He smiled, but there was no warmth in it.
“What a remarkable coincidence.”
I looked at him.
“What is?”
“Nine months without a response,” he said. “Then he opens his eyes the day he gets married.”
Vivian turned sharply.
“Not now, Jason.”
“I’m only saying the timing is interesting.”
“Your cousin may be waking up.”
“And I’m delighted.”
His tone suggested otherwise.
The doctors prepared Ethan for transport to the private medical suite on the estate’s lower floor. As they wheeled him past us, I caught the slightest movement beneath his closed eyelids.
He was still aware.
Somehow, he was still listening.
Vivian watched until the elevator doors closed.
Then she turned to me.
“What exactly did you say to him?”
I repeated most of what I had told the doctor.
Vivian’s eyes remained fixed on mine.
“And then?”
“He moved his finger.”
“Nothing else?”
I hesitated.
Jason noticed.
His head tilted slightly.
“What aren’t you telling us?”
“Enough,” Vivian said.
“I’m asking a reasonable question.”
“You rarely do.”
Jason’s smile tightened.
He slipped his hands into his pockets and walked away, his footsteps fading down the corridor.
Vivian remained beside me.
For a long moment, neither of us spoke.
Then she said, “My grandson was not supposed to survive the first
week.”
I looked at her.
“The doctors told us to prepare ourselves. But Ethan has always had a stubbornness that bordered on arrogance.”
Her gaze moved toward the elevator.
“He stayed. Month after month. Even when there seemed to be no reason for him to.”
Her voice softened.
“You may be the first new reason he has found.”
The words unsettled me.
“I didn’t do anything.”
“You spoke to him.”
“So have other people.”
“Not honestly.”
Vivian faced me again.
“In this house, honesty is considerably rarer than loyalty. And loyalty is nearly extinct.”
Before I could ask what she meant, she walked away.
That evening, the estate felt different.
The servants whispered behind half-closed doors. Calls were made from the library. A second car arrived carrying a neurologist from Manhattan. Even the air seemed to hold a charge, as though the mansion itself had been waiting for Ethan to
