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  “Anywhere else?” Katie asked.

  Ben rubbed his red cheek with a shaky hand. “If anything happened to her, I’ll never forgive myself. I got so mad at her when she dumped me that I told her I hoped she rotted in hell.”

  “I think we’ve all done things in the heat of the moment we regret,” Katie said with a soft, soothing tone. It didn’t happen often, but when she tried, she could really be a caring woman.

  “Can I asked who hired you?” Ben asked.

  Katie and Jackson glanced at each other.

  Jackson nodded. Normally, he wouldn’t divulge this kind of information, but under the cirucumstances, he wanted to gauge Ben’s reaction.

  “Her roommate, Janice,” Katie said.

  “Seriously? They hate each other.” Ben shook his head. “I mean, knock-down-and-drag-out fight kind of hate. Belinda had talked about moving out.” Ben’s bright eyes dulled. “I told her she could move in with me, but that didn’t happen.”

  “Janice paints a different picture of her relationship with Belinda,” Jackson said.

  “That’s shocking. But I don’t really know Janice well. We never spent much time at Belinda’s place, always crashing at mine.”

  “Until a month ago,” Katie added just to scare the crap out of the young man, hoping he’d spill the beans.

  If he had beans to spill.

  “Will you let me know when you find her?” Ben stood, shoving his hands into his pockets. “I just want to know she’s okay.”

  “Sure. But please let us know if you hear from her or think of anything that might help us.” Jackson stood, escorting the young man to the door. “We’ll be in touch.”

  “This case is getting interesting,” Katie said.

  Jackson had to agree, only he didn’t necessarily like interesting.

  “I think it’s time for you to call your new girlfriend and put the pressure on.”

  “She’s not my girlfriend, and I already did. She won’t give us much unless we have a subpoena or Belinda is in danger.”

  “Try again. Because if we wait for the cops, it’s going to be too late.”

  Jackson had to agree.

  Shannon’s purse vibrated. She dug into the bag, hoping she found it before the light turned red. Walking across the street while doing anything but putting one foot in front of the other could prove to be a dangerous action.

  Jackson’s number flashed across her screen. “Hey. What’s up?” Her heart hammered against her rib cage. Besides wanting to know if he had any news on her daughter, just hearing his voice gave her the kind of decadent pleasure that licking the brownie batter off the spatula had given her as a child.

  Sweet.

  Devilish.

  And wrong.

  But oh, so good.

  “I got a visit from Ben Nisson this morning.”

  “Oh, really?” Well, talking about work squashed her mood right quick, especially when she wasn’t supposed to be talking about Belinda’s private sessions with Jackson.

  “So, you know him?”

  “No. Never met the fellow,” she said, tapping her foot, waiting for the pedestrian signal. “But I might have heard of him. From, you know, a mutual friend.”

  “We going to talk in code now. Cool.” Jackson chuckled. “Did you know Belinda dumped him a couple of weeks ago?”

  “That’s a rumor I didn’t hear.” Shannon had spent hours listening to Belinda go on and on about how much she loved Ben but how he didn’t understand her or her issues. Of course, Shannon didn’t think Belinda had been completely upfront with her boyfriend about having been a sex worker, but who could blame her?

  “Really?” Jackson asked.

  “But I heard that a man had shown her a lot of interest in front of Ben. No idea who. She never mentioned a name or where she knew him from. Only that someone other than Ben had been giving her a lot of attention. I think she wanted to use the new guy to make Ben jealous.”

  “Interesting on two accounts.”

  “What does that mean?” Shannon looked both ways before stepping into the intersection. Walking and talking wasn’t a talent she’d mastered.

  “Ben flat-out said she dumped him for a new guy, and you’re giving me a lot of information regarding a patient that you said you wouldn’t. I thought I would have to sweet talk you to get it.”

  “Actually, I gathered that piece of information when I ran into Belinda at the bank while making a deposit. She’d been on a break and asked to chat. That was two days before she missed our lunch, and not during a session.”

  “I see,” Jackson said. “I’ve got something else I need to discuss with you.”

