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He lays on the gas, whipping out around a line of slowing traffic. “Can you try Annalise?”
I frown. For a moment, amidst the drama, she wasn’t in my thoughts, but I don’t see how she figures in here. Okay, there’s an off chance she could be on Blaisdell’s radar, doubly so if the scumbag had any clue of my feelings for her. But he doesn’t, so I can’t imagine she’s a target. “I’m sure she’s fine, too. She’s back in Galveston, right?”
He skirts me an odd glance as he threads the needle between two cars in the right lane, flying past a slowpoke and then flooring it to a speed that any cop would register. “She still refuses to go home.”
“Where is she?”Please don’t say at your place.
“She’s with Avery. At her house.”
It’s a fist in my chest. What an idiot I am, imagining her safely tucked in the bosom of her family, healing—because that’s whatIwanted for her, what I know is best. Instead, she’s in the direct line of fire.
My breath gets short. I feel a little like I did when I started having panic attacks. Tripp is still hauling butt but has slowed to a speed that might get a pass. I dial Annalise and get nothing. Not good, but not necessarily an indication of danger, either.
Still… “Step on it.”
Tripp shoots me a look—then takes off again, parting Dallas traffic with sheer force of will.
As we cross from the city limits, the clock ticks to the top of the hour. I am officially on the lam. Sure enough, my screen lights with my attorney’s number. I decline the call and am about to power down all together, lest the powers that be are zealous enough to track me, when the screen lights again. Relief wilts me. “Allie! You’re alright!”
Nothing.
“Annalise?”
Background noise is all I get. I repeat her name, forestalling Tripp with my hand while I call her name repeatedly. But the only thing I hear is static and then…a voice. A man’s voice. I hear tears. Avery, I think.
“Marco!” Tripp won’t wait another second to be clued in.
Oh, I don’t want to do this. Placing my finger on my lips, I hit the speaker button. Fear is an entity, an icy tidal wave crashing through the cab of the truck.
The words are distant but distinct. “Dell will be here soon.”
Annalise
My eyes swipe open at a sound. The slam of a door? I hear voices, Avery’s and a man’s. Guess Tripp is back from Dallas.
It’s near sunset, meaning, Marco is now a guest of the county. Tripp left this morning with resolve. To find Marco, to help Marco. Still, his arrest was inevitable, though I dared hope. Once I made it clear as crystal that Marco was the hero in our little drama, Tripp finally relented. I think he wanted to all along and was glad to have a reason. Friendship and loyalty are in his DNA. Rejecting Marco would have been like rejecting himself.
A tear slips down my cheek. In a bit, I’ll have the nerve to look Tripp in the eye and hear that Marco’s fate has been sealed.
“Oh, Father.”Jail is a dangerous place, and for a notorious cop? I pray they house him in solitary. They do that kind of thing, don’t they? Surely, they’ll protect one of their own.
I let the tears fall. I’ve cried a million of them in the last weeks, but these are for Marco. How can I not cry for him?
I roll over and nab a tissue. Dry my eyes. My nose is stuffy no matter how much I blow, and I’m certain if I stand, it will turn back into a fountain. That’s the way of things when I get sick.
I don’t hear voices anymore, and time stretches. I thought Tripp would have checked on me by now.
I pull on Marco’s sweatshirt, the one I inadvertently—cough cough—came away from Lubbock with, and snatch a tissue for the road. I need to know how things went.
I slide my phone into the pocket of the hoodie and shuffle my weary self along the hall and down the stairs. One foot from rounding the corner to the living room, I can’t make out the words, but the man speaks. Not Tripp. I’m not exactly up for company, but curiosity is my middle name, so I peer around the corner.
The man has a gun and it’s pointed at a petrified Avery.
Aaaannnd…idiot that I am, I don’t quell my gasp. In an instant, I’m staring down the barrel of a pistol, as well.
The man is more of a kid than anything else. He waves me into the living room and orders me onto the sofa beside Avery. Her eyes and mine meet, just long enough to grasp that I’ve dashed her hopes that I was tucked away dialing 9-1-1. I repent with my eyes, then grab her hand. She must be so scared, this on top of what happened in March. I feel her shaking.
The guy is medium height with hair in need of cutting. In khaki shorts and a graphic tee, he looks amazingly like an average underclassman at any university, only this co-ed is visibly strung out, with bloodshot eyes and shaking almost as much as Avery.
