And when it did, the memories came flooding back.
She was seven years old again, trapped in her childhood bedroom.Smoke filled her lungs.Flames climbed the walls.Her parents screaming from somewhere downstairs.The smell of gasoline soaking into the carpet, into the curtains, into everything.
Because she could smell pure gasoline.
‘I need to leave.’Rebecca's voice came out strangled.‘I can't do this.’
‘Stop.’The therapist stood.‘This is part of the process.’
But Rebecca wasn't listening.The past wasn't past anymore.It was here.Now.She could feel the heat on her skin, hear the crackling of the fire, smell the gasoline spreading across the floor.
She spun around, darting towards the door, her only thought to escape this shack and rid the stench of gasoline off her clothes.
But as he reached for her handle, the therapist was suddenly there.His hand clamped around her wrist with an iron grip.
Rebecca's panic skyrocketed.She pulled and twisted, trying to wrench her arm free, but his hold was unyielding.
'Let me go!'Rebecca yanked her arm back, but his grip didn't loosen.She swung at him with her free hand, her fist connecting with something solid.The therapist grunted in pain but didn't let go, and so Rebecca unleashed a relentless assault; hands flailing, feet kicking, every ounce of her being consumed by a desperate need for freedom.She spiraled into a chaotic frenzy, and the next thing she knew, she had no feeling in her knuckles and blood running down her forearms.
But the therapist, unfazed by her resistance, clutched his hands on Rebecca’s neck and wrestled her to the cold floor.There was a maniacal look in his eyes, one that told Rebecca that all of their sessions and late-night talks had been part of a larger plan, one that had no intention of rehabilitating her.Her wrist was suddenly clasped by cold metal – the unmistakable click of handcuffs chaining her to something immovable.Rebecca screamed at a volume she didn’t know she had in her; deafening cries that penetrated the rotten old wood and bolted through the night.It was a desperate cry that would surely go unanswered in this remote shack, but she screamed until her lungs gave out, fueled by the overwhelming instinct to survive.
And then she saw the cigarette lighter in the therapist’s hand.
He was hanging onto the door frame, bruised and breathless, and time seemed to slow as he brought the lighter closer to the gasoline-soaked floor.
Flames spread across the floor in every direction, racing toward the walls.Heat slammed into Rebecca's face.Smoke filled her lungs.
The therapist stood in the doorway, silhouetted against the firelight.He watched her for a moment, then stepped outside and closed the door behind him.
She was seven years old again.
Except this time, there was no one coming to save her.
CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR
The precinct was dead, save for the occasional janitor gliding past her office window.Ella sat devouring Todd Williams’s notes on the therapy group while every other available officer patrolled the woods on the outskirts of the city.Ella wished she could join the scouting operation, but she had too much digging to do back here.
Ella rubbed her temples, feeling the onset of a headache.Todd’s notes were a jumble of observations, theories, and ramblings, seemingly without any coherent structure.It was clear that Todd had a keen eye for detail, but his method of documentation was chaotic at best.As she scrolled, she found snippets of conversations he’d had with other members, descriptions of group dynamics, and musings on the therapy methods.But it was all surface-level stuff, nothing that gave her the insight she needed.She had hoped for a breakthrough, but so far, Todd's notes were proving to be more of a distraction than a help.
The only thing Ella could really extract from the notes was a list of all the group members that Todd had met during his time there.Ella didn't know which ones were aliases and which ones were real, but it was useful data to have regardless.Todd had also done some of the legwork for her by looking into some of the names and suggesting their real names next to them.Perhaps he did have some journalistic integrity, she thought.
Just as Ella was about to delve deeper into the list of names, her cell phone rang.She glanced at the name, or lack of.
Unknown caller.
‘Hello?’she answered.
‘Hi, Miss Dark.It’s Doctor Sanchez from the Medical Examiner’s Office.’
‘Oh, hi Doctor Sanchez.You’re working late.’
‘Yes indeed.There’s a joke in our industry that we always work the graveyard shift.’
Ella had never met someone in the mortuary business that didn’t have a weird sense of humor.She guessed you had to in that job.‘Very good.How can I help you?’
‘Well, I found something you might be interested in.’
Ella’s ears perked up.‘I’m listening.’
