Fight Dirty

by CJ Lyons

  “She’d been moping around for weeks. Ever since that damn party. Talking back, or worse, not talking at all, giving me the silent treatment. Of course, she acted just fine around Robert the few times he was home. Daddy’s little angel. Then she found out about Tyler. He’s no one, really. Just a waiter over at the clubhouse. But he knew how to make me laugh and feel young again. That’s all I wanted. Is that so awful? To want to feel happy and not feel like a prisoner in my own damn house?”

  “So you and BreeAnna had a fight?”

  “Had several fights. I kept her home from school that day, didn’t want to give her a chance to call her father. First, she was angry, said I betrayed Robert. Then she turned nasty, tried to blackmail me, said if I let her change schools, she wouldn’t say anything.”

  She straightened, indignant. “I’m not going to take that kind of treatment, not from my own daughter. A friend had told me about ReNew, about how they’d come day or night to pick up a kid. Said they really turned her daughter around—she’d been drinking and doing drugs and came back a year and a half later clean and sober. The tuition was outrageous, but I didn’t care. Figured it was the least Robert could do for his little angel.”

  “So you made the call.”

  Shoulders back, Caren faced Nick. Flashed him a triumphant smile. Andre thought it was the first time he was seeing the real woman. “So I made the call. Those two months she was gone were the happiest I’ve had since I got married.”

  CHAPTER 27

  Once she quieted and stopped fighting back, the men in the van left Morgan alone. That didn’t make her feel any better. Instead it demonstrated exactly what little control she had.

  Fear chilled her. Was this how Bree had felt? she wondered. Probably not, but it was as close as Morgan was ever going to get.

  The Norms had it all wrong—they said people like her didn’t feel emotion. Bullshit. Morgan had plenty of emotions; she just usually wasn’t guided by them, could keep them tamped down, focus on what she wanted instead of what silly neurochemicals and hormones urged her to do.

  No, she felt. Sometimes much, much more than Norms ever could. Because when Morgan’s emotions were unleashed—the strong ones like fear, anger, maybe love, she wouldn’t know—they crescendoed into a wave that consumed her, lifting her higher, far above to lofty heights where she could do anything, where there were no rules, no limitations, no reason why she couldn’t be a god.

  Whoever said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself,” was so very right—for the wrong reasons. He meant to forget fear, just carry on, stiff upper lip. Typical sheep reasoning. Gather together and huddle into one big fat target for the wolf to devour.

  Norms didn’t understand the power of emotions. If you embraced them, allowed them to escape from Pandora’s box and sweep you up, they were like riding a tsunami. Her father had tasted that power at an early age. He’d lived his life seeking more, more, more until his addiction had crashed him back down to earth. He’d fallen hard and now paid the price.

  Yes, Morgan felt. But she had none of the paralysis, deer-in-the-headlights freezing that many Norms exhibited. Instead she would become deathly still just long enough to coldly analyze the situation before springing into action. Instead of the tunnel vision and sound dampening that Nick’s soldier patients reported during their traumatic combat experiences, Morgan’s vision expanded to the point where she only needed to move her eyes but the slightest fraction to see everything around her. Her hearing became preternatural as well.

  And instead of fear or anger driving her into a fog of action later poorly remembered—as if Norms’ brains tried to protect them from the repercussions of any heightened emotional state—Morgan would remember everything in precise, intimate detail.

  Something else her father reveled in. Reliving each moment of every heinous crime over and over—but it was only by committing another atrocity, bigger, badder, bolder, that he could truly achieve the stimulation he sought. For him, there was no end, only an infinite compulsion for more, more, more.

  When Morgan felt fear she harnessed it. Like now. Assessing her options and her weapons. Even wryly observing that she’d brought this on herself—and wasn’t this exactly what she’d asked for? An intimate understanding of what Bree had gone through?

  Although Bree didn’t have what Morgan had. Namely, two transmitters, one audio/visual recorder, and a pair of hidden lock picks that not even Jenna knew about.

