Chapter 5 - THE BROTHER WHO KEPT GETTING SICKER
Daniel Blackwood was twenty-three.
He had once been a competitive swimmer.
Now he struggled to walk across a room without assistance.
Adrian showed Elise a photograph of him taken two years earlier.
Daniel stood on a beach, smiling beneath the sun.
Then Adrian showed her a recent photograph.
Daniel sat in a wheelchair.
His face was pale.
His shoulders narrow.
Elise felt a familiar ache.
She worked with sick children every night.
She knew what prolonged illness could do to a family.
But she also knew appearances could not establish a diagnosis.
"Has he been evaluated by independent specialists?" she asked.
Adrian nodded.
"Several."
"Do they agree on a diagnosis?"
"No."
"Then he needs a coordinated medical review, not another guess."
Adrian studied her.
"You don't think I'm crazy?"
"I think you're frightened."
He looked away.
"That's not something people usually say to me."
"Maybe they should."
Daniel's medical records were reviewed by independent clinicians with his consent.
Investigators separately examined the suspicious medication evidence from Adrian's collapse.
The findings raised concerns about unauthorized drug administration.
But they did not yet establish who was responsible.
Elise continued working.
She tried to keep her life normal.
Then a strange thing happened.
The squeaking cart disappeared.
A new one arrived.
Quiet wheels.
Working brakes.
Fresh shelves.
A small note was attached.
For the woman who notices what everyone else ignores.
Elise stared.
Dorothea appeared beside her.
"Secret admirer?"
Elise sighed.
"More like a man with too much money."
Dorothea grinned.
"Handsome?"
Elise looked at her.
"That's irrelevant."
Dorothea laughed.
"That means yes."
That evening, Elise called Adrian.
"Did you send the cart?"
A pause.
"Does it work?"
"That's not the point."
"Does it?"
"Yes."
"Then good."
Elise closed her eyes.
"You can't buy your way into my life."
Adrian was silent.
Then he said quietly:
"I wasn't trying to."
She softened slightly.
"Then what were you doing?"
He hesitated.
"Fixing something I could fix."
May you like
Elise stared at the phone.
For the first time, she wondered whether the feared mafia boss was more complicated than the newspapers suggested.
