Chapter 5 - Shadows and Scars
The study smelled of old leather, expensive bourbon, and cold ash from the unlit fireplace.
Lawson poured two fingers of amber liquid into a heavy crystal tumbler, but he didn't drink it. He stared at the amber fire in the glass, listening to the muffled sounds coming from the east wing through the hidden intercom speaker on his desk.
Aveline was in there with them.
She hadn't brought medical equipment—just her duffel bag containing several small glass vials, a packet of dried herbs that smelled like bitter wormwood, and a leather notebook filled with cramped, handwritten formulas in a language Lawson couldn't identify from the quick glance he'd caught.
The intercom crackled.
“Don't give them that juice,” Aveline’s voice came through, clear and sharp. “It’s loaded with synthetic binders that their livers can’t filter anymore. Throw it out.”
He heard Odessa’s voice protesting softly in the background. “Dr. Yates ordered that nutritional supplement specifically for—.”
“Dr. Yates is reading from a manual printed five years ago,” Aveline interrupted. “Bring me filtered water, fresh ginger root, and the clean linens from the bottom drawer.”
Lawson’s office door clicked open. Prescott slipped into the room, closing it softly behind him.
“I ran her background through the backchannels in Portland and Boston,” Prescott reported, keeping his voice low. “It checks out, boss. Mostly. Aveline Ross. Born in Bangor, Maine. Studied biochemistry at MIT before dropping out abruptly six years ago. No criminal record, no ties to Crosby, no known associations with any syndicate families.”
“Dropping out of MIT doesn't make someone a miracle worker,” Lawson said, taking a slow sip of his bourbon. “What happened six years ago?”
“That’s where it gets murky,” Prescott said, stepping closer to the desk and laying down a single printed dossier. “Around the time Genevieve eloped with you and vanished into Chicago high society, Aveline vanished into a private research collective in the Pacific Northwest—a fringe outfit funded by an eccentric pharmaceutical billionaire who got stripped of his license for unauthorized cellular regeneration trials. The clinic was raided by the feds three years ago. Everyone scattered.”
Lawson looked down at the grainy photograph of a younger Aveline Ross, her amber eyes staring out from beneath a lab coat with the same fierce intensity she had shown at the gatehouse.
“She’s a fugitive?”
“Not officially,” Prescott said. “The feds buried the case because the billionaire had too many politicians in his pocket. But she went underground. Nobody’s seen her in three years. Until she showed up at your front gate tonight.”
Lawson tapped a finger against the crystal glass. “Why now? If she’s been hiding for three years, why walk into the lions' den in the middle of a blizzard to treat two dying children she’s never even met?”
Before Prescott could answer, the heavy double doors of the study burst open.
Aveline stood in the doorway. Her sleeves were rolled up to her elbows, her face pale, and a smudge of dark soot smeared across her cheek. The absolute control she had worn at the gate had fractured into something raw and desperate.
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“Lawson,” she said, her voice shaking for the first time. “Jonah just spiked a hundred and four fever. The spleen is swelling. If we don't start the counter-infusion within twenty minutes, his organs are going to start shutting down.”
Lawson dropped the glass. The crystal shattered against the Persian rug, splashing amber liquid across the wool, but he didn't even look down.
