He found a knot of his mother’s colleagues from the humane society clustered in the waiting area. He ignored them—he would loop back to them later—and located a physician, a Dr. Khan.

“Patricia Stephens is my mother,” Troy said. “What’s her condition? I’m an MD.”

Dr. Khan nodded crisply. “Critical. She has numerous severe internal injuries. We’ve stopped the blood loss, but she is unconscious. We’re monitoring her very closely.”

“All right.” Troy felt dizzy, and had to struggle to stay on his feet. “Prognosis?”

“Uncertain,” Khan said. “We’ve given her three pints of blood. She appears to have a strong heart, which is good, it will aid her recovery. We’re doing all we can, I promise you.”

Troy fired more questions at the physician, but it was for naught. Until his mother‘s vital signs stabilized no one could predict what would happen, and as expected, he wasn’t allowed to see her, eldest child or not, MD or not.

Feeling as if he were dreaming, he shuffled into the waiting area and dropped into a chair. The colleague of his mother who had called him came to him. Her name was Fran. She was a white-haired, bespectacled lady that Troy remembered meeting in the past, at one of the shelter’s charity events.

Fran sat next to him. Her eyes were ringed with crimson. She gently patted his arm. “Any news?”

“Critical,” he said. He pinched the bridge of his nose. “Listen, what happened?”

“That’s what all of us are out here trying to piece together. Pat had literally just arrived at work. I asked her to go and walk some dogs, and next thing we know, she comes out of the ladies’ room screaming.”

Troy couldn’t imagine his mother behaving like that unless something truly terrifying had happened to her.

“Screaming?” he asked. “Any idea why?”

“She seemed terrified,” Fran said. “But none of us could see anything wrong. It’s like she had seen a ghost, or something worse. She ran out of the building as if the hounds of hell were on her heels. I called out to her, went after her . . . but I was too late.”

Troy tented his fingers, lowered his head. Blood pounded in his skull.

“God in heaven, I’ve never seen anything like that,” Fran said. Tears shimmered in her eyes, and she pressed a handkerchief to them, sniffled. “She ran right in front of a truck as if she didn’t see it. The sound it made when it struck her, that’s going to keep me up nights for a long time.”

“It doesn’t make any goddamn sense,” Troy said. “I’d talked to her last night, she sounded fine.”