I was on board until that last part. Hell, I knew it wasn’t going to last between us, but damn, I wanted it to a little bit longer than this. Once more to feel his arms wrapped around me, the hot heavy weight of his breath against my neck. I took a deep inhale of the chilled air to focus my attention away from him yet again.
“You’re right. Of course. I need to get rid of him to save him. I’m just not sure how to do that since I have no power here.”
“You have all the power here, Baby. You just have to use it.”
We did a couple short loops around the building and then turned to go back inside. I glanced up the building and caught Ash staring out his window. I followed Styx inside. She escorted me back to my room without another word. Everything she had said to me jumbled in my head, trying to create enough room for it all. I had all the power. But how did I use it to get what I needed without hurting Ash?
No. I couldn’t add that into consideration. No way we were both leaving this without bruises on our hearts. As much as I wished we could have both been aloof, that everything we did together was just physical, I knew it was a lie. A pretty lie, one I longed to wrap around myself like a thick comforting blanket, but eventually the cold would still seep in.
I sat on the edge of my bed starting at my little universe in a shoebox of a room. I’d stay here, and I’d manage. It would be a comfort to know I saved him from himself.
Once the nurse brought my dinner, I asked if I could use the phone. She stared down at me confused. Everyone here knew I didn’t want to talk to the only person on my approved call list. But she brought me a phone, and I dialed the number to my mother’s secretary.
It didn’t take long to tell the receptionist what I needed, and she’d take care of it without alerting my mother. For their part, they knew any mention of me was likely to get things thrown at them, if not outright fired.
I gave the phone to the nurse with the questions in her eyes and shut my door behind her.
Then I waited.
My mother’s team worked fast.
He shoved into my room, closing the door behind him with careful control. But I caught the white of his knuckles in the light. He wanted to slam it as much as I did.
“What did you do?” he whispered, still facing the door, not even looking at me.
I wished I could have put on a mask of indifference, but no matter what I tried, nothing could stop the tears from forming at the corners of my eyes.
I stood and faced away from him. “I did what I had to do.”
“I deserve an explanation. I thought you wanted me to help you. And now you do this. What could you be playing at?”
I spun to look at him now. Even in anger, I wanted to remember his features. The soft lines around his eyes, the smattering of gray in his hair. “I did what I needed to do to keep you safe.”
“Keep my safe,” he whispered.
He took a step forward, and I retreated. One more and I matched it.
“Why are you running away from me?”
I shook my head. “Please, don’t do this. I made my request. Everything has been processed. You should go before anyone starts talking.”
“Who is anyone?”
I waved at the door. “Anyone. I won’t let you flush your entire career down the toilet for me. Especially when my mother usually wins.”
His mouth gaped open now, and his hands rest at his sides, no longer fisted. “Is that what you think you’re doing? Damning yourself to save my career.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
He stepped up and whispered fiercely right in my face. “It does fucking matter. Stop pretending you don’t care and tell me why you won’t let me fight for you. Why you think this is the better way?”
I could feel the pent up fury along every line of his body so close to mine. I wanted to scream and shout back at him. Instead, I met his eyes. “Because it doesn’t matter. I care enough not to let your risk your career for a dalliance. This was fun and all, but come on…neither of us is in this to forever.”
He blinked heavily and took a step back. Then clenched his fists, his mouth, his jaw. He wanted to throw angry words at me, throw my possessions, maybe even me. But he didn’t.
He turned to the door, opened it, closed it gently, and I listened to the careful cadence of his footsteps as they walked away.
“Because I love you,” I whispered into my new, somehow even emptier, room.
I almost missed the bed sitting down this time. Then almost slid off the edge because I couldn’t force my muscles to keep me upright on the soft mattress. After a second, I twisted onto it and lay facing the wall. Not even a book could comfort me right now.
The door opened a little while later, and I glanced up to watch Styx place a mug beside my bed. She left without a word, and I was grateful. I couldn’t guarantee I wouldn’t throw myself at the older woman seeking the comfort nothing could provide right now.
I faced the wall again and stared at the pattern in the brick. The scent of him still clung to my sheets and pillows, and I lay there inhaling the last piece I had of him. The last bit stolen for myself. Tomorrow, he’d be packed off to another hospital, a better hospital, and I’d never see him again.
I let the tears fall now. I’d never see that triumphant gleam in his eyes as he drove me to my orgasm, or the utterly perplexed look he got when I gave him yet another doctor’s name in place of his own.
I’d never feel the ghost of his fingers in my hair or the soft wetness of his lips on my neck. This was my own fault. I had to remember I did it to keep him safe. In the end, it’s what mattered.
I lay there and whispered it to myself over and over. I did it to keep him safe. I did it to keep him safe. I did it to keep him safe.
Chapter Fourteen
Ash
Anger settled like a dark film over me, inside me, coating me. It sizzled through every part of my body so much so that I could taste it. A bitter acrid flavor assaulting my senses. Once I made it to my office, I closed the door, picked up a throw pillow from the small chair, pressed it to my face, and let out a loud bellow.
