Lizzie was having a panic attack? Why? What had triggered it? Those questions rushed through Grace’s mind as Logan drove them to the hospital. Lizzie had been doing so well. Making so much progress. But Grace was intimately familiar with the fact that regressions were common.
Still…something had to have caused it.
Logan pulled into a parking spot, and Grace was out of the car before it came to a stop. She heard the curse from Logan seconds before he was by her side, hand on the small of her back. She looked up to see him scanning the parking lot like he was watching for—maybe even expecting—danger.
Pushing through the entrance doors, she jogged into the corridor, seeing Tyler down the hall. She’d almost reached Lizzie’s room when she heard it—loud cries. They sounded tortured, filled with raw fear. The sound had Grace’s spine tingling with dread.
Pushing inside the room, she stopped at the sight of Lizzie pressed into the corner of the room, knees pulled up to her chest and head in her knees. Exactly as Grace had been the other night at Logan’s.
The other therapist, Ted, was crouched in front of her, trying to talk, while a doctor stood at the back of the room, syringe in hand.
Walking forward, Grace placed a hand on the therapist’s shoulder. “Thanks, Ted. I’ve got it from here.”
He rose, nodding to the doctor before they both left the room. Grace turned to see that Logan remained, standing just inside the door. She moved over to him quickly. “Logan—”
“I’m not leaving.”
She frowned. “She’s not a danger to me. She fears men. And you can hear everything from the hall.”
His features remained hard. “I’ll stand in the corner.”
She wanted to argue, unsure why he was pushing the issue, but by the look of his set jaw, she knew it was a battle she wouldn’t win. “Fine, but this is the one and only time. And you need to sit down and try not to look so…big.”
Which was an impossible request, but she still said it.
Taking a calming breath, Grace turned back to Lizzie. The woman’s knuckles were white. Cries still wrenched from her chest, so fear-driven they made Grace’s heart hurt.
Moving closer, she crouched down. “Lizzie, it’s Grace.”
Nothing. No reaction whatsoever.
“I want to help you, Lizzie. Will you let me help?”
Again, nothing.
Grace tried a few other strategies, telling the woman she was safe. Reminding her of where she was. Even talking about the woman’s pet dogs back home.
Nothing seemed to work. So she changed tactics.
Pulling her phone from her pocket, Grace sat down, crossing her legs. Flicking through the tracks on her phone, she paused when she found the one she was looking for. It was one her therapist had played for her, and one she continued to listen to in her darkest moments.
There were no lyrics to the song, just calming, melodic piano music. She played it softly, every so often speaking words of safety. Reminding Lizzie that she was in Cradle Mountain with Grace. That no one would hurt her.
It took about eight minutes for Lizzie to go quiet. And another five for the violent shakes in her limbs to subside.
Eventually, Lizzie lifted her head. Her eyes were still slightly glazed. Her bottom lip trembling.
Grace kept her voice gentle. “Hi, Lizzie. It’s Grace. You’re at the Cradle Mountain Hospital, and you’re safe.”
She repeated the words she’d been saying for the last thirteen minutes. Panic attacks had a way of deafening people. Blocking out the world and only showing the ugly that existed in the mind.
“I’m not safe.” Her words were barely a whisper.
“You are safe, Lizzie. Security is guarding your room. I’m here. No one is letting anything happen to you.” She didn’t mention Logan. On the chance Lizzie hadn’t seen him, she didn’t want his presence sending her back into a panic.
Lizzie shook her head slowly. “No. He was here. I saw him.”
From her peripheral vision, she saw Logan leaning forward. She willed him to remain where he was, not wanting to lose any progress she’d made.
Lizzie said the next words so quietly, Grace almost missed them. “Ice was here.”
Ice? Here at the hospital? That wasn’t possible. “Sometimes after trauma, the mind can convince us of things that aren’t real.”
Lizzie was shaking her head before Grace had finished speaking. “No. He was here!”
Grace nodded slowly. The women had each provided descriptions of Ice, but they’d all been slightly different. Which was normal. Trauma could skew what a person remembered. “Okay, what did he look like?”
“My door was open, and he walked past. He looked different. His head was shaved, and he was wearing a huge sweatshirt that made him look bigger. It was when he looked up that I knew it was him. Not only did I see his eyes, but he was wearing the ring that he always wore. A ring with three skulls on it.”
Grace’s very bones chilled, a low buzz whistling in her ears. For some reason, that was a detail none of the women had mentioned before.
Kieran had worn a ring like that. On his middle finger.
She remembered the pain of the ring cutting through the skin of her cheek when he hit her. The way he habitually touched the ring with his thumb when he stood in front of her.
