Chapter 15 - The Woman Under the Sheet
The stretcher reached the outside gate before Nurse Amara caught up. “Stop!” she yelled. “That's my patient.”
Colson stood beside the transport van. “Emergency move. She's been cleared.”
“By whom?”
“Stand aside, Nurse.”
Amara pulled the sheet back far enough to reveal Gloria's gray face. She pressed two fingers to the woman's neck, then looked at the chart clipped to the stretcher.
“This says she's dead,” Amara said. “Her pulse says otherwise.”
A guard shifted uncomfortably. Across the yard windows, faces pressed against glass. Ward was among the officers at the gate. He took out his phone and began recording the time and the license plate.
“You can't film inside a secure area,” Colson snapped.
“Then take it for evidence,” Ward answered. “But log why.”
I saw everything from the stairwell. Brandi stood beside me with her hands fisted.
Amara ordered Gloria back into the clinic. Colson refused until another nurse appeared and repeated the order. Two licensed witnesses had suddenly become more inconvenient than one quiet prisoner.
Gloria opened her eyes as they wheeled her inside. She saw Rhea watching from a distant window and lifted one shaking finger.
“One,” Brandi whispered. “What does one mean?”
I remembered Rhea's words: four women reduced to one file. I wondered if Gloria meant the last piece of evidence.
At evening count, Hazel handed me a note written on a clean medical-label backing. AMARA HAS THE PHONE. DON'T ASK FOR IT. The writing was Gloria's, uneven but unmistakable.
A phone behind the red door. A nurse now holding it. It was possible the whole truth existed in something small enough to hide in a pocket.
But that night Colson had Hazel removed from our cell. He watched as she walked down the tier carrying her folded blanket, then pointed at my bunk.
May you like
“No more witnesses for you, Calder.”
Before the door closed, Hazel called back, “You don't need one witness, honey. You've got a whole building.”
