Chapter 31 #2
I shove him down to the ground and then I get to my feet just as Nico and Aaron join us. Nico’s gaze darts to Damien before switching to me. “Seriously?”
“What? He was running away, and your ass is slow.”
Turning to the sleazebag in question, I pull him to his feet. “So now we get to bring him in and ask him some questions.”
“I want my lawyer!” Damien demands for the hundredth time as the car comes to a stop in front of the station. “I know my rights!”
“You’ll get him once you’re inside,” Nico mutters before we both slip out of the car and close the doors, but even that doesn’t help to dull the protests of the man cuffed in the back seat.
“This is a fucking mess,” Nico hisses, running his hand over his face and then pinching the bridge of his nose.
“Tell me about it.”
I reach for the door handle, but Nico shoots me a death glare. “I think you’ve done enough.”
I press my lips into a tight line, fighting the annoyance. I nod once and take a step back. “I’m listening in.”
He rolls his eyes. “Of course you are.”
Shaking his head, he opens the door and pulls Damien out of the car before hauling him into the station.
“I’ll tell my lawyer about this bullshit,” Damien continues protesting as Nico leads him straight to the interrogation room. “I’ll sue you all. Just wait—”
Nico closes the door in my face, effectively cutting him off.
Sighing, I step into the observation room that’s connected by a one-way mirror.
Their lips move as Nico takes off the handcuffs, but no sound reaches me.
Going to the control panel, I turn on the speakers, Damien’s whining filling the room.
“—manhandling to the list as well.”
Sure, dude.
“There would have been no reason for us to manhandle you if you hadn’t run away,” Nico says calmly. “We just went there to talk.”
“As if,” the guy scoffs, crossing his arms over his chest. “Your asshole partner has had a beef with me ever since he stole my woman.” His gaze darts toward the mirror, and the muscle in my jaw twitches.
His lips curl in a smug smile, as if he knows I’m on the other side.
“How is it fucking her and knowing I had her first? Stretched that pussy so it fits like a glove.”
My blood boils at his crude words, the sound of my wild heartbeat echoing in my eardrums as my fingers dig into the table in front of me so hard my knuckles have turned white.
I’m going to kill him.
Fuck putting him behind bars.
I’m going to throttle him so there is no way he’ll ever be able to talk about Jessica like that ever again.
Anger, hot and all-consuming, burns inside me, dulling everything else around me, so it takes me a moment to catch Nico’s question.
“—dated Jessica?”
“Yes.” That smug smile falls. His eyes narrowing at Nico, calculating. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“Let’s sit down and chat.”
The asshole sneers. “I’m not talking until I have my lawyer.”
“Sure thing.” Nico walks around the table and casually starts for the door. “I mean, if you really don’t want to know why we brought you here in the first place…”
“I didn’t do shit,” Damien hisses, but Nico doesn’t take his bait.
“If you didn’t do shit, then you would talk to me and clear this up in a few minutes instead of waiting for your lawyer to arrive. You know as well as I do that can take hours, but you know your rights, and I can’t do anything if you’re determined…”
Damien’s eyes narrow, but for once, he doesn’t complain. Instead, he leans against the back of his chair, legs sprawling wide, as if he doesn’t have a care in this world. “Fine. What am I doing here?”
Nico turns around and takes the seat opposite him. “There was a break-in at Jessica Richards’s house.”
There is a beat of silence as Nico lets his words settle in. I watch Damien process what was said. His eyes narrow slightly, furrow deepening between his brows. Either he’s an Oscar-winning actor or he’s genuinely surprised.
Damien curses under his breath and jumps to his feet, the sudden motion making the chair fall back.
“Oh, no.” He shakes his head and points his finger at Nico. “No, no, no. You’re not pinning this on me. No way, no how. That bitch ain’t worth this shit. I wouldn’t take her back now anyway after she whored herself out to a pig.”
Fucking asshole.
“But you wanted to get back together,” Nico points out. “Jessica said you’ve had altercations a few times since you broke up, including at The Hut a few nights before the break-in happened.”
“Couples have disagreements; ain’t nothing new about that.”
Disagreement, my ass.
“And you have a tendency to send her flowers afterward? A little apology?”
“Flowers? I didn’t send her any fucking flowers!”
