Chapter 34 The Gilded Cage

• The room they put Vivian Shaw in was not a cell. Not in the traditional sense. It was a medical observation room in the federal detention center’s infirmary, all soft, padded edges and muted beige tones. The door was reinforced, the window was a one-way mirror, but there were no bars. The threat she posed wasn’t physical; it was pathological. Her cage was her own deteriorating biology, and the lies that were now tightening around her throat like a noose.
• She sat on the edge of the narrow bed, still wearing the silk robe they’d found her in, now stained and rumpled. The tremors in her hands were constant, a fine, hummingbird vibration that made the cheap paper cup of water tremble as she tried to drink. The bandage on her wrist—the theatrical prop that had sealed Evelyn’s fate—was gone, replaced by the stark white of a proper medical dressing. The radial artery. A laughable, desperate choice. She’d read about median cubital veins in a medical drama script once, but the term had slipped her mind in her panicked improvisation. A small, stupid mistake. One of many.
• The door clicked open. A stern-faced female agent entered, followed by a doctor with a bland, unreadable expression. The agent took up a post by the door. The doctor approached with a syringe.