Amber
The next morning when we wake up, I just can’t take it any longer. I take the test. Granite and I prepare ourselves for the result, but when we look at it, we are both perplexed and frustrated at what we see. The result is blurred and entirely inconclusive. At this point, we are both too anxious not to get an answer to this lingering question, so we grab some cash, our jackets, and get ready to go to the store to get another test.
But as soon as we open the front door of the cabin, we see that the police are here. I immediately feel as if I have swallowed my stomach. If the cops are here, that means that we’ve been found and that we are going to be put under arrest. I start to panic and try to hold myself together so that I don’t do anything stupid and rash that will make matters worse.
“Can I help you, officers?” Granite asks politely while he stands in the center of the doorway.
“Sorry to bother you, sir,” one of the officers says. “But we are just canvasing the area to see if anyone has seen a young woman around here, late twenties, blonde hair, and goes by the name Lana.”
“No,” Granite says in a tone that is a thousand times calmer than anything I could have pulled off. “We haven’t seen anyone up this way at all. Why?”
“Well, the woman’s son showed up at our police station last night. But he is refusing to talk to anyone. We’ve been trying to find out what happened to him and what may have happened to his missing mother. She has a bit of a reputation around town as being mentally unstable and might be a danger to herself.”
I glance over at granite and squeeze his hand down by his thigh. Wehaveto do something to help Pete now. He’s right here within our reach. Granite picked up on the cue.
“I’m sorry that we can’t be more help in finding the woman,” Granite said. “But perhaps we can be of some help with the boy. My wife here is a child psychologist; we’ve recently moved here from out of state. Maybe she can get the boy to open up a bit.”
“I’d be happy to try and help,” I said as I jump in on the opening that granite has provided for me.
Granted, the entire thing is all lies, but it doesn’t matter. We can’t reveal who we are without raising suspicion, and to my knowledge the old woman never told anyone about us. It is a good cover in order to try to get close enough to Pete to find out what had happened and try to help him. If it hadn’t been for him, Lana could have very well killed us too.
I’m surprised by how gullible the police seem to be as they offer for us to go along with them back down into town to see, try, and talk to Pete. I’m nervous about walking into a police station,reallynervous. Granite can tell because I am pinching his fingers within mine so hard that his knuckles are turning white and probably starting to go numb. When we get there to the jail, one of the officers walks us back to a room that he calls the “holding room” and there sits Pete.
