The Haunted (Sarah Roberts 12) (15 page)

With a strong yank, she almost snapped it out of his grasp. Mustache man was already getting up off the floor.

Forcefully, performing a version of bed tug of war, she backed out of the room as the attendant holding the other end of the bed slipped on the leftover foam from the fire extinguisher. People walked back and forth behind her in the corridor. Rooms were open, patients stumbling around, some agitated, their mental state disrupted with the violence of the alarm moments before.

Two feet out of the door, someone banged into her back as they scuttled by. A woman shrieked from Sarah’s left side. An old man, graying hair, stopped and peeked into her room. He looked back at Sarah with a blank stare on his face.

Then mustache man, a syringe in hand, jumped up on the bed, a wicked grin on his face. The bed blocked the entrance to the room as the other attendant held firm to his side. She had nowhere to go and tied to the bed as she was, would not be able to escape the needle.

In quiet desperation, she gritted her teeth, clenched her jaw, leaned back and planted her feet, pulling and yanking, but it was no use. With the other guy pulling back and mustache man on the bed, she was stuck.

He crawled forward and hopped off on her side.

“You’re really something, aren’t you?” he said, waving the needle back and forth. “Thought you could kill your doctor and just walk out of here?”

“Something like that. Truth is elusive. Like me. Elusive.” She winked.

“Somehow I doubt that, crazy bitch.” He stepped toward her.

“Buck cherry.”

He stopped and looked at his partner who had climbed up on the bed and was exiting the room on the bed that still blocked the door.

“What?”

“You just quoted a song by them. Buck Cherry sings a song called Crazy Bitch.”

“Fuckin’ looney tunes is what you are.” He took the last step toward her. “Hold her,” he said to the other guy.

The patients sauntering about had thickened. Some scrabbled on the floor by the wall as if they were searching for lost coins or mementos of a past when sanity wasn’t so fleeting.

Sarah stepped back from them, but didn’t have far to go as someone moved in between mustache man and her.

Helena, the woman who stuck her head in Sarah’s door earlier and told her about the burning that comes in the night.

“No one touches her,” Helena shouted.

The other attendant shoved Helena aside, then turned to Sarah, his nostrils flaring, eyes red.

“You’ll go down heavy for this and I’ll be there to watch you suffer in here where you’ll rot away under my loving care.”

“Fuck you. I’ll kill you next.”

Then Helena was back. She landed on the attendant’s back, wailing and shrieking, pulling clumps of his hair out. The patients around them stirred into a frenzy. The look of fright on mustache man’s face intensified as he fought off two old men who crowded him.

Sarah eased the bed back and stepped away from the pandemonium as it grew in degrees by the second. One moment they were talking in the corridor, the next, five patients were taking down mustache man as Helena still clung to the other attendant who was now on his knees.

“Should’ve treated them better,” Sarah shouted. “Consequences are always due, paid in full.”

When she had available room, she swung the bed around and started down the hallway, her wrists chafed and raw now from all the twisting and turning.

At the end of the hall, the door leading to the dining room was wide open. She pushed through it and continued to parts unknown.

Then another alarm sounded.

People from the acute ward were escaping. Court-ordered patients were getting out. A full-scale riot was taking place in front of her old room. Backup was coming. The odds of leaving decreased every second she was still inside, cuffed to a bed on wheels.

“Vivian! What now?” she asked as she hit a door on the other side of the dining room.

It was locked.

When she turned around three men in white coats, two flanking the one with a needle held high, entered on the other side. The two on either side had to be the muscle with one of them at least six and a half feet tall.

“Got something here to put you to sleep.” The man held the needle high with pride, as if it was an olympic torch. “For a century.”

Sarah pushed down on her side of the bed, lifted the other end and spun it around to face the trio.

“I was told three assholes would show up for dinner. I didn’t believe them. Man, was I wrong.” She lowered her head, closed her eyes and whispered to Vivian. Images of Vivian’s violation filtered through, bringing goose bumps to her arms and neck. Fury seethed through her. She inhaled deeply, tightened her jaw and looked up.

All three men started running at her.

Chapter 23

Firefighters were already on scene. Police cruisers were coming in behind the ambulance as Aaron’s driver pulled up to the front doors.

“Try to stay out of the way,” the driver said as he exited the vehicle.

Aaron jumped out and stayed off to the side. When he was sure no one was watching him, he started for the side of the building. Firemen ran in the front doors, followed by paramedics. Police stood around and talked to nurses and male attendants. It was chaos, but under control. That allowed him to become unseen.

He used bushes for cover as he slipped along the side of the building until he reached an open door. Adults in disarray, some dressed in pajamas, some in robes, loitered in the area of the trimmed hedges. Some stood on the finely cut grass and others wandered back and forth along the sidewalk. One old woman mumbled to herself, another argued with a wooden bench. A man wore something on his head that resembled a hockey helmet. He felt sorry for the lot of them and the mental demons they carried.

Then he turned and entered through the open side door and ran along a corridor knocking doors open, shouting Sarah’s name.

If she was in here somewhere, he would find her.

If someone had hurt her, he would hurt them.

If someone had killed her—

He let the thought go as he unlocked the door at the end of the hall and entered a dining area littered with tables and chairs.

To his surprise, Sarah was right in front of him. From five feet away he saw that she was tied to a gurney or bed on wheels of some kind. She appeared to be using it as a weapon between her and the three men who were advancing from across the wide room.

“Hey!” Aaron shouted. Sarah spun toward his voice, her hair flying up. He broke into a run, heading straight for the largest man, who had to be over six feet tall.

The man slowed and prepared for Aaron, but nothing could be ready for Aaron’s anger, his raw fury at seeing Sarah in this state.

