Page 84 of Shattered Dreams

We haven’t moved, and I didn’t notice, not until Rourke yells, “Drive!” at the chauffeur who’d been watching our exchange in the rearview mirror.

His eyes meet mine, cold and hard, and I turn away, pressing my face into the back of the seat.

Rourke doesn’t touch me again.

I walked for hours, trudging along the shoulder of the desolate highway, but the truck needs mere minutes to undo my progress. We park in front of the house and Jerricka and Dr. Pederson are waiting.

He pushes me up the porch steps.

“How is she?” Jerricka asks, opening the front door.

“She remembers too much. Isn’t the drug working? You said it was working.”

“I’ve only had her since yesterday. She’s taken four doses since then. Her body hasn’t had time to absorb them yet,” Jerricka explains patiently. Tenderly, she pulls my coat off my shoulders and slides my arms out of the sleeves. The rage she had at breakfast is gone, and she acts maternal again, smoothing her hand down the back of my head.

“Then pump her full,” Rourke snaps. “I want to know the drug is effective. We’ve had to sit on this for too long and it’s time to act.”

“I’ll lock her up downstairs in the lab.”

“It’s what you should have done in the first place.”

“Senator Cook, perhaps you’d like to make yourself comfortable and have a drink? It’s a long drive,” Dr. Pederson says, closing and locking the door.

“Yes. I would appreciate that. My nerves are a bit frayed. My wife is grieving, and she’s demanding I return home.”

He looks pointedly at me, and sorrow threatens to shatter my heart into millions of pieces.

Without Gage, I have nothing.

I look at Jerricka, and she wraps an arm around me. Her sympathy is a trick. She’s manipulative, and she’s always known how to talk me into doing what she wants—breaking up with Gage, taking medication that I know now Zane and Dr. Reagan never approved. I’ve always been her puppet, trusting her to help me recover from the horrors Ash put me through. All she did was add to them.

She leads me downstairs and nudges me onto the hospital bed. “I’m going to cuff you to the rail and lock the door. There will be no more escaping, Zarah. Senator Cook was kind because we need you alive. He wants to hurt you. Don’t give me a reason to let him.” She fills a small paper cup with water and places two pills in my palm. “Swallow these. The pain will go away. I promise.”

The tablets slide easily down my throat, the drug that’s supposed to erase my memories and induce symptoms that mimic a person who has Alzheimer’s. I need the emptiness. I lie down and roll onto my side, and she snaps the cuff around my wrist. Her lips brush my temple. “I do care about you. You’ll be the catalyst to my greatest achievement. Get some rest, and when you wake, we’ll run you through some tests. You’ll have enough in your system we should start seeing results this evening.”

Tears seep into my pillow.

The wood creaks as Jerricka walks up the staircase, and it’s quiet enough I hear the lock snick into place.

I’m left in the dark.

My body, anyway.

I pray my mind catches up.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Gage

The cops want to talk, but I don’t have time. I brush them off and run toward my truck, only to realize I don’t have my keys. “Shit.”

I call Zane, and he answers on the first ring. “Maddox.”

“It’s Gage. Someone threw a firebomb into my apartment. Baby and I are okay and the fire’s out, but the fire department won’t let me inside.”

“What do you need?” His voice is strained.

“Socks. Boots. A jacket. I know who’s behind this, and my mother knew where Jerricka’s lake house is. It’s a little over four hours away.”

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