Authors: Chelsea Cain
Archie pulls his hand away and clears his throat.
Gretchen sweeps her hair back and lifts her head. “All that fury,” she says, “and you still think the Beauty Killer is a man?”
Archie looks at Gretchen Lowell, just a few feet away from him, and he knows that he can never allow her into the investigation. He will just have to tell Buddy no. It’s too dangerous. But not in the way he first thought.
“Hi,” says a voice from the doorway.
Archie’s heart skips. Debbie.
He turns, and there, in the doorway, stands his wife carrying a bag of takeout.
She holds it up and smiles, and then raises a quizzical eyebrow at Gretchen.
How to explain this?
“This is Gretchen Lowell,” Archie says. “She’s a psychiatrist. She’s going to be consulting with us.” He pushes back his chair, gets up, walks over to his wife, and kisses her lightly on the lips. “My wife, Debbie.”
C H A P T E R 21
It had been fifteen minutes since Archie had taken the pill.
Bedtime at Bedlam was nine o’clock. Sedatives were passed out at eight-thirty. Archie didn’t need to stay up long. He just needed to stay up longer than Frank. He was hoping that the five cups of coffee he’d had since dinner would buy him some time.
Unlike regular meds, which they made you line up for, the night nurse delivered the sedatives right to the room. They didn’t want you taking a sleeping pill and then falling flat on your face before they could tuck you in. It was the same every night. This time, Archie needed it to be different. Frank and Archie were in their respective beds. Frank’s light was off; Archie kept his on. He usually read in bed, but he couldn’t risk dozing off. Instead Archie rested on his side, listening to the sound of Frank breathing.
The pill made his blood feel warm. He had to fight it. Concentrate on blinking, prying open the lids that wanted to stay closed.
Frank shifted in his bed, sighing and chomping.
Frank, who had arrived two weeks after Archie checked himself in, and who was always around, just in earshot.
Archie’s eyes closed. He liked the sedatives. It was the closest feeling to Vicodin that they allowed him. He liked the feeling of his body letting go, of giving in.
Frank took in a great rattling breath and released a slow snore.
Archie opened his eyes, glanced up at the surveillance camera in the corner of the room, and reached up and turned off the light.
With the lights off, the camera was useless.
He waited, counting Frank’s snores.
When he got to ten, Archie got out of bed and felt his way around the perimeter of the room to Frank’s built-in Formica dresser. Archie slid the drawers out slowly, as quietly as he could, and felt inside, running his hands along the sides of each drawer and shuffling through the clothing. He didn’t know what he was looking for, but if Gretchen had gotten a phone to Archie, maybe she had gotten something to Frank, too.
But Archie found nothing.
He got down on the floor and ran his hand underneath Frank’s bed. Frank made a garbled noise and turned over on his side. Archie froze. And waited. When Frank’s snoring became rhythmic again, Archie got up, went back to his own bed, sat down, reached under the blanket and felt around until he found the phone he’d hidden there.
Gretchen had him chasing his own shadow.
Archie sat there, in the dark, for a long time. Then he looked down at the phone, highlighted the single number in the log, and pressed call.
It picked up on the second ring.
He listened to it for a long moment. He listened for her breathing, for the catch of saliva in her throat, an involuntary sigh. Nothing.Only dead air. He could still hang up.
Next to him, Frank snored peacefully.
“Are you there?” Archie said quietly.
He heard her exhale slowly, as if she’d been holding her breath. “Darling,” she said. “I’ve been worried about you.”
It had been so long since he’d heard her voice that he had forgotten how lovely it was, her perfect enunciation and honey tones. The effects of the pill vanished. Archie lay back in bed. “We had an agreement,” he said.
“I’ve been waiting for your call,” Gretchen said.
“Here I am,” Archie said.
“Are you having fun?” she asked.
It was a game to her, like tossing a ball for a dog. She was exercising him. “I’m giving you the chance to turn yourself in,” he said.
There was a pause. “Or what?”
Archie gritted his teeth, and his fist tightened around the phone. “I’m coming for you.”
“Oh, goody,” she said.
She hung up and Archie rested the phone on his chest under the blanket.
It was quiet.
Frank wasn’t snoring.
“Frank?” Archie said into the darkness. “You awake?”
Frank didn’t answer. Maybe he was plotting how to murder Archie in his sleep.
Archie felt the slippery warmth of the sedative take hold again. This time, he surrendered to it. His last awareness was the weight of the phone still sitting on his chest.
C H A P T E R 22
Archie bolted upright in bed to the sound of screaming.
He turned on the light, took a couple of breaths, and tried to order his thoughts. Frank snored softly in his bed. It was dark outside.
Life in the psych ward was basically made up of long periods of boredom punctuated by shouting.
Screaming at night? Not so unusual.
Except that this scream was not the scream of someone ranting. This was authentic terror.
Archie got up, put on his slippers, and went to the door. The patients weren’t supposed to leave their rooms at night. It was the kind of thing that earned you a demerit and cost you privileges. Archie listened through the door as the conversation outside heightened. He heard the word “police.”
He opened the door.
Courtenay’s room was the fourth door on the left. A nurse was sitting on the floor just outside it being comforted by the orderly who’d tried to help Courtenay in the break room. George.
Courtenay’s door was open.
Archie walked down the hallway. Other doors opened, as patients began to peer out, but none of them dared enter the corridor. Only Archie. George looked up at Archie as he approached, his hand still patting the distraught nurse. Her face was flushed, the color of the scrubs.
Archie got to Courtenay’s door and looked inside. The mattress on the floor was soaked with blood. And on top of it lay Courtenay. At first glance, she looked like she was sleeping. She was resting on her back, her arms at her sides. Her eyes were closed. Her lips slightly parted. She looked like a fairy-tale princess waiting for a kiss.