Watch Me Die by Erica Spindler Read Free Book Online

with one of her reliable sources? Headed out in the middle of the night, alone, without a thought for her safety or anything else but her need for oblivion? She wished she could answer that she wouldn’t have.
    But she couldn’t. And she despised herself for it.
    Dr. Jasper leaned forward. “You’re in recovery, Mira. It’s a process. A journey.”
    “Screw that. I want to be pissed at myself.”
    “You’ve done incredibly well. It’s been almost a year.” Dr. Jasper crossed her legs, the movement of fabric against fabric making a rustling noise. The therapist was the epitome of elegance and well-heeled beauty. Although Mira knew her to be a decade older than her own thirty-three, they looked close in age. “What do you think precipitated this relapse?”
    “You tell me. You’re the expert.”
    Dr. Jasper didn’t reply, but Mira hadn’t expected her to. The comment had been bullshit, and they both knew it. She sighed. “I woke up and it was like … he was there. Or had been there, standing beside the bed, gazing down at me. It was so real.” She looked down at her hands, clenched in her lap, then back up at the therapist. “I thought, for a moment, that maybe everything else had been a dream.”
    “Go on.”
    “And it all came crashing back,” she said simply.
    “The day you lost him?”
    “Yes. And everything since.”
    “Then what?”
    “I ran for cover.”
    “Shelter from the storm.”
    The storm of her emotions. The truth. “Why now, Dr. Jasper? After all these months?”
    “The sixth anniversary is just around the corner. We tend to mark traumatic events, even if only subconsciously.”
    Six years since Katrina had blown her life to bits. “It makes sense, it’s just…”
    “Just what?”
    She met the doctor’s eyes. “That it feels like a lie. And I don’t want to lie to myself anymore.”
    When Dr. Jasper didn’t respond, Mira’s cheeks grew hot. “It doesn’t do any damn good, does it? It changes nothing and I’m so sick and tired of—”
    Unmoved, the therapist asked, “So sick and tired of what?”
    “Everything. This.” She jumped to her feet. “Of missing Jeff. Of reliving every freaking moment of that day. I want my life back.” She met the therapist’s eyes defiantly. “It’s mine, dammit! And I want it back!”
    “So take it back. Only you can.”
    “Right. And how do you propose I do that? Jeff’s gone. I can never get him or what we had back.”
    “No, you can’t.” She paused. “But you can make a new life for yourself.”
    “Haven’t I?” she asked bitterly. “Isn’t this it?”
    “Living in the past and blunting the pain of the present isn’t a new life.” Dr. Jasper leaned forward slightly. “Let me ask you something. How difficult was the last year for you?”
    “I don’t follow.”
    “Staying clean. Until Monday night, how difficult has it been? On a scale of one being a piece of cake and ten being hell on earth?”
    “Not a piece of cake, but…” But not that difficult. “A four. Some days even a three.”
    “Why do you think that is?”
    Mira frowned, not comprehending.
    Dr. Jasper went on. “I know from our sessions that in the past twelve months, you’ve experienced some version of that night many times.”
    “True.”
    “What was different?”
    The Magdalene window . It popped into her head so quickly, it took her by surprise. Mira frowned. “Why would my work on the Magdalene restoration make any difference in my ability to stay clean?”
    “Substituting one addiction for another isn’t unheard of. In fact, studies indicate it’s common.”
    She shook her head. “The window’s been a cause, not my crutch.”
    Dr. Jasper laced her fingers in her lap. “It’s consumed you for these past months. You’ve given the project everything, your talent and every spare minute, you’ve begged for donations, and in your quest, even alienated people close to you. Do you deny any of those things?”
    “No.”
    “They’re