Chapter 16
Chapter Sixteen
She didn’t think that she’d ever been inside a police station before. Or, particularly, inside an interrogation room before. But then again, she couldn’t remember shit so…
Melody cradled the stale cup of coffee between her hands.
She was in an actual interrogation room.
One with a one-way viewing mirror on the wall.
How Law & Order crazy was that? She was sitting at a little rickety table, Victor stood in front of the mirror, and the detective—Detective Angus Clinton—sat across from her, a cold scowl on his face.
“I didn’t fake my disappearance,” Melody told him. She’d told him this several times.
His scowl just deepened.
“I told you…” She had. All the bits and pieces that she had—she’d told him.
After she’d made it to the station with Victor, a trip they’d made driving on a few sketchy roads with too much sludge and ice.
“I woke up in a hospital. Most of my memory is still gone. I gave you the name of the hospital where I was treated. I gave you the names of my doctors. I signed paperwork, releases so that you could get all of my medical information.” One hand lifted to make a shooing gesture toward him.
“Don’t you have people who can check all of this out?
I didn’t do anything wrong.” Hello, I’m the victim.
“I thought you were working my case to help me. Didn’t realize you were looking to lock me up. ”
“You said you woke up in a Canadian hospital. And you admitted you used a fake ID to get back in the country.” Angus glowered at her.
“No one is locking Melody up.” Victor spoke with utter certainty. “We are here as a courtesy, nothing more.”
The well-dressed woman who sat at Melody’s side cleared her throat.
“I think we should all take a few deep breaths.” That would be her attorney talking.
The lawyer who resembled a supermodel had come running as soon as Victor called her, despite the dangerous roads.
Amaya Abba. Chief counsel at Mage Industries. “My client is cooperating.”
From what she’d gathered, Amaya was more Victor’s attorney than hers.
Or maybe Amaya just worked for Mage Industries.
But the woman had magically appeared at the station just as Angus began his interrogation proceedings, and Melody was certainly grateful for her presence.
Not like she wanted to wind up behind bars.
Melody hadn’t even realized that was a possibility, not until Angus had begun making his threats.
“My client is confused and clearly traumatized, yet here she is.” Amaya sent her a sympathetic smile before she focused back on the detective.
“She’s patiently answering your questions.
Being a good citizen. Giving you as much information as she can so that the evil perpetrator who attacked her can be brought to justice. ”
Melody didn’t know if she’d really been patiently doing anything.
Victor had swiftly updated Amaya on Melody’s, um, situation. He had also stopped Angus from cuffing Melody.
Since they’d been in the interrogation, Angus had gone on and on about her misusing police resources. He’d groused out something about a false abduction.
The abduction was real. Everything about that nightmare was real. And she didn’t like the scowl on Angus’s face. The man seemed pissed that she was alive. Call her crazy, but she didn’t think cops were supposed to respond that way when they found a missing victim.
“I’ve got uniforms checking into the hospital story,” Angus groused.
“Good for you,” Melody muttered.
His eyes narrowed. “You just got home? That’s the story you want to stick with? You seriously expect me to believe you simply sashayed back into town after being dead to the world for a year?”
“I didn’t sashay.” Jerk. “I scrimped and saved my money, and I followed the trickle of memories that I had back to Richmond.”
“Uh, huh. Followed on a fake ID.”
“Not like I woke up with my driver’s license and passport on me in that hospital. If I had, then I would have known exactly who I was. I would have known where my home was. Months passed with me knowing nothing. I thought I would stay like that. Having no one. Nothing.”
A low rumble came from Victor.
Her chin lifted. “Then I started to get flashes. Bits and pieces. I’m in Richmond because I want to know what happened.
I want to put all of those broken pieces back together.
I almost died. I think I deserve to know what happened to me.
” She leaned forward. She also ignored the light hand that Amaya tapped against her shoulder.
She was getting that the other woman wanted her to stop talking, but Melody couldn’t.
Not yet. “I had hoped that you could help me,” she told the detective.
“I wanted to see the files you had on me. I wanted to see what suspects you had in my disappearance.”
“Oh, I can absolutely share that intel with you.” Angus pointed toward Victor. “Suspect number one.”
