by Debra Webb
His gaze settled on Kate’s image once more. What was she hiding? What was so unspeakable that she would withdraw into herself and play dead?
A sense of urgency poked Paul.
Everything depended upon Kate.
He glanced at the time on the dash. Three thirty.
What the hell was he thinking? He should just go. Now.
The vacant blue eyes in the photograph haunted him. Someone had to bring Kate Manning back to the land of the living before the state institutionalized her and steady medications reduced to about zero percent the possibility of her ever coming back. She was the only one who could save herself... and her son.
Ten minutes later Paul was striding up to the hospital’s main entrance. He had the file the chief had provided tucked under his arm in an official manner. He’d donned his sports jacket, even finger combed his hair. He looked professional enough.
Inside the lobby he scanned the register and located the psychiatric ward. Fourth floor. Since Kate Manning had not been officially charged there would be no guard assigned to her room. The hospital staff he could handle.
The elevator whisked him upward with scarcely a sound of complaint. The doors opened with a whoosh and he stepped out into the quiet corridor. The smell of pharmaceuticals and fear—not his own this time—assaulted him.
Two nurses were busy behind the station outside the lock down area. This was where Kate Manning would be. He didn’t have to ask. She would be under close observation since fleeing or suicide was often contemplated by those involved with or suspected of heinous crimes.
Paul stopped at the nurse’s station and flashed the credentials that identified him as a psychologist. “Good afternoon, ladies.” He smiled, pumping up the wattage until he garnered an answering smile from both.
“May I help you, sir?” the older of the two, Nurse Mathis according to her nametag, asked, wariness dimming her smile.
“I’m Dr. Phillips from Memphis. Miss Ellington retained my services for evaluating her sister, Katherine Manning. Since the evaluation is needed as soon as possible I’d like to see her now if convenient. I was supposed to be here earlier today,” he added wearily as if he’d had the day from hell just like the two of them.
The nurses exchanged glances. Bennett, the one who appeared in charge, eyed him speculatively. “We have no record of hospital approval for you to see the patient. I’m—”
“There must be some delay in the paperwork,” Paul interrupted smoothly before she could say the deadly five-letter word. In his experience once sorry was on the table, few took it back. “I’m sure I was scheduled for today,” he insisted, his gaze traveling from her eyes to her mouth and back with blatant approval. “I’m later than I’d expected to be.” He adopted a harried look, much like hers. This was something else he’d learned long ago, consummate lying. Tell people what they wanted to hear and life went a whole lot smoother.
Nurse Bennett glanced at the clock. “I should verify—”
“My evaluation won’t take long,” he urged. “Chief Dotson will be very disappointed if I don’t have my conclusions to him tonight.”
She caved. The change in her posture told the tale before she spoke. “Well, what can it hurt? There’s no point in you having driven all this way just to have me hold you up.” She pulled Kate’s chart. “Come on, I’ll show you the way.”
“I sincerely appreciate your assistance,” he said as they moved away from the station.
Nurse Bennett used her ID key card to unlock the door at the transition point. Paul followed her down a long corridor where she paused at room 415. She passed her key card through the reader and opened the door.
“Buzz me when you’re finished. She’s all yours.”
Paul flashed her another smile. “Thank you, Nurse Bennett.”
She passed him the patient chart and scurried back to the station.
He moved to the foot of the bed and scanned the chart for a time before focusing his attention on the woman, mostly to brace himself. She hadn’t spoken since they found her hovering over her husband’s body. She showed no emotion and ate only if fed.
Placing the chart and the file he’d brought with him on the portable serving tray, he moved to the bedside. The swelling was diminishing, the bruises fading from purple to yellow. She looked vulnerable and helpless. Restraints prevented her from getting up without assistance.
Katherine Ellington Manning was a bright woman, educated as a research analyst. She had an excellent work record with MedTech according to the chief’s report. She was cited as a loving wife and mother by all who knew her. And Paul sensed, without having read it, that she was not a violent person. Unlike her rebellious sister, Kate was quiet, submissive, always obedient.
Yes, mother. Yes, father.
His heart beat faster as the sensations toppled one over the other inside him. The voices whispered to him. Kate would never harm anyone, much less her child or her husband. Jillian knew this without reservation. She felt it. The connection was there, despite being buried beneath years of sibling rivalry and bitter disappointment.
But she loved her sister. She wanted to save her.
Kate’s eyes abruptly flew open. “They’re coming for us.”
Paul jerked back a step. He inhaled sharply, blinked repeatedly and stared down at the unconscious woman. “Jesus Christ.”
He squeezed his eyes shut and shattered the image seemingly burned onto his irises. Kate hadn’t moved a muscle. What he’d seen and heard had come from inside his own head. Maybe. The warning, wherever it came from, was real. The only question was, did the us in her warning apply to Kate and her sister, or to Kate and her son?
He scrubbed a hand over his face. Slow, deep breaths. No panic. Turn it off.
But he couldn’t... not just yet.
