Chapter 7: The Board Room
Dr.
Fell signed the statement the following morning.
Dana filed it with the DA's office by noon, along with the voicemail, the consent form, the payment records, and a formal complaint of medical fraud and conspiracy to commit bodily harm.
The DA's office called Dana back within two hours.
They had been building a separate file on Eleanor Voss for eighteen months.
A previous case — a different woman, a different situation, the same pattern of using private medical contractors to manage inconvenient people connected to Harlan Media.
That case had stalled for lack of a direct witness.
Dr.
Fell was the direct witness.
The board vote was scheduled for ten o'clock the next morning.
At nine fifty-five, two investigators walked into the Harlan Media building and asked to speak with Eleanor Voss.
I was not there for that part.
Dana called me while I was sitting in my kitchen with a cup of coffee I had not touched.
"They have her," she said.
I set the cup down.
"And Jared?"
"He's being interviewed now.
His attorney is already negotiating.
He's cooperating."
"Of course he is."
"Shelby." Dana paused.
"The board voted to suspend operations pending the investigation.
The company is frozen."
I looked out the window.
Harlan Media.
The thing Jared had built his entire identity around.
The thing Eleanor had used my body to protect.
"Okay," I said.
"That's all you have to say?"
"What else is there?"
I heard Dana exhale.
"I'll call you when I know more about the charges."
I said goodbye and set the phone on the table.
The coffee had gone cold.
I poured it out and made a fresh cup.
That afternoon, Jared called.
I let it ring.
He called again twenty minutes later.
I let that ring too.
The third time, I picked up.
"My lawyer is saying I should plead," he said.
His voice was flat in a way I had never heard before.
Scraped clean of everything that used to be in it.
"Then plead," I said.
"Shelby, I need you to understand—"
"I understand everything, Jared.
That's the problem."
"If I cooperate fully, they may reduce—"
"I know.
Dana told me."
A long silence.
"I'm sorry," he said.
The word sat in the air between us.
I thought about the hospital room.
The white roses.
The card that said *You and I against the world.* The sharp sting in my arm.
The surgical scar I would carry for the rest of my life.
"I know you are," I said.
"Does that matter?"
I thought about it honestly.
"Not in the way you need it to," I said.
I ended the call.
Outside, the afternoon light was moving across the floor in long, slow rectangles.
I watched it move.
Then I called my divorce attorney.
Her assistant picked up and said she was in a meeting.
"Tell her it's Shelby Harlan," I said.
"Tell her I'm ready."
The assistant put me on hold for less than thirty seconds.
My attorney came on the line.
"Shelby.
I've been watching the news."
"Then you know where we are."
"I do." A pause.
"Are you all right?"
I looked at the light on the floor.
May you like
"I will be," I said.
"Let's start."
