“Just get back here as soon as possible.” With that, I hung up the phone.
Rounding the coffee table again, I squatted down in front of Tibby taking her cold, clammy hands into mine. “Tibby, look at me.”
Tibby’s multicolored eyes met mine. “You are safe. We aren’t going to let anything happen to you.”
But even to my own ears, I knew that there was no longer any confidence about that in my voice.
CHAPTER 29
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I’m not sure how longI sat frozen on the couch while the people in the house moved around me. Talking, well actually, shouting into their cell phones as they tried to figure out just what the hell was happening.
I heard the words ‘court documents’ and ‘sealed,’ but I barely paid any attention to them. The news story had moved on by now, and the news anchor was now talking about what the weather was going to look like for the rest of the week. As if she hadn’t just shattered the safety net that I’d been living in for the past eight years. My safety net of anonymity.
It didn’t matter now, whether or not I chose to tell people about my story. Whoever the man who had been killing people was, whether it was Jamie or someone else, had made sure that everyone would know what my face looked like. He’d made it so that, no matter who the people looking were, they were now privy to my life’s story that should have been forever sealed in the court system because I was a minor at the time of the trial.
“Cruz, I literally checked in with you yesterday, and you said that we were still waiting for the judge to sign off on unsealing her records. Now you tell me that they were unsealed this morning, andno onethought to call me? Not only that, now you say that one of our FBI agents justdecidedto sell the information of someone that we were supposed to protect to the media, and you quote, unquote, are ‘handling it?’ That agent needs his ass kicked, and then he needs to be thrown into prison to rot for the rest of his life.” He listened to something that was said on the other end of the line before practically shouting into the phone: “If you pull me off of this case Cruz, I walk. I’m not even kidding with you.”
Cobb was pacing back and forth behind the couch. “What does it matter if I’ve become emotionally attached to the witness? That isn’t even pertinent to this conversation...fine. I’ll call you back in an hour.” Cobb hung up the phone and tossed it onto the couch with a frustrated growl.
Matteo, who’d been practically glued to my side for...well I wasn’t actually sure how long he’d been sitting next to me, squeezed my hand. “I take it you got nothing useful from your boss?” He asked Cobb.
Their conversation faded away again, and I just kind of...floated I guess? It was really strange, I was so sure that I’d have another panic attack and become a giant wheezing mess, but instead, I felt absolutely nothing. The world around me slowed and Aria, Cobb, and Matteo’s voices blurred together until they sounded like the parents fromThe Peanuts.Wa-wa-wa.That was all I could hear.
I still couldn’t get past the fact that this whole situation was just so damned unfair. So many other people with traumatic childhoods got to grow up and heal and become better people who live long and happy lives. I had worked for so long to be okay, to be the fearless Tibby that I was. But, ever since the retrial had been announced, it was like I was constantly being dragged back into the past. At this point, I may as well have just walked into the flames that night nine years ago. I couldn’t see myself getting my happy ending, Hezekiah Jordan wouldn’t allow it.
I should be angry and pissed. I should be ranting along with Cobb, or trying to figure out what our next steps were. Normal Tibby would do all of those things, she would talk about how whoever was hunting her must have a really tiny dick for going after someone who didn’t deserve it.
Instead, I just sat on the couch watching the newscaster’s lips move without actually listening to a word that she said.
Someone gave me a little shake, but I ignored them.
“Wa, wa wa wa?” Matteo’s face came into my line of vision, his eyes searching for something in my face. Another shake, and he turned to look at someone before moving out of the way.
Theo knelt down in front of me, and I was vaguely curious about when he’d gotten home. Hadn’t he been in Sacramento? That was almost two hours away, especially with afternoon traffic.
