At first, I think it might go to voicemail, but then I hear a gruff and exhausted male voice say, “Hello?”
I don’t speak.
I stare across the room as my vision becomes blurry and my body trembles so hard the bed begins to shake too.
After a few seconds, Khalil tries again, but this time he sounds annoyed. “Hello?”
My lips move, but no sounds come out. In the background, I hear another male voice murmuring a question that sounds like, “Who is it?”
Zeke.
He’s still awake.
Khalil’s voice suddenly sounds muffled, like he pulled his mouth away from the phone to answer. “I don’t know. They’re not saying shit.”
I hear footsteps growing louder on the other line, and then I swear I hear Zeke utter, “Let me try.”
There’s shuffling from the phone changing hands, and then his voice is clear but not as close as Khalil’s was previously.
Speaker.
They’d put the phone on speaker.
“Hello?” Zeke says. Like before, my only reply is silence, but it doesn’t matter because everyone Thorin has is already in that room. Everyone except me. “Princess, you there?” My head falls as I squeeze my eyes closed. “Princess… I know it’s you. It doesn’t have to be this way. Just come back. Come back to us.”
“I…can’t.” A moment later, I jump when I hear a loud thump on the other end of the line—like someone angrily putting theirfist through a wall. Losing my nerve to say any more or ask about Thor, I drop the phone on the bed and quickly end the call.
I cry for an hour before I pick up the phone again and dial another number. It rings only one time before someone answers.
“Y-hello!” Sheriff Kelly answers cheerfully.
“Hi, sheriff.”
“I know that voice,” he says without an ounce of animosity. “That’s the voice of someone who’s caused quite a bit of trouble on my mountain this summer.”
My smile is small but genuine as I retort, “We both know who those mountains really belong to, Sheriff.”
He chuckles heartily. “That we do. That we do. What can I do for you, honey?”
“How’s the investigation going?”
“As far as I’m concerned, it’s an open-and-shut matter. Some out-of-towners came looking for trouble and got more than they bargained for. Case closed.”
“Good,” I whisper distractedly.
“But that’s not why you really called,” the sheriff guesses wisely.
A sob breaks free as I shake my head like he can see. “No.How is—” My voice breaks. “How is he?”
“He’s fine. He’s fine. Still asleep, butstrong. You just remember that, darling, hear?”
I can’t answer as I unleash all of my emotions on the poor unsuspecting sheriff. He doesn’t complain or stammer uncomfortably. He just waits for me to get my bearings. When I’m finally done crying, I ask with a sniffle, “Can you…can you let me know the moment he wakes up?”
A long silence follows, and then the sheriff sighs. “Aurelia… I don’t enjoy telling you this, or being put in the middle, but I’ve been given explicit instructions not to give you any information about Thorin if you call. I’m sure I’ve already said too much.”
My jaw drops with a gasp at the news that I’ve been shut out.
He wouldn’t.
