The Unwanted Wife's Ultimate Escape

Blair stared at the cracked screen of her phone on the floor. The words blurred together. She dropped to her knees. The hard marble bruised her skin, but she didn't feel it. She snatched the phone up. Her fingers were shaking so violently she nearly dropped it again. She pressed Chaz's name on the screen. She held the phone to her ear. Her breathing was loud and ragged in the empty room. The line rang once. Twice. "You have reached the voicemail of..." Blair pulled the phone away. Her chest heaved. She pressed end and dialed again. Voicemail. She stood up. Her legs felt like they were made of lead. She paced across the living room. She needed noise. The silence of the penthouse was suffocating her. She grabbed the remote and turned on the massive flat-screen TV on the wall. The CNN logo flashed across the screen. A red banner scrolled across the bottom. BREAKING NEWS: SEC RAIDS MORGAN GROUP HEADQUARTERS. Blair stopped walking. Her blood ran cold. The temperature in her body plummeted. On the screen, federal agents in dark windbreakers were carrying cardboard boxes out of her family's Wall Street building. Yellow police tape blocked the revolving glass doors. Her knees gave out. She hit the hardwood floor hard. A sharp pain shot up her shins. She couldn't breathe. The air in the room was gone. The century-old Morgan financial dynasty was crumbling on live television. Then, her phone vibrated in her hand. She looked down. It wasn't Chaz. The caller ID read: Mount Sinai Hospital - Emergency. Blair's stomach dropped into a bottomless pit. She swiped the screen. She pressed the phone to her ear. "Hello?" her voice was a harsh whisper. "Is this Blair Morgan?" a woman asked. "Yes." "Your father, Alastair Morgan, was just brought in. He suffered a massive myocardial infarction. He is in resuscitation right now." The phone slipped an inch down her cheek. She didn't grab a coat. She didn't change out of her thin cashmere sweater. She ran out of the penthouse. The New York winter wind hit her like a wall of ice as she ran out of the lobby. The cold bit into her skin, but she couldn't feel it. She flagged down a yellow cab. "Mount Sinai. Fast," she choked out. The hospital smelled like bleach and sterile alcohol. The scent immediately made her nauseous. She ran to the ICU desk. Her lungs burned. A doctor in green scrubs walked up to her. He held a clipboard. "Ms. Morgan?" "Where is he?" Blair asked. Her fingernails dug into her palms, breaking the skin. "He is stabilized on an ECMO machine," the doctor said. His face was grim. He handed her a piece of paper. "This is his critical condition notice. And this is the billing department's estimate. We need a deposit of one hundred thousand dollars to keep the machines running." Blair looked at the paper. The numbers swam before her eyes. She pulled her wallet from her purse. She took out her black American Express card. The one tied to the Morgan family trust. She handed it to the clerk behind the desk. The clerk swiped it. The machine beeped. A harsh, angry red light flashed. DECLINED. The clerk frowned. She tried it again. DECLINED. "Your accounts have been frozen, ma'am," the clerk said. Her voice was flat. She didn't care. "Federal order." Blair's throat closed up. She grabbed the card. She backed away from the desk. She pushed through the heavy fire doors into the stairwell. It was dark. It smelled like dust and old concrete. She sat on the cold steps. She pulled up Blackburn's private number. She hated him. She hated asking him for anything. But her father was dying. She pressed call. It rang four times. Then, voicemail. She hung up. She called again. Voicemail. She called fifteen times. Her thumb cramped from pressing the screen. Nothing. Her fingers were completely numb. She opened the Twitter app. She searched for Paige Mercer, his assistant. She needed to know where he was. The trending tab loaded first. The number one hashtag caught her eye. GilbertDisney She clicked it. A video started playing. It had two million views. It was dark. The sky was lit up with massive, colorful fireworks. The Disney castle glowed in the background. The timestamp in the corner showed it was from the night before, when he had claimed to be locked in a board meeting. The camera zoomed in on a VIP balcony. Blackburn was standing there. He took off his heavy wool coat. The same bespoke design she had seen him wear on countless winter nights. He wrapped it around the shoulders of a woman. Below the video, a caption and a tagged username appeared: "Kala @nurse_kala – Disney night " The nurse from the photo. The one Blair had stared at hours ago, unable to place. Now she had a name. Kala. Blair's lungs stopped working. A sharp, tearing pain ripped through her chest. It felt like her heart was physically splitting in half. Her fingers went slack. The phone slipped from her hand. It hit the concrete step and bounced down the stairs. The screen shattered into a spiderweb of glass. Blair sat in the dark. She didn't cry. She was completely, utterly empty.