She and Blackwood hurried wide around the edge of the perimeter, finding some of the exhausted hostages seated on the sidewalk curb, telling their stories to police detectives, a few being treated for cuts and bruises.

But nothing more serious than that. Odessa spoke to a young female EMT taking a middle-aged man’s blood pressure. “Were there wounded customers?”

“Two customers and a teller,” she said. “Nothing life threatening.”

“Where are they?”

“Ambulance,” she answered. “Already en route to the hospitals.” Odessa glanced back at Blackwood. He was concerned.

Odessa said, “‘Hospitals’ plural?”

“Three ambulances, three hospitals.”

“Which ones?”

The EMT was getting annoyed at her. “The three nearest ones. That would be Flushing, Jamaica Heights, and NewYork-Presbyterian.”

Odessa straightened. “Presbyterian Queens?”

“Of course,” said the EMT.

The hospital they had just left.

The hospital where Earl Solomon was a patient.

She looked at Blackwood. He didn’t have to say anything. His earlier words came rushing into her head.

No coincidences. Everything is connected.

“Oh my God,” said Odessa.

Chapter

Earl Solomon lay in his hospital bed, fighting sleep. The television was covering the hostage taking at the Santander bank, which apparently had ended in a police raid and the shooter’s death. That was what the words beneath the news anchor said, but the screen swam a bit in his vision, and he wasn’t sure. They had no camera at the scene, and kept looping the same footage of police vehicles and traffic cops pushing people back.

The television was on mute, no sound but the whirring and beeping of his machines, and his breathing, which went in quiet but came out loud. Solomon wanted to reach the television remote control wired to the wall behind his bed. But his arms were numb. They didn’t move as well as he liked. It was easier just to lie still.

Sirens wailed outside, pretty much an all-day occurrence, but these ones sounded close. He heard a crash that seemed to reverberate up the building, as though the foundation had been shaken. Or maybe it was all in his head.

Now they had cell phone footage from somebody in one of the buildings across the street. Two flash-bangs that Solomon saw but did not hear, followed by a tactical entry. Fuzzy because of the distance of the phone owner from the bank…or maybe because of Solomon’s vision.

Goddammit. He was tired of all this waiting. The bed had him now. He didn’t think he’d ever get vertical again. That was a sorry thought. What was the point of waiting? What was the point of being a man in a bed who was never getting out of it again? Maybe it wasn’t his vision drifting, maybe it was his mind.