BREATHE: A Billionaire Romance, Part Five Read online

  But I knew that he was poisoning Derek…

  Somewhere deep inside of me, I was sure.

  I just had to prove it.

  Chapter 3

  “You have got to stop this,” Mama snapped. “Derek’s sick!”

  I hated that everyone kept reminding me of the fact that he was sick. I fucking knew that he was sick! That’s why I was so crazy to find out the truth! The real truth!

  I had just finished telling her about my suspicions with Dr. Freeman and asked advice on how to prove my suspicions to be true. Needless to say, it didn’t go over very well.

  We sat in the living room of my apartment, curled up on the couch with the adorable Golden retriever pup that I had grown to love. And just as I was about to speak again, to defend myself, to show her my side of it all, she continued. “You can’t blame others for him being ill, Zoe.”

  She sighed, a tear flowing down her cheek. “Lord knows I tried to blame enough people when your dad was sick.”

  “But the diagnosis was false,” I whispered, just beneath my breath, still apparently trying to defend myself, although I knew it wouldn’t do any good.

  “Who is to say?” she said. “You still need to get another opinion!” I could tell that she still hadn’t jumped on the whole Derek-doesn’t-have-cancer bandwagon, let alone on any sort of bandwagon that even remotely accused a doctor of poisoning a patient.

  The truth was, she didn’t have hope for recovery; and as much as it pained me to see her give up on Derek, I understood why.

  Back when my daddy was sick, Mama had so much faith that he was gonna make it…

  But he didn’t.

  She had already gone through her bout of disappointment. I knew that she had suffered because of what happened to Daddy; and she was reminded of that disappointment and sadness every day since it happened. Hell, she was bed-ridden with a broken heart for nearly a year after it happened.

  I knew she couldn’t get her hopes up with another seemingly hopeless situation.

  “I mean, the doctor said that he couldn’t come up with any logical conclusion,” she continued, trying to make her point.

  And as much as I hated to admit it, she was right. Dr. Lawrence wasn’t able to give a logical conclusion.

  “He said he was testing him for poisonous toxins, though.”

  “Well, get the blood results back and then get a third opinion…no matter the outcome.”

  I sighed, knowing she was right. I knew that no matter what the test said, we’d need a third opinion. You can’t have two different doctors with two different opinions and only take the word of one of them.

  You had to have a majority ruling.

  And Derek, I knew, would agree. After we heard from the doctor…which didn’t take long.

  In fact, later that day, almost as soon as I walked into Derek’s apartment, his phone rang, and Dr. Lawrence’s number showed up on the screen.

  With a sigh, he flung his finger over the touchscreen and swiped it to answer.

  “Hello?” Derek called out into the tiny device, quite worriedly, just before putting the phone on speaker.

  “Yes, Mr. Sholts. We got your results back, and I’d like to invite you to come into the office to discuss them.”

  “We’ll be there.”

  And we would be there…and we would be ready to hear whatever it was that the doctor had to tell us.

  For better or worse.

  Chapter 4

  The room was even colder this time than it was the last, and I wasn’t sure if it was just because we were both nervous, or if Jack Frost took a piss in the room, but we both shivered as we waited for the doctor.

  Neither of us spoke. Neither of us looked at the other. We only sat—Derek on the examining table, and me in the chair right beside him. And each of us had our hands balled together in our laps, with our heads down, staring the white tile floor below. We were completely silent, lost in our own thoughts and worries…until a creak sounded at the door.

  Both of our heads snapped up in unison as Dr. Lawrence walked in the door with a brown file tucked beneath his arm.

  “Hey guys,” he sighed, just before trekking across the office, having a seat in the swivel chair just in front of where I sat.

  “Let’s get the show on the road!” Derek laughed nervously, clapping his hands together.

  I could tell that he just really wanted to get it over with.

