The Girl Who Was Taken

This chapter returns to the present and follows Livia’s third-person perspective. Following her previous failure and admonishment by her professor, Livia is determined to do a better job when presenting her findings to a panel of professors. She also resolves to treat each body on her table with the dignity and compassion she would apply to her own sister’s autopsy. Emboldened by her new perspective, she delivers a stellar presentation and receives admiration from her professor and her fellow medical residents. She leaves feeling pleased with her efforts as she drives to meet Megan. After discovering the ketamine connection, Livia wants to ask Megan what she remembers about being drugged. She is hoping to find similarities between Megan’s experience, Nancy Dee’s, and Nicole’s kidnapping.

Livia admits to herself that she is predisposed to dislike Megan. She knows that it’s unfair, but she resents Megan for escaping when Nicole did not, and she feels that Megan’s memoir is a self-aggrandizing grab for money and attention. However, as she talks with Megan, Livia realizes that her impression was wrong. Megan reveals that she did not write the memoir herself; her therapist ghost-wrote it and based it on the information Megan shared in her therapy sessions.