POV: Liora Hayes
"I need five minutes," I told Xavier, my voice trembling. "I just... I need to try one more thing."
Xavier checked his watch, the platinum face catching the fluorescent light. "Five minutes, Liora. But remember, every second you spend looking for a miracle is a second closer to your mother being loaded onto that transport van."
I didn't answer. I turned and ran back toward the elevators. I didn't believe in miracles anymore, but I believed in the small, gold-plated object tucked into the secret pocket of my bag.
It was my father's watch. A 1950s Omega. He had told me it was a family heirloom, a piece of history that would always hold its value. It was the only thing I had left of him. I had kept it for years, through the hunger and the rent notices, promising myself I'd never let it go.
But I was out of 'nevers.'
I reached the billing desk again. Mrs. Gable looked up, her expression turning from cold to weary. "Miss Hayes, I believe we've concluded our business. The order is in the system. The team is already prepping room 402 for the move."
"Wait!" I gasped, fumbling with my bag. I pulled out the watch. The leather strap was worn, but the gold casing shone under the hospital lights. I pushed it through the teller slot. "Ummm take this. It's an antique. It's worth thousands. Use it as a deposit. Just give me until noon."
Mrs. Gable didn't even pick it up. She looked at it through the glass like it was a dead insect. "We are a hospital, not a pawn shop."
"Please! Just look at it. My father said it was valuable. It's gold!"
She sighed and picked it up with two fingers. She turned it over, squinting at the back. Then, she set it down with a soft clack.
"It's gold-plated, Miss Hayes. And the movement is seized. In this condition, you'd be lucky to get fifty dollars for the scrap metal. It's a sentimental trinket, nothing more."
The air left my lungs. Fifty dollars. My father's greatest treasure was worth a bag of groceries.
"You don't understand," I whispered, my tears finally spilling over. "I have nothing else. This is everything."
"Then 'everything' is not enough," she said, her voice dropping all pretense of professional courtesy. "Look behind you, Liora."
I turned. At the end of the hallway, two orderlies were pushing a heavy, rusted gurney toward the ICU elevators. On the back of the gurney sat a portable oxygen tank and a stack of thin, scratchy wool blankets—the kind they used for the indigent.
"That's the 6:00 AM transport," Mrs. Gable said. "They're ten minutes early. If you want to say goodbye before she's moved to the county basement, I suggest you run."
I grabbed the watch, clutching it so hard the metal bit into my palm. I ran. I didn't care who I bumped into. I reached the ICU doors just as the orderlies were coming out.
They were pushing her.
My mother looked like a doll made of wax. They had unhooked her from the high-end monitors. She was now connected to a small, battery-operated pump that wheezed with every breath.
"Stop!" I screamed. "Wait! I'm getting the money! I'm signing the papers!"
The orderlies didn't stop. "Sorry, miss. We have our orders. We've got six more pickups this morning."
I grabbed the edge of the gurney, forcing it to a halt. "She's a person! She's not a pickup!"
"Liora..." a voice called out.
I looked up. It was the ICU nurse, Sarah. She looked heartbroken. "The billing office locked the room, honey. I tried to stall them, but the department head signed off. If she stays here, the hospital can be sued for 'bed blocking.' My hands are tied."
I watched as they pushed the gurney into the service elevator…the one used for trash and the deceased. The doors slid shut, and for the first time in my life, I felt the world go completely dark.
I walked back to the waiting room, my feet dragging. I sat on the edge of a hard plastic chair, staring at the floor. My father's watch was still in my hand. I looked at the hands on the dial. They weren't moving.
Time had stopped for me, but the rest of the world was moving on.
"The scrap value went down while you were upstairs," a voice said.
I looked up. Xavier was standing there, leaning against a pillar. He looked perfectly composed, a stark contrast to the chaos inside me.
"She's gone," I whispered. "They took her."
"They're taking her to a facility where the mortality rate is forty percent higher than here," Xavier said, his voice devoid of pity. He walked over and sat in the chair next to me. He didn't offer a tissue. He offered a reality check. "In that ward, she'll be one of fifty patients assigned to a single nurse. The medicine will be generic. The equipment will be decades old. She won't last the week, Liora."
I closed my eyes, a sob racking my body.
"Time is not on your side," he continued, leaning in close. "Every minute you spend grieving is a minute she spends losing ground. I have a car waiting outside. I have a phone in my pocket that can stop that transport van before it even leaves the city limits. I can have her back in that private suite, with the best surgeons in the state, by breakfast."
I looked at him. "And the price is my life."
"The price is a child," Xavier corrected. "A child who will have everything you never did. You aren't losing a life, Liora. You're saving two. Your mother's... and your own. Because let's be honest…what kind of life do you have left after today?"
I looked at the watch in my hand. Then I looked at the elevator where my mother had vanished.
"Take me to him," I said, my voice cold and steady. "Take me to Darian Volkov."
Xavier stood up, a small, triumphant smile playing on his lips. "A wise choice. Let's go. We have a contract to write."