It wasn’t nearly enough to take the edge off, and when I tossed the pillow back on the chair, it came away with a round wet imprint from my mouth.
The room was the same as it was before, except now, I glimpsed her from every surface. Making love to her on the desk. Her playing with me while I sat in my chair. Her smiles and quips from the doorway to the desk. It was as if her ghost spun around the room making a mockery of what I felt for her and how little she obviously felt for me.
I threw myself into one of the solid arm chairs in front of the desk and cupped my head in my hands. The blind fury had yet to abet, but something else had started to wash along the shore of my being: resignation. What the hell could I do? I’m sure the call that told me congratulations, you’ve been moved had already spun out of control. No way I could try to backpedal it and keep my job here. So Kory’s mother got what she wanted anyway. Now, they just needed to find another dumb dupe to take my place as Kory’s keeper.
I stood up and rounded the desk to find my computer. I needed to get things started. And regardless of how I felt about Kory taking matters into her own hands, I needed to help her. To the best of my ability. Even if it meant the cost of my career.
Do no harm.
I took that oath seriously and leaving Kory to the mercies of her mother would kill her.
I opened my laptop and then navigated to the email. There was one man I knew who always won in a fight. I didn’t matter if the enemy was a big fish or a small one. But was I ready to pay the cost? Donny, that old fraternity brother, would certainly exact a high price.
Facing Demeter’s price or Donny’s, it was no question whose punishment would be worse. I was already ruined the moment I put my hands on Kory’s skin. My career, my reputation, was already gone. Demeter couldn’t do anything worse than I’d already done to myself.
And if I took some a piece of her with me w
hen I went down, it would be worth it.
But Donny was something else entirely, and I wasn’t ready to face that storm front yet. I typed an email to one of my other fraternity brothers. One I knew who worked at a national news source. It wasn’t exactly the level Donny was on, but it should at least make for a good story and a high profile one at that.
I sat back in the chair and closed my laptop. He’d call me if he could help. The text hit my phone seconds later.
MO: MEET ME AT EUREKA COFFEE SHOP
I closed the text, grabbed my jacket, and left. Every time I stepped out the door with Kory still in that building, it carved a chunk from my soul. But I had to leave to finish it, and when I returned, hopefully, I’d have some good news to share with her.
The sound of my footsteps echoed around me as I walked, the sun had set and bugs chirped in the wooded area beyond the parking lot. I climbed into my car, skin humming, adrenaline was a funny thing that way.
I made it to Eureka in record time, parked in the empty lot beside the old brick downtown building, and went inside. One customer sat in the back typing away, earbuds in, oblivious to the world. A lone barista stood behind the counter and met my eye as I approached.
I shoved a five dollar bill across the counter. “Coffee, black, please.”
She smiled and pumped out a small cup of coffee from a large carafe near the register.
I took it and gave a hollow smile back. “Thanks.”
She returned to the other counter and her closing routine as I took a seat near the window. A few people were out walking through the small city center, and I watched them before I caught sight of my old fraternity brother Mo shuffling up the sidewalk and into the cafe.
His short hair had a bit more gray than it did since the last time I saw him, but his hurried and harried manner remained the same. He took the seat across from me in a flurry of leather and canvas.
I held my cup toward the counter. “Do you want a coffee?”
He shook his head as he stripped his arms out of his maroon jacket. “No. I’m good. What I want to know is what kind of story you have for me. Your email was vague and cryptic.”
I put my cup down on the worn smooth wood of the table. “It’s kind of a long story, and I’m still trying to wrap my head around things. Also, I don’t have a lot by way of proof.”
He fished a notepad from one of his numerous pockets and froze while flipping it open. “You have a story, that’s strange, but good for me, and you have no proof.”
“Do journalists need proof?”
He shrugged. “It depends. Is this on par with some sort of celebrity gossip or something like Watergate?”
I weighted my answer in my head. Considering this course of action behind the safety of my desk and my computer felt safer. This…dragging him into whatever the hell was happening…confessing my sins…and Kory’s, made me feel more vulnerable. Because once everything came out, there was no world in which my name and deeds didn’t come out too.
I cupped my hands around the rapidly cooling cup and met Mo’s light brown eyes. “I’m going to say Watergate.”
He leaned forward, pressing the table toward me, a determined wrinkle formed between his brow. “Okay, then start at the beginning.”
I took a deep breath and forced it out. “I do want to say if you can keep my name out of it and Kory’s name I’d appreciate it. But I understand if that’s not possible.”
He scribbled on his pad. “Who’s Kory?”
“Kory Sito. Daughter to the presidential candidate Sito. “
His eyes widened, and I knew I had him. I continued. “I can’t go into details about Kory as she is technically my patient, but I have reason to believe her mother has been stashing her troublesome daughter away in mental institutions to keep her silent and under control while she organizes her political campaigns.”
He paused in writing. “I’m not sure what that means? You said she’s your patient. Is she mentally ill?”
