When he saw the body they were carrying out, his heart stopped. For a moment, everything around him blurred—sirens wailed, people shouted—but all Daniel could see was the still figure on the stretcher.
Without thinking, he shoved past the officer.
"Hey—sir!" the man barked, trying to hold him back.
But Daniel didn't care. He broke free and ran straight toward her. "Catherine!" he shouted. "What happened to her? Tell me she's okay!"
Two paramedics were already lifting her into the back of the ambulance. One of them glanced at him with hesitation, then said, almost too quietly, "There's still a pulse. She might be feeling pain. That's... that's a good sign."
Daniel's breath hitched. Good sign or not, Catherine looked lifeless.
He moved to climb in after her, but another officer stepped in. "We can't allow you in. Please follow behind us to the hospital."
He clenched his jaw, fury and fear swirling in his chest, but he didn't argue. He turned and sprinted to his car, starting the engine with shaking hands. The ambulance's lights flashed ahead of him, and he followed—close, desperate, praying the whole way.
The hospital's emergency entrance was already swarming with activity when Daniel skidded into the parking lot. He barely remembered turning off the engine as he bolted toward the entrance, the glass doors sliding open just in time to let him through.
"Catherine Monroe," he panted to the nurse at the front desk. "They just brought her in—please, where is she?"
The nurse looked up from her screen, startled by his urgency. "She's in Trauma Room 2. Please wait in the family area—"
But Daniel was already moving. He spotted the swinging double doors down the hall and pushed through them, ignoring the calls behind him.
Inside, it was chaos. Voices shouted instructions, machines beeped, and nurses moved with frantic precision. He caught a glimpse of her—Catherine—on the table, surrounded by doctors.
"BP dropping—get me a line!"
"She's crashing—stay with me, Catherine!"
Daniel's legs weakened, but he didn't stop. That's when a firm hand caught him by the shoulder. He turned to see a woman in a white coat—Dr. Grace, one of the hospital's trauma specialists.
"You can't be in here," she said gently but firmly. "Please, let us do our job."
"Is she alive?" His voice cracked. "Please tell me she's alive."
Dr. Grace's eyes held something between sympathy and sorrow. "We're doing everything we can. Right now, that's all I can say."
Daniel swallowed hard, his throat dry. Numbly, he allowed her to guide him out of the room. The doors closed behind him with a soft, final click.
And all he could do was wait.
The quiet didn't last.
Chaos erupted again as a new wave of voices surged into the hallway. Daniel turned—and froze.
Catherine's family.
Her mother stormed in first, her sobs sharp and unrestrained, her eyes already scanning like a predator locking on prey. Behind her were Catherine's father—tense, tight-lipped—and a tall young man Daniel recognized instantly: Ryan, her childhood friend.
The moment Catherine's mother saw Daniel standing alone in the hallway, her face twisted.
"You!"
Before he could react—before he could even breathe—her hand lashed across his face with a loud, unforgiving slap.
The sound echoed down the corridor.
"Why are you here?" she shrieked, her voice trembling with fury and heartbreak. "Haven't I told you to stay away from my daughter?!"
Daniel staggered slightly, his cheek burning. "Please—I didn't—"
"Don't you dare," she growled, grabbing his shirt with both hands, her tears falling fast. "Don't you dare pretend you're innocent. I knew something like this would happen the moment she let you back in her life."
He looked around, desperate for someone to intervene, but no one moved. Not Ryan. Not even Catherine's father. Everyone just stood still.
"You bring nothing but pain!" she spat. "Catherine is lying in there—fighting for her life—and you're standing here like you're the victim?"
Daniel's breath caught in his throat.
"Everywhere you go, Daniel—tragedy follows. Even Emily couldn't escape it. She suffered because of you!" Her voice cracked. "And now my baby girl…"
He tried to speak. Apologize. Explain. But his voice failed him.
"You're cursed," she whispered through clenched teeth. "A walking disaster. Get out of this hospital before I lose every bit of control I have left."
She shoved him—hard.
He stumbled backward, his back hitting the wall behind him. The words, the pain, the guilt—it all came rushing in at once.
And then it happened.
His knees buckled. The hallway swam.
And he sank to the floor, trembling, hollow, broken. He didn't fight it.
Hot tears streamed down his face, dripping silently onto the cold linoleum.
