Chapter 7 - The Rapid Spread
I didn't look back.
I bolted along the edge of the tree line, ducking under the low-hanging oak branches, clutching the manila folder inside my coat like a newborn child. Behind me, I heard a car door slam, followed by Vance’s angry voice shouting Henderson’s name into the darkness.
I reached my car, threw myself into the driver’s seat, locked the doors, and tore out of the gravel lot just as the Audi’s high beams appeared in my rearview mirror.
My phone buzzed violently on the passenger seat.
It was Dr. Reed.
I hit speakerphone with a trembling finger. “Dr. Reed! I have the records! I have the environmental data from Cytec—”
“Sarah, you need to get back to the hospital immediately,” Dr. Reed interrupted, her voice tight, strained, stripped of all clinical composure.
The world stopped spinning. “What happened? Is Chloe—”
“The organism is reacting to the drop in her body temperature,” Reed said rapidly. “We attempted mild hypothermic therapy to slow its metabolic rate. It had the opposite effect. It triggered a defensive migration.”
“What does that mean?” I screamed, blowing through a red light onto the highway.
“It has branched again,” Reed replied, background monitors beeping frantically through the line. “It has crossed the thyroid cartilage. We’re detecting micro-perforations along the exterior wall of the jugular. If we don’t perform an emergency surgical extraction within the next forty-five minutes, it will enter her venous system. Once it reaches her heart or brain... there is nothing on earth that can save her.”
“I’m ten minutes away!” I sobbed, flooring the accelerator. “Don't let her die! Please, God, don't let her die!”
“There’s another complication,” Reed added, her voice dropping. “Your ex-husband just arrived with an emergency injunction signed by Judge Harrison. He has full temporary medical guardianship. He is refusing to consent to the surgery.”
“*What?!*”
“He claims the procedure is experimental and dangerous,” Reed said, anger finally bleeding through her professional mask. “His lawyer is threatening to sue the hospital for malpractice if we make a single incision before their private specialist from Cleveland arrives tomorrow morning.”
“She won't survive until tomorrow morning!”
“I know that, Sarah,” Reed said softly. “Which is why you need to get here right now and sign the maternal override before the sheriff’s deputy serves the court order.”
The call clicked dead.
Rain began to hammer the windshield in violent sheets. I leaned forward, my knuckles white against the steering wheel, my heart screaming Chloe’s name with every beat of the engine.
Richard didn't care if Chloe lived or died. He was doing this to win. He was doing this because his corporate lawyer, Brenda Vance, was protecting her family’s chemical empire. If Chloe underwent surgery and the organism was extracted and analyzed by the CDC, Cytec was finished.
They weren't trying to save my daughter.
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They were stalling until the evidence died inside her.
***
