Chapter 12 - The Infiltration
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"GET DOWN!" Mason yelled, pulling his suit jacket over his face as he lunged toward the ventilation unit on the wall, trying to stuff a towel into the intake register.
My chest cast made it impossible to breathe deeply, but the sweet, heavy scent of the gas hit my nostrils instantly. My vision began to blur at the edges, dark spots swimming across my eyes.
THUD.
Detective Mason's knees buckled. He collapsed against the side of my bed, his service weapon sliding across the linoleum floor, his eyes rolling back as the chemical agent overwhelmed his nervous system.
"Mason... no..." I whimpered, trying desperately to reach for his gun, but my arms were locked inside the rigid plaster cast.
The heavy door latch clicked open.
A tall, thin figure stepped into the red-lit room, wearing a nurse's blue scrubs, her face covered by a surgical mask. She didn't hurry. She walked with a slow, agonizing limp, her boots clicking softly against the floor tiles.
She reached up with a thin, bone-white hand and pulled down her mask.
It was the woman from the observation window.
Her cheeks were hollow, her skin stretched tightly over her skull, but her dark eyes burned with an terrifying, feverish intensity. Hanging around her pale neck was the heavy silver pendant.
She walked up to the side of my bed, looking down at my helpless, cast-bound body.
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She picked up Detective Mason's dropped glock from the floor, racking the slide with a sharp, practiced metallic click, and pressed the cold steel barrel directly against the center of my forehead.
"Hello, Claire," Emily whispered, her voice raspy, like dry leaves scraping across concrete. "Do you like living in my house?"
