Page 33 of Girl, Bound

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Ella had him. Shecould see the truth writhing beneath his skin, the secrets clawing at hisinsides, desperate for release. Novak had something he wanted to confess.

But still, hehesitated, the words caught behind clenched teeth and a tightly drawn jaw.

‘You know more thanyou're letting on,’ she said, her voice calm but laced with an undercurrent ofsteel. ‘I can see it in the way you hold yourself, the way you choose yourwords like a man walking through a minefield. Saunders had skeletons in hiscloset, and I'm betting you know where they're buried.’

Novak flinched, a tinymovement, barely perceptible. But to Ella's trained eye, it might as well havebeen a scream. She leaned in closer, invading his space.

‘I'm not here to playgames, Doctor,’ she continued. ‘I want the truth, and I want it now. What wasSaunders hiding? What secrets died in this parking lot?’

Novak swallowed hard,his Adam's apple bobbing like a cork in a storm-tossed sea. For a long moment,he said nothing, the silence stretching between them like a taut wire. Then,with a sigh that seemed to come from the depths of his soul, he began to speak.

‘Saunders...he was theglue that held Seraphic together. The driving force behind our success. We wereon the verge of something big, something that would have changed the face ofmedicine as we know it.’

Ella cocked aneyebrow. Novak ran a hand through his hair, a gesture of nervousness, of barelycontained agitation.

‘Seraphine,’ he said,the word emerging like a prayer. ‘An antidepressant, a wonder drug. Cheap toproduce, easy to distribute, more effective and readily-available than nearlyevery other drug on the market. It would have been a godsend, a miracle for healthcareproviders across the country.’

‘But?’ Ella prompted,sensing the other shoe hovering, ready to drop.

Novak's shouldersslumped, the fight draining out of him like sand through a fist. ‘But...therewere side effects. Damning ones, especially in younger patients. Delayedpuberty, hormonal imbalances, increased estrogen levels.’

Ella's mind raced,putting together a semi-coherent picture. ‘And let me guess. You kept it quiet.Buried the data, the trials gone wrong. All in the name of the dollar.’

Novak had the grace tolook ashamed, his gaze dropping to the floor. ‘We were going to weather thestorm once the billions started rolling in. Plausible deniability. Claimignorance, blame it on improper testing protocols.’

Ella's blood boiled, ahot, sick surge of anger and disgust. The sheer, unmitigated gall of it, thecallous disregard for human life. It was the kind of corporate malfeasance thatmade her want to put her fist through a wall, to scream her rage to the uncaringheavens.

But she tamped itdown, forced it back into the box where she kept all her demons locked away.She couldn't afford to lose control, not now. Not when she was so close to thetruth.

‘And this wasSaunders’ idea?’

Novak's eyes widened,surprise etched into every line of his face. ‘No, no, you've got it all wrong.It wasn't Saunders' idea. It was mine.’

Ella blinked, theconfession hitting her like a sucker punch to the gut. ‘Yours?’

Novak nodded, a jerky,spasmodic motion. ‘Saunders was the one pushing for more testing, more trials.He wanted to fix the problems, to make Seraphine safe. But me? The otherhigher-ups? We just wanted to get it on the market, to start raking in the cash.’

Ella shook her head,trying to wrap her mind around this new twist. ‘So you're telling me Saunderswas the only one with a conscience? The only one who gave a damn about thelives you were playing with?’

‘Yes.’ Novak's saidshakily, the admission seeming to cost him something precious. ‘If it hadn'tbeen for him, Seraphine would have been on pharmacy shelves years ago. But hekept pushing back, kept insisting we do more research, more studies.’

Ella's mind reeled,the pieces of the puzzle rearranging themselves into a new, more confusingconfiguration. Saunders, the golden boy, the one she'd pegged as the mastermindbehind Seraphic's corruption, was actually the lone voice of reason in a sea ofgreed. It didn't make sense, didn't fit with the narrative she'd constructed inher head.

‘But somethingchanged, didn't it?’ she pressed, her instincts telling her there was more tothis story. ‘Saunders couldn't hold back the tide forever.’

Novak's shouldersslumped, defeat written in every line of his body. ‘The shareholders weregetting restless. They wanted a return on their investment, wanted to seeSeraphine hit the market. We couldn't keep stalling, couldn't keep pouringmoney into a project that might never pay off.’

Ella's stomachchurned, bile rising in the back of her throat. But even as the revulsioncoiled, she was trying to make sense of this new information. If Saunders wasthe good guy in all this, the lone voice of reason in a chorus of greed, thenwhy had the killer targeted him? What possible motive could the unsub have fortaking out the one person who seemed to have a shred of decency?

It didn't add up,didn't fit with the profile she'd been building. A killer obsessed withtransformation, with rebirth through suffering. Why would he choose Saunders ashis victim? Why not one of the other executives, the ones who were actuallyresponsible for Seraphic's malfeasance?

‘Okay,’ Ella said.‘So, I imagine you pissed off a lot of people.’

‘To put mildly.’

‘I need names. Peoplewho might have a vendetta against your company, or Saunders in particular.’

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