Chapter 8: Doran's Resignation

Doran's POV

I taped a trash bag over the broken window of Melina Hollin's Honda and watched her drive away with my gauze on her palm.

Then I went back inside to find out what it would cost me.

Constance's assistant met me at the elevator. "Mrs. Hollin would like a word."

"I'm due at the house at four."

"She'd like it now."

The blinds in the office were still down.

Constance sat behind her desk with a fresh cup of tea.

The torn pieces of a check lay in her wastebasket.

"Sit, Doran."

I stayed standing.

"You followed my daughter into the parking lot," she said.

"She was bleeding."

"So I'm told. You were very quick with the gauze." She stirred her tea.

"Elora says you spoke to Melina after the gala, too."

"Elora says a lot of things."

"She says you left the house at two in the morning.

"She says you came back with the smell of a machine shop on your coat."

I kept my face still.

Two years of working for this woman had taught me that she did not guess. She collected, and then she announced.

"You're a good nurse," Constance said. "The best Elora has had. I've told the care home director so myself."

There it was.

My mother lives at Maple Court, in a room with a window over a garden she doesn't remember planting.

Constance has paid the monthly fee for twenty-six months.

Every month she has let me know it without ever saying the number.

"I need a statement from you," she said, and slid a single page across the desk.

"A short one. You were backstage at the gala, and you saw Melina push Elora's chair over."

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