He stopped at the last door, lightly knocking.
A muffled “Come in” seeped from inside.
He twisted the handle, opening the door for me to step in.
My body came to a halt, disbelief and horror pounding in my ears. “Oh, hell no,” I snarled, stepping back, ramming straight into Noel’s physique.
“Alice.” Her red lips arched up. “Right on time.”
Jessica. Fucking. Winters. In all her sleek, icy glory.
Even in this madhouse, I wasn’t safe from her.
Chapter 12
“Why are you here?” I contemplated the office, the modern style, similar to her office in town, already telling me what I knew but didn’t want to accept.
Jessica swiveled in her chair to the side, crossing her legs, ignoring my question. She was dressed in an expensive gray blouse, black pencil skirt, and her trademark blood-red heels, which matched the color on her mouth.
“Come, have a seat.” She motioned to the empty chair in front of her desk.
“No.” I scowled, not moving from my spot. “Why. Are. You. Here?”
“I run this place. It’s mine.” She sighed like she was bored.
“So… what do you do? Seek out people through your other place to become patients here?” I spat. “Convince their families they’re crazy, take their money, and trap them in here for your own entertainment?”
“I didn’t need to convince anyone. You did it all by yourself.”
“You are a sick, twisted bitch.” I skewered each syllable at her.
“You are testing my patience. Now sit down.”
“No.”
“Noel?” She signaled to the huge mass behind me. Large beefy hands grabbed my biceps, shoving me forward. Noel relocated me from the door to the chair, forcing my ass to slam down on the seat, a grunt puffing from my lips.
I glared up at the beast, but his expression was locked down, his eyes empty of anything.
“Did she take her medications?” Jessica stared at me, directing her question to him.
“Yes, ma’am,” he grumbled, his hand landing heavily on my shoulder. “I watched her. Should be kicking in any time now.”
I didn’t move or even twitch a finger, not wanting to react to the fact he lied to Jessica. Was he on my side? Or was he just another person with his own agenda? Though, with his comment, I felt him helping me again. I was supposed to be on something that would probably make me not so combative.
“Good.” Jessica dipped her head. “But I would still want you to stay here.”
“Yes, ma’am.” He stepped back against the wall, with a nod, folding his arms in front of him.
“Have them all potty-trained?” I snorted, not able to help myself.
Her nose wrinkled, her blue eyes glistening with hate. “How I wish I could purge the world of you. Do everyone a favor… including the man you can’t seem to stay away from.” Her detestation oozed through her teeth. “But of course, I can’t.”
My eyebrows lowered. “Is your hate and insecurity so deep you would go through all this to keep me away from Matt? Are you that sick and demented? I think it’s you who needs to be locked up in a padded room, not me.”
“You think this is about Matthew?” She cackled, twisting back her chair, to face me. “Please, Alice. Give me more credit than that. Do I look like a woman who depends on a man? I certainly don’t need one to make me feel whole or worthy. He was only a bonus in all this.”
“All what?”
“In torturing you.” She lifted her brow and grinned, gazing around the room. “Though he also deserves recompense for his own disobedience. This,” she gestured to the room, “is all for you.”
“For me?” I sat back, my mouth dropping open. “I-I don’t understand. Why me? What did I do to you? I barely even know you.”
“Why you? Oh, how many times I’ve asked myself the same thing.” Her gaze crucified me as it went down my figure. “Unfortunately, you are valuable to me, Alice, and I need to understand if you are her.”
“Her?” Trepidation prickled from my stomach down to my calves, making me want to bolt from the room. Noel, acting the guard dog, hovered close to my exit. My gaze drifted over her shoulder to the barred window. “I don’t understand.”
“You don’t need to.” Her sharp eyes followed my focus, a smirk forming on her lips. “Go ahead, Alice. Try to squeeze through the bars or dart for the door. You won’t get far. This place is well guarded inside and out, far from anyone who will help you. It would be better if you cooperated and learned I am the ruler here.”
“You are crazy.” I stood up, backing away from her.