Nico raises his brow. “People said you gave her flowers when you were talking at the Reading Nook.”
“I did. I wanted to pay for her coffee too, but she was being a bitch about it. I’m not spending any more money on her ungrateful ass.
” The frown on his forehead deepens. “Listen. Yes, I wanted to patch things up, but she wasn’t interested.
Was I pissed off? Yes. But I ain’t gonna pant after her like a dog when she ain’t worth it. ”
Nico tilts his head to the side. “Pissed off enough to slash her tires?”
Damien freezes for a moment, his eyes widening, before he shakes his head. “I did not break into her house.”
That isn’t a no.
“When did it happen, anyway?”
“Monday night. Can—”
“Ha!” That smug grin is back on his face as he claps his hands. “I went to The Hut after work.”
Nico’s brow raises. “And you were there the whole time?”
Some of that glee dissipates. “We were there for a while.” He lifts his shoulder in a shrug. “Then we went off to Rodrigo’s to play poker.”
“And Rodrigo is…?”
“A friend,” Damien grinds out, clearly annoyed. “You can call him and ask.”
The silence stretches between them for a moment. Nico pushes from his chair and pulls out his notepad, ripping out the paper and handing it to him. “Write down his information.”
“Seriously?”
“Yes, seriously.”
Damien rolls his eyes but grabs the pen and scribbles something down before handing Nico the paper. “He’ll confirm it.”
Nico looks down at the paper. “I’ll be back in a few.”
Damien’s self-satisfied smirk only grows bigger as he watches Nico leave and close the door behind himself. Only then does Damien’s gaze shift back to the one-way mirror.
Back to me.
We just stare at one another for what feels like forever. Each second that passes makes me bristle more, and it’s like he knows. Like he’s enjoying it. Like this is all a game to him. Maybe it is.
He wiggles his brows. “I know you’re there.”
He pushes from his chair and leans against his forearms, his gaze still locked on me.
“How does fucking her feel knowing I had her first?” My fingers squeeze into a fist on the control panel, my vision narrowing as the rage inside me boils.
“Did she tell you I was her first? You should remember that the next time you fuck her. She. Was. Mine. First. She will always be mine first. And you know what they say. A girl never forgets her first time. I still remember how tight she felt when I popped her cherry, such a sweet—”
His lips continue moving, but I can no longer hear him. I whirl around, my breathing ragged. I was so focused on him; I didn’t even hear Nico enter the room.
My partner eyes me warily. “He’s just trying to rile you up so he can use it against you later. Don’t let him.”
“Would you let him talk that way about Maisie?” The muscle in Nico’s jaw twitches at my bite, his eyes going dark. “Yeah, I didn’t think so.”
“Be that as it may, he isn’t lying. I called Mick, and he said the dude was at the bar. He came around six with some of his friends, and they stayed about an hour before they left.”
“So he could have done it.” My heart races faster, but Nico’s face remains serious.
“I called his friend as well. We didn’t get a chance to talk much because he’s at work, but he said they were at his place the whole night, playing poker.”
“You’ve gotta be shitting me. It’s his friend.”
“I know, and I asked him if he would testify under oath that they were together, and he said he would. He’s going to come later to give an official statement. I’m sorry, Matthew, but there is nothing we can do. Not without more evidence.”
I glance toward the room. Damien is sitting in his chair, all smug, because he knows he’s going to walk.
“Fucking hell,” I mutter, running my hand over my face. “How is this happening?”
“I don’t know. He seemed surprised when I mentioned the flowers, but I’m not sure I believe him. Not that we can link him to it either. I called the shop the day after the break-in; they couldn’t give us any information about who placed those orders.”
“But he wasn’t at all surprised when you brought up slashed tires,” I fire back. “He did it.”
Nico nods. “Most likely. But she never reported it, so I can’t arrest him for a crime that doesn’t exist.”
“Fucking hell.” My fists flex. “He’ll actually walk.”
And there is nothing we can do about it.
“It’s him. There is no other explanation. All of it… it’s personal. Who else would it be?”
“I know.” Nico places his hand on my shoulder, giving it a firm grip. “We’ll figure it—”
A soft knock echoes in the room before the door opens and Mary’s head peeks in, her face grim as her eyes meet ours.
“They found our missing girl.”