No sounds on the line.
“Lillian, please. I know you’re pissed at me but listen. El Socio is alive. I think he’s been looking for a patient that stops by your apartment on the weekends.”
Still nothing.
“Can you hear me, Lily? Are you okay?” This wasn’t like her. “Fuck this. I don’t care if you’re pissed. I’m coming to you.”
He pulled out his phone and saw the badge in motion, indicating Lillian was on the fifth floor, most likely by Labor and Delivery. Why would she have answered her phone and refused t speak to him?
Clarissa opened her eyes, her vision gray and an odd salty taste in her mouth.
The nurse was still with her, not having noticed whatever happened. “The babies,” sang the nurse.
Realizing she would be no help, Clarissa crawled to the desk and felt for the phone, sweeping the security tags on the floor. The phone fell off the desk, and Clarissa fumbled for the keypad.
“Code Pink. Nursery.”
The phone swam in front of her eyes, and everything went dark again.
Chapter26
It was only six blocks to MetroGen, so he went on foot. The front door security passed him through after he showed them his Cleveland PD badge.
The day after Thanksgiving was more crowded than he expected. Then again, with many relatives in town, it was a chance to visit those stuck in the hospital for the holiday. He also noted fewer security guards and nurses in the corridor, even though it was lunchtime and he was near the cafeteria.
Or the staff knew to avoid the cafeteria because they were serving hospital cafeteria grade Thanksgiving leftovers.
His phone tracker led him toward the ER, and he had passed a set of doors when an alarm sounded overhead.
“Code Pink. Labor and Delivery. Automatic containment protocol enacted. Everyone remain where you are as the doors are closing. Elevators will stop on their nearest floor. Please wait until you are cleared.”
The announcement repeated several times, and the doors behind him swung closed.
The procedure from here on out was for the security guards to do a person by person bag search for the patient. No one was supposed to be able to exit until the area had been cleared.
He glanced at his phone again. It said Lily was nearby. He didn’t see her, and he threaded his way through the crowd, heart sinking.
He scanned the faces, seeing a few nurses and a bunch of visitors moving and confusion. A janitor cart pushed its way out of the open main elevators.
Janitor cart.
The janitorial carts were not supposed to travel in the main elevators. They were limited to staff elevators.
The tracker narrowed right around the janitorial cart.
Skimming the outskirts of the crowd, Sean caught sight of El Socio.
He’d trimmed his hair into a crew cut and his goatee had been completely shaved off. He wore the purple uniform of janitorial staff with long sleeves, no doubt to hide his many tattoos. Only the ones by his neck stuck out.
It was a moment of terrible clarity. El Socio had worked in the laundry and janitorial department while in prison. The hospital janitorial staff was able to go everywhere. In fact, people often opened doors for them even without their badges. It was easy enough to fake a badge, just not the electronics behind it. All you needed to do was swipe a real one, and doctors had unlimited access to every department… except labor and delivery. Those badges were specially coded.
This was why no one ever found him, because he was hiding right under their noses in the hospital. The janitorial staff emptied the trash. He’d be able to check Lillian’s discarded paper schedule in the pediatric clinic, watching for his children. And once Vinita had come out hiding, he simply had to wait for her to give birth.
Possession of the baby would be an ultimate bargaining chip to get his children back. It would be a straight-forward trade. One baby in exchange for his two children.
Sean instinctively put a hand on his belt, reaching for the gun and taser that weren’t there. He wasn’t on duty and he wasn’t currently a security guard so he didn’t have them. Besides, contrary to TV, you didn’t pull a gun in the middle of a crowded hallway.
What he needed was a distraction. If El Socio had Lillian’s badge it meant… better to not think about what it meant.