“No, dear, that is you. Everyone saw it… May I applaud you on your great performance? You made this so easy for me.” Her smile turned wicked. “With just a little push, you stepped right into my plan.”
Fuck-an-elf! She was crazier than I thought. Nothing she was talking about made sense. Why did she want me? She just met me a week ago.
“Your files tell me nothing. Average girl, average town. Blah, blah, boring…” She waved her hand at the folder in front of her. “But maybe a loose tongue and your blood will tell me.”
“What?” Panic gulped me down, turning off my logic.
“Noel.” Jessica nodded at the nurse.
Run! My gut told me to go; my life depended on it. Whipping around, I darted for the door. Noel leaped for me. His arms wrapped around me, pinning me in place as I continued to struggle and lash against him.
Jessica pushed out of her seat, her heels clicking as she walked around to me.
“Keep fighting, Alice; it will only wear you out.” She tapped my cheek, walking into the hallway, ordering Noel. “Bring her to the room.”
“Stop fighting,” Noel huffed into my ear, easily moving me into the corridor. “Making it worse.”
Jessica stepped across, opening the door to another room. A shriek caught in my throat.
Holy mistletoe.
The room looked like a lab and an operating room had a baby. A dentist-looking chair with straps sat in the middle of the room, along with a tray filled with needles and operating instruments. Jessica sauntered over, picking up a syringe off the tray.
Noel pushed me farther into the room, heading straight for the chair.
“Noooo!” I screamed, my feet kicking, my body thrashing against my captor. Terror punctured holes into my lungs like a drill corkscrewing into the earth’s core, spurting up bile, burning the lining of my throat. “No. Don’t do this!”
“Hold her down.” Jessica tapped at the needle. Noel forced me into the chair, his huge hands holding me easily in place as he lashed my wrists into the straps, his eyes not meeting mine.
“Please…” I begged him, wiggling around like a toddler wanting desperately to be let down. “Please. Help me.”
Noel’s vivid amber eyes slid up, securing to mine, his fingers digging into my arms where he tightened the restraints. Once again, I felt he was trying to tell me something, but I had yet to figure out the code.
“Clearly we need to up her medication. It does not seem to be working. She might be more resilient than others.” Jessica moved to my side, disregarding my pleas.
“Yes, ma’am.” Noel strapped in my legs, then stepped back.
She wiped a pad across the inside of my elbow, the harsh odor of rubbing alcohol stung my nose.
“No. Shit. This isn’t even legal. You have no right.” I hissed, yanking at the binds, trying to twist my arm to no avail.
“Don’t I?” Her eyebrow curved. “Your parents were so desperate for my help, to fix you, they gave over all rights to me on how to cure you, my dear.”
“What?” Dread sank like a cannonball in my gut. “No, they wouldn’t…” My parents were the kind to read every warning label, wanting to know everything before they did something.
“Oh, they did.” Jessica grinned. “For two people so logical, they crumbled when faced with something so illogical.”
My nostrils flared.
“And I’m sure that had nothing to do with you controlling their minds.”
“Controlling their minds?” Her eyes widened in a false shock. “How could I possibly do that?”
“Don’t even…” I growled. “I know you put something in your peppermint syrup, manipulating them somehow.”
“Wow, I’m influencing them with some flavored creamer?” She let out a low chuckle. “You know how crazy that sounds, right?”
“Fuck. You,” I seethed, jerking against the restraints. I did know how insane it sounded. No one would take me seriously if I spouted it, chalking me up to a mad conspiracy nut. “I don’t know how you are doing it, but you are.”
“What an overactive imagination you have.” She leaned over, the needle pinching my skin. “But we encourage that here. The more truth you tell, the more they will think you belong here.” She jabbed the needle into my arm, driving a whimper from my lungs. My eyes tracked the clear liquid leaving the syringe and going into my arm.
“Nononono!” I clenched my jaw. A rush of heat scorched up through my veins. “What is that?”
“That was a little something to help you relax.” Jessica set the empty needle on the tray.
