Saving the blind billionaire

I was driving my brand new 2021 Ferrari F8 Tributo that morning, one of my favourite songs from a treasured musician playing when my phone rang. On impulse, I looked at the phone's screen. Naturally, I wouldn't, as I always tried to avoid anything that would lead to me having a phone call while driving. Traffic rules were very important to me. Upon sighting Michelle's name in the caller's id, I was a little a turn. Michelle was my fiance and we had had a little fight this morning, owing to a weird behaviour from her. I couldn't help thinking that maybe she had come to her senses and realised her wrongdoing, and was therefore calling to apologise. I didn't want to pick as that would be breaking a traffic rule, but there was the situation of her getting the wrong idea from me ignoring it. If I didn't answer the phone call, the Michelle I knew would most likely jump to conclusions that I was still mad at her, which wasn't the case at all. I loved her too much to be able to nourish lasting anger towards her. Settling my left hand comfortably on the steering wheel, I tried to use my right hand to take my phone from the partition but it slid off to the floor of the backseat. The next thing that happened was also an impulse move. I bent backwards and picked up the phone, which ensured my eyes left the road for a few seconds. I didn't even realise the stupidity till I had a horn. My mind went haywire. When I returned, my car was rushing towards another in a head-on collision. I swerved without thinking or looking towards where I swerved to. It just seemed like the only thing I could do to save myself at that point. From nowhere, there was a loud ringing screech, a hit, then darkness. ☆☆☆☆ My whole life flashed before me. Literally. I saw and experienced the happiest day of my thirty years on earth; the day I proposed to Mitchell and she accepted. Even though we had been dating for years, I had been scared, yet ecstatic. I was scared she might, for some unfathomable reasons, say no. And I was ecstatic that if she did say yes, she would be giving her go-ahead to us spending the rest of our lives together. I had wanted this since the first day I laid my eyes on her, so when she said Yes, happiness I had never felt bloomed inside of me. I saw my seventeen years old self promising my dad I would quit basketball at thirty. It was a promise I had to make so he could let me live my dream of being a basketball player. His conditions were I would quit once I was thirty so I could take over the company. I was also to get married around that age. I quit basketball two months ago, fulfilling my promise. And validating my Mom, who had been the one to convince my Dad to give me the benefit of doubt. I saw Eden, my adopted elder sister, smiling at me. "I'm so proud of you, Lew," she had said. I saw the teenage Mitchell smiling at me. That moment she walked up to me, I had thought nothing but 'What a beautiful, tall, slim woman. She's totally my type." So much had happened since then. I had fallen so much harder since then. The flashbacks ended as I finally went into blank mode. ☆☆☆☆ Mr Lionel Peterson, a successful oil business mogul and father to Lewis, stood dressed in a customized black suit, an immaculate white shirt, a multicoloured bowtie and a pair of brown leather shoes. He was deep in an investment proposal meeting with an airline company which was on the verge of going bankrupt when his phone rang. He ignored it, knowing there was no way he would pick a call during a meeting as important as this. Even when the phone kept ringing continuously, he ignored it. This was until the CEO of the airline company motioned for him to take the call. Instead of doing so, he apologised, "Apologies. I forgot to silence my phone earlier." "You should answer the call, Mr Peterson, it might be useful," someone said. "Don't worry, Mr Stones. I don't answer calls from numbers that aren't saved in my phone, but I'll make sure to check it out when we're done." And to the amazement of everyone in the meeting, he switched off his phone. ☆ Dr Adeline Gerald, Lewis mother and wife to Mr Peterson was attending to a patient in her office when her phone rang. She was a psychiatrist who cared deeply for her patients and took her work very seriously. Excusing herself from the patient, she picked up the call and dropped a quick message. "Please call later, I'm very busy right now." Then she ended the call without giving the caller a chance to speak. ☆ Eden Peterson, Lew's adopted sister, would have come through. She was the one who was supposed to be the easiest to reach among his family, but that was an unfortunately wrong moment. And no, it wasn't that she was busy with class or something particularly important. To be honest, though, this was important to her. For the first time, she was with her crush. And she had the opportunity to tell him how she truly felt. She had loved Abel for two years now, since the time she transferred to immaculate concepts schools. Some guys would give up anything to be with her, but she couldn't care less about them because she had her eyes on only one person and it was Abel. So now that she had the chance to tell him how she felt, a situation she had played several times in her head and continuously rehearsed, she wouldn't give it up -or even pause it- for anyone ever. And definitely not a strange number. That was why when her phone started ringing, she didn't think twice before ending the call and switching off her phone, making sure there wouldn't be any further interruption of this magical moment of her life. ☆ Mitchelle, Lewis beloved fiancee, was the next on the caller's list and probably the last hope the caller had of reaching anyone close to the dying Mr Lewis Peterson. Sadly, Mitchelle wasn't someone one could depend on to show up for a loved one in an emergency. Especially at that moment where she was particularly self-absorbed as she boasted to her friends about the occasion of her and Lew's wedding which was coming up. She kept stressing how powerful she would become after marrying the strong, influential and mighty Lewis Peterson. She believed all of those qualities would automatically become hers too once she married him. "So, for real, for real, it's not that you love Lewis, It's just about all the things marrying him could give you?" Jennifer Seaman one of her friends asked. "You of all people should know Barbara St.Marcus." Tony Boeing, Mitchell's closest