Chapter 54
Jeremiah
Aloud knock on the door had me sit up in bed quickly.
I patted the bed beside me frantically, but my heart settled when my hand met Sadie, breathing peacefully beside me.
I let out a deep breath and looked around the room, wondering if I had dreamed it.
I settled in beside Sadie again, draping my arm around her and savoring her soft skin.
I closed my eyes to drift off to sleep again, but the knock sounded again. This time louder. More urgent.
“What the fuck?” I muttered under my breath, sitting up again.
Outside the large windows, I could see the sky was dark. Purple clouds hung low in the sky. The sun hadn’t come up yet. Sadie stirred beside me, rolling onto her back and looking at me with sleepy eyes.
“What’s going on?” she asked groggily.
“I don’t know,” I said, peeling the sheets off me and looking for my sweats.
I found them on the floor and pulled them on, followed by a wrinkled black t-shirt, just as the knock sounded again and I heard what sounded like shouts from outside the front door.
“Jeremiah,” said Sadie, sitting up in bed and clutching the sheets to her as she looked toward the bedroom door. “Who is here?” She glanced at the clock on the nightstand. It read 5:07 a.m.
“I’ll go find out,” I said annoyed.
I strode quickly down the hallway toward the large entryway where I could now hear distinct loud voices coming through the door.
“NYPD! Open up!”
My heart dropped suddenly, thinking there had been some sort of emergency.
With who, I didn’t know. My thoughts went to my mother.
Maybe something had happened to her and I was the only family to contact.
Or maybe something had happened to Kevin on a job.
I quickly unlocked the door and flung it open, my heart racing.
I was met with four police officers. I swallowed hard as I realized this wasn’t a family emergency.
“Jeremiah Mason?” asked one of the officers, eyeing me up and down.
“Yes. That’s me.” I nodded. “What’s this about?”
Another officer stepped forward. “There is a warrant for your arrest. You’ll have to come with us.”
I blinked a few times, trying to understand if I was hearing him correctly.
“I think you’ve made a mistake,” I said, shaking my head.
“You can do this the easy way, or the hard way. Either way, you’re coming with us.”
I felt like the floor was falling out from underneath me as I watched the officer pull cuffs from his belt.
I heard Sadie’s slippers scuffing down the hallway and looked in her direction, trying to calm the panic that was surely on my face.
As soon as she saw the officers and the handcuffs, she rushed toward me frantically.
“What the hell is going on?” she asked, looking at the officers, her green eyes wide as she clutched her robe.
“Miss, I need you to stay back.” One of the officers held up his hand in a warning.
“Like hell I will,” she spat. “There’s been some mistake!”
“Miss, please.” The same officer pleaded, his eyes drifting toward her bump.
Sadie placed her hands on her stomach protectively and gave a solemn nod, as if understanding he didn’t want to have to put his hands on her. She stayed by my side as I turned and let the officers put the cold, metal cuffs around my wrists. I knew better than to argue.
“Jeremiah Mason, you are under arrest. Anything you say, can and will be used against you in the court of law…” said the officer, tightening the cuffs slightly.
His words droned on. I had heard them before. Twenty something years ago.
Sadie watched on, teary-eyed. I hated that she had to witness this. As the officers began to lead me out the door and into the hallway, I looked at her and narrowed my gaze.
“Everything is going to be okay, baby,” I said. “I’ll sort this out.”
“I-I don’t understand…” she stammered, following us out the door.
“Me either,” I said. “But I’ll get to the bottom of it. Call Erica. Call Gabriella. Tell them to come get you.”
“That’s enough,” said the officer, shoving me forward.
I jerked my head forward, but not before getting one last look at the panicked look on Sadie’s face as she clutched her bump desperately.
Worry set in as the officers shoved me in the elevator.
Sadie was five months pregnant. This kind of stress wasn’t good for her or the baby.
She needed somebody with her. I didn’t want her to be alone.
“Please, tell me what this is about,” I pleaded as the elevator began its descent, along with my stomach. “My girlfriend…she’s pregnant. I can’t just leave her like this.”
It was the first time I had called her that. These weren’t the circumstances I had expected.
The police officers ignored me, staring straight ahead, their backs rigid.
I shook my head frustratedly, adjusting my wrists in the cuffs that dug into my skin.
I was helpless. There was nothing I could do right now.
I just had to get to the station and make my phone call.
My attorney would be the first person I dialed.
This whole thing had to be some sort of mix-up.
Unless…
I clenched my jaw at the creeping feeling that writhed through me.
Anderson.
He had to be behind this.
Bastard.
It wasn’t enough to get me arrested all those years ago, framing me for his crime. His diabolical intent on revenge would never cease. I saw that now. I wondered what he had in store for me now. The thought gnawed at me incessantly as I rode helplessly in the elevator.
