Chapter 1 - The Flowers on the Floor
Flynn stared at me as if the word divorce had struck harder than anything Dr. Reed had said.
For several seconds, the room held only the soft hiss of oxygen and the steady beeping of the monitor beside my bed.
The white roses were still scattered across the floor where he had dropped them.
One stem had snapped beneath his shoe.
He did not notice.
"Mabel, please do not say that right now."
His voice was low, almost pleading.
I had heard that voice before.
He used it with investors when a deal was slipping away.
He used it with board members when he needed forty-eight more hours.
He used it when he believed the right tone could make another person forget what had already happened.
I looked at the bandage beneath my hospital gown.
Then I looked at him.
"You stabbed me twice."
His jaw tightened.
"I know."
"You left me on the floor."
"I panicked."
"You covered Selina with your jacket while I was bleeding."
He closed his eyes.
"I know."
"And now our children are dead."
His face folded in a way I had never seen before.
For one terrible second, part of me wanted to look away.
Three years of marriage had trained me to soften whenever Flynn looked wounded.
That reflex disgusted me now.
I forced myself to keep watching him.
"If I had known you were pregnant, I would never have touched you."
The sentence landed exactly where he should have known it would.
Dr. Reed's eyes hardened.
I almost laughed.
Not because anything was funny.
Because Flynn still did not understand.
"So if I had not been pregnant, you think it would have been different?"
He froze.
"That is not what I meant."
"It is exactly what you meant."
"Mabel, I was angry."
"You were armed."
"I was not thinking."
"You were thinking about Selina."
He took a shaky breath.
"She told me you attacked her."
"And you believed her before you asked me one real question."
He looked down.
That was the first moment I saw shame break through his grief.
It did not make me feel better.
Dr. Reed adjusted the blanket over my legs and turned toward Flynn.
"Mr. Vance, she needs rest."
Flynn ignored him.
"Mabel, give me one chance to fix this."
I stared at him.
"You cannot fix two missing heartbeats."
His mouth opened, but no sound came out.
Then the door behind him opened.
A woman in a dark navy suit stepped into the room beside a uniformed officer.
She was in her early forties, with tired eyes and a leather notebook in one hand.
"Mrs. Vance?"
I nodded.
"I am Detective Lena Alvarez with Chicago Police."
Flynn turned sharply.
"This is not a good time."
Detective Alvarez looked at him without emotion.
"I was not speaking to you."
The silence that followed almost felt clean.
Flynn straightened his shoulders.
He was used to rooms changing shape around his authority.
This room did not.
Alvarez stepped closer to my bed.
"Your doctors say you are stable enough for a brief statement, but if you want me to leave, I will leave."
I looked at Flynn.
His face had changed again.
The grief was still there, but something else had appeared underneath it.
Fear.
"Stay," I said.
Flynn moved toward me.
"Mabel."
The officer immediately stepped between us.
Alvarez did not raise her voice.
"Mr. Vance, you need to remain where you are."
"She has been through major surgery."
"Yes."
Alvarez glanced at the medical chart.
"As a result of two stab wounds."
Flynn's nostrils flared.
"I already told the officers what happened."
"Then this should be simple."
She opened her notebook.
"Mrs. Vance, did your husband stab you?"
My heartbeat accelerated.
I could feel it reflected in the monitor.
Flynn heard it too.
His eyes locked onto mine.
For three years, I had protected our marriage from gossip, from family, from journalists, and sometimes from the truth itself.
I had smiled through dinners after finding Selina's name lighting up his phone at midnight.
I had told friends we were busy when Flynn missed anniversaries.
I had lied to myself more often than I had ever lied to anyone else.
That habit ended in a hospital bed.
"Yes."
Flynn flinched.
Alvarez kept writing.
"How many times?"
"Twice."
"Did you threaten him first?"
"No."
"Did you have a weapon?"
"No."
"Did you physically attack Selina Cole earlier that day?"
"No."
Flynn stepped forward again.
"She was upset, Detective."
Alvarez closed her notebook.
"One more interruption and I will have you removed."
He stared at her.
She stared back.
He stopped talking.
Alvarez turned to me again.
"Mrs. Vance, there is something else I need to ask."
Her tone had changed.
"The first officers were told the incident happened at approximately 4:10 p.m."
"That sounds right."
"The 911 call came in at 4:17."
I swallowed.
"Flynn called?"
Alvarez looked toward him.
Flynn's expression went blank.
"No."
My skin went cold.
"Selina?"
"No."
"Then who?"
Alvarez paused.
"That is what we are trying to determine."
Flynn finally spoke.
"I called for my driver after it happened."
I turned toward him.
"Your driver?"
He looked sick.
"I was trying to get help."
"You did not call an ambulance?"
"I was not thinking clearly."
My hand tightened around the blanket.
Alvarez watched both of us carefully.
"According to the call log we recovered from your phone, Mr. Vance, you called your driver at 4:19."
Flynn said nothing.
"Two minutes after someone else had already called 911."
His eyes flicked toward the detective.
"I did not know anyone had called."
"We know."
Something about the way she said it made him go still.
Alvarez looked at me.
