Chapter 239

Kelly Welch had vanished. She had come to Helso to look for her brother, Joan Welch; after being introduced to a government-run missing-persons program, she left a suspicious message and disappeared. Her fiancé filed a missing-persons report, but the investigation made no headway.

Calling the number Kelly had left on Peoplebook Messenger went straight to voicemail. Either the phone was off or it was out of range. Which meant the clue had to be in the “meeting” she’d said she was attending. Just as Lewis and Siron had gone missing while tailing Joan Welch’s tracks, Kelly might have ruffled the wrong feathers too.

Please help me, I’m trapped, please.

Even searching for Lewis, who had simply evaporated from the world, was more than enough to overwhelm Anna. The self-reproach of being incompetent crushed her day after day. Even so, she couldn’t ignore Kelly Welch’s desperate message.

“I must be out of my mind.”

Anna looked up at an unfamiliar building with a face as tired as if she’d been worked to the bone all day. It was a cube the size of a big-box supermarket, its exterior finished in dull, gray-white concrete. Mounted at the top was a sign: Baggers City Integrated Mental Health Center.

Kelly had been seen at this Mental Health Center. Around 7:50 p.m., CCTV in the area captured her leaving the center and walking toward the bus stop—that was the last image. She learned this by slipping a bribe to a police officer she’d done remedial training with at headquarters, then reading the lazily written preliminary case notes.

The officers who took the missing-persons report had followed procedure to trace her movements, and it seemed they had at least reached her last stop: the Mental Health Center. But whether she actually boarded a bus or took some other means of transport like a taxi—no one knew. The file showed not a shred of new progress.

Anna came to the center to look for Kelly’s traces, yet she found herself seized by a mood unrelated to the current investigation. Those Who Seek Sorrow, which had comforted her when she was struggling, had only been a small group therapy circle led by Jackson Cliff, a psychotherapist. But after he met a wealthy benefactor, it seemed that T.W.S.S.—no, Jackson’s life—had changed in many ways.

The benefactor had established a mental-health welfare foundation and installed Jackson as its director. Whoever he was, he clearly had more money than he knew what to do with. To put up a warehouse-style building on expensive land and use it to gather mentally unstable people—that was all he did? Anna wanted to know what the benefactor was trying to achieve through Jackson.

Inside, Anna was a little surprised. Contrary to her expectation that the “Baggers City Integrated Mental Health Center” would focus on counseling and talk therapy, it was a complex facility systematically run with mental well-being as its goal. It buzzed with the energy of a college campus: the first floor had public lounges, a café, and an outpatient clinic for mild mental illness; the second floor housed addiction rehab and a shelter; the third floor had facilities for adolescent health and group psychotherapy.

Anna recalled the saying that every modern person lives with some degree of mental illness. This place was like an experimental psychiatric hospital where anyone could drop by and explore themselves without stigma.

No matter how I look at it, it’s strange that Jackson became director.

For his résumé, the post was excessive. Jackson was a decent counselor, yes—but he was neither a clinical psychologist nor a psychiatrist. He might hold a certified counseling credential, but he had no authority to diagnose or treat mental disorders.

To put such a massive facility in the hands of a non-specialist—leaving aside her fondness for Jackson, Anna couldn’t understand the benefactor’s choice.

Maybe it’s because of his military record?

Jackson wasn’t the type to brag about his past, but on very rare occasions he talked about his service. He had fought in the Gulf War, lost numerous subordinates during operations, and suffered PTSD. But that wasn’t why he left the military. When his son died of an acute brain tumor, he laid everything down, left the army, and became a civilian.

“What brings you here?”

At the reception desk on the third floor, where the group rooms were, stood a young attendant—a man in his late twenties with a strikingly fit build. Anna tried not to sneak glances at his physique and asked whether the therapy circle she’d attended before the center’s founding was still meeting.

