Critical Diagnosis (Love Inspired Suspense)

by Alison Stone

  “Stephanie—” Lily tried to keep her voice even “—what are you talking about?”

  “My grandparents treat you like another grandchild.” Stephanie’s attention snapped back and landed squarely on Lily, her eyes burning through her like lasers. “If you haven’t noticed, you aren’t their granddaughter. I’m their granddaughter.”

  “Your grandparents are generous to a lot of people. Not just me.” Lily tried rationalizing with an irrational person.

  Stephanie rolled her eyes. “I’m over it. I got bigger problems now.”

  Frank stood and tugged down on his cap. “You ladies done chatting? I’ve got places to be.”

  Stephanie stroked the leather of her large designer bag. She opened her purse, reached inside and pulled out a gun. Icy fear shot through Lily’s veins. Instinctively, she took a step back.

  “Don’t go anywhere. You won’t get far. Not with the old bag out in the waiting area. And I know you won’t leave her.”

  Stephanie slowly pivoted, pointed the gun at Frank and pulled the trigger. Frank’s eyes widened and his features crumpled as if the one person he trusted had just put a bullet in his chest. He pressed his hand to his chest, removed it and squinted at his bloody fingers. A burst of red exploded on his gray T-shirt under his open jacket.

  “Why?” His knees buckled under him. His jaw crashed against the counter with a horrendous crack. His lifeless body crumpled onto the floor behind the nurses’ station.

  Lily bit back a sob. Her legs wobbled under her. She wanted to run, escape, but she couldn’t leave Mrs. York. In the fuzzy periphery of her consciousness she heard Mrs. York hollering to them. No doubt wondering what was going on.

  Stephanie lifted the gun to Lily’s chest. “Take one step and I kill you and the old bag.”

  White dots floated in Lily’s line of vision. She watched as if outside herself. Stephanie grabbed a tissue, then leaned over and pulled a gun from Frank’s waistband. She stood up quickly. “See, I stopped him. Just in time. Self-defense.”

  Taking a chance, Lily scooped up the receiver on the phone. “We need to call the police.” She pointed at Frank, a red puddle forming under his body. “This is the same man who had tried to get into the clinic before.” A million scenarios scraped across her aching brain. None of the puzzle pieces snapped into place.

  Stephanie pressed her palm to her forehead; a trace of something Lily couldn’t name flashed in her eyes. Then Stephanie’s attention seemed to snap into focus. She shook her head. “Nothing’s ever easy, is it?” Stephanie fisted her hand. “I only wanted what was rightfully mine.” Her lips thinned into a straight line. “My mother had everything growing up. Everything. But she threw it all away. Hung around with the wrong people. Got herself disowned.” She pounded her fist on the desk. “I had to work my whole life to get myself back into my grandparents’ good graces.”

  “Your grandparents love you.” Lily pressed together her trembling lips.

  Stephanie narrowed her gaze. “As soon as James returned to Orchard Gardens, good old Declan wanted him to run Medlink.” She gritted her pristine white teeth. “I’ve been working like a dog for Declan. I was supposed to run Medlink.”

  Lily couldn’t gather enough saliva to swallow. “You know James doesn’t want to run Medlink. He wants to practice medicine. You already know that.” Lily scrambled to talk Stephanie off the proverbial ledge. “You’ll run Medlink. Just like you always wanted to.”

  Stephanie scoffed. “Seriously? You really do live in la-la land.” She lifted the gun. She had traded her tissue for a black leather driving glove that coordinated with her ensemble. “The only way I’m going to maintain my current lifestyle is to kill you.” She raised her eyebrows. “And James.”

  * * *

  James parked in front of the clinic on the street and stared up at the neat Victorian home. Every time he came to this place, his loyalties were torn between reenlisting and staying here and practicing medicine. Part of his indecisiveness stemmed from knowing that as long as he lived in Orchard Gardens, his grandparents would be in his ear about returning full-time to Medlink.

  But now he had something else to consider. Little Chloe.

  And Lily.

