Wishing for Wonderful (Serendipity #3)(46)

She gasped. “Oh my God! Eleanor! Where’s Eleanor?” The sound of panic ripped through her words. “Where’s Eleanor?”

“Stay calm,” he said, clasping his hands over her arms and holding her in place. “Do not try to move around. Is Eleanor the woman you were with?”

“Yes,” Lindsay answered. “Is she okay?”

This was Gavin’s first day on the job and although his heart was beating almost as rapidly as Lindsay’s, he had been trained to respond without expression, which is what he did.

“We don’t know anything yet,” he answered. “She’s on her way to the hospital in the first ambulance. Jefferson University has a great team of doctors, and I’m sure they’ll do everything they can.”

“But is she going to be okay?” Lindsay’s question had the sound of a plea.

“Stay calm,” he repeated. “We’re on our way to Jefferson right now. As soon as we get you inside, I’ll check on your friend Eleanor.”

“She’s my stepmom,” Lindsay said, sobbing. Somehow the pain in her leg now seemed small in comparison to the thought of losing Eleanor.

“My phone,” she said. “I need my phone.”

“Did you have a phone with you?”

“Yes, I was talking on it when…” Little by little the pieces came together. She could see the phone flying from her hand as she tumbled backward.

“I need to call my dad.” Her left eye was swollen shut, but the right filled with tears that overflowed and carved a pathway down her cheek and into her ear.

“Please remain still,” Gavin repeated. “As soon as we get to the hospital, I’ll take care of everything. I’ll call your dad and check on Eleanor.”

~

I went nose to nose with Life Management on this one. I told him the accident was unfair and unwarranted. He argued it was part of the plan and refused to budge.

In my opinion, any plan that screws up four people’s lives the way this one would is basically flawed. I asked him to change it one last time and when he said absolutely not, I hit him with the only weapon I had: love. I zapped him with a dose strong enough to have every person in Manhattan walking around starry-eyed. I wasn’t sure it would work, but it was all I had. For a moment he just stood there with a goofy falling-in-love expression; then he issued a revised event order.

I danced out of there without even glancing back. The truth is I don’t want to be around when he figures out what I’ve done.

It’s strictly against the rules for any department to use their powers against another one, so if you don’t hear from me again it’s because I’ve been transferred to Graveyard Reconnaissance.

~

That evening six victims of the accident were delivered to the emergency room of Jefferson University Hospital: the elderly couple suffering cuts and lacerations, the teenage boy with a dislocated shoulder and broken arm, the sales clerk who’d been pinned behind the car, Lindsay and Eleanor. The driver died before the officers could extricate him from the car, and the young girl who’d been walking two steps in front of Lindsay was killed instantly. Both of those bodies were taken directly to the morgue.

As soon as Gavin rolled the gurney through the emergency room door, Lindsay started asking him to check on Eleanor and call her father. When he said he’d have to get her admitted first, she threatened to get up and find out for herself.

“You can’t do that!” Gavin said. He wheeled the gurney into the hallway, situated it to one side and trudged off to find out about Eleanor.

After three inquiries he learned that Eleanor had been transported to the radiology department on the lower level and was apparently considered in serious condition. Sydney Harper, a nurse who was dating Doctor Brinkley and had the inside scoop on everything, whispered, “Jack thinks her back may be broken.” Jack, of course, was Doctor Brinkley, the ER attending.

“I can’t tell her that,” Gavin said with a groan.

An expert at easing the concerns of worried families, Sydney replied, “Just say she’s gone for a CT scan.”

Gavin settled for doing that. When Lindsay replied, “You mean they don’t they know anything?” he simply shrugged. She rattled off their home telephone number and asked him to call her father.

“John,” she said, “John Gray.”

Gavin returned to the lobby and used the telephone at the admitting desk. He punched in the number. It rang once then stopped. He tried again and the same thing happened. After the third try, he returned to the hallway where he’d parked Lindsay.

“Are you sure this is the right number?” He read back the number she’d given him.

“Yes, that’s it.”

“Strange,” he said. “Must be trouble on the line.”

“Trouble?”

He nodded. “I get one ring then it goes dead.”

Lindsay realized what was happening. “Oh my God, the calls are still being forwarded to my cell phone. You have to find my cell phone. Please, go back, look for it.”

“I can’t do that,” Gavin said apologetically, “but give me your home address, and I’ll get a patrol car to drive out and inform your dad.”

“Seven-six-seven Oak Tree Road in Medford.”

Gavin jotted down the address then pushed the gurney back to the admitting area and began filling out the necessary paperwork. When the orderlies rolled Lindsay into the small examining room she called back to Gavin, “Don’t forget.”