Saving Souls Page 2

  Glancing around the room, I make sure I meet everyone’s eyes. There are six total guards, including Raid. Five males. One female.

  And three who I can’t read, including Raid and the woman. That sets me on edge and makes trusting them so much harder. I’m not going to outright challenge them, ask what they’re hiding, but that’s because I don’t want them knowing my gifts.

  “Hello,” I say, ready to get things rolling. “My name is Dr. Zahra Deas, the head psychiatrist here at MacFarlane Psychiatric Hospital for the Gifted. I’m sure you don’t want to hear the normal pitch I give others about this place. All you need to know is that this is the first hospital built specifically for the gifted in the United States, and I’ve been heading it for the last two years. Due to my abilities, I was able to fast-track my education, and the MacFarlane family were the first to believe in me and hired me to turn this into the number one gifted hospital in the States. You agree with me; otherwise, you would have gone elsewhere. So, please, tell me your side of the story.”

  “Our side?” the black man sitting to the right of Raid asks. He’s the second man I can’t read anything from. The woman stands behind them, looking straight ahead, eyes blank, standing at attention, body alert and ready for things to go dangerously wrong.

  Raid gives him a warning glance. The man shakes his head, pressing his lips together.

  “Let’s start with introductions. I’m Raid.”

  I snort. His eyes narrow at me in warning. I flash him a sweet smile, full of patience, telling him to proceed.

  “To my right is Journey Landry. He also goes by Jur. If I can’t be reached, he’s the man to go to.” The black man has brown eyes, a scruffy jaw, and wide features. A scar runs from his chin down the left side of his neck, nearly white against his dark skin. He looks like he wants to eat me for dinner while he relaxes on a bed of nails. And not the fun sort of eating either. It doesn’t help that I can’t see his energies. I push back the unease that stretches through my body as I meet Raid’s team.

  “Next is Christo York.” Raid motions to the man next to me. Blond hair, blue eyes, a deep frown, and apparently in love with the color black. Black clothes, black earrings, and a black leather choker around his neck.

  The third man at the table is Nicolas Cortez, or Nic for short. I have a feeling Raid enjoys nicknames. Nic grins at me, flashing white teeth and laughing green eyes.

  Then Raid introduces the only woman in his group, Peyton Philips, who doesn’t move or react at all when Raid speaks about her. He calls her Pey. She’s too uptight, and it’s a little irritating. I’m tempted to get up and make her break that blank, empty, robotic facade. Her black hair is twisted up into a bun, her pale skin flawless, and her hazel eyes focused on the wall behind me.

  The last person is Felipe Nyvans. He stands next to Peyton, smiling shyly when our eyes meet. His curly brown hair spills over his face, light brown eyes peeking out from behind the strands that fall over them.

  So the people I couldn’t read at all are Raid, Jur, and Peyton. I store that away. Maybe when Jackson sends me the information on everyone, there’ll be an explanation. Could it be part of their abilities? Are they hiding something?

  I don’t know what to think, and it worries me as Raid goes into an explanation of how he got ahold of the patients he brought with him and what he hopes by coming here.

  “If you need them to hide, do you think here is a good place?” I ask. “While we are transitioning into a private hospital, we still receive funding from the state government. We aren’t a secret.”

  Raid looks at Jur. The man leans forward, expression hard. “We wiped out every piece of information we could on those four people. We covered all our tracks. Currently, if they were searched for, they’d be heading to New Mexico, potentially California instead. There are some good private hospitals out that way too. If they even bother checking hospitals. I’d imagine the few who even know about these four would think we’d hide them deep underground.”

  “Okay.” I lean back, the chair tipping slightly. “You need to realize you essentially brought me some high-profile patients. People will be looking for them.” I eye the group. “I imagine they are looking for you too?”

  “No,” Raid says. “We stayed in the lower ranks, on the outskirts. We had one contact we were working within the inner circle. Considering we have his niece, he won’t do anything to put her in jeopardy. She’s all the family he has left. He’d rather be dead. That’s if they know to question him.”

