Propped up in her hospital bed, Charlie Dawson didn’t look like she was ready to be released in a few days. She looked like she’d been through the wringer. An IV still snaked from her arm to a bag of fluid on a pole. Her silky brown hair was shaved on one side. The remains of a nasty bruise remained in a yellow circle around one eye. Stitches zigzagged down one cheek. Bandages covered nearly every visible part of her arms. God knows what lay underneath the hospital gown and blankets, Maggie thought, swearing softly under her breath.
Even so, the girl looked a million times better than the first-time Maggie had visited her.
“Is this a good time?” Maggie asked from the doorway.
“Did you get him? Did you find who did this?” The fear was still in the girl’s eyes.
Maggie took a deep breath and was relieved when the father spoke.
“Officer Bychowski has some information to share. But first, are you sure you’re up to this Charlie?” He patted his daughter’s leg under the hospital sheet.
“Yes, Dad.” Charlie seemed to sit up even straighter against the bank of pillows propped behind her back. Maggie glanced at Matt Dawson and he nodded.
Earlier that day, she’d called him. He’d met her in the hospital cafeteria. She’d told him her suspicions and asked if she could question Charlie.
He had looked down and pressed his lips together. Maggie got the feeling he was trying not to cry, but when he looked up his eyes were hard. “If it takes talking to Charlie to make sure those girls pay, then yes. It needs to happen. But god damn it, it’s going to break her heart.”
Now, looking at the girl in the hospital bed, the last thing Maggie wanted to do was break her heart.
“Charlie …” Maggie began but then closed her eyes. How could she tell a twelve-year-old girl that her two best friends in the world had tried to kill her. It was unfathomable. At that age, your friends were your whole life, your whole world. Maggie opened her mouth wide and looked at Matt Dawson, shaking her head. “I can’t. I can’t tell her.”
He looked panicked. “Please. Please you have to. They need to be punished.”
Charlie’s eyes grew wide and she looked from one adult to the other. She tried to stand, pushing her blankets aside. “They? They?” Her voice was shrill. “What do you mean they?”
Matt Dawson looked down as he said the words. “Ellie and Sienna.”
“No!” Charlie shook her head wildly and then looked to see if Maggie would deny it. Maggie slowly nodded her head.
“No no no!” Charlie sobbed the word at first and then screamed, tearing at her hair and trying to get out of the bed, her legs and feet flailing. Matt Dawson grabbed her and held her down, hugging her, tears streaming down both their faces as she pounded on him with her fists. “No no no no. Daddy, no. Why would they do that to me? Nooooooo. Nooooo.”
Maggie could hear her wailing even as she reached the bank of elevators at the end of the hall.