Page 106 of Hide and Seek
I race through the internal doors.
“Hey, you can’t go back there,” someone yells from reception, but I don’t bother to even glance back as my feet pound against the hospital’s cheap linoleum. All that matters is Harper at the other end of the hallway.
Three security guards hover around her, holding on to her too tightly as other doctors and her colleagues stand around her, talkingabouther but nottoher.
I reach her in all of three seconds, barging past the doctors. “Get your hands off my fucking girl,” I rumble, the threat clear as day in my tone, making all three of the security guards stop what they’re doing and shoot their gazes straight to mine.
At my voice, Harper’s head snaps up, her eyes wide and full of fear, and there’s something there I’ve never seen before. It’s as though she’s not even in there.
“Knight,” she whimpers as if begging me to make it all go away, the pain in her tone like nothing I’ve ever heard from her, and it crushes every ounce of my soul.
I step closer as the guards hastily release her, letting her fall heavily to the ground, her knees crashing into the linoleum. I grit my teeth and dive after her, not daring to let her go as I pull her back to her feet and straight into my arms, cradling her as though I’ll never let go.
The guards will have me to deal with as soon as I’ve dealt with Harper and figured out what the fuck is going on here. Being in my job for as long as I have, I’ve had more than my fair share of encounters with these guys, and they know damn well that I’m about to bury their asses for even thinking about putting their hands on my girl, let alone letting her drop to the ground like that.
“What’s going on, doll?” I ask, my thumb brushing over the side of her face as I hold her to my chest, her tears soaking into my Kevlar vest that I never had a chance to remove. “What are you doing here?”
She shakes her head, her voice barely a whisper now. “I have to find him.”
“Find who?”
“Laith. His body is gone. I have to know that it’s real.”
“It’s okay, doll,” I tell her, wishing there was some way I could make this go away while knowing that she’s going downhill fast. There is no body. There never was. Hell, there’s no fucking stalker. She’s sick, and I have to get her the help that she needs. “We’ll find him.”
She pulls back just an inch and lifts her gaze to mine. “Really?”
I nod. “Yes, but I need to get you back home and into your bed first. This is too much stress on your body. It’s still healing. You can’t handle all of this moving around so soon after your surgery.”
She watches me closely, and for a moment, it almost looks as though she’s going to let me lead her away, but when her brows pull down, I quickly realize that I’ve lost her. “You’re lying,” she says, her chest heaving, panic in her bright green stare. “You told me you would never lie to me.”
“Doll, please let me help you,” I beg her. “You’re not well.”
“I knew it,” she cries, ripping out of my hold and making the guards reach for their guns, and I immediately step forward, putting myself between Harper and their guns. “All of you are liars. Where’s Laith? What did you do with him?”
“Sir?” a doctor says from behind me, one I’ve never met before. “She’s having what I believe to be a psychotic break. I need to sedate her before she hurts herself or anybody else.”
My gaze shifts back to Harper, and she shakes her head, having heard every fucking word. “No,” she says, horror in her eyes. “No. I’m not sick. You have to believe me.”
Every piece of me shatters seeing her like this, but there’s no talking to her when she’s like this. There’s no reasoning with her. She needs help, and despite how she feels, at some point, I’m going to have to step in and take it into my own hands.
“Do it,” I tell the doctor, knowing that there’s going to be one hell of a big conversation when she wakes up.
Harper looks at me with betrayal, tears rolling down her beautiful cheeks, and as the guards and the doctor rush in, she hastily tries to get away, but there are too many of them. She’s immobilized while frantically trying to free herself, her eyes locked on mine for every damn second of it.
The doctor quickly prepares the sedative, and within seconds, he’s grasping her upper arm and injecting it into the muscle. Her chest heaves, and as the doctor steps away, her body starts to relax.
I hurry in, taking her from the guards and lifting her right into my arms, and as she watches me through her sleepy stare, shegently shakes her head, a tear still sitting on her perfect cheek. “How could you?” she whispers, and not a moment later, she gives in to the sedative, her body going limp in my arms.
37
HARPER-RAYN
Heaviness sinks into my muscles as I peel my eyes open, taking in my blurry surroundings. Unease immediately pounds through my veins. Is this . . . fuck. This is the psych ward. How the hell did I end up here? Did somebody have me committed?
My brain is foggy, and as I try to sit up, something pulls me back.
My brows furrow, and I pull against my wrists, only to find them restrained to the rails on the edge of the hospital bed.
