Page 51 of Unwell
Then I heard it.
A scuffle. A scream.
Silence.
Another blood-curdling scream.
I hit the ground running.
Roots tore at my shoes as I fumbled toward the screaming, praying it wasn’t Ginny.
Unless the baby was coming.
My baby.
But it wasn’t new life that awaited me. I crashed into a tree to steady myself as I stumbled into a nightmare.
Robert lay sprawled on the forest floor with his throat no longer recognisable as human. Awkwardly placed limbs and scarlet. So much blood. Blood had soaked the dirt a rich black, like the asylum grounds were sucking up Robert’s life-force like some hungry vampire. His face, what remained of it, was a ruin. One eye was nothing but a mangled socket, and the other? Frozen in place.
My stomach lurched and threw an acrid, burning liquid up my throat. As much as I hated him for whathe did, it still gutted me to see him like that. The man I’d shared so many years with was gone.
Beside him, stood Ginny, clinging onto a pair of shears and looking more blood than girl.
She rocked back and forth, one hand cradling her precious cargo while the other twitched against the shears. Her nightgown was soaked to the elbows, crimson coated her fingers. And in her face? A vacancy that ignited a spark of fear in me. Her sweet pink hair ribbon danced in the wind, contrasting so sharply with the destruction on the ground.
‘Ginny,’ I whispered, reaching out for the shears.
I stumbled forward with my heart hammering, but before I could reach her, someone whimpered behind me.
Larry.
He lumbered into view, his giant frame trembling. Catching sight of Robert’s body, he froze. His hands fluttered helplessly at his sides, like he didn’t know what to do with them.
‘Blood,’ he whimpered. ‘So much blood on Dr. Robert.’
Panic wrapped around me as I tried to find a solution. If they found Ginny dazed and drenched in Robert’s blood, they’d drag her to one of the high security wards. I’d never see her. Hell, they might cut the baby out before it ever drew breath.
I couldn’t let that happen.
‘Larry, I need your shirt,’ I demanded.
‘My shirt?’ He clung to the hem.
‘It’s to help Ginny. Please?’
Larry bit his lip before tugging it over his head, wrapping his arms around himself and looking dismayed.
I stripped Ginny’s bloody gown with shaking hands and stuffed it under a nearby tree root. Hauling Larry’s shirt over Ginny’s head, I tugged it down quickly. It swamped her, even with her bump.
‘Go. Shower.Now. Wash it all off and get in bed,’ I hissed.
‘What if someone sees?’ Ginny sounded dazed, but not manic.
‘He tried to hurt you, didn’t he? Put that baby inside you. That was wrong.’ I tried to cut through her haze.
She nodded, her lower lip shaking.
‘There’s an old fountain near the edge of the woods by the back fence. There will be standing water in it from the rain. Wash the blood off as best as you can and wait until everyone comes out to help me. Sneak in, and go straight into the showers.’
