I don’t let my flicker of confusion show. Cynthia isn’t there, I’m sure, but wouldn’t Nolan be? Why wouldn’t he open the door for a detective? I’m sure Lincoln announced himself, probably showed a badge, too, because he seems like the type to do everything by the book. He’s dressed in a sharp black coat, and even his winter boots look professional. Nolan might work in tech law, but surely he knows enough to spot a detective thrusting a badge at the peephole.
Unless he went to eat, and I gave him an extra key to Darkmouth, so that’s possible.
“Here I am,” I say, keeping my tone even and my fingers laced with Sylvan’s. “You caught me.”
Sylvan breathes a laugh but I feel Faust tense at my side, his knee knocking into mine.
I’m unafraid.
I’m not guilty.
And I won’t betray either one of them. I trust them now, and there’s nothing Lincoln could say that would change my mind.
Besides, is the world really worse off with those men gone? Ace, maybe, but who knows what secrets he had in his closet? Will and Jackson deserved what they got. Mitchell was a stray, but there are casualties in any war.
I don’t say it though, because even I’m not that stupidly bold.
“Yeah,” the detective says, glancing down at the cement floor beneath his boots.
The scent of popcorn and the metallic tang of the ice hits my nose, but so does the cologne and soap radiating off my boys.
It grounds me.
I inhale softly through my nose, taking it all in.
We’re going to be okay. Whatever Lincoln has to say to me won’t upend my life. I’m innocent.
“You’re not quite the Devine I wanted to catch,” he says, looking back up at me.
Sylvan’s grip on my hand grows firmer. It hurts, but I don’t want him to stop.
I think of Nolan questioning me.
His sickly sweet voice.
Telling me in the most manipulative, subtle ways what I should and shouldn’t do growing up. Whispering in my head over the summer that the coaching business I started was too much for me, and who wasIto give anyone advice?
“I can’t deal with him.”Mom’s words. I thought she was a cunt for that. I thought she chose her new husband over us. Like Marty blocked out her maternal instincts.
Now I wonder what she was really choosing between.
“I need you to come with me,” Lincoln continues, staring right at me. We’re far enough away I can’t quite make out his expression without my glasses, but his tone is softer.
I take a shaky breath in. I’m shivering and it’s not from the ice.
Faust puts his hand on my knee and curls his fingers there, holding onto me.
I think the detective notices, but he says nothing.
“Just her?” Sylvan asks, his tone antagonistic. Like he’ll protect me from the world.
“She’s not going anywhere without us.” Faust is the one who brings the hammer down. He’s not asking.
“You can come with her,” Lincoln says quietly. “But you can’t be in the room when I ask her questions.”
“Do I need a lawyer?” I’m proud of the strength in my voice, despite my fear.
“That’s up to you.”
