me, and I tore free from Levi, launching myself at the freak who’d taunted us in the parking lot the other day.
I was bigger and angrier, and when I slammed into him, he stumbled backward a few steps before losing his footing. We both ended up on the ground, and I heard myself screaming, “Where is he? What the fuck did you do to him? Where is he?”
I took hold of his face, pinning him down, screaming, my spittle flying. It lasted less than ten seconds before I was hauled upright and slammed face-first onto the pavement. A knee landed in the middle of my back, pinning me down.
I was too far removed to process what was happening. The officer was saying something, and all I could think was that this man had taken Skylar from me, and why weren’t they holding him down?
By some miracle, Levi talked the officer into letting me up. I didn’t hear their conversation. The blood pumping through my head dampened all sound and reasoning. The officer gave me a warning, but it bounced off me.
Then Levi dragged me toward the SUV, bitching and reprimanding me for being an idiot. Still, nothing penetrated.
In the car, once I’d come down a few degrees and my ears stopped ringing, I turned to Levi. His grip on the steering wheel made his knuckles white. He hadn’t started the car, but he was angry. Fuming.
“I’m sorry.” My voice was grave.
“You can’t help Skylar if they lock you up. Do you understand me?”
“I know.”
“You can’t attack innocent people because you’re angry.”
“He took Skylar.”
“No. You don’t know anything. He’s here willingly helping with the investigation. They’re going to ask him a few questions. Just because he was obsessed with Morgan doesn’t mean he was responsible. There are hundreds of people who followed Morgan’s trial back in Kingston. Hundreds. It doesn’t make them criminals.”
I sat quietly, sulking, angry, and so fucking tired and worried I didn’t know where to put myself. My stomach was in a knot, and fear like I’d never felt in my life consumed me.
“Can we go to his apartment? I want to know what they asked his roommates.”
“Can you control yourself?”
“Yes.”
“Are you sure?”
“Levi, I said yes.”
He touched my leg and squeezed before starting the car. “Where to?”
It was clear when Hunter answered the door in the same clothes he’d been wearing the previous night that he’d slept about as well as me. Maverick didn’t look any better. His eyes were red-rimmed, and he was pale.
“Come on in,” Hunter said. “Sorry about the mess.”
It was a typical apartment belonging to three male university students. Messy, with leftover food containers scattered about and dishes littering many surfaces. Hints of Skylar were all over the main room. His hoodie was draped over a couch. His schoolbooks took up a portion of a small table. His backpack leaned against the wall by the front door.
“Have you heard anything?” Maverick asked, shifting on the couch to face us when Levi and I walked in.
“No. Have you?”
“No.”
“Did his parents talk to you guys?”
“His mom,” Hunter said, adjusting his glasses as he wiped his nose. “At the police station last night. She was alone. Not sure if Walter came or not. I didn’t see him there.”
“He’s an ass,” Maverick added.
I could have said a lot about that, but Levi’s phone rang.
He checked it and said, “It’s the station.”
I reached for the phone, but he pulled it back. “Can you talk like a normal person, or are we going to have another problem?”
“Give me the phone.”
Levi gave me a warning glare but handed it over.
“Hello?”
“Mr. Atkinson? It’s Officer Mund.” Everything inside me wanted to correct him and say, It’s Dr. Palmer, but it wasn’t. Not yet.
“Yeah. It’s me.”
“I hear you were causing a problem.”
“I’m sorry. It won’t happen again. Did you talk to that guy?”
“Dennis Caper is being interviewed right now. However, he has a solid alibi, one we have already verified.”
“But he could—”
“Mr. Atkinson, I understand you’re worried. We are going at this from a lot of angles. Right now, I need your help because I’ve run into a discrepancy.”
“A what? What do you mean?”
“I was wondering if you could come down to the station.”
“Okay. Sure. How come?”
“I have your friend Reggie McGuire here, and he claims he has no idea who you are. I thought maybe we could sort this out.”
Chapter Twenty-SIX
Jason
I hung up and stared at Levi’s phone, a deep furrow in my brow.
“What’s wrong?” Levi asked.
“That was Officer Mund. They have Reg