Lucidity

Chapter 11 - The Beast

Eve removed the last of the electrodes from Lukas’s shaved scalp. “Let’s go over everything we covered tonight,” she told him.

Lukas looked up at her with glassy blue eyes—his usual look, not a side effect of the Lucidine therapy. But he was more engaged now than he had been when they began therapy four months ago. He flexed and closed his long, skinny fingers but otherwise sat perfectly motionless, his body slumped in the chair, watching her with that almost-vacant stare as if trying to judge if she was real or not.

“Tell me about your wife.”

“Gracie. Gracie is my wife.” His face became animated, his gaze bounced around the room as if his wife hid in a corner.

“Is?” Eve frowned. Tonight’s session had been frustrating—all the ground she’d gained over the past four months lost again for unknown reasons. She pounded her fist against her thigh. Renee Redding was not going to like this. Not at all.

And if Renee wasn’t happy with Lukas’ progress, then Eve would lose the funding for her private clinic. “You mean, was, right?”

“No.” Lukas frowned, concentrated on twisting his wedding band. Eve had tried repeatedly to get him to stop wearing it, decided when that finally happened, she’d know that her treatment was a complete success. Until tonight, she’d thought that might be any day now. “Our fifth wedding anniversary is coming up this May.”

Damn it! She’d worked so hard—she couldn’t stand it that those idiot psychiatrists at Western Psych might be right. They’d had Lukas for almost four years and got nowhere—said his delusions were fixed, he was beyond treatment, psychotic.

But with the help of Lucidine, she’d been able to replace those delusions with a new reality, one that would render the man harmless to society. It was to be Lucidine’s greatest triumph when Lukas was re-evaluated in two weeks.

The launch pad for her own clinic, supported by the government grants Renee Redding promised her after she cured the lobbyist’s son. Renee also assured her a steady stream of private patients once Lucidine therapy was validated.

“Lukas,” she injected the venom she felt into her voice. “We’ve been through this. You and Gracie were married but what happened on your honeymoon? Do you remember driving home from the airport? The drunk driver swerving into your lane? Remember, Lukas?”

He squinted at her, brow creased in a frown as he tried to separate his delusions from the alternate reality Eve had programmed his brain to respond to. She leaned forward, took his hand. “Think, Lukas. Remember the blood? Her screams?”

He nodded as if in a trance. “I remember blood. I remember screaming.”

That was right, big boy. Only it had nothing to do with a drunk driver. When Eve first got Lukas, sent to her by his lawyer after a long court battle and a lot of string-pulling by his wealthy, politically connected mother, he’d thought every woman with dark hair or wearing white was his Gracie. It had taken a lot of creativity to devise a program of therapy for him. She hadn’t even had a photo of the real Grace to start with—the police had refused to release the file to her. But she’d begun with various stimuli and monitored Lukas’ response. Certain chairs became synonymous with Gracie as did knives with long, wicked blades. Anything the color of blood.

Finally, he’d begun to respond. Until tonight. Now Lukas fought her every step of the way.

“I had my hands around his throat,” he continued in a low whisper. “He deserved to die for what he did to my Gracie.”

Eve sighed, patted her hair back into place. They’d make more progress tomorrow. Now that Fate had intervened and deposited the real Grace into her hands, giving her the final trigger she needed to cure Lukas.

Eve would use Grace Moran’s presence to introduce more realistic stimuli and expedite the therapy. But time was running out. She needed to get Helman’s patient up here, under her control before Moran’s surgery. If the woman died under Helman’s knife, she was no good to Eve.

Grace Moran was the key to Eve’s future.

“That’s enough for tonight, Lukas. Let’s get you back in bed.”

She motioned for the orderly to go ahead and open the door to the locked ward. Lukas was its only resident and he was doing so well that during the daytime when there was enough staff, he was free to roam the unit. Not that he did. He spent most of his time in his room, working at the computer his mother had brought, only occasionally venturing to the door. Sometimes the nurses, who all believed the same fantasy Eve was programming him with, would coax him as far as the nurses’ station where they would play cards or give him a book to read.

Lukas stood, his gaze still fixed on his silver wedding band, shuffling toward the door. They headed toward the locked room at the end of the hall where the orderly waited. As they passed the nurses’ station Lukas suddenly froze, raised his head, eyes wide as he sniffed the air.

“She’s here! Gracie, where are you? Gracie—” His shouts reverberated through the empty corridor. He began pounding his fists on the closed doors along the hallway. Eve tried to grab his arm, but he flailed out, knocking her off her feet. The orderly dashed down the hall and tackled Lukas.

As they wrestled on the floor, Eve rushed to the medication cart inside the nurses’ station. In four months, he’d never been violent—what the hell had gone wrong? What had set him off? She punched in her security code and grabbed a syringe full of Haldol. Lukas blocked her way out, lunged at her, teeth bared.

“I know she’s in there!” he screamed at Eve. “Why are you hiding her from me?”

Eve looked around. Other than her, the nurses’ station was empty.

The orderly regained his feet and slammed Lukas against the wall. Lukas bucked and writhed against the bigger man’s weight, but this time the orderly was able to hold him.

It couldn’t be the Lucidine making him act this way. Eve jammed the needle into his biceps. It just couldn’t be.

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Grace cowered behind the cart rack, hidden in the shadows beneath the counter. Her hands covered her head, ready to ward off the blows that would come any second. The wasps tore through her skin, their exuberant buzzing ricocheting off the insides of her skull.

He was back, they said he was gone, had promised, but he was back, he was coming for her, all over again, it was happening all over again—and there was nothing she could do.

Her body trembled and sweat soaked the thin cotton scrub top she wore. She tasted blood, bit her lip harder in an effort to keep from screaming in terror.

Jimmy, come get me, take me home, please Lord, not again, Jimmy where are you? Her tears burnt her eyes, but Jimmy didn’t come.

Her eyes closed tight on a vision of blood, Jimmy’s face, but not Jimmy, not anymore—Lukas had won that time—and now it was just her, alone, Jimmy wasn’t here, wouldn’t come here, was powerless to stop Lukas—stop the Beast.

The screaming out in the hallway came to an abrupt halt. It was replaced by the sound of a man cursing and a body being dragged away. A door slammed shut. Then there was silence.

Dead silence.

Even the wasps seemed afraid to come out of hiding.

Grace peered through the spaces between her fingers. Nothing moved. She crawled away from the chart rack, dared to look out in the hall. She could see figures silhouetted behind the thick glass of the locked ward. No one else was visible.

Now or never.

She pushed off like a sprinter in the race of her life and ran down the corridor, not stopping until she was half way through the Skyway leading to the Annex. She didn’t dare to look back, just caught her breath and kept on running.

Not the Annex—she couldn’t bear to be alone, not now. Try for home? Jimmy would be there—or would he? What if she made it home and found it empty? No Jimmy, no Ingrid, no one to protect her when the Beast came for her again. He knew where she lived; it was the first place he would look for her.

So where would the last be?