Page 48 of Darling

“Like an Android?” the girl asked. “I have an iPhone, but the base should still work. Does anyone have an Android cord?”

The girls in her group shook their heads, so she turned around and shouted to the rest of the line. “Does anyone have an Android cord?” Everyone within earshot turned around and shouted some version of “No.” Which sucked, but definitely wasn’t as bad as what happened immediately afterward. The yelling alerted the attention of all the nearby officers, who immediately zoomed in on Wendy. The officer closest to her, a frighteningly muscular white man in combat boots with his face partially obscured by a mask, grabbed Wendy’s arm and pulled out a walkie-talkie.

“Got her, moving her now,” the officer said as he marched Wendy roughly away from the group. “Anyone else still unaccounted for? Over.”

The girls gaped at Wendy as she was dragged away, the nice girl with the portable charger holding it dangling as she watched Wendy go.

The officer took Wendy around the back of the warehouse, where there were significantly fewer people. Standing next to several unmarked cop cars was Detective Hook himself.

He stared hard at her as she got closer, surly eyebrows furrowed dark over his eyes, maroon coat blowing in the wind.

Wendy could see Tinkerbelle, Ominotago, and Curly in one car, Nibs and Fyodor in another, and Charles and Minsu being cuffed and ducked into a last car—which Wendy was getting hauled toward.

But Detective Hook put up a hand to stop the officer pulling Wendy. The detective looked hard at Wendy’s face for a long moment, then waved her on to the car.

Wendy was passed off to a policewoman, who cuffed Wendy with actual metal handcuffs, not zip ties like before. The officer pushed Wendy’s head down roughly as she was ushered into the car, and closed the door on her with sharp finality.

Charles and Minsu looked miserable, but also like they were handling this arrest much better than their previous one. Their hands were cuffed behind their backs, and Charles was leaning heavily on Minsu’s shoulder again. The officer got into the front of the car, and without saying another word, she started the engine and pulled out of the lot.

Wendy had never been inside the back of a police car before, but the entire situation had incredibly bad energy. She desperately wanted to ask Charles and Minsu if the police had gotten Peter, but even though no one had told her not to speak, she had a general sense that it probably would be a bad idea to start a conversation.

Charles nodded firmly at Wendy. “The good news,” he said quietly, “is that we’re not far from the precinct. The bad news is that I now know what it’s like to be detained.”

“They didn’t read us our Miranda rights,” Wendy said just as quietly. “Can’t we sue or something?”

Charles shook his head. “It’s not that kind of arrest.”

The policewoman driving them glanced at them placidly over her shoulder, but didn’t tell them to be quiet, so Wendy proceeded more confidently.

“Aren’t you worried about your school stuff?”

“Shh,” Charles said. “If things go the way we hope, that will be the least of our problems.”

“My dad is not going to care what kind of arrest this is,” Minsu said mournfully. “And I only have about an hour to get home.”

“You have got to give up the concept that you’re getting home on time,” Charles said. “And we should really stop talking.”

Wendy sighed and sank lower in the seat. She put her head against the window and let the road rattle her brain around her skull for the rest of the ride to wherever they were being taken. After about ten minutes, they stopped at a large police station.

The officer opened their car door and told Charles, Minsu, and Wendy to join Tinkerbelle, Ominotago, Nibs, Fyodor, and Curly in a line outside the station. Ominotago was at the back, her brown eyes widening as she saw Wendy cuffed with the rest of them. Wendy smiled at her sheepishly and shrugged. Ominotago’s face crumpled, and before the officer nearby had time to do anything about it, Ominotago leaned forward and pushed her forehead against Wendy’s in sweet apology for the circumstances. Even though the officer turned Ominotago right back around, Wendy could still feel the warmth of her friend’s touch, and it grounded her. She was thankful for it as they walked through the hallways of the station.

It was busy inside, but Wendy didn’t see any of the kids who had been at the party. Everyone else in here was an adult, from the police all the way to the people she could see on their way to holding cells. She and the others were marched right past the booking area to the back of the station. The officer in front opened a locked door and pushed them all inside, locking it tightly behind them.

To Wendy’s surprise, they weren’t in a cell at all. It looked like some kind of waiting room. It was sparsely decorated, but there were chairs, a table, a few magazines, and even a water cooler. None of these things would do them any good because they were all still handcuffed, but it was relaxing to know they were in a room where someone cared whether they had something to read.

“What is this place?” Wendy asked. She sat down on a low couch and grimaced at how uncomfortable it was.

Fyodor sat down next to her, smiling mirthlessly and raising an eyebrow. “Waiting room?”

“It’s where they put you when they can’t decide if you’re a suspect or not,” Curly said, leaning against the large table in the middle of the room. Nibs mirrored his position; he rolled his shoulders as if he were doubly irritated by the fact that he couldn’t use his hands.

“No,” Ominotago corrected. “It’s where they put you when they’ve decided that you’re going to be interviewed and they don’t know whether you’re a suspect yet, but want to have access to recordings of you talking and your DNA from drinking water from the cooler.

“In our situation,” she continued, “because we slipped zip tie cuffs earlier and now they can’t trust whether we’ll follow instructions, they detained us in the ‘bad kids but not so bad as to be in cells’ area.” She lifted one of her legs up and tucked it under her cuffed arms, then did the same with the other so that her arms were cuffed in front of her body instead of behind.

“Don’t do that,” Fyodor said, scooting low into the couch cushions. “They do not like that.”

Ominotago shrugged, looped her cuffed arms over Tinkerbelle’s head so they were locked together, then kissed her on the cheek.