Total pages in book: 120
Estimated words: 111860 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 559(@200wpm)___ 447(@250wpm)___ 373(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 111860 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 559(@200wpm)___ 447(@250wpm)___ 373(@300wpm)
“The lieutenant called me after he called you. I’m so sorry I got here after you did.” He looked to the side, and she saw the muscle in his jaw tighten. It wasn’t his fault, though. It was hers. Not only because she’d raced straight here with something to prove to herself but because she should have waited for backup, or had one of the officers walk with her down the block and stand guard as she checked out the scene. She hadn’t, though, because again, she was trying to force herself to employ mind over matter. And look what had happened.
She might have been killed this morning by a homeless junkie she’d thought was dead. He’d been so high he’d had superhuman strength. Three more seconds and she’d have died in a foul-smelling nylon tent on the street as a bus driving by covered her screams.
Or maybe she wouldn’t have died—not quickly anyway. Visions swarmed her mind, coming to her in bursts of horror. The officers looking around and seeing her gone, assuming she’d headed to some nearby store to question someone else, maybe, as they watched the bus trundle by the spot where they were standing? But instead, she’d be inside that small capsule with a drug-fueled monster. Something similar had happened the year before—a morning jogger had been attacked and dragged into a homeless encampment. She’d been raped and brutalized. And though Lennon hadn’t worked that case, sometimes she had nightmares about it anyway.
A moan sounded in the air, and she realized it was her, and so she clamped her lips shut and closed her eyes. Her skin felt hot and clammy, and her right eye was throbbing. Why was her eye throbbing so badly?
“Lennon.” His voice was soothing, and she realized her hands were covering his on her knees. The contact of his hands was keeping her from spiraling completely, and so she’d placed her palms on his knuckles to ensure he didn’t take them away.
“Come on,” he said, his voice so gentle it made her want to cry. “You need to be checked out.”
She looked up to see that an ambulance had arrived, and she shook her head. She didn’t want an ambulance or a hospital. She didn’t want strangers looking at her and knowing how weak she was. “Not just for your eye,” he said, sliding his hands out from under hers but then grasping them. “There might have been fentanyl in that tent or on that man. I’m going to get checked out too.” He pulled her up, and she was relieved to find that she could stand, and even walk. And so she did, allowing Ambrose to lead her to the ambulance.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Into the forest I go, to lose my mind and find my soul.
—John Muir
Seventeen Years Ago
Patient Number 0022
Thud, thud, thud, woosh, thud, woosh. Confusing sounds, bright, squeeze. Piercing cry, fear rising as his body was constricted, tight, tight, tight. Then flail. “I’m so glad you’re here. Look at you. Perfect. Wonderful.”
He heard the sounds, the voice, but he couldn’t make sense of the words, only the hushing, soft sound. The lessening fear. Thud, thud, thud. Softer now. And then warm, tight but not too tight. Good.
He slept, and in his dream, hands reached for him, grabbing. Tearing. Scared. He cried. Alone. No one. Cold. Empty. His stomach knotted.
“Shh.” The voice again. Then sweetness. Warm. The empty feeling abated, but the warm stayed. He moved back, forth, back, forth. Thud, thud, thud. The voice became song, and he floated. No dreams this time. No tearing, just warm.
Emptiness again. Fear. Then filled. Warm. Sweet. Good.
Thirsty. Drink. The song again. The one that meant back, forth, back, forth. Warm. Good. Thud, thud, thud.
Am I the song? Am I the thud? Am I the cold or the warm?
It didn’t matter. He didn’t care. He floated, and it was good. “There’s that smile. What a beautiful smile for a beautiful boy.”
Am I the smile? Am I the boy?
He became aware of something other than the empty and the warm and the cold, but he didn’t know what to call it. Soft, pressing. Tickle. Fuzzy. It touched him. It caressed him. He was . . . him. He had a body. He was inside a body with parts that could feel things. He was the boy. Happy. Good. Beautiful.
“What a good boy. A perfect boy. I’m so glad you’re here. You’re safe.”
The warm and the sweet and the full were safe. He drifted. He slept.
The cold came but was quickly replaced by warm. The empty widened but was soon made full. Back, forth, back, forth. The song rose and fell. Thud, thud, thud. Words whispered. Good. Beautiful. Safe.
He was the boy. The beautiful boy. The voice was happy. It sang him songs and hummed and hushed. The voice was good. The place was good. He was good. He was safe.