The Warden by Madeleine Roux

Author:Madeleine Roux
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2015-12-23T16:00:00+00:00

Lucy almost spoiled the plot right after they reached the main level.

For a moment, Jocelyn was certain Tanner had abandoned them, but then he came around the corner, wheelchair gleaming like a chariot, and Jocelyn felt a spike of hope. Unfortunately, that hope was immediately dashed as they crossed in front of Crawford’s office. Lucy recognized the name or the door, seizing in their grasp, her mouth opening wide in horror.

Jocelyn anticipated the scream just in time, clapping her hand over Lucy’s mouth and wrestling her down into the wheelchair.

“No, no, no,” she whispered. “Not him. We’re not going to see him. Tanner, go!”

“Go where?”

“The lobby, the doors! Take her outside!”

“Outside!?” Madge hiss-whispered, trotting after Jocelyn and Tanner. The wheelchair squeaked as they turned it around and raced down the corridor, through the lobby, past the bewildered nurses at the station, and toward the front doors. “You’re going to get us fired, Joss!”

“Relax, it’s just for a minute, just so she can get some air and see the sky,” Jocelyn replied, sounding much more calm and confident than she felt.

For her part, Lucy was behaving, sitting quietly, her hands clutching the handles of the wheelchair for dear life but her mouth clamped shut. Good. They might actually make it out the doors without the whole of Brookline being alerted.

Jocelyn dodged around the wheelchair, breaking into a run and reaching the doors before Tanner could crash into them. Flinging the doors wide, she couldn’t help but smile, absorbing the look of wonder and excitement that broke across Lucy’s face as the sunshine fell in her lap.

“Is there a point to this?” Madge asked, watching as Tanner wheeled the girl down the walkway and toward a shaded patch just to the right of the hospital. They paused near a bed of tulips, the flowers all bowed from so many nights of rain, but a few petals still clinging on. “Other than getting us all sacked, of course . . .”

“Isn’t the ‘program’ all about unorthodox treatments?” Jocelyn said with a shrug. “Maybe she just needed some fresh air. It couldn’t hurt.”

“Yes, it could,” Madge replied. “What if she runs off and we can’t catch her?”

“There’s a fence.”

“What if it’s . . . I don’t know, overstimulating or something!? What if she has a deathly allergy to tulips? Or grass? What if she catches pneumonia and dies?”

“Man, are you always this square?” Tanner teased. He smiled at them, apparently enjoying the little jailbreak, his blue eyes gleaming behind his specs. “We take patients outside all the time for therapeutic walks. It’s not that unusual, Madge.”

“You do not get to call me square and then pretend we’re on a first-name basis!” she squawked, pacing. Her red, red lips turned down in a pout, but then she stopped, observing Lucy from the side as the girl simply sat in the wheelchair, kicking her gangly legs out, the bottoms of her feet brushing the grass. “Fine, I can admit she looks . . . better.”

“Not so square then,” Tanner said with a smirk.

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