  I have a feeling if their contact is to be questioned, it’d involve lots of horrible torture too.

  “Dr. Deas,” Raid says, “we are here on the off chance that trouble did manage to find us. It would be unfair of us to drop them here and then run off. Getting these people out has been part of our plan for a long time. We wanted to help more people, but our window was too short and these four weren’t in a place many knew about. And that’s only because Holsen has always been a paranoid man. Not many even know they existed. We wish to keep it that way.”

  I blow out a breath. “Okay. Fine. As you know, I can’t give you access to the other floors until you are properly cleared and in the system. I’ll introduce you to our head of security, Camden Shields—and yes, I see the irony in his name.” I flash a smile, hoping to break through the tension brewing in the room. The only person to give me a smile back is Nic. “He’ll help you with all the appropriate paperwork to gain access to other floors. Once you have that, I’ll give you the grand tour and rules. Please understand there will be areas you do not have access to without an escort. I will give you access to the floors, but only to the common areas. You are not welcome in the resident halls unless I give permission and someone escorts you. Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” Raid replies. The others smile or nod in agreement.

  “Good. Come on, I’ll show you to the staff kitchen and you can eat whatever leftovers you can find. They ordered catering for lunch today, so I’m sure there’s something there for you guys. While you eat, I’ll get Camden to come meet you. He’ll bring you back to his office to get the process started. It usually takes a couple of days to gain access, but I understand the importance, so hopefully, we can get everything settled by the morning.”

  I stand up. The scrapes of their chairs echo my own as they get to their feet.

  The kitchen isn’t that far away, and I drop them off there before heading to Camden’s office.

  My shoulders refuse to release the tension building. The longer they’re around, the more I feel a target on my back. Especially when I can’t read anything from three of them. That freaks me out more than anything else about this situation.

  I never thought trouble would find me, but I guess that’s too much to hope for.

  3

  Raid brought me his seven-year-old daughter, a nineteen-year-old girl with an affinity for death, a twenty-three-year old illusionist, and a twenty-year-old tracker. The last two are male and female respectively.

  I’m set up in an office space on the first floor, about to do the initial interviews for each patient. I stare at the new files before me, skeleton files that will grow each day the longer the patients are here. There’s no telling how long that will be, especially if Holsen’s constituents want their hands on them.

  There’s a knock at the office door and the oldest of the new patients comes in. Worn clothes hang off his thin frame. He’s tall and lanky, with pallid skin, a mop of dark brown hair, and sad eyes. I hate sad eyes. While they look into your soul, a hand reaches into your chest, grabs your heart, and twists so hard that breathing becomes impossible.

  Behind him are Karen Orana, our head nurse, and Emerson Marron, the orderly. They escort Lucas Pope into a chair and step back to give him space.

  Lucas’s green eyes move around the room, never landing on one thing. I don’t say anything for a few minutes as he continues to do that. Finally, his shoulders slump and he leans back.

  “Mr. Pope,” I say
in my practiced kind voice, “my name is Dr. Zahra Deas. I am the head psychiatrist here at MacFarlane Psychiatric Hospital. Do you understand where you are and why you’re here?”

  His eyes flicker to me, down to his hands, and then back up. Tendrils of gray and red dance together around him, not quite the true color of his soul, but representative of all the damage done to him. The tendrils reach out to the desk, and the pen cup sitting there erupts into fire, wisps of smoke lifting in the air.

  Karen gasps and Emerson moves to get up.

  “Don’t,” I say.

  I glance at Lucas, noting the angry challenge in his eyes. Leaning forward, I feel the heat of the fire. When I quickly run my hand over it, I can feel the bite of its flames. Very much real.

  Smiling at Lucas, I say, “That’s a good one.”

  He blinks, confusion twisting his expression into something more vulnerable now that I broke through the edginess inside him. He wants to flex his power, make me fear him. Too bad that at night he will never make an appearance in my nightmares. I have too many other ones already.

