"Yeah."
"Hop in," he says, grinning. "Sheriff said to bring you to the station." His expression is neutral and professional, but I'm no friend of his. They all act kind until they learn what you’ve done.
I climb into the passenger seat and he pulls back onto the road. The cruiser's warm, the heater running full blast. My fingers start to thaw, tingling painfully as circulation returns.
"We found your truck," Varen says after a minute of driving. "It was downtown, parked crooked across two spaces outside the station. Your friend made quite an entrance."
"She's not my friend."
"Yeah, the sheriff mentioned that." He glances at me sideways. "Also mentioned she was wandering around your property. That happen often?"
"Never happened before."
"Must've been quite a surprise."
I don't answer. He's fishing, trying to get me talking, and I'm not biting. We drive in silence until the town starts to materialize around us—a scattering of buildings, streetlights casting pools of yellow on empty sidewalks. At this hour, Sutter's Gap is a ghost town. Even the bar closed thirty minutes ago.
The sheriff's office sits on Main Street, a squat brick building with barred windows and a parking lot that's usually empty. Tonight, it's got my truck taking up two spaces at an angle that suggests panic parking. Varen pulls into a spot near the entrance and kills the engine.
"Fair warning," he says, "she's not happy. Been demanding that we arrest you for kidnapping, assault, drugging her. The whole nine yards."
"I didn't drug her."
"Well now, I didn't say you did. But she's convinced, and Sheriff Carver's got questions." He opens his door and steps out, waiting for me to follow.
Great, just what I fucking need. She'll have no proof of anything and even if they searched my home, they wouldn’t find it because I didn't do it. But this bitch is really putting a kink in my panties and she's not going to like what I have to do to make this mess go away.
Inside, the station is exactly what you'd expect from a small-town sheriff's office—linoleum floors, fluorescent lights, metal desks covered in paperwork. Wade Carver sits at the largest desk near the back, arms crossed over his burly chest, graying dark hair slightly mussed. His blue eyes track me as I enter and watch me as I walk over toward him.
And there, standing near the front desk with her arms wrapped around herself, is the woman who stole my truck.
She looks worse than she did at the cabin. Her hair is wild and tangled from the wind. Her feet are filthy, cut in places from running barefoot. And the black dress is torn at the hem and covered in dirt. But her eyes—those hazel eyes—are clear now, burning with fury.
"That's him!" She points at me and with a raw voice, she hisses, "He's the one who kidnapped me. He's the one who drugged me and dragged me to his cabin and locked me in."
"I didn't lock you in," I say calmly. "You were free to leave anytime. In fact, you did leave. In my truck."
"Because you were holding me prisoner!"
"I was trying to keep you from freezing to death."
Wade stands, moving to position himself between us. "Alright, let's everybody calm down. Miss…?" He pauses, looking at her expectantly.
She hesitates, then says, "Grady. Sloane Grady."
The name doesn't register with him, which is good. It means she hasn't made connections yet between her patient in Queens and the man standing in front of her. Or if she has, she's keeping it to herself.
"Miss Grady," Wade continues, "you're claiming Mr. Strouse here kidnapped you. Can you provide any evidence of that?"
"Evidence? He admitted it! He told me he found me in town and took me to his cabin against my will."
"Actually," I cut in, "I told you I found you stumbling around in forty-degree weather wearing that, and I brought you somewhere warm. You were disoriented, slurring your words, clearly under the influence of something. I was trying to help."
"Help?" She laughs, bitter and sharp. "You locked the door. You wouldn't let me leave. You interrogated me about—" She cuts herself off, eyes darting to Wade, then back to me. "About things that were none of your business."
Wade picks up on the hesitation. "About what things?"
"It doesn't matter." She suddenly clams the fuck up, just like the good little girl I know she is. "I just want to go home. I want to press charges and go home."