  He rolled his shoulders, trying to ease the knot between his shoulder blades. He climbed out of the car, strode up the path and pulled on the glass door. Locked. He tented his hand and pressed it against the glass. From here, he couldn’t see past the small foyer into the waiting room, but he assumed Lily and Mrs. York were still waiting for him. Nancy had called him on her way out and left a message to let him know she had closed the clinic, but Lily and an older woman were waiting for him there.

  James unlocked the door and stepped inside the small foyer. The air was thick with antiseptic and something else he couldn’t quite put his finger on. The stillness put him on high alert. In the waiting room, he found Mrs. York in a wheelchair, her head lolling forward at an awkward angle. “Hello!” he called, glancing around the clinic. Deep shadows stretched into the corners of the space. He touched Mrs. York’s neck. Her pulse was steady.

  “Hello.” Stephanie appeared in the archway dressed in her regular non-work-hours uniform: black yoga pants and a black T-shirt.

  James cocked his head. “Is...Lily here?”

  Stephanie stepped back. Lily was sitting on the stool, a terrified look in her eyes.

  “What’s going on?” The fine hairs on the back of James’s neck stood on edge. The coppery scent of blood filled the air. He swept his gaze over Lily from head to toe. Physically she appeared okay. Where is that smell coming from?

  “What is going on?” he repeated.

  Stephanie pulled a gloved hand out from behind her back and pointed a gun at him. Instinctively, he lifted his hands. Years of army training kicked in. But could he use deadly force against his cousin?

  Stephanie took a quick step back and pressed the barrel of the gun to Lily’s head. Lily closed her eyes briefly, her chest rising and falling. A tear ran down her cheek.

  “Don’t try anything,” his cousin said.

  “What in the world is going on?” Rage shook his voice.

  “Why didn’t you tell me you had no interest in running Medlink?” If Stephanie hadn’t been holding a gun to Lily’s head, he might have thought he detected concern—contrition, almost.

  James flinched. “What do you mean? I told you and Grandfather I wanted to reenlist a few days ago.”

  “You would have saved me a lot of trouble if you had only told me sooner. Much sooner. Before I made all these plans. Plans I couldn’t undo. You knew how much I wanted to run Medlink.” Her tone reminded him of how she used to beg their grandparents for gifts on the few times she visited as a child. “I really want the doll with the pretty blond hair.”

  “This is all about you wanting to be the boss?” James asked, a muscle working in his jaw.

  Stephanie slid her hand under Lily’s chin. “It’s a shame, really. If you had only been honest, this all never had to happen.” She gestured to James with her chin. “I had paid Frank to come to the clinic to kill you. To kill you. Then I would have been the logical choice for CEO of Medlink. And then this one—” she patted Lily’s cheek roughly “—had to take a trip to the Dumpster. Get in the way.”

  A jolt shot down his spine. He fisted his hand as he locked gazes with Lily. He tried to project with his eyes that everything would be okay. Dear God, let everything be okay. “Why are you doing this now? If I reenlisted, the position would still be yours.”

  “Everything is black-and-white with you, isn’t it? My friend here—” Stephanie’s nose flared in disgust as if she couldn’t believe her own stupidity “—got greedy.”

  James followed his cousin’s lowered gaze and saw for the first time the man on the floor behind the nurses’ station. His cold eyes stared into no
thingness. “What happened?”

  Stephanie dug her fingers into her scalp, then dropped her arm. She gestured with her gun at the man on the floor. “I hired this idiot to kill you.”

  A ringing started in James’s ears. “What are you talking about?”

  “With you out of the way, I’d get to run Medlink. But this idiot couldn’t even do that right. On his way to stage a break-in at the clinic, he runs into Lily. Once he recognized her photo in the local paper, he realized she was the researcher I had stupidly told him about. He knew how valuable her research was to Medlink’s future. To my future. So he blackmailed me.”

  Lily leaned heavily on the counter and spoke for the first time. “Frank told me he could get me whenever he wanted. Now it makes sense. He wanted Stephanie to know he could hurt me if he wanted to. That’s why you were so eager to have me leave town. If he couldn’t get to me, he couldn’t blackmail you.”

