Storm

by Lagomarsino, Giulia

  I stalled in the doorway, but Nancy rested a hand on my arm and leaned in. “That’s what they want,” she murmured before grasping my hand and leading me to a wheelchair. “They’ll expect you to be out of it, so play the part.”

  That wasn’t too hard. I stared off in space, not wanting to look at anyone for fear that I would give away the plan.

  “See those beautiful roses?” she asked, pointing out the window. I glanced that way, but I didn’t get what was so fucking spectacular about them. “They’re always so beautiful. Our caretaker does an excellent job with them. He always wants to make sure that the flowers look nice for the patients.”

  Why the hell was she telling me this? I didn’t give a shit about the roses or the fucking caretaker.

  “You should really take another look. They really are very beautiful.”

  Rolling my eyes, I looked out the window again, this time catching sight of a hearse parked on the street. Someone must have died. She wheeled me down another hall and then parked me by the wall.

  “I’ll just be a minute, sweetie. I’m just going to step away for a moment.”

  What the hell? She was just leaving me here? What if someone came by and started talking to me? Or worse, what if a doctor saw me sitting out here by myself and wheeled me off somewhere? Nancy wouldn’t know and my chance would be blown.

  My wheelchair started moving and I had to force myself not to panic and leap out of the chair. It had to be Nancy. Anyone else would talk to me first, right? I watched the signs overhead to see where we were going. Whoever was pushing me didn’t take me to the cafeteria, but instead took me to a room at the end of the hall. When I was spun around and then backed into the room, I started hyperventilating.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  Storm

  I hated seeing Jessica so out of it. I knew that being in here would be hard on her, but this was fucking terrible. She just stared off, not showing any signs of life. Nothing like the fiery redhead I had come to know. And it was all my fault. She was in here because I didn’t try and run with her when she begged me to save her. Yet another person I had let down.

  As soon as the door swung shut, I walked slowly around to the front of the chair and knelt down in front of her. She slowly raised her eyes to meet mine and then they widened in surprise.

  “You!”

  I jerked back in shock, surprised by her fury. “Uh…”

  “What are you doing here? You’re ruining everything. Nancy was going to break me out of here.”

  “I know,” I reassured her, still trying to come back from the fact that she wasn’t catatonic. “Dr. Abner was working with her and she contacted me when she saw me come here to question Dr. Shelby.”

  “I don’t understand. Why didn’t she say anything?”

  “Can we talk about this later? We have a short window to get you out of here and we can’t afford to miss it.”

  “Fine, fine.” She waved me out of the way and stood, brushing the hair that had come out of her braid back from her face. “What do we do now?”

  “Unfortunately, now you play dead.”

  “What?”

  “Okay, I know it’s not ideal. I had a different plan, but this is much more convenient.”

  She spun around and I cringed. I had hoped she wouldn’t do that. “There’s a dead person in that bed.”

  “I know.”

  “Please tell me you don’t plan on making me get in that bed with her.”

  I snorted and shook my head. “Of course not. That would give you away as soon as the doctor walked in the room.”

  “Good.” She turned to me slowly, her eyes narrowing. “You are giving me a new bed, right?”

  “Sorry, but it needs to be this one.”

  “Why?”

  I really didn’t want to tell her. She would definitely put up a fight. But this was the way to go. “Okay, don’t freak out.”

  “Don’t tell me not to freak out.”

  “Well, I need you to not freak out. Look, when a person dies, the body no longer has control over anything. Which means that bodily fluids are released and-”

  “No! No way. You want me to get in a bed that has someone else’s piss in it?”

  “Look, I know it’s not the most convenient, but it’s the fastest way to get you out of here without anyone realizing you’re gone.”

  “And what are you going to do with her?”

  I patted the wheelchair.

  “You can’t be serious. You’re just going to wheel her out of the room and plop her in the hall?”

  “The longer we argue about this, the less likely it is that we’re going to get you out of here.”

  She glared at me, but walked over to the woman and flung back the sheet, pinching her nose when the smell reached her. “Oh God, that’s awful.”

  “Just be glad you don’t have to move her,” I muttered.

  I slid my hands under the woman’s body, cringing when my hands touched the wetness on the bed. But if I was asking her to lay down in someone else’s piss, I could fucking deal with it. I set the woman in the chair, but her body was already turning stiff and she slid right out of the chair.

  “Shit. Come here. Help me get her in the chair.”

  “Hell no.”

  “I just need you to hold her up so I can tie her to the chair.”

  “And you don’t think that’ll draw attention?”

  My frustration was growing by the second and Jessica could tell because she hustled over and held the woman up so I could tie her to the chair.

  “Who carries around rope with them?” she hissed.

  “I’m always prepared for anything.”

  She snorted and I motioned for her to get in the bed. She sank down, grimacing when her backside hit the wet spot.

  “This is so gross. I hope you realize you’re not getting sex after this.”

  “Who said I want to fuck you anyway? You’re batshit crazy.” Her hand snapped out and hit me across the face. “Too soon?”

  “Just get me out of here.”

