Page 110 of Forged By Sacrifice

But I also started thinking, my research of the summer swimming in my head. Then, they were there. The cops were at the table and asking us to go with them. I didn’t have a choice. I grabbed my sister’s hand and followed the men from the building. My heart was still pounding as my future was swirling down a drain. There was a small…infinitesimally slim chance of being able to right it.

We weren’t taken to a police station like I’d expected. Instead, we were taken to a nondescript building over the 14th Street Bridge where we were separated and led into different rooms. As they took my purse from my hand, I had the forethought to say, “I do not consent to the search of my bag.”

The man taking it looked up at me with shock.

“Did you hear me?” I asked. “I am not consenting to the search.”

He left me in the room at what could have almost been considered a cheap card table with a two-way mirror staring me in the face. I wished I had my old bear with me. A bear I could squeeze, push my head against its belly, and pretend that none of this was happening. I was angry and sad all at once. I wanted to kill Malik for leaving us at the club. For putting the drugs in Raisa’s purse instead of keeping it himself and taking responsibility for his shit.

I wanted to cry because Mac and I had barely had a chance to be a couple. A week of tangled sheets and shared dinners.

Eventually, the door opened, and a man and a woman in suits entered. They weren’t the beautifully tailored suits Dani and Mac wore. They were off-the-rack kind of suits. My heart hurt at thoughts of the Whittakers. At the thought of what was going to happen now.

“Can you tell me what this is all about?” I asked and was surprised my voice wasn’t shaking.

The woman slid a picture across the table to me. It was of my purse and a plastic, brick-shaped bag that I’d never seen before. I assumed it was the drugs Raisa had put in it.

“You’re in quite a lot of trouble, Ms. Astrella,” the man said, sitting with his arms crossed, leaning back in the chair like the jocks in high school had.

I didn’t say anything. I just sat there with my own hands on the table, crossed over each other so I wouldn’t fidget with them or my hair, trying hard to model Mac’s grandma’s poker face.

“You do know you’ll never be admitted to the bar with possession and distribution charges on your record?” he asked.

My stomach fell to my knees, Mac’s gorgeous face and blue eyes winking before me again, disappearing like my career.

I wanted to repeat the fact that I hadn’t consented to the search, and that if they didn’t have a warrant, the charges wouldn’t stick. But I also wasn’t at a police station. I was at some unknown location. I wasn’t sure if the normal rules applied. I was a U.S. citizen, but Raisa wasn’t. I hoped beyond hope that she knew not to talk.

“I’d like to call my attorney,” I said instead of all the other things that were going through my brain.

They exchanged a look.

“That’s one way to play it. But we both know the drugs aren’t yours. They’re likely Malik Leskov’s, or Raisa Leskov’s, or both,” the woman finally spoke, eyeing me like I was a yummy pizza she was ready to devour. I wasn’t going to be her pizza.

I bit my tongue before I could spit out that Raisa didn’t do drugs. Malik, I couldn’t speak for anymore. The mood swings that Raisa had mentioned made sense now. His arguments with Petya, too. Because if Petya knew about the drugs, he’d be furious. He didn’t want that kind of attention. Although, I had a feeling the people in front of me were hoping to use Malik’s drugs as leverage to get him to turn on his dad.

“Sorry. I’m not sure I stuttered. Phone call. Lawyer,” I told them again.

“That’s all you have to say?”

“I will add this. I’ve never seen that plastic bag before.” And I thanked God that I could say that truthfully. “We were at a club. We left our bags at the table.”

“You left your bags unattended in a crowded nightclub?” the man scoffed.

I nodded. “Now, I’d like to speak with my lawyer.”

“You’re Ian Astrella’s daughter, Petya Leskov’s stepdaughter. You want us to believe that you didn’t know anything about the cocaine?” The guy was almost snarling. The woman put a hand on his arm.

“All I have to say—and I’ll spell it out so you don’t have any doubts about it—is: L.A.W.Y.E.R.”

The guy was pissed. I could see that he wanted to push me, but the lady stood, taking the picture with her. She got to the door, glancing back at the man who had leaned so far back in his chair that I hoped, ungraciously, that he fell over.

The woman said, “Let’s go.”

The guy eyed me, shoved off the table, and slammed his way out of the room.

A different woman brought me my phone and stood there, waiting for me to place my call. I looked down at it, debating with myself on which number to dial. Mac was the one I ached to see. But he’d gone to pick up an upset Dani, and I wasn’t sure I was ready to see the disappointment in his eyes like the disappointment I’d seen in my mom’s the day she and Dad had been arrested and I’d given up the music box.

With a sigh, I dialed a number I never thought I’d have to use for this reason. It rang several times before it was answered.

---