  “Yes. But you wouldn’t listen. You had to stay in town.” Stephanie swiped her free hand across her forehead. “You just couldn’t listen.”

  James knew he had to keep her talking. “How did Talia get mixed up in all this?”

  Stephanie narrowed her eyes, and she looked as if she wanted to hit someone. “Frank was using her. When I hired him, I told him about Lily’s research. How valuable it was. He took it upon himself to hang out at the social spots around Medlink, and he eventually struck up a relationship with Talia. Frank was going to find a way to extort money out of me one way or another. He used Talia to gain access to your research. And I ended up playing right into it.

  “That Talia’s such a needy girl. I can’t stand needy people. If I could have twisted things around, I would have made her look guilty. But she went and killed herself. And I knew this jerk wasn’t going to go away.”

  James kept his mouth shut that Talia’s suicide had been unsuccessful.

  “So this has nothing to do with gang activity?” James asked.

  Stephanie made a get-real sound. “No. That was Frank being clever. Trying to distract the police with some stupid theory that gangs were involved.”

  “Stephanie, you’ve got to stop this craziness. Please.” James took a step toward her.

  “You can’t tell me what to do.” She lifted the gun and pointed it at his chest. He froze.

  “I did us all a favor. Now Frank can’t try to sell your research.” Stephanie’s mask of indifference and her flippant tone made Lily’s blood run cold. “Now that Regen is moving into clinical trials, I’m confident it will be a success, even if Lily here is not around to see it through.”

  “Stephanie—” James warned, a muscle ticking in his jaw “—it stops here.”

  Stephanie closed her eyes briefly, drawing in a deep breath. Tired. Resigned, almost. Her hand dropped from Lily’s neck. James sprang off the balls of his feet and slammed Stephanie into the counter. She hit it with an oomph. The gun tumbled to the ground. Lily bolted from the stool and picked up the gun, holding it away from her body as if she had a rat by the tail.

  James yanked Stephanie to her feet and wrenched her arm behind her back. She grunted. He glanced over his shoulder at Lily. “Lock the gun in the top of the desk and call the police.”

  Lily nodded, her eyes wide with shock.

  “Sit on the ground, Stephanie.”

  His cousin slid down the wall and covered her face. James pressed his fingers to the man’s throat. No pulse. James averted his gaze from all the blood, a violent image from his army days clawing at his memory.

  Pivoting, he crouched next to Stephanie. “You didn’t go to all this trouble because you were mad Grandfather had picked me over you to run Medlink.” He angled his face to get a read on hers.

  Stephanie lowered her hands and hugged her knees to her chest. She released a shuddering breath. “I stole money from Medlink.” Resting an elbow on her knee, she braced her forehead in her hand. “Grandfather wasn’t as involved as he used to be. No one was paying attention. I knew once you came back, you’d notice the discrepancies in the accounting.” She pounded her forehead with the heel of her hand. “I am so stupid.”

  “Our grandparents gave you everything.”

  Stephanie lifted her tearstained face. “I needed the money. I lost a lot of money gambling. I had some really bad guys after me. I had to pay them back.” Her entire body shuddered. “That’s how I met Frank. We became friends at the casino tables.”

  “So you tried to have me killed to hide the fact you were embezzling money?” He sat on a stool, his knees growing weak. His cousin. His own flesh and blood.

  “I couldn’t go to prison.” She lifted her palms. “I couldn’t lose everything I had worked so hard to get.” Her flattened mouth puckered at the edges. “Lily wasn’t supposed to be at the clinic that day Frank came.”

  “Is that supposed to make me feel better?” Rage bubbled under the surface. “So you decided you’d come here today, kill me and Lily and then blame it all on Frank.”

  “Yep.” Cockiness returned to her expression. Lightness in her eyes. “I was going to come in and kill him in self-defense. Tie up all the loose ends.”

  James scratched his head. “I understand your motive to kill Frank, even me, but why Lily?”

