Chapter 152
Chapter 152:
She hadn’t even had time to turn on the lights when her phone buzzed in her clutch.
She glanced at the ID. Harper Yates.
She frowned. Harper knew she didn’t take calls after ten, especially not when she was decompressing from a social event. She picked it up.
“I’m not taking new clients, Harper,” she said, her voice cool, detached, echoing slightly in the empty, dark apartment. “And I’m certainly not coming back to the party p>
“It’s not a party, Aurora,” Harper’s voice came through, tinny and urgent. “It’s a Code Blue. Matriarch Kensington. Cerebral hemorrhage. They’re giving her twelve hours p>
Aurora froze. Her hand hovered over the light switch.
Kensington.
The name struck a chord deep inside her, vibrating against her ribs. A sudden, sharp pain spiked behind her eyes, followed by a phantom ache in her left inner arm, right where the birthmark lay hidden under her sweater.
It was the bloodline calling. She didn’t know it yet—she couldn’t know it—but her biology recognized the threat to its source.
“I’m not a licensed surgeon,” Aurora said, her voice tight. “Take her to Mount Sinai p>
“We are at Sinai,” a male voice interrupted. It was deep, rough with suppressed emotion. Atticus. “They can’t help her. They say it’s ninety percent fatal. Harper says you’re the Phoenix. If you are… name your price. Just come p>
Aurora closed her eyes. She recognized the voice. The man from the balcony. The one who had looked at her like he was trying to solve a riddle.
She felt the pull again. Stronger this time. An invisible tether yanking her toward the hospital.
“It’s not about money,” Aurora said softly.
Around the corner, a nurse pretending to check a chart tapped furiously on her phone. She sent a text to Vivian Kensington: They found a healer. Aurora Vance. She’s coming.
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In the waiting room, Vivian read the text. Her eyes narrowed into slits. She snapped her phone shut.
“I can be there in twenty minutes if the traffic holds,” Aurora said into the phone.
“I’ll send a helicopter,” Atticus said. “Go to the roof of your building. Now p>
Aurora hung up. She stood in the center of her vast, silent penthouse. She felt like she was standing on the edge of a cliff. Going there meant stepping into the spotlight. It meant engaging with the Kensingtons, a family known for chewing up outsiders and spitting them out.
She reached up and touched the inside of her left arm through the fabric of her shirt.
“One look,” she whispered to the empty room. “I save her, and I leave p>
She grabbed her vintage leather medical case—the one filled with silver and gold needles, not scalpels—and ran for the private elevator.
Vivian Kensington cornered Dr. Shaw near the coffee station. The hospital lights hummed overhead, harsh and unforgiving.
“You can’t seriously be considering this,” Vivian hissed, her voice low and venomous. “Allowing an unlicensed, twenty-something girl to stick needles in my grandmother? Think of the liability, Evelyn. Think of your career p>
Dr. Shaw stiffened. She was a woman of science, but she was also a woman who enjoyed her tenure. “The family insists, Vivian. Edward is the primary next of kin, and Atticus supports him p>