Chapter 61

The news spread through the city like a toxic wildfire. The triumphant banners reading “Williams saves a child” were instantly incinerated and replaced by lurid headlines: “Journalist killed attempting to assassinate Dr. Niran Williams.” Speculations and feverish analyses of the last live images, the few chaotic seconds filmed before the guards destroyed the equipment, were scrutinized thoroughly. Television programs erupted in fierce debate: Was the journalist, Oswald, a martyr exposing corporate rot, or a terrorist driven by mad vengeance? Had he truly lost his career because of Dr. Williams?

Makizal, running on pure adrenaline and guilt, followed Beta’s cold advice. Within the hour, a terse press release affirmed that Dr. Williams was “under intensive, private care in a secure wing of the hospital.” The lie was perfect, keeping the wolves at bay and providing a temporary shield.

But the journalist’s final words, referring to her destruction and silence, had ignited a new and heated debate that Makizal now had to defuse. His mind raced, reviewing plans of action: close the Marz case, silence Romaric once and for all, and obliterate the journalist’s allegations with a deluge of contradictory evidence. Beta had discussed with the editor of TM Magazine, and certain media outlets had already been paid to emphasize the violent nature of the journalist’s act: a man who chose to kill someone in the presence of the parent whose child she had saved. His goal was to make the journalist a hated public figure, which would deter anyone from defending or protecting him. Whatever the reason for Williams’s senseless flight, he had to prove himself.

A cold dread gripped him. He was a professional killer, yet he had forgotten the most basic target of all: Williams’s relatives.

Everyone, from Miss Kai and her husband to Malaya, Rosa, Emilio, Romaric, and Adeline, was instantly aware of the chaos. Only Evelyn, locked in her room, and Kannika, still unconscious, remained oblivious to the gunshot that had just fundamentally shifted the power structure.

Miss Kai arrived at the hospital in a whirlwind of silk and fury, her husband following, their faces etched with horror. Swarms of police officers were securing the perimeter, their flashlights cutting through the media scrum. Kai bypassed the chaos and found Polo, the hospital administrator, her only immediate anchor.

“Where is she, Polo? I demand to see my daughter.”

Polo intercepted her mid panic, calming her exactly as he had been instructed. “Madam, she is stable. She is in a private, high-security wing. She requested complete isolation, even from family. The trauma of the attempt is severe. We must respect her need for solitude and recovery.”

Miss Kai searched his eyes, finding only professional concern, not deception. She swallowed her maternal fear. She did not know the full extent of the lie, but she saw the police, the fear, and accepted the shield he offered.

Meanwhile, at the villa, Williams was fighting a losing battle against her own biology. Having rushed into the spacious, marble-tiled master bathroom, she tore off the blood-soaked suit. The sight of the deep, jagged wound in her right shoulder, already swelling and throbbing, was professionally noted, but the raw, agonizing pain defied her mental defenses.

Her right arm hung uselessly at her side.

The bullet had crushed through muscle near her clavicle, grazing a nerve cluster. She could barely feel her fingertips.

Her breath came in sharp, shallow bursts.

She stripped down with her left hand, teeth clenched, skin slick with sweat.

Close to her lay her medical box. She was determined to remove the bullet herself.

Then she saw it in the mirror: the swelling, the bruising, the slow trickle of blood pooling downward.

“This is going to hurt,” she whispered to herself.

She sterilized a set of forceps and scissors as best as she could, then tried to angle them toward the wound.

The moment cold metal touched her torn flesh, she screamed.

A raw, guttural sound pierced the engineered silence of the house. Evelyn, in her cage, heard it, a sound too deep and animalistic to belong to the staff.

She crept to her door. The lock, which a staff member had forgotten to reset in the panic of ejection, clicked open under her tentative hand.

Astonishment and fear were Evelyn’s only companions as she moved through the vast, silent corridors. The house was empty. Eerily empty. Then she saw it, a darkening smear of blood on the pristine white floor, leading like a grim trail toward the master suite. The moans intensified, becoming shorter and sharper gasps of pain.

“Hello?”

Her voice wavered.

No answer, only another muffled cry.

She reached the bedroom door, luxurious and intimidating, and pushed it open. The room was in disarray. Blood-stained towels littered the floor beside a scattering of scalpels and gauze. It looked less like an injury and more like a struggle. Then a sharp, choked cry of pure anguish from the attached bathroom galvanized her.

Evelyn ran, throwing open the bathroom door.

The horror stopped her dead. Williams was half slumped against the sink, sweat dripping down her jaw, chest rising in violent gasps. Her right arm hung limp. With her left, she clutched a pair of bloodied forceps, fighting to keep her vision steady. Her face twisted in agony.

“Williams!” Evelyn lunged toward her.

Williams reacted instantly, pushing Evelyn away with her undamaged left arm. “What are you doing? Who let you…” She stopped. Realization hit. The guards must be outside.

Then she saw Evelyn’s face. “Get out of here. Now.”

But Evelyn did not move.

Instead, she grabbed a clean cloth and pressed it to the bleeding wound.

