Chapter 9: Ash Street

Rafe's POV

I walked Ivy across the dark quad at one in the morning and told myself I was only being careful.

She limped less than she had a week ago.

She did not seem to notice, and I did not tell her.

"What do you think she found?" she asked.

"I think it's bad," I said. "Dr. Lowry doesn't call people at midnight for good news."

She nodded and kept walking.

She had not asked me to come, and I had not asked if I could.

There was something I had not told her, and the longer I walked beside her, the heavier it got.

Three years ago, I had been a rookie on the Blackridge ambulance.

One cold night we were sent to Ash Street for a little boy with a silver burn from a kitchen accident.

We arrived forty minutes after the call.

Garrick Clinic had received the call first.

Its desk had put the call in a queue for a doctor who was busy on a promo shoot.

The boy lived.

His foot did not.

I wrote my first report that night, and it went to the council.

Russell Garrick sat on the council.

The report disappeared, and I wrote another one, and another.

Nobody ever answered any of them.

I told myself I stayed in Blackridge because somebody had to watch that clinic.

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