Triptych (Will Trent #1) - Karin Slaughter Page 0,139
his shoulder and looked up to see the man in the three-piece suit standing behind him.
John said, “What’s going on?”
The man looked at Robin, so John did, too.
“I’m sorry, John,” she said, and she really seemed to be, but he did not know why. She reached into her purse and pulled out her wallet. Stupidly, he thought she was going to pay the bill. He opened his mouth to tell her not to worry about it, but by then he caught the glint of gold as she flipped open her badge.
As if he couldn’t see for himself, she told him, “I’m a cop.”
“Robin—”
“It’s Angie, actually.” The man behind him tightened his hand on John’s shoulder. “Let’s do this outside.”
“No…” John could feel his body starting to shake, his muscles turning to liquid.
“Outside,” she ordered, her hand digging up under his arm, making him stand.
He walked like an invalid, leaning against her as the man opened the door. The Decatur cops had done the same thing to him when they had dragged him out of his bedroom. They had taken him down the stairs, into the front yard and cuffed him in front of the whole neighborhood. Somebody had screamed, and when he looked behind him, he realized it was his mother. Emily had fallen to her knees, Richard not even trying to hold her up, as she sobbed.
The sun in the parking lot outside the diner was brutal, and John blinked. He realized he was panting. Jail. They were taking him to jail. They’d take away his clothes, strip-search him, fingerprint him, throw him in a cell with a bunch of other men who were just waiting for John to show back up, waiting to show him exactly what they thought about a child-raping con who couldn’t make it on the outside.
“Will.” She was talking to the man behind John. “Don’t.”
John saw the silver cuffs the man held in his hand.
“Please…” John managed. He couldn’t breathe. His knees buckled. The last thing he saw was Robin moving forward to break his fall.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
8:55 AM
Angie felt dirty. Even after a scalding hot shower, she felt like she would never get rid of the filth inside.
The look on John’s face, the fear, the sense of betrayal, had cut her heart like a jagged piece of metal. Will had carried John to the car, helped him into the backseat like a child getting ready for a trip to the store. Angie had stood there thinking, Here are the two men whose lives I’ve ruined the most.
She left before Will could stop her.
What was it about John Shelley that made her want to save him? Maybe it was because he was all alone in the world. Maybe it was because he wore his loneliness like a suit of armor that only Angie could see. He was like Will. Exactly like Will.
Despite the fact that she had cleaned her house top to bottom a few days before, Angie put on her gloves and went to work. She used half a gallon of bleach in the bathroom, scrubbing the glistening white grout with a toothbrush. Will had laid the tile for her, putting it on a diagonal because he knew instinctively that this would make the room look larger. He had painted the walls a creamy yellow and used an off-white oil on the trim while Angie had chided him about his decorating skills.
She should call him. Will was just doing his job. He was a good cop, but he was also a good man and it wasn’t right for her to punish him because John Shelley had gotten mixed up in something bad. As soon as she finished cleaning the house, she would call Will’s cell, make sure he knew it was the situation she hated, not him.
Angie started on the kitchen next, taking out pots and pans, wiping out all the cabinets. She kept going over what had happened this morning, trying to think if there was a way she could have made it easier.
“Fuck,” Angie cursed. She needed shelf liner. It was stupid to wipe out the cabinets when there was probably all kinds of trash underneath the liner. She picked at the corner of the sticky vinyl on the bottom of the sink cabinet, ripping it up in two pieces. The base was clean, but she had already ruined the liner. Angie stood to get more, realizing before she even reached the pantry that she was out.