My head was swimming, and I needed to sit down. I gripped the phone tightly. “Yeah. Yeah. Of course.Anything.I just need to grab a few things.”
“Good. I’m just around the corner. Come out to the curb.”
“Okay. See you in a bit.” I hurried to grab my wallet, sliding it into my back pocket, and grabbed my coat and slipped on my shoes. My heart was pounding when I stepped outside and sent Spence a text that I was outside. I looked around for whoever Creighton had watching me today, but I couldn’t see anyone. I’m sure he was there, and for once, I was appreciative for their discretion. Spence asked to leave Creighton out of this, but no way would he be okay with me leaving without a tail. Wejusthad a talk about compromise.
I didn’t have to wait long before a truck pulled over in front of me. Spence was driving, so I went around to get into the passenger side. “Hi.” My chest was tight.
He gave me a forced grin back, but got back into traffic before he could be harassed by other drivers.
“You know which station to go to?”
He nodded, checking his rearview mirror. His hands gripped the steering wheel tightly. Really tightly.
He looked more stressed than he should’ve. It wasn’t like he’d been arrested.
I frowned. “Uh. Spence?”
“Yeah.” He threw me a fast look. “I just want to get there. Get this done with.”
Cool. Yeah. I got that.
I told myself to relax, except something was off. This didn’t feel right.
I tried to tell myself to relax.
I was certain this wasn’t the first time something like this happened at Octavia. And I was sure Spence was partially doing this so Creighton wouldn’t use this in any way against ... Well, against someone. I wasn’t totally certain.
“Was there footage of the incident?” Was Levi taken in? “There would’ve been a really big guy with them. Did he get arrested too?”
“Uh. What?” He ran a hand through his hair, batting some loose ends away. He scowled. “Who are you talking about?”
“One of the guys with my friends. He—” Did I mention who Levi worked for? Would that help in this situation? I thought better of it. “Uh. Never mind. Do you know how many people were taken in? Was it all of them?”
He shook his head, still distracted. “I don’t know. They’re your friends. My night manager said they arrived with you.”
“Uh. Yeah.”
He nodded, more to himself. He kept nodding to himself. “Right. Right. We’ll get this figured out. Don’t worry. We’re almost there.”
I stared at him, and again told myself to chill. I wanted to know everything, but he was right. Just get to the station, and we’d go from there. More than likely there wasn’t anything I could do, except be there. It would be all Spence, and he was going in to help me out. Help my friends out.
That’s all I wanted.
Except as we kept driving, we began to head away from the main traffic roads.
My stomach began to shrivel up.
Thiswasn’tright.
He turned down a street that led to a bunch of warehouses, and lead lined my insides.
He parked outside of one of the buildings and turned the engine off.
Yeah. Crap. This was most definitely not a police station. Why hadn’t I acted on what my gut was saying?
I turned to him, ready to say something, anything for an excuse to get away from him, and that’s when I saw the gun.
He had it pointed at me, from the other side of him. He clipped out, “Give me your phone.”
