by Tara Brown
He walked me to my room, strolling straight past the nurses’ station without even a hesitation when they saw us both up. He didn't talk to fill the air or try to flirt with me. When we got to my door he stopped several feet from it and smiled politely. “Have a nice sleep, Sierra.”
My eyes lowered to his lips and my smile curled into something flirty, but he remained stoic.
He was the strangest boy I’d ever met. Without a doubt.
Chapter Eight
The Visit
“Lucy W. Thirteen-year-old girl suffering from delusions and paranoia. Fits of anger and rage. Attempted suicide after trying to harm a baby and killing cats. Frequent hallucinations caused her to believe someone else was responsible for the violent acts she was accused of. Specifically, killing her friend and attempting to kill a baby. She also blamed the fictitious girl for her repetitive self-injury behavior of cutting and her misuse of prescription drugs. Photographs were taken but they have been transferred with the patient. She stole meds and attempted suicide again in the hospital. When restrained the patient threatened to kill a nurse. A week later she did. After finding a weapon she stabbed the nurse over fifty times, killing her. Patient was transferred immediately. She was relocated several months later to Silver Hills and appeared docile and calm. She was in a coma for several months at the other facility, the result of experimental drug use by the doctors. They agreed whatever rage was inside her had been successfully treated.” Linds finished reading and gave me a look. “Is this for real?”
“I found it in the records room.” My eyes darted around the garden where we sat. None of the other crazy people had braved the cold, and I needed to be alone with my friends where no one else could see us. Even Finn wasn't here. A small part of me wished he was. Something about him made me feel better.
“That’s sick.” Sage’s eyes watered. She’d been a hot mess for months, going from crying to pretending everything was fine. I suspected she was a lot closer to a breakdown than Lucinda had ever been.
Rita swallowed hard. “So maybe, what we’re all not saying is that Lucinda wasn't crazy and didn't do the things they said she did.”
I nodded. “Maybe.”
“And now, for whatever reason, she is doing this to us.” Lainey shuddered.
“Except she’s a veg,” Rita pointed out.
“A veg that might be acting. Or a veg that might be getting her revenge carried out for her. What if her mom and dad want to get even for what happened to their daughter and somehow we’re involved? I mean really, it could be anyone. Hired killers.” Lindsey gave me a look. “So this was your link in the chain? She’s humiliated my dad and Lainey’s. Killed Rachel. Somehow recruited Andrew and Tom and tortured Jake and Lainey. And now you’re the one she shows the truth to?”
“I don't know. If that's the truth. We might have just found a file of lies. Anything is possible.” I didn't want to talk about it. “When are we getting me out of here?”
“This afternoon.” Lainey smiled and leaned forward, taking my thin hand in hers. She squeezed. “Your dad is here talking to the doctors. He’s told them they will finish assessing the damage done to you by whoever once you are home.” She winked. “He has the doctors convinced you were forced into the Hatton Head institution as a mean prank. He’s threatening lawsuits.”
“How?”
“The guy he hired convinced him someone did this to you. Your dad’s furious. He asked us if we thought someone would do this as payback for you sleeping with their boyfriend. We said yeah. He called the police, which might end up being a good thing. You’ll be interviewed when you get back. Your dad wants you to just relax and transition calmly at home. He asked us to come and talk to you first.”
“He believed that? I have the worst parents ever. Seriously? After everything else, my jackass of a dad believes that? He’s such a fuc—”
“It’s not worth being pissed off, Sierra. We need to focus on getting you home and getting Christmas over with. If everyone in Crimson Cove thinks some chick got revenge on you for sleeping with her boyfriend, then so what? You’re Sierra Casey—you don’t give a shit what people think.” Lainey stood, helping me up. She was probably the only person who could get away with saying that sentence to me. “We can bet our parents still plan on hosting the parties and whatever. You’ll have to get used to the idea of this being what people think.”