  “I have to meet with a patient at the hospital in a few minutes. It might run through dinner, but want to meet at the fire pit in a couple of hours?”

  Say, yes. Please, just say yes.

  “Sounds like a plan. See you then.”

  “Looking forward to it.” She ended the call.

  Shannon crossed the road with a new spring in her step.

  She’d deal with her patient, then go home, pour a glass of wine, and enjoy an evening with Jackson. She’d tortured herself enough over the years. At thirty-six, she had the world in the palm of her hand. She’d beaten the odds. And now, maybe, just maybe, she’d be able to really let go and let a man in.

  Even if for only a short time.

  Shannon entered the hospital through the main emergency doors. Though she had many patients come through the ER, she wasn’t a regular, but everyone knew who she was. She took a slight detour down the side corridor to snag a cup of coffee and two candy bars—plain chocolate for her, and a Snickers for Gretchen.

  She took the long way to the psych ward, giving her a few moments to collect her thoughts. She smiled as the evening security guard noticed her coming down the hall.

  “Good evening,” Kent said.

  Kent couldn’t have been more than twenty-two, but he’d been working this post for the last three years. He always greeted her with a smile, and tonight was no different. “Haven’t seen you here in a while.”

  “That’s a good thing,” she said, patting him on the shoulder then handing him the cup of coffee.

  “You’re the best. No one else brings shitty-ass hospital coffee.” He buzzed her through the doors.

  The moment they swung open, her muscles tightened with anxiety, and depression swallowed her heart. She forced a smile as she signed the appropriate paperwork and then asked for the nurse on duty to page the doctor on call.

  Dr. Franklin was her least favorite psychiatrist in the hospital because he viewed psychologists as beneath him. He never came out and said that anyone who hadn’t gone to medical school wasn’t capable of treating the mentally ill, but he was always condescending in his tone.

  And he had a constant need to be right.

  What sucked was that nine out of ten times, he was.

  “Shannon,” Dr. Franklin said as he strolled leisurely up to the nurses’ station, refusing the professional courtesy of using her doctor title. “We’re still waiting on the toxicology report, but according to the patient, she ingested a half a bottle of antidepressants after freebasing cocaine, drinking at least a pint of vodka, and she thinks she might have taken some ecstasy, as well,” he said without a trace of emotion. “After her body detoxes, I’ve prescribed a combination of medications to deal with the bi-polar issues. It is imperative that she stay on the medications.”

  Shannon opened her mouth to say, “Thank you,” but before she could get the words out, Franklin hushed her with his hand.

  “I know you prefer non-medication treatment,” he said. “But in this case, it is necessary. Please, trust me on this. She has a better chance of staying away from the other chemicals if her mood is more efficiently balanced, and I also recommended she seek out a different type of therapy after she is released.”

  “That will be up to my patient.” Shannon dug her nails into the side of her thigh. The fact that her patient had la
nded herself in the psych ward didn’t give Shannon any reason to pat herself on the back for being an excellent therapist. If anything, it proved the exact opposite. But she didn’t need this asshole jumping down her throat because he had a problem with PhDs over medical school degrees.

  Or maybe it was women over men.

  “As far as the medication goes, I have worked closely with her primary care physician for the right meds. If she takes them like she’s supposed to, her mood stabilizes.” Shannon knew she shouldn’t pick a fight with this guy, but it was too late to take it back. “It took a while for us to find the right combination with the right dosage. I will make sure her primary gets you the exact combination and dosage tonight.”

  “I’ve already requested them. However, it’s obvious that this course of treatment isn’t working. This is her third time in the unit.”

  “Not for an attempted suicide.” She raised her hand to keep the pain-in-the-ass doctor from speaking. “And just so we are straight, you are the one who made that judgment call when she arrived. So, this is visit number one under those circumstances.”

  “That’s not the point,” Dr. Franklin said. “I will be recommending a different course of treatment.”

  “Recommend all you want,” she said under her breath. “But I’m her therapist, and even though you are the doctor on call, she’s still my patient. So, back off and let me do my job.”

