I cast a frantic glance around the room. “But… Where… I’m not… I don’t…”
Nothing makes sense.
Jenna’s dead. Killed. Someone attacked me. I have a concussion, if what Indy says is right, and given the pain in my head, I think he is. And now I’m in a strange bedroom with a man I haven’t seen in over two years.
“I don’t understand,” I finally whisper.
Guilt darkens Indy’s gaze. “I know. And I’m sorry.”
Half of me wants to curl into a ball and try to pretend none of this is happening. To retreat back into the darkness, where Jenna isn’t dead and the world makes sense again.
But the other part of me, the part that convinced my parents to let me get my implants at seventeen even when they wanted to wait, that taught myself how to use them twice as fast as the doctors predicted, that never turned away from a challenge—that part insists on the truth.
So I rein in my tears and swallow my sobs. I take shuddering breaths until my breathing settles. Then I look Indy straight in the eye and ask firmly, “What. Happened?”
He hesitates. Then, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out his phone. As he taps the screen, he says, “I did something, Bea. Something you’re probably going to be angry about. But there was no other choice. Not if I wanted to keep you?—”
With a sigh, he holds out the phone, screen side up. “You’re not really supposed to look at screens with a concussion,” he says, “but if I just tell you, you may not believe me.”
Heart pounding, I take the phone from him with trembling fingers. There’s an article displayed on the screen, one with a bold headline that announces,Physical Therapist at VA Hospital Arrested in Gruesome Murder.
As I read the article in breathless disbelief, Indy says, “I knew you couldn’t have done it. I just knew. And when I found out about the evidence?—”
My pulse skips.“The evidence?”
But before he can respond, I see it. In black and white on the screen.Police haven’t revealed details yet, but an inside source claims all the evidence points at Beatrix Howe as the killer.
The phone falls to my lap.
I can’t breathe.
“Bea.” Indy’s voice sounds distant. Like I accidentally set the volume on my implants too low.
“They think I killed her?” I croak.
His hand comes to my shoulder. Heat seeps into my chilled skin. “Yeah. My friends and I looked into it. After I heard. The evidence… it doesn’t look good.”
“I… I don’t understand. I didn’t. I found her. But I didn’t…”
“I know. I know you didn’t. You couldn’t.” Indy’s gaze searches mine. “If there had been another way… But Jenna’s boyfriend, his dad is a Congressman. And he’s already pushing the DA for a quick trial. The maximum sentence.”
“What?” I look at Indy in horror. “A trial? Maximum sentence?”
“For murder, Bea.” He sighs heavily. “I hate having to tell you like this. But yeah, you’re the main suspect in her murder. The only suspect, really.”
“What?”
“We think someone framed you. We, meaning me and my friends. My team. The police were waiting for you to be declared stable. By now, you probably would have been arrested and taken to jail.”
It feels like I’m in some horrible nightmare universe. Or one of those oldTwilight Zoneepisodes my dad likes so much.
“But.” I cast another look around the bedroom. “I’m not in the hospital. Or jail. So… whereamI? And why are you here?”
Indy sighs again. “I went to get you. In DC. Well, not just me, but two of my friends, as well. We snuck you out of the hospital. And we brought you here. To my company’s headquarters.”
“Yourheadquarters?” A beat later, the rest of what he said hits me. “Youkidnappedme?”
“No.” It’s quick. Fierce. “Not like that. They would have taken you to jail. Today. Chances are, with the evidence and the Congressman pushing, you’d be convicted. I’m just protecting you until we can find out who really killed Jenna.”
