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“I’m Detective Marsh. I spoke briefly with your colleague last week regarding your ex-boyfriend. I was hoping to ask you a few questions as well. Would you be available to come into the station?”

“Oh, of course. I can stop by sometime today if that suits.”

“That’s fine.”

He rattles off the address of a station in the city. It’s not the local precinct in town, so I write it on a notepad Ares keeps beside the register. When I hang up, all eyes are on me.

“Detective Marsh,” I say before anyone speaks. “He wants me to come into the station.”

“Everything will be fine,” Ares reassures me. “I will take you there after we eat.”

“What about the bar?”

“Fuck the bar. Someone can come in, or I will close until we get back.”

“Yeah, fuck the bar,” Vero adds. “After I get my nuggets, though.”

Clay scoffs. “You’re such a child. Who eats nuggets for breakfast?”

“Hey,” I say. “Leave him alone and eat your slightly burned toast.”

“Yeah, leave me alone,” Vero throws back.

Ares goes into the kitchen and comes out with Vero’s nuggets and our breakfast wraps. We all sit and eat, but nerves settle in my gut. I can’t help but wonder what questions they will ask me. Clay is beside me and has one hand on my knee, grounding me, which helps a little. Once we are done eating, Ares and I head out to his bike.

The ride is nice, and I keep my arms wrapped tight around him as we fly through the city. Thankfully he has his bike because parking is a nightmare. We finally find a spot almost a block away and walk there together.

“They have nothing,” he says, which is not reassuring at all. “Trust me when I say we have everything handled. There is no footage, and Clay sent them the tapes showing him leaving the island and everything afterward, proving he never returns.”

When we get to the station, I stop us just before we reach the stairs. “Can you wait here? I need to do this on my own.”

“Sure, but I will be right here.”

Ares pulls me in for a kiss. It’s his first public display of affection, but it doesn’t feel right mentioning it now.

The station smells like burned coffee, and the carpet is worn down in the center of the room. A young officer at the front desk takes my name and asks me to wait, so I sit in a chair near the window until a man old enough to be my father walks out.

“Thank you for coming, Miss Quinn. We won’t keep you long.”

He takes me into a small interview room and sets a recording device down on the table. Detective Marsh introduces himself and his colleague, who has joined us.

“We’re doing a routine follow-up on a missing person’s report,” he says. “It was filed by a parole officer. Aaron was released from prison approximately six weeks ago.”

He watches my face, but I don’t react, or at least I don’t think I do.

“Would you be able to fill us in on your relationship with him?”

“He’s my ex-boyfriend. We were together for a long time, and it was not a good relationship, but I guess you already know that from our files.”

Marsh eyes me suspiciously, but his colleague nods.

“When did you last have contact with him?” the detective asks.

“The day he got arrested. After that I packed up my things and left,” I tell them.

“Did he attempt to contact you after his release? Any calls, messages, anything like that?”

“No, nothing. I had no idea he was even released from prison.”