“Mom!” And there he was, standing next to the bed, looking anxiously at her.
“Ryan!” she cried. “Where—”
But before she could finish her question his hand clamped over her mouth, silencing her.
“Shh! Do you want me to get caught?”
Caroline’s mind spun. Caught? What was he talking about? He couldn’t have gotten in without anyone seeing him. Unless—
“What time is it?” she whispered.
“A little after eleven,” Ryan replied. “Get up! We have to help Laurie!”
Laurie! The last image she’d had of her daughter rose out of her memory, and the pain of it almost made her cry. Almost, but not quite. “Pull the covers off and undo the straps,” she told Ryan. He looked at her blankly. “They strapped me to the bed,” she whispered.
Ryan pulled the sheet and thin blanket back, and stared at the woven nylon straps that imprisoned his mother’s wrists and ankles. For just the tiniest fraction of a second he hesitated, but then went to work on the buckles that held them fast.
In a few seconds less than a minute — a minute that seemed more like an hour to both of them — Caroline was free. She sat up, and was just about to swing her feet off the bed when she heard something.
A key, being fit into the lock of the door!
Ryan heard it too, and now he was staring at her, his eyes wide with sudden terror.
“Down!” Caroline whispered, and without even a split-second’s delay Ryan dropped to the floor and rolled under the bed so he was on the side away from the door. In the same instant, Caroline yanked the sheet and blanket back up, and dropped her head onto the pillow. By the time she heard the latch of the door click open, her eyes were closed and she was concentrating on keeping her breathing smooth and even.
Footsteps approached the bed, and a moment later she could feel someone standing next to her.
Feel the person looking at her.
Then she felt the sheet and blanket being gently pulled down, as if whoever was uncovering her didn’t want to wake her. But if the covers were pulled too low, and whoever had come into the room saw that her wrists were no longer bound by the straps—
The thought died as the covers stopped moving and she felt something cold touch the skin of her right arm.
Something cold and wet.
An alcohol swab!
Whoever was there was about to give her a shot! And if that happened—
Caroline lunged upward and to the right, hurling all her weight at the person standing next to the bed. Caught completely off guard by the sudden attack, whoever it was lurched backward, went off balance, and fell to the floor.
“Help me!” Caroline whispered as loudly as she dared, throwing herself on the figure on the floor that was already trying to stand up.
In an instant, Ryan slithered back out from under the bed, and as Caroline struggled to hold the figure down, he grabbed a pillow off the bed, put it over the person’s face, then threw himself onto it, the entire weight of his body pressing the pillow over the mouth and face.
In the dim light of the room, the figure on the floor thrashed and kicked, trying to escape Caroline and Ryan.
Both of them held tight, neither of them saying a word.
The silence stretched on, but in less than a minute the kicking and thrashing grew weaker, and at last the form beneath Caroline was still.
“I–Is she dead?” Ryan whispered, his voice shaking.
Slowly and carefully — ready to launch another attack if the still figure so much as twitched — Caroline got to her hands and knees.
It was a nurse — wearing the same kind of uniform as the one who’d given Caroline the pills she hadn’t swallowed a few hours earlier. Caroline picked up her limp wrist and felt for a pulse.
At first there was nothing, but then she felt a faint throbbing under her fingers.
“She’s alive,” she whispered. “Help me!” Pulling a wad of Kleenex from the box on her nightstand, she stuffed it into the nurse’s mouth. “See if there’s anything in the closet,” she told Ryan.
A second later he was back, holding the robe she’d been wearing when she found Tony and his friends— She cut the thought off, focusing her entire mind on the problem at hand. Jerking the belt of the robe free from its loops, she wrapped it around the nurse’s head a couple of times, then tied it tightly over her mouth, holding the Kleenex firmly in place.
“What if she chokes?” Ryan asked.
Caroline ignored the question. “Help me get her clothes off her. Start with her shoes.” As Ryan began pulling the nurse’s shoes and white stockings off, Caroline began unbuttoning the blouse of the uniform. In less than another minute they were done, and a minute after that they’d succeeded in hauling the nurse’s unconscious body off the floor and onto the bed. Then Caroline attached the straps that had bound her own limbs only a few minutes ago to the arms and legs of the nurse, making certain they were just as tight on the nurse’s wrists and ankles as they had been on hers. “Pull the covers up,” she told Ryan as she stripped off the nightgown and put on the uniform she’d taken from the nurse. It was about two sizes too large, but Caroline didn’t think it would matter — it would just look a little bulky, and it was better than wearing a nightgown out into the streets in the middle of the night. The shoes, too, were a little too large, but she pulled the laces tight, and they fit well enough that she was fairly sure they wouldn’t come off even if she had to run. “How did you get in?” she whispered as she tied the last knot.
“The roof,” Ryan replied. “It was really easy. I climbed up the—”
“Show me,” Caroline cut in. “If you didn’t get caught sneaking in, maybe we won’t get caught sneaking out.” Checking the gag on the nurse one last time, she followed Ryan to the door. He opened it a crack, and they both listened. Hearing nothing, he opened the door wider and peered out into the hall outside.
Nothing.
“Come on,” he whispered. “Follow me.”
“You climbed up this?” Caroline asked as she peered down the ladder that led to the first landing of the fire escape on the back of the building next door to The Biddle Institute. Just looking at it made her dizzy, and the thought of climbing down it made her stomach churn.
“It was easy,” Ryan said. “Lots easier than jumping off the roof of The Rockwell.”
Caroline stared at him, but could see in his eyes that he was telling the truth. But instead of speaking the words that rose in her throat — the words of a horrified mother who can’t believe how stupid her own child could be — she choked them back. Battling the vertigo that threatened to overwhelm her, she stepped up onto the rampart at the roof’s edge, turned around, gripped the top of the ladder as hard as she could, and started down. I’ll never make it, she thought. I’ll miss my step, and lose my grip, and—
“Remember what Dad always said,” Ryan whispered, sensing his mother’s fear. “Never give up!”
As Brad Evans’ words echoed in her ears she decided that no matter what happened, she wouldn’t miss her step.
And she certainly wouldn’t lose her grip — not on the ladder, and not on her mind.
CHAPTER 38
I just look like a nurse going home from work, Caroline told herself as they hurried east on 82nd, not quite running, but walking as quickly as they could without drawing attention to themselves.
“Why don’t we call the police?” Ryan had asked almost the moment they’d climbed down the ladder into the utility passage behind the building next to the Institute. But Caroline had rejected that idea immediately, clearly remembering the look on Sergeant Oberholzer’s face as she’d tried to tell him what was happening in The Rockwell. The first thing the police would do would be to call Tony Fleming — or whatever his name really was, since she was certain he’d had as many as Virginia Estherbrook. Then she’d be right back in the Institute, and Laurie and Ryan—