Chapter 5 - THE DOCTOR I’D NEVER MET
Luke had access to every security system in my house.
That was normal.
Then I found something that wasn’t.
Two years earlier—three days before I was shot—Luke had opened a sealed medical file under my name.
Inside was a neurological examination signed by a physician I had never met.
Dr. Victor Hale.
I searched my memory.
Nothing.
Yet the file said Hale had examined me personally.
I called Luke.
No answer.
Again.
Nothing.
Emma entered the study.
“Where’s Luke?”
“I thought he was with you.”
I turned the monitor toward her.
She read the name.
Her face drained.
“Dr. Hale.”
“You know him?”
“My mother used to say that name.”
“Why?”
Emma swallowed.
“He signed my father’s death certificate.”
The next morning we drove to Hale’s old private clinic outside Milwaukee.
The building had been abandoned.
Hard drives gone.
Files burned.
Furniture overturned.
Someone had tried to erase the place.
Behind a cabinet, Emma found a loose floorboard.
Under it sat a metal lockbox.
Inside were photographs.
Politicians.
Judges.
Members of my organization.
Emma at eleven years old.
Me at twenty-seven.
Me weeks before the shooting.
And Luke.
On the back of Emma’s childhood photograph, someone had written:
PROJECT MERCER — SUBJECT FAMILY.
Inside another folder were clinical reports.
Mine.
Thomas Carter’s.
Emma’s mother, Sarah Carter.
One line stopped me cold.
COGNITIVE RESPONSE CONDITIONING SUCCESSFUL.
A second read:
SUBJECT DEMONSTRATES ELEVATED AGGRESSION, PARANOIA, TERRITORIAL RESPONSE AND DIMINISHED TRUST FOLLOWING CONTROLLED NEUROLOGICAL STRESS.
“These aren’t medical records,” I whispered.
Emma shook her head.
“No.”
“They were experimenting on somebody.”
Her eyes lifted toward me.
“You.”
Fragments returned.
A hospital room.
Dr. Hale beside my bed.
Luke behind a glass door.
A voice saying, “Increase dosage.”
Then another memory.
A basement.
Metal chair.
Bright monitor.
Someone asking:
“Who do you trust?”
“Luke.”
“Who do you fear?”
My own voice answered:
“Thomas Carter.”
I opened my eyes.
Emma was staring at me.
“I remembered your father.”
Hope flashed across her face.
“What about him?”
My mouth went dry.
“I think someone trained me to hate him.”
May you like
And suddenly, the shooting that had destroyed my body no longer felt like the beginning.
It felt like the middle.