  The fire disappears and all the pens look fine.

  “Mr. Pope, do you understand where you are and why you’re here?” I ask again, this time in a harder voice.

  He nods.

  “Will you tell me?”

  His tongue slips out and licks his cracked lips as he nervously glances around again. “He’s dead? Holsen’s dead?” His voice is low and gruff, scratchy from disuse. He hasn’t had a lot of opportunities to talk before now. I can tell by the careful way he seems to choose his words and the unsurety in his tone.

  “Are you asking me or telling me?” I ask gently.

  He shakes his head. “No. Not asking. He’s dead. Dead.”

  “Yes. Holsen is dead.”

  Lucas flinches when he hears Holsen’s name.

  “Dead,” he repeats. “He’s dead.”

  This. This is what makes my job so fucking hard. But also worth the emotional pain I go through seeing another human being suffering. I have the chance to fix people, and I’m willing to do anything to do that. They deserve the help.

  “Yes. Do you know where you are?”

  “He said I need help. I can be helped.” He stares at his hands, lifting them from his lap. He curls his fingers together and then uncurls them. “That I can be saved.”

  “Who is he?”

  “Sid’s father.”

  “Sidney Gaines?”

  “He said I can be saved.” Tears fall down his face, streaking his cheeks until they drop onto his shirt.

  I get up from my chair and move slowly. Lucas tracks every movement I make with an intense gaze. The change in Lucas is instant as he stiffens, ready to make a move if he feels threatened. His expression hardens as darkness seeps in. His hands rest on his thighs, but now they curl into fists.

  Emerson stiffens as his eyes narrow onto the back of Lucas’s head as he senses the change. The orderly has a touch that soothes. And when he works hard enough, he can put anyone to sleep. There have been countless times that gift has saved my life.

  After moving in front of Lucas, I crouch down and ask, “Lucas, may I touch you?” I raise my hands, palms up, so he can see them. “May I offer you kindness?”

  His eyebrows furrow. “Kindness?”

  “Yes, kindness. Support. May I touch your hands and your forearms? Nothing else. I promise.”

  “Promise?” His question is almost desperate.

  “Yes, I promise. I will never touch you without your permission. I will always ask. I promise.”

  “Yes.” His answer is a hiss through his teeth.

  Reaching out to him slowly, I keep an eye on his expression and on his aura. The tendrils of his existence aren’t as red anymore. They’re duller now, seeping toward a purple blue. The black is still there, a shadow to the colors, just outlining them to remind me that if he needs to, he can be extremely dangerous.

  Our hands touch and Lucas stills. His skin is cold, hands rough with scars. I don’t look away from him as I give his hands a light squeeze.

  “Sid’s father is right. You can be saved. You can be helped. By being here, by talking with me, you’re already taking that step. But being saved, it isn’t about me helping you. It’s about you helping yourself.”

  As I talk, I reach out to his soul and have to bite back my dark emotions when I feel it. His very soul is in tatters, stitched together haphazardly so that at any second it might all unravel and he’ll break. The damage is so extensive that I’m not sure where to start.

  Trauma. Think of it like trauma, I remind myself. Assess, diagnose, treat. Start with the worst ones, the dark ones that bring out that dangerous side to him. Find the root of it, and treat it from there.

  “Will you let me help you help yourself?” I ask. “I think I’d like to know the man you’re meant to be. I think he’s an interesting guy.”

  Lucas ducks his head briefly, trying to hide his blushing. “Yes. He’s interesting. He’s nice, and he cares.”

  “Yeah? What else do you like about him?”

  “He could play sports. He liked swimming and playing volleyball.”

  “Those are good sports. They’re often overlooked because of the popular ones, but I think those are more intensive.”

  “They are. So much training.”

