Chapter 10 - A Visitor in the Waiting Room
September arrived with a sharp drop in temperature, bringing the familiar smell of woodsmoke and turning leaves to the Portland streets.
It was a Tuesday afternoon, and the clinic waiting room was crowded with patients coughing through the early autumn flu season. I had just finished stitching a deep laceration on a local carpenter when my nurse, Sarah, knocked briskly on my office door and pushed it open.
"Dr. Brooks, you have a visitor in Room Three. Not a patient."
I frowned, peeling off my latex gloves and tossing them into the bin. "Who is it?"
"He wouldn't give a name," Sarah said, her expression tight with unease. "Suit, sunglasses, clean-shcut. Looked like a federal marshal or a very expensive lawyer. He asked specifically for you."
My heart gave a brief, hard thud against my ribs. I walked down the sterile hallway, my rubber-soled shoes squeaking against the linoleum, and pushed open the door to Examination Room Three.
Sitting on the edge of the examination table was a man in his late forties wearing a charcoal bespoke suit that looked entirely out of place among the blood-pressure cuffs and tongue depressors. He had slicked-back graying hair, cold blue eyes, and a small, neat scar running along his jawline.
"Dr. Amelia Brooks," he said, standing up smoothly. His voice was flat, devoid of warmth. "My name is Arthur Vance. No relation to the obstetrician who lost his nerve in Bar Harbor."
"Mr. Vance," I said, keeping my hands steady as I leaned against the doorframe. "You're a long way from the federal district court in Boston."
"Damon Blackwell sends his regards," Vance said, reaching into his inner jacket pocket.
I didn't flinch, though every instinct I possessed screamed that I was standing too close to the blast radius of a collapsing empire. "Damon isn't allowed visitors outside immediate family and legal counsel."
"True," Vance agreed, sliding a thick manila envelope across the paper-covered examination table. "Which is why this isn't a social call. This is a transfer of assets."
"I don't take money from convicted felons, Mr. Vance."
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"It's not money, Doctor." Vance’s eyes locked onto mine with unsettling precision. "It's a parcel. Delivered to your PO box tomorrow morning. What you do with it determines whether a very old debt is finally settled, or whether it passes down to the next generation."
Before I could ask what was inside, Vance slipped past me into the hallway, moving with the silent, practiced efficiency of a man who knew how to vanish in a crowded room. By the time I reached the front lobby, he was already gone.
