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Chapter 174
I finally grasped what Dexter was up to. He was baiting Colin, prodding him to spill the truth. He wanted to force Caleb to confess that it was his hands that ended Phoebe’s life.
He yanked me into a spare room at the mental institution, a place designed to be a witness box of sorts, and pointed me toward the monitor. “You keep denying that he’s a murderer, saying he’s not mad? Well, you sit right here and watch.”
“Mr. Fitzgerald, we’re all set,” an assistant notified Dexter.
I watched in horror as the lights flickered on in the room on the screen; Dexter was about to rub salt in Colin’s wounds, using the ghosts of the past to goad Caleb.
“When patients are under stress, they can’t differentiate reality from their nightmares. They start to believe this world is a facade, and that’s when they reveal their deepest, darkest truths,” a doctor in a stark white coat declared gravely.
I turned, clenching my fists. “You’re Lamont, aren’t you? The doctor who blew the whistle on this asylum’s dark secrets?”
He nodded solemnly.
“Then you’ve gotta know Caleb’s not a bad seed. Why are you playing along with Dexter, tormenting Caleb, rubbing salt in the wounds?” I demanded an answer.
His silence hung heavy before he finally spoke. “He killed an innocent, Mr. Fitzgerald’s wife… and she was with child.”
“Bullshit! Phoebe was never his wife. Dexter’s the one who murdered her!” I glared at Dexter, my anger boiling over.
The nerve of this man!
Dexter remained silent but grabbed my chin from behind, forcing me to keep my eyes on the monitor.
“Phoebe…” Suddenly, a figure burst into the room, out of control..
“Phoebe…” Colin’s arrival was frantic, calling out my name.
“You lured him here with me as bait?” I hissed through clenched teeth.
So, Dexter’s intention in that alley today was always to kidnap me, to use me as leverage against Caleb.
“He seems pretty fond of you,” Dexter murmured, his voice a low growl as he compelled me to watch the screen.
My hands balled into fists as I watched Colin standing alone in the desolate room, a sharp pain clutching at my heart.
No sooner had he barged in than the iron door slammed shut behind him, locked from the outside.
He called out my name in the empty room.
The lights dimmed, and Colin’s icy gaze fixed on the camera, his eyes chillingly cold,
“I’ll kill you…” he rasped, his voice hoarse and ominous, directed at the unseen watcher behind the lens.
Dexter smirked, signaling the doctor to proceed.
After a moment’s hesitation, the doctor stood up and pressed play on the computer.
As the lights grew dimmer, Dexter instructed the doctor to project onto a screen in the room the very horrors that Colin had endured in that institution.
My fists clenched tighter, witnessing Colin beating against the iron door, repeating desperately, “I need to get out; she’s waiting for me; let me out…”
But they didn’t release him. Instead, they strapped him to a chair, injected him with drugs, force–fed him pills.
Back in the room, Colin was losing it, pounding at the iron door with all his might. That fear of entrapment was enough to drive anyone mad. And they were so cruel, forcing Colin to relive those torments.
The scenes on the monitor were too gruesome, and I couldn’t bear to look, shutting my eyes
tight.
But Dexter forced them open.
On screen, the doctor took pleasure in tormenting Colin.
Colin snapped, snapping his restraints and seizing the surgical forceps from the table, bringing it down on the doctor’s head again and again.
“See, he’s a murderer,” Dexter wanted me to witness Colin’s act of violence.
In the monitor, the past overwhelmed Colin, huddled in a corner, shaking uncontrollably.
“You’re a murderer, you killed the doctor.” The door opened, and Lamont entered the room, trying to soothe Colin. “You did it, didn’t you?”
Colin was pulling at his hair, mumbling nonstop, “Phoebe… I need to find Phoebe.”
“And you killed Phoebe, too, right?” Lamont coaxed him, aiming to extract a confession. “Tell me, how did you do it? What did you do to Phoebe?”Belonging © NôvelDram/a.Org.