High Noon Page 0,57

Liz demanded. "That the cuffs snapped over her wrists?" She pulled up Phoebe's arm, gestured to the wrists. "Did her clothes accidentally rip off her body so she had to crawl, half naked, for help?"

"Things get exaggerated. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I don't feel well. Can you go? Can you just go?"

"Did he tell you he just wanted to talk to me, Annie?" Phoebe kept her voice low, the tone even. "Just talk to me in private? Maybe scare me just a little, or push his point just a little, since I was being so unfair? I was being unfair to him, wasn't I? Did he tell you that when he asked you to signal him I was heading down?"

"I don't know what you mean. I didn't do anything. If you fell-"

"I didn't fall. Look at me, Annie!" Phoebe snapped the words out so that Annie jumped, then hunched her shoulders. "You know I didn't fall. That's why you're sitting here, sick, scared, trying to convince yourself it was an accident. He told you that. He told you it was an accident and I-what?-lied to save face? I made up the attack so I wouldn't be embarrassed about falling?"

"How long have you been sleeping with Officer Arnold Meeks, Annie?" Liz demanded.

"I didn't! We didn't. Not really. I didn't mean anything. I didn't do anything." As the dam broke, Annie snatched up tissues from a flow ered box of Kleenex and buried her face in them. "He said it was an accident, that you were going to make things up, maybe to try to get him in trouble. He told me how you came on to him, and then-"

"Officer Meeks told you Lieutenant MacNamara approached him sexually?"

"He turned her down, and she's been trying to ruin his reputation ever since." Lowering the tissues, Annie turned a pleading face toward Liz. "He'd file sexual harassment charges, but he's embarrassed to, and his wife's not giving him any support at home. Plus she's sleeping with Captain McVee, so what good would it do?"

"He told you all this, and you swallowed it?" Liz shook her head from side to side. "Maybe that's excusable, maybe not. Maybe you thought, really thought, you were just doing Arnie a favor. Maybe you didn't want to believe he was lying to you, again and again and again, leading you on. But you know he lied to you now, don't you, Annie? You can't look at Lieutenant MacNamara and believe what he told you."

"I don't know. I don't know."

"How about some pictures?" Liz pulled some out of her satchel.

"There's the lieutenant's blood in the stairwell. Oh, here, here's her clothes that accidentally tore off her body. How about the laundry bag he pulled over her head? Here's a good one, of her blood on the cuffs he snapped on her. That's some accident."

"Oh God." The tissue shield went up again. "Oh God."

"What kind of person does this, Annie? Maybe the kind of person who's thinking about doing it to you, or doing worse. Because you're the one who can tie him to it."

"I didn't know. I didn't know." Annie sobbed, yanked more tissues from the box. "I didn't do anything wrong. He just needed a few minutes to talk to her, to show he wasn't going to be intimidated. That's all. I only called his number, let the phone ring twice. That was the signal. It's all I did. I didn't know."

"But you know now. You're going to have to get dressed and come with me."

"Are you arresting me? Oh God, am I under arrest?"

"Not yet. If you get dressed and come in now, give a true statement tell the truth, Annie-I'll talk to the DA for you. He lied to you. I believe you when you said he lied."

"So do I." Phoebe kept her fury banked and spoke soothingly. "I believe you, Annie."

"I'm so sorry, Lieutenant. I'm really sorry."

"Yes, I'm sure you are."

Liz looked over at Phoebe. "I'll drop you back home and take it from here."

Chapter 10

"I want to be there. I need to be there."

Dave leaned back in his desk chair, continued to scan Phoebe's face. "First, it's not my call. Second, this is Liz Alberta's case. You're the victim. If you have trouble remembering that, I can have a mirror brought in."

She knew how she looked. A couple of days meant some of the bruising was turning from black to sickly yellow and storm-cloud purple. Her jaw and eye were angry watercolors. Still, the