Chapter Three
“Hey, Kellyanne, you got the list of tonight’s inmates?” I grumble, arriving at the reception desk.
“Don’t let Dr. Hollister hear you say that.
He takes great pride in this hospital.” Kellyanne cocks a brow and leans over the desk she’s manning.
Her dark eyes skim over the length of me before settling back on my face with a knowing smile.
I know the receptionists talk. Despite my lack of conversational skills, they’ve taken a particular interest in commenting on my appearance, questioning my jagged past and guessing what I’m running from.
Rumor also has it there’s a wager running for who on the roster can bed me first. I scoffed when the security guard told me, and quickly became horrified to find his own name was on that list.
Turning to leave, Kellyanne rushes around the desk in a bid to hold my attention.
“Oh, before you go,” the nurse chuckles to herself, standing with her hip popped and a finger twirling in her hair.
“Mrs. Mitcham has been eagerly awaiting your next shift. She’ll possibly throw herself out of bed so you’ll have to lift her again.
” At the mental image of Mrs. Mitcham’s tight smile against her leathery skin, I grimace.
“Thanks for the heads up,” I say dryly. Note to self, start my round on the far side of the building and hope Mrs. Mitcham is asleep by the time I circle back.
She’s sweet enough, really, always offering me a boiled sweet each time I tuck her back into bed.
It can happen multiple times a night, though somehow never when the others cover my round.
Rumor has it she was a hooker back in the day, a suspicion I can confirm by the way I find her face down, ass up, whenever she’s sprawled across the floor. Shudder.
I shouldn’t complain. The medical director, Dr. Hollister, took one look at me sleeping in a bus shelter and hired me on the spot because of my build.
He even found me a room to rent down the road and gave me a two-week advance to get me on my feet.
I don’t usually accept charity and couldn’t help being suspicious of his generosity, but a favor I can work off is different.
This is a fresh start. Honest, hard work for a decent man who’s shown me respect.
One day, I’ll be in the position to help someone in need too.
And yes, I could have fleeced Wavershit for all he’s worth, finding myself a luxury apartment just to spite him.
It’s the least I deserve after the hell he’s put me through, and that was before Harper appeared on the scene.
I refuse to think of her, of what they might be doing.
If she’s safe with him, if he’s protecting her with the same vigor as I would.
She’s not mine to protect anymore. She was never mine in the first place.
Alas, my mom’s old debts are cleared, her care and accommodation is covered for the next five years, and I’m making an honest living.
Clipboard in hand, I bid Kellyanne goodnight and stroll toward Falcon Ward.
Running a hand over my beanie, I breathe in the sharp chemical tang of disinfectant and push down the pang of longing I never thought I’d feel for one of Peterson’s classes.
Every time I try to shove the thought aside, it comes back harder, forcing me to press a fist against my chest through the thin cotton of my T-shirt.
Black cargo trousers hang heavy on my legs above sturdy boots, a baton and can of pepper spray clipped to my belt. Overkill for a so-called “night porter,” if you ask me. But with this shiny new hospital planted right in the middle of Detroit’s most dangerous neighborhood, I suppose it’s necessary.
As expected from glancing at the list, around half of the new patients in tonight have obtained gun shots or knife wounds and I find myself wondering yet again if I’m here to keep the gang members out or so-called victims in.
A concept I struggled with at first, my fingers itching to protect the truly vulnerable and throw the troublemakers out on their injured asses.
But as Jaye Dean, one of the matrons explained, the goal here is to keep the violence at bay long enough for the sick to get better, and whatever happens once they leave isn’t our concern.
Rounding corners from one empty hallway to the next, I flick various switches for the lights to dim and allow those in both communal and private rooms a short reprieve to sleep.
Occasionally, a nurse will pass between the rooms with a wheeled trolley, checking heart rates and administering timed medications.
There’s an eerie silence that oddly soothes me, knowing those in pain are gifted a brief rest from the real world.
Pain and deceit festers outside these walls, curling around the bricks and rasping at the windows.
