Chapter 5 - THE RETURN OF THE GHOST
At 9:30 AM the next morning, Lincoln Park was shrouded in a heavy, freezing rain.
The alley behind our condo building was slick with black ice. Inside our apartment, the shades were pulled down tight, blocking out the daylight and plunging the living room into a dim, mausoleum-like gray twilight.
I stood in the center of the bedroom, dressed in the same pale blue pajama set I had been wearing when I had fallen ill two days ago.
Dr. Cheryl Vance was standing beside the bed, holding a specialized medical kit. On the nightstand sat a precise, theatrical arrangement: an overturned water glass, an open bottle of fever medication, and my cell phone lying face down.
"Everything is set with the State's Attorney's special investigations unit," Cheryl whispered, adjusting the tiny, high-definition pinhole camera hidden inside the smoke detector directly above the bed. "Two undercover officers are stationed in the security room downstairs. Another two are in the alley."
"Did Victoria make the call?" I asked, my voice steady despite the adrenaline coursing through my veins.
"Yes," Cheryl confirmed. "She texted Nathan twenty minutes ago from his hotel landing page at O'Hare, asking if he needed her to pick him up. He told her no—he said he was taking an Uber straight home to 'check on his poor, sick wife.'"
"Good," I said. "Now leave through the rear service stairwell, Cheryl. I need to be alone when he walks through that door."
Cheryl looked at me with deep concern, placing a warm hand on my shoulder. "Grace, you have a wire beneath your collar. If he suspects anything, if he reaches for you, just say the word 'Bramble' and the officers will break down the door in six seconds."
"He won't suspect anything," I said, looking at the bed. "He thinks he’s walking into a funeral."
After Cheryl departed, the apartment fell into absolute silence.
I didn't lie on the bed. That would be too dangerous if there were residual chemical traces on the frame. Instead, I stood behind the master bathroom door, keeping it cracked open by a quarter of an inch—the exact same vantage point I had used two days ago behind the couch.
At 10:14 AM, the front door lock clicked.
The sound was identical to two days ago. Cautious. Measured. The entrance of a predator returning to check his trap.
Footsteps moved softly across the hardwood floor of the living room.
"Grace?" Nathan’s voice called out softly.
There was no answer.
"Grace? Honey? Are you awake?"
He moved closer. I watched through the narrow gap in the bathroom door as Nathan stepped into the bedroom.
He was wearing his dark wool overcoat, his leather briefcase in his left hand. His face was a masterclass in performative anxiety—his brow furrowed, his lips slightly parted in a look of tentative concern.
He walked over to the side of the bed.
When he saw the empty bed, the unruffled duvet, and the missing pillowcase—which we had replaced with a fresh, plain white one—his expression froze.
The performative concern vanished instantly, replaced by a sharp, cold confusion.
"What the hell..." he muttered under his breath.
He stepped closer, reaching out to touch the center of the pillowcase. He hesitated, pulling his hand back, realizing that touching it bare-handed was a risk.
He pulled his phone from his pocket, his fingers flying across the screen as he dialed a number.
Inside my purse, hidden on a shelf in the bathroom right behind me, my cell phone was set to silent. But on the wire feed transmitted directly to the police van downstairs, Nathan’s outgoing call was picked up instantly.
He was calling Victoria.
"Victoria!" Nathan hissed into his phone, his voice dropping into a frantic, angry whisper as he paced the foot of the bed. "She isn't here! The bed is empty!"
He paused, listening to whatever Victoria—who was currently sitting in an interrogation room at the 18th Precinct with a detective standing over her—was scripted to say.
"No, she didn't answer her phone!" Nathan snapped quietly, rubbing his hand over his face. "Listen to me, something is wrong. The pillowcase I treated... it's gone. Someone changed the sheets. Did you talk to her yesterday? Did she come to your clinic?!"
He listened again, his face turning pale.
"If she found out, Victoria, we are completely ruined!" Nathan snarled, dropping all pretense, his voice laced with pure, toxic malice. "The insurance policy doesn't pay out if she’s alive! And if she went to the police with that pharmacy ledger—"
"She didn't need the pharmacy ledger, Nathan," I said, my voice echoing clearly from behind him.
Nathan spun around so fast he nearly tripped over his own briefcase.
I stepped out of the bathroom, pulling the door wide open.
I was standing tall, my shoulders back, wearing a black tailored suit, my eyes locked onto his with an intensity that made him stagger back two steps until his legs hit the side of the bed.
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"Grace...?" he gasped, his eyes bulging in pure, unadulterated terror. He looked at me as if he were staring at a ghost rising straight from a grave. "You... you're..."
"I'm alive, Nathan," I said softly, stepping into the dim light of the bedroom. "I know how disappointing that must be for your bank account."
