Page 77 of The Puppetmaster

Nothing on his face speaks of any kind of reaction to my welcome. He looks stoic, coming to a halt just before the bed, about three feet away from me.

“Or did you come here to bribe me?” I proceed, jutting my chin toward the folder in his hand. “Another nondisclosure for me to sign? Another contract? A promise to pay me some of your bullshit money so I will keep my mouth shut? I can tell you that won’t work, because I’m not—”

“It wasn’t your fault!” he cuts me off in a surprisingly loud voice.

I recoil with bewilderment, my eyes whipping up to meet his with a silent question written all over my face.

“What?”

“That guy back then, the one who you defended yourself against,” he says. “What happened to him wasn’t your fault. His heart didn’t just give in because of your fight.”

I stare at him in disbelief. Why is he bringing that up now? Of all the things I anticipated him to say, this was the last thing I would have thought of.

“What the hell are you trying to do?” I retort, shaking my head. “How… why are you saying this?”

I’m too stunned to move or say anything when he comes closer, taking his seat right next to me on the bed. Salwa, however, gets up on her feet and meanders over to me, taking her seat in my lap while casting him a disdainful look. Raad regards her with a raised eyebrow before he looks at me.

“May I untie you?” he wants to know. “Your arms must be hurting.”

They are, but I would never admit that to him.

“Yes, you may,” I say instead, raising my chin defiantly while he reaches around me to find the knot at my back.

I can’t suppress a sigh of relief when the strings are loosened and I can finally move my arms freely again. I stretch, rolling my shoulders as I cautiously move my sore arms, the strings now hanging idly from my wrists.

“Thanks,” I manage, only catching his gaze for a moment before I avert my eyes again. “What are you trying to do? Winning me over on your side? Why are you saying those things, Raad?”

“Because it’s true,” he says, opening the folder in his lap. “The guy’s heart didn’t give in because of you, but because of a medication he was taking as part of a medical trial back then. A medication that should never have been approved by the FDA.”

I prick up my ears, still unwilling to let my guard down when our eyes meet. “What are you saying?”

“He was one of the test subjects in a trial a while back, a trial that I tried to stop,” Raad continues. “Because our labs had worked on the same medication and our research showed that the combination of active agents was too unpredictable to be considered safe. They could potentially cause more harm than help, even though the cases were rare—they were still enough for my guys to stop working on the idea. However…”

He clears his throat, going through the stack of paper in his lap, before he pulls out one sheet that he hands over to me.

“It didn’t stop this firm,” he goes on, while I try to understand what’s written on the paper he just handed me. “They knew about the risks, but when they heard that we stopped working on it, they saw an opportunity. The shareholders soon decided that they needed to secure the patent on the product as quickly as possible. Their only interest was to bring the product to the market—and to be the only ones doing so.”

I’m shaking my head, confused at the numbers and names on the paper he gave me. It’s a list with names, next to percentages and other numbers I can’t make sense of. “I don’t… understand.”

“I was one of the shareholders,” Raad explains, pointing at one of the names on the list—his own. “But back at the time, I was only holding a small percentage of shares. Too small to influence their decision-making.”

“And you needed more to… stop them from doing this?”

He nods. “Yes, a lot more. If I wanted my voice to overpower that of the other main shareholders, I needed to be in possession of more than half of the firm’s shares.”

“Why didn’t you just buy them? Why did you use our names?”

“Because the other shareholders know me, and they knew what I was up to,” he responds. “I approached them when my lab came up with its results, because I wanted to warn them. And when they wouldn’t listen, I tried to make them stop by force.”

“So they couldn’t know it was you who took control of those shares?” I assume.

“Correct. I had to split the purchases, too, so they wouldn’t draw too much attention, while I gathered control of the company in secret. But you already figured that out on your own.”

I suggest a nod. “Yes, but—”

“It may look like I did this purely out of greed for profit, but I didn’t, Alena. I knew that was the accusation I would be facing once it became known that I’m the one holding all of those shares. I expected that to happen, because the public doesn’t know any better and the company will do what they can to stain my name. But it’s not true. I did it because I want to stop them from obtaining patents on that dangerous drug and to have the possibility of using our research results to countermand the FDA approval. You have to believe me.”

He pins me down with a pleading look, looking even more defeated thanks to the mark I left around his eye.

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