Olivia, Striking Back - Danielle Norman Page 0,2

the office of Dr. Bannon, an award-winning psychiatrist.

But Olivia wasn’t there for therapy. Rather, Dr. Bannon’s wife was their latest client, and this was all part of the job.

Olivia’s body tensed as the door opened without warning. An attractive man, tall in stature and subtly muscular, walked in with a chemically whitened smile.

“Hi, Olivia,” he said, taking long strides across the room toward her. “I’m Dr. Bannon, but you may call me Drake.”

Olivia stood and shook his hand, and her skin crawled when they made contact because she knew he was an abusive fraud who hid behind a charismatic persona.

“Hi, Doc—I mean, Drake,” Olivia replied, batting her eyelashes demurely. “Thank you so much for fitting me in. I’m really, really grateful.”

“Of course.” He chuckled and gave a lecherous smile. Olivia hoped that he was amused by her giddiness. “Have a seat. How about we begin by talking about why you decided to make an appointment with me in the first place? Tell me a little bit about yourself.”

Drake sat across from her in the cushioned chair. He had a clipboard in his hand, likely with Olivia’s information on it. For some reason, the image caused Olivia to think that there was something oddly familiar about him. But, no…that couldn’t be right. Olivia had no reason to believe that she met the psychiatrist before. It was probably just that she and the girls had been studying his social media profiles so thoroughly leading up to this moment.

“I’m not really sure,” Olivia said with a shrug. “I’m not sleeping very well, I guess. Um, but when I do sleep, I tend to startle awake. My heart pounds and beats really fast. It’s really troubling.”

She was lying, of course. However, she always did her research. She saw a video of a woman talking about her anxiety symptoms on social media just the other day and figured that it would be a good place to start when it came to pretending to being in need of psychiatric help.

“Okay.” Drake nodded thoughtfully. “Is there anything going on in your life that you think might be causing you distress?”

“Well, yeah…I used to share a house with my three best friends, but they all moved out. I’m home alone now. Maybe I’m a little anxious about being all by myself in a big house?”

Dr. Bannon shifted. “Yes, maybe. Do you think it’s possible that you might also feel left behind by them? Why did they move out?”

Olivia couldn’t believe that a trained psychiatrist would seed ideas like this. But, to his credit, Dr. Bannon did follow the appropriate script of a psychiatrist. For the briefest of seconds, she almost forgot that she wasn’t actually in the middle of a therapy session.

Olivia knew that the most convincing lie was one that stuck to the truth. She also knew that there was no real harm in using her friends’ names.

“Well, first, Adeline moved out when she met Riley. They’re married now. Then Sunday moved in with her boyfriend Bo, and now Melanie lives with her fiancé Keanen.”

Drake gave a condescending smile, as if Olivia said something amusing. “I understand you are passionate about this. Let’s slow down and analyze these feelings. I’m sure you are feeling abandoned. Maybe like, you will never find the one.”

Olivia frowned. She wasn’t feeling that way at all, she was happy for her friends. “I’m not upset, at all.”

“Calm down.” Dr. Bannon patted his hand in the air.

Olivia rolled her eyes, she knew that Dr. Bannon was trying to gaslight her, she wasn’t stupid.

Something about the way that he said calm down reminded her of someone. The tone of his voice, the arrogant look in his eyes, and the gentle smirk on his lips were just like that of someone who said that exact phrase to her a decade ago.

“Sorry,” Olivia forced herself to say, remembering that she was supposed to be meek.

As Olivia studied Drake, she realized with a jolt that he was definitely familiar. More familiar than a face she’d seen smiling at her from a social media account or informational webpage. She’d met him before. Years ago…but she knew without a doubt that this man in front of her had crossed her path before. The memory ignited another spark of determination within her.

When she told the girls where they’d met Dr. Bannon before, they were going to be shocked.

Drake set the clipboard aside on the coffee table and folded his fingers together. “So all of your friends have found love and