EIGHTY SEVEN

The nurse smiled at her with that practiced kind of gentleness that always came before bad news or goodbyes.

“You’re free to go, Mrs. Hale. The doctor says your vitals are stable now. Try to rest, alright?”

Rachael blinked, still half lost between dream and daylight. The room smelled like antiseptic and flowers.

The flowers were lilies, maybe, and somewhere beyond the curtain, someone was laughing. For a second, she almost forgot the incident, the smell of rust and damp walls, the screams that had once been hers.

“Free to go?” she repeated softly, as if saying it aloud might make it real.

The nurse nodded, and in came two men in plain black clothes. Jaylen’s men. She’d seen them before, the quiet ones who said little but carried themselves like walls that could move.

One of them, taller with kind eyes, gave her a small nod.

“Ma’am, we’ll take you to a safe house,” he said. “Orders from Jaylen. He’ll check in soon.”

She didn't like the feeling of being caged and watched over but it w