Folks thought she was touched in the head. But she found solace in knowing the spirits turned to her when they were lost between the darkness and the light.
Tree branches cracked and snapped in the wind, footsteps crunching dried leaves somewhere nearby. She pivoted. Someone was there. Someone watching her.
She’d sensed his presence many times. Heard some of the Shadow People called him the Watcher. Although she hadn’t seen him in some time now.
No one knew if he was good or evil. But he roamed among them all the same. Lurking and watching. Hiding from something.
She didn’t think he was this latest killer. A sorrowful aura radiated from him as if pain and life had been too hard on him, and he was lost.
Softly, as the rose petals fluttered around her, she began to hum her favorite gospel hymn, willing Ellie Reeves to find answers fast before another woman was taken, another innocent life over too soon. Before the evil created a permanent stain on the trail.
Sixty-Nine
North Georgia State Hospital
Ellie looked up at the forbidding mental institution.
While pacing the waiting room at the hospital, anticipating news about her mother, she’d received word from Derrick that he had an ID on the man who’d visited Hiram in prison. As Bryce booked Paulson for arson, she swung by and picked up Derrick.
“The man’s name is Vinny Holcomb,” Derrick said as they parked. “He has a record for assault against women, and he attacked his own mother, who called the police. He’s institutionalized in the same mental facility where Hiram had first been sent for evaluation.” He hesitated. “He escaped last week, Ellie.”
Derrick had already checked to make sure a bulletin had been issued for the escaped mental patient and all authorities at the airports, ports, and borders were notified. It was still active, but with everything else going on it wasn’t something Ellie had been made aware of. Although if Holcomb was the Weekday Killer, he must be hiding out somewhere in the mountains.
The gray stone hospital, located in a neighboring county about twenty minutes away, resembled a haunted castle, with turrets and a spiked roof. An electric fence surrounded the property, which backed up to the river and the sprawling forest behind it. A few who’d managed to get past the guards and the electric fence had plunged to their death in the raging river as they tried to escape.
“I’ve heard about this place,” Derrick said as he parked.
“I’m not surprised,” Ellie said. “It definitely has a reputation. There are rumors that in the fifties and sixties they used to try out experimental procedures on prisoners being treated here.”
Ellie shivered as they entered, the giant stone walls closing in on her. She could practically hear the screams of patients who’d suffered in this place, ones who might have been locked away for life.
The director of the hospital, a tall, thick-chested man with a gray beard and bulbous nose, met them at the front door, introducing himself as Carlton Hudson.
“We’re here about your patient who escaped,” Ellie said.
“Yes, I figured you’d show up sooner or later,” Mr. Hudson replied.
“How did he get away?” Derrick asked.
The director made a low sound in his throat. “The details are sketchy. Happened at night after the patients were on lockdown in their rooms. We think he somehow overcame a guard, stole his gun and then his uniform. Drove out of here in the man’s car.”
“You alerted the police?” Ellie asked.
“Of course. The sheriff over in Ellijay.”
How hadn’t they heard about this?
“What about the Marshal Service?”
He shook his head. “Vinny wasn’t a prisoner, Detective Reeves. It’s true that we temporarily assess and treat convicts here—hence the security measures—but we specialize in long-term, secure treatment of the mentally ill.”
They followed the director through a security area and down a long dark hallway. Voices, medicine carts and a loud banging sound from inside one of the rooms echoed around them. The scent of dust and medicines and something rancid that Ellie couldn’t define permeated the air.
They passed a solarium with potted plants, tables where patients gathered for card and board games, and an area for arts and crafts, complete with easels for painting. Floor-to-ceiling windows allowed sunlight to flood the room, which made Ellie breathe a little easier.
Staff members supervised the small groups and a guard stood by the door, his eyes on the room.
Unease grew inside Ellie as they veered down another hallway, then stopped at another security station.