Lady Monica's hand shook slightly and then tightened around her phone, her face clouded all over.
"What hospital?" She breathed in suppressed fury.
"St. Martin's hospital." The voice filtered through again.
"I see. Just let me know if there's a change." She instructed and ended the call.
She slowly set the phone down. Her hand curled into a fist and clenched. Her breathing was ragged.
"Alex Hort." She gritted her teeth in fury.
For a brief moment, the calm and composed matriarch of the Hort family disappeared, replaced by a grandmother burning with anger.
*
*
*
*
*
Kelvin's car rolled to a stop at the pull-up area of his penthouse.
The towering building stood quietly against the skyline, its glass walls reflecting the light of the day.
He pushed open the door and stepped down.
His expression calm, his eyes swept across the wide area just as a guard stepped forward. "Welcome, Boss."
He gave him a curt nod.
"Anything out of the ordinary?" he asked while making his way toward the elevator.
The guard shook his head immediately.
"None," he replied crisply.
"Alright. I will go up first. Alert me if anything." Kelvin instructed as the elevator closed.
The ride upward was silent.
When the doors opened, Kelvin stepped into a wide corridor illuminated by soft white lights. The place was quiet, almost sterile.
He walked briskly toward a shut door at the end of the hallway.
A few guards stationed outside immediately straightened and bowed slightly in greeting.
Kelvin acknowledged them with a faint nod before pushing the door open.
He paused briefly at the entrance, his eyes scanning the room as if confirming everything was exactly as it should be.
Satisfied, he stepped inside and the door closed softly behind him.
The room was spacious but quiet, filled with the low humming of medical machines.
Kelvin moved toward the wardrobe behind the door and pulled it open.
Inside were neatly arranged medical supplies and a set of sterile scrubs.
He slipped into the scrub quickly before bending over the sink to wash his hands thoroughly with disinfectant.
A sharp exhale escaped his nostrils as he rinsed the foam away and dried his hands.
With slow, steady steps, he walked toward the hospital bed.
His gaze lingered on the woman lying there.
Her face was pale and fragile against the white pillow, almost as though the life within her had faded away.
For a moment, his expression softened.
Then he began checking her vitals.
"How are you doing today?" he muttered casually, his voice calm and loud enough to fill the quiet room.
Like always, he was met with silence.
He didn't seem bothered.
After all, she wasn't awake.
"This should be the last blood bag to take and your blood level would be okay?"
"And your IV solution dosage should be completed by tomorrow."
When he was done adjusting the IV line, he bent beside the bed to check her pulse and heart rate.
"You are good." He said with a small smile before he straightened up.
Silence.
Kelvin dragged a chair closer and sat down, crossing one leg over the other as he began writing his observations in a file.
The scratching of his pen was the only sound in the room.
When he finished, he closed the file and looked at her again.
"Sonia Walker…are you really going to remain asleep because you are asked to?"
His voice carried a faint hint of mockery.
"Shouldn't you fight for yourself at least this once?"
"Is the eldest daughter of the Walker family this weak?"
"Oh."
"I forgot."
"Even when you are the eldest, you were still treated badly… while the second and illegitimate daughter was treated like a princess."
He sighed heavily.
"You really are easy to bully."
He leaned back in the chair.
"Anyway… tomorrow is the funeral rite."
"And you know what that means."
"Just as you wanted… you would disappear from the face of the earth."
"You would be forgotten."
"Erased."
"And discarded with no guilt."
"Yeah." He sighed dramatically. "You should understand that kind of feeling."
"The people that killed you will walk the face of the earth… discharged and acquitted without trial."
"And you…"
"You would turn into dust buried beneath the soil… six feet deep."
"You know what that means?"
"It only means that in the end… you are still the one who lost."
He leaned closer.
"Sonia Walker, are you ready to lose this fight?"
He gently patted her cheek with a teasing grin.
"Then it's your call."
He bent closer to her ear.
"And my princess… believe me, I will surely fulfill that wish."
"I will send you to the Hort family to be buried."
"At least you might find some rest there."
He glanced at his wristwatch."It's twenty-four hours from now…"
"And if by the seventeenth hour you are still like this… I will have no other option than to…"
His voice trailed off.
His brow furrowed slightly at the redness like a blush spreading across her pale face.
He blinked and when he looked again, it was still the same.
If she was awake, he would have counted that as anger but no she wasn't awake and he wasn't even sure she was waking up.
But then he hoped she would wake up.
Kelvin felt he was asking for the impossible but then he couldn't find himself to stop.
He hoped to talk some senses into her. To remind her is not all about giving up on oneself.
No matter how he thought about it, he still wanted to believe Sonia Walker would give herself a chance.
A chance to re-write her story. A chance not to be the docile daughter and the lovely daughter-in-law.
Others might not know but he had always known she had a few things she loved.
Things she wanted to achieve.
And while she wanted these, she was afraid to speak out. To make the Old Lady burdened.
She hoped Alex would see her good side but no it was all a lie.
He hoped she would see this reality and make a decision.
While saving her at the hospital, he had noticed her indecisiveness of living or dying.
"Give up on you and send you to the Hort's family for burial."
With that said, he grabbed his note and walked towards the door, his fist clenched tightly around his notepad.
He pulled the door open and without a glance back he shut it with a bang that rattled across the entire floor before.
The guards flinched at the anger radiating off from him. They exchanged a quick glance between themselves.
And then shrugged.
It wasn't their place to know but it was surprising, he had gone into that room gently and had to walk off in anger.
They were all clear that the lady in there was in a coma and would definitely not make him angry.
Meanwhile, the atmosphere in the ICU took a drastic turn.
Kelvin never noticed but Sonia's hand had twitched while he was talking.
Her brow furrowed a few times, at the loud bang of the door.
Moments later, her eyes slowly opened and the off white ceiling came into view.
She blinked once.
Twice.
It was still there.
Off-white.
Not white.
Her brows slowly furrowed.
"Where… is this?"