  Dr. Lawrence sighed and nodded just before opening up the folder he carried. “Well, as you know, I was worried about toxicity levels. When we did the biochemistry profile, it indicated that there was a rise in creatine kinase and lactate dehydrogenase. And your urinalysis had high levels of myoglobin.”

  Both of our eyes widened in concern and confusion. What the hell had he just said? Was it English? Were we supposed to know what the hell he was talking about?

  “English, Doc…” Derek sighed. “I didn’t go to med school.”

  “I’m getting there, Mr. Sholts. I just wanted to explain what the results yielded and then we’ll talk about what it means.”

  He cleared his throat, and the sound echoed throughout the room.

  “There’s degradation of your liver, which explains the jaundice—and there are also some renal concerns. You mentioned tightness in the chest, which is also a major concern…and fluid in the lungs.”

  He flipped the page, and we continued to stare forward. My eyes were on his lips, paying close attention to every word although I didn’t quite understand all of it.

  “You have difficulty breathing, low blood pressure, and have experienced loss of consciousness as well as several other symptoms correlated to this sort of toxin.”

  “I don’t need a play-by-play of all the shit I have or have experienced, Doc…” Derek spoke up, using his hand to signal a halt. “What kind of toxin?”

  “I have concluded that this is all conclusive with an excess of the toxins found in a common household anticoagulant.” His voice cracked a bit, clearly not giving us good news. “Rodenticide.”

  “Rat poison?” I choked, remembering back to when my dog got into the box my daddy kept in the barn. My hand flew to my mouth as I tried to stifle my cry.

  Derek huffed and stared at the fluorescent lights above us. I could tell that he was trying to hold back tears.

  “Yes, rat poison.” Dr. Lawrence trailed. “Fortunately, though, there’s an antidote.”

  Both Derek and I seemed to release a breath of relief almost in unison as he continued his spiel.

  “The antidote is vitamin K, and I would like to order a full blood transfusion immediately, as well as vitamin K treatments and dialysis,” he said, closing the folder. “We will definitely need to hospitalize you. And,” he continued, “if you aren’t taking it purposely, then it’s either being done maliciously or consistently accidentally…so we may need to discover a route cause of all of this.”

  “Wow…” Derek breathed, his jaw dropped. “Uhm, let me …uh-process…?”

  “I understand; just breathe for a moment.”

  And so he did. He took a moment, and through the tears, he took a long deep breath. I could tell that he was trying to process, trying to think everything through…

  “I hope you don’t mind, but I’d really like to get a third opinion…” he finally managed to breathe. I was proud that he had even managed that thought. We had discussed a third opinion and agreed upon it, but hell, I didn’t remember anything.

  I couldn’t think. I could hardly breathe after hearing the results. I had to commend Derek on his strength. He had a lot more of it and a lot more composure than I could have ever even dreamed of.

  “I understand completely; this is a big deal.” Dr. Lawrence leaned forward in his chair and looked to Derek then to me, and then back to Derek once again. “Two doctors are telling you two different things, and I’m sure that’s scary and confusing.”

  He leaned back again and grabbed a couple of files from the shelf just above his desk.
“I’ll refer you to a few doctors and you can choose one. All of these are excellent in this field of medicine, and have openings.”

  He pulled a singular piece of paper and circled a few options just before reaching out to Derek with the sheet of paper. “Let me just remind you that time is of the essence here,” he warned, pulling the sheet back for a moment. “You really need to be treated for all of this as soon as possible…so don’t wait too long, okay?”

  Derek nodded, reached forward, and grabbed the sheet.

  “I won’t wait. I’ll get right on it.”

  Chapter 5

  Who the hell would have poisoned Derek? I mean, sure, he was an asshole around the office. But everywhere else, he was far from terrible.

  So could have anyone at work really tried to hurt him?

  Maybe Frank?

  I mean, sure, Frank was a douchebag, but he was far from psychotic. And I just couldn’t buy that he would have done anything like that…

  Whoever it was, though, was clever.

