Page 149 of Aftershock
With shaky fingers, I open it.
At first glance, it looks like senseless scribbles. Rows upon rows of Alaric’s elegant, very un-doctorlike handwriting.
But the second I start reading the words, my eyebrows pull together.
Alaric hasn’t been writingLilith’s future husbanda million times.
He hasn’t been doodling or working on a how-to-kill-abusers-for-dummies manual.
He’s been doing the last thing I thought a careful, calculating man like him would ever do.
The more pages I turn, the clearer it becomes.
He’s been documenting each torture, breaking it down with the methodical precision of scientific research.
Subject ID. Name.
Date.
Baseline vitals. Elapsed time.
Something black catches my attention in the corner of the table. A timer.
So that’s what he’s been tapping at.
Focus!
Right.
The notebook.
Intervention applied. Response observed. Outcome recorded.
The entries go back years. I move slowly as I leaf through them.
Too slow, apparently, because I still have a lot more to go through when it happens.
A hand clamps over my mouth.
Alaric.
I’ve been so consumed by his notes that I didn’t hear him come in.
“Lilith.” His voice in my ear. It’s pained. Wrong.
Oh, shit. He must think I’m either going to hate him or that I’ve been planning to hand the notebook over to the cops.
Never.
“Mmm!” is the only sound coming out of me.
As if I’m one of his captives.
I’m not.
Can’t be.
This is Alaric, after all. My Alaric.