“What are you going to do to me?”
“If you’re good? I’ll take a little blood. Ask a few questions,” she replied. “If you’re bad? Well, let’s say there are severe punishments for disobedient little girls.”
My head began to spin, the drugs already working through my system, weighing down my lashes. Butting against the need to close my eyes, I crunched my teeth together, compelling my lids to stay open. The fluorescent lights above my head blurred and swirled with other colors, splaying across my vision. My eyes and mind sludged through at different speeds, distorting my understanding of things.
A hazy object darted behind Noel, my lids narrowing on what looked like a three-foot rabbit… and I swore it was wearing a holiday-themed apron. I knew from its more humanlike qualities it was a boy. I blinked, strangely feeling calmed by him instead of scared. Like he was a friend sent to comfort me.
My mouth slurred as I pointed, “Vhere.”
Noel turned to where I was pointing, then looked back at me with confusion, not seeing what I was pointing at. Another entity suddenly appeared on top of the counter to my right.
A penguin?
It flapped and waddled around, but this time I could hear it singing a Christmas song, sounding warped in my ears.
“It’s kicking in,” I heard Jessica say, but my gaze caught on the movement behind her. Bumping into each other were two distorted figures, small children dressed in elf outfits with pointy ears and round rosy cheeks.
“Alice, come play with us.” The girl flipped onto her head, clicking her heels, colors swirling around her like a stream of sunlight catching on a soap bubble. “It’s not scary from here.”
“Sometimes looking at something from a different perspective changes everything.” A man’s deep voice rumbled through the room. I jerked my head to Noel, but he stood there silently guarding.
Sprinkles and frosting! What was happening to me?
The whole room wobbled with colors and distorted figures, their voices chatting away, growing louder and more distorted in my head until it was bursting.
“Alice. Alice. Alice. Alice!”
“Stoooppp.” I closed my eyes, but their voices still twittered. Familiar, but the more they pulled at the veil in the back of my head, the more the pressure built behind my eyes, stabbing them with pain. “Please stop!”
I had gone under general anesthesia a few times in my life; I knew what it felt like. This wasn’t the same. Whatever she injected me with was causing my hallucinations to come fully alive, crashing into me all at once. It reminded me of the one time a boyfriend and I tried mushrooms together, but it was not as intense as this. Sight, taste, hearing, and sound swirled and twisted, heightening until you could experience the rainbows of color bursting around.
Jessica moved into my line of sight. Sweetness turned to ash on my tongue, the hues turning to black like she was a tempest, bringing evil down on the happy kingdom, obscuring the voices and visions around the room.
“Alice.” My name clung to the air like smog, Jessica’s face bending as if she were in a kaleidoscope. “Tell me how you were able to travel through the looking glass?”
“What?’ my mouth said, but my brain had no connection. It felt like it was floating inside my head, and my thoughts drifted to a space where I was suddenly surrounded by diamond-crushed mirrors and continuous images of me spinning around in fog and snow.
“Only one has enough magic to do that. No one, especially a human, should be capable of traveling through a portal. There’s no way you should be her. You’re human.” Her nose wrinkled with repugnance. “How were you able to fight the Land of Lost and Broken and enter the Valley of Mirrors. How did you do it, Alice? How did you pass through the mirror?”
As if I was suddenly set in that snowy-white place, where I felt no cold or heat, mist laced around my ankles. I watched my feet stroll up to the mirrors, blue eyes reflecting in the glass, beckoning me to come through, his voice commanding and deep.
“Let go, Alice. Let the madness in…” His voice swathed my heart, wrapping it up with bliss. Something I couldn’t get enough of. I didn’t just want more, I needed it. “Once you let it in. Everything will be right again.”
“I—I…” I felt my arm rise, reaching out to touch him… the desperation to be near him, the desire to follow him anywhere. The man’s blue eyes and deep voice were like a dream, one I wanted to wrap myself into.
“Yes?” She got closer to my face.
