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feeling of her heart tearing in two.How do you give up on your family? How will I tell the
boysÉand Jane?
Halfway to her destination she had the sudden urge to stop.So she did, turning back to
see what she knew in her heart that her remaining living relatives were sitting patiently on
the curb, waiting for her return.She lifted her hand to wave and both boys waved back,
causing a tiny, affectionate smile to twitch at her lips despite the situation."I love you.Be
good," she mouthed silently
Lewis mouthed back ÔYes' and James just rolled his eyes, pulling his cap down over his
face.
When Ginny turned back to the fire she felt dizzy and she grasped onto the side of one of
the fire wagons to keep her balance, but for some reason her fingers wouldn't work and
she slid to the ground.The sound of the people rushing around her, the spraying of fire
hoses and the crackling of burning wood all seemed to fade as tiny dots danced before her
eyes.She caught a glimpse of the wagon carrying the stretchers starting to move a split
second before her world went black.
The ferry butted gently against the dock and several bulky men from the New York
Penitentiary, clad in striped prison attire, plain brown caps, and shabby coats, loaded the
injured and ill from the boat onto wagons.A nurse quickly picked through the coughing,
crying or simply unconscious bodies, separating the critical patients from the rest and
loading them onto a blue wagon that would be allowed to leave for the hospital first.
Ginny's stretcher was placed alongside an elderly vagrant who'd been stabbed in a robbery
the night before and who'd waited in the receiving area of Manhattan's finest hospitals as
the hospital administrators argued over where he should receive treatment.Ginny had
been much more fortunate and was routed directly to the docks where the Charity
Hospital Ferry was just about to cast off.
With a quick snap of the reins, the blue wagon began to move and Ginny gazed up into
the winter sky.She was confused and she blinked several times, trying to gather her
scattered thoughts.Am I dead? she wondered dazedly.Where are the boys and Alice?Why
can't I breathe?She rolled her eyes sideways in time to see a nurse, who was riding in the
wagon along with her patients, scowl as she checked an old man's pulse.Ginny closed her
eyes again, welcoming the darkness.She didn't want to see the blanket that was covering
him pulled over his head.No more, she told herself.No more death today.
On the other side of Blackwell's Island, a second ferry carrying patients bound for the
Charity Hospital docked with a muted thud, sending a small wave of dark, dirty water
sloshing over the wooden landing.This transport was nearly empty and its few injured
passengers were unloaded quickly.A single stretcher holding Lindsay Killian was placed in a
blue wagon and rushed towards the hospital emergency room.
On this day, two young women's fates were about to collide and each would be changed
forever.
Chapter Three
It was full dark before Lindsay was moved from the surgery to a bed at the far end of the
women's fourth floor east wing.Two prisoners lifted her from the gurney she was riding in
and gently placed her on a bed clad only in dingy white sheets and topped by a thin pillow
inside a pale pink pillowcase.
Her head sank into the pillow and the sheet was draped over her. Lindsay let out a little
moan and licked dry lips as the Ôorderlies' disappeared.She cracked open one eye and the
room spun a little as she tried to gain her bearings.
She had awoken to a world of hurt that reeked of bleach mixed with the metallic scent of
blood.Where am I?
Most of the ward's lights had been turned off, casting the unfamiliar, institutional setting in
haunting shadows.Gone were the bridge and the railroad tracks, which were the last
places Lindsay could truly remember being, though she had a vague recollection of being
carried down the tracks, the cavernous but warm interior of a church, and a frantic wagon
ride.
She blinked with exaggerated slowness, realizing that she was only seeing out of one
eye.Her entire body ached and felt impossibly heavy and the room appeared to be draped
in a dense haze.
Lindsay tried to open her other eye and, when she couldn't open it at all, a surge of panic
tore through her.What if she'd lost it in the fight?Her heart began to pound.What if the
dogÉ?God.The room swam as she tried to sit up. "Damn," she cried out brokenly as a bolt
of searing pain halted her movement instantly.Her abdomen felt as though someone was
twisting a knife in it and her head throbbed.Where the dog had torn into her shoulder she
could the tight, burning sensation of new stitches holding together tender skin.
"Now then," a nurse, whose accent clearly indicated she was from Queens, startled
Lindsay. But despite the woman's somewhat grating tone, Lindsay was relieved to hear a
voice, any voice, being directed at her. That means I'm not dead, doesn't it?
"You shouldn't move," the nurse chastised mildly.The woman was middle-aged and plump,
her dress protected by a white apron that stretched to the floor. A crisp white hat sat atop
her head of dull brown hair.
Cool air tickled Lindsay's legs as her sheet was pulled back.She fought the urge to cover
herself."Clothes?"
"Those rags are long gone.But your soiled coat and shoes are under your bed." The nurse
made a face."I'll see if we can't clean up the coat tomorrow so they won't be forced to
give you a new one."
"They?"Lindsay's voice was weak.She thought she remembered several nuns hovering
over her. Or was that years ago?"The church?"
"Hardly," the nurse snorted."I mean the State of New York."She tapped a syringe in her
hand, removing the air bubbles."No one's told you anything, have they?"
Lindsay's silence was her answer.
"You're in the hospital on Blackwell's Island."
"Jail?" Lindsay squealed, again trying to sit up.
"No."The nurse gently coaxed her back down with a practiced hand."The hospital isn't part
of the prisonÉ or the lunatic asylum," she assured before Lindsay could ask.Then her voice
took on a slightly impatient edge."Now hold still."
Lindsay felt a prick on her thigh as a needle pierced her skin, then a stronger, burning
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