He didn't even flinch when she tried to shove him again.
Someone—maybe a nurse, maybe Ryan—stepped between them at last, holding her back. But Daniel didn't register it.
All he could feel was the ache in his chest.
All he could see was Catherine's pale, lifeless face burned into his memory.
And all he could hear were her mother's words, ringing over and over again in his head:
You're cursed.
Daniel stood up slowly, as if the weight of her words were pressing against his spine. His ears rang with that accusation, but louder still were Catherine's words to him.
"I know I'm risking my life telling you this..."
Her voice had been weak, but determined. Just like Emily's the last time he saw her.
Emily.
Her name hit him like a punch to the gut. The girl who vanished after their last argument, the one they stopped searching for when hope ran dry after months of searching. Declared dead.
But Daniel had never accepted that.
He couldn't.
Not after what she told him. Not after what Catherine had confirmed.
He turned on his heel, eyes burning, chest heaving. Every breath felt like glass. His vision blurred with tears, but he blinked them back, furiously wiping them away as he stumbled toward his car.
He didn't go home.
He couldn't.
Instead, he turned the keys in the ignition and drove—straight to Lenny's place.
If anyone could help him make sense of this madness, it was Lenny.
And he had a feeling the storm was just beginning.
___
The door creaked open before he even knocked.
Lenny stood there, eyebrows raised, a half-eaten sandwich in one hand. "Daniel?"
Daniel didn't say a word—just brushed past him, shoes heavy against the wooden floor. Lenny shut the door behind him, chewing slowly as he watched his friend crumble into the armchair like a man aged ten years overnight.
"I need to talk," Daniel said, voice raw.
Lenny nodded, now serious, and dropped into the opposite chair. "Talk."
And so he did.
Daniel told him everything—starting from the moment he went back to Inspector Graves's office, to the abandoned house in the middle of nowhere, to Catherine's place and her mother's outburst this morning.
He talked fast, like he was afraid the memories would escape him. And Lenny listened—brows furrowed, arms crossed, silence never once breaking his focus.
When Daniel finally stopped, breathless and spent, Lenny leaned back and let out a long, thoughtful sigh.
"That's a hell of a story," he said. "But if all that happened... how did you wake up at your place, Daniel? You were unconscious. If someone—or something—wanted you dead, why dump you there instead? Did your mystery killer grow a conscience at the last minute?"
Daniel shook his head, frustration in his features. "I don't know. I don't know. I would've thought I hallucinated everything—except for this."
He pulled something from the inside of his jacket and held it out.
Lenny reached for it slowly—a piece of paper, crumpled and stained. Blood at the corner. And scrawled across it, in a shaky, almost panicked hand, were words that made the hair on Lenny's neck stand up.
His skepticism flickered.
Daniel leaned forward. "She shoved it into my pocket before she collapsed. She knew something, Lenny."
Lenny stared at the letter, then looked up. "Daniel... this handwriting. This blood. This is—this is real."
"There's more," Daniel said. "I saw her body. There were dark bruises on her neck, like she was strangled. That wasn't in my head. That wasn't a dream."
Lenny was quiet now, no longer doubting his friend's sanity—but grappling with a chilling truth instead.
"Then you didn't imagine it," he said slowly. "Which means whoever did this... they're not just trying to scare you."
Lenny stood up, rubbing his temples like he was trying to massage away the weight of this reality. He paced the room for a few moments, the silence between them thick and heavy.
"So, what do we do now?" Lenny asked, breaking the tension. "Sit here and wait for the next shoe to drop? Whatever you saw—it's not over, Daniel. Whatever this is, it's just getting started."
Daniel ran a hand through his hair, his thoughts a blur. The more he thought about it, the more certain he became.
"We go back," he said, his voice firm, though a part of him dreaded what they might find. "The abandoned house. Something doesn't add up, Lenny. I know it sounds crazy, but that place—it's connected. It's like a dead end... and we're supposed to find a way through it."
Lenny stopped pacing, turning to face him. His expression was uncertain, but there was a spark of determination in his eyes. "You're sure about this?"
Daniel nodded without hesitation. "We have to go back. I have to know what's there."
Lenny exhaled slowly, looking at the letter again, still resting on the table between them. Then, without another word, he grabbed his jacket off the back of the chair and headed for the door.
"Then let's go," he said, his voice steely.