A sudden eruption of dramatics occurs, glasses and plates clattering and women getting up at all angles. I stand and back off away from it, watching as screaming and hysterics begin. Objects fly through the air, noise colliding against surfaces as they crash and bang. The two with their eyes downcast stay perfectly still, as I keep backing away, their mouths still chewing slowly. And then three women in blue hurry into the room, two men in white following them.
What the hell is going on here?
The back of my legs bump into something, and I yelp at the impact, spooked and not ready at all to defend myself in this room full of maniacs. Jesus. Where am I?
“He doesn’t belong to any of them,” a sultry voice says behind me. I swing to look back at the other woman, watching as she keeps rocking back and forth. Dark eyes look up at me slowly, her face a picture of insipid features. “He’s mine.”
Chapter 11
Gray
T he view from my desk gives me direct line of sight over to the centre. I glare at it in the distance, as my fingers input more data absently, unable to deny the need to go back there and see how she is. The annoying fact of the matter is, that that is entirely the incorrect thing to do, and I’m entirely incorrect to think about it.
My hands lift from the keyboard and I push the chair sideways to stare some more at things that are not mine, elbows on the desk and chin on my clenched fists. Distance and time – that’s the right way forward from here. It’s the only way. She’s safe there for a while. Contained. Drained of the effects of pills and hedonistic desires, and ready to begin again. She’ll come back to herself over there, find reality and some of those truths she’s been after. Hopefully she’ll retain that evolved version of herself she found. She’ll just do it in lucidity rather than confusion.
I smile at the thought, imagining that evolved state as she walked around my apartment as if she owned it, and me.
“Gray?”
I glance behind me at the sound of Beatrice, watching as she comes up to me. “You asked for the latest notes.” The raft of sheets gets placed on the side table and she hovers, as if thinking about saying something that isn’t in her job description even if it might be within her family responsibility. “Do you mind if I speak candidly?”
A snort comes out of me, a chuckle following it.
Candidly.
I swivel the chair to look at her, wondering what candid words she might have. Candid seems relevant now after Hannah. She’s good at candid, effortless with her tongue when she wants something answering. Effortless with her tongue anyway. Especially around my dick.
Another chuckle, my own tongue licking over my lips. “Why not, Beatrice. Let’s hear it.”
“Why are you still trying?”
There’s a question. “Your expert opinion assumes I shouldn’t be?”
She looks at me over the top of her glasses, picking up one of the files she brought in with her. “This data, along with the previous years’ worth before it, prove that nothing is correlating correctly. It isn’t working.” She throws the particular file on my desk in front of me, taking her glasses off, and backs away to sit in the far chair. “Have you considered that maybe it’s time to let it go?”
Every damn day.
And then I remember how fucking pissed I am.
“No. It just needs more thought.”
“How many more years’ worth of thought would you like to give it?” Gutsy. I smirk a little, unsure where this new version of my test analyst is coming from. “And who’s the new woman I welcomed the other night at the centre?”
And there’s my sister’s sisterly love to join in on the party.
Still, my eyes narrow, a frown dropping, and I swivel away to look out the window again.
“No one.”
“Obviously. I’ve often known you stay over there throughout the night for someone who means as little to you as the others do.” She looks me over, clear concern about my fatigued face and dark circles. “Sleep might be useful, Gray.”
My frown deepens. “Beatrice,” I warn.
“Don’t use that tone with me. Who is she to you? I saw her bloodwork, Gray. If she’s being trialled then-“
“Leave it, Beatrice,” snaps out of me. “She’s nothing to do with you.” I stand, eyes glaring at hers. “And I will not tolerate you meddling with anything that is nothing to do with you. You know what your job is – do it.”
She stands with me. Chin aloft and enough Rothburg lines to let me know I just aggravated her beyond previous rational behaviour.
“Really? Alright then, it’s about time you heard this anyway. It’s a bloody lost cause, Gray. Even you, with all your intellect, are not making any headway on this.” I blink, then turn to glare out the window some more rather than acknowledge that. “Since the initial findings, there’s been no clear movement in analysis. No change.” She sighs in the background. “You brought me here from Oxford to help you, and I have, with everything I’ve got, but you’re not getting anywhere and now it’s nothing but a fool’s errand. Since the initial trials it’s-”
My fist clenches on the desk. “That’s not a reason to abandon-"
“No, but seeing you smile occasionally like you were doing when I came in would be better than watching you flog a dead horse for the rest of your life.”
The bluntness of the statement makes me swing to look at her, sharp eyes conveying my displeasure with the words. “Not dead.”
“Not alive either,” she retorts.
My body swings back to her. Ire and fucking antagonism building because of this whole damn situation and my exhaustion with the facts. “I will get my answers, Beatrice. I want to hear the words in the air. A goddamn apology and some fucking remorse for screwing with my life. You haven’t got a fucking chance of understanding what it-”
“You’re screwing with your own life, you obstinate brute!” she shouts. “Pointlessly at that!”
Not accepting that in the slightest, regardless of the truth of the matter, I turn away from her again and pace the room to try calming down. My hands find my pockets, fingers twining into the gold chain I’m still carrying around like a fourteen year old with a schoolboy crush.