Soon the doors opened and the officers led me out of the elevator and into the lobby.
Thankfully, there weren’t many tenants awake yet, but the ones who sat at the tables sipping their coffee stared at the scene they were witnessing with a look of shock.
I tried to avoid eye contact as the only sound throughout the expansive lobby were our footsteps.
The doorman looked at me worriedly as he opened the door and let us pass.
“Mr. Mason,” he said in a panic. I just looked straight ahead, keeping my head high as we walked out onto the sidewalk where more people stopped to watch.
On the curb sat two police cars, the red and blue from their lights bouncing off the glass building behind me as an officer opened the door.
He placed his hand on my head and firmly guided me into the car.
He and another officer got in the front seat.
A siren sounded behind us from the other squad car, and in answer, the officer driving the car flipped the switch on his car.
The sirens blared in unison as we pulled away from the curb, away from the gawking early morning crowd.
Away from Sadie, who was probably still upstairs in shock.
I hoped she would do as I said and call her friends. I didn’t want her anywhere near this.
Twenty minutes later, we arrived at the station.
The lead officer led me inside, past the offices, and down a dimly lit hallway lined with metal doors.
He stopped at the last one on the left and opened it, leading me inside.
I had flashbacks from the interrogation all those years ago.
Though I hadn’t been in this exact room, they were all the same.
Sterile. Quiet. Practically empty aside from a small wooden table and two sets of chairs. All three bolted to the floor. A flickering hanging light overhead. A large mirror that I knew was really a one-way window. Camera in the top right corner, red light blinking.
It was as cold as I remembered it, and I took a seat in the chair the officer wordlessly pointed to.
“Don’t I get my phone call?” I asked coolly.
The officer looked at me with an amused smirk tugging at his lips.
“Soon enough,” he said before slipping out of the room.
I watched him go, my eyes practically glaring daggers at his back. He got off on this power. I knew this song and dance. He’d leave and join his buddies on the other side of the window to watch me sweat. But I wouldn’t give them the satisfaction. I had done nothing wrong.
With no clock, I had no idea how much time had passed before the door opened again and a man with silver hair, wearing a black, ill-fitted suit strode in carrying a file under his arm. I looked him up and down casually as he sat across from me at the table.
“Mr. Mason,” he said, placing the file on the table and eyeing me with his gray eyes. “I’m Detective Benson.”
“Still waiting on that phone call, detective,” I said, drumming my fingers impatiently on the wooden table. My wrists still bound together by the handcuffs.
“Of course. Of course.” He waved me off, which pissed me off. Where the hell was the procedure they were supposed to follow? “This won’t take long,” he smiled, feigning reassurance.
I sat back in my chair and pressed my lips tightly together, watching carefully as the detective opened the file in front of him and began going through its papers.
I wondered if it was his tactic to go through them so slowly, licking his thumb as he did to peel them apart, to bring my impatience to the brink.
I refused to fall for it, focusing on my breathing instead.
As I waited for him to get to whatever the point of this arrest was, I tried not to think about Sadie back at the apartment, probably in a worried pace that could wear the wooden floors down.
I needed to get back to her. I needed to tell her everything was okay, even though right now, it felt far from it.
I clenched my jaw as my desire for answers consumed me. What the hell was Anderson up to now?
“Ah, here it is,” said the detective, slapping the paper he was holding with the back of his hand. He set it down next to the open olive-green file that my eyes drifted to.
“This is your file, Mr. Mason,” said the detective, as if sensing the question in my gaze. “Seems like you got in quite the messy situation before you became big-time CEO of Manhattan.”
I stayed quiet. He was trying to get a rise out of me.
Detective Benson just smiled at me patiently before looking down at the paper he set aside. He ran his finger over the text until it stopped at a few words highlighted in neon yellow.
“Markus Roane,” he said, reading the page.
The name hit me like a gut punch, but I just tilted my chin up and looked at him nonchalantly.
“Ring any bells?” asked the detective, raising a brow as he watched me.
I shrugged. “He was a gangbanger in my neighborhood when I was a kid. Ran drugs and weapons.”
I left out the part the detective already knew. That I had gotten caught leaving the alley after a meeting with Markus, concealing one of his guns. It was all in the file that sat before us.
“Why?” I asked, looking up at Detective Benson.
He studied me for a moment, as if trying to get a read on me. I just sat back in my chair and waited for him to break the silence that now pooled before us. It didn’t seem to bother the detective. In fact, I could see something growing behind his cold eyes, like he was about to deliver a punchline.
“Because he’s in the room next door claiming you paid him half a million dollars to put Anderson Bradley six feet under.”