The Select (43 page)

This is crazy, he thought.

The best thing to do would be find a
motel and spend the night. Forget about The Ingraham for tonight
and get some sleep. The roads would be clearer in the
morning.

He pulled onto the shoulder and yanked
the cellular phone from its cradle between the bucket seats. He
fished out a slip of paper with Quinn's number and punched it
in.

If he wasn't getting there till
tomorrow, he wanted to make sure she didn't zip off to Baltimore or
the like for the day.

The signal was shaky but he recognized
her hello.

"Hey, Quinn, it's Matt."

"Oh, Matt. Thank God you called. It's
Tim! I think he's here!"

"What? He came back?"

Matt was stunned. But beneath the
shock was a strange mix of emotions, an uneasy balance between
relief that Tim was back and anger at him for running off in the
first place.

"No. I don'...ink he ever went
away..."

The signal was breaking up. Through
the static Matt thought he'd heard her say something about Tim not
going away.

"Come again, Quinn? I didn't catch
that."

"I th...'s here, at...ngraham...ink
they're hiding him."

"Quinn—"

"...'m going...ind
out...sure...night...Sheriff's.... Southworth..."

And then he lost the signal
completely. He tried the redial button a couple of times but
couldn't make a connection. Either he was on the fringe of the
local cellular transmitter zone or the storm was doing it.
Whatever, he'd lost the connection.

But even through the static, Quinn had
sounded strange. Frightened. Almost deranged.

Something about somebody hiding Tim at
The Ingraham? What was happening to her?

To hell with knocking off, he thought
as he put the Cherokee back in gear. He'd push through to The
Ingraham tonight. A glance at the dashboard clock and he corrected
himself: This morning. It was almost one a.m.

*

Quinn waited for Matt to call back.
She'd barely been able to understand him. He'd sounded as if he'd
been calling from a car phone. But why would he do that from
Connecticut?

She waited a while, and
when he didn't call again, she decided it was time. Enough waiting.
Time to
do
. She
had everything ready, lined up on the bed: her sneakers, her
security pass card, and her penlight. All she had to do was put on
her coat and slip into her boots.

Her hands shook as she slid the
leather boot tops over her calves. One part of her mind was
scolding her for even thinking of engaging in such a foolish,
no-win stunt—if she didn't find Tim but was caught by security,
she'd be in deep trouble with Dr. Alston and maybe even Dr.
Emerson; if she did find Tim and got caught, she'd be in even
deeper trouble, because she'd know something she shouldn't, and the
people who had shangaied Tim would have to do the same to
her.

But she
wasn't
going to get
caught. She could do this. She
had
to do this.

Because another part of her was
prodding her on, telling her she couldn't last another night
wondering if that had been Tim in Ward C, couldn't go on with
another day of her life until she knew the truth.

But what did she want the
truth to be? Did she truly want to find Tim tonight? If that was
Tim in Ward C, at least she'd know he was alive and know where he
was. But she didn't want to find him
there
. Because that would mean there
was something hideous about The Ingraham. Knowing that would put
her in jeopardy and Tim in greater peril than he was
already.

I have to know, she
thought as she slipped into her coat. I won't have a moment's peace
until I
know
.

With her sneakers jammed into the
pockets of her overcoat, Quinn exited the dorm at a dead run,
ducking past the camera in the lighted doorway, and dashing outside
to where the powdery snow was gusting through the frigid air. The
flakes seemed smaller now, and there were fewer of them falling,
but the wind was rearranging them, building dunes around the shrubs
and between the buildings, and scraping the open areas
clean.

She had decided against the direct
route to Science along the walks around the pond on the central
campus. That would mean running the gauntlet of security cameras on
all the flanking buildings. She opted instead for the rougher,
woodsier route behind the class building to approach Science from
the rear. She was a little concerned about her footprints at first,
but when she turned to see how much of a trail she was leaving she
saw the wind busily filling it in almost as soon as she completed a
step.

When she reached Science, Quinn paused
in the darkness outside the cone of light in front of the emergency
exit door on the west side and looked around. No one about, nothing
moving except the flakes. Still, she felt as if she were being
watched. She knew there was a camera over the door, but were there
others about? She wished she'd bothered to take note of their
positions during the months she'd been here, but who'd have thought
it would ever matter?

She pulled her security card from her
jeans and took a deep breath, then she marched up to the door,
slipped her card into the slot, and entered. She eased the door
shut behind her but kept her snowy boots as close to the threshold
as possible. Quickly she pulled her sneakers from her coat pocket
and laid them on the floor. Then with repeated, nervous glances
down the hall, she began pulling off her boots. She hated standing
here in the fully lit, deserted corridor, sure to be spotted by
anyone who walked into the rear end of the building's lobby, but
she didn't dare leave a trail of wet footprints in the
hall.

She also figured this gave her an
excuse in case anyone in security had been monitoring the camera on
the west side of Science during the two seconds she'd been on
screen. If someone came to check, instead of a skulking interloper
they'd find a student standing in plain view, changing her shoes.
Quinn even had a story ready: She couldn't sleep so she'd come over
to see if Dr. Emerson was around and if she could put her insomnia
to good use.

But no one had come to investigate the
door by the time she got into her sneakers, so she carried her
boots over to the stairwell door, unlocked it with her card, and
ducked inside. She left the boots in a corner and started up the
steps, pulling off her coat as she climbed.

