“What did you do?” Madden asked.
“I went to check it out,” he said.
Which made him brave or stupid, or a little of both.
“Didn’t walk right into the light—I’m not an idiot. I eased up by the corner, tried to keep to the shadows.”
He swallowed, throat working. His gaze shifted somewhere over my shoulder, out past the pilings. “Some guy had a girl pinned against the wall. One arm across her chest, the other on her shoulder. She was pushing at him, trying to twist away. He had her jammed in close. I… I thought he was gonna—” He cut himself off, jaw clenching.
“Did you get a good look at him?” I asked.
“Not his face,” Willie said. “He had a cap pulled down and a hood up. White guy, I think. Not real tall. Maybe couple inches shorter than me. Dark clothes. He was… solid. Not huge, but not little. I mostly saw shape.”
“And the girl?” Madden’s voice softened.
“Smaller,” he said. “Maybe a little over five feet? She had dark hair, swinging around. Her skin wasn’t pale. Darker. Tan, maybe. Hard to tell with the light and all.”
“What was she wearing?” I asked.
“Tank top. Jeans,” he said after a second. “I think. It all happened fast, okay?”
“You’re doing fine,” Madden soothed.
He nodded like he was trying to believe her.
“What happened next?” I asked.
“I thought about yelling,” Willie said. “Or going in hot. But the dude had fifty pounds on her and probably twenty on me, and I was alone and not totally sober.” Shame flashed across his face. “I hesitated. Couple seconds. Then she kneed him. Hard, from the sound of his choke. She shoved him off, cracked him with her elbow, and he crashed sideways into the wall.”
He lifted his hand to his own face like he remembered the impact himself.
“She took off toward the front. Fast. I mean, she was gone. Didn’t even see me. He kinda lunged after her, but he was doubled over. Ended up half-stumbling the other way.”
“Away from the front of the bar?” I confirmed.
“Yeah,” Willie said. “Street side to the back.”
“You didn’t follow her,” Madden said. Not accusing. Just naming.
“No.” The word came out small and a little ashamed. “By the time I got my feet moving, she was gone. So was he. I walked around front. Music was going, people laughing, nothing looked wrong. I told myself she made it inside. I… I should’ve gone in and checked. Or called it in. I know that. I do.” He gripped the edge of the bench hard enough his knuckles whitened.
“Did you see her face at all?” I asked.
“Just a flash when she ran under the light,” he said. “Side view. Hair in her face. I couldn’t pick her out of a lineup on that.”
I pulled out my phone and brought up Priya’s photo again. “Could it have been her?”
He stared at the picture for a long time. Too long.
“Maybe,” he said finally. “She’s the right size. Dark hair. Skin kinda like that. But… it was dark. And I was high. And I only saw her from the side for, like, half a second. I don’t wanna say yes and screw you over if I’m wrong.”
“If you had to put a number to it?” Madden asked. “How sure or not sure are you?”
“Forty percent,” he said, almost immediately. “Like… not nothing. Not enough to swear on.”
Honesty. I’d take that over a convenient certainty any day.
“Okay,” I said. “Forty percent we’re talking about the same girl. Sixty that we’re not. Either way, someone was attacked out there.”
