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“Just tell us where you went after you left the Thirsty Swan,” I said, lifting my shoulders. “How hard is that?”
“I went to find Lalani,” he snapped, his eyes flashing. “Satisfied now? Can I go?”
“How?” Joaquin asked.
“How?” Liam repeated.
“Yes, how?” Krista asked, tucking her hair behind her ears. “No one can see half a foot through the fog. How were you going to find her?”
“Carefully?” Liam shot back in an uncharacteristically sarcastic tone.
“Did you find her?” I asked.
“Yes,” he snapped. “And you were wrong, by the way. She does remember her brother, and she’s wondering where the hell he is.”
Tristan and I locked eyes. So the Tses weren’t just a blip.
Liam shot me a disgusted look and turned away. “I’m not saying anything more to you.”
“Liam—” I started.
“No!” he snapped, shoving himself to his feet. “I trusted you. You made me trust you! And you lied to me! And now you throw me in here? Who the hell do you think you are?”
His hand shot through the bars and I jumped back. Joaquin grabbed his wrist and twisted until Liam’s knees hit the floor, his face contorted in pain. I pressed myself back against the wall, gasping for air as Joaquin leaned in toward the top of Liam’s bowed head.
“You even try to touch her again and you’ll be sorry.”
Krista and I looked at each other, stunned.
“Dude,” Tristan said. “Release.”
Joaquin gritted his teeth but let go of Liam’s arm. As he stood up, Liam drew his hand into his chest and held it there, curling in on himself like a startled snail pulling back into its shell.
“Maybe…maybe we should go get some air,” Tristan suggested, looking around at the rest of us. “Go outside and talk this through?”
“Strategize,” Dorn said, his eyes like slits. “I like it.”
“We can’t just leave the two of them in here togethe
r,” Joaquin pointed out.
“I’ll stay,” Krista offered, holding her chin up bravely. Even pale and sweaty, she still managed to look like a supermodel.
Dorn clapped her on the side of her arm, and she staggered sideways into the bars of Pete’s cell. “If you need us, you’ve got your walkie.”
Krista nodded, tugging it out of her dress pocket and cocking it at him like a gun. “I got it.”
As I followed the guys out of the room, I looked back over my shoulder at Liam one last time as he gripped the bars and glared at Pete, the fury plain on his face.
Outside the wind was whipping furiously. A pair of women walking out of the beauty-supply store screamed as a scrap of wood shingle came flying at them. They clung to each other and ducked, just narrowly avoiding some serious head injuries as the scrap slammed into the front window. A few visitors sat inside the picture window at the general store, staring out at the horizon, the pads of one man’s fingers pressed into white dots against the glass. When I turned to look, I saw slate-gray storm clouds gathering over the bay.
We hadn’t gotten one full day of sun. Not even a day.
“This is not good,” Tristan said, pausing next to the swan fountain at the center of the park. Even its shallow water was rippling in the wind. Bea, Fisher, Lauren, and a crowd of other Lifers huddled under the awning of the bike shop, watching us, waiting for direction. “It’s starting to feel like the Jessica time around here.”
“Dude, please. This is nothing like that,” Joaquin shot back.
“Are you kidding me?” Tristan demanded, his long blond bangs blown back from his face. “You just nearly broke some kid’s arm when we have zero proof that he did anything wrong.”
