Chapter5

The sky was a dull, leaden gray as the car merged onto the highway to the airport—like a dirty dishrag.

The GPS showed forty minutes to the airport. Forty minutes. The final physical distance between me and this city, between me and the past three years.

Then, my phone rang.

Not my personal phone—that number Jordan had was already blocked. It was my work cell. He knew this number but rarely called it.

The name jumping across the screen looked like a dying insect thrashing about.

I stared at it for a few seconds, until the ringing was about to cut off, before pressing the Bluetooth answer button.

"Sienna!" Jordan's voice burst into the car—sharp, urgent, carrying a panic I'd never heard before. "Where are you? Wherever you are, get to St. Claire Hospital! Now! Right now!"

"The hospital?" My voice remained steady, even carrying a note of perfectly calibrated confusion. "What happened? Are you hurt?"

"Not me! It's Chloe!" He was practically shouting, the background a chaos of muffled announcements and hurried footsteps. "She collapsed! The doctors say she's severely anemic and needs a transfusion immediately! She's RH negative—goddamn rare blood type! The hospital blood bank doesn't have enough, they're trying to get it from other hospitals but it takes time! You're RH negative too, I remember! Get here and donate for her! This is life or death!"

RH negative. Yes, we both were.

When we'd discovered that coincidence years ago, he'd joked that I was "chosen." Now it was the basis for his righteous demand that I donate blood for his mistress.

I drew a slow breath. Outside the window, scenery flew past. "How is she now?"

"Unstable! The doctor says the sooner she gets blood, the better! Sienna, please, I know I wronged you, I know I screwed everything up, but this is someone's life!" His voice mixed pleading, command, and his usual impatience. "Where are you? I'll send a car!"

Please? He actually used the word "please." For Chloe.

"I'm in the east end, meeting with a collector—pretty far from St. Claire." I lied, my tone carefully layered with difficulty and anxiety. "But I'll get there as fast as I can. I'm not sure how long it'll take, traffic's bad."

"As fast as you can! Fastest route possible!" He seized on it like a lifeline, words firing like bullets. "Go straight to the blood center on the third floor! I've already told them you're coming! Hurry, Sienna, she's white as a sheet..."

"Okay." I cut him off, deliberately injecting a thread of tight concern into my voice. "I'll try. Keep your phone on."

I didn't wait for him to finish. I hung up.

The car fell silent again.

My face showed no expression.

No anger, no bitterness. Just a cold, hard clarity.

I picked up my personal phone, unlocked it, found a contact saved not with a name but just the letter "R," and dialed. The call was answered almost instantly.

"RH negative blood, St. Claire Hospital, and all major hospitals within a fifty-mile radius of it—their reserves and transfer channels," I said into the receiver, my voice clear and calm, like stating a business decision. "I need them to experience a 'temporary, force majeure scheduling shortage' for the next twenty-four hours. Come up with your own reasons—technical malfunction, logistics issues, whatever. Make sure not a single drop of RH negative blood can successfully reach the third floor of St. Claire Hospital for a patient named Chloe Bennett."

A second of silence on the other end, then a flat male voice: "Understood. Priority level?"

"Highest," I said. "Execute immediately. Any resistance, drop my father's name."

"Yes, Miss Reed."

The call ended. I tossed the phone onto the passenger seat.

Life-saving blood?

Yes, blood could save lives. But my blood, any drop of my resources, would never flow for him—or anyone he cherished—ever again.

Chloe's pallor, Chloe's fragility, Chloe's need for careful nurturing of her "emotional stability"... let Jordan save her in his own way.

He was so capable, so full of "responsibility," wasn't he?

Airport signs appeared ahead. I slowed, turning into departures.

I parked, grabbed my purse and the file box containing all my secrets, and left the car keys on the dashboard. Someone would handle the car, just like everything in the apartment.

I walked into the terminal. The din of voices and announcements washed over me. I checked in, checked my luggage, went through security.

Throughout the entire process, my work phone never rang again. Maybe he was still anxiously waiting. Maybe he was starting to suspect.

It didn't matter anymore.

On the way to the gate, I took out my personal phone one last time.

The screen showed several unread messages from the blocked number, sent earlier.

I opened the latest one.

[Sienna, answer the phone! Where the hell are you?! Chloe needs blood! Are you doing this on purpose?! I'm warning you, if anything happens to her, I'll never forgive you!]

Never? He'd lost that right long ago.

I created a new message to that familiar number.

My fingers tapped the screen without hesitation.

[Jordan, best of luck to you and your dear 'sister.' You won't get another drop of my blood. Game over. Don't contact me again.]

I hit send. Almost the instant the delivery confirmation appeared, I long-pressed the number and selected "Block this caller."

Then I powered off the phone.

The gate had started boarding. I tucked the powered-off phone into my bag and pulled out my ticket and passport.

Engine roar filled my ears as the plane taxied onto the runway, accelerated, lifted its nose, and punched into the leaden clouds.

Weightlessness washed over me. The city below shrank into a miniature model of scattered lights, then was completely swallowed by the thick layer of clouds.

I leaned back against the seat and closed my eyes.

I knew that in that city growing ever more distant below, on the third floor of a hospital, a desperate race against time was unfolding.

And the man who'd once said he loved me was tasting the first real sip of panic he'd brewed with his own hands.

But none of it concerned me anymore.

New York, and a new life, waited just above the clouds.