Controlled Substance

Jude Chadwick killed at least twelve men over six years. Left each one staged at their own table with a signature so brutal the FBI gave him a name. The media calls him The Shade. The facility calls him their most dangerous patient. I don’t see what the fuss is about.

I’m the court-appointed behavioural monitor assigned to assess his treatment at Greenridge Forensic Psychiatric Facility. My job is to observe, document, and report. That’s it. I’m not his therapist. I’m not his friend. I’m the independent set of eyes making sure the system isn’t abusing a patient’s rights — no matter what that patient has done.

And the system is definitely abusing his rights.

The sedation doses don’t match what’s on file. The restraint protocols are excessive for a man who sits across from me and asks about my day. Staff are terrified of him. I’m not. I don’t know why everyone keeps telling me I should be.

My reports are clean, factual, and damning. Every one I file chips away at the facility’s case for keeping him heavily sedated. His lawyer is using them to build a legal challenge. The head of security keeps finding reasons to walk me to my car. And the quiet patient in Ward A has started learning my schedule.

I thought I was protecting a man’s rights.

I didn’t know I was the key to his cage. And he’s been waiting for someone exactly like me to turn it.

Tropes: Serial killer romance, psychopath hero, oblivious heroine, morally black MMC, MFM reverse harem, institutional setting, forced proximity, Jekyll & Hyde hero, bodyguard/protector, who did this to you