Page 36 of Mine To Hunt

Her thumb hovers over the button.

“Wait.” I blurt before I can stop myself.

Olivia pauses, looking at me.

“Just… leave it.” I say, my voice quieter now, eyes fixed on the screen.

She hesitates, then lowers the remote.

The screen cuts to crime scene photos, blurred for broadcast but graphic enough to turn my stomach, restraints on a chair, shallow cuts tracing arms and torso, blood pooling dark and accusing. Mutilated.

The word echoes, horror mingling with a morbid pull as one image flashes. Something specific, a mark on the skin that catches my eye, blunt and deliberate, like a signature carved in flesh.

My breath hitches, pulse quickening because it feels too patterned, stirring unease that's not just from the news.

The reporter continues, her tone dropping sympathetic.‘Forensic teams confirm torture preceded death with multiple lacerations, signs of prolonged restraint. Scott's ex-wife called him 'harmless, just tired of life.' Police urge tips, no suspects yet. A community in shock grapples with why an ordinary man met such an extraordinary end.’

"Miss Iris?" Olivia's voice cuts through, gentle but firm, clipboard in hand.

I jolt, dropping the pen as my name echoes, the news fading to background hum. She's smiling still, gesturing toward the inner door.

"Dr. Ashcroft will see you now. Right this way."

Chapter 10

Her

The door clicks shut behind me, and the sound echoes in my chest like a lock turning on a cage I didn't know I was stepping into. It's final, that noise. Too solid to pretend I can just walk back out and forget this ever happened.

My feet hesitates just inside the doorway, carrying me deeper into the room, but my mind races ahead, screaming that I've crossed a line I can't uncross.

Therapy. The word still tastes foreign, like something I agreed to in a haze of hospital lights and Maddie's pleading eyes, but now, here, it feels like surrender wrapped in a white coat.

Across the space, two chairs face each other, separated by a small table that holds nothing but a notepad and a pen. Simple, unthreatening, but it makes my stomach twist anyway.

The man in the chair closest to the window looks up from his notes.

His expression is composed, unreadable. A blank canvas that gives nothing away, and that both grounds me and sets my nerves on edge.

There's a steadiness to him, like he could anchor a storm without raising his voice, but it unsettles me too, because what if that calm sees right through the walls I've barely started building?

He sets his pen down with deliberate care, rising halfway from his seat in a gesture that's polite but not overly warm.

“Good morning, Miss Iris.” He says, his voice smooth and even, carrying a faint accent I can’t place. Eastern European, maybe, but softened by years elsewhere.

“I’m Dr. Nathaniel Ashcroft. Please, take a seat. Whenever you’re ready.”

I nod, but my feet feel glued for a beat longer than they should, my mind snagging on the news segment from the waiting room. The grainy images of that poor guy, Ethan Scott, his body marked in ways that stuck like burrs.

I force a step forward, lowering myself into the chair opposite him, the cushion yielding under me like it’s trying to swallow my hesitation. The table between us feels too small now, a flimsy barrier against whatever this hour will drag out of me.

He settles back, crossing one leg over the other with an ease that makes the room feel smaller, and waits, his gaze patient but direct.

“You seem lost in thought already.” He observes, no judgment in his tone, just a gentle nudge. “What’s on your mind right now?”

I blink, heat creeping up my neck because he’s right. I zoned out the second I sat, that TV report replaying unbidden. A nervous laugh bubbles out, too sharp in the quiet, and I wave it off like it’s nothing, even though my hands twist in my lap.

“Oh, it’s nothing. Just… a news thing I caught while waiting. Stupid, probably. My brain latches onto random crap when I’m nervous.”