While the resuscitation was still technically going on, Jazz walked out of the room. She went back to the nurses' station and stepped into the utility room. She sat down and cradled her head in her hands. She needed a few minutes to pull herself together, She had been unnerved by what happened with Stephen Lewis, and then having something untoward happen with Rowena seemed like too much. Jazz couldn't believe it. She'd never had any problem whatsoever on all her previous cases. She couldn't help but wonder if she would be spooked on her next mission.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Susan appear out at the nurses' station. Jazz couldn't hear but assumed Susan had asked the aide manning the desk where Jazz was, because the aide was soon pointing in Jazz's direction. When Susan started toward the utility room, Jazz knew that she was about to weather another confrontation.

Susan came in and closed the door. She didn't talk, even after she sat down. She just stared at Jazz.

"Are they still trying to resuscitate the patient?" Jazz asked, discomforted by the silence. Jazz wanted to get it over with if they were going to have an argument.

"Yes," Susan said simply before another pause. Jazz felt it was like some kind of weird staring contest, so she decided to wait it out. Finally, Susan said, "I want to ask you again why you were in Sobczyk's room. You say the patient called out. What exactly did the patient say?"

"I don't remember if it was any words. I just heard her, okay? So I went in to check."

"Did you talk with her?"

"No. She was asleep, so I just turned around and came out."

"So you didn't see that the IV was wide open."

"That's correct. I didn't look at the IV."

"Did she seem all right to you?"

"Of course! That's why I was coming out when we bumped into each other."

"What are those scratches on your arm?"

The way Jazz was sitting with her elbows on the built-in desk, her sleeve had fallen just enough to reveal the three scratches and a bit of dried blood.

"Oh, these?" Jazz questioned. She took her arms off the desk and shook her sleeve back down to cover the wounds. "It happened in my car. It's nothing."

"They've been bleeding."

"Maybe a little, but it's no problem, really."

Jazz again found herself having the same weird staring contest, as if they were in the third grade. For almost a minute, Susan didn't say anything and hardly blinked. Jazz had had enough. She pushed back and stood up. "Well, time to get to work." She skirted Susan and opened the door.

"It strikes me as a strange coincidence you being in that room," Susan said as she swung around and faced Jazz.

"Obviously, when the patient called out, it was the beginning of whatever caused her code. It just wasn't apparent when I went in there. Maybe I should have checked her better than I did. But tell me! Are you trying to make me feel worse than I already do or what?"

"No, not really," Susan admitted. She looked away.

"Well, you're doing a pretty good job, whether you're trying or not," Jazz said before walking out to find the nurse's aide she'd been assigned to work with that night.

At first, Jazz felt like she had talked herself out of a potentially problematic situation with Susan, but as the rest of the shift wore on, she got progressively paranoid. It seemed like every time she turned around, Susan was staring at her. By the time report rolled around and the morning-shift nurses were hearing about the evening, including the code on Rowena Sobczyk, the problem had advanced to a point of ridiculousness. With Susan's behavior, there was no question in Jazz's mind that she was suspicious. All Jazz could think about was Mr. Bob telling her that there could be no ripples. As far as Jazz was concerned, this situation with Susan wasn't threatening ripples-it was portending a tidal wave.

Jazz's biggest fear was that Susan would take off after report and go directly to blab her suspicions to the nursing supervisor, Clarice Hamilton, an enormous African-American woman who Jazz thought was as big a dud as Susan. If that happened, all hell would probably break loose, and Jazz would surely have to use the emergency number to call Mr. Bob. Yet what Mr. Bob could do at that point was fairly limited.

The moment report was over, Jazz remained where she was and pretended to be doing a bit more chart work. Susan spent another five minutes debriefing the day charge nurse about specific problems. As close as Jazz was, she could hear most of the conversation. Luckily, Susan didn't say anything about Jazz. When that was over, Susan got her coat, and laughing and carrying on with June, she went down to the elevators. That was when Jazz got her own coat. She also grabbed a pair of latex gloves from a box on the utility-room desk next to the door.

At that time in the morning with the shift changing, the elevator area was crowded. Jazz made sure she stayed in the periphery, as far from Susan and June as possible. When the car came, she wormed her way to the very back. She could tell where Susan was by her ridiculous bun.

When the elevator stopped on the second floor, Jazz pushed her way to the front and disembarked, along with a half dozen other people, including Susan. Jazz knew that Susan, like herself, drove to work. Like a clutch of cackling hens, the group walked down to the door that opened onto the connecting bridge that crossed over to the parking garage. Jazz hung back to bring up the rear. As she walked, she pulled on the latex gloves.

Once in the garage, the group splintered off to their respective vehicles. At that point, Jazz upped her pace. She had her hands in her pockets with her right hand gripping the Glock. She closed the distance between herself and Susan so that when Susan slipped in along the driver's side of her Ford Explorer, Jazz was doing the same on the passenger side. The second Jazz heard the unlocking mechanism activate, she opened the passenger-side door and slipped into the front seat.

Jazz had timed it perfectly. It was almost as if she'd been sitting there when Susan climbed in. Under different circumstances, Susan's shocked expression would have been hilarious. The trouble was, Jazz wasn't finding any of this funny.

"What the hell?" Susan questioned.

"I thought maybe we could talk in private and mend fences," Jazz said. She had both hands in her pockets with her shoulders scrunched up and her arms straight.

"I don't have anything to talk to you about," Susan snapped. She put her key in the ignition and started the engine. "Now get out of my car. I'm going home."

"I think we have plenty to talk about. You've been giving me the evil eye all night. I want to know why."

"Well, you are an odd duck."

Jazz laughed with derision. "That's funny, coming from you."

"That's the kind of comment that underlines my impressions," Susan spat. "To be honest, I've never felt confident in you. I don't know why you are a nurse. You don't get along with anyone. You have no compassion. Every night, I have to give you the easiest cases."

"Oh, bull!" Jazz sputtered. "You give me all the junk cases."

For a second, Susan stared at Jazz just the way she had been doing all evening. "I'm not going to argue with you. In fact, if you don't get out of my car, I'm going to go get security and let them deal with you."

"You still haven't told me why you have been gawking at me. I want to know if it has anything to do with Rowena Sobczyk."

"Of course it has something to do with Rowena Sobczyk. It's too much of a coincidence with you coming out of her room when she wasn't your patient. And I happen to remember you were seen coming out of Sean McGillin's room, and he wasn't your patient, either. But talking to you about all this is not my job. It's the nursing supervisor's job, so you'll be talking with her I'm sure."