  Dr. Franklin blinked but otherwise remained still. “We’ll hold her for forty-eight hours, and then we can discuss what will be the most appropriate medication and psychotherapy.” With a wave of his hand, Dr. Franklin dismissed Shannon. “Miss Carson is in room four.” He nodded over his shoulder before stepping around Shannon.

  “I can’t believe you stood up to him,” the nurse said. She must have been new because Shannon had never seen her before. “No way could I ever talk to a doctor like that,” the nurse continued.

  “Doctors aren’t God.” Shannon took a mental note of the young girl’s name spelled out on a tag across her colorful scrubs. “Erica, are you Gretchen’s nurse?”

  She nodded. “I’ll be here until midnight.”

  “Great.” She pulled out her card. “Call me if Dr. Franklin continues acting like an ass when it comes to my patient, okay?”

  “I can’t go against him. Or any doctor.”

  “All I’m asking is to be informed if Franklin goes against my recommendations. Can you do that?”

  “Yeah. I can manage that,” Erica said.

  “Thanks.” All Shannon wanted to do at this point was assess her patient and go home.

  To be with Jackson.

  This part of the psych ward was referred to as the holding tank. It consisted of one small nurses’ station and one large room partitioned off by six curtains creating six patient rooms. The curtain to room four was completely drawn.

  Shannon took a deep breath and let it out slowly as she pulled the ugly green shade. She smiled at Gretchen.

  “Hey,” Gretchen managed. “Fancy meeting you here.” More anger than humor laced her sarcasm, but her eyes showed a sadness in her soul. “Shocked it’s not my funeral?”

  “Thought you might like this.” Shannon placed the Snickers bar on the side of the bed, ignoring the bait to engage Gretchen in a battle of you-really-don’t-care-so-why-are-you-bothering banter.

  “That other doctor gave me a whole bunch.” Gretchen pointed to the rolling table. “A lot more than you brought.

  “That was kind of him,” Shannon said.

  “It sure was. God knows I need some sugar, and this place sucks ass. I bet if I had a real doctor and not some stupid therapist, I’d be out of this joint.”

  Gretchen was good at the blame game. Normally, she’d toss it all at her mother. She had enough ammunition with her lack of parental support, along with a history of abuse that, to her, it was no surprise she’d turned out the way she had. To be able to turn her life around, Gretchen needed to understand how her internal monologue related to the triggers in her addiction. That meant self-awareness. Currently, she had very little.

  Shannon pulled up a chair and sat down. “How are you feeling?”

  “How do you think I feel?” Gretchen turned her head and grinned. “I’m just peachy.” She reached for the Snickers and ripped it open. “I want the fuck out of this place. Can you make that happen?”

  Shannon shook her head.

  “I bet Dr. Franklin could. He’s a real doctor. I’m in here because of you.”

  “You took a lethal dose of pills and recreational drugs. On purpose. When you got here, you were barely breathing.” If Gretchen were to get better, she had to own up to her actions.

  That said, given her agitation, the way her fingers twitched, and how her hands shook, she was still high, coming down from all the drugs and going into withdrawal.

  “Spare me the lecture,” Gretchen said. “I got things mixed up and thought I was taking something else. Besides, if you’d had my day, you’d want to take a bunch of mind-numbing, completely legal drugs, too.”

  “Not an entire bottle. And not all the drugs you took were legal.” Shannon picked up the chart and scanned the documents. “So, what happened to trigger such anger and the need to escape?”

  “Like telling you the events of the day is going to change anything,” Gretchen said with a mouth full of nuts and chocolate. “But if you must know, I went to my mother’s.”

  “Really?” Shannon didn’t like that she sounded so shocked, but the reality was that Gretchen’s mother didn’t care about her children and was toxic when it came to Gretchen. “When?”

  Gretchen brushed back her unruly auburn hair, showing a nasty bruise on her face. “I showed up unannounced for lunch.”