“But we know the truth.” Sage jumped up, wrapping herself around me. Her tears soaked through my sweater into my thin shirt. I didn't have the anger or the energy, or whatever it was I lacked, to cry with her. Not even when Rita wrapped around me too. I hardly knew her, but she sobbed into my shoulder, consoling herself on me.
Linds and Lain stayed back but they looked at me in a way that worried me. “You bitches better stop staring at me like that.” It wasn't said with the usual sarcasm.
Linds flinched. “I know.” Her eyes held more pity in them than I had in my entire body. “Sorry.”
Lainey folded her arms around her waist. “It’s going to take some time to get used to you—like this.” Her brutal honesty stung but not as much as watching her eyes flicker to the wounds on my wrists and hands. “No one knows what it feels like. Each of us is suffering differently. Separately.”
Her words clicked something in my head. “We can’t tell the police anything. I’ll tell them it was some group of girls I pissed off. But we can’t talk about the whole Rachel thing.”
“What?” Sage pulled back, her sorrow and anguish washed away quickly. “Are you insane? We need the police. We clearly can’t handle this. People are dying, Sierra. She freaking abducted you and burned and cut you and made you look crazy.” She snatched my hands and flashed my scars and burn marks in the air like they were on display.
“Don't you think I know that?” I pulled back, lifting my shirt to reveal the knife slice along my abdomen. It looked worse now that it was healing. “You think I don't see what’s going on here?”
Shock filled their faces.
“She cut me in ways that would scar but not kill. She messed with me to change me on the inside where no one could see. She wanted me to be marked up and ugly and scarred and damaged. She knew my weaknesses and she went for them. She read my journal and starved me. She tried to kill me without killing me. ME! So don't act like I might not understand how serious this is, ‘cause I do.” A sob escaped my spit-covered lips. “That bitch kidnapped me and tortured me and made me shit in a box. A box where I also ate her freakin’ soggy apples—”
“She’s right,” Lainey cut me off. “Whoever the girl is, she has the pictures of us with Rachel. All of us there, covered in blood. We seem guilty. And now it looks like Sierra has tried to kill herself, racked with guilt. We can’t talk to the police. We have to solve this on our own.”
“We could say they were photoshopped.” Sage quickly slipped into the role of know-it-all.
“Except for the fact our DNA is there, yours and mine. The photos would be enough to get a blood warrant. Then they would prove at least a couple of us were at the murder scene at the time of her death and the photos would do the rest.” Lindsey reminded Sage who was the actual know-it-all in the group.
“Shit!” Rita flung her arms up. “This is getting bad, like really bad. How the hell do we, five clueless socialites, solve this without looking more guilty?”
“Guiltier.” Lainey shrugged. “We hire someone. We don't have the skills to save ourselves, but we know someone who does.”
I had no idea who she was talking about, but I lost interest before she could say. My father, in a suit and holding a briefcase, stalked across the crunchy grass to where we were.
Every instinct told me not to run to him. Every bit of me wanted to ignore him. He’d left me here. He didn't care that I was broken inside or someone had tortured me. He didn't come to visit me.
But the moment I saw him crossing the grass I ran, not from him but to him. He dropped the briefcase and ran too.
I di
dn't miss the desperation on his face. His fear and anguish hit me before his hands touched me. However, when they did, his fingers dug in so deep I almost cried out but even then I didn’t. Only one word left my lips and it crawled out in a hoarse whisper, “Daddy.”
Tears blinded me.
Emotions swirled around me.
Fury choked me.
Love drowned me, pushing away my rage. It was impossible to be angry when I just wanted him to hug me and tell me everything would be okay.
“I thought I did this to you. I couldn't face it. I’m so sorry.” He choked on his words which were obviously painful to speak, “Your mother and I—” He sniffled and my whole world ended.
My father didn't cry, not in the real world.
I had never seen him cry.
Lie, yes.
