by, all I can do is hope the door will burst open and someone will announce they’ve found Delilah. Half the time I imagine it, there’s a sense of relief that follows. The other half of the time I’ve stared at the clock as these two cops drone on has led to me imagining they’ve found her lifeless body. All the while I did nothing to save her, because of them. My gaze narrows as I stare at the back of Skov’s wrinkled button-down.
“It hasn’t even been twenty-four hours yet.” The statement comes out with a guttural groan from Detective Skov. He’s a fucking idiot and so is his partner, Detective Gallinger, if either of them think I’m going to fall for this good cop, bad cop shtick. I’m an FBI agent, for fuck’s sake.
There’s only one piece of this act that’s based on reality: Detective Skov wants me to go down for all of it. For every whisper of Marcus there’s ever been. He’s decided I am Marcus. That I created him and I’ve been the one responsible for the deeds attributed to Marcus. That part isn’t entirely untrue. I’m responsible for more than anyone could possibly know. Even if they managed to find any evidence and could put the pieces together, there’s so much that’s gone unwritten. So many moments where I played a part in pawns being moved across the chessboard. The weight of that blame would have buried me alive over the past few hours if not for my constant monitoring of the clock while the names of men who could have possibly taken Delilah continued to pile up.
Skov’s got a hunch I’m behind it all. He’s made that more than clear. Even worse, he thinks Delilah’s involved with Marcus’s crimes. The dull pain in my chest aches from rage every time he speaks her name. He should be searching every inch of Cadence’s place with a fine-tooth comb. Looking for any evidence in the woods behind her apartment complex. Checking for any signs of a struggle from her mother who was also taken.
Anything at all other than wasting his time interrogating me and throwing out every accusation he can. If anything happens to Delilah, I’ll murder them myself. All of them. The men who took her and the detectives who kept me in this cage so I couldn’t go after her.
Picking at the dry skin on my knuckles, the two go back and forth over whether or not I should be released. Whether or not they can hold me against the lieutenant’s orders. Whether or not the case is about to “break wide open.”
As if I can’t hear them over the groan of the ancient heater tucked into the drop ceiling above.
All the while, my frustration and anger simmers. I’ve sat here far too long, answering questions from men who know far too little. The weight of my sins pressing against my chest is heavy as I breathe in as deeply as I can, yet what’s happened still feels suffocating.
They took her. My trembling hands find their way back onto the steel table, the metal feeling like ice against my heated flesh. My throat is raw and hoarse from screaming at the men who appear hell-bent on ending my career. Hours of fighting them, and for what? For nothing. Time is slipping away and I can do nothing to save her while I’m trapped here.
They have the wrong man, the wrong theory … and all I can do is bite my tongue and pray to both God and the devil that Marcus already has her. I hope he tracked down the men who dared to take her and skinned them alive. With the back of my teeth grinding against one another, I silently wish he saves one of them for me. There’s a bit of comfort in the thought that she’s with him, safe and unharmed. More than a bit. I’d sell my soul for that to be reality.
The interrogation room door creaks as it opens further, allowing light from the hallway to drift into the dimly lit room. The fluorescent light above me hums and flickers, and it’s then I realize how tired and dry my eyes are.
The temperature in the room is cranked up too high, uncomfortably so. After being awake for nearly twenty hours with no rest, I know their intention was to exhaust me and keep pushing until I crack and give them what they’re looking for—answers about Marcus. My eyes