Page 62 of Over the Edge

“Like I told you last week, Lindsey, being here for clients during a crisis is part of my job.” He handed her a bottle of water and took the seat he always claimed. “Tell me about the upsetting experience you mentioned on the phone.”

“It’s going to sound off the wall.” Pulse picking up, she wrapped both hands around the bottle of water. “Crazy, almost.”

He offered her an encouraging smile. “Trust me, I’ve heard more than my share of unusual stories. Crazy is too strong a word for most of them.”

“Mine may be the exception.”

“I’ll give you my honest opinion after you share it with me. Fair enough?”

“Yes.” After taking a swig of water, she launched into a condensed version of the lake incident and the doubts that had begun to infiltrate her mind about the accuracy of her perceptions.

Throughout her account, his expression remained neutral, giving no indication of his reaction.

When she finished, he tipped his head and studied her. “That’s a very scary story.”

“Because someone attacked me, or because the attack could be a figment of my imagination?”

His brief hesitation wasn’t reassuring.

“Primarily the former. In the eighteen months you’ve been seeing me, I’ve never picked up any indication of compromised mental processes. That said, however, repeated stresscantake a toll.”

She frowned as her fingers tightened on the water bottle, producing a harsh crinkling sound in the quiet office. “I don’t think the police detective is certain about my mental soundness after all the bizarre turns my life has taken of late.”

“Let me ask you this. In your own mind, is there any doubt about where you left your car last week, or that a hand grabbed your foot at the lake?”

“No on the car. I’m not absentminded, and I remember parking it by the basketball hoop. The lake situation is a little different. I couldn’t see much in the murky water. All I know is that whatever latched onto my ankle felt like fingers.”

“It couldn’t have been a submerged object?”

“I don’t think so. My foot didn’t just get caught. I was pulled down. Hard. I thought I was going to ... to drown.”

“Yet you didn’t.” He tapped his pen against his tablet. “Whatever—or whoever—this was, released you.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

One of many questions she couldn’t answer.

“I have no idea. I can’t explain anything that happened yesterday. All I know is I ended the day very unsettled, questioning myself, and on the cusp of a panic attack.”

Faint furrows scored his forehead. “You haven’t had one of those in months. Not even after finding yourself at a murder scene.”

“I know.”

“When and where did it come on?”

She set the water bottle on the table beside her and wiped her palms down her slacks. “At home. After I told the detective about the South Carolina shooting.”

His eyebrows peaked. “I thought you avoided talking about that incident.”

“I usually do.”

“What prompted you to discuss it with the detective?”

“I’m not certain. I’d referenced it in passing during one of our conversations, and when he came to take my statement about the lake, he asked me about it. I tried to put him off, but he said he was going to research it anyway. In the end, I decided to save him the trouble.” Not a lie, but there had been more to her motivation than that—even if she hadn’t pinpointed exactly what.

One more mystery to add to her growing list.

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