  “I thought I needed her alive for Regen, but once I learned her research was moving into clinical trials, I knew her value had plummeted. Another researcher could pick up where she had left off to find a cure, right? But for now, the treatment she had found would make Medlink rich. Maybe richer than finding a cure, thus ending the need for a treatment.”

  “You’re evil, you know that?” James stood and her empty gaze followed him. She was huddled on the floor, a stressed-out mess. “You had everything....” Disbelief swirled in his head.

  “I’ll never have what you have, James.” Stephanie’s head dropped into her hands. “As long as you and Lily were around, our grandparents wouldn’t care about me. They never really had.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong.” James dragged a hand through his hair. “Want to hear the ultimate irony, Stephanie?”

  She glanced up at him with a question in her eyes.

  “The other night, Grandfather told me the board of directors had audited the books. They had found some discrepancies.” James shook his head. “You killed a man for nothing. You were never going to get away with embezzling money.”

  Stephanie slammed her head back against the wall. “Stupid, stupid, stupid.”

  “James?” Lily’s voice snapped him out of his nightmare. “The police are here.” She tipped her head toward the waiting room, where an EMT was checking on Mrs. York.

  An officer strode in and arrested Stephanie. EMTs tended to Frank, but any sense of urgency seemed lost. The man was dead. As the chief led Stephanie out, he called over his shoulder, “I’ll be back in to take your statements.”

  Lily came in from the waiting room. “Mrs. York’s going to the hospital in an ambulance. She’s groggy from the pain medication Nancy gave her, and she needs her leg x-rayed.” Her teeth chattered.

  James reached out and took her hand, pulling her into a fierce embrace. He smoothed his hand down her hair and back, and a quick shudder racked her body.

  “Thank God you got here when you did,” she whispered into his chest.

  James tilted his head back and looked into Lily’s glistening eyes. A small smile lit her face. He touched his lips to hers and thanked God.

  EPILOGUE

  Nine months later...

  “There you are.”

  Lily spun around, a slow smile spreading across her face at the sight of James strolling around the side of her cottage out in the country. He had on jeans and a T-shirt on one of the first spring days warm enough to forgo a jacket. The bushes at the back of her cottage had started to sprout new buds. It was her favorite time of ye
ar.

  New beginnings.

  Lily inhaled deeply, smelling the damp soil, the pine needles, the fresh new scent of spring. “There you are. We’ve been waiting for you!” Lily said.

  She turned around and grabbed the rope of the tire swing hanging from a huge maple tree. “Now, make sure you’re holding on tight. Okay?”

  Chloe tipped her head back, her braids spilling down her back. She squealed in delight. “Higher, Momma Lily, higher,” she said in the adorable way only a three-year-old could say.

  “Not too high.” She’d never grow tired of the way the precious child called her Momma Lily.

  James came up behind Lily and slipped his arm around her waist. She lifted his hand and kissed it, the sun glinting off the gold on his ring finger. “How are you, Mrs. O’Reilly?”

  She nudged him gently with her elbow. “That’s Dr. McAllister-O’Reilly.”

  James nuzzled her neck. “It has a nice ring to it.” One she was still getting used to. They had gotten married last month after a whirlwind courtship, romance and legal proceedings, which made them an instant family.

  James caught the tire swing and kissed his daughter. Their daughter. Happy tears blurred Lily’s vision.

  “How’s my peanut?” James asked, pulling the tire swing close. Chloe reached out, wrapped her arms around his neck and held on like a little koala until he dragged her off the swing.

  “Momma Lily says we’re gonna eat hot dogs and have a picnic.”

  “Is that what you want?”

  Her brown eyes opened wide. “Hot dog with ketchup.”

  Chloe wiggled and James put her down. She ran after the soccer ball and kicked it around the yard.

  Lily tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “Talia called me this morning.” James’s eyebrows drew together. “She’s doing well. She’s seeing a therapist.” Lily shook her head. “It’s so sad that she had such low self-esteem she allowed Frank Smith to manipulate her to the point she felt her only out was to try to take her life. I told her I’d help her any way I can.” Lily scratched her forearm. “I think she’s going to take some time to heal before making plans.”