Story code: ST-000869
Part 2: The Digital Trail
The violent impact of her cheekbone against the polished hardwood floor, just inches off the edge of the Persian rug, shattered the creeping darkness. Jess did not wake up so much as she was viciously shoved back into her failing body. The jolt forced a tiny, pathetic squeak of air past her swollen vocal cords. Her lungs were screaming, locked in a rigid, agonizing spasm that simply refused to expand. Every muscle in her chest, back, and neck strained, pulling tightly against her ribs in a desperate, primal bid for oxygen, but nothing moved.
The edges of her vision remained tunneled, rimmed in a fuzzy, pulsing gray that threatened to swallow her again. The roaring of her own frantic pulse in her ears almost drowned out the sound of the ocean waves crashing outside the sunroom windows.
Above her, Eleanor’s voice filtered through the ringing, sounding distorted but entirely too calm. “Oh, do not be so dramatic, David. She just has a bit of a chest cold. It merely illustrates my point about the environmental impact of this construction you people constantly approve.”
A tinny, compressed voice snapped back from the speaker of Eleanor’s phone. “Eleanor, that sounds like a severe medical emergency. You need to call for an ambulance immediately. I am disconnecting.”
The sharp beep of the call ending echoed in the massive, sunlit room.
“Useless, bureaucratic coward,” Eleanor muttered.
Jess blinked, her eyelashes heavy with cold, clammy sweat. She was lying on her side, her arm outstretched toward the glass coffee table. She could see Eleanor’s red-soled heels pacing toward her. Jess tried to push herself up on her elbows. Her muscles felt like they were packed with wet sand. Her brain was starving for oxygen, making her thoughts sluggish and violently disjointed. *Medicine. Need the medicine.*
Eleanor stood over her, looking down with an expression of intense, aristocratic irritation. “Look at the mess you are making, Jessica. You are sweating all over the antique silk.”
Jess’s mouth opened and closed like a fish suffocating on a dock. The wheezing sound coming from her throat was growing quieter. It wasn’t a sign of recovery; it was the terrifying indicator of a “silent chest,” meaning almost no air was moving at all. Carbon dioxide was building up quickly in her bloodstream, bringing a wave of heavy, terrifying lethargy.
Eleanor sighed, finally registering the distinct blue tint spreading across Jess’s lips and fingernails. However, instead of panic, a cold, calculating mask slipped over the older woman’s features. She looked at the torn white pharmacy envelope in her hand. The thick red security tape hung limply from where she had sliced it with the silver letter opener.
“This has my name on it,” Eleanor said aloud, speaking more to herself than to her dying employee. “If the paramedics come, they will ask questions. I cannot have a scandal about mail tampering or withholding employee medication. The press would have an absolute field day, especially with the zoning board hearing next week.”
Jess watched through half-closed eyes as Eleanor stepped over her. The wealthy woman walked to the massive marble fireplace, where the embers from last night’s fire still glowed faintly behind the ornate iron grate. For a heart-stopping second, Jess thought Eleanor was going to throw the medicine into the ashes.
Instead, Eleanor slid the small, blue plastic rescue inhaler out of the packaging. She tossed the torn envelope with Jess’s printed name and the sliced red tape directly onto the hot coals. A small curl of acrid smoke rose as the evidence of her mail theft began to blacken and crisp.
Eleanor turned back and walked to the glass coffee table. She set the blue plastic inhaler down right in the dead center, placing it carefully beside a perfectly fanned stack of architectural magazines.
“There,” Eleanor announced, her voice adopting a rehearsed, artificially innocent tone. “You left your medicine right there on the table. You simply collapsed before you could reach it. A tragic accident, brought on by your own negligence.”
The inhaler was only two feet off the ground, but to Jess, it might as well have been on the summit of a mountain. She dug her fingernails into the expensive rug and dragged her dead weight forward. Her chest burned as if she had inhaled shattered glass. Millimeter by millimeter, she pulled her shoulder under the edge of the glass table.
As she reached her trembling hand up toward the smooth glass edge, her knuckles brushed against her own cell phone. It had clattered to the floor when she fell, the screen still glowing brightly with the pharmacy delivery confirmation page.
Eleanor noticed the light. She swooped down and snatched the phone from the floor. “Ah. The digital trail.”
Eleanor held the phone up, trying to angle it toward Jess’s face. “Face ID required. Of course.”
Eleanor dropped to a crouch. She grabbed a fistful of Jess’s hair, yanking her head up from the rug with brutal efficiency to align her face with the phone’s camera. Jess groaned, a silent, airless sound of pure agony, her eyes rolling back. Her features were contorted by the extreme muscular strain of her failing respiratory system. The phone screen shook, failing to recognize the distorted, hypoxic face of its owner.
Eleanor dropped Jess’s head back onto the hardwood floor with a disgusted huff. “Passcode, Jessica,” she demanded, her tone icy and impatient.
Jess stared up at the blue plastic inhaler sitting just above her on the glass. She extended her hand again, her fingers shaking violently in the air.
“I will hand it to you,” Eleanor promised. She picked the inhaler up from the table, holding the life-saving medicine in her left hand and the locked phone in her right. “But first, I am going to delete this delivery email and the tracking text. I will not have you or your family claiming I stole your mail and caused this. Tell me the passcode.”
Jess tried to move her lips. She couldn’t form words. She didn’t have the breath to power her vocal cords.
“Speak up!” Eleanor snapped, losing her temper.
Jess lunged blindly, a final, desperate surge of adrenaline propelling her upward. Her hand shot out, her fingers brushing against Eleanor’s wrist as she tried to pull the inhaler down to her mouth.
Eleanor reacted with lightning speed. She shoved Jess backward and stepped down hard. The sharp stiletto heel of Eleanor’s designer shoe drove directly into the soft center of Jess’s palm, pinning her outstretched hand firmly to the floor.
“You are not listening to me,” Eleanor said softly, the theatrical anger gone, replaced by a chilling, dead-eyed calm. “You brought a hazard into my home, you interrupted my vital phone call, and now you are creating a massive legal liability. I am not going to let you ruin my week. Now, give me the passcode.”