and that my boyfriend attacked him. He could have you arrested."
There’s silence from the driver’s seat for several miles. And when Rickie speaks again, his voice is pure ice water. "Take out your phone. I need to give you a number."
"Whose?" I gasp. There isn't enough oxygen, suddenly. Take out your phone. He’d said that to me before. On our first trip up 91.
Before I’d met Reardon. Before Rickie had been—
I’m afraid to finish that thought. The words Rickie had hurled at Reardon were terrifying. I put that thought in a drawer and close it. For now.
“Your phone,” he repeats.
“Whose number?” I gasp again. The air is too thin. I can’t think.
"My father's. Take this number. And try to breathe slow."
So I take out my damn phone, and I tap in the number he gives me. Then I plug my phone into Rickie’s charger.
And, as we drive up the highway, I eventually breathe more slowly. I close my eyes and I absolutely do not think about everything that just happened. I can't. Not yet. I put my fear into that same imaginary drawer and close it.
Instead, I picture Rickie's house on Spruce Street. In a few hours we'll be there, the door closed and locked. Nothing bad ever happens on Spruce Street.
And in the morning it will all be less terrifying. Maybe then I’ll be able to think what to do. Maybe I’ll be less angry.
I’m so angry.
“You should have told me,” I repeat. “When did you realize you recognized him?”
Silence.
“When, Rickie? Don’t lie to me. You said you’d never lie to me.”
“I didn’t,” he grunts.
“Really? Then tell me when you realized you knew Reardon.”
He sighs, which is proof—just barely—that he hasn’t been snatched by aliens and exchanged for a robot. “After your birthday,” he croaks. “I Googled him. I knew his face, but I didn’t know why. This week my Academy roommate finally wrote me back. And I learned some things about my accident.”
“You learned some things,” I repeat, while fury blooms in my chest, bright and dangerous. “You should have said!” I shriek. “You’re probably in trouble now. And I’m in trouble. I’m in worse trouble than I would have been alone.”
“I’m sorry,” he croaks.
But it doesn’t help, because I’m working myself into a real lather now. Anger is easier on my breaking heart than cold, cold fear. “You’re sorry,” I hiss. “That’s nice. That’s an uptick from the last man I trusted, who screwed me over without saying sorry. Yay, me! Screwed over again, but I get a sorry this time.”
“Daphne, listen—“
“Why?” I shriek. “So you can be sorry?”
“Listen!” he shouts. He also puts the blinker on and decelerates, even though we’re nowhere near an exit. “You say whatever you need to. You tell them whatever you want. Don’t spare me, because I don’t deserve it. But do not talk to them when you’re angry, okay? And don’t do it alone.”
“Talk to who?” I gasp. And then I notice a flash of blue in the side view mirror out my window.
A cop car. Holy shit. Rickie is being pulled over.
“We’re not speeding,” I say, as if I could make more sense of this.
“He works fast. Senator’s son.” Rickie stops the car. “It’s probably on every cop’s radio for three states.”
My head swivels like an owl’s, and now there are two cop cars. One of them pulls to a stop in front of us. The other behind us.
And the cop up ahead gets out of the car with his hand on his gun.
Slowly, Rickie lifts his hands where they’ll be visible above the steering wheel. “I’m sorry,” he whispers, and I can barely hear him over the sound of blood pounding in my ears. “Call your family, okay? They’ll help you. And call my father.”
The next few minutes are surreal.
“Step out of the car, sir,” the cops say. “You too, miss.”
It’s windy on the side of the road, and the cold goes all the way to my bones.
The cops are calm, in their commanding way. But I’m not. I watch them bend Rickie over the hood of the car. He doesn’t look at me. My throat closes up as they cuff him, his hands behind his back.
They read him his rights. They lead him away to the back of a cruiser, and shove him inside.
He still doesn’t look at me.
Again, it’s like I’m watching a film of someone else’s reality. Until the cops turn their attention to me. One of them, a woman with a tight ponytail, asks