I groaned. “Does it show?”

He laughed.

I told him my entire life story, and before I knew it, we were sitting on the helipad at TLC. “Nice, smooth landing,” I said.

Sky nodded at me and got up and nudged Nicky, who woke up and appeared to be rather clearheaded. If I took a quick nap, I was groggy for days. I envied him.

“We need to fill out our paperwork, Pauline,” Nicky said.

“Sure. Later, Sky.” We nodded at each other and I followed Nicky into the lounge, where I got a hot tea, he a coffee. In a few minutes our paperwork was done, and I wondered if the woman Sky had come here to be with had anything to do with TLC.

The entire trip took so long I hadn’t realized that I’d missed lunch. Now I was famished. No one could leave the lounge area since they were all waiting for calls. I wondered where ER Dano and Jagger were. Maybe together sitting on the southern side of town-talking about me! Yikes!

No. No way.

“I’m going to get something to eat. Doesn’t anyone want anything?” I asked the gang, but they all declined since they were used to bringing their own food. Since I was still on orientation, I felt certain that I could leave, so I went to tell Lilla I would be gone.

“To where, chéri?” Her desk was neatly cleaned off. Lilla was a heck of a worker. Just like her mom. Hopefully the powers that be wouldn’t throw her back across the border. I was fairly certain someone had pulled some strings so she could work here.

Fabio? Jagger? Her mom?

“I’m going to…hmm. Not sure.” Half of the day was shot, although the flight was rewarding in the fact that we got the patient safely to her destination, and I’d given her meds on time and without any problems. Now I had to work on my “second” job. I looked at Lilla. “The hospital cafeteria has a chicken Caesar salad to die for.”

Her dark eyes widened. “Oh, chéri, bad choice of words,” she said, grabbed her purse from her desk and took my arm. “You drive. I have to redo my makeup, and we need to stop at your place so I can borrow some scrubs or something for a disguise.”

With that Lilla and I set off to my place, and then to “lunch” in the hospital-only floors below comatose Pansy Sterling.

Hmm…

Lilla, dressed in my white lab coat with my stethoscope draped over her shoulder, and I eyed each other and then our empty Caesar salad dishes. For some reason, I knew, just knew we were thinking the same thing.

“So, how do we get in to see her?” I said.

Looking very much like a doctor and sporting my old hospital employee ID-which my friend Sara in Human Resources arranged for me to keep as a souvenir from Saint Greg’s Hospital, where I’d worked-Lilla winked at me and we stood and took our trays to the conveyor belt. My heart started to race.

We could get a huge break in my case-and I’d be doing it without Jagger!

That alone was reason enough to be there.

Although, to be honest with myself, I knew Jagger was keeping up behind the scenes with Sergeant Shatley about the stabbings and as much as he could find out about the fraud.

I “borrowed” Miles’s ID badge and wore it backwards as if it’d turned around on its own. Although Lilla didn’t look like my picture-unfortunately, that is-I figured no one would be looking that closely at the ID badge. As evidenced by all the males in the cafeteria, they’d all be looking at Lilla’s face and other more important parts and not checking her ID. Besides, she acted so nonchalant, no one seemed suspicious.

A few people recognized me though, so I claimed I was there doing part-time float-pool work, so they couldn’t connect me with any unit. Each time I acted as if I were in a hurry so there’d be little chitchat with old coworkers. Damn. I was getting better and better at this stuff.

I said a silent prayer that we could get in to see Pansy and she would be out of her coma enough to give us some information. Well, I wished she’d be out permanently for her own good.

Lilla and I made our way toward the Central Supply department, as that was the least traveled route. We could have gone straight up to Pansy’s floor on the elevator, but I noticed a few docs that I’d worked with near the elevators and needed to avoid them. This area was like walking in the basement of the hospital: Very few people came through here.

“You look very good, Lilla. Very real.”

She smiled. “Thanks you, chéri.”

I winked and decided not to correct her English. She was turning out to be a real asset to my case. “I’m trying to think of a reason for us to use to get into the room. Past the guard. With one being attacked already, they might be more careful. Not that they weren’t before.”

I stopped talking and pushed the elevator button. When nervous, I tended to ramble, and right now I felt a whopper of a ramble coming on.

“Can we say we are going in to exam her?” Lilla asked as we stepped into the empty elevator.

“Examine? Yeah, and hopefully, the guard won’t ask questions. So much staff goes in and out of patients’ rooms on a daily basis that I’m banking on the hopes that fake outfits and IDs will do the trick. Not to mention the fact that we need Pansy to wake up for us.”

I watched the floor numbers inside the elevator light up as we passed each one. Good. No one else got on.

Suddenly it slowed, stopped and the door opened to the OR floor. Damn it. Staff was bustling about inside the OR doors. Good thing Miles was off duty for the next two days. Someone might recognize me and see his ID if it turned slightly. I looked down to make sure it hadn’t flipped around.

The doors started to shut. Just as I started to take a breath in relief a hand reached out and grabbed the door.

“Damn elevator,” a male voice said.

I slunk to the back of the small elevator cab and pushed Lilla to the side to kind of cover me.

The orderly pushed a stretcher in. Johnny Wakefield. Miles had dated him! The patient had on a mask. Must have been in isolation so she wouldn’t be spreading germs into the air.

Germs.

Air.

Masks!

I looked at Lilla and winked. She stepped more in front of me and Johnny started rapping some song that sounded like every other rap song I’d ever heard. Well, at least he didn’t turn around and see me.

The elevator opened on Pansy’s floor, and Johnny didn’t move. Darn it.

Lilla had the good sense to say, “Excuse us, please.” Her female pheromones were wasted on Johnny, but she didn’t know, and I didn’t care. He moved to the side and let us out without a word as I bent my head forward enough so that my hair pretty much covered my face.

I did, however, trip out of the elevator and landed smack into old Dr. Carrington, whom I think looked like he could have starred in Father Knows Best, he was that old.

“Excuse me, nurse,” he said to me.

Great. I passed the incognito over-eighty-medical-staff test. Now, on to the real thing.

Lilla followed me toward the nurses’ station and around the corner. I paused and looked over the receptionist’s shoulder to see the room numbers of the patients on the charts in front of her.

No luck. Too far away.

Lilla murmured, “Won’t her room be the one with a guard outside the door?”

I wanted to grab her and hug her. “Good going.”

We walked around the unit with no one noticing while we chatted and acted as if we belonged there. I noticed a guard sitting on a straight chair outside the room at the end of the hallway. I would have thought they’d have her closer to the desk, but maybe that was all that was available. When we got closer to the guard, I paused and grabbed Lilla’s arm.

“Today is our lucky day,” I whispered.

We walked right up to the guard, said hello and took out masks, rubber gloves and Johnny coats from the supply stand near the door.