Chapter 7: The Call

The ambulance took Joan to the nearest hospital, a small one with two surgeons on call and neither of them for hearts.

I stood in the emergency corridor with the inhaler in my fist.

A doctor came out, still pulling on a fresh glove.

"Are you family?"

"I'm her friend. She has no one else here."

"Her heart stopped in the ambulance. We got it back, but it's failing. She needs a cardiac surgeon in the next hour, and we don't have one."

"There's one at Cascade General," a nurse said. "He'd come if anyone could get him over here."

"Who is he?"

The nurse shrugged.

"The one who does the Haskins family's hearts."

I took my phone out in the corridor with my hand shaking.

I thought about the screenshot on it, and the bottle that hit my shoes, and the face Nolan had made in the street.

I knew exactly whose family he worked for.

I called Nolan.

It rang four times.

"Kirsten," he said, low. "I'm in the middle of something."

"Joan Mabry is dying," I said. "Her heart is failing. There's a surgeon who owes your family favors. Call him. Please."

I had never said please to him like that.

I had not known I still could.

There was a short silence.

I heard a woman crying very softly behind him.

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