  Jenna. Did she know what Greene had planned? Maybe. She’d been excited by the possibility of what Morgan could learn inside ReNew. Clever of Greene to outmaneuver Jenna so he could be alone with Morgan long enough to ask her to also get his precious files.

  She couldn’t trust either of them. Fine with Morgan. She was better off trusting herself anyway.

  The van made a sharp right-hand turn and rocked as it traveled over a gravel or dirt road. Finally it came to a stop.

  What would a fish do? Morgan didn’t have to imagine, all she had to do was remember her father’s victims.

  “Where are we?” she cried out. The van door slid open and hands lifted her out, feet on the ground. “Daddy! Daddy, are you there?”

  “I’m here, sweetheart,” came Greene’s voice. “Just do what they tell you to. Everything’s going to be okay.”

  One man held her in place while the other cut the restraints circling her ankles. Then they removed the hood. She blinked in the sunlight. They were in the parking lot in front of the main doors leading into the ReNew facility.

  Not even dinnertime. Guess she was stuck here for at least the night. Hopefully not longer.

  She didn’t look at Greene or her captors, rather she stared at the featureless concrete block wall beyond them. Took a deep breath, focusing on what she wanted rather than the adrenaline jackhammering through her, just like Nick had taught her. She wasn’t nervous or afraid; she simply did not want to be here—and it wasn’t often that Morgan did anything she didn’t want to do.

  “Daddy?” she turned it into a plaintive wail, edged with desperation.

  Greene stepped in front of her. “It’s for your own good, sweetheart. Really.”

  “You sonofabitch!” she screamed at him, falling into her character, struggling against her bonds. The men effortlessly held her in place.

  “Lower your voice,” Greene shouted back. “Haven’t you caused me enough problems already?”

  One of the guards interceded. “You can come peacefully, and we’ll let your hands free,” he said in a bored tone that indicated he really didn’t care what she did. “Or we can carry you in and sedate you.”

  She scowled at him but nodded and stopped struggling. “Okay, okay. You win.”

  “Good girl.” He cut her wrists free. She shoved both hands deep into her jacket pockets, hunching her shoulders up around her ears, a turtle withdrawing into its shell. Greene took her elbow and led her to the door.

  The guard opened the door and held it for them. “Director Chapman is waiting for you. Right this way, please.”

  Morgan couldn’t help but note how quickly she was relegated to nonentity, being ushered through the corridor as if she was a piece of luggage. All attention was on Greene—a.k.a. James Renshaw. Fine with her, it gave her a chance to assess the situation.

  Inside, the building continued its pleasant elementary school facade. The front doors were solid wood with sidelights on either side, the lock nothing Morgan couldn’t handle. No alarm system—at least nothing obvious, not out here in the public area.

  The guard led them down the hall to what would have been the principal’s office if this really were a school. Despite the expensive “tuition” ReNew charged, the decor was low-key, businesslike, designed to underwhelm. Made sense. They weren’t selling a posh prep school experience; they were selling the illusion of serious people seriously interested in helping children.

 
Sean Chapman, the program’s director, waited behind a plain oak desk clear of everything except a single file folder and a phone. She was surprised to see that he was only in his midtwenties, although he wore glasses and a formal suit designed to make him appear older.

  “Mr. Renshaw,” he said, standing to shake Greene’s hand. “It’s good to see you again. Sorry it has to be under these circumstances.”

  Chapman’s office had two walls lined with floor-to-ceiling bookcases. The wall opposite the door was filled with windows adorned with the omnipresent ReNew sunrise graphic done in a film that allowed the real sunlight to stream through the colors, giving it the impression of stained glass. The only other adornment was a simple cross on the wall beside the door.

  There were two leather chairs in front of the desk. Chapman smiled at Greene and nodded him to one. He, like the guard, didn’t acknowledge Morgan’s presence. She played along, acting her role of disgruntled teen, by slouching in the corner, her back to a bookshelf.

