“It’s four oh eight in the morning.”
I glanced at the clock, shocked he knew exactly what time it was. He was off by one minute. “Ay-ay. Come on man.”
“What the hell do they want?”
“I don’t know.” I shook my head. “It’s the same two numbers, over and over. Fourteen missed calls.”
“Fourteen....” He stretched and yawned and finally accepted the phone from me. “I don’t recognize this number at all. Where the hell is that area code...”
He looked terrified in the next moment, and swiped the phone open. He scrolled through the missed calls and I could see the abject horror spread on his face. I glanced at the screen and grabbed my own phone, punching in the number in the search bar.
“Is it what I think it is?” Aaron asked, barely above a whisper.
“Maryland State Police.”
Before he could react to anything, the phone started ringing in his hand and he swiped to answer, hitting the speaker button. “Hello?”
“Hello, is this Aaron Jacob Donner?”
“Yes, speaking.”
The man on the other end cleared his throat. “Mister Donner I’ve been trying to reach you for the past six hours.”
“I was on stage and then I was asleep. In Italy. Who is this?”
“My name is Detective Moran, of the Maryland State Police. You’re currently in Italy?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I have some terrible news, and I usually do this in person, but as you’re out of the country. I’m afraid that your parents were murdered earlier today.”
His face fell, and a chill rolled over us like I had never felt before. But there were no tears, and no real reaction from him. After a moment he spoke in barely a whisper, “Murdered? By who? And where’s my sister?”
“Well that’s the thing, Mister Donner. Your sister is being held on suspicion of murder. We have her on a seventy-two hour hold.”
“Can I talk to her?”
“No, sir, not on the phone. I can give you the name of her attorney...”
The phone sort of fell out of Aaron’s hand as he shook his head. He was clearly in shock, and didn’t know what to do. I grabbed the phone. “Detective, my name is Maddox Jones, I’m Aaron’s partner. Can you talk to me? I’m afraid he’s gone in a bit into shock.”
There was a shuffle of papers. “Sure. Miss Donner was found holding a gun over her father and it was freshly fired. She was in shock as well, and we brought her down to the station. She’s in a holding cell right now and is saying nothing except her name and Mister Donner’s name. She won’t even talk to the lawyer, and we don’t know what we can do here. Is there anyway Mister Donner can make it back here?”
“Where’s here, Detective? And is Miss Donner’s lawyer court appointed?”
“He is,” Moran said. “And here is McHenry, Maryland.”
“I don’t know anything about flights,” Aaron whispered.
“I got it,” I said. “I think I can get him there by about mid-morning. Is that acceptable?”
“That would be amazing if you could,” Moran said. “We want to figure out which way to proceed with this.”
“She’ll have a new attorney as well.” I looked at Aaron. “Let me get all of this settled and if we find any serious delays, we’ll get in touch with you so we can update you on the time of arrival.”
“Thank you, Mister Jones. Appreciated. Will we see you soon?”
“Not me, just Mister Donner. He’ll see you soon.”
