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inch-long slit just above his left nipple, which was probably going to kill him, was her lightning-quick assessment. The rhythmic way the blood gushed from his chest was ominous, but it told her that his heart was still beating. Although it had been hard to tell at first glance, she saw that he was breathing on his own as well.
    “It was Nash who done it. They’re taking him to the hole,” one of the guards—Johnson, she saw with an upward flick of her eyes—said to Pugh. The way he grimaced told Charlie that he thought he was in big trouble for letting the attack happen. She guessed the warden had been on this side of the gate, on his way to his office in the first of the five buildings that made up the huge prison complex, when the assault had gone down, and that the commotion had drawn him back to the scene.
    “Nash was with the group we was taking to the library,” another guard added. The library was on the same side of the mesh doors as Charlie’s office and the interview rooms, so clearly the attack had happened as Garland was coming out and the library group was going in. “He jumped at Garland so fast, wasn’t nothing nobody could do. Just, boom, like that, and it was done.”
    “We got the shiv,” a third guard volunteered. “About six inches long, sharp as a razor blade.”
    “Goddamn it. Find out where it came from.” Pugh’s face was suffused with anger as he looked at the guards. Spotting the feds looming behind Charlie, his complexion went from dark rose to magenta in about half a second. His eyes bulged and his jaw worked. Charlie saw all this in passing even as she slapped her hand flat against Garland’s wound and laid the other one on top of it, putting her weight into it, applying as much pressure as she could in an attempt to stop the bleeding. His chest was wide, warm, firm with muscle—and slippery with blood. So much blood.
    “Put the whole damned place on lockdown,” Pugh snapped, andone of the guards started barking the necessary orders into a handheld radio.
    It was no wonder Pugh was upset: a violent death inside the prison meant an outside investigation, Charlie knew, and knew, too, that such an investigation was the last thing the warden wanted. Just a month before she had arrived at Wallens Ridge in June, the Bureau of Prisons had concluded an investigation into the death of an inmate who had supposedly committed suicide in his cell. The inquiry had been ugly, and the final report was still pending.
    With the FBI agents observing, there would be no hiding this.
    “Move back,” somebody said above her. The voice was authoritative: she thought it belonged to Bartoli, and that he was talking to the nervous guards, but she was concentrating too hard on Garland to glance up and make sure. “Give her some room to work.”
    “Uhh,” Garland moaned. His head moved slightly. His wrists were shackled and fastened to the chain around his waist. His hands, resting on his abdomen, twitched. His chest heaved as he suddenly began to fight for air. He gasped and coughed and choked. Bloody froth rose to lips.
    Not good . Charlie’s heart beat faster.
    “It’s bad,” she told Pugh, reluctant to be more specific on the off chance Garland was still capable of understanding what she was saying. She could feel his heart beating against her palm, feel its desperate attempt to function. His skin was still warm, hot even, but she saw with a sinking feeling that his lips were starting to turn blue.
    “Mr. Garland, it’s Dr. Stone.” She spoke as calmly as she could. “I know it hurts. Keep trying to breathe.”
    “Just keep him alive.” Pugh’s face was a study in furious dismay. “Dr. Creason”—the prison doctor—“is on his way. There’s a stretcher coming, too. My God, we can’t let something like this happen again.”
    “Tell them to bring oxygen.” Charlie’s voice was tight as Garland gasped again. “Mr. Garland, take shallow breaths. In and out, as easy as you