The steady beep of hospital monitors pulled Isabella back to consciousness. White ceiling tiles swam into focus as pain throbbed behind her eyes. Her body felt like one massive bruise, each breath sending sharp jabs through her ribcage.
"Welcome back to the land of the living."
Isabella turned her head—too quickly, sending the room spinning—to find Vivian Rodriguez watching her from a chair beside the bed. The attorney's tailored suit was wrinkled, dark circles shadowing her eyes as if she'd been there for hours.
"Claire?" Isabella croaked, her throat raw from smoke inhalation.
Vivian's expression tightened. "Critical condition. Burns over thirty percent of her body. They've induced a coma."
Isabella closed her eyes, flashes of the explosion replaying behind her eyelids. "Evelyn?"
"DOA."
The words landed like stones. Isabella's fingers instinctively went to her pocket, finding nothing. Panic surged through her. "The USB—"
"Safe." Vivian produced the small drive from her blazer pocket. "Along with this." She placed a hospital bracelet on the bedside table—identical to the one Alexander had kept in his safe.
Isabella stared at it. "How did you—?"
"Alexander contacted me the night you left for Alaska. Said if anything happened to you, I was to fly immediately to Anchorage with certain... documents." Vivian leaned forward, lowering her voice. "The Sterling family retainer has always been more than just a legal position, Isabella. I've been the keeper of their secrets for two generations."
Isabella struggled to sit up, ignoring the protest from her battered body. "Then you know about Thomas."
"The heir?" A thin smile crossed Vivian's face. "I drafted the trust documents myself when Edward Sterling found out about Claire's pregnancy. The old man was livid, but even he wouldn't risk a biological grandson being raised outside the family—especially one with a legitimate claim to the Sterling fortune."
"But if Edward arranged Claire's 'accident'—"
"Edward arranged many things before his convenient heart attack six months ago." Vivian's gaze was calculating. "Including your introduction to Alexander."
The revelation hit Isabella like another explosion. "I was... placed with him? As what—a distraction?"
"As his handler." Vivian opened her briefcase, sliding out a thick folder. "Your parents didn't die in that car crash when you were sixteen, Isabella. That was the cover story. Witness protection is quite thorough when it needs to be."
Isabella's world tilted on its axis. "You're lying."
"Am I?" Vivian placed a photograph on the blanket—Isabella at graduation, flanked by a smiling couple she'd called Mom and Dad. Behind them, partially blurred but unmistakable: Edward Sterling. "Your father was Edward's accountant. When he discovered the money laundering through Sterling International's overseas subsidiaries, Edward gave him a choice: work for him or disappear for good."
"No..." But memories were surfacing—hushed arguments behind closed doors, sudden moves in the middle of the night, her father's haunted expression as he'd looked at bank statements.
"When you caught Alexander's eye at that charity gala three years ago, Edward saw an opportunity. You were the perfect plant—someone who could get close enough to keep Alexander in line while Edward orchestrated his grand finale."
"Which was what?" Isabella asked though a terrible suspicion was forming.
"Cleaning house." Vivian tapped the USB drive. "This contains the real Sterling will, not the public version. Edward left controlling interest in Sterling International to Thomas—to be held in trust until his twenty-first birthday."
"Cutting out Alexander completely."
"And Evelyn, who Edward believed had become a liability." Vivian checked her watch. "Alexander doesn't know about the will yet. He thinks Thomas is just a complication to be managed, not the nuclear option Edward designed him to be."
A memory surfaced—Alexander's voice, tinny through the cabin phone: *Not all Sterlings are monsters.*
"If Alexander isn't behind Claire's attack, then who—?" Isabella began.
The hospital room door swung open. Alexander stood on the threshold, his expensive suit incongruous against the sterile hospital backdrop. Blood—not his own—stained his shirt cuff.
"Marcus," he said simply. "On my father's orders, carried out posthumously by the board." His eyes, red-rimmed with exhaustion, fixed on the USB drive. "I see Evelyn found it."
"You knew?" Isabella asked.
"I suspected. My father was nothing if not methodical in his cruelty." Alexander's gaze lingered on Isabella's bruised face, something like regret flickering across his features. "What I couldn't figure out was why he'd chosen you, of all people."
Isabella met his stare. "Now you know."
"Yes." He stepped into the room, closing the door behind him. "The question is: what happens now?"
Vivian cleared her throat. "That depends on where Thomas is."
Alexander's jaw tightened. "Safe. Beyond anyone's reach—including mine."
"You've hidden your own nephew?" Isabella's voice rose incredulously.
"I've protected him," Alexander corrected. "From the same people who tried to kill Claire. Who still might succeed." He turned to Vivian. "The board meeting is tomorrow. They expect me to present Father's supplemental will—the version that gives them control of the Asian markets."
"And if you don't?" Isabella asked.
Alexander's smile was cold. "Then we all become liabilities."
A knock at the door interrupted them. A nurse entered, carrying a small package. "Delivery for Isabella Whittaker."
Isabella frowned. "I didn't give anyone this location."
The nurse shrugged, placing the box on the bedside table before leaving. Alexander approached it cautiously, examining the label.
"It's from Anchorage Regional Hospital," he said. "Archives department."
With trembling fingers, Isabella opened the package. Inside lay a single black-and-white sonogram image. Written on the back in unfamiliar handwriting:
*He has my eyes, but his grandmother's smile. Find us at the beginning. —C*
"The beginning?" Isabella looked up at Alexander, whose face had gone ashen.
"Claire's hometown," he whispered. "Where we met. Whitehorse."
Vivian stood abruptly. "If Claire is moving Thomas, we need to get there first. The board has resources—"
"The board," Alexander interrupted, "just tried to kill the mother of my child." He pulled out his phone, dialing quickly. "I'm done playing by my father's rules."
As he turned away to speak in hushed tones, Isabella caught Vivian watching her with an unreadable expression.
"You have a choice to make," the attorney said quietly. "Edward chose you because you have something he valued above all else a conscience. The question is: whose side are you really on?"
Isabella's fingers closed around the hospital bracelet, the plastic warm against her palm. "Thomas's," she said firmly. "Always Thomas's."
Vivian nodded, something like respect flashing in her eyes. "Then I suggest you start by asking yourself who sent that package. Because Claire is still in this hospital, unconscious."
Cold realization washed over Isabella as Alexander ended his call and turned back to them.
"The plane is ready," he announced. "We leave for Whitehorse in thirty minutes."
Isabella met his gaze, searching for any hint of deception. Behind him, through the partially open blinds of her hospital room window, she caught a glimpse of a familiar face watching from the building across the street the man from the cabin, the one she'd seen with the detonator.
He was alive. And he was watching.
"I need to make a call first," Isabella said carefully, her heart pounding. "There's someone who should know we're coming."