Chapter 7 - THE GHOSTS OF THE SANATORIUMTwo hours later, the private black helicopter touched down on the snow-dusted helipad behind the abandoned St. Jude’s Sanatorium in the Catskills.
The facility had been decommissioned in the late nineties, a sprawling monolith of red brick and cracked glass surrounded by iron security fences topped with rusted razor wire. According to the decrypted files on Jack’s hard drive, the north wing had been privately leased under a dummy corporation for over five years.
Dominic stepped out of the chopper, the rotor wash whipping his heavy wool coat around his legs like a black cape. He wasn't alone. Four SUVs carrying twelve of his most lethal, hand-selected enforcers rolled up behind the helipad, doors flying open before the vehicles had even come to a complete stop.
"Perimeter secure," barked Marcus, Dominic’s new head of security, stepping up with an automatic rifle slung across his chest. "We cut the power grid five minutes ago. No alarms out, no communications in."
"Move in," Dominic commanded, walking briskly toward the reinforced steel doors of the north wing. "And if anyone gets in your way, don't ask questions."
The heavy iron doors didn't require picking; Dominic simply raised his SIG Sauer and put two rounds through the electronic keypad lock, kicking the door open with a resounding crash.
The interior smelled of antiseptic, damp concrete, and unwashed fear.
They swept through the sterile white corridors, past rows of empty, locked psychiatric wards, until they reached the sub-basement level. There, hidden behind a heavy fire door, was a modern, climate-controlled medical suite that looked entirely out of place in the derelict asylum.
Dominic kicked open the final door.
The room was dim, illuminated only by the pale morning light filtering through high, barred security windows. Heart monitors beeped with a slow, steady rhythm. An IV drip stood beside a narrow hospital bed.
And lying in that bed, pale and impossibly thin, was a woman with honey-brown eyes and soft dark hair.
Clara Bennett.
Dominic stopped dead in his tracks. The breath caught in his throat for the second time that week. The woman in front of him wasn't just a memory; she was flesh and bone, weathered by years of isolation and chemical sedation, but still unmistakably the woman who had handed him a paint roller in Brooklyn five years ago.
Clara slowly turned her head toward the sound of the door. Her hollow eyes widened in disbelief.
"Dominic?" she whispered, her voice cracking like dry parchment. "Am I... am I dreaming?"
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Dominic crossed the room in three rapid strides, falling to his knees beside the hospital bed. He reached out with trembling fingers—hands that never shook—and gently touched her face.
"You're not dreaming, Clara," Dominic choked out, his voice thick with an emotion he hadn't allowed himself to feel in half a decade. "I'm right here."
