Chapter 2 The Phone on the Table
~ Victoria's POV ~
"Clear!"
A massive jolt of electricity ripped through my sternum. My entire body arched off the table involuntarily, every muscle convulsing under the brutal shock.
Nothing. Just the shrill, unbroken scream of the flatline monitor.
"No pulse! Charge again! Three hundred joules! Clear!"
THUMP.
The second discharge slammed through my chest like a freight train. My body crashed back down against the mattress.
And then, deep within the center of my chest, a violent flutter answered. A hard, jagged thud. Then another. Then a rapid, desperate drumbeat as my heart remembered how to beat.
I gasped, my lungs tearing open as I sucked in air like a diver breaching the surface of a frozen lake.
"Sinus rhythm restored! We have a pulse! Blood pressure coming back up to ninety over sixty!"
The fluorescent ceiling lights blinded me. The air smelled of burnt ozone and antiseptic alcohol. I reached out blindly, my trembling fingers digging into the sleeve of the nearest resident like a drowning victim clinging to a lifeline.
"Easy, Mrs. Cole. You're back with us. Just breathe. You're safe now."
I couldn't form words. I just lay there with tears running down my cheeks, listening to the rhythmic beep of the cardiac monitor, trying to convince myself that I was still alive.
Two hours later, they moved me into a private recovery suite on the fourth floor. My body felt as though every bone had been ground into dust, but the sharp agony in my chest had subsided into a hollow, bruised ache.
An elderly floor nurse stepped inside to adjust my IV drip, writing observations onto her digital chart. She looked down at me with gentle pity before speaking in a low, quiet tone.
"Your husband's executive office was paged five times while you were in resuscitation, Mrs. Cole. His personal secretary answered, but Mr. Cole hasn't checked into the hospital desk yet. I'm sure he is simply caught in urgent corporate meetings."
At first, I was trying to understand what she just said to me. Or if I was the one who was hearing different things.
Five pages. While I was technically dead on an operating table.
I forced a tight, reassuring nod. He is the CEO of Cole Technologies, I told myself fiercely. His company is undergoing a massive restructuring. He doesn't know how bad it was. He loves you. He took a metal pipe to the skull for you.
I clung to that thought like armor.
Twenty minutes later, the door swung open, and Ethan walked in.
"Victoria!" He rushed straight to the bedside, his dark tailored suit slightly rumpled, his silk tie loosened at the collar as though he had sprinted through the lobby. "Thank God. The nurse at the station just told me what happened. I got here as fast as humanly possible."
"Ethan..." I reached out, my fingers trembling as he caught my hand in his.
"I am so sorry, sweetheart. I was stuck in transit across town in emergency investor negotiations and…"
BZZZ. BZZZ.
The sharp vibration rattled from the inside breast pocket of his jacket.
Without breaking eye contact, Ethan slid his hand inside his coat, tapped the side button through the fabric to silence the call, and continued talking as if nothing had happened.
"I should have been sitting in that waiting room babe. When the clinic paged my office and said your heart stopped... Victoria, I felt like the world was ending. I cannot lose you."
BZZZ. BZZZ.
The phone vibrated again. Persistent. Demanding.
This time, I saw the subtle tightening of his jaw, a micro-expression of suppressed panic that he couldn't hide fast enough.
"Who is calling you so urgently?" I asked softly.
"Just work," he replied. Giving me that same smile I was already used to.
The word came out too fast. Polished, defensive, and rehearsed.
He pulled the sleek black smartphone out of his pocket. But instead of returning it to his coat or answering it, he set it down on the small bedside table right between our chairs. He deliberately placed it face-down, he didn't trust his own instincts not to look at the screen while sitting in front of me.
I stared at the glossy glass back of that phone for a second longer than normal. A cold knot formed in my stomach, but before I could press him, the door clicked open again.
My father, Richard Hale, stepped into the room.
He arrived alone, leaning lightly on his silver-headed walking stick. Imposing, austere, wearing a bespoke charcoal coat, he commanded the entire room without uttering a single word.
He had never visited me in a hospital before. He rarely visited my home at all.
The moment his piercing eyes locked onto my pale face and the tangled IV lines running into my arms, something profound fractured behind his face. For a split second, I saw raw, agonizing vulnerability break across his features, a look of sheer terror I had never witnessed on him in twenty-four years.
