Page 12 of Monsters Like Us
I sit on a weathered bench, pulling my sweatshirt tighter around me. For the first time all day, my shoulders loosen. I let my eyes close, tilting my face to the gray sky.
Footsteps crunch over gravel. My eyes snap open.
Micah Morrow is there, his shadow cutting across me, tall and inevitable. He wears the same gray sweatpants and sweatshirt I’m wearing, institutional sameness meant to erase identity, but on him it doesn’t work. The fabric clings to his size, his presence, like it knows better than to try to contain him. The soft slip-on shoes whisper against the gravel as he stops in front of me.
The guard trails several paces behind, watching but not close enough to matter. Not close enough to stop anything if Micah decided to move.
He doesn’t speak at first. Just stares—sharp, unblinking, cutting through me like the edge of a blade. My pulse stutters. My breath catches. I can’t speak or move. The whole world narrows to the space between his eyes and mine.
Then his mouth curls, like he’s savoring something. “Katana Morgan.”
My stomach drops. Hearing my name in his voice feels wrong, invasive, like he reached inside and stole something private.
But the part that chills me most—the part I can’t explain—is that I only said my last name in group therapy.
And Micah wasn’t there.
So how the hell does he know my last name?
My voice scrapes out before I can stop it. “How… how do you know my name? Was it you? Did you leave that note?”
He doesn’t blink. Doesn’t move. A sinister grin stretches across his mouth, dark eyes gleaming like they see straight through me.
“I know more about you than you can imagine, Katana.”
My chest tightens. Instinctively, I glance toward the guard trailing him—too far back, hands tucked in his pockets, eyes drifting toward the fence line like he’s bored out of his mind. Oblivious. Useless.
The realization crashes over me, cold and heavy. If Micah wants to do something to me, no one can or will stop him.
My pulse jackhammers, urging me to run, but I stay rooted to the bench. Fear hammers at my ribs, but there’s something else beneath it—curiosity. That magnetic pull I felt the first time I saw him. The terrifying certainty that if he reached for me, I might not pull away.
He tilts his head, watching me tremble, like my fear is a song only he can hear. Like he already owns every note of it.
I swallow hard, forcing air into my lungs, and finally push myself up from the bench. My legs are shaky, but I force them to move, breaking the weight of his gaze.
“Leave me alone,” I whisper, the words weak and trembling, my last defense as I turn away from him.
My body screams to run, to put space between us. And yet, even as I walk away, every step feels wrong.
Beneath the cold fear curling in my stomach, a darker truth lingers. Part of me hopes he doesn’t listen.
Part of me hopes he follows.
But I don’t dare look back.
CHAPTER 10
Micah
Her whisper driftsthrough my ears, thin and trembling. “Leave me alone.” She rises on shaky legs and flees, but I don’t move to stop her.
I almost laugh out loud. Instead, I let it slide from me in a low, silent chuckle, the kind that coils deep in my chest. She doesn’t want me to leave her alone. Not at all. Fear can lie and pass between her lips, but I see the truth in her eyes. She’s already tethered to me.
I trail her, silent and steady, keeping just close enough that she feels the weight of me shadowing her steps.
Inside, the fluorescent lights hum and the walls press close. She moves faster, her shoulders stiff, pretending she doesn’t sense me behind her. But I know she does. Every instinct in her body is tuned to me now.
She turns the corner into the common room, and that’s when Marcy appears, stepping into her path. “You’ve got a session with Dr. Vale tomorrow after breakfast,” Marcy says, scribbling something on her clipboard.
