Page 107 of Tell Me Something True

And Miles could check the system to see if anyone matching her description had been reported missing.

They might be able to find out who she was that way.

But if they took her to the station, Tabitha might lose any chance she had of gaining the girl’s trust.

Tabitha glanced into the room. The girl was still huddled on the bed, back in the corner, her sweatshirt pulled over her bent knees, head down.

This girl needed her.

She turned back to Miles. “Five more minutes.”

He studied her with his suspicious, hooded gaze for a good ten seconds. Then twenty. Then finally, finally, he nodded.

She’d take it.

Unlike him, she didn’t have the luxury of ignoring inconvenient truths.

And the truth was, while she wanted his trust, she didn’t need it. Not to do her job. Not to be good at it.

She just needed him to stay out of her way while she did it.

***

Miles would give her five minutes. Hell, he could even give her six.

He could be flexible when the situation called for it.

But he doubted any amount of time would make a difference.

The girl wasn’t talking. She was terrified. And while he didn’t want to add to her fears by taking her to the station, he did want to make sure she was somewhere where she could get the support and care she needed.

He followed Tabitha back to the room, stopping in the doorway while Tabitha went inside. Leaning against the doorframe, he watched as Tabitha carried the chair from the corner to between the beds. Mouth turned down, eyeing the chair warily, she sat on the very edge as if trying to keep as much of herself from touching it as possible. Her posture was rigid, her face pale. But her expression was all stubborn determination.

It shouldn’t appeal to him, but what could he say? He was a Jennings. They held stubbornness in high regard.

“My mom used to bring me to motels like this,” Tabitha told the girl, and though her voice was quiet, her tone was strong. And steady, as if this was a story told many times before. One that no longer held any power over her.

But she was rubbing the scar on her chin. And that stubborn determination didn’t quite reach her eyes. Couldn’t mask the pain in them.

And he knew this wasn’t going to be easy for her. Wasn’t going to be painless.

“When I was little—much younger than you are—I’d hide in the bathtub with my eyes closed and my hands covering my ears so I could pretend I was somewhere else,” she continued. “So I couldn’t hear what she was doing with the men who knocked on the door. So I could pretend I was invisible when some of those men came in to get me.”

Miles went absolutely still, his stomach clenching painfully. He could barely breathe. Was afraid to move. Partly because he didn’t want to draw attention to himself.

Mostly because if he moved, he might do something idiotic, something completely unprofessional and out of control and storm into that room and take her into his arms.

Head still bent, the girl brought her thumb to her mouth. Chewed on her ragged, dirty thumbnail. “Did your dad die, too? Like mine?”

“I never had a dad. It was just me and my mom, but she was an addict, so it was hard for her to take care of me the way she should have. The way I deserved. So whenever I see a motel like this, it reminds me of the times she didn’t protect me. Of the things that happened to me in rooms just like this one.”

His heart was thudding in his chest, too hard. Too fast. He knew what she was doing and why. Opening up to the girl in the hopes that she’d earn her trust. That she’d realize she wasn’t alone.

And in doing so, she was also allowing him to understand her in ways he’d never been able to before.

Ways she’d never let him see her before.

“And then,” Tabitha continued, “one night, when I was only a few years younger than you, at one of those motels, my mother left me in a room very much like this one while she went to get us something to eat. I waited for her to come back, just like she told me to. I waited and I waited. I was still waiting when housekeeping came to clean the room the next afternoon.”

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