"The caller used a voice masking application, but they gave your exact address and said a woman had been stabbed in the abdomen."
A chill moved through me.
"They knew where I was hurt."
"Yes."
"So they saw it."
"Possibly."
Flynn shook his head.
"No one else was in the house."
Alvarez turned to him.
"That is what you told us."
"Because it is true."
"Then someone was watching."
The room seemed to shrink.
I thought about our house.
The enormous windows.
The gate cameras.
The interior security system Flynn had installed after a shareholder made threats two years earlier.
There were cameras at the front entrance, the garage, the rear terrace, and the hallway outside his home office.
There had once been one facing the living room too.
Flynn had ordered it disconnected after complaining he did not want to feel watched inside his own home.
Or at least that was what he had told me.
I looked at him.
"Was the living room camera really disconnected?"
His face changed.
It was slight.
Almost nothing.
But I had spent three years studying his expressions across dinner tables.
I saw it.
So did Detective Alvarez.
"What living room camera?" she asked.
Flynn answered too quickly.
"Old equipment."
I did not take my eyes off him.
"You told me it was disconnected."
"It was."
"When?"
"Two years ago."
"Who disconnected it?"
He hesitated.
"Security."
Alvarez reopened her notebook.
"Which company?"
Flynn rubbed a hand over his face.
"Vance Global internal protection handled the system."
"Then we will need their records."
He looked at her sharply.
"Those systems contain confidential corporate information."
Alvarez's voice stayed flat.
"A woman nearly died."
He said nothing.
I felt something bitter settle inside my chest.
Even now, he was thinking about access, liability, exposure, and control.
Dr. Reed stepped closer to my bed.
"This interview needs to end soon."
Alvarez nodded.
"One last thing."
She reached into her folder and pulled out a clear evidence sleeve.
Inside was a photograph of the paring knife.
I had expected to feel fear.
Instead, I felt cold concentration.
"Do you recognize this?"
"Yes."
"Was it normally kept in your kitchen?"
"Yes."
"Did you see Mr. Vance holding it before Selina arrived?"
"He was cutting an apple with it."
Alvarez nodded slowly.
"That matches his statement."
Flynn exhaled.
Then Alvarez continued.
"But there is a problem."
Flynn's relief vanished.
"What problem?"
She looked directly at him.
"The knife was wiped clean before officers recovered it."
My eyes moved to Flynn.
His face went rigid.
"That is impossible."
"No usable prints."
"I dropped it."
"You said you dropped it beside Mrs. Vance after the second strike."
"I did."
"Then someone cleaned it after you dropped it."
A silence stretched across the room.
My thoughts moved immediately to Selina.
Her tears.
Her scratch.
Her smile.
I heard my own voice before I realized I had spoken.
"She stayed behind."
Alvarez turned toward me.
"Who?"
"Selina."
Flynn shook his head.
"No."
I looked at him.
"You left the room to get your phone."
His eyes widened.
A memory seemed to catch up with him.
I remembered lying on the floor, fighting to stay conscious, while Flynn disappeared toward the hallway.
I remembered Selina crouching beside me.
I remembered perfume.
I remembered her whispering something I had not been able to understand.
Then darkness.
"She was alone with me," I said.
Alvarez's pen stopped.
"For how long?"
"Maybe a minute."
"What did she do?"
I closed my eyes.
A broken fragment returned.
Selina's hand near the knife.
Her face very close to mine.
Her lips moving.
I felt nausea rise.
"I think she picked it up."
Flynn stepped forward.
"No."
I opened my eyes.
"You were not there."
"Selina would not touch the knife."
Detective Alvarez looked at him.
"You seem very certain."
Flynn did not answer.
The detective closed her notebook.
"I think that is enough for today."
She handed me a card.
"Do not speak to anyone about details you remember unless you trust them."
Her eyes moved briefly toward Flynn.
I understood.
The officer opened the door.
Flynn looked at me as if he expected me to stop them from making him leave.
I did not.
"Mabel, I will come back tomorrow."
"Do not."
"You do not mean that."
"I do."
He stared at me for one long second.
Then he walked out.
The door closed behind him.
I thought that was the worst thing I would learn that day.
I was wrong.
Detective Alvarez waited in the hallway until Flynn disappeared around the corner.
Then she stepped back inside.
Her expression was different now.
More serious.
"Mrs. Vance, I did not want to say this in front of your husband."
My pulse jumped again.
"Say what?"
She placed a second evidence photograph on the tray.
It showed our living room from above.
The angle was unmistakable.
The sofa.
The rug.
The fruit bowl.
And me standing near the coffee table.
The timestamp in the corner read 4:08 p.m.
Two minutes before Flynn stabbed me.
"The living room camera was not disconnected," Alvarez said.
My throat tightened.
"Then you have the video."
She looked at me carefully.
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because someone remotely deleted the footage at 4:23 p.m."
I stared at the timestamp.
"Who had access?"
Alvarez's next words changed the entire investigation.
"According to the security administrator, only three people had active credentials."
She held my gaze.
"You."
"Your husband."
Then she paused.
May you like
"And Selina Cole."
