It was quiet for nearly twenty minutes.

Then, the screen lit up again.

It wasn’t a call.

It was an automated text alert from my bank.

My eyes strained to read the small font in the dim light of the room.

The alert was for my family’s primary trust account.

An attempt had been made to withdraw fifty thousand dollars in cash from a branch near the airport.

The transaction had been declined.

A second later, another alert popped up.

A credit card under our joint account had been declined at an airline ticket counter.

My heart began to race.

He was at the airport.

He was trying to buy a ticket out of the country.

I struggled to sit up, the pain in my back and arms screaming as the motion pulled at my skin.

I needed to call Sullivan.

I reached out with my left hand, my fingers stiff and wrapped in thick white gauze.

My fingertips brushed the edge of the phone, knocking it off the table.

It fell to the tiled floor with a loud, sickening clatter.

“No,” I whispered.