Chapter 2 - The Missing Confession
The hospital emergency room smelled strongly of sterile alcohol and bleach.
Nurses quickly swarmed around my bed, administering heavy doses of painkillers.
My neck and shoulder were tightly wrapped in thick, white gauze.
Julian sat in the corner chair, resting his face in his hands to fake his profound grief for the doctors.
As soon as the medical staff left the room, his entire demeanor instantly changed.
He stood up and walked slowly toward my bed with a cold, dead stare.
He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out my digital recorder.
"Is this what you were looking for, Clara?" he mocked, turning the small device over in his hands.
My heart pounded furiously against my bruised ribs.
Eleanor must have found the handbag before the police arrived to inspect the house.
Julian dropped the heavy metal recorder onto the linoleum floor.
He crushed it violently under the heel of his expensive leather shoe.
Plastic shattered and internal wires snapped under his heavy weight.
"You really thought you could outsmart us," Julian sneered.
He tossed a thick stack of divorce and property transfer papers onto my lap.
"Sign everything right now, or I will tell the doctors you have severe psychiatric issues and need to be committed."
He handed me a cheap plastic pen.
I stared at the broken pieces of the recorder scattered on the floor.
I slowly picked up the pen with my uninjured hand.
Julian smiled triumphantly, assuming he had finally broken my spirit.
He did not know that the recorder in his house was just a cheap decoy.
My real recording device was seamlessly built into the diamond necklace I was currently wearing.
"I will sign the papers," I whispered weakly.
"But you are going to regret this for the rest of your miserable life."
Julian laughed in my face and snatched the signed documents away.
He walked out of the hospital room to immediately file the asset transfers.
I instantly hit the emergency call button for the nurse.
May you like
When the door opened, it was not a nurse who walked in.
It was Eleanor, and she was holding a syringe filled with a cloudy, unknown liquid.