  Director Chapman and Greene talked particulars about Morgan’s “personalized curriculum.” It sounded like pretty nonpersonalized rules to her: no visitation for the first thirty days and after that only once she completed Step Five, whatever the hell that was; staff wasn’t allowed to administer any corporal punishment but could restrain students for their safety and the safety of others if a student grew agitated and out of control; students slept in a same-sex dorm room to facilitate socialization, but if they were disruptive, they were moved to an isolation room; periodic searches for contraband were required for the safety of all; and, of course, ReNew and their employees were not liable for anything that happened to the children left in their care. Sign here and here.

  Yada yada . . . their words faded as Morgan focused on slipping the pen-recorder on top of the books on one of the lower shelves, where it wouldn’t be seen. Mission accomplished, she began pacing behind Greene, head down, hair covering her face to hide her gaze as she focused on the door. A Schlage lock—good quality, but she could handle it. She pretended to examine the other bookcase, all books on religion and spirituality and self-help crap.

  No signs of a hidden safe, no signs of any file cabinets, no computers, and she hadn’t seen any in the waiting area out front. The files must be kept somewhere else.

  She tuned back into their conversation just as Chapman was asking about her medical history. So far Greene had done a good job establishing their cover.

  “Any surgeries?” Chapman asked, his pen hovering over a checklist.

  “No,” Greene answered.

  Morgan didn’t turn to face them but said over her shoulder, “Don’t forget my appendix.” Then she whirled to Chapman, leaning over him and pulling up her shirt to expose her belly button. “Wanna see my scar?”

  He dropped his pen and for the first time looked her in the eye. “It is rude to interrupt your elders, young lady. I think it’s time for you to leave.” He focused on Greene once more. “Given the extreme nature of your situation, the good Reverend Doctor Benjamin has come in person to do your daughter’s intake evaluation.”

  His tone was one of awe, as if the good Reverend Doctor was granting them a royal boon. Greene played along, nodding eagerly as he juggled the stack of forms in front of him.

  The guards must have been right outside because the door opened and before Morgan could blink, they were hustling her out, her toes barely touching the ground, one guard on each elbow.

  Staying in role, she twisted her head and glanced back over her shoulder and cried out in a plaintive wail, “Daddy!”

  CHAPTER 28

  The guards ushered Morgan to a second office around the corner from Chapman’s. Just before they shoved her over the threshold, she got a glimpse of a third room across the hallway from the counselor’s office. It was labeled “Intake.” The floor was covered with gym mats, and on the wall across from the open door was a set of two solid metal doors.

  Beyond them would be her home for the next few days.

  First, she had to make it past the good Reverend Doctor. The guards wheeled her around, and before she knew it she was sitting in a plastic chair—the kind that would blow away in a strong breeze if you left it out on the patio—across from a middle-aged man who lounged in his executive leather chair as if he owned the world.

  Which she guessed he pretty much did. At least the world of ReNew.

  The good Reverend Doctor Amos Benjamin. His grey suit had a subtle shimmer to it, as if it was made of Teflon. Beneath it he wore a royal-blue shirt with a clerical collar. Jenna hadn’t been able to trace any aliases or find any hint of wrongdoing in Benjamin’s past. Neither had Morgan—which made her all the more suspicious.

  The man was either a master manipulator, walking away clean, leaving others to take the fall, or he was exactly what he appeared to be: a God-fearing man of the cloth, working passionately to save troubled children fallen from grace.

  There was no mistaking the power Benjamin exuded. A certainty that he was absolutely correct in whatever he did. That he was the one in control, the one with a direct line to the Almighty. “Ms. Renshaw. You’ve caused your poor parents quite a lot of pain and suffering. What do you have to say for yourself?”

  The guards didn’t leave, instead stood behind Morgan as if waiting for her to do something. More than waiting . . . wanting. As if they lived and died for the chance to forcibly restrain a skinny teenage girl.

  Of course, they did, Morgan realized. What better way to convince parents they’d come to the right place while also relieving any guilt or misgivings they might have? She glanced up and saw cameras overhead in two of the corners. No books here—too easy to use as weapons.

