I could have been pissed off, but I knew Felicia’s main concern was her patient’s welfare, so I didn’t go for her jugular. Anyway, I was too worried to bother with drama. I held up both hands to show I wasn’t trying to smuggle in a Tarot deck, Ouija board, or Magic 8-Ball. “What’s the matter with Lillian?”

“Starin’ at the ceiling,” Felicia said stormily. “Won’t take a bite of food. Don’t you go in there and upset her, now.”

I hurried past Nurse Ratchet and into Lillian’s room.

My self-appointed mother lay utterly still in her bed, small under the thin white blanket, and she’d aged a year since I’d seen her the day before yesterday. Her hair looked straggly and thin, and her skin was papery.

My heart lurched. I went to her bedside, took one of her hands gently in both of mine. “Hey, there, Diamond Lil,” I said, using the nickname Ham had given her soon after they got together. “How ya doin’?”

Lillian looked up at me with an expression of helpless, befuddled fear. Her mouth moved, but no sound came out.

I held her hand a little more tightly. Blinked back tears.

“I’m still trying to figure out those Tarot cards you gave me,” I said.

Felicia crepe-footed it up beside me. “Mrs. Travers’s been like this since I started my shift this morning,” she fretted.

“I want to see her doctor,” I answered.

Lillian’s eyes drifted closed, as though the lids were just too heavy to manage.

“She’s down the hall,” Felicia answered. “I’ll get her.”

Lillian began to snore.

I tucked the blanket around her, leaned down to rest my forehead against hers for a few moments, then straightened, sucking up all my angst. Falling apart wouldn’t help.

Dr. Alice Bilbin was standing in the doorway when I turned from Lillian’s bed. Bilbin was small, with plain features and a severe hair-style, and she had that jumpy look typical of the permanently harried.

I approached and offered my hand. Bilbin took it, her grasp firm, and let it go just as quickly.

“Your mother’s vital signs are good,” the physician informed me. I guess she didn’t have either the time or the energy for preliminaries. “I’m convinced she just needs to rest.”

“Rest?” I echoed. The word came out high and thin. I cleared my throat, took a steadying breath, and tried again. “Doctor, it isn’t as if Lillian’s been running marathons. She does nothing but rest.”

“The vital signs are good,” Bilbin insisted, in the same monotone as before. “According to the night staff, she hasn’t been sleeping well for the past two or three days. I plan to administer a sedative before I leave the facility this afternoon. I’m sure she’ll be right as rain by tomorrow.”