  “You have a restraining order out on your mother, you shouldn’t have done that. Did she put that bruise on your face?”

  “Yeah.” Gretchen nodded. “I guess I puked all over her new white carpet, and she thought hitting me fit the crime.”

  “So, you went to your mother’s wasted?”

  Gretchen nodded again.

  Shannon waited, but it was obvious the only way she would get any more out of her patient was to keep asking questions. “Was this the first time you used?”

  Gretchen shook her head. “Been using since the day after the last time I saw you. I was so angry at what you said that I used.” Tears rolled down her cheeks.

  “You can blame me all you want, but the choice to pick up a drug…that’s on you.”

  “No, it’s not. It’s on you for telling me I can do better. And on my mother for sleeping with my new boyfriend.”

  “New boyfriend?” That was brand-new information. “You didn’t tell me about the boyfriend. And we talked about how you need to stay away from your mother.”

  “My mom thinks you have a mommy complex with me,” Gretchen said.

  Shannon arched a brow. “I’m more concerned about how you feel about your mother sleeping with your new boyfriend.”

  “I had no idea he even knew my mom until I saw her coming out of his apartment. She had sex-hair, and his shirt wasn’t tucked in. She grabbed his balls as she kissed him goodbye. I flipped.”

  Shannon reached for the tissue box and left it on the bed. Gretchen’s mother had a record for prostitution, drugs, and she’d lost custody of her children when Gretchen was fourteen. Gretchen and her twin brother went to live with their father. Austin, her brother, died by suicide two years later. Gretchen was determined to follow in his footsteps. “So, you started using when you saw your mother and this boyfriend?” Shannon could understand how that would trigger the crazy thinking addicts used to justify picking up again after extended periods of sobriety.

  Gretchen shook her head and then blew her nose. “I told you. I used when you said I could do better. When you judged my grades in school, my choice in friends, and wanting to have a relationship with my mother.”

  “Yes. I said you could do better because I know you tend to self-sabot
age. But I’ve never judged you. As far as your mother is concerned—”

  “Right. Make boundaries. Protect myself. I think I need protection from you.” Gretchen paused to blow her nose again. “I hate her. She’s the reason I’m like this. She’s the reason I fell off the wagon. And I hate you because all you care about is keeping me sick. Making sure you get paid.”

  Shannon placed her hand gently on Gretchen’s wrist.

  Gretchen yanked her arm free.

  “You will get through this. I believe in you.” Shannon swallowed her lie. She wanted to have faith in Gretchen. Wanted to trust she’d be one of the few who truly changed the course of her life, but Shannon had her doubts.

  Big doubts.

  Gretchen would have to learn how to change and then like the person she chose to be.

  The choice was always the hardest part.

  “I’m tired. I want to sleep,” Gretchen said, tossing the candy wrapper onto the floor.

  Shannon knew anything she said at this point would fall on deaf ears. Gretchen needed some time to detox, and then Shannon might be able to break through her defenses once again.

  Shannon stepped into the hallway, closing the curtain.

  “That didn’t go too well,” Erica said.

  “No. It didn’t. I’m concerned she’s coming off the drugs too hard. Can you get Dr. Franklin to check her blood levels and adjust medication if necessary? No reason to let the poor girl suffer when we can make the withdrawal easier.”

  “Oh, I don’t know. I could never question Dr. Franklin.”

  Shannon let out a long sigh as she checked her watch. All she wanted to do was put her feet up and stare at Jackson’s strong profile under a cool spring night in front of a fire.

  “You’re not questioning him. You’re giving him a message.” Shannon took a piece of paper from behind the nurses’ station and scribbled instructions. “I know Dr. Wood is in the hospital tonight. I will get him to check on my patient. You can give this to both Wood and Dr. Franklin.” She shoved a piece of paper at Erica. “Learn to stand up to the doctors. You stood up to me, but only because you fear Dr. Franklin. Don’t ever be afraid to speak your mind. We can’t do our jobs without nurses. In this situation, you spend more time with our patients than we do. I bet you noticed how agitated Gretchen has been.”