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“And we waited. We waited for someone to come and take us away.

“We waited for so damn long.”

Leaf sped toward downtown, cursing every red light. He prayed no cop would pull him over while half-listening to Clint trying to drag words out of Tristan on the radio.

“In my research, I came across some extraordinary material,” the radio host said. “News articles said they pulled two kids with blood smeared on their faces out of the house. They had spent hours in the same room as their, quote, unquote, slaughtered parents. That was twenty years ago. How do you deal with that, Tristan?”

“Fuck!” Leaf cursed and grabbed the phone.

While he was once again stopped by a red light, he called Carol. The manager picked up, and it sounded like she covered her mouth to keep her voice low while speaking.

“Leaf? Hello?”

“Stop it!” he shouted into the receiver and started driving again when the light turned green. “Stop the damn interview!”

Carol gasped in disbelief. “But they’re live—I can’t just—”

“Do your damn job and get Tristan out of there!”

He hung up and tossed the phone on the passenger seat. Even though he had reached downtown quickly, it wasn’t fast enough for him.

“I …” Tristan’s voice sounded thin as porcelain over the speaker. “Where … Twenty? … I don’t know …”

“Oh, fuck! Do something!” Leaf shouted, silently cursing Carol, who was completely blind to such things. He couldn’t even blame Andrej, because he was surely as blindsided as Tristan. But eventually, he intervened.

“I don’t think this is appropriate, Clint,” Andrej said.

“I’m just doing my job,” Clint defended himself.

“You’ve crossed several lines in the last few minutes without even hesitating. We should probably just end this now.”

Suddenly, there was static noise, then the station reacted immediately and switched back to the studio. “Um, yeah … Here’s Anna Banana again! Looks like Clint here … tsk, tsk … Clint, you naughty boy! I would have loved to learn more, but … uh … let’s listen to a song first. Maybe we can come back to him later.”

Leaf turned onto Hope Street and drove straight to the parking lot. He jumped out of the car and hurried into the hotel. Although some drugs were still running through his system, adrenaline had flushed most of it out since Tristan’s distress call.

He rushed through the lobby and took the escalator up. Once there, he rode the elevator to the rooftop bar. Upstairs, he only needed to follow the voices, and when he turned the corner, he saw Carol arguing with an Elvis Costello look-alike.

Leaf was boiling with anger.

How dare this guy hurt Tristan? Does he have no respect at all?

Nearby, the radio crew waited in silence; behind them, Tristan and Andrej came into view. Andrej offered him a glass of water, but Tristan seemed absent, lost in his thoughts. One didn’t need to be a genius to see how he was being consumed by his dark memories.

Leaf put his hand on Clint’s shoulder and spun him around, then landed a right hook. As Clint staggered backward, the horn-rimmed glasses flew off his face. One of the technicians was close enough to catch the radio host.

“Leaf!” Carol exclaimed, horrified.

Anger boiled up inside Leaf, and he wanted only one thing: to take down the guy who had hurt Tristan.

He grabbed Clint’s shirt and punched him again. When he cocked his fist for a third, Carol yanked him back.

“Stop it!”

“I’ll sue you!” Clint snarled, touching his bloody lip.

“And I’ll make sure you never do another interview again!” Leaf barked at him. “Go become a lawyer if you want to cross-examine someone! But you can’t just spring something like this on people!”

In a rage, he broke free from Carol’s firm grip and pushed her away. “And you! How clueless can you get? Why didn’t you step in?”