A harsh, hacking cough drags my attention to a room set back from the rest. The door is slightly ajar with a lamp on inside, shadows moving across the walls.
The name on my clipboard for room sixteen reads Anastasia Grant, suffering from bronchitis.
Low muttering meets my ears as I inch forward, curiosity leading me onwards.
Through the gap in the door, my eyes fall on a stick of a woman enveloped in a curtain of her black hair.
Despite simultaneously sweating and shivering, it’s not her holding my attention but the two young boys curling into her sides.
Their shaggy hair and scruffy faces drive a spear through my heart, knocking the breath out of me as I turn away.
A familiar tightness crushes my chest, the same rising panic that I’ve been battling during every shift. I can’t save them all. I can’t save anyone. My role is to protect the walls of this hospital, to sleep well and keep in shape, only to come back and do it all again. That’s all.
Stepping back into the corridor, a metal trolley crashes into my shin and I quickly reach out to steady the wide-eyed nurse stumbling behind.
Her hands have latched onto my forearms, the small watch clinging onto her blue tunic swinging violently as she breathes out a shaky laugh. But no humor can pass my lips.
“Do you know what the story in there is?” I nod my head back to the way I came, withdrawing my arms when she doesn’t immediately let go. Her brown eyes flick beyond me and a small frown pulls at her mouth.
“Single mom,” she murmurs. “The hospital only provides meals for her, but she gives the food to her sons, so she’ll never have the strength to get better.
” With a small shake of her auburn-covered head, she steers the trolley around me and continues her round.
I swallow thickly to sink the knot stuck in my throat and stroll into the empty waiting room opposite.
I almost stumble, the collapse of my chest threatening to overwhelm me.
Switching off the boxy TV in the corner which was playing to itself, I collect the discarded magazines no one would ever choose to read willingly and put them back in a stack on a low table.
Pulling a crumpled twenty from one of my many pockets, I smooth the note over my thigh and push it into the vending machine.
Piling a few sandwich boxes, packets of crisps and chocolate bars into my arms, I slip back across the hall to lay them out onto an empty wheelchair I spot and silently glide it into the room without being seen.
No, I can’t save them, but I can at least feed them for one night.
Their future beyond that is in someone else’s hands.
Resuming the job I’m being paid for, I stroll out of Falcon Ward before starting on the next, shifting from room to room without anyone noticing I’ve been there at all.
The silent savior no one wants or needs.
The rest of the night is uneventful, each level of the hospital filled with the bleeping of heart monitors and soft snores filtering through blue curtains. Occasionally there’s a cry of agony or distant alarm, to which clusters of nurses rush and I promptly jerk out of their way.
Approaching the final ward, I sanitize my hands as I always do when moving from one to the next, then press the red button to open the double doors.
An empty nurses’ station sits to my left.
Blue tunics and navy Crocs disappear into the room at the end of the corridor, a red light flashing above the door.
My shoulders slump as I’m forced to head in the opposite direction, starting with the room at the far end.
“I’m not sure when he’ll be here, Mrs. Mitcham, but—” drifts out as I push the door open.
“It’s okay, Kaylah. Thank you. I’ll take it from here.”
Kaylah steps aside, revealing a very empty bed.
I bend to retrieve Mrs. Mitcham from the floor, staring at the ceiling to avoid seeing how her hospital gown has ridden up her wrinkled thighs.
I have nothing against the female figure, but when someone old enough to be my grandmother is trying to shift my hand from the back of her knees to other places, a line needs to be drawn.
After placing her back in bed, I tuck the covers beneath the mattress tight enough to hold her until a doctor comes in the morning. Her pruned fingers caress my bicep.
“You know, I’d still be able to show you a good time, for the right price.” She winks over her glass eye.
“How about I pay you not to throw yourself out of bed, Mrs. Mitcham?” I manage a friendly smirk. A small, fragile laugh leaves her, shifting the white wisps of hair on her bony shoulders.
“I’ve told you, call me Sarah. I want to hear my name on those full lips of yours.” I flinch as her thumb brushes across my mouth. Whoever I was in a former life, I must have been a hell of a dirty bastard to deserve this.