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“I’m impressed, detective,” Larkin says, and I can hear the arrogance in his voice. He thinks he’s won, that I’ve stepped over my hard-drawn line in the sand. “Mister Carson will be well on his way to the elite by this evening. I’ve already prepared additional security measures. Just think: your career will be made by the end of the night.”
I hang up.
By the end of the night, I won’t have a career. The plan is not to bring in the Alpha; it’s to end the threat.
For good.
13
Identity Crisis
Avery
Despite fighting my way into a fitful sleep, I slept undisturbed, not even stirring at three a.m. to the usual rocking—the never-ending motion of the boat that haunts my nights. Once the letter was written, and the truth as I want to present it was made manifest, my screams didn’t break the night, my nightmares held back as if Quinn’s hand never left mine.
Quinn had already left by the time I woke, leaving behind his own letter. Which didn’t acknowledge my statement, only reiterated in his own candid, protective way that I wasn’t to leave his apartment without officer detail.
I didn’t need them. I planned to accept Aubrey’s offer to oversee my lab so I could take the day off. I’m not needed at the lab, anyway—not really. My emotional state is causing anxiety for my techs, and I know what a hectic work environment that creates.
It’s stressful enough as it is. The pressure to examine five victims and then reexamine every time new information is discovered by a detective. I usually excel under pressure, but there’s a limit, and nothing within me wanted to meet that challenge this morning.
For one short moment, when I first awoke in Quinn’s bed, with his masculine scent embracing me, it was bliss. A blank slate, the mind empty of all painful memories, and then the flood of awareness. The violent reminder of trying to atone for my sins was accompanied with physical pain, tangible proof that I’m mentally devolving.
I dread Sadie’s reaction when she discovers I put our secret into words. Given Quinn hard evidence to tie me to Price Wells. I penned the letter to him in a fit of delirium, and I’m not even sure what I divulged—other than I took full responsibility.
Sadie’s name was not mentioned. Every action she took to plot and execute Wells’ demise, I claimed for myself. Regardless if Quinn will puzzle out all the altered details behind my statement, the proof I provided him will only testify that I killed my abductor.
There is liberation in acceptance.
I didn’t even feel this free when I was unshackled from that dungeon.
I’m not a martyr—I don’t think that highly of myself; I’m not selfless. I’m just doing what’s right by the woman who avenged me.
Will I see that look in Sadie’s eyes afterward? The one that pities me for being so weak?
The truth is: I’m not as strong as her. I’m not sure if that revelation calms or frightens me, but I’m at least certain in my role. I’m not her.
Wells dressed me like her, made me relive the torture she endured. She was only sixteen when she was abducted and exposed to this world’s cruelty. Somehow, she survived, and she channeled her painful experience into strength, where she not only stands up to monsters like her abductor; she seeks them out. Punishes them. Her existence in this turbulent world means less people will suffer because of her.
Me? I barely escaped my dungeon. Having felt what Sadie did broke me. I put myself together for a short time, but I also used alcohol and my designer aphrodisiac just to feel normal.
Then when confronted with having to live that torture all over again…I cracked. Within twenty-four hours, I’ve exposed Sadie and myself, and now I’m tempted to expose us even further—
—just to make it end. Just to hear the blessed hum of silence and to make the inner voice shouting in my head shut the hell up.
“The fuming chamber is ready, Doctor Johnson,” Natalie says, awakening me from my destructive daze.
I run my forearm across my brow, wiping at the clamminess of my skin. The humidity in the lab is stifling. “Thanks, Natalie. Please let Doctor Paulson know we’re about to begin.”
She trots off, always striving to impress. She’ll make a good medical examiner in my absence. I should be alarmed at how at ease I am with that realization, but I’m not. I’m complacent.
I’m simply tired and ready for the relief that follows once I no longer have to hide my secrets. Repentance has to be the next step.
With gloved hands, I prep the hotplate, setting the temperature to 260 Fahrenheit. The process of lifting a latent fingerprint from a dead body is not an easy one. Rather, it’s downright impossible, unless the body was preserved in an ideal environment. Aubrey called this morning, sure he’d discovered a possible fingerprint on the back neck area of vic number five. There was no taking today off. There was no alternative.
I have to be here.
Aside from the third vic donning my lab coat, the Alpha made no other threats—leaving me to believe the other victims were simply discarded merchandise; test subjects no longer of use. If there is an auction tonight, keeping the ACPD busy chasing a killer is an ideal distraction. A sick logic, but the Alpha sacrificed some so the rest remain unseen.
