Ellen shouted, "We're not doing it this way! Not this way!"

"Ms. Gleeson, please." Special Agent Manning grabbed Will by the shoulders and he screamed.

"Mommeeee!!"

"Don't touch him!" Ellen stepped back with him, but the elevator door was closed behind her. Will cried louder, and she whirled around holding him tight, looking for the emergency exit, but one of the FBI agents grabbed her elbow, and Special Agent Manning wrenched Will from her arms. "He's my son!" she screamed, suddenly empty-handed.

Will wailed louder. "MOMMEE!"

"We're moving, people!" Special Agent Manning called out, carrying a hysterical Will out toward the exit.

"No!" Ellen screamed, trying to grab Will's foot but coming away with his blue sock. "Will! It's all right!"

"MOMMEEEE!" Will's eyes widened with fright, and he reached for her over the FBI agent's shoulder, his bandaged head bobbing as they swept him through the entrance hall in a moving phalanx.

"WILL!" Ellen lunged after them, but two cops held her back as she torqued this way and that, then another cop joined them, and she fought them all while Officer Halbert tried to get her attention, his eyes sympathetic.

"Ms. Gleeson, please stay here. Please, stop. Don't make us arrest you.

"MOMMEE, COME!" Will screamed, before the hospital doors slid closed behind him and a thousand lightbulbs went off.

"Let me go, you bastards!" Ellen screamed, out of control. Will was gone, just like that, and it hit her. She couldn't stop screaming. She couldn't breathe. The room spun around, a blur of polished floors, shocked faces, camera flashes. She felt as if she were going crazy. She flailed out with the court papers, then her open hand. "They just can't take him, just like that! Just like that!"

"Ellen, no!" a man called out, and the next thing she knew, Marcelo appeared next to the cops, and she reached for him.

"Marcelo! They took Will! Call Ron Halpren! Call Ron!"

"Let her go!" Marcelo shoved the cops aside. "Are you guys insane? You're hurting her! I have her, I've got her now."

"She has to let the kid go!" one of the cops shouted.

"She did! What, are you trying to kill her?" Marcelo circled an arm around Ellen, and in one sure motion, ran her away from the cops and the entrance. She half stumbled and half sagged against him, her brain finally giving up and her heart taking over. There were too many tears to see anything clearly. There was no air to breathe.

"WILL!" She heard herself howl at the top of her lungs, a sound she'd never heard come out of her; it didn't even sound human, and she was going insane, she could tell by the stunned expression on the nurses walking by and an old man carrying a stack of morning newspapers and another woman so upset her hand flew to her mouth.

Ellen screamed again but Marcelo kept her from falling, and suddenly security guards in dark blue uniforms were running beside them and Marcelo said something to them, and they all ran down one shiny hallway then another until they hit doors and freezing air and a parking lot and a red-lighted sign that read EMERGENCY, and there was a maroon car with the engine running and another security guard sitting in the driver's seat.

Marcelo shoved her into the backseat and she landed screaming with her wet face and snotty nose against the cold leather seat and Marcelo threw himself in after her, holding her from behind as she fought and howled and choked and cried, and the car lurched finally off.

Chapter Eighty-four

When Ellen woke up, she was lying in her clothes in a bedroom she didn't recognize, and Marcelo was sitting at the end of the bed, holding on to her hand. Her head felt fuzzy and strange, her thoughts blank. The room was very dark. The wood blinds were closed, the walls covered with black-and-white photographs, and the dresser a lacquered black, under a mirror of onyx.

Marcelo focused on her, a tiny buckle creasing his forehead. His expression looked strained, the corners of his lips turned down. He had on an open white shirt, and the edges of his body blurred in the darkness.

"You awake?" he asked softly.

"What time is it?"

Marcelo's gaze shifted to his left, then back again, presumably to check a bedside clock. "Seven thirty at night. You've been asleep since this morning."

Ellen tried to understand. "I slept the whole day?"

"You needed to."

"Where am I? I feel funny."

"You're at my house, and you took a Valium."

"I did?" Ellen didn't remember.

"Yes, you were so' upset. I offered one to you, and you said yes. I drug my women only with their consent."

"Why do you have Valium?"

"An old girlfriend. The relationship expired, but the pills didn't." Marcelo smiled, and Ellen sensed from under her pharmaceutical cloud that he was trying to cheer her up. She didn't dare rewind the day's events to remember why she was here. She knew, but she didn't want to know. She had traded in one insulation for another.

"Why did you bring me here and not home?"

"Your house was a crime scene."

Of course.

"Though it's since been released. Also, there was press out front."

"Who did we send?"

"Sal."

Ellen lifted an eyebrow.

"Who better?"

"Make him tell it right, Marcelo. Tell it true, all of it. I'm fine with it."

"Good."

"Just so it's not Sarah." Ellen felt bitterness even through her drug haze. "She's the one who called the Bravermans, you know, for the reward."

"I heard from the police." Marcelo's smile vanished. "Which would probably explain why she quit the other day."

"She did?"

"Walked in and quit, packed up her desk, and left. No notice, nothing."

"Did she say she didn't need it, because she's rich now? She won the lottery."

"No, she said I was the worst editor in the country and I was just", Marcelo paused a minute, smiling, "a pretty boy."

"She said that?"

"It's not that funny. I am pretty." Marcelo stroked Ellen's cheek, and she started to feel something, which worried her. She didn't welcome any emotions right now, even good ones.

"Do you have another pill?"

"Yes, but I don't think you should take it yet. Your lawyer's here."

"Lawyer?"

"Ron. You asked me to call him, and he came over at the end of the day."

"He's here?" Ellen started to get up, but Marcelo gentled her back down.

"Stay put. I'll have him come up." He rose and left the room, and Ellen lay still, trying to maintain an equilibrium. It wasn't time for emotion, but action. Maybe there was still something that could be done. In the next minute, footsteps scuffed on the stair and Marcelo came back into the room, followed by Ron Halpren, in a dark suit and tie.

"Hi, Ron," Ellen said, to show that she was a functioning human being. "Please don't say anything nice or I'll lose it."

"Fair enough." Ron sat down on the bed, his beard grizzled and his crinkly eyes soft.

"Also don't look at me like that."

Ron chuckled, sadly. "Okay, I'll be the lawyer, not the friend. I heard what happened, I read the papers."

"Papers?"

"The court papers they gave you at the hospital," Marcelo said, standing behind Ron, his arms folded.

Ellen thought back. Whatever. "So is there anything I can do?"

Ron hesitated. "Nothing."

Ellen tried to stay in control. "I mean, just about the timing."

"What about it?"

"It's so' soon. Abrupt. He has clothes at home, and toys, and books, and DVD'S, and a cat." Ellen stopped herself. Will would miss Oreo Figaro. Maybe she could get the cat to him. "Why can't we ease the transition? And for his benefit, not mine." She was remembering what they'd said at the hospital.

"It doesn't work that way, at least not with Braverman. I spoke with Mike Cusack, a big gun at Morgan, Lewis. I gather Mr. Braverman has some dough."