Three quick strides later and he was on them. A fast jump to give them the wrong impression and then Aaron slipped to the floor, slid a few feet on the polished wood, and jabbed open palmed at the large man’s heels before he could retreat. Aaron counted on the large man being slow on his feet. The contact was clean, snapping something on the inside. The six-foot-plus man yelped and dropped hard, the floor vibrating with the fall. Aaron rolled twice to avoid being landed on.

Aaron rose to his feet and ran at the remaining two. The man in the middle held a syringe and continued toward Sarah, but the other had turned to challenge Aaron.

He stepped in close to the guy, who grabbed Aaron’s lapels in both hands. Aaron shot his right arm across his body to dislodge one of the man’s hands from his shirt, then lifted his arm up high, spun it out and around the man’s other arm that still held on. After it was fully wrapped, Aaron lifted up, trapping the man’s arm. His opponent’s elbow bent in a way it wasn’t made to. When the pressure was at the breaking point, Aaron jerked upward. The man’s elbow popped under the strain. He screeched when Aaron released the arm and it flopped the opposite way, bouncing in a sick fashion. The man fell to his knees, staring at his ruined arm as if it was a mad disease about to consume him.

Aaron wasted no time admiring his handiwork as he turned his attention to the last man, still holding the needle, who had stopped to watch what Aaron had done.

“You aren’t a patient,” the man said, more a statement than a question.

“Drop the needle and walk away or you’ll be a patient at the local hospital for a long time.” He pointed at Sarah and bellowed, deep and raspy, “Nobody threatens my woman.”

People were entering the cavernous room behind Aaron. He heard them but didn’t turn around.

“Aaron.” Parkman’s voice, warning, cautioning. “The police are here now. That’s enough.”

“It’s never enough. Drop the fucking needle and step off.”

The man seemed to think about it. Aaron stepped forward and jerked as if he was going to jab or punch. The man flinched and tossed the needle. It landed harmlessly ten feet away.

“There,” the man said. “You happy?”

Aaron moved toward Sarah. As he stepped past the man, he elbowed the side of his head. The guy yelped and bent at the waist.

“Now I’m happy,” Aaron said as he wrapped his arms around Sarah. She couldn’t hug him back as her hands were still bed-bound. “Are you okay?”

She nodded against his shoulder.

People stepped in closer, uniformed police officers surrounding them.

“Sarah Roberts,” Kershaw said. “You’re going to have to come with us.”

She pulled back from Aaron. “Am I under arrest?” she asked.

“We’ll talk at the station.”

“I’m not going anywhere with you.” Sarah turned to Aaron. “Find me some keys and get me the hell out of these things. Then take me to a hotel. I need sleep, food, and whiskey, but not in that order.”

“I’m afraid I can’t let you do that,” Kershaw said.

“Why the fuck not?” Aaron asked, moving toward Kershaw.

Parkman’s hand landed on Aaron’s shoulder. “Calm, man. This is Kershaw. He isn’t the enemy. Be cool.”

“A woman,” Kershaw said, “as of yet to be identified, was found deceased in Sarah’s car. There are other questions that need answering like what happened here. Once everything is sorted out, we’ll see where that takes us. But for now, I’m requesting Sarah come with us.” He faced Sarah, a stern grimace creasing his features. “If you refuse, I will have to arrest you.”

Sarah redirected her attention to Aaron’s eyes. “It’s okay. I’ll go with him.”

“You know how I feel about this,” Aaron said, directing it to Kershaw.

“I know what I’m doing,” Sarah said to him.

Aaron stepped back.

Sarah addressed Kershaw, the bed shaking. “I go willingly on one condition.”

Kershaw raised his eyebrows and glanced at Parkman who smiled and nodded. “What’s the condition?” Kershaw asked.

“Through that door and down the hall.” She pointed. “Inside the room that had the fire, there are a pile of boxes. Some of them burned, some aren’t. Inside those boxes you’ll find a lot of interesting documents. Proof and evidence that was meant to be destroyed in the fire. Retrieve that, seize it, tell them you’re taking it out to be destroyed, get a warrant, whatever. I don’t care how you do it, just get them and keep them safe. Then I’ll come willingly. Those are my terms. Meet those terms, or a lot of people will be visiting the hospital because I’ve got a very angry pit bull beside me who will do as I say.”

“Fuckin’ right,” Aaron shouted. “Who’s first?”

Kershaw moved closer to Sarah. “I won’t agree to those terms because you’re coming with us whether you want to or not. My officers won’t be cowed or threatened. But I will secure those items because it’s something I want to do.” He motioned for his men to leave. Three men ran out of the dining area toward the room that had burned. “Because of my long-term friendship with Parkman, and I know how he feels about you, I’ll let your threat go.” He stepped back and spoke to the officers behind her. “Undo those cuffs and take her to the car.” He stole a glance at Aaron. “Take him, too.”

“Fuck this up, Kershaw, and it’ll be your career,” Sarah said. “I’ll see to it. That’s not a threat. That’s a promise and I never bluff. If you lose Cole Lincoln, he will strike again. Take me for now. But it’s Cole you should be after.”

“Tell me all that and more at the station.”

Two men grabbed Aaron’s arms and led him away. He allowed it as struggle now would be futile. As he neared the door he heard Kershaw ask Sarah a question.

“Tell me Sarah, how did you know my name?” Kershaw asked. “We haven’t met.”

“Sometimes, I just know things,” Sarah said.

Aaron looked over his shoulder. She was turned toward Parkman as they worked on her wrist cuffs. “Or maybe Parkman used it once already. Come on, Kershaw. Is that the extent of your detective career? You’re going to have to be more observant.”