I shook my head. “I can’t talk about what she is or isn’t. Just know she doesn’t belong in the hospital, in my professional—and personal—opinion.”
“How many times has she been in?”
I stared down into the coffee. “I can’t say how many times as I can’t divulge any details about her treatment, or care, hell I wasn’t even supposed to tell you she is my patient.”
He put the pad on the table and leaned in. “I understand the ethical code and all that, but you are the one who called me. If you want this story out there, you are going to have to give me a little more than the bare facts here. I need something to write. Senator commits daughter for unknown reasons for unknown number of times doesn’t exactly make a story…or hell…not even a headline.”
Obviously, he was right. I couldn’t just give him the minimum and hope he could spin a story from it. I was already going down. My ethical code had been shattered that night at the bar when I lost myself to her the first time, even if I hadn’t known it at the time.
I nodded. “Of course, you’re right.”
“There are such things as whistleblower laws and stuff. I’ll try to keep you and anything that can tie to you out of the piece, but I can’t even sell my editor on it if I don’t have the details to give him.”
I needed to grab my balls and commit if I was sticking to this plan. A part of me wished I’d talked to Kory about it before coming here. She should be warned her personal details might be disclosed to the public. “No, I get it. Kory has been committed several times, it seems, for years with a pattern of being institutionalized every six months. She doesn’t have any reason to be in the hospital as she is not suffering any mental illness that needs long-term institutional care.
He scrubbed furiously on the pad and flipped the page. “How long have you been treating her? What made you think something was suspicious?”
“I took the job at the hospital the same day she showed up. It was suspicious when I didn’t seem to have any other patients. And her records were all over the place. She didn’t have a single diagnosis despite being in the facility multiple times over multiple years.”
I watched him continue scribbling and waited for the next question. “Have you spoken with the Senator since you started treating her daughter?”
“Yes, on the phone. Also, she came to see her daughter one day, and I met her in person then.”
“And did she seem remorseful for actions?”
I thought about it and shook my head. “No. It seemed like the two had some sort of deal going on. A one-sided deal, but Kory seems resigned to it all. She knows she’s not sick, but she also thinks there is nothing she can do to break the pattern and her mother’s hold on her life.”
He sat back in the chair and stared down at his notes his lips moving as he read them back to himself. They were a mess, and even I couldn’t read the scribble across the small pages. “I have to run this by my editor. I’ll just step outside and call him, and then I’ll let you know.”
I trapped his notebook under my fingers. “You do understand the sensitivity of all this right?”
The look he gave me reminded me of Kory. The exact same head tilt and lip purse she used when I’d apparently asked a stupid question.
He slid out of the chair and out the door in a few steps. I watched him from my seat as he paced back and forth on the sidewalk talking to his editor. The minutes stretched until he finally returned. He sank into the chair and shook his head. “I’m sorry, my editor doesn’t think it’s enough to go on.”
I did not just tank my career for nothing. “No, what else do you need to sell him on it? You know I’m not some crackpot trying to catch my fifteen minutes.”
He shrugged and slid his notebook into a jacket pocket. “Don’t worry. I’ll do a little digging, and then I’ll re-pitch it. If I need anything, I’ll send you a text.”
Without so much as a goodbye, he gathered his things and left. I stared after him. This wasn’t good. I hadn’t considered what I’
d do if my plan didn’t work.
I threw away the rest of my coffee and left the shop. As I crossed the street to my car, my phone started vibrating in my pocket. I fished it out along with my keys and checked the caller ID: Unknown.
I answered. “Hello?”
My blood froze at Demeter’s voice on the other end of the line. “Oh, Doctor. What have you done?”
Chapter Fifteen
Kory
A knock on my door jolted me out of the copy of Dante’s Inferno spread open on my crossed legs. My body revolted stringing tight for a moment at the thought of Ash standing on the other side. But no, he was supposed to be gone. And Styx never bothered to knock.
I closed the book and stashed it on a nearby pile. “Come in.”
A brown woman with long black hair poked her head into the room. “Are you decent?”
I stared as she squeezed between the slightly open door instead of opening it wider. She closed it behind her and faced me. “Hi Kory. I’m Dr. Moirai.”
“My new babysitter, I assume.”
She noticed the piles of books and started to weave her way through them as she read the titles. “If you like. I don’t think I’ll be here long. But long enough for sure.”
“Long enough for what?”
She shrugged and crouched down to pick up a copy of Zadig by Voltaire from the top of a pile. “Have you read this one?”
“I’ve read all of these books, several times.”
She nodded, her red lined lips folded in. “Ambitious.”
Who was this woman? “Thanks?”
She stood again and crossed her arms under her breasts. The arms of her white coat stretching tight around her biceps. She was taller than me no doubt, and curvy under the lumpy shape of her coat. She looked to be of Indian descent, but I couldn’t tell and it was always rude to ask.
“Do you need anything? The nurse tells me you’re not eating.”
“I’m not hungry.”
Deranged: Twisted Myths Book One Page 9
