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"By 'calm her down', do you mean coach her in what to say?" Lloyd pressed, his attitude clearly not helping the situation.
"Oh, Lloyd," Lo said, giving him a condescending smile. "If you think a single one of my people could possibly need coaching on how to talk to a police officer, then you don't know the first thing about how Hailstorm operates. Renny, let her go," she said and Renny lowered her down on the floor. "Come on, Jstorm, let's talk to the nurses instead of scream at them," she said, obviously knowing the woman well.
"Alright," Lloyd said, obviously annoyed at the turn of events. "Let me guess. None of you saw anything," Lloyd said, not even bothering to pull out his notepad.
"Black car, blackout windows, no plates," Renny answered immediately, surprising me. I don't know why, but I had expected them to lie.
"Really? That's all you got? Right now, I have cops at the compound again looking for evidence."
"Fucking good," Renny said with a shrug. "This shit needs to stop. Fat lot of good law enforcement has done so far on this."
"Maybe we would do better if you didn't bring your arms trade bullshit into our town."
Arms trade?
Arms?
As in... firearms?
They sold guns?
That almost seemed... tame to what I had been expecting. I don't know exactly what I had been picturing but drugs and hired murders had come to mind a time or two.
"Allegedly," Lo called over her shoulder, giving me a wink when my eyes caught hers.
"You," Lloyd said, looking at me and I felt myself start.
"Me?" I repeated.
"Haven't seen your face before. What's your name?" he asked as he finally went to fish out his notebook and pen.
I guess he saw me as an easy target. Nothing about me seemed to scream that I was a hardened criminal like the rest of them, that I knew how to lie to the police. I didn't. But that being said, he wouldn't get anything from me for the sole reason that I didn't know anything. I hadn't even seen the car I had been so frozen.
"Penny Williams," I supplied immediately.
"You from around here?"
"I was born here then I moved to Florida for a while and I just moved back last week."
"Just moved back last week and you already got yourself wrapped up with the likes of them?" he asked in a very tisk-tisk way that had my spine stiffening.
I think in that moment, for the first time in my life, I understood the term gumption.
Okay. So maybe I was a little naive and trusting. But I wasn't stupid. And I wouldn't be talked down to either.
"I'm sorry, are you going to ask me a question regarding the shooting or just be a condescending jerk?"
I heard Duke snort beside me and when my gaze caught Renny's, he was grinning.
Lloyd's eyes flashed for a second. "Alright, tell me about the shooting."
I shrugged at that. "Duke and I had just pulled into the compound. Duke got out of the car before me. Then Renny said to get down. I guess he saw the car; I never did. Then there was the gunshots and, ah," I said, trying to shake the image away as it flashed across my mind. "And then Wolf was shot and... that's it. That's all I know. I really didn't see anything. I was watching Wolf, not the road."
"Convenient, that," he said as if he didn't believe me. "Duke, Renny, I'll need to talk to you two. Separately," he added, giving me a hard look.
Duke reached out and grabbed my hand, giving it a squeeze, before moving off with Lloyd. "Stay with Renny," he told me quietly before they disappeared.
"Hey," Renny said, drawing my attention. "You okay there, blondie?"
I took a deep breath. "No," I said honestly.
To that, he simply nodded. He didn't press. Which was good because I wasn't sure I wanted to talk to him or anyone else about it anyway.
"They took him right into surgery," Lo said, coming up behind us. "So we won't be hearing anything for a while most likely." Her arm was wrapped around Janie who was silent and tear-free, but everything about her said she was barely holding on. "We're going to go sit down. Penny, want to come with us?"
I was shaking my head before she stopped talking. "Duke said to stay with Renny."
"Right," she said with a nod and led Janie away to a small seating area to the far side of the room.
"You're not gonna go into shock on me, are you?" Renny asked, giving me a small smile.
"Ah, no. I think I'm alright."
"You're not alright by a long shot," he countered. "But you handled yourself well with Lloyd."
"He's an ass," I admitted, making him smile a little distractedly.
"He is that," he agreed.
"How bad was Wolf?" I asked when I trusted my voice not to wobble too much.