On Fifth Quinn carded herself out of
the stairwell, blocked the door open with her coat, then crouched
in the corner and checked the hall. Most of the overheads were out;
only those by the nurses station were on. Softly glowing night
lights were spaced low on the walls along the hallway. A Neil
Diamond song was playing softly on the radio at the nurses
station.

Quinn crept down the hall. So far she
hadn't broken any rules. If they caught her now, her insomnia story
would still hold up. She glanced into Ward C as she passed the
window but it was dark in there. The only illumination came from
the vital signs indicators, IVAC infusion pumps, and cardiac
monitors over the beds. She tried to identify the patient she
suspected was Tim but in this light they were all
indistinguishable.

She stayed close to the wall as she
edged toward the nurses station. Neil Diamond's baritone had segued
into Michael Bolton's caterwaul on the radio—apparently one of
those easy-listening stations. She knew there were two nurses on
the late shift; she heard the muffled sound of their voices behind
the music. They didn't sound as if they were at the desk, so she
chanced a peek around the corner at the station.

Empty.

The music and the voices were coming
from the little lounge room behind the med cabinet. That was where
the nursing staff gave report, relaxed, and listened to the control
board for alarms from the monitors in the ward.

This was her chance. She had to act
now, before they came out onto the floor again. As the two nurses
broke into soft laughter, Quinn moved. Without giving herself time
to change her mind or lose her nerve, she dropped into a crouch,
scurried around the corner, and ducked through the door into Ward
C.

Now
you're over the line, she thought as she eased the door
closed and felt her terrified heart beating a mad tattoo against
the inner wall of her chest. Now you've got
big
trouble if you're
caught.

*

For a few seconds, Louis Verran didn't
know where he was. He jerked forward in his chair and looked
around. He was in Monitoring.

Christ! He'd dozed off.

He rubbed his eyes. Good thing he was
alone. If Kurt or Elliot had caught him, they'd have given him a
helluva razzing. But Elliot was in Baltimore on some R&R and
Kurt was sacked out next door in the on-call room.

Goddam Quinn
Cleary.

They all should have been getting some
R&R. Christmas break wasn't a break for Security, as a rule,
not with all those applicants rolling through here next week.
Christ, it seemed like a treadmill at times. But at least they used
to get off the first weekend of Christmas break. Not this year.
Because Cleary was staying, and because Alston wanted close tabs on
her, only one of them was off tonight. Elliot had drawn the high
card.

Verran got up and
stretched. His gut burned. He needed a break. He
craved
a break. He was
still feeling the stress of last week—hauling in the Brown kid,
putting him in storage, none of it was his cup of tea. He hadn't
figured on any rough stuff when he took this job—who'd have
thought? It was rare, but the potential was always there, and it
never failed to set his stomach acid production a few notches
higher.

He grabbed for his bottle of Mylanta
and unscrewed the cap. As he tilted back his head to chug a couple
of ounces, he saw the red light blinking on the
recorder.

Shit! She'd been on the phone. When
the hell had that happened?

He hit the rewind button, put on his
headphones, and listened.

An incoming call from her friend,
Matt. Lots of static. Those two had already talked earlier in the
day. Verran relaxed and smiled. Maybe old Matt was trying to move
in on the absent Tim. But the smile vanished when he heard Cleary
mention Tim.

"It's Tim! I think he's
here!"

Acid surged anew into Verran's
stomach.

"I don't think he ever went
away"..."I think he's here, at the Ingraham. I think they're hiding
him"..."I'm going to find out for sure tonight. If something
happens to me, call the County Sheriff's office. Ask for Deputy
Southworth."

Verran tore off the headphones. Where
had she got those ideas? And when had her friend called her? There
was no timer on the recorder.

...I'm going to find out
for sure tonight...

Christ! She could be upstairs in Ward
C right now.

He grabbed the phone and dialed her
dorm room. If she picked up, okay—he could sit down and carefully
consider his next move. If not...

Half a dozen rings and no answer. He
began to sweat. Four more and he slammed down the receiver. If she
wasn't already here she was on her way.

He dialed the Ward C nurses station.
Doris answered.

"This is Verran. Anybody strange
wandering around up there?"

"Strange?" Doris laughed.
"There's
nobody
wandering around up here but us chickens."

"Check Ward C anyway."

"Mr. Verran, there's no
way—"

"Check it
now
, goddammit!" he said
through his teeth. "We may have a trespasser."

He could hear her swallow.
"Yessir."

He hung up and began shouting for
Kurt.

*

Got to make this
fast.

The penlight trembled in Quinn's hand,
its narrow beam wobbling ahead of her as she moved among the Ward C
occupants, weaving her way toward the rear of the room to where
she'd seen the patient who'd signaled her.

As she approached the bed, she heard a
phone begin to ring out at the nurses station. She flashed the
light on the patient's bandaged face. Only the eyes were visible;
they were closed in sleep and the lids did not open in response to
the light. Holding her breath, Quinn hooked a finger under the
facial bandages and pulled down.

The nose came free. It wasn't
Tim's.

She pulled farther down, exposing a
pale, shiny area of scar tissue. She jerked her hand away. Not
Tim.

She stood there in the
dimness, confused and uncertain:
Crushed
because it wasn't Tim, which
meant he was still among the missing;
elated
because it wasn't Tim, which
meant he wasn't the victim of some grisly plot.

She rearranged the
bandages into their original position. How could she have been so
terribly wrong? She'd been so
sure
.