“Has she made her phone call yet?”
“No,” Johns ground out.
Withdrawing my notebook, I ripped out the page on which I’d written Berkley’s name and number and dropped it onto the table in front of Sutton.
“Call that number. She’s a friend of the family, and she’s going to help you.”
Though she still didn’t look at me, her head bobbed in a nearly perceptible nod.
“She’s not saying anything else until her attorney is present,” I told Johns. To Sutton, I added, “Say it, sunny.”
“I’m not saying anything else until my attorney is present,” she parroted, but her voice was flat, entirely devoid of emotion. My eyes swept over her, along the slumped curves of her shoulders, her rounded spine, how she seemed to be shrinking in on herself.
Somethinghad happened in the short time she’d been here to put her in this state.
“What did you do to her?” I asked Johns.
“Nothing,” he said. “Just asked some questions.”
“And we showed her our texts,” Addie quipped, sounding positively gleeful.
“What—” I started to ask but cut myself off. I refused to entertain Addie’s particular brand of crazy. I’d figure out what she meant by myself.
“You need to leave, Lane,” Johns said.
Though I had every intention of doing just that, I leveled my finger in his face. “That’sSheriffto you.”
“Right. You need to leave,Sheriff,” he corrected sarcastically.
Turning for the door, I put my hand on the knob to head out but looked at Sutton one last time.
“It’s going to be okay, Sutton. We’re going to figure this out and get you out of here.”
My girl didn’t move, and though every fiber of my being demanded I go to her, scoop her off her feet, and run far away from this place where no one would ever find us, I knew I had to abide by the rule of the law here.
There was too much at stake not to.
forty-one
. . .
LANE
Treyand I didn’t discuss anything until we were safely ensconced in his bat cave.
“What happened back there?” he asked, breaking the silence.
“I think she’s given up.”
“Sutton?”
I nodded. “She was so…quiet and had shrunk in on herself. I don’t know what the fuck they told her in that interview room, but it wasn’t good.”
“Are you sure Sutton didn’t do this?” The glare I gave him was lethal enough to kill, and he raised his hands in surrender. “Okay, okay. Stupid question.”
“You’re lucky I don’t throat punch you for asking it.”
“I’d deserve it,” he agreed. “But if you want to clear her name, we’re going to need you to turn that anger away from me and toward figuring out what happened. Do you have any idea whyJohnsbelieves Sutton did this?”
