The Doctor in the White Hallway
Chapter 10 - The Doctor in the White Hallway
At St. Catherine’s Hospital, alarms sounded as security sealed the intensive care wing.
Dr. Vale moved down the hallway in borrowed scrubs, pushing a medication cart. He had shaved his beard and dyed his silver hair, but Nurse Sofia Ramirez recognized his eyes from the false death certificate circulated among staff.
She stepped into his path. “Can I see your badge?”
Vale abandoned the cart and ran.
Grace’s room was at the end of the corridor. Inside, Grace had awakened again. She heard the alarm and saw a shadow pass beneath the door. Though weak, she reached for the call button.
Vale entered before she could press it.
“I never wanted this,” he said, locking the door. “Victor promised the drug would wear off after the burial was canceled. He said Ethan would return in time.”
Grace stared at him in horror. His excuse was impossible. The coffin had been scheduled to leave for the cemetery less than an hour after Ethan arrived.
“You signed my death certificate,” she whispered.
Vale removed a syringe from his pocket. “I can still make this look like a complication.”
Before he reached the bed, Grace knocked a metal tray to the floor. The crash echoed through the locked door.
Ethan was still ten minutes away, but Hope began crying in the neonatal unit across the hall. The sound gave Grace a burst of strength. She pulled the monitor leads from her chest, setting off a sharper alarm, and rolled away as Vale grabbed for her arm.
Nurse Sofia and two security officers forced the door open. Vale dropped the syringe and raised his hands.
He was arrested without anyone being harmed.
When Ethan arrived, breathless and wild-eyed, Grace was sitting upright with a blanket around her shoulders. For the first time since the coffin, she looked directly at him.
“You came home,” she said.
He knelt beside her bed. “Too late.”
“No.” Her voice trembled. “Late would have been after they closed the ground.”
Ethan rested his forehead against her hand. He wanted to promise that everything would return to normal, but normal had nearly killed them. So he promised something else.
“No more secrets. No more choosing work over fear. We rebuild honestly, or we don’t rebuild at all.”
Grace squeezed his fingers.
Across town, Detective Brooks questioned Dr. Vale. Faced with the financial records and the attempted attack at the hospital, he agreed to cooperate.
He confirmed that Victor had planned every step—from the drugged tea to the rushed funeral.
But he also revealed one final accomplice.
Someone inside the hospital had altered Grace’s admission records and cleared Vale through security.
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The name shocked Ethan more than Victor’s betrayal ever had.
It was Claire.
