After the Darkness

"Tuesday?" Sister Agnes looked pained. "Oh, Grace, it was kind of you to arrange it. But I can't supervise a pickup on Tuesday, I'm afraid. A delegation from the department of corrections will be here for a tour. Sister Theresa and I have our quarterly budget meeting with them afterward. We'll be out all afternoon."

"Oh." Grace looked disappointed. Then she suddenly brightened. "Perhaps I could do it?"

Sister Agnes frowned. "I don't know about that, Grace."

Inmates in A Wing were not supposed to help with pickups or deliveries. The warden considered it a potential security risk. But Grace had come so far in her rehabilitation. Sister Agnes would hate to give her the impression that she wasn't trusted.

Grace said, "The children have already waited weeks. It seems a shame to delay things even further."

"Those crates are heavy, Grace," Sister Agnes said awkwardly. "It's a two-person job."

"Cora can help me."

"Cora Budds?" This idea was going from bad to worse.

"She has kitchen duty on Tuesdays but she's usually finished by three."

Grace looked so hopeful, so eager to please. Sister Agnes wavered. What harm can it do? Just this once.

"Well, I suppose...if you're sure you and Cora can handle it..."

Grace smiled. "Loading a delivery truck? Yes, Sister. I think we can manage that."

Her heart was pounding so loudly she was surprised Sister Agnes couldn't hear it. She was a sweet, kind woman and Grace felt bad deceiving her. But it couldn't be helped.

It was starting.

GRACE BROOKSTEIN'S PLANNED ESCAPE ATTEMPT RAPIDLY became the worst-kept secret at Bedford Hills. The idea was simple: The delivery truck would arrive at the children's center. Grace and Cora Budds would begin loading up the crates of clay. While Cora distracted the driver, Grace would go back into the storeroom, empty one of the crates and hide herself inside it. Cora would complete the loading on her own, making sure that the lid of Grace's crate was not fully sealed, to allow her some air, and that it was hidden well back among the others.

It was the next part of the plan that was the wild card. Everything rested on the security check. Trucks came in and out of Bedford Hills every day, delivering everything from toilet paper to detergent to food. The prison was equipped with state-of-the-art security systems. As well as manual searches, the guards used sniffer dogs and even infrared scanners to spot-check vehicles, in addition to the CCTV cameras that were everywhere at Bedford. Typically, the more thorough searches took place on the way in to the prison. There was less emphasis on what might be going out. But all searches were at the guards' discretion. If they didn't like the look of a driver, or a vehicle, or if they just felt like it for whatever reason, they could hold people up for hours, X-raying every square inch of their car or person. Grace hoped that on a cold January night, the guards' appetite for hauling out crate after crate of children's modeling clay would be low. But she wouldn't know until they got to the checkpoint.

Once the truck was waved through, if it was waved through, and they drove clear of Bedford, Grace would climb out of the crate and make her way to the rear doors. As soon as the driver stopped at a junction, she would open the door of the truck and jump to freedom.

Easy.

"IT'S NOT GOING TO WORK."

Karen leaned across the table and helped herself to Grace's watery mashed potatoes. They were at lunch, a few days before the breakout was supposed to take place.

"Thanks for the vote of confidence."

"Have you thought about what you're gonna do if you do make it out of here?"

Grace had thought of little else. When she fantasized about her escape, she pictured herself as the hunter, unmasking Lenny's killer, wreaking her revenge. But the reality was that she would also be hunted down. If she were going to survive, she'd need food, shelter, money and a disguise. She had no idea how she was going to obtain any of them.

"What about friends on the outside. Is there anybody you can trust? Anyone who'll cover for you?"

Grace shook her head. "No. No one."

There was one person she trusted. Davey Buccola. Davey was working on new information, checking out the alibis for everyone who'd stayed with Grace and Lenny on Nantucket the day Lenny died. If Grace turned to anyone on the outside, it would be him. But she wasn't about to tell Karen that.

"In that case, we need to fix you up with a survival pack from here."

"A survival pack?"

"Sure. You'll need a new identity. A few new identities, so you can keep moving. Driver's licenses, credit cards, some cash. You won't get very far as Grace Brookstein."

"Where am I going to get a driver's license from, Karen? Or a credit card. It's impossible."

"Said the woman who figures she's going to escape from Bedford Hills! Don't sweat the small stuff, Grace. Leave that to me."

Karen had warned Grace that she would need to let "a few of the girls" in on the escape plan in order to get what they needed in such a short space of time. To Grace's horror, "a few of the girls" turned out to be almost every inmate at Bedford. Forging a credit card and a driver's license was no mean feat. Karen was forced to corral help from all over the prison. Inmates in the warden's office, the library and the computer room typed, Photoshopped and laminated for days, all of them risking their own paroles and futures for a chance to help Grace and be part of the Great Escape. The only people who didn't know about the plan were the guards and Lisa Halliday.

It was debatable whether Lisa would have snitched on Grace - powerful inmates could attack their rivals with impunity but selling out another prisoner was still considered taboo. Still Karen wasn't prepared to risk it.

Grace was grateful for everyone's help, but she was nervous.

"Too many people know."

"They're not ' people,'" Karen told her. "They're your friends. You can trust them."

Trust. It was a word from another life, another planet.

TUESDAY MORNING DAWNED GRAY AND COLD. Grace had barely slept. All night long, the voices haunted her:

Lenny: Whatever happens, Grace, I love you.

John Merrivale: Don't worry, Grace. Just do what Frank Hammond tells you and you'll be fine.

Karen: When they catch you, they'll shoot you, no questions asked.

Grace didn't touch her oatmeal at breakfast.

"You need your strength," Cora Budds told her. "Eat somethin'."

"I can't. I'll throw up."

The big black woman narrowed her eyes. "I ain't asking you, Grace. I'm tellin' you. You better get it together, girl. I'm putting my hide on the line for you today. We all are. Now eat."

She's right. I can do this. I have to do it.

Grace ate.

"ARE YOU SURE YOU'RE ALL RIGHT, Grace? Perhaps you should go and lie down."

It was noon at the children's center. The delegation of senior prison officials was due to arrive at twelve thirty. The morning had been spent tidying up desks and toys, putting up fresh artwork and generally ensuring that the facility looked its very best. If the delegation was impressed, they might raise the budget. Or at least not slash it. Grace had worked diligently as usual, but Sister Agnes was worried about her. Her complexion had been green when she arrived for work this morning. Now it had faded to a sickly off-white. A moment ago, reaching up to a high shelf to rearrange some books, she'd become dizzy and almost fainted.