Another wave of nausea hit her, but not from whatever bug she had. Abby thought about their past conversations, how he’d always steered away from talking about Dani and her switch from dancing to fighting. Whoever Tinker had attacked had hurt Dani.
Her stomach gurgled and spasmed as a wave of real nausea hit her. She threw back the covers and bolted for her bathroom, shutting the door behind her. By the time she returned to her bed, she was wrung out.
Burrowing under the covers, she stared at Will with his brown hair sticking out in every direction. She could only imagine the violence she would be capable of if someone hurt him. She settled her hand gently on his arm, needing the small physical connection with him as her eyes drifted shut.
Abby woke slowly with a heavy weight pressing on the right side of her neck. Fuzzbutt’s fur tickled the corner of her mouth, and she rubbed the spot, before petting the cat. She blinked several times before moving the cat off her neck. He let out a squeak of protest. “I know, buddy.”
The display on the bedside clock showed 11:03. She glanced at her windows and noted it was dark. God, she hoped that was eleven o’clock that night and she hadn’t slept for more than twenty-four hours. The space beside her was empty.
She flipped on the bedside lamp and got up, shuffling across the hall to Olivia’s room. She opened the door and peeked in. The dim lamp on the opposite side of the room highlighted Olivia’s form under the covers. Abby padded in next to the bed and placed her hand on Olivia’s forehead. She was no longer warm.
Olivia’s eyes blinked open and she jolted away from Abby’s hand.
“I’m sorry. I was just checking on you. Go back to sleep.”
Olivia nodded, but the fear still lingered in her eyes.
Abby backed away before turning to leave the room. Damn it. She hadn’t even thought about Olivia’s reaction when she touched her. It didn’t matter that she hadn’t meant to wake her or frighten her.
She thought about the note Olivia’s aunt had sent. Fuck. That. Bitch.
Will was tucked into his bed. He didn’t wake when she touched his forehead. His fever had broken as well. He was wearing new pajamas, so he’d gotten up at some point. Her mom must have convinced him to go back to sleep in his own bed, which was a miracle in and of itself.
Abby tiptoed back out of the room and down the hall, finding her mom asleep on the couch. In the kitchen, she found a container of chicken soup and her tea from earlier.
Staring at the microwave, she briefly considered warming up one or both but didn’t want to take the risk of waking her mom. She shrugged and sipped the cold tea.
Back in the living room, she found Tinker’s record on the top shelf of the bookcase. She didn’t know if her mom had returned them or even had a chance to look at them.
Abby took her mug and the papers back to her room. Back in bed, she read the full police report.
By itself, out of any kind of context, it was damning. Tinker had beaten a man named Dimitrii Popov. One sentence in the report caught her attention and confirmed her fears.
She closed her eyes as the words she’d read played through her head.
During initial questioning, the suspect admitted to assaulting the victim, stating that the victim had previously sexually assaulted the suspect’s minor sibling.
Throwing things
“Fuck!”
Tinker turned the steel bar over to look at the hole he’d punched in the underside, the side that wasn’t supposed to have a hole. It was the second bar he’d done that to.
He threw it against the far wall of the garage, where it smashed against the metal sheeting with a satisfying bang. Running a hand over his head, he admitted defeat. There was no way he could focus on the bike he was building, not with his head all over the place.
“Got your text. Rough day?” Dani joined him at the worktable in the center of the garage and hopped up to sit on the workbench across from him.
“You could say that.”
“Wanna talk about it?”
“Yeah. You in the abstaining from drinking part of your training yet?”
Dani stared at him assessingly. “Depends. Is this a beer or whiskey conversation?”
“We can start with beer. May need to switch to whiskey, depending on how it goes,” he said.
She hopped off the bench. “All right. Office?”