He walked slowly to the mattress, staring at me in silence.
"You have her eyes," he murmured under his breath. The words were so soft, so steeped in ancient grief, that they seemed meant entirely for someone who wasn't in the room.
"Whose eyes, Dad?" I asked, my voice straining. "My mother's?"
And before he could even answer the question I just asked him, a female hospital administrator knocked briskly on the door frame, stepping in with an urgent, pale expression. She whispered something directly into my father's ear.
I didn't hear or have an idea on what she just told him. But I watched my dad hand gripped the silver handle of his cane. Every ounce of color drained from his face.
"Excuse me for one moment," he said, as he stepped out into the private hallway with her.
I turned my head toward Ethan, bewildered. "What is going on? Do you know why my father is here?"
"I have no idea," Ethan muttered, though his eyes darted anxiously toward the closed door. "Your father has never approved of me or my company. He probably thinks I'm not managing your healthcare properly."
Two minutes later, Richard Hale returned. He didn't look at Ethan. He walked straight up to my bedside, leaned down, and gripped the brass rail with shaking hands.
"Victoria, listen to me with absolute clarity," his voice carried an urgency that made my heart race. "Do not sign a single corporate document this week. Not one contract, not one shareholder proxy, not one financial release. Am I clear? Do you understand me?"
"Dad, what are you talking about? What documents?"
"Give me your word!" he demanded, his voice cracking with uncharacteristic emotion. "No matter what Ethan brings to you.” He said that, not even looking at Ethan. And then he continued. “No matter what reasons he gives you about saving his business, you sign nothing until I return for you. Promise me, Victoria."
"I... I promise, Dad, but please tell me what's happening…"
He didn't wait to explain. Without looking back at Ethan or acknowledging the room again, he turned and strode out into the corridor.
An eerie, suffocating stillness descended upon the hospital suite.
Ethan stood near the foot of my bed, staring at the closed doorway with a tense, guarded posture.
"What did he mean by that?" I whispered, pulling the thin hospital blanket tighter around my shivering shoulders. "Ethan, why did my father warn me about corporate documents? Are you in trouble?"
Ethan forced a stiff, reassuring smile and rubbed the back of his neck. "You know how paranoid your father is when it comes to business, Victoria. Cole Technologies is finalizing a routine venture partnership. He probably thinks someone is trying to leverage your family name. It's completely routine business stuff. Don't stress yourself over it."
He turned his back toward the table to pour a cup of water from the plastic pitcher.
At that exact instant, the phone he had left face-down on the nightstand vibrated with a sharp, double buzz.
The screen illuminated brightly against the wooden surface, casting a pale glow from underneath. Out of pure instinct, I reached out and gently tilted the phone upward just enough to see the lock screen.
A banner notification preview was glowing across the display:
SELENE ASHFORD "Ethan, Harold is ready to execute the merger paperwork. We need to finalize the marriage contract before Victoria finds out ab…"
The breath evaporated from my lungs.
Marriage contract? Selene Ashford?
Before I could read the rest of the truncated sentence, Ethan spun around. The moment he saw my fingers touching the glowing screen, his entire face turned as white as chalk.
He dropped the plastic cup immediately, lunged across the bedside, and slammed his palm down over the glass display, a fraction of a second too late.
I looked up at him, my vision blurring with tears. My chest ached with a pain that no defibrillator could ever restart.
"Ethan," my voice broke into a jagged whisper. "I need you to tell me the truth right now.” I said, my voice sounded differently. “Who is Selene? And why did you sign a marriage contract with her?"
Ethan stood frozen over me, his hand trembling against the phone. Panic flashed across his eyes before hardening into a cold, defensive wall. He snatched the phone off the table and shoved it deep into his inner coat pocket.
"Victoria, it’s not what it looks like. You're misinterpreting things. I have an urgent operational crisis at headquarters, I have to leave right now."
"Ethan, answer me! Look at me and answer me!"
He backed away toward the door, refusing to meet my gaze. "Rest. We will discuss this tonight."
And then, the heavy door clicked shut behind him, leaving me alone in the dim room, clinging to a broken heart and a terrifying truth.
