Page 85 of Wildling

“How are you feeling?” Regina asks me. “You seem distracted.”

“Better,” I finally tell her. “My head feels clear.”

Regina sits on a leather couch across from me and doesn’t look overly convinced. She’s been with me since I arrived. She took residence here just to oversee my care and will continue to monitor me after I leave. I’m not sure what she will do now that I’m better. Though does one ever truly recover after suffering psychosis?

Regina believes I’m better, and I’ve not suffered any symptoms since the final night I saw Nick. Regina’s convinced that what I experienced was acute. An accumulation of everything that happened.

She pushes up her glasses. “Let’s recap everything one more time. What happened to you, Layla? Tell me in your own words.”

I sigh, my attention drifting back to the trees. We’ve gone over my memories countless times, dissecting and re-working each one to ensure I could decipher what was real from what was a hallucination, a line that has become increasingly thin.

I close my eyes and exhale. “I received a letter from my boyfriend’s sister telling me Nick died on a mission. I had a psychotic break and ended up killing her. I also killed another woman, making it look like an accident. Feeling guilty, I ran off to the bunker on Nick’s property, where I suffered from extreme psychosis and relived memories from my relationship with Nick. When the food ran out, I left the bunker and called Detective Crawley from a burner phone, framing a man named Toby Myers. It was all meticulously planned out beforehand.”

Regina’s eyes perk up. “That sounds logical, doesn’t it? Especially coming from someone who orchestrated the deaths of two people, making them look like accidents. Then killing another man and getting away with it.”

I bite my lip. “I suppose.”

“What else can you tell me about after your isolation?”

I scratch my arm, harder than necessary. “My hallucinations in the bunker carried on into my life after. I used that same burner phone to message myself, forcing myself to believe that my dead boyfriend was alive and taunting me. I dreamed about him nearly every night, and hurt myself while reliving my pain, guilt, and trauma. I had his gun and moved the mark around my room, further pushing my mind toward his existence. I created a shadow version of Nick, named the Archer. He guided my mind back from the darkness.”

She nods as if this clinical synopsis of the past year of my life makes perfect sense. “That’s good, Layla. What else can you tell me?”

I suck in a breath and swallow hard. “I come from a long line of serial killers. I started killing because I had to help my grandfather and mother finish the Zodiac cycle.”

“And what will happen if you don’t finish the killings?”

“Bad things.”

“Like what?”

I take a deep breath and say, “If we don’t complete the ritual. People we love die.” Thank god for doctor/patient confidentiality, or the fact Regina doesn’t have to work another day in her life if she doesn’t want to.

She presses her lips together. “Okay. Now, what will the rest of the world believe happened?”

I smile, but it doesn’t reach my eyes. “They will see a girl driven to madness from the wrongdoings of her mother.”

Lies. Lies. Lies.

“This is important. Beth’s trial is tomorrow. There can’t be any doubt. And she didn’t kill three people. She’s only confessing to one.”

My eyes glaze over. “I was taken by Toby Myers.” The story they are spinning to the press is Toby Myers took me out of spite. He used to work for Stormwood, and my grandfather fired him. He took me out of revenge.

This seems to satisfy her. “Good. That is a logical motivation. Revenge and desperation.” She pauses for a moment as I drift my attention elsewhere again. “Your mother will get through this, but she needs you now. The company is yours; you need to step up and keep it going. You employ thousands of people.” And Regina needs to stay on the lucrative Ashby payroll.

It took Detective Crawley three months to finally gather enough evidence to indict Beth. The only charges she faces are related to Keely’s death, specifically as an accessory to murder. Beth wasn’t there when it happened, so the only thing connecting her to Keely is Beth’s own confession, and what Gabriella says. I’m not sure how she managed it, but all the other evidence was hidden.

The only proof now exists in my head. Over one hundred years of lies, murder, and deceit—Mrs. Parkinson’s spider bites, workplace accidents, lake drownings, murdering Sarah’s father—gone. The whispers in the walls and my grandfather’s dying words to me. His warning of what will happen if I don’t finish. Beth will go down as one of Canada’s most notorious and brilliant serial killers, who got away with it. They can speculate, but they can’t prove it. Everything is tied up like a little white ribbon.

I grab the rest of my clothes on my bed and neatly fold them, along with the six months’ worth of paintings I plan to donate to charity. Who knew my sick mind would be so valuable. Regina helps me pack the rest in silence. After a few minutes, I stop and stare at her.

She arches her brows. “What’s wrong?”

Goose bumps form over my skin as they always do when I think of the shed. “There is something else that’s bugging me.”

She runs her hand along her brow. “What’s that?”

I sit on the edge of my small bed, my heart pounding and my skin turning ice-cold. Phantom pain shoots up my arms, reaching my shoulders. The memory of this pain feels so real, I can still feel it. It’s crippling. “There’s one hallucination I can’t quite grasp. I know it couldn’t have been a real memory. But when I think about it, my arms feel like they’re being pulled from their sockets.”