  She laid down and I quickly pulled on some scrubs so I appeared to be one of the hospital staff.

  “I’m so glad you thought to do that after I already climbed in the bed. It’s really a delight to lay in someone else’s piss.”

  “Just be glad there’s no shit in the bed.”

  I opened the door and flicked the door stop down, then unlocked the wheels of the bed and started rolling her down the hall. We were almost to the elevator when a doctor walked by and nodded to me. I returned his nod and slid the bed onto the elevator. When the doors closed, I turned and faced the doors. Luckily, Jessica was smart enough not to talk.

  The doors opened and I wheeled her down the hall to a loading dock of sorts for bodies to be taken to the morgue. The man that sat behind the desk to check out the bodies stood and walked around to process the paperwork.

  “Are you sure this is Mrs. Daniels?”

  “Is there more than one dead body here?”

  The man nodded like that made total sense and asked me to sign the paperwork. I scribbled something unreadable and pushed the bed over to Coop, who was waiting by the hearse. This had been our original plan, to leave in a hearse because it wasn’t that conspicuous. We just hadn’t thought there would actually be a dead body. I thought that I was going to have to pay off the guy or knock him out. But this was so much better. He was signing her out without realizing it, and therefore, wouldn’t raise suspicion nearly as quickly. I had stored poor Mrs. Daniels in the bathroom. No one would notice that she was in there until they went in to clean the room, which I was hoping wouldn’t be until later in the day.

  Coop opened the body bag and laid it out on our own stretcher that was in the hearse. He helped me lift Jessica by the sheet and set her into the bag. I had no idea if we were doing this right or not, but the guy that worked down here didn’t seem to think it was odd. Coop zipped up Jessica and pushed her into the back of the hearse. I nodded to him and
went back to the elevator as Coop pulled away from the building. Once I stashed the bed, I made a beeline for the back exit and tossed my scrubs into the dumpster. I hopped the fence and ran one block over where Coop was waiting for me.

  “Drive,” I said as I got in the passenger side.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  Jessica

  Oh God. I was zipped up in a body bag. Once we were moving, I fumbled with the zipper, trying to pry my way out of the bag, but I couldn’t find the end. My brain was overreacting and my breathing was out of control. Spots were dancing in front of me as panic took over. I couldn’t be in a body bag, This was so disturbing. I started clawing at the material, trying to find a way to rip it open.

  “Let me out!” I shouted, no longer caring if it was safe to be yelling. I had to get out of here. “Please,” I pleaded. I couldn’t even wiggle myself off the gurney because I was strapped down, which made my claustrophobia even worse. “Help! Let me out of here! Help!”

  I shouted over and over again until my throat was raw. Tears soaked my cheeks and it wasn’t long before my chest was hurting from my lack of oxygen. I felt the car jerk, but I was too hysterical to figure out what was going on. I thought I heard a voice and then there was light streaming in and Storm was hauling me out of the bag.

  “You’re fine. Stop yelling,” he said, trying to be soothing, but now that I could breathe, I was furious.

  “You zipped me up in a body bag. Why would you do that?”

  “We had to. It was the only way out of that building.”

  “Then you should have pulled over to let me out! I’m claustrophobic, you asshole!”

  He ran a hand over his face and sighed. “I’m sorry. I really am, but it was the only way out. We’re almost back to Reed Security.”

  My body started shaking as everything sank in. I was free. I was out of that clinic. But now I had to find a way to prove that I wasn’t insane and didn’t belong there. I had to find a way to take down the people in that clinic before they found a way to shut me up for good.

  Storm pulled me into his arms and ran his hand up and down my back. A half hour later, we pulled onto Reed Security property and Coop opened the back door to let us out. Storm led me through the halls of Reed Security, glaring at anyone that tried to talk to me. I wouldn’t have minded stopping, but I smelled really bad and I needed a shower as soon as possible.

  When I got out of the shower fifteen minutes later, Storm was sitting on the bed, his head hung as he leaned on his knees. He was rubbing his hands together, as if he had to keep busy. He looked up when I walked in the room and stood, staring at me like he was waiting for me to pounce.

  “You shouldn’t have let them take me,” I finally said.

  “I know.”

  “But why didn’t you know it then?”

  It wasn’t like I thought that he was my savior and protector. And I knew that we didn’t have any kind of relationship where he owed me something. But we had been sleeping together and spending time together. I just hadn’t expected him to watch as they dragged me away.

  He took my hand and sat down on the bed with me. “So, remember me telling you about Mikey?”

  “Your friend? Yeah.”

  “He and I grew up together. We were always out causing trouble, but nothing too terrible. We had our first drink together when we were fifteen. It was New Years and our parents left us at his house while they went to a party. They had gotten us a bottle of sparkling cider so we thought we were the shit.”

  I watched as he grinned, almost like he was back there, reliving it with his friend. This was a new side to him, happy and talking about something other than work or getting in my pants, but I didn’t know why.

  “So, we decided, after we drank the cider at nine o’clock, that we really needed some alcohol to drink at midnight. His parents had liquor open and we knew how much we could get away with drinking, so we started doing shots.”

