I Stopped Loving Him When He Let Me Bleed Out novel Chapter 11

Yolanda Fletcher's hand paused as she lifted her wine glass.

Only for a second.

The next moment, she smoothly handed the glass back to the housekeeper, turning around with a look of mild confusion.

"Sienna Sterling?"

She sounded as if she were trying hard to recall an insignificant stranger.

"You mean that med student? What could possibly happen to her?"

Mr. Fletcher cut into his steak, not even lifting his head.

"That was ages ago. Why even bring her up? She's old enough now. She's probably already married with kids."

Their reactions were crisp and clean, as if rehearsed countless times.

It was too deliberate.

So deliberate that it felt like a cover-up.

Finn Fletcher didn't say another word.

He lowered his head, picked up his glass, and took a sip of water.

He didn't press the issue.

Because he knew that in this house, pushing for answers never yielded the truth.

But he could find out himself.

Early the next morning, Finn drove out.

In the rearview mirror, the outline of the Fletcher estate shrank until it vanished into the morning mist.

His phone buzzed twice.

A message from Yolanda: "The date is set for June eighteenth. It's a beautiful day for a wedding."

He didn't reply.

Another text came through: "Finn, life is so good right now. Our family is together, safe and happy. York needs you, Chloe needs you, and this family needs you."

The same old guilt trip.

He let out a self-deprecating chuckle. His parents knew him too well, perfectly exploiting his sense of duty.

He locked the screen and tossed the phone onto the passenger seat.

Outside the window, the harsh March sunlight made his eyes ache.

His destination was the most prestigious hospital in Capital City—St. Jude's Medical Center.

It was also the hospital where Sienna worked.

He wasn't sure what he would find.

Medical records were confidential, and the hospital wouldn't just hand them over.

The records department was on the fourth floor of the old wing. The hallway was dimly lit, the air thick with the scent of aging paper.

An older woman in her fifties was organizing files.

"You want to check records from four years ago?" She glanced up at him. "What's your relationship to the patient?"

Finn hesitated.

What was he? Her ex-boyfriend?

"Family," he said.

She brushed it off.

She changed into her white coat and stepped into the breakroom.

A printed schedule lay on the desk.

She picked it up and scanned it.

Her fingers tightened around the paper.

This was absurd.

For next month's ER schedule, she was assigned seven consecutive night shifts.

Seven!

The ER night shift was notoriously grueling. Twelve straight hours without a single minute to close her eyes.

Car crashes, heart attacks, brain hemorrhages, drunk brawls... everything flooded the ER in the dead of night.

One night shift left a person feeling entirely hollowed out.

Two in a row was already pushing the limits of human endurance.

She flipped through the schedule. Everyone else's night shifts were spaced out, with a maximum of two in a row.

Only hers were stacked perfectly together.

"Sienna." A head poked through the doorway. It was Penny Sawyer, a young nurse she got along with, keeping her voice to a harsh whisper. "Did you hear?"

Sienna's hand paused. "Hear what?"

"They're saying..." Penny hesitated, biting her lip. "They're saying you're arrogant, that you look down on people, and that you played with a male colleague's feelings on a date. They're also saying that because you studied abroad, you act like you're better than everyone else, disrespecting your coworkers and even the directors."