The screaming of the women gradually died down as exhaustion got the better of them, and soon there wasn't so much as a peep in the mental asylum.
It was dark. It was quiet. It was terrifying.
Tomorrow I would see Carter and Nathaniel, and we would figure it out. I could easily survive this for just a few hours. It really wasn't even that bad.
I curled my legs into my chest and squeezed my eyes shut. Tomorrow, I chanted to myself, the words both a familiar and yet unfamiliar mantra. Tomorrow will be better.
***
"Why don't we start with your side of the story?" Dr. Peterson said, smiling. The tops of his teeth were slightly brown and his icy blue eyes gleamed from behind his bifocals.
I sat in a plain white chair across from his wooden desk. This room, like most of the hospital, seemed to exude a cold, sterile aura, despite everything in this room not being a painful white. Other than the chair I sat in, only the ceiling was white. The walls were brick, the doctor's desk and chair were mahogany, the floor was cedar. It looked almost homey yet felt completely the opposite. "You want to hear my side?" I repeated.
"I think it's only fair, don't you, Miss Gallagher?"
I narrowed my eyes, debating. Then I tilted my chin in the air. "First, I ought to remind you that you are speaking to a lady, not a common woman. I should like you to address me as such."
"I apologize, but it is the policy of this institution. Once you are housed here, you relinquish the position you once held."
"What?" I exclaimed.
"It is for the calmness of the patients," he explained. "It wouldn't do to have one patient treated any better than another. I do apologize for any insult you might feel, Miss Gallagher."
I didn't exactly know when the name Lady Gallagher had come to mean something to me but hearing him call me something lower grated on my nerves. Still, I mumbled, "Very well."
"Now, then," Dr. Peterson said, poising a pen over a blank notepad, "start from the beginning."
"I am not entirely sure what you wish to hear."
"You were brought here under the advisement of Lord Hugh Lawrence, is that correct?"
Just his name made me want to punch something. "Yes."
"Why did he feel you would fare better here?"
I studied the old man. The top of his head was bald but a few stubborn white strands rimmed his skull, and his scalp was speckled with spots. He looked harmless enough, but I had learned long ago not to trust anyone. "Perhaps you ought to ask him," I responded.
"Miss Gallagher," he said, and I fisted my hands in my lap, "I only want to help you. But I need your compliance to do so."
"You expect me to know the reasons behind Lawrence's actions?"
"I expect you to have an opinion on the subject, yes."
I leaned forward in the chair, making sure he completely understood me when I said, "Hugh Lawrence wants nothing more than to steal the fortune that was left to the McLeods. The only people who could get in the way of that effort have been conveniently locked away here."
"You're claiming the only reason you've been sent to this establishment is for a financial gain?" He didn't seem to be judging my statement. In fact, he looked genuinely interested.
Which is why I responded, "I am not claiming. I am telling you. That is the one and only reason my friends and I are here. It is a mistake. There is nothing wrong with our minds. We do not belong in this place, with these people, any more than you do."
He nodded in understanding, his eyes honest, open. Maybe...maybe this man could actually help us, save us from this place. He would see the truth in my words, and he would make sure we were released.
But then he said, "Just before you were brought here, Carter McLeod murdered a sickly old man."
My blood immediately ran cold.
Something had changed in Dr. Peterson's eyes. They were no longer innocent and clear. "Both you and his brother were accomplices to the crime," he continued. "So either you are criminals or you are sick individuals. Lord Lawrence believes you are the latter. Do you not agree, Miss Gallagher?"
I blinked several times, my throat running dry. Perhaps it was all the terror of entering this place, but as unbelievable as it seemed, the image of blood on Carter's hands had been completely wiped from my memory until that very moment.
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Chapter 2
Start from the beginning
