Mena said, her voice hitting a higher octave.
