08 Illusion by Frank Peretti Read Free Book Online

have lent it to Johnny. As he stood to give the doctor his chair, he went back into wall mode, eyes on Mandy, all business. Mandy may have gotten a faint smile out of him a minute ago, but now his face was back on duty and there was nothing to like about him.
    “So …” said Angela, flipping the file open. “Things are going in the right direction for you.”
    Mandy leaned forward, waiting.
    “First of all, we have good news as far as your medical condition. All the tests came back negative. No drugs, no alcohol, no brain damage or injury to your head. All your vitals are just fine. The only problem we still have is …” She looked in the folder at a page that had nothing to do with medical tests. Mandy could see her home phone number among a flurry of notes. “You’ve given us names and phone numbers and we’ve tried to contact these people and as far as anyone can tell”—she looked straight into Mandy’s eyes—“there are no such persons, no such phone numbers, no such addresses. Besides that, there’s no Mandy Whitacre on file with the Department of Motor Vehicles. The Social Security Administration has no record of a Mandy Whitacre with your Social Security number. There’s no Mandy Whitacre enrolled at NIC—and it’s North Idaho College now, not North Idaho Junior College. Your insurance company … well, they were bought out in 1995 and don’t exist anymore as a company.”
    It had to sink in a moment. This learned doctor could not possibly be saying such things. Lies. How in the world? Somebody just wasn’t thinking. Mandy looked right back into Angela’s eyes. “And no Mandy Whitacre sitting right in front of you? I know my own name, Doctor!”
    The doctor was flustered. “We know it seems real to you, but we can’t verify any of it.”
    “As if I don’t know my own name and my own father? How dare you say such a thing to me!”
    Angela raised her hands for a truce. “That’s not for me to decide, that’s what I’m getting to. It was my job to check you over physically, to make sure you don’t have a medical emergency, and now that’s done and my part in this is over.”
    Mandy looked at Johnny, Bruce, and Dave. “So why are these guys still standing here?”
    “There are some other people you still need to see.”
    “And they’re going to make sure it happens, is that it?”
    “They’re here to keep you safe.”
    Well. Enough of this. “I’d like to leave now.”
    Dave put a hand on her arm. She slapped at it. “Get your hands off me!”
    Bruce took her other arm. Outrage! She reefed and twisted against their grip as her indignity built to a scream. “Let go of me! Let go! ”
    Angela—dear, lying, off-her-ever-loving-nut Angela—came in close, speaking softly, trying to defuse the situation. With what, more lies? More branding her a liar?
    “Mandy, listen to me.”
    She glared at the doctor, every muscle in her body pulling, straining against her captors. Check my heart rate now, you witch!
    Angela kept trying. “You have no clothes, no shoes, no money, no ID. Do you want to go back out there with nothing but those scrubs? How long do you think you’d last?”
    “Long enough to go home !” The thought made her cry. She twisted and fought some more because she doggone felt like it.
    Angela got right in her face— close enough to spit on , Mandy thought, but didn’t. “If you want to go home, then stop this, right now! Stop.”
    Mandy didn’t relax but she held still, angry breath gushing into and out of her nostrils.
    The doctor spoke quietly, slowly. “You are here on a police hold, which means by law you have to stay here at least twenty-four hours for evaluation, maybe longer, until everyone is satisfied you won’t be a danger to yourself or anyone else—”
    Of all the stupid! “Well, what—”
    “And …”
    “—do you think I’m gonna do—”
    “AND—are you listening?”
    Mandy listened.
    “There are people who will help you, they’ll listen