Professionals had her now.
My hands were beginning to shake from the cold, and suddenly I remembered that my apartment was forty minutes away on foot, my coat was wrapped around a six-year-old, and I had an eviction notice folded beside three dollar bills in my purse.
I took two steps.
“Rue.”
I stopped.
Harlan was still crouched beside Belle.
His attention should have been entirely on her, yet somehow he had noticed.
“You said you wouldn’t leave her.”
“She has you now.”
“She asked for you.”
I looked down.
Belle’s fingers were sticking out from underneath my coat.
They were reaching toward me.
That was how I ended up riding to Henry Ford Hospital in the third SUV while one of Harlan’s doctors monitored Belle in the vehicle ahead.
It was also how I discovered that even a man who could apparently summon a private medical team into a parking garage in less than five minutes could not make a hospital move faster once his daughter was behind a set of double doors.
