Twisted (Burbank and Parker 1)

He withdrew the knife when I was safely inside the bathroom. Twenty minutes, he said. That’s all I have.

It’s enough.

With the door shut and locked behind me, I reached into the old ceramic bathtub and turned on the water, waiting for it to heat up. I’d decided on a shower rather than a bath. In part, that’s because I don’t want to waste an instant of my freedom waiting for the tub to fill, and, in part, because I want to wash away every drop of filth, not sit in it.

I glanced in the mirror just before turning on the shower spray and stepping in. God, I barely recognize myself. My face is gaunt. My eyes are huge, with big, dark circles underneath, and my pupils are dilated from the drugs. My hair is tangled, sticky with sweat. I’d lost my hair band when I struggled with him on campus. So my hair was loose, hanging down, limp and lifeless. I reached up, and my fingers touched the gash on my neck left by his combat knife. It wasn’t being treated, so it wasn’t healing. And it was far from the only mark on my body.

My gaze shifted to my arms. Needle marks. So many of them. And bruises, everywhere. From my capture. From those visits when the madness filled his eyes.

I shuddered and turned away, stepping into the wall of water that was my illusory reprieve.

Hospital for Special Surgery

New York Weill Cornell Medical Center

East Seventieth Street, New York City

4:50 P.M.

Constance Griggs was a forty-one-year-old divorcée with loans up the wazoo, an ex-husband who was as reliable as the rhythm method, and two small kids to raise on her own. She was a natural blonde with a trim figure, a healthy enjoyment of the opposite sex, and no time for a social life. Still, she was a born optimist who believed in happily-ever-afters and had a natural affinity for helping people. She was also fascinated with orthopedic medicine and the intricacies of the fine bones and blood vessels that composed the human hand.

Maybe that’s why she was the best occupational hand therapist in all of Manhattan.

Sloane had been with Constance ever since Dr. Charles Houghton had referred her eight months ago, just after her second surgery. Dr. Houghton was a bona fide genius. He’d operated on Sloane twice—once to reverse the damage done by her initial surgery, conducted under emergency circumstances in a rural Ohio hospital. The surgeons there had done their best, but their focus had been on stopping the bleeding.

They’d patched her up, but their lack of expertise in treating such a complex injury left Sloane with major scarring around the tendons of her index finger, ultimately leaving it so stiff it could scarcely bend. Thankfully, she’d already moved back east and was being treated by Dr. Houghton, who immediately diagnosed the tendon as being stuck in flexion. He operated, removing the scar tissue and freeing the tendon to heal. Then he sent her to Constance for physical therapy. That was the good part. The bad part was that the healing process had to start from scratch. And Sloane was a lousy patient.

When the splint was finally removed, she began resistance exercises, and despite Constance’s warnings to take it easy, Sloane had pushed herself too hard, too fast. As a result, the tendons in her index finger ruptured, and she’d been back in the operating room again. Dr. Houghton had done a brilliant job of grafting her tendon, the only negative being some residual nerve damage—and more rehab.

The process was grueling, painful, and frustrating as hell. But thanks to Constance, she could now bend her finger about two-thirds of the way to her hand. That was good—but not good enough.

Unless she regained full use of her trigger finger and was able to pass the pistol qualification test, reapplication to the FBI was out.

Sloane wouldn’t give up. And Constance wouldn’t let her. That was the other perk that had come out of this life-altering nightmare. Sloane and Constance had become friends.

Constance worked directly with Dr. Houghton at

the Hospital for Special Surgery. She also had a small private practice near her home in Morristown, New Jersey, where she worked two days a week. That kept her child-care expenses down and accommodated both her New York and New Jersey clients. It was also ideal for Sloane, who lived about forty-five minutes away from Morristown. So twice a week she went there and once a week she went to the hospital.

Today was hospital day.

“Hi, Connie,” she said, greeting her therapist as she walked into the occupational-therapy room. “Sorry I’m late.”

“It happens. Thanks for calling, though. I returned a few phone calls from patients while I waited.” Connie glanced up from the various sensory reeducation tools she’d been laying out for Sloane’s session, frowning as she saw the expression on her friend’s face. “Bad day?”

“Weird day.” Sloane sat down on the padded patient’s chair at the examination table and flexed her fingers. The action didn’t make her wince the way it once had, but the ache was still there and the lack of full sensation in her index finger was still glaringly apparent.

“You look stressed out,” Connie observed. “How’s the hand?”

“Depends on when you ask. Some days good, some days not so good. Also depends on who you ask.”

“I’m asking you.”

“Okay then, the throbbing’s been keeping me up at night. That part I can handle. Now for the parts I can’t. The feeling in my index finger still isn’t back. Neither are my small motor skills, even though I do my exercises every day. And I’m still not hitting the damned bull’s-eye on my archery course, even though I’ve reconditioned myself to drawing back the bowstring with my ring and middle fingers.”

Connie rolled her eyes. “And I bet you haven’t walked on water yet, either.”

“I haven’t tried.” Sloane sighed. “Okay, I get it. You think I’m expecting miracles. But I’m not. Connie, it’s been forever. I just want my life back.”