Chapter 7 - The Evidence
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Victor looked down at the three folded parchment packets in Marta’s trembling hand. He didn't see paper. He saw physical evidence of a murder in progress.
“How long has she been doing this?” Victor asked, carefully taking the packets from her palm. The paper felt agonizingly heavy.
“Twenty-three days,” Marta whispered, her voice hollow and exhausted. “Since she fired the night staff. Every morning, every night, she tries to force them down her throat.”
A cold, icy dread settled in the very center of Victor’s chest, spreading outward until his veins felt like they were pumping freezing water. Audrey wasn't just neglecting his mother. She was systematically destroying her.
“Marta,” Victor said, his voice dropping to a terrifying, absolute calm. It was the voice his enemies heard right before their worlds ended. “What is in these capsules?”
Marta looked up at him, her face completely stripped of the uncertainty and fear she had carried for weeks. The grim reality of the situation left no room for hesitation.
“She is not trying to make your mother sleep, Mr. Victor,” Marta whispered, the final, horrifying truth echoing off the tiled walls. “She is waiting for your mother to die.”
Victor closed his hand around the packets, crushing the paper slightly.
“You did exactly the right thing,” Victor said, pulling a massive roll of cash from his inner jacket pocket. He peeled off several hundred-dollar bills and pressed them into her hands. “You saved my mother’s life. Keep doing exactly what you are doing. Do not change your routine. Do not let Audrey know I am here.”
“Where are you going?” Marta asked, staring at the money in shock.
“I need to find out exactly what weapon she’s using,” Victor replied, turning toward the heavy utility door leading out to the underground garage.
An hour later, Victor sat in the back room of a dingy, unassuming pharmacy in the Bronx. The man behind the counter, a disgraced former toxicologist named Elias, poured the contents of the capsules into a mass spectrometer.
Elias adjusted his thick glasses, reading the digital output on the screen. He let out a low whistle.
“This is nasty stuff, Victor,” Elias muttered, looking back at the crime boss. “It’s a highly concentrated synthetic digitalis derivative mixed with a heavy barbiturate.”
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“In English, Elias,” Victor growled, pacing the cramped room.
“It’s a cocktail designed to mimic massive heart failure,” Elias explained grimly. “It slows the heart rate down while suppressing the respiratory system. Given your mother’s recent stroke, any medical examiner would chalk it up to natural causes. A tragic, secondary cardiovascular event. Completely untraceable unless they were explicitly looking for it.”
