Page 17 of Monsters Like Us
I wait until the hall quiets, then slip out, moving like smoke down the corridor until I find what I need: opportunity. The broken camera in Wing C. The nurse leaves her laptop open too long when she takes a call.
I lean casually against the wall, her perfume still hanging faintly in the air, and tilt the screen toward me.
Schedules. Therapy logs. Movement rosters.
I search until I see her name: Katana Morgan.
I memorize everything. Group therapy. Next session with Vale. Lunch rotations. Where she’ll be, when, and with whom. I carve it into my brain like scripture.
By the time I return the laptop to its careless angle, the plan is already alive inside me. If Vale thinks he’s going to peel her open in his office, he’s wrong.
I’ll get to her first.
Later,after lunch, the flock spills out onto the grounds. I follow at a distance, my hands in the pockets of my sweatpants. Bruce trails just far enough behind me to make him useless.
Katana walks slowly, her hazel eyes tilted toward the brittle sky, her hands stuffed in her pockets. The picture of someone trying to breathe in a place that only strangles.
I wait by a tree, letting her get close enough that when I step out, the snap of a twig makes her jump. Her breath catches as she whirls around, wide-eyed.
“Relax,” I murmur, a smile cutting across my face. “You did good today.”
Confusion flickers in her gaze, then realization. Then something hotter that’s normally buried deep.
She doesn’t answer, but she doesn’t run either.
I close the distance in two easy strides. She stiffens as I circle the way a wolf circles prey that already knows it’s caught. Her shoulders are tense, and there’s a tremor in her hands.
“You listened to me,” I say softly, my voice brushing her ear as I step behind her. “You kept Vale out. Good girl.”
She swallows hard, her breath shaky. “Y-You shouldn’t?—”
My hand lifts, the backs of my knuckles grazing her back, so light it’s barely there. A loose thread clings to the hem. I pinch it between my fingers and roll it away as though it belongs to me now. She doesn’t even notice.
“You told me to leave you alone,” I whisper, leaning close enough that her hair tickles my jaw, “but you don’t really mean it. Do you, little murderess?”
Her inhale shudders through her chest. “H-How do…” She stops herself, biting the words off.
I let the silence stretch, then step in front of her, pinning her with my stare. “I know what you did, Katana. I have… ways… of knowing things.” Bruce is still far enough away that I brush my fingers against her hand. It’s a fleeting, claiming touch. “Don’t worry. Your secret’s safe with me.”
Her eyes are wide, glassy, her lips parted like she’s caught between protest and plea.
A satisfied sigh slips from me. “That’s what I thought. You trust me.” The air between us is thick and charged.
When I finally step back, it’s only because Bruce’s shadow lengthens across the grass.
I smirk as I drift toward the path, leaving her trembling, staring after me.
Next time, I won’t just take a loose thread from her sweatshirt.
I’ll takemore.
CHAPTER 15
Micah
It’s Wednesday.I’m in Dr. Vale’s office for my regular meeting with him. My wrists are cuffed to the arms of the chair, my body a block of stone. My eyes don’t flicker, my mouth doesn’t move.
Vale drones on, a surgeon’s questions pitched like scalpels. He thinks those verbal traps will bleed me dry. He’s wrong. All the renowned psychiatrist is doing is wasting his breath.
