Chapter 1My Ghost Still Protects My Son

I died in the sterile, fluorescent-lit hallway of the very hospital my wife built, shortly after being forced to undergo a "procedure" for the sake of the man she truly loved.

Before I took my last breath, my six-year-old son, Toby, begged her three times.

The first time, Toby reached out and caught her hand. His voice was trembling, telling her that I was coughing up blood.

Madeline just sneered, her eyes cold as flint. "You’re getting better at this," she said, looking down at our son as if he were a stranger’s dog. "Teaching a child to lie for you? That’s a new low, Ben."

With a flick of her wrist, she signaled her security detail to haul the boy out of the private wing.

The second time, Toby grabbed the hem of her designer coat. He was hysterical, crying that I was drifting in and out of consciousness, mumbling nonsense from the pain.

Madeline didn't even look back. She just checked her watch, her brow furrowed in minor irritation. "It was a standard procedure. The doctors said he’d be fine. Stop being so dramatic."

Once again, the guards stepped in, dragging Toby away while his sneakers skidded across the polished marble floor.

The third time, Toby didn't stand. He collapsed on the floor, burying his face in the fabric of her trousers, his small body racking with sobs as he told her I wouldn’t wake up.

That was when Madeline finally snapped. She didn't kneel to comfort him. Instead, she grabbed him by the collar of his shirt, her face contorted with rage, and shoved him toward the exit.

"I told you, Ben isn't going to die! If you come back here one more time and disturb Sebastian’s rest, I will have both of you thrown out of this hospital and onto the street. Do you understand me?"

Desperate to save me, Toby did the only thing a six-year-old could think of. He went to the nursing station and took off the heavy silver locket he’d worn since the day he was born—the one my mother had given him for protection.

"Please, ma'am," he whispered to the nurse, holding out his only treasure. "I don't need to be lucky anymore. I just need my daddy to stay alive."

The nurse, moved by the sight of the bruised, tear-streaked boy, took the locket and agreed to move me to the last available recovery room.

But Sebastian—Madeline’s "great lost love," the man who had occupied her heart long before I ever stepped into the frame—had other plans. He sat in his wheelchair, clutching his designer French bulldog, and blocked the doorway.

"I’m so sorry, little guy," Sebastian said, his voice dripping with mock sympathy. "But your mommy was worried I’d get lonely without my dog. This room is reserved for Princess."

* * *

To make room for Sebastian’s dog, my gurney was pushed out into the drafty, crowded service corridor.

As the heavy mahogany door clicked shut, Toby stood there, his hands empty, his locket gone.

His knuckles were bruised and purple from pounding on the doors. He didn't stop. He hit the wood again and again, his voice small and cracking.

"Sir? Please. Please give the room back to my daddy."

"Sir, it’s Toby! Please open the door!"

His high-pitched voice echoed through the hallway, but it couldn't pierce the thick insulation of the VIP suite where Sebastian was busy cooing at his pet. The louder Toby cried, the louder Sebastian turned up the television, laughing as he played with the dog.

"Good girl, Princess. Don't listen to the noise outside. It’s just trash."

Toby’s voice began to fail him, turning into a raspy, jagged whisper.

This was the boy who used to cry and run for a hug if he so much as scraped a knee. Now, he just used the hem of his dirty t-shirt to wipe the blood from his split knuckles.

His eyes were red-rimmed and full of a hollow, haunting hatred. "You’re a monster!" he croaked at the closed door. "I bought that room. I gave them my locket! You can't give it to a dog!"

"You monster!"

But his voice was too thin now. It was a ghost of a sound, fragile and breaking.

I lay on that thin hospital mattress in the hallway, watching him. Tears mixed with the copper tang of blood in my throat.

I’m so sorry, Toby.

I’m sorry I couldn't protect you. I'm so, so sorry.