Pavol sneered at him. “What do you know about everything I’ve been handling here? It’s not your place to worry about the director or the business. You’re just here to keep the patients alive until we want them otherwise.”
Get out of here. Now,the woman’s voice whispered in my ear, and this time I didn’t wait to see where it was coming from. I trusted her somehow.
Blackwood shook his head and reached into his pocket.
“You still think that, don’t you? You still don’t know who works for the director and who works for you.”
Pavol paled. “Lucciano works for the director, that’s why he was sent here.”
Blackwood pulled his hand from his pocket, something black and shiny in his grip. A gun. I froze at the sight. The doctor had moved around the far side of the room, his eyes locked on Father Pavol.
He shook his head and sighed.
“It was never Lucciano. He’s here for training. It was never the guy before him, either. It was always me. And the director is fucking sick of your flagrant mismanagement. I’m afraid he’s going to have to let you go.”
I watched through my dreamlike confusion as Blackwood raised the gun toward Pavol and, before the priest could step away, shot him in the chest.
The sound was suppressed by a silencer, but I still jumped. Pavol reared back from the impact, careening into the tablebehind him and knocking over the multitude of candles. His numerous bottles of spirits also fell, some smashing on the floor. The fallen candles made contact with the spilled liquid, and with a loud whoosh Pavol went up in flames.
I jumped up, backing away as the burning man flailed around the room. The curtains went up next.
“Jesus, what an idiot, he can’t even die gracefully,” Blackwood muttered, and took my arm in a steellike grip. He guided me from the room as thick smoke clogged the air. The windows shattered behind us, oxygen feeding the blaze. A scream rent the air, and it took a long moment to understand that it was coming from me.
Blackwood went for a fire extinguisher on the wall and tried to go back in, but he soon gave up. I edged away from him up the hall, watching him tuck the gun away somewhere under his coat.
“Fuck,” he swore, watching the growing blaze. He turned to me. “Get out of here, and wait outside for me.”
“Why?” I asked. Who was he to me? Why would I wait for him?
“Because I told you to. I’m your doctor, Katarina, I want what’s best for you. So do what I say.”
“You’re my doctor? You just killed someone,” I said, the words jumbled and thick in my mouth.
He nodded. “To save your life. That man wanted to hurt you. He’s hurt a lot of people. He’d have hurt more in the future. I did the world a favor.”
“You should have called the police. You can’t just kill someone,” I cried, hysteria making my voice thin and sharp. Smoke flowed out of the burning room, and I coughed.
Go on. Unless you want to burn to a crisp.
I started at the voice. There was a long line of mirrors on the wall, and I could see myself clearly in them. I was alone. Therewas no woman whispering in my ear. She sounded like me, but confident and all-knowing.
She was inside my head. The certainty hit me like a gut punch.
I was hearing a voice inside my head that made more sense than anything that was happening outside it.
Was I crazy?
“Kat. I know this is all scary, but you don't need to overthink anything. Just trust me.”
Blackwood put his hands on my shoulders, and I shuddered. His touch felt wrong.
“I’ve taken special care of you here, you just can’t remember that right now. I’ve cared for you on behalf of your mother, Elena, and your fiancé, Ivan.”
Fiancé?The name Ivan meant nothing to me, but Elena? That name clicked somewhere inside me, soothing my fear and pain for a moment. A comfort that could never be denied.
Elena. Mom.
“You know my mom?” I asked, gripping onto his white coat.