“Will you just consider it, Gray? There is more to life,” she says, tone softening. “One more year and I’ll be retiring. What will you do then?”
“Find someone else who’s better.”
“Charming. And I suppose you’ll have them stay here permanently rather than you again, so you can live your separate lives.” She walks over to me, her hand reaching for my shoulder. “Except, it isn’t separate, is it, Gray? You’re still stuck here, even when you’re not. As your big sister, I'm begging. Please. You have a right to life.” A breath pulls into me, body unstiffening given her look of compassion. “Perhaps it’s time.”
I squeeze her hand on my shoulder, accepting her worry. It’s not needed, but it’s valued nonetheless. “I appreciate your concern, Beatrice, but I’d rather you get on with helping me achieve results.”
She nods, with a sigh, and slips her glasses back on her face. “I’ll go over to the centre then.”
“No.”
“Analysis?”
“No. Not while she’s there. Leave it for a few days.”
I look at the floor, wall, anything other than her, and then walk straight out the damn office in the hope that I can avoid the rest of the interrogative conversation that might ensue at any given moment. Dealing with Malachi’s inquisitions is bad enough, dealing with a sister on full analytical attack mode is something I’m not even remotely interested in.
The house echoes with every footfall I make, barely any life in it to dampen down the sound of my quick strides through it, until I’m outside and heading for the barns. She won’t follow me there. Dislikes horses and is allergic to straw. It’s something I could cure if I felt inclined to. I won’t. It’s my only escape from her.
Always was.
The shame of it is, I can still hear
her shoes clattering the tarmac tracks behind me, as if this is worth arguing about passed her allergies and fears.
“Did you fall for one of them?” she shouts. I keep walking, speeding up and looking at nothing other than those doors to the red barn. “Gray, stop!” she snaps.
No.
The sound of her heels stop, and I half breathe a sigh of relief, as I keep moving. Sadly, it’s only a few seconds more before I feel her hand on my shoulder again. It tugs, twisting me back to her, and I find her with her heels in her hands rather than on her feet. “You did, didn’t you?”
She stares. She stares long and hard like she used to when we were kids and I’d had my hand in the cookie jar that was off limits. “You fell for a test case, didn’t you?”
The chain twirls in my fingers, hidden in the depths of my pockets like Hannah is hidden in the depth of my thoughts. “She’s not one of them,” I mutter, turning to walk again.
“Why is she over there then?” she calls.
“Because I can’t have her near me.”
I might as well have not bothered saying it at all for all the volume I managed to get out. I don’t even know why I answered her. I probably should have just said no, or ignored her suggestion and made her feel foolish for even proposing it. I haven’t. Stupidly. Maybe I can talk her out of me. Use logic and rationale to dismiss the notion of feelings when I shouldn’t have any. At least she’s not Malachi with his tormenting and pushing. Beatrice is nothing but facts and figures. Harsh, systematic, and judgemental. Just like me.
My feet stop, mind whirring over the possibilities of doing just that, and then I shake my head and move again. Annoyingly, I don’t want to talk her out of me. I want her lingering there, want the memories lodged in even if there isn’t anything other than it. I’ll bury it. Bury it all and keep moving until I get my answers and then maybe there will be something else for me one day.
“Gray?”
The sight of one of the horses being led outside makes me smile slightly, watching as the small form leading it walks alongside. A sigh falls from me. That’s something else I haven’t reconciled my feelings for yet, let alone begun trying to understand what I’m supposed to do going forward.
He looks over and holds his hand up, waving at me with a smile on his face. Riding. I could go for a ride, forget everything for a while and take some time, refocus.
“Gray?”
I sigh again, watching as she comes to the side of me and puts her shoes on again, her hand leaning on my shoulder to balance herself. “What Beatrice?”
“I don’t know. Just … I’m here.”
I nod. I know that.
It doesn’t help.
Chapter 12
Hannah
I don’t know where the fuck I am, but I’m not staying here a minute longer.
These people are either insane, or demented, or possibly both, but no way am I one of them.
My feet move me slowly away from the ruckus still carrying on, and I back up to the far wall and check the exits. Shouting and screaming still echoes around the room as women are dragged and carried out of this space into others. White coats on some men, blue uniforms on women. It’s like a fucking sanatorium, not a therapy centre.
I flick my gaze back to the only two who seem remotely normal still looking at their plates of food, and then realise that they can’t be either. Who the hell just sits there in the middle of all this and barely moves, let alone doesn’t react to glasses flying around their heads? And the other one at the back of the room certainly isn’t. Rocking back and forth, now muttering to herself about someone not being anyone’s.
I plant myself in a quiet corner, unsure how I get out. Three doors. One back into the corridors, one to the kitchen by the look of it, and one that possibly leads outside. With all the commotion, I edge the perimeter in the hope that I can make it without fighting or arguing until I get to the main one. The handle pushes down, nothing happens. Locked. A quick scan of the people in uniforms and I notice key cards on chains dangling from their waists.
Hmm.
