Free The Witness: A Novel by Naomi Kryske Page B

and was informed that the flat wasn’t ready for occupancy, having not been refitted after the departure of the last tenant. He pulled rank and made a late morning appointment to tour the premises anyway.
    When he arrived at the hospital, he was glad to see that the additional men he had requested were already by the stairwell and the lift. The armed PCs outside Jenny’s room stood as he approached. They were smiling broadly. “Congratulations, sir!”
    Sinclair raised his eyebrows.
    “The news got round,” one of them reported, “about the arrest. Well done.”
    Those highs didn’t come often enough in policing, so Sinclair accepted the compliment, recognising as he did so the part that Jenny had played in it. “The young woman you’re protecting did all the work,” he replied. “I hope you know—and will pass it on to the next shift—that the danger to her has not diminished. I’m counting on you. More important,
she’s
counting on you.”
    He went in. He was surprised to see Sullivan still with her, but even more surprised—shocked, even—by her appearance. She looked as frail and weak as she had in intensive care.
    Sullivan rose to his feet immediately, his hat in his hands, his dark eyes sober, his dark hair dishevelled. “She had a bad night, sir,” he said. “The sedative didn’t work very effectively. I didn’t like to leave her alone.”
    Her eyes filled. When bad dreams had fractured her sleep, he had encouraged her to keep at it until she got a good one. When the dragon lady had swept in to take her vital signs—the night nurse whose swift, abrupt movements startled her in the dark—he had called her an old bat and insisted he was scared also. When she had cried from exhaustion and despair, he had distracted her with tea and stories about growing up with too many sisters. He was the first officer who’d talked to her about anything other than police matters.
    “I kept it as light as I could, sir.”
    “Well done, Sullivan.”
    “I’ll just push off then.” He put his hat on. “Time to look like the real thing,” he grinned, giving Jenny a jaunty salute as he left.
    “I’d be dead if it weren’t for him,” she told Sinclair, her voice flagging. “I’ve been here—two weeks? three?—and I’ve almost died twice. I wish I were somewhere else; I wish I were someone else.”
    She was emotionally overwrought and physically exhausted. Dr. Adams would never agree to release her in this condition, nor would she be able to maintain focus during the next round of questioning. “Jenny, I can’t grant those wishes, but I can promise you a better day, beginning right now. Denton!”
    The officer with the rugby physique answered Sinclair’s summons. “Sir?”
    “I don’t want Miss Jeffries left alone,” Sinclair told him. “Take a seat and stay with her until I relieve you.” He headed to the nurses’ station to inform them that there would be no physiotherapist visits to Jenny today. If any nursing functions needed to be performed, they should be done immediately. His men were going to guarantee her a three-hour rest period. He moved one of the PCs from the stairwell to maintain the force level at Jenny’s door. “Your instructions are to bar everyone—medical personnel included—from entering this room until noon today. No exceptions.” It was probably outside the scope of his authority, but the officers on duty now were armed, and that should be sufficient for the short term. “I’ll be back at noon to deal with any malcontents.”
    On his way to meet the lease agent, he rang the Yard. Graves had scheduled a briefing for five p.m., Andrews reported. “Tell Bridges to meet me at the hospital at noon,” Sinclair ordered. “Jenny’s at the end of her tether, and we need to find a way to improve her frame of mind.”
    When he reached his block in Hampstead, the agent was waiting. Sinclair found the flat sufficient, and he convinced the man that cooperating with the police