“It’s alright,” I interrupted the chief before she went on. “As I recall, my family claimed the O.S. was nearly fireproof. ‘Nearly’ is not one hundred percent. Chief Han claimed that it was luck that I was not harmed and was able to help others. However, it wasn’t luck…it is due to the state-of-the-art technology at the O.S., and had it not been tampered with, I’m positive there would have been even fewer injuries.”
That got their attention, more than a few them sitting up and calling out.
“Are you saying that the security system was tampered with?”
“Was this arson?”
“Has the fire chief confirmed?”
“Do the police have a suspect?”
Reaching up to my lips, I blew on my fingers, making a high-pitched whistle that was further amplified by the microphone, making them cringe. Dropping my hand, I took a deep breath before speaking.
“I am a doctor. I came here to give you all a status update on the patients under my care. If you do not have questions regarding the patients…like seven-year-old Mary Gore-Booth, who has serve burns on both her left and right arms, along with her feet. She’s scheduled for skin grafts within the week…and hopefully, within a few months, this will be behind her,” I replied, lifting the photo of Mary. Did I have the mother’s permission? No. Would she give it to me? I was sure Bridget wouldn’t ever question this family again. “While there are no critical patients, we do currently need blood donations…to those who have donated, thank you.”
I could feel myself going on autopilot. My mother used to say the press are like puppies—hyper, attention-seeking, eager for a bone. So always give them your attention and a damn bone. They were asking me questions, but I was sure they were all itching to question the police and fire chief about an arson suspect. Meaning my family…the O.S. didn’t fail but was a victim of arson. So long as trust in my family was still maintained, and that we still had a good image, I didn’t care who took the fall for the arson.
No... that was a lie. I did care. Which is why I already had a scapegoat.
NEAL
“Sweets, hold on,” I said to her as I ste
pped out onto the street. One of the guards who’d driven in behind me jumped quickly out of the Ranger Rover, hand outstretched for my keys.
“Who are you?”
“Mannix. But people call me Monk.”
“I don’t really care. What I care about is my precious. Do you know what that is?” I asked him, nodding to my car.
He glanced to my precious quickly before looking to me. “It’s a vintage Ferrari.”
I stared at the blonde-haired, lanky man-boy stepping forward. I put my hand on his shoulder, turning him to face my precious along with me. “A poor man sees an old Ferrari. This, my ginger-haired friend, is a one-of-a-kind, custom-built forest green 1961 Ferrari 250 GT SWB California Spyder. It’s almost as precious to me as my children. So how will you treat it?”
“Like it’s your child?” he replied.
“No,” I shook my head. “You’ll treat it like it was more important than your child. Your favorite child. Your only child. Got it?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good man.” I nodded to him, tossing the keys up for him to catch, which he did as if I’d thrown up gold, before looking toward the hospital behind me. “I’ve been back in this city for an hour and already at the fucking hospital. Can you believe this shit, Sweets?”
“Are you talking to me or the driver still?” she answered back.
I grinned, pressing the Bluetooth further into my ear as I walked forward. “You know you’re the only Sweets I have.”
“Umm,” she replied to me. Then to someone else, “Put that in the corner and leave that. I’ll unpack it myself.”
“I still don’t understand why you needed to pack anything. We could have bought anything that wasn’t already in our room here.” I said to her as I glanced over the emergency room. The smell of alcohol and disinfectant trying but failing to mask the scent of smoke and burnt flesh.
“Well, when you decide to copy Declan’s bad habit of expensive cars…we should save anywhere we can.”
I rolled my eyes at her piss-poor excuse to take a jab at cars. “Sweets, it is our duty as insanely, unimaginably rich people to spend money on obscene shit. It’s an insult to the poor if we don’t, AND it hurts the economy.”
“Did you really just say not buying expensive shit hurts the poor and the economy? You don’t give a crap about either of those things!” She laughed so hard she snorted, which in turn made me laugh as I walked up to the visitors desk.
“That is not true! I care a lot. That’s why I’m about to donate to…” I paused, picking up one of the flyers on the desk. “Half-Home!”