With a groan, she folded her arms on the desk and pillowed her head. How did the saying go? Be careful what you ask for because you might get it? Well, she had begged for boring, and boy, did she have it. In the six weeks she'd been working at the clinic, she'd had one customer. A young boy with braces. In the middle of the night, a wire had come loose in his mouth. His frantic parents had brought him here so she could reconnect the wire. Otherwise the loose wire could have stabbed the inside of the boy's mouth, resulting in… blood.

Shanna shuddered. Just the thought of blood made her woozy. Memories of the Incident swelled in the dark recesses of her brain, gruesome bloody images that taunted her, threatening to come into the light. No, she would not let them ruin her day. Or her new life. They belonged to another life, another person. They belonged to the brave and happy girl she'd been for the first twenty-seven years of her life before all hell had broken loose. Now, thanks to the Witness Protection Program, she was boring Jane Wilson, who lived in a boring loft in a boring neighborhood and spent every night at a boring job.

Boring was good. Boring was safe. Jane Wilson had to remain invisible and disappear into the ocean of countless faces in Manhattan for the sole purpose of staying alive. Unfortunately, it seemed that even boredom could cause stress. There was just too much time to think. Time to remember.

She switched off the music and paced across the empty waiting room. Eighteen chairs, upholstered in alternating hues of dusty blue and green, lined the pale blue walls. A framed copy of Monet's Water Lilies hung on one wall in an effort to inject calm serenity into nervous patients. Shanna doubted it worked. She was as edgy as ever.