  We continue like that for the rest of the session. There are moments when we reach certain parts of his life where he lashes out, creating an illusion meant to scare us. Another fire. Infestation of spiders. A ghost. But I show him he doesn’t scare me, and they go away after I play with his illusions, taking in how very real they feel. The heat of the flames burning my skin, the feel of spiders crawling over me, or the coldness of a ghost passing through me. They’re all good, and I have a feeling they’re all child’s play. His way of telling us to back off.

  I listen and do just that. I back off.

  Once the session is over, I lean back in my seat and sigh, already feeling exhausted. I still need to meet with the other three.

  There’s barely enough time to put all my thoughts down into his file along with the beginning of a game plan before the next person walks in.

  Chana Decker, twenty years old, with the ability to track people. Her session goes about the same as Lucas’s. We don’t touch since I know that’s the root of her ability and it’s clear she doesn’t want anyone to touch her.

  For most of the session, she barely speaks, her toffee-colored eyes staring at me. Quickly, I learn her nervous habit is to yank on her hair, which explains why she sports a short style. The wavy, light brown hair hangs haphazardly around her face, stopping at her chin in uneven layers.

  There seems to be a lot of confusion on her side about why she’s here, about what happened, about Holsen being dead. No one wants to believe it because it’s too hard to imagine the one main monster in your life is suddenly gone. Especially when there is no body to see. No tangible proof other than people’s words.

  And for these people, words aren’t worth anything.

  That means she doesn’t trust me and prefers tossing out random threats over talking about anything else. The young woman has a very good imagination, so much so that Emerson grows agitated and Karen white-faced by the end of the session. Wanting to cultivate her imagination and hopefully push it in a healthier direction, I give her a journal. She tries to hide it, but her energy tells me that she likes what she perceives as a gift.

  The third person is Karly Rivera, nineteen years old with a massive existential crisis that I’m not sure how to appropriately approach. It’s a bit hard to help someone stop questioning life when their ability allows them to see a person’s death. I can’t begin to imagine the kinds of deaths she saw under Holsen’s tutelage.

  A million questions about her gift comes to mind. Is the death she predicts final? Is there a way to change them? Has she tried? Is there crossover between Karly’s gift and Adalyn’s? For Adalyn, the future is forever changing, every second
, every decision affecting the outcome until it narrows to that final moment. Taking Adalyn’s gift into consideration, wouldn’t the deaths that Karly sees be able to be prevented?

  So many questions, but none I’ll be able to get answers to now.

  Karly sits in front of me, a sheet of red hair falling over her face. Once in a while, she lifts her head and peeks out from behind the curtain of hair with dark blue eyes, so dark they’re nearly black.

  “Miss Rivera, you understand you’ll never have to do anything you don’t want to. Not anymore. If you don’t want someone touching you, they won’t. You tell them to stop, they will. As long as you aren’t a danger to anyone, including yourself, you don’t need to worry anymore.”

  She snorts. “So if I am a danger?” she asks. Tendrils of black snap out from her, and I stiffen.

  “Like anyone in this world, if they are dangerous, then the wellbeing of those around them takes precedent.”

  “I’ll be touched?”

  “Yes, you would be touched.” I tilt my head to the side. “Are you planning to be a danger?”

  “Isn’t that what my existence is?” she asks. “I’m the grim reaper.”

  “Is that what you call yourself?”

  She shakes her head.

  “Did Holsen call you that?”

  Her lips lift into a snarl. “He never touches me. He always makes me wear gloves, and if I need to take those off, then he’s well covered. I can never touch him. No matter how hard I try.” A cackle comes out of her, the lack of humor in it sending the little hairs on my body to attention. “Bet he wishes I saw his death now.”

  My heart hurts for her. Her gift is something people fear or covet. They will either think she’s putting a curse on them, or they want to know so they can change it. I know I don’t want to know. Not because I think it’s a curse, but because a person’s death isn’t something I think they should know. I’m of the mindset that knowing your death creates an unhealthy desperation to make sure it never happens. That isn’t a way to live.