12. Kai #2
Thatcher looks up, tilting his head with a soft, almost paternal curve to his mouth. Like he fucking feels sorry for me.
“Multiple witnesses saw her leaving the scene. Why wouldn’t your girlfriend stick around to help you?”
Yeah, Haven. Why didn’t you stick around?
I’m acting surprised, but I saw it happen. Watched her walk away while campus security were on their power trips, pinning me to the ground. I watched her disappear into the trees while I had a knee in my spine and hands forcing my face into concrete.
And I know who was waiting there for her because the fucker waved at me.
Rooke.
What are the odds he just happened to be around when all this shit went down? I’ve been running calculations in my head like fucking Einstein since last night. They all lead me to the same conclusion.
It was him.
All him.
I don’t know how, but I can guess why.
He’s a fucking psycho who wants my girlfriend, and wouldn’t hesitate at framing me for something like this to get me out of the way.
Thatcher shakes his head, sighing when I fume silently instead of replying. “We’ll be talking to Miss Lee later. First, let’s discuss Melissa Parker.”
“I didn’t touch—“
I cut off when he flips over the stack of photographs. The top photo is a picture of my back.
“Know what we call these marks, Mr. Jordan?” Thatcher taps his pencil on the photo, continuing before I can answer. “Defensive wounds. Because they’re usually made by people trying to defend themselves.”
Defensive wounds? Ha. Looks like I tried to fuck a tiger without its consent.
“I can explain—”
“I certainly hope you can, because it sure looks like she touched you. A lot.”
I think I’ve ground off all the enamel on my teeth by now. “Those…that was Haven.”
“I don’t follow,” Thatcher says slowly, face as deadpan as his voice.
Sick fuck. He knows exactly—
“She likes to scratch me when we fuck,” I grate through clenched teeth.
Thatcher uses the back of his pencil to slide photo after photo off the pile. Each shows a part of my body covered in marks. It’s obvious some scratches are fresher than others. Deeper.
My wrists.
My forearms.
My chest.
My shoulders.
My back.
Some on my lower stomach that I don’t remember Haven giving me.
Even the faded teeth marks where Rooke bit me in the hospital bathroom.
Fuck, Haven. Fuuuck.
He stops at a photo of my neck. “Does she also—”
“Yes. She also likes trying to choke me.” I huff out a humorless laugh. “Trying being the operative word.”
“Big hands for such a small girl.”
My gaze flicks down to the photo again. Maybe it’s the way it was shot—the contrast or something—but the bruises on my neck are definitely larger than I’ve seen Haven leave before. Then again, she was pretty pissed off with me.
Still…a dread feeling swells inside me until Thatcher slides the photos back into the envelope.
He sits back in his seat with a sigh. “And she’d obviously be happy to corroborate your statement.”
It’s not a question, but I mutter out, “Obviously. Since she fucking did it.”
“Think she’d be able to convince a judge?”
I flinch when his eyes dart up to mine. “I didn’t fucking touch Melissa!” I wince at a stab of pain from my lip. This time when I touch my mouth, my finger comes back smeared with blood.
“Miss Parker explicitly named you, Mr. Jordan.”
“She’s—“ I flail my hands as best I can in the chained-up handcuffs. “—fucking confused or something.”
Thatcher glances down at his notepad, using his pencil to point out one scrawled line after the next.
“We have you trying to flee the scene.” The pencil moves down a line.
“Resisting arrest.” Another scrawled sentence.
“You were found with a weapon—” he taps the knife with the back of the pencil without taking his eyes off his notes “—and no reliable accounting for your whereabouts last night or this morning. That’s not even considering what we’ll find when the lab results come back on the blood we found under your nails. ”
Jesus. It feels like I swallowed a bowling ball.
So it was blood.
Why the fuck did I have blood under my fucking nails?
There’s a sharp light in his eyes when he looks up—an odd contrast to the soft smile still on his lips. “I know you did it, son. What I’m trying to ascertain is why.”
My mouth is open. I close it. Clench my teeth.
He just keeps staring, looking content to sit here all fucking day if needed.
“If I did it, then why would I show up at the library, huh? Why would I walk right into—” I cut off, because nothing on his face changes.
Can’t he see it doesn’t make sense?
If I kidnapped and assaulted Melissa, why the fuck would I stroll onto campus like nothing happened? With a weapon. But that’s the problem with being innocent. You don’t think like a guilty person, so you end up looking like one.
I saw cops, and instincts honed from a rough childhood and years of petty thievery flipped switches in my brain. So I ran. And it makes me look guilty as fuck.
There’s another knock at the door.
Jesus, what now? Camera footage of me stuffing Melissa in the trunk of a car?
Thatcher gives me a double take on his way to the door, and I hurriedly wipe the grim smile from my mouth.
“Deputy? Need you for a minute,” someone outside the door says.
Thatcher takes one step out of the office, then turns back. “Better safe,” he deadpans as he slips the knife and photos back into the envelope, taking it with him when he leaves.
Damn. I was gonna use that to break out.
I crash down into folded arms, gripping my biceps.
Guess this is another interrogation technique. Leaving me alone in this coffin of a room, nothing for company but the fluorescent buzz and the image of Haven walking into those woods playing on repeat behind my eyelids.
Why the fuck did she leave me? Was she scared she’d be arrested too?
Why the fuck did Melissa say I hurt her?
I barely fucking know her!
Sure, she dated Ezra for a while, but it’s not like we hung out. Ever. Yet for some reason she decided I was involved with…whatever the fuck happened to her.
I only caught a glimpse of her, but she looked bad.
Like true crime documentary bad.
Thank fuck I’m not left to stew for too long, because I’m starting to spiral.
The door opens, but it’s not the deputy.
It’s a man in a tailored Italian suit, wire-rimmed glasses. I don’t know what scares me more—the perfunctory glance he sends my way, or his crocodile leather briefcase.
“Mr. Jordan?” He sets the briefcase down. “I’m Jonathan Barnes. I’ve been retained to represent you.”
“What?” I say through a laugh.
“May I?” Barnes gestures to the chair opposite me, where Thatcher had been so politely interrogating me.
I pull at my chains. “Does it look like I can stop you?”
Barnes quirks the side of his mouth as he takes his seat. Not sure what the fuck the briefcase is for, because he sets it down beside him and doesn’t look at it again.
Gravitas, I guess.
Sure fucking works.
“Who the fuck hired you?” I hesitate, wrapping the chains around my knuckles again before venturing a cautious, “Was it my dad?”
Barnes meshes his fingers. “Bastian Rooke.”
“R—” I cut off with an incredulous chuckle. “Fucking Rooke?”
It doesn’t make any sense.