Chapter 3 - The Traitor’s Smile
Fernanda looked immaculate even in the damp underground garage, wearing a sleek cashmere trench coat, her dark hair pulled back into a severe, elegant chignon.
“Yes, Salgado, I’m checking the security manifests now,” Fernanda spoke into her phone, her voice carrying a cold, aristocratic detachment that sent a shiver straight down my spine. “The girl couldn't have gotten out of the building. Security has every exit sealed. Just prep the O.R. My brother is getting impatient to close this chapter.”
Hearing her speak about me—her sister-in-law, who had cooked family dinners for her, comforted her through bad breakups, and treated her like blood—as if I were a slaughtered calf on a butcher’s block shattered the last fragile remnants of my old life.
I ducked behind a towering stack of plastic medical crates just as Fernanda turned her head in my direction.
“Make sure the cremation papers are already filed with county records,” she added into the phone, her footsteps clicking sharply against the concrete as she walked closer to my hiding spot. “We don't want any prying journalists asking why a healthy twenty-eight-year-old woman suffered cardiac arrest during a routine kidney donation. Keep it clean.”
She walked past my crates, heading toward the security guard station near the main exit.
This was my only window.
I scrambled out from behind the crates and sprinted the remaining thirty feet toward dock three. The back of the laundry truck was open, piled high with massive canvas bags filled with heavy, blood-stained and sterile hospital sheets. Without hesitating, I leaped into the truck bed, burrowed deep beneath a mountain of damp, heavy cotton linens, and pulled a soiled sheet over my head, curling my body into a tight ball.
A minute later, heavy footsteps echoed on the metal liftgate of the truck.
“Hey, Pete! You got the final manifest for the north district?” a gruff voice called out.
“Yeah, toss it in the cab,” another voice replied—the truck driver.
The heavy metal roll-up door slammed down with a resounding BANG, plunging the interior of the truck into absolute, suffocating darkness. Seconds later, the diesel engine roared to life, vibrating through the metal floorboards as the truck shifted into reverse, backed out of the loading bay, and lurched forward into the torrential rainstorm.
We were moving. I had escaped the hospital.
As the truck bounced over potholes and accelerated onto the highway, the adrenaline slowly began to recede, leaving behind a cold, hollow ache in my chest. I had escaped with my life, but I possessed nothing—no phone, no money, no identification, and no shelter. My husband, my family, my entire existence had been an elaborate, murderous lie.
And worse: they still believed they were going to win.
After driving for nearly forty minutes through twisting suburban roads, the truck slowed down and finally came to a complete stop at what felt like a red light or a depot checkpoint. Peering cautiously through a gap in the canvas bags, I spotted a brightly lit gas station sign through the truck’s rear window grille: Apex Fuel & Mart, Exit 14.
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When the driver hopped out to grab a cup of coffee inside the convenience store, I quietly pushed open the back latch of the truck, dropped silently onto the asphalt behind a row of parked cars, and melted into the rainy night.
Soaking wet, shivering in my oversized janitor’s uniform, I stumbled into the fluorescent-lit haven of the gas station convenience store, acutely aware that my face was likely already flagged on every security camera in the city.
