He sprinted back to his car.

He made no attempt to keep quiet. He wheeled his car into the road, hastily made a two-and-a-half-point turn and gunned his engine towards his escape route.

Had he just followed the instructions he was given, Straus was sure that the blood dripping from Alexander’s hands would be his. If he had trusted Alexander’s assistant, he would have no ability to implement Plans B and C. No, if he had been a sheep like most others and had just done what he was told, he would be dead.

As he slowed his BMW to a speed less likely to raise suspicions, Straus grabbed his phone, removed the battery, and tossed it into his back seat. He then removed the Plan B driving directions from his center council and prepared to turn off State Route 8.

He had spent a considerable amount of time planning his alternate route, making certain that if Alexander and his accomplice were to try to follow him that they would be hard pressed to keep up with the frequent turns. Within an hour after leaving his lodge, Straus pointed his car south and headed towards New York City.

His first stop would be to see Brian Lucietta.  He had to let Brian know what had happened.

“Brian,” he said while standing outside of his car in Mercy Hospital’s employee parking lot, “both you and I need to protect ourselves. If what O’Connell told me is true, he and Alexander are not planning on making everything public but in exacting revenge.”

“William,” Brian Lucietta said, “you’re running scared from two people who, unless I’ve missed something, are not career criminals. If what you believe you saw at your lodge actually happened, the police will have them in custody within a day. Two at the most. I’m staying right here and keeping things business as usual.”

“I’m going to Hilburn. Ward C is impenetrable. I’ll keep in touch with you and with the news and won’t come out until I know Alexander and O’Connell are either dead or behind bars.”

“You’re overreacting. What you should be more concerned about is explaining to the authorities why you kept Alexander hidden all these years.”

“I’ve already figured that out,” Straus replied.

“Shouldn’t you share your story with me so that we are on the same page?”

“As far as you know, Alexander was just another patient, and you had no idea of the circumstances behind his arrival to Hilburn or departure.”

“Keeping me safe, are you, Will?”

“Keeping things clean, Brian. My story is the only one that is ever heard, if things come to that point. The more you deny, the better.”

“And with Jacob and Peter out of the way, that only leaves the doctors from Chicago to deal with,” Brian said as he checked an incoming text message on his cell. “I have to get back. You keep in touch, and let me know if there’s anything else I need to know about your story.”

“I have a plan for the good doctors from Chicago.”

“Good enough,” Brian said as he extended his hand to Straus.

“I do think it unwise for you not to take precautions,” Straus said as he shook Brian’s hand.

“I still carry my Taser. Just in case.”

Doctor William Straus was now safe, hidden in a place that he knew better than anyone. A place where no one would look for him, but from where he could keep fully informed of Alexander and his accomplice’s doings. Behind the locked doors of Ward C on the second floor of the vacated Hilburn Psychiatric Institution, he sat surrounded by a month’s worth of supplies. He had everything he needed, and now only ventured out of the protective confines early in the morning and late at night.

The rooms in Ward C had no exterior windows. The steel and brick construction blocked the WiFi signal from the tech startup company that was housed in the old Hilburn supply building that stood fifty feet from the walls of the main Hilburn hospital building. Straus would carefully listen for any noise outside of the only door that led from the “hub” of Ward C to the hallway. After hearing nothing for at least three minutes, he would unlock the door and quietly make his way down the southern hall to a window that faced the old supply building. There, Straus was able to log on to the tech company’s WiFi signal on his iPad, access news streams, check emails, and respond to any that he considered to be “critically important.”

He was certain that no one knew that Ward C was no longer vacant and knew that the only time a visitor would enter the abandoned main hospital building would be if a possible tenant was interested in seeing the available space. Over the years, three of the four buildings of the Hilburn campus were converted. One building was occupied by the tech company, another was converted to a warehouse, and the third was converted to small offices for start-up companies looking for inexpensive office space. While there were many companies interested in the three story main hospital, no tenants had been found. Rumors of the hospital being haunted were well known in the area, and local police had to increase their watches to keep out amateur ghost hunters and teenagers looking for a thrilling night.

Straus didn’t believe in ghosts and was able to easily dismiss the occasional sounds he heard during the night as echoes from the nearby roads or kids, loitering in the parking lot. There were some sounds, however, that gave Straus pause. Sounds that sounded eerily familiar.

His first night back in Hilburn, Straus thought he heard a crackle of electricity coming from the first floor where doctors like Brian Lucietta would perform “therapeutic shock therapy.” Later that night, Straus was certain that he heard the voice of a particularly disturbed patient calling for him. The patient died on the second floor from asphyxiation, though the exact cause was never determined.

Though the sounds startled Straus, he passed them off as his nerves getting the better of him.

“I’ve never read an obituary that claimed ghosts as the cause of death,” he chuckled to himself. “Empty halls distort sounds, and a nervous mind can turn the wind into a blood curling scream.”

It was at the window where Straus read about the two doctors murdered in Chicago. He read about Rinaldo having been killed by “severe blunt force trauma to his skull” and about Zudak being strangled in a motel thirty miles west of Chicago. He also read the details of the murders at his lodge and of the police search for “Doctor William Straus, wanted for questioning.”

There were no emails worth his response and nothing from Brian Lucietta. The only email that he did find interesting enough to be saved and read several times, came from an unknown Gmail account. He assumed that someone, probably Alexander or O’Connell, had accessed the computer in his study at the lodge, had learned his email address and had contacted him. The message was simple, concise and well written;