Chapter 5: The Loading Dock

I went back to University Hospital the following Tuesday, because I owed one person a thank-you.

The lobby had a wall of names carved into gray stone.

THE WHITBREAD FAMILY WING, it said across the top, in letters as tall as my hand.

I stood in front of it until the security guard asked if I needed directions.

"Dr. Neville," I said. "Trauma."

"Fourth floor, but he's not on the schedule."

"Then where is he?"

The guard looked down at his desk.

"Loading dock," he said. "He's carrying boxes."

I found him there, in a gray T-shirt and jeans, lifting a cardboard box off a rolling cart.

It held a lamp, a stack of journals and a framed diploma with the glass cracked across one corner.

He saw me and set the box down.

"Hallie. You shouldn't be walking around yet."

"I'm walking very slowly."

"That isn't the same thing."

He pulled a folding chair out from the wall and I sat in it, because he was right.

"They put you on leave," I said.

"Administrative leave pending review. It started at nine this morning." He nodded at the box. "I had an hour to clear my office."

"Because of the form."

"Their counsel asked me again whether I'd seen you decline transport."

"What did you say?"

"That I'd seen your husband decline it, and I'd put that in writing if they liked."