  “I’m sorry,” I interrupted him, “but I thought we were talking about me and why you didn’t stop them from hauling me off the asylum.” I realized after I said it how bitchy it sounded. It wasn’t like I needed everything to be about me, but I needed answers.

  He looked down at his hands and sighed. “You said that you were an all in kind of woman. That you expected honesty and sharing.”

  “Yeah, but that’s when I’m dating someone.”

  His gaze met mine and there was a vulnerability there that I hadn’t expected. I actually felt bad for how I spoke to him.

  “I’m tired of hiding,” he said quietly. “I like you and I enjoy spending time with you. I don’t know what your story is, but I want you to trust me enough to tell me. I was so caught off guard by the police showing up that I just froze. I didn’t know what to think. And that’s my fault, because I treated you like any other woman I would take home. But I think we both know that there’s something more between us. I don’t know what that is or where it’ll lead, but I want to find out. So, I’m telling you about myself, in the hopes that you’ll understand me a little better and we could do something normal, like go on a date.”

  I was completely baffled. I never would have thought that Storm would come after me, let alone sit here and tell me stuff that he probably didn’t want to tell. “Okay,” I said hesitantly.

  He nodded and continued his story. “So, sometime after midnight, we passed out, drunk off our asses and completely oblivious to the mess we left behind. His parents got home sometime in the morning and were absolutely pissed. But Mikey, he didn’t make excuses or try and put the blame on me. In fact, he pretty much took all the heat for himself so I wouldn’t get in trouble. That was just the kind of friend he was.”

  It hit me then that he kept referring to Mikey in the past tense. Which meant either he was dead or they weren’t friends anymore. “What happened to him?”

  He laughed slightly, staring down at the floor. “He followed me off to war and he never came home.”

  I placed my hand on his shoulder, trying my best not to cry. I didn’t know Storm that well, but I could tell that this was something that had really affected him and changed his life. I knew what it felt like to have someone ripped from your life and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. I couldn’t even begin to imagine what it felt like to lose a best friend. I had never had one, but I knew how it felt to lose my mother. I had always wondered why she was taken from me, and I would bet that Storm wondered the same thing about his friend.

  “I had to continue my deployment and I was angry. I had lost so many people and I just couldn’t lose anyone else. And when I got home, my parents were waiting for me. But Mike’s parents were there to welcome me home, too. They were further back, probably not wanting to intrude.” He shook his head slightly and his muscles tightened. “I was a coward. I ran away. You see, I had a letter to give his parents and I couldn’t do it. It felt like I was shoving it in their faces that I was alive and he wasn’t.”

  “So, you didn’t give it to them?”

  “I mailed it. I hugged my mom in the airport and then I turned around and left. I haven’t seen them since.”

  “Punishing yourself won’t make everything right. And running away won’t make it any easier on you. They’re your support system.”

  “Not anymore,” he said quietly.

  “So, this is why you don’t get involved with anyone.”

  A smile tilted his lips, something I wasn’t expecting to see right now. “It’s a terrible excuse. I can see that now. I just didn’t know how else to deal with it.”

  I nodded and tried to find the courage to say what was on my mind. I was tapping my hand on my thigh when he reached over and interlaced our fingers.

  “My grandmother and mother were both labeled insane. They weren’t, but there were other things at play.” He turned toward me and actually really listened to everything I was saying. I didn’t once feel like he was judging me or he didn’t believe me. In fact, I found him nodding along, like he was taking d
own notes in his head and ready to get to work.

  He stood suddenly, pacing back and forth when I finished my story. “We need to get back to the estate and find out what else is hidden down there.”

  I grimaced, not really wanting to go back there anymore, but I knew he was right. “Maggie and I found a crematorium in the basement. If that’s where they were getting rid of bodies, then there could be other things down there.”

  “I don’t know that anyone’s going to be willing to go back there. The guys are all freaked out about that place.”

  “It’s not their fight.”

  He walked over to me, standing so close to me that I swore I could feel his heart beating through his shirt. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned about these guys over the past year, it’s that no one fights alone. We’ll talk to them and tell them what happened, and I can guarantee, scared shitless or not, they’ll be down there with us.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  Storm

  Closing the door behind us, I just watched as she moved around the room, taking off her cover up and laying it across the arm of a chair. I had taken her to the hot tub to relax and now I just wanted to get her out of her bikini. Her hair was falling out of her ponytail and little wisps of it clung to her dampened skin. It was like watching something out of a movie, watching her hand slide across her skin as her tongued lick her lower lip just as she glanced up at me. Her eyes locked with mine and then it was a standoff to see which one of us would make the first move.

  I tossed my shit onto the chair and stalked toward her. This was about as real as it got between us. Up until now it had only been two strangers fucking. But now I understood her. Now, I knew her. Now, I wanted to fucking own her.

  My lips crashed down on hers and her fingers immediately went to my shorts, yanking at the string and slipping her hand inside. My kisses were urgent and demanding. I tore at her bikini, needing to get it off and feel those big tits in my hands.