Page 211 of Mile High Ruin

“The way you look at her.”

Silence.

Sloane’s face changes. So does mine, though I hope less obviously. Ethan closes his eyes again as if he has used up enough energy embarrassing his sister for one evening.

“You look exactly the way she described,” Ethan murmurs.

“Really?” I say.

“But I didn’t expect something,” he says, “and now that I know you feel it too, I’ll be able to have my rest soon.”

“Ethan,” she sobs. “Don’t say something like that. You’re well, you’ll be fine. We’ll grow old together, you and me.”

I look at her, and then at her brother. They look a lot alike. I can’t stop myself from asking. “What did you mean by that?”

He holds my gaze. “You look like you’d kill someone for her.”

Sloane makes a strangled sound.

I look at her. “I have.”

Her eyes flash. “Not helping.”

Ethan laughs weakly, then coughs, and the humor disappears from Sloane’s face instantly as she leans toward him.

I step back. For the next several minutes, I watch her adjust his blanket, speak to the nurse, check the water beside his bed and touch his forehead with the familiarity of someone who has done all of this too many times.

I understand now, why she stayed. I understand more than I want to.

When Ethan falls asleep again, Sloane settles into the chair beside him. She doesn’t look at me.

I leave the room quietly. Anton is waiting farther down the corridor. He sees my face and straightens.

I take out my phone. “Get me everything on Ethan Mercer’s current medical team.”

Anton pauses. “Everything?”

“Doctors. Consultants. Treatment history. Current medications. Every specialist who has reviewed his case.”

He studies me. “And then?”

I look through the glass at Sloane sitting beside her brother, and then I dial a number.

34

SLOANE

When I wake, my neck aches from sleeping at the wrong angle and one of my hands is still curled around the edge of Ethan’s blanket, as though some part of me believed holding on to the fabric would keep him exactly where he was while I slept.

The room is dim except for the monitor beside his bed and the faint wash of morning beginning to gather beyond the window, and for a few seconds I sit there without moving, trying to remember what woke me before realizing nothing did.

I simply slept longer than I meant to.

Ethan is still asleep. His breathing is shallow but steady, his face turned slightly toward me, and I reach across to touch his hand before glancing toward the glass panel beside the door.

Vadim is gone.

There’s no dark figure standing in the corridor, no Anton waiting several feet behind him, no security men pretending not to watch me while somehow noticing every time I move.