into his arms, press a kiss to her forehead, and promise her everything was going to be alright. That he would be by her side and fight to take away her pain, even if that pain could never really go away. He wanted to catch every monster responsible for this and make them pay.
April didn’t give him a chance to do anything, and he would never actually admit it, but he was glad of the save.
He knew she wanted to hug Ri, but everything in her body language screamed that such a thing was a bad idea. So April stood awkwardly in front of her, and she put two hands on Ri’s shoulders. “I love you. I really do,” she said, sounding far less confident and sure of herself than he’d heard in a long time. “And I’m so fucking thankful you’re here, Ri.”
Ri stiffened. “It’s Orion now.”
Maddox knew his sister. He knew her better than anyone, so he was impressed at the fact she could still smile through the pain he knew she felt at that dead tone and the empty stare. The coldness in Orion’s voice.
“You’ll always be Ri to me, babe,” she finally said, forcing cheer into the words. And she forced a smile. “The parents would love to see you sometime . . . when you’re ready.”
Ri—Orion, had a reaction to that. A small one, but Maddox guessed that even a small crack in her façade was something big. She nodded, accepted.
“I just need a little time,” Orion said meekly.
April nodded in understanding.
“April,” he snapped, remembering his job, his badge, and his responsibilities. “Move it!”
She walked casually toward the door and glared at him with glassy eyes. “I’m leaving, you fat cunt.”
The other girls in the room cracked up, and April looked back at them and winked.
“I’m not fat, so that doesn’t even work,” Maddox argued.
“Yeah, okay.” April opened the door and eyed the two detectives for a moment. “Ahem . . . what about you two pervs?” She gazed pointedly between Maddox and Eric. “There are women here who obviously need to change, get cleaned up—and don’t worry ladies, we’ll be going shopping to remedy the crimes of fashion the police have committed upon you as soon as humanly possible—and I’m sure they don’t need an audience.”
“We’re following you out,” Eric interjected smoothly before Maddox strangled his sister Homer Simpson style.
His gaze flickered to Orion, just to make sure she was still there, that she was real. She didn’t look away when he met her eyes. She held his gaze with determination and a little hostility, some stubbornness he recognized from her childhood that had matured a little.
“Yeah. Uh huh. Let’s go, Grandpa,” April said, motioning toward the open door.
He sneered at his sister. “I’m only two years older than you, so that doesn’t really work either.” He looked at Orion. “Okay, well, we’ll be right outside, ladies,” he said awkwardly.
April cackled.
Orion didn’t respond.
There were reporters.
Outside the hotel.
Outside the police department.
Orion figured there would be a private entrance for this kind of thing.
Apparently not.
Shelby’s parents had insisted on taking her in their car, even though it had been explained to them that they wouldn’t be able to be in the interview room with her.
They had been adamant their daughter was not going anywhere without them.
Somehow, they were unaware that their little girl had been drinking and getting stoned the night before. Though it did make sense, since it was likely the first night of real sleep they’d had since she was taken.
Shelby had been walking home from cheerleading practice when it happened. Like Orion, she just never came home. Unlike Orion, her parents loved her, cared for her, missed her. They had raised the alarm immediately. Mounted community searches. Gone on TV with rewards for their daughter’s safe return. They’d hired private investigators when the police gave up.
They never stopped.
Orion had seen it on them when she met them. The exhaustion that sank into their bones. The sorrow etched into their eyes.
She understood them clinging to Shelby like they did. She’d observed that kind of love. She reckoned that’s what April’s parents would’ve been like if their daughter had been taken.
She hated Shelby a little for a snatch of a second. Right until she met her eyes from the car window. There was panic in them. These people were strangers to her. Orion and Jaclyn were her pillars of safety, despite the fact they never really protected her from anything. But how could they have?