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James Wheeler pushed a hand through his hair and pressed his lips together. “Don’t worry yet, Piper. It’s standard procedure in cases such as these.”
I shook my head. “I didn’t hear everything. What did he say?”
His eyes squeezed shut and the words he said next caused the air in my lungs to rush out in a whoosh.
“They are suspending your medical license.”
I swallowed hard, forcing the bile that had started up my throat back down.
That was it. I was done. My career was over.
I was going to be sick. With a shaky hand, I reached for the glass of lukewarm water that sat on the table in front of me. The liquid did nothing to help with my parched tongue, nor did it stop the roll of nausea.
Mr. Wheeler put his hand over the microphone and leaned toward me. “I know this is difficult for you. But, please, try to relax until we’re done here and then I’ll explain everything to you.”
I nodded mutely, my mind racing.
Everything I’d worked so hard for, gone.
But just when I thought things couldn’t get any worse, they did.
“Miss Kelley, are you listening?” The man on the end of the panel who was deciding my fate spoke my name, pulling me back to reality.
I nodded, still unable to really speak.
He cleared his throat and looked at the people seated beside him. “Miss Kelley, we are recommending that the DEA take this to trial.”
If it were possible for my heart to stop beating based on a few words, then I would be dead in the very chair I sat in. I couldn’t believe what I’d just heard.
In the matter of a few minutes, I’d gone from the devastating news that I would no longer be able to practice medicine to the mind-numbing knowledge that I could be going to prison.
The rest of the hearing moved in slow motion, and I spent the duration feeling like I was treading water in a pool that was just a hair too deep. The moment Mr. Wheeler clasped my elbow, I shot to my feet and nearly dragged him from the room.
Lawson was waiting for me on the other side of the thick wooden door and as I burst through he launched to his feet, catching me as I fell into his arms.
With my face pressed into the crook of his neck, I sobbed, “I’m going to go to prison.”
He held me, his arms wrapped tightly around me, and let me blubber into his shirt, soaking it with my tears. All around us, people milled about, but he didn’t try to move me out of the middle of the hallway. When I’d finally exhausted all the tears I had, I pulled back to look at him.
“You’re not going to prison,” he told me firmly.
“They are recommending taking it to trial! I’m going to rot away in a jail cell,” I moaned.
He shook his head and pressed his lips to my ear, whispering, “We will run the fuck away before I ever let that happen. Do you understand me?”
I pressed my lips together to stop the quivering and nodded mutely. Lawson pulled back and as his eyes searched my face, I blinked the moisture away.
“Let’s get home and we can talk about what happened.” Lawson glanced over my shoulder at where Mr. Wheeler was still standing. “You follow us back to my house.”
I assumed he nodded in agreement because Lawson spun us, and with his hand at my back, guided me through the door and out into the sunshine.
I wanted to laugh at the irony of how one of the worst days of my life was such a beautiful one. But there was nothing funny about the predicament I was in.
When we arrived back at Lawson’s house, Pieters was waiting for us. We’d settled at the table with Mr. Wheeler and Lawson had demanded the attorney tell us, in great detail, everything that was said during the hearing.
“Wait,” Pieters said. “Tell me the names the prescriptions were written under again.” He’d been sitting in the chair next to the attorney across from us, his forearms propped on the table. But he’d turned his torso so he was facing Mr. Wheeler, his eyes intense as the attorney started reading the names from the legal pad he’d jotted them down on.
“Stop,” Lawson barked as he shot out of his seat. “Let me see that.” He reached over and snatched the pad out of Wheeler’s hands and scanned the list of names.
