Before the silence, there was a scream. Not the kind that ever left Hanna’s mouth, but the kind that stayed buried deep inside her, tangled in memory and muscle. The other kind, the ones that tore out loud and raw, were easier; they made a noise that bounced off walls. Sometimes they even left bruises in the air, visible enough that someone might actually stop and notice.
This one had stayed inside her, a raw, splintered sound that no one else could hear. It began years earlier, long before prison walls and intake assessments, before the polished office, the framed degrees, and the calm expression she wore like armor. It had started in a living room where adults forgot she was there and in a bedroom where the door didn’t always lock. These were memories she had tried to file away like case notes, tucked into neat folders in the back of her mind, but they always found their way back, especially when the world got quiet.
People liked to say that trauma made you stronger, but Hanna knew that wasn’t true. It didn’t make you tougher or braver. It made you quieter. It made you sharper. You learned how to watch, how to listen, and how to stay one step ahead. You learned to smile when you were hurting and to nod in agreement when every part of you wanted to run. It taught you how to survive, even when survival meant disappearing inside yourself.
She had learned all of that before she turned twelve.
Now she was a woman shaped by stillness. A woman who understood that not all monsters lived behind bars. Some wore wedding rings. Some carried badges. Some looked you in the eye and said, “I love you,” right before they shattered everything. And sometimes, they sat across from you in handcuffs and asked for therapy.
Very few inmates ever requested a specific therapist.
But Richard Hale had. His name was printed at the bottom of the intake form in steady, deliberate block letters,
Dr. Hanna Nowack only
He wasn’t her patient. He wasn’t even in her unit.
Hale was high risk, housed in solitary, and always escorted by at least two guards. There was to be no direct contact. His file was long and unsettling, layered with flags for psychological manipulation, aggression, and control. He wasn’t just the kind of man who craved power. He was the kind who studied how to take it from other people.
And now, for reasons he didn’t explain, he wanted her.
Hanna stared at the form. The phone sat in her hand, still warm from the last call, but now it felt heavier somehow, like it already knew what was coming.
She’d been warned by others in the department to steer clear of him. They told her not to fall into his trap. Richard Hale didn’t talk unless he was working an angle.
Her thoughts raced. Her gut told her to walk away, but curiosity pressed in harder than caution. She had to know why. Maybe she could get him to talk.
She dialed the Special Housing Unit extension.
“This is Dr. Nowack. I’ll see Richard Hale at ten.”
Hanna hung up the phone and leaned back in her chair. She had stopped fearing monsters a long time ago. She’d learned early that the real ones never looked like monsters at all.
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