Slaughter people mercilessly with his harsh words, yes.
Manipulate the weak for the strong, yes.
But cry? Never.
But this was not the real world.
Somehow in this mixed up Wonderland, we had both changed. Maybe his transformation had taken place in the dark like mine.
All I knew was that I was sobbing and so was he as we gripped one another until my hands gave out and my knees started to buckle. Then he lifted me up and carried me like a princess to the chairs where my friends sat. He sat and cradled me to his chest, like he did when I was a small girl. It took us a bit to resurface from the painful moment.
When we did, he was the man I remembered him always being. “Tell me exactly what happened. Start at the beginning. I want the entire tale in chronological order. I know you’ve been keeping things from us. No more, okay?” His eyes darted to Lainey. “Don't miss one detail. I need it all.”
Lainey gave me a look. “Want me to start?”
“Yeah.” I nodded and she spoke, rehashing all the details from the very beginning. Telling him like she was unloading the worst sins, some we weren’t guilty of and others we were.
He didn't speak or argue or try to interject, something odd for him. He listened, taking in the whole story.
“And then we all went to Rita’s for the Halloween party. And no one saw Sierra again.” Lainey sighed, seeming exhausted from just talking.
“Sweet Jesus.” He shook his head. “And now everything you remember from the moment you left the party.”
I took a deep inhale and began my version of the story.
His eyes widened as I spoke, flashing scars and scabs and marks to illustrate each moment. He flinched and winced and cringed until he stopped altogether. His expression hardened and he didn't balk again. Fury built in his eyes.
I handed him the file we’d found, Finn and me.
“I’m glad Mr. Finn was helpful for you.” He said the name like he’d said it before and then swallowed hard. “Leave this with me.”
“Do you know why she would want to torture us?” I couldn't leave it. I had to know.
“No.” His eye twitched as he shook his head and got up. “No. But I will find out.” He reached forward and helped me up, hugging me once more before leaving us alone in the garden again. “I’ll just speak with the doctors and be waiting for you in the reception area.”
“You saw his eye twitch, right?” I fought the urge to protect my father and whispered to Lainey as she came to stand next to me.
“Yup.”
“He’s lying.” I couldn't believe it. My father knew something about this, something about thirteen-year-old Lucinda Wentworth and how she ended up in a mental institute, swearing she was innocent. Something about how I ended up here, burned and beaten and starved and crazy. I gagged a little.
“Oh my God.” Lindsey leaned on me sounding like she might gag as well. “Our parents did this. I bet you anything, they’re to blame and now we’re being targeted as payback.”
“Well, screw that!” Rita jumped up with quite the amount of New Yorker in her accent. Her moods determined where she was from. I’d seen her go from full Jersey to so Southern that butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth. “I didn't even live here until the summer. How the hell am I involved in this?” She turned and stormed across the grass.
“Where are you going?” Sage hurried after her.
“To the Wentworth house to beg for my life. I know Lucinda. She knows my mom and dad had nothing to do with this shitstorm.” Rita left us but Sage stopped partway across the field. She turned back and eyed the three of us huddled together.
The instinct she fought was obvious in her eyes—the one whispering for her to leave us and go beg for her life with Rita. But she didn't listen. Sage waited for us to walk to her. “What are we doing now?”
“We can’t trust Mr. Casey.” Linds gave me a look. “No offence, but we clearly can’t trust any of our parents.”
“I agree. Whatever they did, they started this. My dad knows something about Lucinda Wentworth.”
Sage’s perfectly plump lips lifted. “Then we are going to finish it.” She looked crazy, smiling at a moment like this.
I wanted to believe her but I didn't.
I was stuck on the fact that my dad knew Finn and he knew something about all of this. I couldn’t get past that so easily.
Chapter Nine
Invasion of the Body Snatchers
He didn't lift his head to see me walking into the quiet room where he read some book with a name that didn't even look English.
“You know my dad.” It wasn't a question.
