Chapter 4 - The Ghost in the Sanitarium
The delivery van rattled to a halt behind a dense grove of weeping willows, concealing it from the imposing iron gates of St. Sebastian’s Memory Care.
“This is as close as we get,” Marcus whispered, cutting the engine and handing Julian a pair of heavy-duty wire cutters.
Julian stepped out into the damp autumn air, adjusting the collar of his black dress shirt as he looked up at the grim, Victorian-era brick structure.
“Lucy, you stay here with Marcus,” Julian instructed, checking the charge on his flashlight.
“No way,” Lucy countered instantly, stepping out of the van with a determined glare. “It’s my mother in there. They won’t listen to you; they’ll think you’re just another distraught visitor.”
Julian hesitated, seeing the fierce determination in her eyes that reminded him so much of the woman he had loved and lost a decade ago.
“Fine, stay close behind me and keep your hood up,” Julian relented, leading the way toward the perimeter fence where the thick brush offered cover.
They slipped through a gap in the rusted wire, their footsteps crunching softly on the blanket of dead leaves covering the overgrown garden path.
“The administrative wing is on the second floor, but wing B is where they keep the long-term involuntary patients,” Lucy whispered, navigating the unfamiliar grounds with eerie precision.
Julian glanced at her in the dim light. “How do you know this layout so well?”
“I bribed an orderly last month with my college savings,” Lucy admitted quietly, ducking beneath a low-hanging oak branch.
They reached a side service door that, true to Lucy’s information, was propped open with a rubber doorstop left by a careless staff member.
Inside, the antiseptic smell of bleach and old floor wax hung heavily in the sterile hallways, illuminated only by dim emergency lighting overhead.
“This way,” Lucy signaled, leading Julian down a maze of cream-colored corridors toward the rear elevator bank.
As they rounded a corner, the low murmur of voices drifted from the nurses’ station ahead, forcing them to duck into an empty linen closet.
Julian pulled the heavy wooden door shut until only a narrow sliver of light remained, his arm shielding Lucy against the stack of crisp white sheets.
Through the crack, they watched two orderlies in white scrubs wheeling a portable medical cart past the door, discussing the night’s transfer orders.
“Vance’s private transport is already at the loading dock,” one orderly muttered. “We need to clear out room 412 before the auditors arrive.”
Julian’s heart hammered against his ribs as he recognized the room number from the flash drive documents—it was Olivia’s room.
Once the footsteps faded down the hall, Julian slipped out of the closet, motioning for Lucy to follow at a dead sprint toward the stairs.
They reached the fourth floor in record time, bursting through the stairwell door into the quiet, desolate hallway of wing B.
“Room 412 is right at the end,” Lucy breathed, pointing toward a heavy wooden door with a small reinforced glass window.
Julian crept forward, peering through the glass to see a frail woman with long silver-streaked brown hair sitting up in the narrow metal bed.
He reached for the brass doorknob, turning it slowly, but stopped dead as a cold metallic click echoed against his temple.
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“Step away from the door, Mr. Vance, or the girl dies right here,” a gravelly voice growled from the shadows behind them.
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