Chapter 5 - Yesterday
Daniel could barely stand.
Yesterday.
If Vanessa was telling truth, Ava had been alive less than twenty-four hours earlier.
“Where is she?”
“I don’t know.”
“You just said she gave the ring away.”
“I said the patient received it yesterday.”
“From Ava?”
“Through a courier.”
Daniel slammed his palm against the table.
“Stop speaking like a lawyer.”
Eleanor almost smiled sadly.
“You married one.”
Vanessa ignored him.
Ava had not appeared physically.
The ring arrived in a padded envelope with a handwritten instruction:
Put this on her right hand before Daniel sees her.
No signature.
But inside was a phrase only Ava, Vanessa and Daniel knew.
The phrase came from Ava and Daniel’s first year of marriage:
Blue means tell the truth.
A private joke after Ava once caught Daniel lying about liking a terrible blue sofa.
Nobody else should have known.
Unless Ava had told them.
Daniel asked who delivered envelope.
Hospital courier camera showed a woman in gray coat, face hidden by cap.
Height similar Ava.
Could be.
Could also be someone else.
Then the engraving was cleaned.
Dr. Reed placed ring under magnifier.
Daniel expected names.
Instead:
V-17 / SECOND LEDGER / 0419
And beneath that, smaller:
NOT AVA.
Daniel stared.
“What does ‘not Ava’ mean?”
Nobody knew.
Maybe warning patient wasn’t Ava.
Maybe warning ring wasn’t proof.
Maybe Ava had engraved it herself to prevent exactly the assumption Daniel made.
Then Daniel remembered woman’s words:
“You still don’t know who I am.”
Everything pointed away from Ava.
But Vanessa had whispered:
“Ava never died.”
Two truths could coexist.
Ava alive somewhere.
Patient someone else.
Then Eleanor traced 0419.
April 2019?
Locker?
Case code?
Ava’s notes contained repeated reference:
0419 SAFE.
Location?
St. Catherine Medical Archive.
A sealed pathology storage case.
Requested by:
Dr. Samuel Reed.
Daniel turned to surgeon.
“You knew Ava before today.”
Reed’s expression hardened.
“Yes.”
“How long?”
“Six years.”
Daniel stared.
Ava had maintained a secret relationship with her surgeon?
Not romantic.
Reed clarified.
He had treated Evelyn Vale after reconstructive surgery complications.
Ava paid anonymously.
Then, four years ago, Ava approached him asking how to preserve old medical evidence.
He helped store V-17 tissue slides and device fragments under legal hold.
0419 was storage case.
“What’s inside?”
Reed answered:
“The evidence your father tried to save too late.”
Daniel frowned.
“My father?”
Reed nodded.
“Charles Mercer created the case.”
May you like
That turned everything again.
If Charles was covering up, why preserve proof against himself?