“You are losing too much blood,” she said, voice trembling. “We need to call for help.”

“What are you… STOP.” Williams ripped her arm away with a weakened but still forceful effort. “Can’t you see I am trying to excise a projectile? Get out of here and do not, do not call the police.” Williams desperately tried to re-sterilize a pair of surgical forceps she had retrieved.

Evelyn looked at the powerful, arrogant woman reduced to this vulnerable, bleeding mess. Had she been ambushed? Had her own ruthless game finally turned on her?

“Get out,” Williams hissed again.

“No.” Evelyn’s voice cracked. “You need help.”

“If you contact anyone, you are a dead woman.”

“But you are losing too much blood, Williams.” Evelyn darted toward the bedroom door, looking for a phone.

“I forbid you,” Williams screamed.

Evelyn saw the phone. One call to the police, and this entire nightmare would end. But she hesitated, hearing the raw, broken groans as Williams tried again to fish the bullet out. If the building was empty and she had retreated like this, there must be a reason. A voice in Evelyn’s own mind, long suppressed, whispered that this was the moment to be strong; to prove she was not a weakling, to serve the suffering woman she had sought for so long. She turned back and headed to the bathroom.

Evelyn dropped to her knees on the marble floor in front of Williams. “You took painkillers and a stimulant. That is why you are still standing. Tell me what to do. Now.”

“Your pathetic sympathy will not change what awaits you,” Williams spat, rage mixing with pain.

“I am calling the police, or you tell me what to do. Make a choice quickly.” Evelyn’s tone was sudden and utterly devoid of intimidation, purely authoritative.

Williams stared at Evelyn, her eyes blazing with furious recognition. Weakened and cornered, this woman had dared to challenge her. It was the first time in memory she had felt such a visceral pushback.

“Fine. I am calling for help…”

“Wait,” Williams finally conceded, the word bitter and reluctant. “The bullet is not deep. The wound is small.” Her medical professionalism instantly seized control, overriding the persona. “Take these surgical tweezers. You will sterilize them with the alcohol swab in the second drawer. You are going to steady my arm against the wall. You will penetrate the entry wound. Follow the shallow track of the bullet superiorly and posteriorly. It is lodged close to the bone, just below the acromion. Once you feel the distinct metallic resistance, you extract it straight out. Do not twist. Then apply direct pressure with the gauze.”

It was too much information, too fast, but Evelyn nodded, grabbing the sterile equipment. She looked at Williams, her hands suddenly trembling. She could not do it.

Williams’s face twisted into an expression of sheer contempt. She snatched the tweezers away. “Go on, get out. You are useless.”

That word resonated in Evelyn’s core. Useless. The pain of her own lifelong self-doubt surged, overriding her fear of blood and Williams. Here you are again, looking for the way out. Evelyn’s eyes filled not with tears of pity but of cold, focused vengeance against her own inadequacy.

She snatched the tweezers back.

“What are you doing?” Williams rasped.

Evelyn stared, her gaze steady and challenging. “Be quiet.”

Evelyn did not answer. She tied her hair back with trembling fingers, pulled on the nitrile gloves Williams had dropped, and set the sterilized tray beside her.

Williams blinked.

Confusion flickered.

And something else, that strange magnetic pull she could never explain.

“Fine,” Williams exhaled weakly. “Listen carefully.”

Her instructions came in short, clipped breaths.

“Position me on the floor. I need to be flat. The angle helps you avoid the subclavian artery.”

Evelyn gently lowered her, supporting her head.

“Good. Now open the wound slightly with the scissors. Follow the trajectory. Do not dig randomly.”

Evelyn swallowed hard.

Her hands hovered.

“Do it,” Williams ordered.

She did.

Williams arched off the floor, biting her lip so hard it bled.

“Now go deeper until you feel something solid.”

“I cannot…”

“You can.” Williams’s voice broke, but the command remained. “Focus. Keep pressure steady.”

Evelyn’s throat tightened.

Their eyes met, and something electric passed between them.

Pain. Defiance. Fear. Connection.

Evelyn pushed deeper.

Williams shook violently, but she did not look away.

“There, stop.”

Her voice was barely a whisper.

“You are touching the bullet.”

Evelyn’s breath hitched. Tears blurred her vision, but she nodded as she too felt that metallic resistance.

“Grip it gently, then pull in one motion.”

Evelyn steadied herself.

Then she pulled.

Williams’s scream shattered the room.

Finally, Evelyn made it; the bloody bullet rested in her palm.

Both women trembled.

Williams’s face softened, barely but enough.

After sterilizing the wound with cotton and antiseptics.

“Bandage it,” she whispered. “Tight. Then pressure above the clavicle.”

Evelyn’s hands moved with new confidence, and for the first time, Williams did not push her away.

She stared at Evelyn for a long second. Before she could speak, her breathing slowed, not unconscious but depleted.

Evelyn remained by her side, blood on her gloves, adrenaline crashing through her veins.

she realized something terrifying: She had just saved the very woman who had almost died because of her.

And yet she could not stop herself from carrying the guilt of the past.

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