Medical Center.
Late at night.
After the effects of the drugs wore off, the three long-legged cheerleaders didn't need the restraints anymore. The nurse untied them, and they sat side by side, staring blankly at the TV without moving a muscle.
The tall guy was no rookie at this. The stuff he slipped into the chocolate was just pure ecstasy—nothing else mixed in. He didn't dare give them too much either. But even so, when the girls' parents rushed in and saw their daughters sitting there, dazed and unresponsive, they lost it completely.
Sure, they'd been through similar wild days themselves and kinda knew what was up, but seeing it happen to their own kids? That's a whole different story. The guy's parents nearly got jumped by the angry mob.
The cops showed up to take statements and had to step in hard to stop a full-on brawl. Adam said what he needed to say and did what he had to do. Whatever happened next wasn't his problem.
In the world of American high school dramas, stuff like this happens all the time.
As Adam left the room and walked down the hallway, he suddenly froze mid-step. He turned around to see a nurse standing there, facing the wall like she was staring at something.
Something's off.
This is weird!
"Debbie, you okay?"
Adam walked over and patted her shoulder. With his knack for remembering people, he knew everyone in the hospital—every detail about them stuck in his head. That's why he got along with everyone so well, like they were old buddies.
"What?"
Nurse Debbie kept staring at the blank wall, smiling without turning her head.
"Huh?"
Adam frowned, grabbed her arm, and gently turned her around to face him. Her face was glowing with joy… but it was kinda lifeless, too.
"No way…"
Adam's mouth twitched as he waved toward the nurse's station. "Carol!"
"Dr. Duncan, what's up?"
Nurse Carol jogged over right away.
"Take Debbie to a room. She's acting like she's high."
Adam gave the order, then something clicked. "Wait—where's that box of spiked chocolate from earlier?"
"Oh no!"
Carol got it instantly and gasped. "I saw it in the nurse's lounge a minute ago!"
"Get it out of there and destroy it, now!"
Adam checked Debbie over, saw it wasn't too bad, and let out a relieved but exasperated sigh.
"Yes, yes!"
Carol nodded quickly, helping Debbie toward the lounge.
Adam just shook his head.
This is the danger of tampered food—you never know who's gonna get hit.
Honestly, he could kinda get why the nurses did it. They're swamped all the time. Remember that big nurse strike last time? Sometimes they're so busy they don't even have a second to hit the cafeteria. When they're starving, they'll grab a snack or some fruit from a patient's room to keep going.
No one says anything about it.
Happy patients don't care, grumpy ones don't notice, and the really sick ones? They're past noticing anything.
It's not just nurses—doctors do it too. Dr. House next door loves snagging stuff. His team even raids patients' homes looking for clues and munches on whatever's around.
Emmm… sometimes they even hook up on the patient's bed! 😳
Talk about guts. Aren't they worried about eating something bad—or that the bed itself might be ground zero for whatever's making the patient sick?
This time, though, some clueless nurse couldn't resist the heart-shaped chocolates, swiped them to the lounge, and bam—down she went.
That football player went all out to trick those three cheerleaders. A big box of fancy chocolates like that? Not cheap!
Two hours later…
After finishing a little "private session" with Alice Grey, Adam was heading out when he ran into Nurse Carol. "How's Debbie doing?"
"Eh, same old."
Carol gave a wry smile. "This one's a total embarrassment. Debbie's not the only one who ate the spiked stuff."
"Not the only one?"
Adam blinked, startled. "Let's go check it out."
Carol led him to the lounge, and what he saw left him speechless.
Six nurses were lined up on a couch, each holding a tub of ice cream, grinning like idiots—slow, blissful idiots. They were eating so painfully slow, not even chewing, just licking it bit by bit, smacking their lips like it was the best thing they'd ever tasted.
Nearby, the male nurses were staring. Some held the same ice cream, glancing between their own tubs and the girls', either zoned out or hunched over with weird looks on their faces, lost in who-knows-what thoughts. 😅
Adam took one look, realized what Carol meant by "total embarrassment," and bolted.
"Officer Beckett, yeah, it's me. I've got another case to report…"
Adam dialed Kate. As a good citizen, he felt obligated to report this messed-up drugging incident to the authorities—and push them to take it seriously.
The fallout was insane!
Look at this chain reaction—six nurses down, acting like total loons. What if someone saw this and thought the medical center was some sketchy dump? Or if these zonked-out nurses kept treating patients and screwed up big time? Or if their weird vibes freaked out the normal staff and caused a disaster?
Adam didn't know about anyone else, but he was pissed after seeing that scene!
He had to do something. If Kate couldn't give him a satisfying answer, he'd go straight to the media—the fourth estate—and spill it all as an anonymous tipster. He knew an ambitious reporter like Robin would eat this up.
"Kate, don't let me down," Adam muttered as he left the hospital and drove back to his apartment.
The next day…
Adam showed up to work with a scowl. Kate had let him down, big time. Even Robin, who'd sniffed out the story and knew it was tied to society's darkest corners, chickened out the second she realized how huge it was.
In the locker room…
"He's not as bad as you guys make him out to be," Meredith was saying, defending Mark—the guy who'd cheated on her ex. "His $400-an-hour shrink told him that behind his rugged, confident exterior, he's a self-loathing, self-destructive, borderline pathological mess.
"Nobody's perfect. Cheating's wrong, sure, but doesn't the husband bear some responsibility? Was he really such a great husband?"
"Heh."
Adam pushed the door open with a grin. "That shrink's got skills—feeding him exactly what he wants to hear. No wonder he charges $400 an hour!"
$400 an hour, 10 hours a day—that's $4,000. Even with weekends off, that's $20,000 a week. Fifty weeks a year? A cool million. A top-tier earner dragging up the average for every shrink out there!
"You don't buy it?"
Meredith glanced at him.
"Nope," Adam shot back. "All those fancy theories and buzzwords just boil down to one thing—he couldn't keep it in his pants!
"Self-loathing? Nah, he's just drooling over her body. Dude's a creep!" 😏
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