“I just stepped in,” my mouth answered, but I had no connection to my responses, like someone else had taken over my body.
Her lids narrowed, her back going rigid as she straightened. “You. Simply. Stepped. Through? You didn’t do anything else?” Jessica spat out with irritation. “And woke up in Earth’s realm?”
“Yes.” I nodded my head, and it felt as if the whole room bobbed along with me. “He asked me to… reached for me… and I followed.”
“Who, Alice?” She folded her arms. “Say his name.”
“Scrooge.” The name slid across my tongue like a hot toddy—warm, strong, comforting, and it tingled through me. Though I had no idea why I said that name.
A strange grin twisted her mouth; black and grays spun and dipped around and over her. “I knew he’d be the perfect bait. As you are for him. I enchanted the mirrors to show you the person your heart craves the most. To entice you. While I piggybacked on you to come here.”
“Let’s see if you’ll be more useful to me for this.” She moved closer to me, her face a distorted Picasso painting. “Tell me where he is hiding. I know you have seen him. There is only one reason you’d be in the Land of the Lost and Forgotten. I know he’s on Mount Crumpit, but he is veiling himself from me, constantly moving.” She pinched her lips together. “Tell me where he is, Alice.”
“Whhhooo?” I puffed into her face, drawling out the word.
“You know who,” she clipped. “The man who destroyed my life. My husband.” She gripped the arms of my chair, moving into my face. “Nicholas. Where is he hiding, Alice?”
The rabbit, penguin, and the two elves fluttered around the edges, shaking their heads like they were my conscience telling me not to speak.
“Don’t tell her, Alice!” the girl elf pleaded, her eyes big and wide.
I nodded, knowing I wouldn’t have anyway. It was an instinct I couldn’t even describe; my mouth clamped shut.
“Tell. Me!” Jessica grabbed the hair at the back of my head, yanking it back painfully. “Or you will lose that pretty little head of yours.”
The words came out of my mouth as if they were put there on my tongue. “You better watch out. Don’t cry. He knows if you’ve been bad or good.”
Hues of red burst from her like flames as her nails dug into my scalp. “You asked it for i
t, Alice,” she seethed, grabbing for another needle on the tray. This one was attached to a tube and bag. “I told you there are consequences for being disobedient to me.” She pierced my vein with the needle, my blood filling up the tube, darkness bleeding at the edges of my vision.
“I just need to keep you alive. Enough to keep the door open. Then I will destroy him once and for all and slam that door shut for good. Ending the legend of Santa and the silly girl who’s supposed to save him. Though looking at you, I can’t fathom how it could be you.” Her voice sounded as if it were moving farther away, and maybe I was. Blackness and nausea pulled me down as my eyes closed. “When I’m done, take her to the dungeon. She needs to learn not to disobey me.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
Dungeon? Majesty? My confusion only skimmed through my thoughts before I seeped further into unconsciousness.
“Know this, Alice: You are never getting out of here,” Jessica whispered against my ear. “Ever.”
Then darkness crept in, nabbing me like a thief.
Chapter 13
Time was running out.
Running. Searching. Lost. Darkness.
Stuffed animals floated by me. A rabbit. Penguin. Reindeer. Snowman. Elves. Their huge stitched-on eyes staring at me with accusing expressions, as if I was failing them.
I felt a desperation to find something, but I had no idea what. Tears slipped down my cheeks. The pendulum swung back and forth, the hands of the clock speeding around like a car race, trying to win.
Panic pounded my heart, the need to call out for someone, but the name dissolved on my tongue, disappearing before I could capture it.
“Alice.” My name drifted over the wind in a whisper, stopping my feet. Nothing but darkness and strange toys floated by me; their pain and agony radiated off them. The call of my name, the deep husky voice, was the only warmth in this place. It was my lifeline, the single link to my survival. My head swiveled, blood pounding in my ears.
A crackled laugh of a woman echoed in the air, chilling my spine. “Time’s up, Alice. You lost… everything.”
Ascending From Madness Page 9