“I do.” Finn didn't lift his gaze but his fingers tightened on the book.
“You helped me because he made you? All that talk about being with me was a lie. Did he pay you to be with me?”
His face finally lifted from the book. He wasn't wearing his glasses so his dark-blue eyes stood out even more against his pale skin and black hair. “No and yes.”
“What?” He was so weird.
“He paid me but I would have helped you no matter what. When I told you I was with you I meant it. I am with you.” He said it so flatly I didn’t have anything else to say.
Except, “Why?”
“Because you needed it.” The way he just dropped his words made me uncomfortable. He didn't smile or charm or flirt. He didn't laugh or joke. He just said everything like he might be part robot. Or all robot. No matter whether it was an uncomfortable or a sensitive topic, he just dropped his words with no feeling behind them.
“Who are you?” I walked closer, sitting on the large leather chair across from him. He closed the book with the crazy word starting with D and placed it on the table next to him.
“I am a guy who knows how to get into places. I know how to hack things. Sometimes people like your dad need my help.” His eyes narrowed as he watched me digest that.
“So you’re a criminal?”
“I am.” He shrugged. “No more than the people I’m working for.”
“My dad isn’t—” I started to defend him, but I stopped short. I couldn’t say it. Not if he knew about Lucinda.
“Don't lie to me, Sierra.” He was bold for someone so dorky. He pulled on his glasses, looking like Superman becoming Clark Kent. “Your father is a lawyer. They’re all criminals. They get information illegally. They let terrible people off the hook for money. They lie, cheat, and steal, all in the name of justice, even though she is rarely involved in the final outcome.”
“And you work for them, doing the same thing? You’re awfully high and mighty for someone breaking the same rules.” I didn't know why I was defending my dad but something about the entire moment bugged me.
“Depends on the story. If the person is guilty then yes, I help. If they’re innocent, I help the other side.”
“You mustn’t work for my dad much then.” I laughed bitterly.
“I worked for him this time,” he added, seeming indifferent as he stood and walked away. “See you around, Sierra.” He waved like he knew I was watching him walk away as he left me alone in the room.
Something about his leaving hurt me.<
br />
It reminded me of when my nanny took away my blanky. I called him banky, and he was the thing that made me sleep at night. She took him away and I was vulnerable. Exposed.
Exactly how I felt standing in the quiet room when a doctor walked in with a somber expression. “Miss Casey, how are you?”
“Fine. Tired. Ready to go home to my own bed.” I’d learned to say something extra, not just fine. You had to add something bad so they would accept your answer as honest. None of us were fine or we wouldn't be here. So you were fine but tired. Fine but lonely. Fine but hungry. Anything but just fine.
“Yes, I would imagine. Your father has told me some interesting things. I am so sorry for the horrid prank that was played on you. I can’t begin to tell you how sorry I am. We checked into the video of you admitting yourself.”
The words “admitting yourself” made me feel psychotic, but I held tight to my emotions.
“We can’t believe—none of us can believe—that they checked that girl in with sunglasses and a wig without making certain it was you and not someone else. And I can’t imagine how they got you into that old section of the hospital. Those old solitary confinement chambers haven’t been used in decades. It’s just horrible.” He sighed and scowled, obviously distressed. “I think you will need some time to readjust. I don't want you to think we are only here for people who are mentally ill. The point I am so poorly trying to make is that if you get scared or you need a break, come back. No one will judge you, not after something like this. You might find the quiet of Silver Hills is easier to handle after such a shock to the system.” He shook his head. “I don't understand hazing or teenaged girls, but I swear they’re becoming worse than ever before in history. To check someone into a mental institution and abuse them so it appears as though they did it to themselves is possibly the worst thing I have heard of happening here.”
He said it but my brain flickered on a moment at Silver Hills that might have been just a touch worse. “At least I didn’t get lobotomized.” I said it before I had given it any thought.