Orla nodded, not sure if she could stand, let alone run away.
When she put weight on her feet, they stung. She’d only walked a few times since Crow had brought her to the asylum. Her muscles groaned in protest.
She put most of her weight on Ben, and he held her around the waist, supporting her to a cold, sterile room with a bathtub in the center.
She sat on a hard wooden chair and watched as he filled the bathtub with steaming water. He produced a bar of soap and a washcloth from a bag.
When she settled into the water, the bite marks stung, but she sank deeper.
She had no memory of the assault. She’d lost consciousness seconds after Frederic extinguished the candle, but her body remembered.
She soaked until the water turned cold. Ben sat in the chair, facing away from her and reading a book.
“What are you reading?” she asked him.
He lifted his head but didn’t turn.
“’The Hobbit’,” he said, holding up the book.
Orla smiled.
She and Liam had read The Hobbit together. Well, not together, but simultaneously. They’d spoken on the phone after each chapter, gushing about the giant spiders of Mirkwood, and later about the hideous wargs. They plotted their own hobbit-style adventures in the days before Liam met Erin and shifted his focus to building a family.
“I love that book,” she said.
He turned, saw her nakedness, and quickly twisted away.
“Really? I’ve read it five times,” he admitted.
“Can you help me out of the bath?” she asked.
He set the book on his chair and moved to the tub. He tilted his face away, his cheeks red as he touched her slippery body. She grimaced at the pain but gritted her teeth and limped back to the room.
Ben looked at his watch.
“Crow will be here in two hours. Please, don’t tell him about the bath.”
“I won’t,” she assured him.
He offered her a clean nightgown and underwear. When she lay back on the bed, he left the straps undone.
“I’ll have to secure them, but I’ll wait another hour, okay?”
“Thank you,” she murmured. “What will he do?” she asked, nodding at her beaten body.
Ben frowned.
“I don’t know.”
But when Crow arrived, he did nothing. He paused, gazed at the bruises distastefully, and then went about his usual work administering truth serum, drilling her with questions, and then forcing her to touch a variety of objects. He wrote down his observations.
In the hall outside the room as the doctor left, Ben stopped him.
“Dr. Frederic raped her,” Ben said, his voice rising.
“And what proof do you have of that?” Crow hissed.
“Didn’t you see her body? The bruises?”
“Doctor Frederic is an esteemed colleague, a highly accomplished doctor, and a value to this institution. I suggest you keep your outlandish accusations to yourself.”
“But-” Ben started.
“Enough,” Crow barked.
Orla heard the sounds of his steps fading down the hall.
Orla woke that night disoriented, but sure of one thing: no straps held her bound to the bed.
She fumbled her blanket away, but the gloves made getting her bearings more complicated. She forced them off, clutching the mattress and swinging her legs to the floor.
Orla stumbled into the dark hall. Her legs, weak, wobbled beneath her. She huffed, unable to catch her breath, and forged on despite the dizziness pulling her sideways.
Pausing, she pressed a hand against a wall.
Screams, sobs, the faces of a dozen people in various states of despair exploded in her mind. She reeled away, turned, pushed her hands out to keep from falling. This time her hand caught on the back of a wheelchair abandoned in the hall. Its last occupant reared up in her vision. A young woman who fought with her husband, who went into the asylum with big dreams, a wild spirit, but emerged catatonic and compliant.
“No more,” Orla mumbled, curling her hands against her chest. She was in the bowels of the asylum, in a dark place, a forgotten place. Crow had hidden her there, knowing they would not find her.
“Have to get out,” she cried. Tears streamed down her cheeks. Her leg buckled, and she fell to one knee. Pain exploded in her kneecap and her arms swung out for a safehold. She found nothing and hit the ground with a thwack, smacking her face on the cement floor. Another explosion of pain in her chin and jaw.
The drugs were too powerful, impossible to hold on to consciousness.
She lay her cheek on the cold, hard ground, legs splayed out behind her. A mass of sticky warmth spread out from her face, a bloody nose, she thought. The darkness crept toward her, softening the edges, pulling her gently away from awareness.
Ben’s face hovered above her. His brow wrinkled, his hands moving quickly as he wiped her face.
Orla had a vague memory of the previous night. Somehow, she’d gotten loose, fled into the hallway. She had not escaped.
“I shouldn’t have undone the straps. I didn’t think you’d try to escape. I just wanted you to be able to defend yourself. That was stupid,” Ben fretted, hurriedly lifting her from the floor.
She whimpered and bit back the pain.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, we don’t have much time.” He carried her back to the bed, hoisting her on top.
He strapped her to the bed, and seconds later, Dr. Crow strode in, Dr. Frederic behind him.
Chapter 36
Liz
Liz found Hazel and Abe in Grady’s Diner, hunched over a map.
“He cut a piece of her hair,” Hazel said. “Who does that?”
“But she never saw him act violent? He never tried to hurt her?”
“No, and she wouldn’t have lied. She wasn’t protecting him.”
“Hi!” Liz said.
They both looked up, surprised. Abe glanced down at the map.
“I left you a message yesterday, Abe. You never called me back.”
Hazel scooted over, and Liz slid into the booth beside her.
Abe brushed a hand through his hair and sighed.
“I’m sorry, Liz. My brain has been hijacked by tips since that article came out.”
“Who cut whose hair?” Liz asked.
“Remember the guy with the gold sports car?” Hazel asked.
“Spencer,” Liz stated. She remembered. Did either of them believe she did anything except think about the cases, wonder who stole her daughter, who ended her bright, beautiful life full of promise?
“I spoke with a girl yesterday who dated him last summer. He cut a piece of her hair.”
“Why?”
“He claimed she had gum in it, but she clearly didn’t believe him. It creeped her out.”
“What did she look like?” Liz asked.
Hazel’s eyes darted to Abe.
“Long blonde hair, green eyes, very pretty,” Hazel admitted.
Liz bit her lip. Susie had long blonde hair and green eyes. Jerry sometime called her his green-eyed beauty.
“Did Susan have any connection to the Leelanau Peninsula?” Abe questioned Liz.
She frowned and shook her head.
“What kind of connection? She liked to go to the beach out there. All the kids did, because of the sand dunes. She never dated anyone who lived there. Spencer is a name I would not have forgotten.”