Chapter 4 - TYLER HAD USED MY NAME BEFORE
Tyler left before dessert.
Vanessa followed.
Giovanni did not stop them.
Neither did I.
“You’re letting him leave?”
I asked.
“This isn’t an arrest.”
“You think he’s involved.”
“I think he knows something.”
“That’s not the same.”
I looked at him.
“You’re annoyingly careful.”
“I’ve paid lawyers enough to learn.”
Sophia found me ten minutes later.
My sister was still in her wedding dress.
Understandably furious.
“Would anyone like to explain why my reception now looks like a congressional hearing?”
I hugged her.
“I’m sorry.”
She pulled back.
“Did you secretly marry the billionaire?”
“No.”
“Good.”
Pause.
“Are you going to?”
“Sophia.”
“What? It has been a strange evening.”
Giovanni actually laughed.
Sophia looked at him.
“Do not encourage her.”
“I wouldn’t dare.”
Then her expression softened.
“Jess, are you okay?”
No.
“Yes.”
Sister translation.
She knew.
“Go.”
“What?”
“This is my wedding.”
“I know.”
“And I have three hours left to eat cake and pretend Aunt Melissa isn’t drunk.”
She squeezed my hand.
“Go figure out whatever this is.”
I kissed her cheek.
Giovanni and I left through the hotel’s side entrance.
No limousine.
A black sedan.
Still absurdly expensive.
Inside, he opened a tablet.
Twenty-seven incident reports.
Redacted patient data.
Dates.
Hospitals.
Equipment serial ranges.
I found mine.
My language.
My notes.
Then:
STATUS — CLOSED.
RATIONALE — DUPLICATE / NON-DEVICE RELATED.
“That’s not what I concluded.”
“I know.”
“Who changed it?”
“We’re tracing credentials.”
Then I noticed a name in the distribution log.
T. BENNETT — Hartwell Clinical Commercial Liaison.
My stomach dropped.
“Tyler?”
“Yes.”
“Why would sales see safety reports?”
“They shouldn’t.”
There were eleven accesses under his credentials.
Including mine.
I stared.
“You knew this before the dance.”
“I knew a Tyler Bennett had accessed the file.”
“And you knew he was my ex?”
“Not until I heard him talking to you.”
“So when you approached me—”
“I recognized your name from the report.”
That made more sense.
Still strange.
“You memorized my name?”
“Your report was unusually detailed.”
“I’m a nurse.”
“Yes.”
“That’s our job.”
“Apparently not everyone thinks so.”
We drove to a Fierro Health administrative building near the river.
Independent compliance officers were already there.
Giovanni introduced me to Dr. Rebecca Cho, chief clinical integrity officer.
She did not treat me like a poor nurse rescued by a billionaire.
Thank God.
She said:
“Jessica, I need you to tell me exactly what happened with the H-12 incident.”
So I did.
Patient age.
Weight.
Medication.
Programmed rate.
Observed discrepancy.
Pump replacement.
Engineering response.
Everything.
No embellishment.
Then she asked:
“Did anyone contact you afterward?”
I remembered Tyler’s call.
“Yes.”
“When?”
I checked old phone records.
Two days after the report.
Dr. Cho looked at Giovanni.
Interesting.
Then she asked:
“What did Mr. Bennett say?”
I told her.
Still complaining about Hartwell equipment?
At the time, meaningless.
Now:
Potential unauthorized awareness of a confidential safety report.
Then my phone rang.
Vanessa.
I almost declined.
Dr. Cho said:
“Answer if you want. Don’t bait her.”
I put it on speaker.
“Jessica.”
Vanessa was crying.
“Where’s Tyler?”
“I don’t know.”
“He left me.”
“What?”
“He dropped me at my mother’s and drove away.”
I closed my eyes.
“Vanessa—”
“He said this is your fault.”
Of course.
Then:
“What did you do?”
I almost laughed.
“I filed a patient-safety report four months ago.”
“What does that have to do with Tyler?”
“You should ask him.”
Silence.
Then Vanessa whispered:
“He told me you were trying to ruin his promotion.”
“What?”
“Months ago.”
I stared at Dr. Cho.
Giovanni became completely still.
Vanessa continued:
“He said you’d become obsessed with making complaints about Hartwell because you were jealous of us.”
There it was.
Different battlefield.
Same weapon.
Make Jessica look bitter before Jessica speaks.
I asked:
“When did he tell you that?”
“Before Thanksgiving.”
My report was filed in October.
“Did he say how he knew?”
“No.”
Then Vanessa started crying harder.
“Jessica, he told me you were unstable.”
I closed my eyes.
Five years earlier, when Tyler left me three days after I announced my pregnancy, he told family:
Jessica was impossible.
Jessica was obsessive.
Jessica would use the baby to trap him.
Now he had done it again.
Not just with Vanessa.
Professionally.
Discredit the woman before she becomes inconvenient.
Then Vanessa said:
“There’s something else.”
“What?”
“Tyler has a laptop he never lets me touch.”
Everyone in the room became still.
“He keeps it in a storage locker.”
“Where?”
“I know the facility.”
Dr. Cho wrote something down.
Vanessa continued:
“And two weeks ago, I heard him arguing with my father.”
“About?”
She whispered:
May you like
“Hospital reports.”
---
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