People nearby began to notice something was happening. The same diners who had stared at her with disgust earlier now leaned in with morbid curiosity. They wanted a show. They wanted to see the crazy old woman fail—and the billionaire in the wheelchair disappointed yet again.
Cold sweat ran down my spine. What if Mark was right? What if this was just desperation finally breaking me? I’d spent fifteen years in that chair. Fifteen years crying alone in a mansion full of things that meant nothing if I couldn’t walk to the window to watch the sunrise.
The woman stood up. She was barely taller than me while I sat. She placed her old, battered Bible—one that looked like it had survived a lifetime of storms—on my useless legs.
“Mark,” she said calmly, calling my guard by name—though no one had told her.
He stiffened. “How do you know my name?” he whispered.
“That doesn’t matter,” she replied. “Stand behind him. Not to protect him from me—but to hold him when his faith wavers. He will be afraid. Fear weighs more than this wheelchair.”