Wife's Bitter Revenge Against Neglectful CEO Husband-Chapter 166: From Bad to Worse

"What did you do to my brother?"

I held the phone from my ear and looked at the caller ID. Why was Joshua calling me? Had something happened to King?

"Joshua? Is King alright?" 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞

"He is in intensive care."

I jumped up from my office chair and started gathering my belongings. "Where is he? I’m on the way. What happened?"

"Don’t come. You don’t mean anything to him anymore, and you aren’t related. You can’t see him."

"Tell King that. He still thinks he owns me."

"I don’t know about that. What I do know is going cold turkey off an unknown medication can be deadly. You did that to King, and now he is in a coma, and I don’t know what to do about it."

"I did that?"

"You are the one who made him promise to stop taking the drugs, right?"

"Yes, I guess I did, but Joshua, I can’t find any information about this medication. It is changing him. I was trying to protect him."

"You aren’t qualified to help him."

"I didn’t see anyone else doing it, including you, Joshua."

Josh sighed. "Yeah, I guess you are right in that regard. I’d noticed the changes but wrote them off as part of his mourning process."

"You don’t know the half of it, Josh. He’s having me followed all the time, and he is harassing Alec with photos his men have taken, which, out of context, make it appear I’m sleeping around. King is ruining my relationship; otherwise, I would have stayed out of his business."

"Okay, I get it. You didn’t mean to hurt him. He has become a pest that you can’t ignore. You’ve never lied to me, so I believe you. It tracks with what Ben told me. The next question is what have you learned about the medication?"

"Nothing about the medication. I have a couple of the pills. I planned to talk to you or Alec about finding a chemist to analyze them. I had a few fires to put out first."

"Good. Send them over. We have the resources here. I can have a rush put on it."

"Can you arrange for me to see King? I promised King if he would stay off the drugs, I’d have dinner with him every night until I solved the mystery."

"Yeah, I guess, but Teela, he won’t know you’re there. He is seriously out of it."

"I won’t stay long. Just in case he can sense it, I should be there, especially if I played a role in his condition."

"Fine but express those pills over now. The sooner I know what I’m working with, the sooner I can help King."

I didn’t waste any time. I called Wyla in and had her hand deliver the samples to Josh.

The call concerned me. Yes, King was a pain in my ass, but we had spent years together. At one time, I had liked him well enough to marry him. I didn’t want him harmed. A big part of this whole process was because the drugs were harming him, and I didn’t want him harmed.

Now, it wasn’t a matter of want but a matter of need. I needed to find out what was going on with King. It could be a matter of life or death for the man. I notified Stiff so we were all on the same page, then I called Alec.

"Alec, King is in the hospital."

"What happened?"

I filled him in.

"What can I do to help?"

I thought about it. I dug into my pocket for the other pills I’d set aside. I trusted Josh, sort of. It niggled in the back of my brain that Josh was a party to some of the torture Lettie had inflicted on me. He wasn’t a totally ethical person, or he would have stood up for me or at least informed King on my behalf.

Instead, I suffered at his hands. I always thought his participation was reluctant because he was under the control of Lettie and Anya, but he was a doctor. He had taken an oath to do no harm. He harmed me both mentally and physically. A part of me will never fully forgive him for his actions, whether he did them willingly or under pressure from the women in his life. No one should succumb to pressure to the point of harming another person.

By that train of thought, I wondered if I should trust him to act in the best interest of King. No, I was better off having an independent analysis done by a private source and comparing the results to whatever Josh came up with. Josh would either prove himself loyal to King or possibly part of the problem. Either way, I was invested in protecting my ex-husband at the moment for no better reason than he was a human, and he could not protect himself right now.

"Alec, who would you recommend to work up a chemical analysis of the medication King was taking?"

"Of course. Bring the medication over to the facility. We have people on staff who can handle the project."

"How quickly can it be done?"

"I’ll have someone waiting to start the work as soon as you arrive."

"Thanks, Alec. I appreciate it."

"You speak as if we are strangers, Teela. I’m your partner in life. If something is important to you, it is important to me."

"Even if what is important is a man from my past?"

"Unless you are working to put King’s health right so you can leave me for him, I’m on board. You’re not, right? I mean, leaving me for King? I’d need a minute for that to soak in before I could face you."

"No, Alec. I’m not going back to King. We weren’t a good fit before. We still aren’t."

By the time I arrived at Alec’s building, I’d dug a little bit deeper into Dr. Pacer’s background. Something Stiff may not have caught, but I did was that the good doctor had attended the same university as King. I wondered if she may have known him in school. If so, should she have excused herself as his therapist, or did King agree to see her because he knew her? Did he schedule us for couple’s therapy with her because he knew she would side with him?

I slapped my laptop closed when I saw Alec waiting for me at the entrance with an older lady in a lab coat. He opened the door for me as soon as the car stopped.

"Teela, this is Dr. Alberson. She leads our research team. If anyone can find answer for you, she can."

I shook the lady’s hand. "Thank you so much for your help. My friend is laying in coma after trying to go off these pills cold turkey. His doctor is waiting for your results to help him."

"His doctor didn’t prescribe them?"

"No, his therapist did."

"Have you called her?"

"I don’t know if his doctor did, but I’m not a relative. I doubt she would tell me anything."

"What is the therapist’s name?" Alec asked.

I provided the information.

"The name sounds familiar. Let me check with my staff. See what I can find out about her. In the meantime, Let’s go to my office to wait for the results. You can work from there, right?"

"If I won’t be in the way."

Alec saw me to his office, then disappeared to attend a staff meeting. I spent the time conversing with CK and Stiff who were at a loss to discover anything new that was actually helpful. Knowing Dr. Pacer was a cheerleader in high school or that she had a sister named Dot didn’t exactly lead to any ah ha moments. Neither did learning about her perfect credit score or that she lived next door to a world-class model.

"I think she may have known King when she was a teenager. Can you follow that lead? Is it possible he broke her heart once or something? At least that would explain why she is feeding him so mystery drug."

"I’m on it," CK said.

Stiff said, "Good because I need a break from King drama. I’m headed to the gym for a little while. I’ll be back in an hour to pick up where I left off."

"You go to the gym?" CK asked.

"I’ve been known to work out," Stiff said.

"Not since I’ve known you," CK said.

"I don’t tell you everything," Stiff said.

"You can’t tell you work out from our taekwondo sessions," CK said.

"I’ll kill you."

I interceded. "That’s enough, guys. You can kill each other after I have answers."

Stiff said, "Yeah, yeah. When have I ever let you down?"

"Never. Let’s keep it that way."

Alec returned with a short man sporting a handlebar mustache, and l ended my call.

"Teela, Dr. Bassy reminded me where I knew the Dr. Pacer’s name from. She interviewed with us a couple of years ago. We chose not to hire her. I’ve contacted HR for her file."