  I Googled rat poison symptoms, and they were completely in sync with what Derek had been experiencing. And upon further search, so were side-effects of chemotherapy.

  It was brilliant, so brilliant that I doubted anyone in the office would have been lucky enough for such a plan to just fall out of thin air and into his or her lap.

  The only person who would have possibly been able to make the tie and give a proper false-diagnosis was none other than that good-for-nothing, piece-of-shit, older stepbrother of his.

  And I wanted him to throw it in his face, beat him with the truth, and ingrain it in his stubborn head…but not until I knew for sure… not until the third opinion came in.

  And even then, I wasn’t sure I could.

  I didn’t get enjoyment out of arguing with him, nor out of hurting him. And every time I brought it up, it resulted in one of the two situations.

  So I had put it out of my mind until I knew rat poison was really the issue…which was just later that afternoon, into the evening.

  Derek had chosen a Dr. Ortiz as our third opinion doctor. She was quite well known in the medical and scientific community. She was known for her brilliance, as well as her success at such a young age.

  And he didn’t say, but I couldn’t help but wonder if that was why he chose her. I wondered if he somehow felt a kinship to her because of her brilliance and early success, but something told me that he might not care to talk about it; and hell, for all I knew, even if he had felt a kinship, he may not have chosen her for such a reason consciously.

  There was no way to tell.

  The only thing for certain was that we were there, and had been for hours. Derek had already gone through several tests, and we were told that they would in-house the blood tests so that we could get our results even quicker.

  I was more than fine with that.

  It just sucked to wait around.

  However, with New York traffic, you never wanted to leave and just come back later.

  It was better to just stay put.

  At least in my experience, it was.

  I sighed as I looked around the room and nearly scoffed at what I saw. For someone so incredibly advanced, her rooms were just as bleak, yet curiously not nearly as cold as Dr. Lawrence’s. I swear, it really was like Jack Frost had taken a piss and turned Dr. Lawrence’s room into a winter wonder wasteland.

  But, I had to admit, that a part of that warmth could have been attributed to Dr. Ortiz’s looks. She was literally the epitome of smoking hot.

  She was thin, but curvy, with an hour-glass figure. Her hair was long, wavy, thick and voluminous. She was a Latina dynamo…

  She was stunning.

  And not only that, but she had a British accent!

  “After looking over everything, I would have to concur with Dr. Lawrence’s diagnosis.” I hated to think it, but the woman’s brilliant accent gave a little more ease to the horrific blow of the results. And I could tell by listening to her that she was more than sympathetic about it all; she was genuinely upset by what lay before her in the reports.

  “I also agree that time is of the essence and that we need to get you into treatment as soon as possible.” She sat the files on her desk and walked across the room to look at Derek even closer, her eyes glistening with warmth and sympathy. “If you’d like, I could go ahead and put in paperwork to get you hospitalized?”

  Derek nodded faintly, and I could tell that his mind was whirling. He clearly wasn’t sure what to do about it all, what to think about it all…and I was sure he wondered how Dr. Freeman had “missed” it all.

  “Just like Dr. Lawrence highlighted, you’ll need vitamin K, a blood transfusion, and prolonged treatments. You could be in for a long ride.”

  He nodded once again, showing signs of understanding her. She patted his shoulder. “Would you like Dr. Lawrence or myself as the supervising physician for this?”

  “Dr. Lawrence, I suppose, since he’s the one that caught it,” he whispered, sounding defeated.

  “We may need to speak with the hospital board,” she said seriously, likely noting his disappointment. “It’s my responsibility as a doctor to speak with the board about a misdiagnosis of this caliber; as well as any overall concerns about any one of our physicians.”

  “Will he get in trouble?” Derek asked, almost pitifully. “Because I don’t think he did this on purpose.”

  “The reality is that you don’t have cancer. Best case scenario—this is considered negligence by a lack of testing.”

  “And worst case?” he asked, glancing up at her.

