Chapter 7 - The Fire in the Blood
Corporate victories, however, do not heal broken nerves.
Two nights after the boardroom purge, a terrible scream tore through the silence of the estate at three in the morning.
I awoke instantly, the adrenaline surging through my system. I threw aside my blankets, pulled myself into my chair with practiced, violent efficiency, and rolled down the dark corridor toward the carriage house connector.
The scream had come from Sammy’s room.
When I burst through the door, Rebecca was on her knees beside the bed, weeping frantically, holding her son in her arms. Sammy was thrashing violently against the sheets, his skin burning with a dry, terrifying heat, his eyes rolled back in his head, his teeth chattering so hard I feared they would shatter.
"Sammy! Sammy, look at me!" Rebecca sobbed, pressing a cold, wet cloth against his forehead. "Ethan, he's burning up! He was fine when I put him to bed, and now he won't wake up—he's having a seizure!"
I wheeled myself to the side of the bed. I touched the boy's cheek; it felt like hot tin left out in the desert sun.
"Call 911!" I ordered.
"I tried!" Rebecca cried, her hands shaking so violently she dropped the cloth. "The storm knocked the landlines out, and my cell phone has no service in the valley—the cell tower on the bluff was hit by lightning an hour ago!"
I looked at the boy. His breathing was shallow, a harsh, whistling rattle in his throat. His lips were turning a faint, terrifying shade of blue.
*Febrile convulsions.* Or worse—acute bacterial meningitis. In a child his age, hours could mean the difference between life and brain death.
"We can't wait for an ambulance from Highland Park," I said, my mind snapping into crisis mode. "The estate gates are locked, and the power outage will keep the motors from opening the iron gates automatically. We have to take the Range Rover. The manual gate override is in the glove box."
"I can't drive the big truck, Ethan!" Rebecca wailed. "I've only ever driven a manual Civic—I don't know how to handle the heavy SUV in the mud!"
"Then you carry him," I commanded. "Get him wrapped in a blanket. Now!"
I didn't think. For fourteen months, every movement I made had been preceded by a paralyzing internal debate about my limitations, my dignity, and the medical certainty of my paralysis.
There was no time for certainty.
I rolled out of the bedroom, leading the way through the dark service tunnels to the four-car garage. The emergency generator had kicked on, casting an eerie amber glow over the concrete floor.
Rebecca ran behind me, carrying Sammy wrapped in a heavy fleece blanket. The boy was limp now, his breathing terrifyingly faint.
I wheeled myself up to the driver's side of the heavy Land Rover. The door was high, the running board four feet off the ground. Under normal circumstances, two physical therapists spent ten minutes assisting me into a vehicle using a specialized sliding board.
I grabbed the steering wheel with my left hand and the B-pillar with my right.
"God help me," I whispered through gritted teeth.
I pulled.
The agony in my shoulders was blinding, the tendons in my forearms screaming as they bore the full weight of my body. But as my torso lifted from the chair, something else happened.
My right leg—the leg that had shown no sign of life since the crash—spasmodically planted its foot against the running board.
It was not a smooth, graceful movement. It was a violent, primitive reflex. The knee locked, bearing forty pounds of weight for a fraction of a second, just long enough for me to heave my hips over the leather bolster and collapse into the driver's seat.
I lay across the console, gasping for air, sweat stinging my eyes.
"Ethan!" Rebecca cried, opening the passenger door.
"Get in!" I roared. "Put him between us! Hold his head!"
She climbed in, laying the unconscious boy across her lap, his small head resting against my thigh.
I hit the starter button. The eight-cylinder engine roared to life with a deep, mechanical growl.
The Land Rover was an older model—my brother's favorite vehicle, which I had kept preserved in the garage out of sentimental torment. It had an automatic transmission, but the foot pedals were standard.
I looked down at my feet.
My left foot could twitch. My right foot was dead weight on the floorboard.
I couldn't operate the accelerator and the brake with my feet.
"Ethan, we're not moving!" Rebecca screamed, tears streaming down her face as she checked Sammy's pulse. "His pulse is so fast—it feels like a hummingbird!"
My eyes darted across the interior.
In the center console, between the front seats, lay an umbrella—an old, heavy, steel-shafted English walking umbrella that had belonged to my father.
I grabbed it.
I wedged the curved horn handle against my right knee, hooked the steel tip over the wide rubber pad of the accelerator pedal, and held the steering wheel with my left hand.
I shifted the transmission into reverse with my right hand, held the brake pedal down with the steel shaft, released it, and slammed the umbrella shaft down onto the accelerator.
The Land Rover surged backward out of the garage bay, its tires screaming against the slick concrete.
I spun the wheel, hit the brakes with the umbrella, threw the lever into drive, and hammered the shaft down again.
The heavy vehicle launched forward into the rain-swept darkness of the driveway, headlights carving two tunnels of brilliant white through the downpour.
Ahead of us stood the massive wrought-iron security gates of the estate, dark and motionless due to the dead electrical grid.
"Hold on!" I screamed.
"Ethan, the gates are closed!"
"Hold him, Rebecca!"
I didn't reach for the manual override in the glove box. We didn't have thirty seconds to spare.
I jammed the umbrella shaft down with all the strength in my right arm, pinning the pedal to the floorboards.
The three-ton SUV accelerated down the straightaway: forty miles per hour, fifty, sixty.
May you like
We hit the iron gates with a deafening crash of tearing metal and shattering glass. The center latch sheared off with a sound like a rifle shot; the heavy ornamental wings blew outward, screeching against the stone pillars as the Land Rover burst through the wreckage and tore onto the county highway.
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