âYou need time from the memories, Megan,â Gerard said. âYou need someone to listen. Help. Support.â
âAnd that would be you, of course.â
âExactly. Have the nightmares stopped since you arrived here?â
Megan turned away. âPlease, Iâm not ready for this. I canâtââ She shoved away from the post. There was the sadness again, not only in her eyes, but in every inch of her body.
âKirstie told me about her blackouts,â Gerard said. âDid she mention to you that she was afraid she was being poisoned?â
Meganâs expression froze, her eyes darkened with shock. âShe told you that? Why didnât she say something to me about it?â
âYou refused to take her case.â
âOf course I did. She needs a neurologist.â
Gerard shook his head. âYou still think that?â
Megan raised an elegantly arched brow. âWhat would you say if I told you she warned me recently that I could be in danger?â
A silver blade sliced through the curtained exam room, its target the helpless patient of Dr. Megan Bradley. The hand that held the blade was crusted with grime, fingernails whitening as it squeezed the handle with the force of fury. Megan clutched the cold steel of a revolver in her hand, aimed it at the faceless attackerâs chest and pulled the trigger.
No burst came from the chamber. No sound touched her at all. She tried to scream. Silence. The blade reflected Meganâs contorted features as it plunged downward again. The pressure of her scream threatened to explode from her chest. She fought her way out of the silent nightmare of a Corpus Christi rescue mission clinic and into her soft bed in the darkness of her tiny cabin in the Missouri woods.
âNo!â She battled the blankets and sat up, still seeing the sweet, dark-haired young homeless woman with the huge belly. âOh, Joni, no.â
Megan squeezed her eyes shut at the hideous memory that repeated itself far too often at nightâ¦the killer ripping his way through the curtained cubicleâ¦the bloodâ¦the screams mingling with the recoil of Meganâs weapon as the loud report deafened her. She watched the grimy killer hit the floor, splattering blood and ripping a section of the curtain from the ceiling. And then she slid through the blood to Joniâs side to find the young womanâs eyes staring into nothing.
Gerard Vance rushed into the ruined cubicle, his head brushing the rails that held the curtain, his shoulders framing him as he entered. At the sight of Joni, his face filled with grim pain. He dropped to his knees at Meganâs side without a glance at the dead man tangled in the fallen curtain. âIâve got your back, Megan. Donât look at him. Letâs get the baby out.â
With his aid, Megan held her tears and controlled her hands, performing a postmortem C-section, sickened by the desecration of her sweet young patientâs body. The cry of little Daria, Joniâs orphan, soon filled the clinic, the sound of life echoing past her young motherâs death.
Megan forced away the malignant memory, forced herself to breathe slowly, forced her eyes to open. She brushed the hair from her face and focused on her surroundings, anything but the reason sheâd fled Corpus Christi. A slight breeze outside moved a tree branch across the window beside her bedâa lifeline to reality. A trickle of moisture drew her fingers to her neck; she touched the droplets of perspiration.
She blinked slowly and in that brief moment she was attacked once more by the memory of her own contorted features in the killerâs knife blade, like a misshapen mirror. The dregs of the nightmare mingled with reality.
She flung the blanket from her legs and leapt from the bed. âWake up,â she muttered into the chilly one-room cabin. âStop this. Youâre doing it to yourself, Megan.â
Talking to herself, yes, but even the sound of her own voice helped break the spell. Inhaling deeply and then exhausting her lungs of air, as if she could cleanse her system of the weight of knowledge with the carbon dioxide, she kept her attention on the movement of that one branch outside the nearest window. Though gray in the night, she knew she would see the green color of life when the sun rose. Focus on the hope of dawn.