  “I don’t make assumptions. Truth is, I have no idea what happened in your diagnosis. But the fact remains that you were misdiagnosed and actually do have something wrong; your toxicity levels are terrible, and if we had caught this any later, you wouldn’t be sitting here.”

  He sighed, but Dr. Ortiz continued, “Regardless of what happened, your physician had a responsibility to treat you and, quite honestly, I’m disturbed at the fact that a doctor—one of our hospital’s doctors, at that—would miss something as important as this.”

  Chapter 6

  Those few seconds of walking back into another hospital room, were seconds that I never cared to re-live again. Walking into Derek’s room and seeing him lying on the hospital bed, frail and weak, was probably my biggest nightmare ever since the fateful day I found him in a puddle of his own vomit.

  I just had to keep reminding myself that he was there for a better reason this time. Both times he as there to get better, but last time it seemed like he was on his last limb. However, this time was different—this time was going to be the first of everything else to come, not the last.

  I moved slowly towards the bed before reaching the singular chair placed beside the bed. I sighed, and I cringed at the sight of him with IVs plugged into his veins. One was red. Blood red to be exact, and I became lightheaded just looking at it.

  I hated the sight of blood.

  But beyond all else, it all just looked so uncomfortable.

  I leaned towards the bed and reached out to stroke his hair, which had notably grown longer over the past couple of days.

  “Der, you sure are full of surprises aren’t you,” I cooed, wiping small stray hairs from over his brows.

  “A woman sure has to be strong to be with you.” I took a deep breath, and a small pain shot through my spine. I grunted just before shifting in my chair so that I could sit more comfortably. “And I’m not sure if I am, but dammit, I’m trying to be.”

  “You’re doing a good job,” he whispered, completely surprising me. I thought he was asleep. He opened his eyes and grinned up at me.

  “Ya know, if you woulda told me on the first date that we had that you’d be this big of a pain in the ass, I might have turned tail and ran.” I laughed, tears burning the brims of my eyes. I hated seeing him like it, but I found humor in him, and how much I loved him.

  He chuckled a bit, not hurt at all by what I
said… and that only sealed the deal even more for me. He knew I wasn’t serious. And he was almost impossible to offend.

  The only thing that really bothered him was me talking negatively about his stepbrother…his good for nothing stepbrother.

  “Promise me you’ll go home tonight and get some rest,” he said. And I could tell that he was serious.

  “I promise.” I lied. Truthfully, I wasn’t going anywhere.

  I was going to remain at his side… all day, and all night. Even if it killed me. And even if I had to sleep in the most uncomfortable chair known to man.

  Which I did…

  I had slept, in an in-and-out sort of way, all day, as Derek drifted in and out of consciousness.

  I was even asleep when I heard a creak at the door. The sound startled me and was the entire reason I jolted awake in the first place.

  It was dark in the room, and I knew that it had to be late, so who could have possibly been there at such a late hour?

  But when my eyes finally adjusted, I could do nothing more than flash a half smile when I saw a young male nurse standing with his head poked inside the door way. He was checking on us.

  But there wasn’t a lot going on.

  I was a dud and so was the ever-sleeping-Derek.

  He had been asleep almost all day, and I lay sprawled out on the chair beside him, clutching his sweaty hand. It was sort of gross, but I didn’t have the heart to let him go.

  “Would you like a blanket?” the man asked, sweetly, and I thought for a moment…

  Hell yeah I wanted a blanket! I didn’t even realize how cold it was until he asked.

  “Yes, please, if it isn’t too much trouble.” I brought my knees up to my chest and readjusted the way I was sitting in the chair, so that I was almost laying in it.

  “No trouble at all!” he pepped in a whisper, so not to disturb Derek just before his head slipped back through the door.

  But it wasn’t but just a moment or two later that the young man came back with a warm blanket and pillow. Half asleep, I felt him drape the heavy fabric over my shoulder and move the pillow beneath my head. And just as quickly as he came, I felt him scurry off.