“I volunteered, like I do every Wednesday.”
“Where?”
“Hope House.”
Lucy’s focus sticks on mine for a second, and I can tell she wants to turn to Colin, likely knowing he was there, too. But she doesn’t. Just scribbles onto her notepad.
“And then what?”
“And then I went bowling with my friends.”
“Did you see Max at the bowling alley?”
“Not that day,” I tell her. She eyes me in question. “The first time I met him was at the bowling alley last weekend. He challenged me and my friends to a game. They lost.” I smile, remembering our victory.
“And then you left the bowling alley…”
“Yes. My friend gave me a ride back to my car, which you might already know has been parked outside your station for a few days.” She nods, but doesn’t say anything, silently encouraging me to go on. “I saw who I thought was the guy who drugged me at the party, and—”
“I thought you said you didn’t remember being drugged.” Lucy tilts her head, her pen poised above the paper in her hand.
“I’ll rephrase,” I say, tilting my head back at her with a flare of annoyance. “I thought I saw the guy whomy friendssaid I was hanging out with at the party. The man they think drugged me.”
“Max,” she says.
“Right. So I followed him into the alley, and—”
“What were you planning to do when you caught up to him?”Knife him, of course.
Colin turns from the door, staying quiet behind her, but I can tell by the look on his face that he’s curious to hear my response as well.
I narrow my eyes at Lucy. “You are the one who asked for my recount of events. Is there a reason you keep interrupting me?”
Her eyes widen slightly, taken aback by my brash tone.
“Apologies,” she says meekly.Bitch.“Go on.”
“When I turned the corner into the alley, he punched me.” I wave a hand near my cheekbone, drawing her eyes to the proof on the side of my face. “Is he in jail?”
“He’s in the hospital,” Lucy tells me, catching me off guard for the second time tonight.
“The hospital?” I repeat.
Colin turns from us, facing the backyard again, and Lucy glances at him before returning her attention to me. “Detective Mills…subdued him.”
My mind flicks back to the memory of me rubbing my thumb against his knuckles in my room. The scratches on his swollen knuckles.He protected me. Again.
He did more than protect me. He put a man in the hospital for touching me. And that says more about how he feels about me than he ever has.
“Was he alone?” I ask, remembering someone’s demand to ‘pick me up.’
“He was not. There were two others who got away on foot. Our officers have not been able catch up to them,” she says, sounding regretful.
My gaze trails to Colin, at his wide, tense stance behind Lucy. That’s why he hasn’t left. He’s worried about me, and that knowledge plants a seed in my heart, the blooms of potential taking root in my body. Him being here, this all goes so far beyond a lustful kiss. You don’t put a man in the hospital for touching a woman you just want to fuck.
“Your blood test came back positive for GHB. And Max…” Lucy pauses, her eyes shifting between me and the notepad in her hand. “His DNA came back positive for a few crimes in the area that have taken place recently, so he will be going to jail for the foreseeable future once the hospital releases him.”
“Crimes?” My heart thumps heavy against my ribcage, and my mind begins to swirl, another inkling of fabrication sweeping through my brain.
