Chapter 3
I waited.
“Should that mean something to me?”
“It didn’t to me either.”
He walked to my desk and pulled a small notebook from inside his jacket.
“I noticed it when Emma’s background file came through. Helen Carter worked for twenty-two years as an administrative assistant at St. Vincent Rehabilitation Hospital.”
I felt something cold move through me.
St. Vincent.
The place where I spent eleven months after the shooting.
The place I hated so deeply I had forbidden anyone in my house from mentioning it.
“Her mother worked there?”
“Until four years ago.”
“That’s all?”
Luke didn’t answer immediately.
“No.”
I stared at him.
“What else?”
“Helen filed an internal incident report three days after you were admitted.”
My pulse changed.
“What kind of report?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
“The hospital says the record was archived during a system migration. I only found the index.”
“What was the title?”
Luke opened his notebook.
“Patient visitor discrepancy. Room 614.”
I knew my room number.
I would know it until I died.
“Someone came to see me?”
“Maybe.”
“I was unconscious for three days.”
“I know.”
“Who?”
“The visitor log from that week is missing.”
I laughed without humor.
“Convenient.”
Luke stayed quiet.
My mind was moving faster now.
“Does Emma know?”
“I don’t think so.”
“You don’t think?”
“Her mother’s memory has been declining for years. Emma mentioned in her hiring interview that Helen sometimes talks about old jobs, but most of it is fragmented.”
I looked toward the doorway Emma had used minutes earlier.
“You approved her because of her mother.”
“At first.”
The admission landed harder than I expected.
“You put her in my wing because you thought she might know something.”
“I approved a qualified applicant whose mother happened to have worked where you recovered.”
“You used her.”
Luke’s jaw tightened.
“I watched her. I checked everything. She wasn’t a threat.”
“That isn’t what I said.”
“No.”
“You let her walk into this house without telling me.”
“If I told you, you would have refused to hire her.”
“Yes.”
“Exactly.”
My anger rose quickly.
Then stopped.
Because another realization arrived behind it.
“Does she know you investigated her mother?”
“No.”
“Does she know anything about my room?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“As sure as I can be.”
I turned toward the window.
For months after the shooting, I had convinced myself I no longer cared who had done it.
That was the story I told everyone.
The truth was uglier.
I cared too much.
So much that I had eventually stopped looking because every dead end made me feel as helpless as waking without movement below my waist.
Behind me, Luke spoke carefully.
“There’s something else.”
I turned.
He removed a folded photocopy from his notebook.
It was old.
Faded.
A handwritten scheduling page from St. Vincent.
Three names were visible.
Two meant nothing.
The third did.
Dr. Samuel Reeves.
My first rehabilitation physician.
The man who had spent eight months telling me the spinal damage was complete.
The man who had encouraged me to accept that certain things would never change.
“What am I looking at?”
“Your mother’s shift notes mention Reeves.”
“My mother?”
“Helen Carter’s notes.”
I stared at him.
“You said it was a schedule.”
“It is.”
Luke pointed to handwriting along the bottom.
The ink was faint, but readable.
614 visitor not family. Dr. Reeves approved. No badge issued.
I read it twice.
Then a third time.
A sound came from the hallway.
We both looked up.
Emma stood in the doorway.
She had a stack of clean towels in her arms.
Her face was pale.
“How long have you been there?” Luke asked.
She ignored him.
Her eyes were fixed on the photocopy.
“That’s my mother’s handwriting.”
Nobody spoke.
Emma slowly entered the room.
“I know because she still writes her sevens that way.”
She placed the towels on a chair.
“What is that?”
I looked at Luke.
He said nothing.
So I told her.
Not everything.
Just enough.
Her mother had worked at St. Vincent.
She had apparently written a note about an unidentified visitor to my hospital room.
Emma listened without interrupting.
When I finished, she sat down.
For once, she looked exhausted in a way sleep could not solve.
“My mom talked about a patient once,” she said quietly.
My heartbeat seemed suddenly too loud.
“What patient?”
“I don’t know.”
She pressed two fingers to her temple.
“This was before the memory-care facility. Maybe three years ago. She would repeat stories from work.”
“What did she say?”
Emma looked at me.
“She said there was a man everyone was afraid of.”
Luke and I exchanged a glance.
Emma continued.
“But she said he wasn’t awake when she saw him.”
My throat tightened.
“What else?”
“She said somebody came to his room who shouldn’t have been there.”
The room seemed to shrink.
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“Emma.”
“I really don’t know.”
She closed her eyes.
Then opened them again.
“There was one thing she kept repeating.”
May you like
“What?”
Emma’s voice dropped.
