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Part 6: The Asylum

I called Griffin from a neighbor’s phone. He picked us up in an unmarked van ten minutes later.

“Where are we going?” Griffin asked, seeing my blood-stained clothes.

“Blackwood Pines Sanatorium,” I commanded. “If Graves locked the real Garrison away to cover up the murder, the only way we destroy Graves is by getting a confession from the man he’s protecting.”

Griffin sped through the night, arriving at the towering, gothic gates of the private psychiatric facility nestled deep in the Washington forests.

“Graves owns this facility through a shell company,” Griffin warned, handing me a heavy flashlight. “It’s a fortress.”

“Create a distraction,” I told him, leaving Arthur safely locked in the van.

I snuck through the service entrance while Griffin drove his van directly into the main security gate, laying on the horn and causing a massive commotion.

I slipped past the distracted orderlies, creeping up the dark, sterile stairwell to the high-security third floor.

I found Room 307. The heavy steel door was locked, but there was a small, reinforced glass viewing pane.

I looked inside.

Sitting in the corner of a padded room was a man who looked exactly like Dane, but withered, pale, and entirely feral. His hair was long and matted. He was rocking back and forth, muttering endlessly to himself.

The real Garrison Locke.

I tapped on the glass. “Garrison.”

The man snapped his head up. His eyes were wide, bloodshot, and completely devoid of sanity. When he saw my face in the dim hallway light, a look of absolute, soul-shattering terror warped his features.

He scrambled off the floor, throwing his emaciated body against the steel door, screaming at the top of his lungs.

“Serafina! You’re dead! I pushed you! I watched you fall!” Garrison shrieked, scratching at the glass. “You and Graves! You betrayed me! I killed you!”

I held my phone up, recording every single deranged, confessing word through the glass pane. I had it. The proof that Graves had covered up a murder to steal a criminal empire’s funds.

Suddenly, the cold, unmistakable click of a pistol hammer echoed behind my head.

“You’re a very resourceful woman, Brynn.”

I slowly turned around.

Chief Inspector Roland Graves stood in the hallway, flanked by two armed men. He looked immaculate in his tailored suit, a sinister, victorious smile playing on his lips.

“But resourcefulness is a fatal flaw when you’re outmatched,” Graves said, extending his hand. “Give me the phone.”

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