At the next rally of bitching and screaming from one of the women, I scoot forward, get in the way of the attack, and hold my hands up to one of the men. “Please stop,” whimpers out of me, as something shoves my back. “I shouldn’t be here and I need to get out.”
He looks me over, and then dives to the side to catch the one behind me, giving me enough time to swipe the key card from him before being manhandled. The loose chain snaps in the middle of the uproar, and regardless of the hands shoving me sideways again, I gain some balance and head straight for the entrance way again.
One swipe and the door buzzes and clicks, as more screams and shouts ring out in the space. I slip through the open door, letting it close behind me, and run through more corridors and hallways. Another door, another swipe of the card, and I aim directly at the light filtering in from a window in the hope that it leads me to the outside.
Passing a man in a glass booth, I tear round more corners and finally find an exit door. Freedom. I look left and right once I’m outside, no idea where I am or what I do now. The wind whistles slightly against the tall line of trees surrounding the drive, and there’s nothing but fields between me and that other big house. There must be help there, though. I’ll be able to make a call, find a cab. I don’t know, but either way I am not going back into that madhouse.
I jog quickly, covering my arms against the wind at the same time, and shrug the hoodie up over my head. Cold out here. November, I think. Or maybe it’s not anymore and it is December now. Time seems to have slipped away from me. Days and weeks have blended into nothing more than darkness and light, if there was any ever real sense of light at Malachi’s.
When I’m far enough away, I take some breaths and slow to a walk, trudging onwards to continue picking my way across a pathway of dirt and grass. The house. Nothing else matters than getting to that at the moment. I’ll deal with whatever is going on with Gray at another time, or perhaps never if this is his idea of the truth. Me is the important thing now. Getting me away from this place and back to the land of sanity and realism. He was right to a degree, things seem clearer now, less murky, even if the thought of him still batters around inside me constantly. Maybe the pills were altering me, changing what I saw or thought, how I behaved. I liked them, though. Liked the way they helped me evolve, grow.
Half the field passes me by before I look up and notice a fence rounding the grounds. It’s wire, almost seamlessly blending against the sky behind it. High, too. I glance up and down the fence line, looking for an opening. Nothing. It just looks like an endless run of barrier in both directions. And then I hear something behind me. I turn to look at it and find a man running, white clothes cutting a fast pace through the dark ground beneath him to get to me. I can hear the thudding from here, his feet slamming on the ground in chase.
Thud, thud, thud. Thud, thud, thud.
It’s not my thud, though.
Not Gray’s either.
And I am not going back there.
My legs take off, thighs and calves burning under the exertion to get me away from him. There’s nowhere to go. All there is is this fence line keeping me trapped behind borders, away from the rest of the world. I sprint, though. I sprint with everything I’ve got, chasing the wire down in hope of an opening somewhere, and run for my life. The head wind doesn’t help. It pounds against me, tiring what is already exhausted before I’ve managed to get far enough away or put enough distance between us.
But there … there. I can see it in my line of sight, a gateway, tarmac road.
I’m not fast enough.
Something catches hold of my arm, hauling me back towards it no matter how much I struggle. I twist, turn, slam my foot down in the hope of hitting his, and then send my hands flying at his face, but still the arms seem to have me in a vice like grip. Each touch from him seems practised, making me howl and scream, as he pulls me into a position I can’t get out of. One o
f my arms twists up behind me, his own going up to my chest to hold me still, and then something puts pressure on the back of my knees.
I hit the ground hard, shins and ankles cracking under the weight of him smothering me into place.
“Calm down,” he says, his breath ragged.
No. I’m not calming down. I am fighting and running and getting the hell away from wherever this is. I tug again, using all my strength to get out of the hold I’m in, and push forward again to get to my feet. My ankle is grabbed, sending me straight back down to the ground, and then he’s over my back and sitting on me to keep me still.
“Asshole,” spits out of me.
My hand whirls round, body still winding and snaking under him to get out, and I grab hold of his ear. He curses and pushes down on me harder, digging his hand into the back of my neck to hold me still. Fuck him. My ass rises, bumping him up off me for a few seconds, and I try again to get out only to be met with a slap so hard on the back of my head I slump forward.
My head’s squashed into the dirt, face ground into it, as more curses come out of his mouth, and then the weight begins easing slightly, irrespective of both my hands being grabbed and pulled up behind me.
“Still being rebellious, I see,” Gray’s voice says from somewhere.
The chuckle at the end of it, and the part shock of him at all, makes my head spin towards him ready to rip a few curse words of my own, until I see him sitting on the other side of the fence.
On a horse. A horse?
Where did a horse come from?
I gape, unable to articulate what any of that bizarre vision means to me, or why I can’t talk, and take the look of him in. Casual, black jeans and a brown jacket, heavy boots more reminiscent of Malachi than him. The whole sight is off. No suit. No sharpness other than the usual arrogance cutting his jaw like glass and his dark eyes staring back.
He arches a brow at me and walks the horse a little closer, covering ground slowly until he’s up against the wire. “Let her go, Ridley,” he says.
A Sorrow of Truths Page 8