Chapter 4 — The Woman in White
Chapter 4 — The Woman in White
Grace heard soft footsteps crossing the living room.
Nathan pulled her behind the kitchen counter.
Nicholas remained tied to the chair, but he sounded strangely calm.
“You’re late,” he called into the darkness.
A woman’s voice answered.
“You said she would be unconscious.”
Grace recognized the voice.
Dr. Evelyn Shaw.
Her therapist.
The woman who had treated her insomnia for two years.
The lights came back on.
Dr. Shaw stood near the front door wearing an elegant white coat. Two men in dark suits stood behind her.
She looked at Grace without surprise.
“So you found the photograph.”
Grace raised the gun.
“Stay where you are.”
Dr. Shaw sighed.
“You were always more difficult than Nicholas predicted.”
“You’ve been drugging me.”
“Regulating you.”
“Erasing me.”
Dr. Shaw’s expression remained clinical.
“Memory is not sacred, Grace. It is chemistry.”
Nathan stepped into view.
“You kept me in that clinic.”
Dr. Shaw looked at him with detached curiosity.
“You were not supposed to recover.”
The two men drew their weapons.
Grace’s heart pounded.
Nicholas spoke from the chair.
“Untie me, Evelyn.”
Dr. Shaw ignored him.
“Where is the second envelope?”
Grace glanced toward the bedroom.
That was enough.
One of the men moved.
Nathan shoved the dining table onto its side. Grace ducked behind it as bullets tore through the wall.
Nathan grabbed Nicholas’s chair and dragged him into the kitchen.
“You brought armed men into my home?” Nicholas shouted.
Dr. Shaw remained near the door.
“You failed. Again.”
Grace crawled toward the hallway.
Nathan whispered, “The fire escape.”
“What about you?”
“I’ll follow.”
She looked at Nicholas.
“What about him?”
Nathan’s expression hardened.
“He comes with us.”
“Why?”
“Because he’s the only one who knows where they kept the original evidence.”
Nathan cut the cord around Nicholas’s ankles but left his wrists tied.
Together, they moved toward the bedroom.
Dr. Shaw’s men circled the overturned table.
Grace reached the window and forced it open.
Cold air rushed inside.
She climbed onto the fire escape.
Nathan pushed Nicholas after her.
A bullet struck the window frame.
Grace hurried downward.
Three floors below, a black SUV waited in the alley with its engine running.
Nathan saw it.
“That’s not theirs.”
The rear door opened.
A gray-haired woman leaned out.
“Grace!” she called. “Get in!”
Grace recognized her immediately.
Her mother, Margaret.
The same mother who had died four years earlier.
Grace nearly fell from the ladder.
Nathan caught her.
“That’s impossible,” she whispered.
Margaret looked up at her.
“No, sweetheart. Your entire life is the impossible part.”
Behind them, Dr. Shaw appeared at the window.
Grace had no choice.
May you like
She climbed into the SUV beside the mother she had buried.
And Margaret handed her the second envelope.