“Victor didn’t do anything to hurt me,” she scoffed without even glancing his way. “He wouldn’t.”
“Exactly the same shit you told me before,” Angus muttered back. He gave a disgusted shake of his head. “Still singing that same old tune, are you?”
His words caught her off guard. “What? Why would I tell you that? And when would we have talked?”
The tension in the room seemed really, really thick.
Victor took a step away from the mirror. “When in the hell did you talk to Melody?”
But Angus wasn’t looking at Victor. His stare was only on her. “You really don’t know, do you?”
“Give the man a cookie.” She snapped her teeth together.
“This isn’t some game or some joke. It’s my life.
I was attacked. Bleeding in the snow. Someone took me.
Someone hurt me. I’d like to know who the hell that person was, and I’d prefer for you to arrest that individual, not threaten to cuff me.
” Okay, those words had come out fast and angry.
She should probably take a breath. Or maybe a sip of stale coffee.
Do something to calm herself down a bit.
“Huh.” Angus sucked in the side of his left cheek. “Huh.”
She sipped the stale coffee. Almost immediately spat it out again. That was truly the stuff of nightmares. Melody pushed the coffee cup away.
“Detective, you never told me that you knew Melody.” Victor stalked across the small room. “You never told me about any conversation you’d had with her.”
“I didn’t? Odd, isn’t it, how people can leave out details?” Angus shuffled the manila files in front of him. “And it’s those little details that matter a great deal.”
“How did you know Melody?” Victor questioned, voice harsh.
Angus glanced at Victor.
So did she.
Oh, yeah, he definitely looked pissed. “Victor, it’s okay.
” It probably wasn’t, but she didn’t want the man taking a swing at a cop.
If he did that, then Victor would be the one winding up in jail.
She’d prefer for them to both get out of there without an arrest, if possible.
Was that too much to ask? Melody didn’t really think so.
“It’s not okay,” Victor gritted back. “This detective grilled me again and again while you were gone. Like he just said, I was suspect number one. I wanted his help to find you. At first, he refused to even consider the fact that you’d been taken.
Thought you’d left on your own. So much fucking time was lost because I was the only one who knew you were missing from day one.
Everyone else—including this prick—thought that you’d just walked away. ”
It was probably not the best idea ever to call the detective a prick. To think it, sure, but to say it? The animosity between the two men was clear. Super, super clear to see.
“The first forty-eight hours after a disappearance are vitally important.” Victor’s voice thickened with fury.
“Evidence is strongest. You can find physical evidence faster—you can preserve it. Use it. That’s also the best time to get leads because any witnesses still have fresh memories.
” His jaw clenched. “The more time that passes, the less likely you are to find the missing person alive.”
A shiver skirted down her spine.
“Yet here you are,” Angus murmured. “Alive.”
Her gaze whipped toward him. He was staring straight at her again. His intense gaze made her feel uncomfortable. She shifted a bit in her chair. “You need to mark Victor off your suspect list. He didn’t do anything to hurt me.”
“Yes, he did.” Angus seemed certain. “I think you and I need to talk, Ms. Mage, and we need to have that talk alone.”
Amaya laughed. Hard. “That is adorable.” More laughter.
She even wagged her finger toward the detective.
“Here I am, representing my client, proudly using all of the wonderful years of schooling that my parents worked so diligently to pay for…and you think I’m just going to walk away from my job so that you can privately grill a victim? ”
Angus flushed. “I’m not grilling her. I’m simply going to remind her of a few facts, seeing as how her memory is impaired.”
“Then remind her,” Amaya invited. “By all means. Just do so with me present.” Her smile taunted him.
Angus’s flush deepened. But his head turned toward Victor. “Not sure you want what I’m about to say to be common knowledge.”
“What the hell are you driving at?” Victor’s face darkened.
“You should ask the lawyer to step outside.”
“Amaya…” Victor directed, “don’t move.”
“Wasn’t planning on it.”
A dull ache began behind Melody’s left eye.
Dammit. Not another headache. Not now. They came and went far too often.
She had no idea if she’d suffered from bad headaches before her attack or not, but she certainly faced them a lot now.
A fun side effect of her head injury. “I don’t understand what’s happening here.
” There was a lot she didn’t get. “How did you even know I was at my house?” she asked the detective.