Chapter 11: Separate Rooms

I was on the floor before the glass stopped rolling.

Grandda's eyes were open.

His lips were gray and his skin was cold and wet.

I put two fingers on his neck.

His pulse was there, slow and huge.

Thirty.

"His heart's blocking," I said. "Somebody call it in. Tell them eighty-nine, heart rate thirty, and we're five minutes from Mercy."

Conall already had his phone at his ear.

His face went flat.

"Mercy's on diversion," he said. "The dispatcher says they're sending the bus to the other side of the city."

Twenty-five minutes.

At thirty beats a minute, Grandda didn't have twenty-five minutes.

"Your car," I said.

Conall and two of his men lifted Grandda, tank and all, and carried him out of the pub at a run.

My mother stayed with Niamh, white as paper.

Conall's driver had the car at the curb before we were out the door.

I rode in the back with Grandda's head in my lap and my fingers on his pulse.

Twenty-eight.

"Stay with me, old man."

"Don't you dare," I told him. "Conall still owes you eight dollars."

"Nine," he whispered.

The driver ran two red lights and took a corner on the sidewalk.

Mercy's ambulance bay was dark.

A sign on a sawhorse said TRAUMA SERVICES LIMITED: PLEASE PROCEED TO MAIN ENTRANCE.

There was a security guard at the trauma doors, one I didn't know.

"Ma'am, this entrance is closed," he said.

"I'm Dr. Sheehan. I work here."

He checked a list on a clipboard.

"You're suspended, Doctor. I can't let you in."

Conall came up behind me with Grandda in his arms.

He didn't say a word to the guard.

The guard looked at him for one long second.

Then he stepped aside and held the door.

Inside, the trauma bay was half-lit.

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