He took her hand in his and closed his eyes. This was the part he hated most of all. He focused intently on Kate Manning. The pictures he’d viewed from the crime scene... the family photos. Her snapshots as a photography buff. But nothing came. A brick wall met his continued attempts. She wouldn’t let him back in. Or maybe he held back on a subconscious level.
Why warn him, then hold back? Didn’t make sense. He picked up the chart and the file, buzzed the nurse and walked to the door. He had to get out of here before the next phase hit. The routine was always the same. He had maybe a minute.
As if to defy him, pain split through his head, followed by a bright flash of light. He groaned, pushed it away. He didn’t want to go there now. He steeled himself and focused on the door. He needed out of this place. Just turn it off. Don’t think.
The panic reared its ugly head, a creeping, swelling fear that rose in his throat inhibiting his ability to breathe. It burgeoned in his chest, pressing against his thudding heart. Sweat broke out across his skin. The urge to run raced through his veins.
Where was that nurse?
They mustn’t find him...
He’ll never be safe if they find him... Save us!
He had to get out of here.
“Is everything all right, Dr. Phillips?”
Nurse Bennett’s voice jerked him from the trance... the panic. She held the door open, waiting, looking up at him with mounting concern.
He nodded. “Everything’s fine. Thank you.”
He couldn’t get out of the hospital fast enough.
He burst through exit and gulped in breath after breath. Didn’t help. The voices... the haunting images followed him. He couldn’t make them go away. The darkness edged in... threatening his control... dragging him back to that place where he’d lost himself completely.
He forced the images away. Breathed more deeply.
He wasn’t going back there... not for anyone.
Not for Kate or her son... not for Jillian.
~*~
Jill dropped her purse onto the hall table and checked the answering machine for messages. The day was almost over and there was still no news about Cody. Her apprehension was mounting
fast now. He’d been unaccounted for since Sunday morning. A neighbor had seen Kate and Cody getting into her car, presumably to go to church. But no one saw them at church. The urge to join the search was very nearly overwhelming. But how could she do that and all this?
Jill frowned, suddenly too aware of the silence. He was gone.
But then that was what she’d wanted, wasn’t it?
After what Cullen Marks had to say, she understood more than ever that she absolutely needed some kind of miracle that would save her nephew and sister.
Even if it meant believing in someone like Paul Phillips.
Dear God, she was losing her mind. Jill closed eyes and struggled to hold onto her composure. How could she fix this?
First things first. She would check her father’s study to see if Phillips had left a report.
Insistent knocking echoed around her. The possibility it was the chief with an update had her hurrying to the door, praying there was good news. She yanked it open and Paul Phillips filled the doorway as if her desperation had somehow summoned him. Whatever foolish relief she felt was short lived.
He was ready to bolt. He didn’t have to say a word. She could see it in his eyes, in the dark, tense angles of his face.
“Can I come in?”
“Of course.” She stepped back, opened the door wider. He came inside just far enough for her to close the door. Again she wondered about the demons that haunted him. He was unquestionably a tortured man. This looked like far more than burnout... deeper than a breakdown. When he stared at some point beyond her and said nothing, she asked, “Have you learned something about my sister’s case?”
“You said you didn’t want me to waste your time so I won’t.” He looked directly at her then. “There’s nothing I can do for you.”
He was right. She had said that. Some random brain cell screamed at her not to let him go. She was all alone in this and she needed someone.
“You found nothing that might help.” Her voice sounded as hollow as she felt. There had to be something.
He reached for the door. She didn’t miss the fine tremor in his hands. “The police will figure it out. They can’t be that blind.”
Adrenaline fired through her. He had found something. Stay calm. “You’re probably right.” Don’t challenge him. Lead him. “They aren’t blind. I’m just not sure they’re going to look.”
In a few days they would call off the primary phase of the search for Cody. It was the only logical thing to do. She knew the routine. A bigger story would come along and the press would lose interest, search volunteers would return to their lives and jobs. Then it would be over for Cody. But every fiber of her being cried out for them to continue. He was out there. She knew he was. And he was alive.
“I can’t control what the local authorities do,” Phillips argued. “I can only tell you the three things I know.” The haunted look in his eyes—this man she had deep down hoped would be her miracle—spoke of uncertainty and fear. Emotions every bit as strong as her own.
There was something. Jill’s heart rose in her throat. “Please, tell me.”
“First,” he said tightly, “any fool can see the beating your sister suffered didn’t take place in her home. It happened somewhere else, at the hands of someone besides her husband. Whoever did this to her, she feared for her safety. Make them look harder.”
“There is more to this.” It wasn’t a question, she’d known it all along. But to have it substantiated, even by someone she had every reason not to trust had victory soaring inside her. This was no love triangle. Her sister hadn’t been involved with another man.
Phillips held up a hand for her to listen. “Second, your sister, in my estimation, most likely did kill her husband. I can’t give you motive for her actions or even for my conclusions,” he went on before she could interrupt, “it’s just something I know.”