  No furniture besides the two chairs. The wall beside the door was lined with large important-looking diplomas in expensive frames. Their writing was in Latin, so it was impossible to read much except the institution name and Benjamin’s. Maybe she could hide the bug on top of one of the frames? Because clearly this was the room where all the good stuff happened.

  She eyed the cameras. They had to be feeding into a computer somewhere in a back room not visible to the public. Hopefully on-site. If not, she’d be returning to Greene empty-handed.

  “Ms. Renshaw.” Benjamin’s voice cracked across the space between them, although his posture remained relaxed. “Please do me the courtesy of answering me when I speak to you. I asked what you have to say for yourself.”

  “About what?” Morgan replied. Benjamin was deliberately baiting her, she was certain.

  He steepled his fingers and gazed above her as if reading something only he could see. “I understand your parents have caught you stealing liquor from them. Is that true?”

  Morgan shrugged in answer. Benjamin glared at her. “I couldn’t hear you. Is it true, did you steal from your parents?”

  “Yeah, I snuck a few beers. So what?”

  “So you’re a thief and an alcoholic.” Benjamin nodded in satisfaction.

  “A few beers doesn’t make me an alcoholic,” Morgan protested.

  “Denial is a common response, Ms. Renshaw. No worries, we’ll deal with all that in good time. I see that you’ve also used drugs? Which ones?”

  Morgan slouched in her chair, arms crossed over her chest. “I’ve never used drugs.”

  Benjamin jerked a chin at the guards. One of them wrapped his fist around Morgan’s jacket collar, jerking her upright so hard and fast that the denim cut into her armpits, while the other emptied her pockets. There went her lighter, a pack of cigarettes, lipstick, comb, cash. And the small stack of pennies with the hidden microphone. It rolled to the far side of the desk and fell to the floor.

  The guards and Benjamin didn’t even notice. Instead Benjamin nodded at the cigarettes. “Tobacco is a drug and against the law for someone your age to possess.” He made a dramatic sound, not a sigh, rather a reluctant inhalation. “So now we have
lying, thieving, drinking, and drug use.” He squinted at Morgan. “I assume we can add sex to that as well?”

  The guards dumped Morgan back into her chair. She glanced at one of the cameras, giving a show of being flustered. But secretly she was thrilled—both bugs planted without any problem. “None of your business.”

  “Your parents found you along with a girlfriend in the company of three older men. Two eighteen-year-olds and”—Benjamin raised an eyebrow—“a twenty-three-year-old? That’s statutory rape. Oh, and your friend is a year younger than you, only fourteen? That makes you an accomplice. You could be labeled a sexual predator if we took this to the police.”

  He leaned back once more and smiled at the guards, shaking his head sadly. “Can you imagine that? Fifteen and already a sexual predator facing felony time. And in Pennsylvania, a fifteen-year-old can be prosecuted as an adult, which means real prison.” Benjamin leered at Morgan. “You ever hear of Rockview, the state penitentiary? It’s where they keep the electric chair.”

  Morgan had to fight her laughter, twisting it into a sound of dismay and fear. Last thing she needed was for Benjamin to know she’d visited Rockview only yesterday when she went to see her father.

  Her father. If he could see her now. Lord, how he would be howling with delight at the sheer irony. Morgan trapped as good as any fish. Forced to play the victim.

  “What do you want?” she finally whispered. This was the real reason why Benjamin took the time to do his intake interview. To learn where his new prisoners were most vulnerable, assess their breaking point.

  That and the ridiculous extra fee he charged for his personal attention.

  “We’re here to help,” Benjamin crooned as if leading a prayer. “All we want is to redirect you onto the right path, to help you ReNew your life. You work the steps, do as you’re told, stay out of trouble, and we’ll get along just fine. If you relapse into your old, criminal, drug-addict, sexual-predator ways, well, then, we’ll just have to work harder, won’t we? So you see, there’s an easy way to spend your time with us and a difficult way. Which would you prefer?”