friend replied. "There's no way on this huge earth I'm leading a low life again after leaving the St Marcus home. No way!" Mitchelle smirks. "I will never..." This was when her phone started ringing. She first went through an unnecessarily dramatic hassle of bringing out her phone from her tiny bag, then when she finally got it out, she hissed in disgust upon sighting the caller's Id. "Guess who?" she asked rhetorically. "James." This made them burst into a serious round of laughter. "Your ex James?!" They choruses in bewilderment and continued laughing. Mitchelle ended the call swiftly and threw the phone into her bag. She snatched it out again, with precision this time, when it started ringing again. She channelled so much energy into the scream she directed at the phone. "I've warned you to stop calling this number! Do you want to die?!" Ending the call angrily, she once again threw the phone into her bag, then burst out laughing alongside her friends afterwards. ☆☆☆☆ The caller was beyond frustrated at this point. Dilly-dallying for a while, he went ahead with the last option; calling the family's house line. Ava, the family help was busy reading a novel when the telephone rang. She read the last word aloud so she could remember it for when she was ready to return to it. "Hello, this is the Peterson's house and I'm Ava St Marcus. How may I help you?" she asked impatiently. "Mr Lewis Peterson just got into an accident and has been rushed to the UAMC emergency room." She heard from the other end. She was so shocked that she lost balance and the ability to hear for a few seconds. She took two steps backwards, wishing she could unhear what she just heard. "Hello, Ms Ava! Are you there?" It was a call-out to ascertain if her attention was still held, but Ava herself couldn't say for sure where her mind was. She knew, though, that she had to snap out of it real quick. "I- I c- ca- can hear you," she stuttered. "We'll need a family member's signature as soon as possible, else, he might not make it." The call ended abruptly, leaving Ava talking to no one but herself. "I'll be there soon." She was at once scared of how this might end for Lewis. With how the person had spoken, it was obvious he was in a very critical state. How did he get into that situation? It was only a few weeks to his wedding, and this made it all so much sadder. She was particularly nervous about him entering a coma-like the billionaire in the book she was reading. She had been reading the story of a billionaire's son who lost consciousness in an accident and entered a girl's lifeless body. She shook her head at the thought of that. Then it dawned on her that she had been sitting on the ground. She quickly got up, picked up her phone from where she kept it and ran out of the house. As soon as she reached outside, she boarded a cab to the hospital. While in the cab, she called every other member of the Peterson family but their phones were switched off. After spending about two hours on the road with twenty-five awful minutes wasted in traffic, she got to the hospital. All the while she fruitlessly phoned the members of the Peterson family. It was when she got to the hospital it occurred to her that she didn't have any money or her debit card on her to pay for the cab fare. She came up with a plan of how she was going to salvage the situation as they got to the hospital. As soon as the cab stopped, she jumped out of it and ran towards the hospital's entrance. She hoped that, for some reason, the cab driver wouldn't follow her. She was wrong. He left his car and pursued her, calling out to her and reminding her she was yet to pay her fare. "Hold on, Ma'am. You haven't paid." Ava was too shaken and confused about what to do, so she just kept running into the hospital, while silently praying for her to not be embarrassed by him. "I'm here for Mr Lewis Peterson," she screamed at the waiting nurses as soon as she got to the reception. "Are you his guardian?" One of the nurses asked. "Yes, what am I supposed to sign?" she replied, gasping for air. "I'm sorry, ma'am, but you didn't pay me," the cab driver said, tapping her shoulder from behind. Ava gritted her teeth in frustration as she realised he followed her into the hospital. "I'm sorry, hold on sir," she said without sparing him a glance. "Please can I see him now?" she asked the blonde nurse attending to her. "Sure, of course." The nurse left the counter, gesturing at Ava to follow her. "This way, please." But she couldn't push off the guilty feeling that tugged at her as she walked further away from the man, especially when she turned to see him staring at her. She went back to him eventually. "I'm sorry, sir. I can make it up to you if you give me your number." "Don't worry, I just saw the news. Please go and save Lewis Peterson's life." "News?" Her face lit up with a little relief. "Maybe his family must have heard it." "Are you not his family?" he asked. She fumbled. "Not...exactly." "Please, ma'am. You have to come with me right away," the nurse who had been waiting impatiently called. She left the cab driver and ran up to the nurse. When they got to the ER and saw the state of her Lewis was in, she cringed with fear. He was in a state where she couldn't exactly describe, except that almost every part of him that wasn't covered by the hospital cloth was bandaged. "Oh Lew," she sobbed. "He needs an immediate surgery in order to survive, but we need a signature," said a doctor as he emerged from behind them. "Can I sign?" She was confused. "As long as he won't die I'll sign." She nodded as she spoke, even though doubt was written all over her face. "Let me sign please." "Follow me," the doctor said and she obeyed. "The surgery is not hundred percent guaranteed." "Nothing is hundred percent guaranteed," she replied, signing the papers without reading it. "As long as we can get eighty percent, I'll manage." "I just hope the Petersons won't make you regret doing this," the doctor said. Ava, who hadn't considered this before, was hot nervous at the possibility. "I never gave it a second thought," she muttered to herself. "I will be off to the theatre now," the doctor said, leaving her in his office. He stopped and turned to her when he reached the door. "Are you sure you want to do this Ms Ava St. Marcus?" The question made her really uncomfortable, she wasn't going to lie, but she knew it was a necessary question. It wasn't as if there was a lot of options anyway. "Yeah, I am."