Jill’s hopes wilted. She still resisted accepting that her sister could do such a thing. How could he know with such certainty? He couldn’t. More of that frustration she’d been battling swooped in on her. How could he give her such hope only to knock her down again?
She wanted to rail at him that he couldn’t be certain but one more look into those fierce, dark eyes and she had to admit that, somehow, he was. Defeat settled heavily onto her shoulders.
“Third,” he continued, his voice low and tight, tension spiking. “The boy” he paused, looked away. “The boy’s alive... somewhere.”
Jill’s heart leapt in her chest, her hands went to her mouth to hold back the sob that shook her. Thank God. Oh, thank God. She’d known Kate couldn’t hurt her son. She’d known it with all her heart.
“We have to find him.” No matter what she thought she knew about this man, he believed her. She couldn’t let him go.
“Don’t.” He held up his hands, his face grim. “This is all I can give you. Don’t ask me to stay.” He shook his head, the movement scarcely visible. “I can’t.”
As frustrated and confused as she felt, she understood that whatever had happened to this man, the pain and fear he suffered was very real. He was rigid with the weight of it, distant, untouchable. The articles she’d read about him…the horrors he had investigated and evaluated…the breakdown…all of it zoomed into vivid focus like scenes from the latest bestseller by Stephen King.
He’d said he didn’t do this anymore. Coming was a favor to Richard. In that moment Jill suddenly realized the heavy price it had cost Paul Phillips to come here.
As much as she needed him, basic human compassion wouldn’t allow her to beg him to stay. This battle was going to consume her life, perhaps even tear it apart. How could she ask him, a man who had no personal ties to the crime or the people involved, to set himself on a course for self-destruction again? She couldn’t.
“I understand.” The words were hers, but the voice was alien to her ears.
He nodded, the movement stilted, his gaze shifting away.
She extended her hand. “Thank you.”
He stared at her hand. For a long moment she wasn’t sure he was going to touch her. Then he wrapped those long fingers around hers. He flinched, startled or pained. Her own body reacted to a flutter of awareness.
“At least I have something to go on. Thank you for that. I will find my nephew.”
He drew his hand from hers. All signs of pain or fear or the other emotions he battled disappeared. “Wherever he is,” he warned, the change in his tone chilling her to the bone, “he’s safe from the threat.” He looked around the room as if searching for the right words, then his gaze zeroed in on hers “Whatever this is, don’t go looking for it, Jillian. It’s already looking for you.”
Chapter 5
His lungs would not fill completely with air, no matter how deep the breath he took, no matter that his driver’s side window was open and allowing the wind to whip against his face.
Paul drove faster, wanted this damned town as far behind him as possible. He wanted images of Jill, Kate, and her son out of his head.
But they wouldn’t go.
Save us.
He couldn’t save them. He was way beyond saving anyone. Didn’t they know that? He couldn’t even save himself.
The urgency wouldn’t go away. Those needy tentacles reached out to him, urged him to go back. He couldn’t go back. Not and survive. Right now survival was all he had left.
His panic grew, expanded, crowding out all rational thought. He had to get back in control.
Breathe.
Don’t think.
Just breathe and drive faster. Get the hell out of here.
A sign inviting him to Please Come Again mocked him. The idyllic garden scene depicted behind the name Paradise made his gut clench with the urge to heave. But the symbolism was more accurate than anyone knew. Paradise was the perfect small southern town, all right. Just like the Garden of Eden to Adam and Eve. Perfect, serene, offering all that their simple lives required.
But they hadn’t been alone..
. something bad had been in that perfect garden with them. That same kind of evil was in Paradise.
He hoped Jill would watch her back. Saving her sister and nephew might just prove the last thing she ever did.
Sweat bloomed on his skin. Not the clean kind you earned with hard physical labor. But the tainted kind, soured by the essence of pure terror.
His terror.
He couldn’t risk getting sucked into that kind of darkness. He’d gotten lost there too many times… until he’d broken. Now he could never go back… not and walk away with his sanity, such as it was.
The deepest of the darkness had been waiting for him in Paradise. Like a cancer that lay dormant until just the right moment and then it awakened, consuming all in its path. He had worked for five long years to keep that abyss at bay.
Still they came to him, begging for his help. He told them what they wanted to hear and took their money. He’d hoped that with enough failures they would stop coming.
But a single success out of dozens of failures gave all the others hope. And they kept coming. Wanting answers he couldn’t give without wading into the darkness.
He couldn’t do it.
A cat darted in front of him. He slammed on the brakes. Tires squealed. The odor of burning rubber filled the air.
The Land Rover skidded and rocked to a stop.
For long minutes he couldn’t move. Just sat there on that deserted road and tried to regain some semblance of control. Inside, where no one could see, he was shaking with a fear that refused to be conquered.
A fear that wasn’t about Jill or Kate or the missing kid.
It was about Paul Phillips.
A secret fear that had been growing, becoming stronger every day as long as he could remember.
His work had only exacerbated it. No matter how hard he focused on something else it was always there. Waiting. It had taken over completely that once… in that dark, dank cave where a little girl had died just because he had been a coward.