Disappointingly, everything had been overhauled, and midstream entry into ongoing programs was not allowed. As the center had grown, its professionalism had increased, but somehow the familiar warmth and comfort seemed to have vanished.

The attendant recommended a psychological assessment, but she had no time to peer into her broken heart.

“Have you seen this woman by any chance?”

Anna showed him her phone screen. It was a three-year-old photo of Kelly Welch she’d found on Peoplebook.

“She came here a week ago. It’s a three-year-old photo, so she looked younger then than she does now.”

The man stood to look more closely, bending at the waist. He was a hand taller than Anna—who herself topped one-eighty. The word alpha flickered through her mind. With a bland face, he answered,

“Sorry, but for privacy reasons, I can’t confirm whether she visited.”

Anna started to pull her police badge from her pocket, then stopped and sighed.

“Then why look at the photo if you weren’t going to tell me anything? I mean... she’s a friend. She’s been out of touch for days and this was her last stop—”

“Anna?”

At the voice behind her, Anna turned. Jackson Cliff stood there, his face gone rigid as if he’d seen a ghost. Striding up to her in a few quick steps, he fixed her with sky-blue eyes whose black pupils stood out starkly.

Hurt at her ignoring his messages and a banked anger flickered across his face. But then the gladness of seeing her after so long flooded in—he looked an instant away from embracing her and thumping her back. Even so, as always, he kept his composure and approached her with courteous restraint.

“It’s been a while.”

Jackson offered a faint smile and held out his hand. Anna took it and gave it a polite shake.

“It’s been a while.”

“Are you coming back to the group?”

“Mm, I don’t know.”

With an ambiguous smile, Anna lifted a shoulder. At her lukewarm response, Jackson seemed to think of ✧ NоvеIight ✧ (Original source) something and asked, carefully,

“How is Lewis?”

“Sorry?”

“Is there... any improvement?”

Startled by the question, Anna belatedly remembered that people around her still thought of Lewis as a brain-dead patient who had died long ago. Brain death is treated as legal death; usually, life support is withdrawn within two days.

She herself had almost forgotten—but at the time of the accident, Lewis had been an actor finally emerging from a long run of obscurity. News of his accident had briefly made headlines. But there had been no follow-up reporting on his death.

“No.”

Pity flashed across Jackson’s face.

“The funeral?”

“...We held it properly.”

“Anna, I’m sorry.”

Jackson concealed his sympathy and kept the proper decorum. Anna felt her resolve soften, a desire to lean on him—but she reminded herself this was no time to accept comfort.

“Jackson, that’s not why I’m here.”

Anna showed him Kelly’s photo. Jackson studied it for a long moment, grave, then finally spoke.

“You know I can’t confirm whether a client came in, Anna. We’re bound by a confidentiality pledge.”

Just as worry deepened in Anna’s face at his admonishing tone, Jackson stepped in close beside her. He brought his lips near her ear, covered his mouth with his hand, and whispered:

“It was Miss Kelly Welch. About a week ago, yes—we brought her to the center.”

Feigning innocence, he zipped his lips in pantomime, then suggested they walk while they talked and led her away.

The building was designed around a central atrium, its open core ringed by clear guardrails. The floors were linked by escalators, so as you moved you could take in the layout of every level at a glance.

Stepping onto the descending escalator, Jackson said,

“She told us a sibling had gone missing and the police were no help—that she needed ours.”

He quietly smiled when he said the police.

“We told her our center’s purpose was to restore emotional balance and daily life, but she said she wanted to meet families of the missing. So we brought her in. As expected, though, once therapy started, she couldn’t stand it and left.”

“Why?”

Jackson shrugged.

“She must have decided she wouldn’t get the information she wanted. Besides, Kelly wasn’t in a state that required emotional recovery. She got bored, and slipped out when it came time for members to share experiences.”

“So psychologically, she was stable.”

Jackson nodded lazily.

“Anna, may I ask why you’re looking for Miss Kelly Welch? If I can help, I’d like to.”