“He lifted his hand to touch his face. He did it on purpose. He wanted me to see. He always wore it on his—”
“Middle finger,” Grace whispered, finishing the woman’s sentence.
Grace worked hard to keep her breathing under control. She refocused on the music that still floated through the room, willing herself to remain in the moment.
She desperately tried for a small smile. “Even if the man you saw was from the compound, he can’t get to you. You have security stationed outside your door at all times. You’re protected.”
“For now.”
It was like Lizzie had plucked the words right out of her mind from eight years ago. Right before her father had stepped in.
Suddenly, every fear and insecurity that she’d worked so hard to control bubbled to the surface. It took every ounce of her strength to press it down. Suffocate it.
Lizzie didn’t need her fear, she needed reassurance that she was safe. That Ice hadn’t been in the hallway.
Grace locked her knees, forcing herself not to rise. Not to run or let her fear suffocate her. She remained on the hospital floor for a long time. Nodding. Smiling. Saying all the right things. All the things she knew Lizzie needed to hear. When inside, she was falling apart.
When she eventually left the room, she almost collapsed right there and then. Would have collapsed if Logan’s strong arm hadn’t wrapped around her waist and held her firm.
She leaned into him, sucking the breaths in hard and fast. “It’s him.”
Every second she’d been in that room, she’d felt more certain. Like, once the seed had been planted, it just continued to grow.
“How do you know?”
She tightened her grip on his arms, knowing her fingers were digging into his flesh. “He had the same skull ring.” It was one of the many things that haunted her nightmares. Grace breathed through her panic.
Without letting go of her, Logan reached for the phone in his pocket, placing it at his ear. “Steve, did you arrange for the hospital surveillance footage to be recorded?” Logan nodded as he listened. “I need access. Ice might be here in Cradle Mountain.”
Ice. Kieran. All this time, her enemy…the very man Logan was hunting.
“Thanks.” Glancing down at her, he put his phone away, then placed his hand on her cheek. It immediately calmed some of the storm raging inside her. “Do you want to watch the footage?”
No. But she needed to. She couldn’t leave here wondering. “Yes.”
His jaw ticked. He’d heard the lie. But she wasn’t changing her answer.
He turned his head to glance at Flynn. “Notify the team of what’s going on and keep your eyes peeled.”
Flynn nodded, having heard everything. He pulled out his phone.
Breathing out a heavy breath, Logan curved an arm around her waist and led her down the hall. They turned a corner and, at the end of that hall, another.
Logan stopped in front of a door and pushed it open. Inside sat two security guards with about a dozen screens in front of them.
One of the guards was just hanging up the phone. “Logan, I take it?”
He pulled her farther into the room. “We need to see the hallway footage outside room eight from about an hour ago.”
The guy nodded to the other guard, who immediately started pressing buttons. He pointed to a screen at the top. “This is the camera we’re looking at.”
It rewound for a few minutes before the footage played on a slow, fast forward. People came and went, none of them significant.
Then she saw him. A bald man, with a big, baggy sweatshirt.
Logan stepped forward. “Stop. Rewind about thirty seconds and play at normal speed.”
The guy did as asked. When the recording started, Grace took two large steps toward the screen. At first, it was impossible to see his face.
“Stop,” Logan said.
The recording stopped. The bald man was now looking up, right at the camera. Like he wanted them to see him.
“Can you enlarge that?” Logan asked.
The man enlarged it. Then enlarged it some more.
Suddenly, Grace’s entire body flooded with adrenaline that made her limbs weak. “It’s him.”
His dark eyes. The haunting face.
She was staring right at the man she’d never wanted to see again. The man who had tried to take everything from her.
Logan wrapped his strong arm around her again. His touch was her only anchor to reality. He spoke to the guards, but Grace barely heard.
Shortly after, he led her out of the room, basically carrying her because her legs were trembling so badly they almost didn’t work. Bit by bit, she was shutting down.
She was sure that if she tried to speak, no words would come out of her mouth. All she could think was one thing…
Get out. Out of Cradle Mountain. Leave. Disappear.
If Kieran was here, she couldn’t be.
Would she be able to disappear a second time? She couldn’t ask her father to risk his career and freedom again to create another identity for her. So what could she do?
When they got in the truck, she felt Logan’s eyes on her. But she didn’t say anything. She couldn’t.
He’d only been driving for a couple of minutes when his phone rang.
Using the car’s Bluetooth, he answered the call. “Wyatt, now’s not a good time.”
“A body was discovered on the outskirts of Cradle Mountain today. It’s been identified as Scott Pilgrig. He’s been dead for over a week.”
