Chapter 12
Kai
The interrogation room in Agony Hollow’s county sheriff’s office is airless and musty. The AC unit looks like it was last operational pre-COVID. Judging from the rust on the vents and the water damage on the wall beneath it, that’s probably when it broke down.
I’m cuffed to a metal ring in the table. Lip and cheek stinging. Wrists raw. Still, I keep dragging my cuff’s chain through the ring because it’s better than sitting here doing nothing as I slowly lose my mind.
I tell myself it’s frustration at being locked up when I did nothing wrong…but I know it’s really panic. I got through the first part of the booking fine. Handing over my shit, fingerprints, mugshot.
It was when they started swabbing my mouth for DNA that shit got real way too fast. The stuff they scraped out from under my nails looked a lot like dried blood.
And then I had to strip and get photographed, and it was the first time I realized how many scratches and bruises Haven had given me over the past few days.
She likes digging her nails into my shoulders and back when I fuck her. And Jesus, I like it just as much. But when I glanced over my shoulder and saw the marks she’d left on me last night…never mind the bruises on my neck, and the scratches on my wrists and arms.
No wonder Deputy Thatcher is all leaned back in his chair like he’s already won and I’m just too stupid to realize it.
He’s right.
I am that stupid.
I believed Haven when she promised she’d stop seeing Rooke, didn’t I?
“Run me through it again, Mr. Jordan.”
Third time answering this. Fourth? I’ve lost count.
I should have lawyered up as soon as they cuffed me to this table, but I’m innocent for fuck’s sake. And who’d I call, anyway? Only guy I know is Emerson, our family lawyer.
But he conspired with Ezra to get me booted out of the frat. I wouldn’t call him if he could grant me eternal life.
“Told you already,” I mutter, trying not to move my mouth too much. It’s not about the pain—I just don’t want to keep opening up my split lip before it gets a chance to heal.
“That’s why I said ‘again,’” Thatcher says, politely enough to set my fucking teeth on edge.
I sigh, dropping forward to rest my head in my hands, fingers delving into my hair. “I was at the Airbnb the whole day until I met Kruger—”
“That’s Sean Kruger, correct?”
I sigh out, “Correct,” before continuing. “I met him at The Hollow Point. We were there for a couple hours—”
“What time did you meet?”
“Nine? Ten? Fucked if I know.” I yank at the chains. Thatcher doesn’t even flinch. “Told you, if you gave me my phone, I could see when I got the Uber!”
He turns a page in his notebook. “Exactly how many hours did you stay at the bar?”
Here’s where I’m fucked, because I still haven’t figured out what to tell him. So I just stick with what I know…which is fuck all.
“Don’t know,” I mutter.
Thatcher leans forward and gives me another one of those wan, polite smiles that means everything and nothing—depending how fucking paranoid you are. “I suggest you try very hard to remember, Mr. Jordan.”
“Told you, I blacked out.”
“Real convenient.”
“Real fucking inevitable after ten shots of J?ger and some tequila.”
Thatcher tuts under his breath, but I’m not sure if he’s judging my alcohol consumption or my refusal to cooperate.
My teeth grind together. I want to tell him to go fuck himself, but that won’t help. Nothing helps when you’ve got no alibi.
“So you blacked out at this bar and remember nothing for the rest of the evening?”
“Not until I woke up on Kruger’s couch this morning,” I mutter, tugging on the neckline of the bright orange county-issue jumpsuit they put me in. It feels like canvas, smells like bleach.
“With no memory of how you got there?”
“Kind of what happens when you black out.”
“Or when you need an alibi.”
“That’s not—“
He doesn’t let me finish, which is a recurring theme in his interrogation technique. Accuse me of something—lowkey or fucking outright—then moving on before I can defend myself.
“You also don’t remember what time you went back to the Airbnb?”
“It was right before I went to the jeweler. And like I said, that guy’s got to have security footage or something, so you can see exactly when I—“
“Except Haven was asleep, so she can’t confirm when you arrived, or when you left…or even if you were there at all.”
“I bought her breakfast!” I flinch, rolling my lip inside my mouth to check if I’m bleeding again.
The memory comes out of nowhere. I should have thought it through before blurting it out—Thatcher’s look tells me I’ve just dug myself deeper.
“How thoughtful. What did you buy her?”
I drop my gaze, trying my best to remember, but of course that’s where my memory fails me.
Briefly.
I hold up a finger, grinning. “I have a receipt.”
“Do you now?”
“You took all my shit, right? Well, check it. There’s a receipt somewhere in my shit for the takeout.” I stab my finger onto the desk. “That’ll tell you exactly when I was done at the jeweler’s.”
