Page 95 of Rent Free

I would do that.

“All right,” I said.

When he pushed away and headed for the door with his food, I asked, “Is it time yet?”

He tossed me a look over his right shoulder and said, “You’ll know.”

I was getting darn tired of hearing ‘you’ll know.’

I left within ten minutes, leaving Maven the cleanup like she asked me to.

The drive to Forest’s school was a breeze, every person on the road just as determined as I was to get where we needed to go.

Forest lit up like a Roman candle when he saw me there to pick him up and ran as fast as his little legs would take him as he barreled into me.

I caught my little Atlas Junior up in my arms and hugged him tight.

“Hey there, little guy,” I said. “You want to go see Daddy at the police station before we go back to the house and play in the pool?”

“Daddy! Peas! Pool!” he chirped as I grabbed his stuff, waved to the teacher, and headed out.

The station was a short drive from the school—as planned—and took us two minutes to get there.

I walked into the station, my eyes moving every which way, in a desperate attempt to see someone I knew.

Since I’d never been in the station on my own before, and I didn’t see a single Carter in sight, I moved toward the chief’s office, which happened to be the only place I knew exactly where it was at.

I had to bypass the front desk, and the woman behind it dismissed me, either recognizing me, or not caring enough to stop me.

Either way, I walked directly to Germaine’s office and knocked on the door.

“Enter,” I heard the deep voice order.

I ‘entered’ and waved at Germaine, who looked surprised to see me.

He got up and walked toward me, hands out for Forest.

Forest went, excited to see him, and started babbling a mile a minute as he was wont to do.

“Is that right?” Germaine asked, then turned to me. “You get any of that?”

I snickered. “I got ‘teacher’ and ‘police station’ as well as ‘daddy’ and ‘pool.’”

“Ahh,” he chuckled. “I guess I didn’t even get that.”

I shrugged. “He’s good. Don’t get me wrong. He talks a whole lot. But I still don’t have the knack for translating two-year-old.”

“Well that makes two of us,” he said. “Not that I’m not happy to see y’all, but is there something wrong?”

“Oh, no.” I shook my head quickly. “I’m just here to visit for a few seconds. Atlas asked me to stop by.”

“Gotcha,” he nodded.

“And I have no clue where I’m going. Yours is the only office I knew how to get to. I figured you could point the way,” I admitted.

His brows rose. “Did the receptionist not tell you how to get to the SWAT area?”

“Uh,” I hesitated. “She didn’t acknowledge me at all. And watched as I walked right by.”

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