Page 39 of Cut Off from Sky and Earth

Thirty-Six

Alex

I cy rain pelts my neck as I lay facedown in the frozen mud. When I press my hands to push up, pain lances through my right shoulder. I collapse, panting.

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

I was so sure I could grab the phone, call for help, and get back into the attic. Now the phone is as broken and useless as I am. It lies, its screen smashed and dark, in the mud near the edge of the lawn.

My pulse thrums in my neck. I gather my strength and will myself to try again.

My right arm quivers as I tense it to straighten it.

Another bolt of stabbing heat tears through my shoulder, and I hear the crackling of bone grinding on bone.

I grit my teeth and force myself to turn onto my left side.

Sweat beads my forehead, my stomach lurches, and bile rises in my throat.

I support my full weight with my left arm and push myself to a seated position.

Clumsily, I make my way to my knees, ignoring the throbbing in my right shoulder.

But when I try to stand, I don’t even make it halfway up before collapsing back to the ground in a heap, my right ankle pulsing as pain shoots up my leg. I can’t walk.

I’m trapped. Helpless. Unable to rush to Emily’s aid. I turn my gaze up to the attic, half-expecting to witness the attack on her play out in front of the round window. But I can’t see anything through the stinging, wintry mix of sleet and sheets of rain.

A hot pulse of anger slices through my agony and despair and with it, a shard of fragmented memory emerges—the first sliver from the night I was attacked two decades ago working its way to the surface like a splinter that’s been embedded deep in my skin.

Tom Weakes’ face pressed against glass. My window. He’s always been creepy, too familiar. And now he’s watching me.

I scream. His eyes widen, and for a heartbeat I think he’s reacting to my shriek. But his expression conveys horror, not arousal, and his gaze is over my shoulder.

I turn to see what he sees and— the scene dissolves, replaced by the light gray mist that always fills my mind when I try to remember the attack.

But the emotion from that night remains. In that moment, twenty-one years ago, when I turned to see … whatever I saw … I didn’t feel fear. I felt rage. Heart-pounding, gut-twisting rage. The same rage that propels me forward now despite the exquisite, excruciating toll it exacts.

I crawl. Each movement sends a jolt of electric heat through my body. I swear, I sweat, I cry, but I keep going. My left hand claws the earth as I drag myself toward the steps, my busted shoulder and mangled ankle bumping uselessly against the hard ground. But I keep inching forward.

Tristan

“Go find Graham. Please, Loretta. I need to know if he got ahold of Alex Liu.”

My attorney gives me a concerned looked. “Tristan, we need to focus on these charges. They’re serious.”

“Emily’s in danger,” I insist. “And so is Alex.”

Loretta takes off her glasses, polishes them with her sleeve, and returns them to her face. Then she peers at me, owlish and alert. “Tell me again what you think happened.”

“I know what happened.” My voice is raw. “My father was a voyeur. Tate, too. But watching wasn’t enough for Tate. He … escalated.”

“To attacking women.”

“Killing them.”

“Including your wife’s college roommate years ago?”

“Cassie. Right. And a woman in Arizona. Before that, the one who started it all, was Alex Liu. But she survived.” I can see the question forming in her mind and answer it before she asks. “With no memory of the attack.”

She considers this. “And Tate’s dead now, but you didn’t kill him.”

It’s a statement, not a question. I nod in agreement anyway. “I think Wilde killed him. Tate got close to him somehow. And now Dr. Wilde is—” My throat closes around the words.

She waits.

“—finishing what Tate started,” I choke out. Then I stalk back to the table and press my palms against the cold metal surface. My gut twists. “Tate wanted a partner.”

Before I can go on, the door bursts open. Detective Dunn, trailed by Graham, rush in. Their expressions are grim.

“Did you speak to Alex?” I demand.

Graham shakes his head. “The storm knocked out her landline.”

I clench my fists.

Dunn clears his throat. “I contacted the local PD. Their 911 service received a call from Alex Liu’s mobile.”

“What did she say?”

“There was nobody on the line when the call came through. The operator tried calling back, but there’s no answer. Either she lost her signal or her phone died.”

“Or she died. Do something.”

I hear the pleading tone in my voice and I hate it.

I hate being helpless, trapped here hundreds of miles away while Emily’s in danger.

I can’t rescue her. The only thing I can do is convince the authorities to take me seriously.

A bleak comparison springs to mind: I’m like the characters in her manuscript—trapped in a windowless room, lacking agency.

“First responders are on their way, Tristan,” Graham tells me levelly.

“How long until someone gets there?”

“Emergency vehicles are ten minutes out.” Dunn hesitates. “But it could be longer. The mountain roads are slick.”

My stomach lurches. “That might be too late.”

“Emily’s a smart woman,” Loretta says. “If she and this Alex woman already called 911, they know something’s wrong.”

“Wilde’s been her therapist for years. He knows how she thinks. He’ll be able to anticipate her every move—if she even realizes she can’t trust him, which isn’t guaranteed.”

Loretta pauses, lets this sink in. Then she counters, “If what you say is true, Alex Liu is a survivor. Emily isn’t alone.”

Alex was lucky. And everybody’s luck runs out sooner or later.

Emily

A sharp crack splits the air. The rocking chair, stacked precariously on the pile of boxes barricading the door, slides an inch to the left.

My gaze darts to the window where Alex vanished, then back to the door.

My worry for her wars with my fear for what will happen when my luck runs out and the door gives way.

Trapped in this attic, I can’t do a single thing to help her.

I have to save myself if I’m going to have any chance of saving her.

Another crack, and the rubber bin full of books shifts. A sob rises in my throat.

“Fee-fi-fo-fum,” the voice sing-songs from the other side. More splintering sounds follow, and the door frame buckles. “I smell the blood of—” A pause. “Well, you know how it goes, Emily.”

That voice. So familiar, yet somehow wrong. Distorted, like it’s a bad cell phone connection. Is it Tate? Maybe I recognize him because he’s my husband’s brother, but it’s off, wrong, because it isn’t Tristan?

Maybe. Whoever it is, the menace underlying the old nursery rhyme sends a shiver through me.

I back away from the door, gripping the poker in my sweat-slicked hands.

My shoulders smack the wall beneath the window.

Cold air whistles through the open window.

I almost turn to look, to see if Alex has miraculously stood up and escaped. Saved herself.

I hope she has, but I don’t check. I can’t think about Alex now. I have to focus. Have to?—

The rubber bin topples. Books cascade across the floor like dominoes. The man outside laughs. And suddenly I know why I recognize the voice. It’s not Tate. It’s Dr. Wilde. My throat goes dry.

Dr. Wilde.

The man who helped me process my trauma, who guided me through my darkest moments after Cassie’s death. The one person who knows my every fear, every weakness, every vulnerability. I’ve bared more of myself to him than anyone, including my husband.

Another crack. The barricade shudders.

“Your sessions were quite illuminating, Emily.” His voice, despite it all, maintains his professional warmth. “All those hours discussing your novel and what it meant to you. A woman trapped in a tower. How autobiographical.”

I grip the poker until my knuckles turn white. My mind races. Every revelation about my past, every breakthrough about my anxiety, every piece of understanding I gained about my past gave him a blueprint. An operating manual that he can use now to manipulate me, torment me.

Fuck that.

The words explode inside me. I won’t let him. I can use his knowledge of me against him.

I stiffen my spine, solidifying my resolve, as the door frame splinters. Through the widening gap, I catch a glimpse of him. The familiar face that nodded sympathetically across his desk while I sobbed about Cassie is now twisted into a distorted mask of violence.