Thatcher doesn’t seem impressed with my amazing memory.
“So you got the takeout, went back to the Airbnb to have breakfast with your girlfriend, and then you went to the library together?”
“Not together. She’d already left when I got back.”
“You just said you brought her breakfast. Was that a lie, Mr. Jordan?”
“No! I bought her breakfast, but she wasn’t fucking there when I got back.” I wince at the sting on my lip, dipping my head to touch the cut. Still no blood.
“Where did she go?”
“I—” I try to clear my raspy throat. “I don’t know. She didn’t say.”
“Interesting.”
So interesting, in fact, Thatcher feels compelled to write in his fucking notebook in that chicken scratch handwriting I’ve been trying to decode since he flipped the damn thing open.
“So from the time you picked up the takeout to arriving at the library, no one can vouch for your whereabouts? Why do I have a feeling if I checked the timestamps, there’d be plenty of time for you to dump someone in the woods, Mr. Jordan?”
My hands are in fists, trembling as I force myself not to lunge over the table and strangle Thatcher.
Stop. Breathe.
But it’s not working. I’m practically panting with frustration, my head throbbing, stomach both queasy and grumbling with hunger.
I’ve had one cup of coffee since I got here, and it was so shit I think it literally made my hangover worse.
The terrible lighting in here isn’t helping—one fluorescent is strobing like I’m at Coachella.
Thank God someone knocks on the door right then, because I was either going to bash my head on the table or throw up.
Thatcher closes his notebook, stands, and strolls over to the door like he has nothing better to do. In this shithole of a town, that’s probably the case.
Ha, funny to think I’ve probably been his entire caseload since he arrived in Agony Hollow. First, beating on Ezra. Then tossing Haven’s dorm room. Now this?
Guess I’m in my villain era.
He has an inaudible exchange with whoever’s on the outside of the door and then comes to take his seat carrying a manila folder.
Don’t like that.
Don’t like that one fucking bit.
When he looks at me, I swear I see a glint of sympathy in his eyes. Or maybe it’s pity.
“Last chance for us to work this out, son,” he says quietly.
Jesus, I hate it when people call me ‘son’ like I’m fucking twelve.
I wrap my hands around the chain binding me to the table, pulling it taut. I haven’t wanted a cigarette this badly since the first day I quit. And, I mean, there’s been a ton of weird shit going down since then.
“I told you, I don’t—“
Thatcher tips the envelope over, sending the contents sliding onto the table.
An evidence bag with a knife inside. The one I took from the Airbnb’s kitchen this morning.
Christ. Not this again.
Some photographs, but they all land face down.
“Remember this?” he asks, gesturing to the knife. Any other person would have said it sarcastically, maybe even with a hint of spiteful glee. Thatcher just sounds tired. “It was on your person when—”
“Like I could forget,” I drawl, suppressing a laugh. “Officer Dipshit nearly tazed me when he found it.”
I swear there’s the hint of a smile on Thatcher’s mouth before it forms a stern line again. “Care to explain what you were doing with a concealed weapon on school property?”
I sigh, leaning forward again so I can pinch my eyes closed. I’d already told them when they were frisking me in the campus gardens, but I guess I have to repeat everything a hundred times for the sake of the tape recorder on the table between us.
“Exercising my Second Amendment rights,” I mutter.
“Those rights don’t extend to restricted spaces. You do understand it’s expressly prohibited to carry weapons of any kind on campus grounds?”
“It’s a kitchen knife, not a fucking machete.”
Thatcher sighs like I’m giving him a headache.
The feeling’s mutual.
There’s no way I’m telling him why I took that knife, because then I’d have to admit I was planning to confront my psychology professor convinced he might be fucking my girlfriend. Because Haven’s message was eating at me and I needed to do something about the acid in my veins.
Because I’m the kind of fuckup who makes bad decisions when he’s spiraling.
“Look, I didn’t touch Melissa, okay?” I pull against the cuffs. Futile. Stupid. “Call Haven. She’ll vouch for me.”
“Haven Lee.” He flips open a notebook. “Your girlfriend.”
“Yeah.”
“So you do know her.”
I groan, my forehead sinking onto the table’s cool surface. Of course he’d remember me being evasive as fuck after the Rain Dance, pretending not to know Haven.
I push up, taking a deep breath.
“Guess you can say we’ve become…reacquainted,” I say dryly.
I swear this hangover is turning me into Dickens.
“Remarkable,” he murmurs, studying his notes with a slight frown between his thick brows. “And this would be the same Haven Lee who left the scene moments after we detained you?”