Page 73 of Cut Off from Sky and Earth
I force myself to move faster, ignoring the grinding in my shoulder. If I can just make it to the guest room. To the locked box in the closet. To the weapon inside.
Emily
Dr. Wilde steps over the splintered wood into the attic and his homicidal mask melts away. He looks the way I remember him. Kind, serious, attentive. For a fleeting moment, I feel safe, relieved.
I shove the emotion away. I’m not safe. I have to remember that. I can’t allow him to lull me into a feeling of false security.
“What … why are you here?” My voice shakes. I let it.
“I need to finish this.”
I swallow, my eyes locked on his. “Finish what?”
He pauses, considering his answer. He takes a step toward me.
I force myself to stand still—as if I’ve frozen.
We’ve been over fight, flight, fawn, freeze dozens of times in our sessions. He knows my trauma response as well as I do. I freeze.
The only way out is to let him think I’m paralyzed with fear—and then fight. It’s the only chance I have.
He takes note of my stiff posture and a hint of a cruel smile flashes across his mouth before he answers.
“Your husband has been protecting you,” Dr. Wilde says in the same measured tone he uses in our counseling sessions. “From his brother. From himself. From the truth. From your destiny, Emily.”
“My destiny?” I croak.
“Yes. You have to die.”
He says it without emotion—like it’s just a fact.
“Why?”
“To close the circle.”
“I don’t understand.”
I don’t actually care what reasoning his diseased brain has latched onto, but I need to keep him occupied while I use my peripheral vision to scan the attic for a weapon. The poker and knife rest against the wall near the window, tantalizingly out of easy reach—I’d have to dart past him to get to them. There’s a framed print resting against a chest, a box labeled ornaments, and a stack of bins. Nothing that will protect me from the blow of an axe, if that’s his plan.
Involuntarily, my gaze falls on the axe.
He looks down at the tool in his hands as if he’s surprised to find it there.
Then he gestures with it, carving an arc through the air. “I’ve been treating Tristan.”
I stare at him. “My Tristan?”
He nods. “For years. For as long as I’ve been treating you.”
For a long moment, I consider this, then I shake my head. He has to be lying. “That’s not possible. Isn’t that?—?”
“A conflict of interest. It would’ve been if I’d known, but he lied to me. He told me his name was Tate Weakes. For years, I didn’t realize you were married to him. He used his brother’s name, but his own story. I was helping him work through his guilt and trauma.”
Heat surges through my chilled body, and my vision swims, as I try to process what he’s telling me. “What trauma—his dad’s death?”
“In a way, yes. But more than that, the fact Tristan knew, or at least, suspected that his brother had … urges. That knowledge shaped the trajectory of your husband’s life.”
As curious as I am about this statement about Tristan, I focus on the urges.
