Chapter 13: No Scenes

"Call an ambulance," I shouted. "Now!"

Nobody moved for a second.

Then a waiter ran for the phone, and a woman at the next table started to cry.

I pressed two fingers to Heath's throat and counted.

Summer had his head in her lap and was stroking his hair.

"I've got him," she kept saying. "I've got him, Ainsley. You can step back."

"Take your hands off him."

"I'm helping."

"I know exactly what you're doing."

She looked up at me, wide-eyed and hurt, for the benefit of the room.

"Why would you say that to me?" she whispered.

Two paramedics came through the crowd with a stretcher.

Summer climbed into the ambulance beside him before I could reach the door.

"I'm his partner," she told the medic. "I'm the one he's been leaning on."

The doors shut in my face.

I ran the whole way to Port Hollis General in my work boots.

At the emergency desk a nurse looked me over, sawdust and all.

"Family only."

"I'm his girlfriend."

"Miss Everhart says you're his ex."

Behind her glass, Heath's mother stood in the corridor with her arms folded.

She saw me and her face went hard.

"You stood on our lawn and told my son he was a mark," she said. "Now you want in?"

"Mrs. Gresham, please. Summer isn't what she looks like."

"She sat with him for four days while you were nowhere. Go home."

The nurse picked up a phone to call security.

Then the doors banged open, and Frankie walked in.

She had walked here from the boat shop.

Her shirt was soaked through, her face was gray, and she held the wall with one hand.

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