AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Kris looked away from Mark as he stepped out into the hallway. Jacks wondered how long it would take for her, for both of them, to fully trust his stepfather again, despite whatever strings he had pulled at the NAS.
After a few more minutes of small talk Mitch and Gwen left to get more coffee, and Kris stepped out to make a call and check up on Chloe. Kevin, feeling awk
ward about being the only one in the room, excused himself to use the bathroom.
Maddy and Jacks lay on their sides, facing each other, and let the silence overtake them. Maddy gazed into Jacks’s pale blue eyes. Jacks looked right back.
“Thank you,” Jacks said finally.
“For what?” Maddy said.
“For saving my life.”
Maddy blushed slightly.
“You . . . do you remember what you did up there. You saved me?” Jacks said.
Maddy nodded.
“I know. That’s what we perversions of nature do, I guess.”
“Maddy, please.”
She rolled over onto her back, wincing a little, her eyes growing tired again.
“Well, I don’t care,” Jacks said.
“But everyone else does. I’ll always be a freak. Even if they say I’m ‘a bit more Angel’ than they thought.”
“Can you not be impossible just for one day?” Jacks asked.
Maddy laughed a little. “I’m too tired to argue anyway.”
Her eyes fluttered shut. Another silence drew out and Jacks watched her, still in happy disbelief that she was here, alive. Then he spoke.
“Was it true?” he said quietly.
“Was what true?” Maddy said, her eyes still closed.
“What you said on the rooftop. When Ethan was going to kill me.”
Jacks waited for her to respond. He waited until he heard her slow, steady breaths. He sighed.
She had fallen asleep again.
CHAPTER FORTY
The ACPD credentials and authorizations got Detective Sylvester through every checkpoint he needed. A guard at the jail rode with the detective in the elevator, down to the maximum security level. The Tombs. The lift whirred. Sylvester merely stared forward, the ride passing in silence. The entire time the guard attempted to hold his hands still, but they wouldn’t stop shaking.
Eventually the guard drew his pistol.
“That won’t be necessary, Officer,” Sylvester said as calmly as he could.
He’d been expecting this. But that didn’t mean he was ready for it.
With a ding the elevator reached its destination. The door slid open, revealing chaos in the bowels of the jail. Prisoners screamed to be let out, banging anything they could against the inside of their cells. Begging. Two guards with drawn rifles stood on each side of the elevator, waiting for Sylvester. Droplets of sweat had formed on their foreheads.
“Right this way, sir,” one officer said shakily, leading him to the corridor on the right.
