Disturbed Mind (A Grace Ellery Romantic Suspense Series Book 2) by Charlotte Raine
Authors: Charlotte Raine
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fingers over her. Then, I would tie her to the bed and become her god.
Kayla : Bryce?
I open my eyes and type back to her.
Me : You know you’re in love when you give someone all of your power and they don’t use it to destroy you.
Kayla : What happens if they destroy you?
I remember the lines of disgust and pity in Grace’s face as I confessed my love for her. She completely annihilated me—my hope, my love, my dreams of a future. It was all replaced by hatred. Her attack and Bryce’s death are on her hands. She will never be able to wash the blood off.
Me : You kill them.
I turn off my phone before she can ask if I’m joking. I can’t be honest for much longer. I can’t be humane.
I open the Bible again and put Bryce’s teeth back inside it. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth— but all I want is a butchered heart for a butchered heart. The only difference will be that Grace’s slaughter will be literal.
Chapter Fourteen
Sam, 2015
( F riday Late Morning ; Murray Hospital, Murray, Virginia)
JOHN DOE IS USED as a placeholder name for a corpse with an unknown identity. It might seem strange to give someone a generic name, but it’s actually better this way. It allows me to be detached from the body—I can pretend it’s just flesh, bones, blood, and organs. I can pretend they weren’t alive before, that they didn’t have a family, that they didn’t have a future. I can be a scientist instead of a coroner.
I set the bone shards and slivers from John Doe’s skull on a metal tray. I’m not sure if there’s enough there to reconstruct the face. It seems like some of the bone washed away into the lake, which is unfortunate because it seems like facial reconstruction is the only thing I can do that would help the investigation.
There’s a small knock on the door before it swings open. Alicia strides in, her hair whipping behind her like a runway model.
Alicia is, in the generic sense of the word, “flawless.” She has long, flowing chestnut brown hair that belongs in a shampoo commercial and blue eyes that remind me of the Caribbean Sea. She takes her fashion cues from beauty pageant winners (she even drives out of town to have her dental work done by a dentist who has done whitening and straightening for a number of Miss Virginia winners) and posh fashion magazines. If she's not in a chic suit or pantsuit, she's in ultrafashionable workout attire, even though she never works out in public. She's always the sort of person who shows up at Starbucks looking radiant, as if she might have just been running or doing yoga. She does work out daily at her home—or at least she did while we were dating. I think she didn’t want anyone to see her sweating or struggling, but I could never quite figure out how her mind worked.
She wrinkles her nose, taking a step back toward the doors. “That looks nasty.”
I cover John Doe with a plastic sheet.
“It’s pretty bad,” I say. “What’s up?”
“Oh, I just had some ideas for how to sell Grace’s house faster and make a better profit.” She brings me over a pastel pink folder. I flip it open to see pictures cut out of magazines and paint samples. “I thought we could paint some of the rooms some bright colors—that will make buyers feel happier when they walk in and that cream color the walls have now just isn’t that…enticing. It reminds me of a hospital or an old person’s home. Then, for less than two hundred fifty dollars, we could buy some things from the Red Silk store. They have the cutest decorations, including this wooden vase that has flowers carved into it.”
She gestures to a picture of the vase. It is beautiful.
“Wouldn’t water soak into a wood vase?” I ask. “How would you keep flowers in it?”
She lightly slaps my arm. “It’s just decoration, silly. You could fill it with anything. Fake flowers, marbles, cattails, a candle…oh, my gosh, do you remember that time we went to that five-star restaurant that we
Kayla : Bryce?
I open my eyes and type back to her.
Me : You know you’re in love when you give someone all of your power and they don’t use it to destroy you.
Kayla : What happens if they destroy you?
I remember the lines of disgust and pity in Grace’s face as I confessed my love for her. She completely annihilated me—my hope, my love, my dreams of a future. It was all replaced by hatred. Her attack and Bryce’s death are on her hands. She will never be able to wash the blood off.
Me : You kill them.
I turn off my phone before she can ask if I’m joking. I can’t be honest for much longer. I can’t be humane.
I open the Bible again and put Bryce’s teeth back inside it. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth— but all I want is a butchered heart for a butchered heart. The only difference will be that Grace’s slaughter will be literal.
Chapter Fourteen
Sam, 2015
( F riday Late Morning ; Murray Hospital, Murray, Virginia)
JOHN DOE IS USED as a placeholder name for a corpse with an unknown identity. It might seem strange to give someone a generic name, but it’s actually better this way. It allows me to be detached from the body—I can pretend it’s just flesh, bones, blood, and organs. I can pretend they weren’t alive before, that they didn’t have a family, that they didn’t have a future. I can be a scientist instead of a coroner.
I set the bone shards and slivers from John Doe’s skull on a metal tray. I’m not sure if there’s enough there to reconstruct the face. It seems like some of the bone washed away into the lake, which is unfortunate because it seems like facial reconstruction is the only thing I can do that would help the investigation.
There’s a small knock on the door before it swings open. Alicia strides in, her hair whipping behind her like a runway model.
Alicia is, in the generic sense of the word, “flawless.” She has long, flowing chestnut brown hair that belongs in a shampoo commercial and blue eyes that remind me of the Caribbean Sea. She takes her fashion cues from beauty pageant winners (she even drives out of town to have her dental work done by a dentist who has done whitening and straightening for a number of Miss Virginia winners) and posh fashion magazines. If she's not in a chic suit or pantsuit, she's in ultrafashionable workout attire, even though she never works out in public. She's always the sort of person who shows up at Starbucks looking radiant, as if she might have just been running or doing yoga. She does work out daily at her home—or at least she did while we were dating. I think she didn’t want anyone to see her sweating or struggling, but I could never quite figure out how her mind worked.
She wrinkles her nose, taking a step back toward the doors. “That looks nasty.”
I cover John Doe with a plastic sheet.
“It’s pretty bad,” I say. “What’s up?”
“Oh, I just had some ideas for how to sell Grace’s house faster and make a better profit.” She brings me over a pastel pink folder. I flip it open to see pictures cut out of magazines and paint samples. “I thought we could paint some of the rooms some bright colors—that will make buyers feel happier when they walk in and that cream color the walls have now just isn’t that…enticing. It reminds me of a hospital or an old person’s home. Then, for less than two hundred fifty dollars, we could buy some things from the Red Silk store. They have the cutest decorations, including this wooden vase that has flowers carved into it.”
She gestures to a picture of the vase. It is beautiful.
“Wouldn’t water soak into a wood vase?” I ask. “How would you keep flowers in it?”
She lightly slaps my arm. “It’s just decoration, silly. You could fill it with anything. Fake flowers, marbles, cattails, a candle…oh, my gosh, do you remember that time we went to that five-star restaurant that we
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