Chapter 15 The Vigilante
Chapter fifteen
The Vigilante
Fucking Brandon Everett. This time slot was supposed to be Raelynn’s, and it probably still would have been if I didn’t have the degenerate pedophile as a patient.
Yesterday had been out of the norm for me.
It wasn’t just because it was my day off; it was the first time I had ever gotten a phone call from the clinic requesting I talk to a patient in that capacity.
Shemar had apologized, over and over, asking if I just wanted to talk to her on the phone.
I had been the one to insist on seeing her in person.
Maybe if I hadn’t and had settled for a phone call, I would still have her as my patient this morning.
I could never regret the decision to come in, even if the clinic saw fit to change the schedule with our impromptu session yesterday and Jessica’s illness today.
I wasn’t complaining about seeing her for a session off the routine schedule yesterday.
Truthfully, despite the circumstances, a part of me was thrilled she had called, that she had needed me.
Most men —true men— needed to feel needed.
It was one of the things that made us feel accomplished in life, like our contributions mattered.
My job made me feel needed on a daily basis, my extracurricular activities made me feel needed even more so.
Raelynn admitting she needed me was on a different level, even if she hadn’t spoken the words aloud.
When I listened to her, at times she allowed her vulnerable side to surface, but her exterior mask—the one she wore so well around everyone—was so well put together it was hard to think she ever needed anyone.
She had flaws and weaknesses, but she covered them up with her sarcasm and wicked tongue.
Strong independent women were worth a lot in my book—a rare commodity to discover amongst so many carbon copies cut from the same cloth.
If you could make them need you, bring out their soft, feminine side, then you would have something special.
Having to give up additional time with her just to talk to a man whom I’ve already sentenced to death boiled my blood.
Tonight, Raelynn’s sister was due to bring her journals to me.
After talking with her briefly about what she was writing before we began yesterday, curiosity had me gnawing at the bit to get my hands on them.
It was one thing to read about her day-to-day life, another if she had included any fictional writing with the truth to give me a better glimpse of how she viewed the world.
I desired to know more about how she would punish the man who had done her so wrong.
Did she share the same bloodlust for justice as me?
Did she crave to see bad things happen to deserving people, or was it selfishly just what she would dish out upon someone who had hurt her?
Would she participate in it, or was it strictly just fantasy for her to write about?
The questions I wanted answers to weren’t easy ones, I could try and slip in unnoticed into our sessions.
Hopefully, her journals will give me more insight before I meet with her again.
Raelynn was a mystery to me that I wanted to not only solve, but also to unlock the secrets of.
The way her blue eyes hardened in defiance and how she used sarcasm as a shield made my hands itch to show her who was in charge.
She needed someone to be in charge—not in a way that lessened who she was, but to build her up into the most powerful woman she could become.
Even if she didn’t see it yet. The freedom she could experience by relinquishing that control to me would be close to euphoric.
Routinely, I would have gone to get Brandon for our session, only there was nothing routine about Brandon as a patient.
After his last outburst, he’s had an orderly assigned to him at all times to help keep him under control.
Most of his outbursts have been contained so far; he hasn’t inflicted any lasting damage on any of the other patients or staff, however, that didn’t mean he wasn’t capable of it.
Per the email this morning, Thomas would be escorting Mr. Everett to my office after their group walk outside.
The thought of him alone with any of the women in that group had me clenching my fists on top of my desk.
When would the idiots that ran this place get it through their heads that the safety of their patients wasn’t worth the political bullshit they let sway their decisions?
Brandon's little episodes alone should have been enough to either keep him in solitary confinement or, at the very least, have him moved to the criminal ward while he was awaiting trial. Money may have bought him a more comfortable stay while he was undergoing his evaluation, but it couldn’t buy him out of his death sentence.
A knock on the door prompted me out of my thoughts and brought me back into the present.
Mr. Everett's time was almost up; that should be enough to calm me down from the rage I felt building at all the injustices being allowed.
I stood and made my way to the door. Other than the board of directors, no other staff could scan their badge to enter my office.
I forced myself to take a deep breath through my nose and exhale through my mouth, counting to six before striding to the door.
Thomas was almost as tall as I was, which was an impressive feat, though he had me beat in sheer mass.
He wouldn’t have been out of place in a wrestling match with the way he was built.
Brandon, on the other hand, well, slimy was a good word to describe him.
He wasn’t slimy in the literal sense; his demeanor was just snake-like, a lowlife who wasn’t evolved enough to have legs, but a creature forced to slither around, mingling with garbage.
He didn't even try to hide it. I hadn’t reached a conclusion yet whether he projected it on purpose, as a show for his stay here, or if it really was his personality.
For all the money he had to pay off his lawyer, he didn’t seem to care about paying him to bring him decent clothing whenever he came to visit.
He was the only patient on the behavioral wing who insisted on wearing the paper scrubs that were provided when you didn’t come in with any clothes.
It didn’t do any good to imagine him being in an orange jumpsuit instead of the light blue scrubs when I knew he would never face justice through the court system.
The system was far too broken to speak out for the niece that he so brutally raped and murdered.
“What’s up, doc?” Brandon sneered as Thomas led him into the room.
“Go take a well-deserved break,” I told Thomas, “you probably need it after having to deal with him all day.”
I wasn’t worried about speaking kindly to Brandon.
My sessions weren’t recorded, and my notes were in a short-hand only I could translate.
The worst thing that could happen was if he made a complaint against me, then an investigation could open up, and it would be a headache for a while, but nothing would come of it.
I’ve helped far too many patients who have made great improvements with their lives for the board to think I was doing anything unethical, so fuck him if he didn’t like my frame of mind.
“You should work on your bedside manner, aren’t you therapists supposed to be all sunshine and daisies and shit rainbows out your ass?
” Brandon grumbled as he took his seat. He was smaller than I was in stature and slender.
By no means was he unfit; I just viewed him as a toothpick that could easily be snapped in half despite his lean muscle.
“And if you were a patient deserving of that behavior, that is what you would be receiving. You’re not though, are you, Mr. Everett?” I placed my notebook on my knee as I took my seat in my usual armchair. Thomas didn’t stick around when I dismissed him, leaving me and the pedophile unchaperoned.
“What do you want to hear, doc?” I resisted the urge to strike him every time he called me doc. He knew damn well I wasn’t a doctor.
“Where did we leave off last time? We were discussing what brought you into the behavioral clinic, but the little stunt you pulled during the group session the other day messed up our schedule, didn’t it?”
Brandon smiled, an unkind smile that showed too many of his teeth. With his bald head and sunken dark eyes, he looked like a demonically possessed version of Vin Diesel.
“My outburst wasn’t entirely my own doing,” he stated, slouching back in the middle of the sofa like this wasn’t going to be a horribly uncomfortable conversation. His body language always became more relaxed when the topics were going to start venturing into the realm of the taboo.
“Then whose doing was it? I spoke with Jessica while they had you in solitary. No one provoked you during group.”
“It was hers, doc, she looks so young and so innocent. Her eyes, I bet her eyes would look even prettier if she wore her hair in pigtails,” his tongue darted out to lick over his lips like a snake catching scent of prey.
“Who is ‘her’? You can’t blame someone else’s presence for your behavior.”
“The new girl, I don’t remember her name.
Her name doesn’t matter. The only thing that matters is how tight she is, and doc, she looks like she could be tight.
She looks like she could be young enough to be untouched.
With the right clothes, she might even pass for a pre-teen.
” The desire was evident in his voice; the more he talked, the stronger it grew.
His hands rubbed up and down his thighs as he caressed himself, his muscles tight as he thought about her, sickening arousal becoming apparent.