Page 23 of Guarding Fable

He looks at me, his eyes widening.

“You done fucked up, man. You went after a cop.”

He sneers at me. “It’s not like I haven’t taken care of a cop before.”

“Maybe, but you threatened Fable, andthatI won’t tolerate. Get out, hands up.”

He hesitates. “Do it, or I’ll shoot you in the kneecap.”

He glowers at me, but the moment he hears the siren, he apparently realized there is no way to escape.

A short time later,a tow truck has his car, and the bastard is being hauled into the jail. We get him to lockup, and the tow truck is taking care of the sedan. Fable knows the man.

“You remember him?”

She nods and shivers beneath my coat as she sits in my office. “He’s Gregor’s partner, I guess that’s the word.”

I nod. “You remembered what happened to you, though?”

Her eyes are glassy, as if she’s in shock. Mirabelle comes in with a cup of coffee for her.

“I wasn’t sure how you liked it, so I brought stuff.”

She tosses me a worried look, then looks back at Fable. “Hun, how do you like your coffee?”

“Two sugars and lots of cream.” Fable’s voice is barely above a whisper.

Mirabelle does as Fable directed, then hands her the cup. “Do you want me to leave, Fable?”

She shakes her head, then sips the coffee. “They ran me off the road, and they wanted to get me back to my father. Why didn’t I remember the second guy?”

We still don’t have a real name for him. His ID says Viktor, but I know that’s a lie. It’s a good forgery. He refuses to talk to us.

“Maybe it was easier for you to handle. Just remembering one guy,” Mirabelle offers.

“So, I got away from them. I was running through the woods. They were busy trying to figure out how to get me back to New York. Papa had apparently threatened their lives. Nothing new for him.”

I have to fight the anger brewing in my gut. If her father was here, I would definitely kill the bastard. From the look on Mirabelle’s usually smiling face, I might have to get in line.

“And you hit your head?” I ask.

“That’s still a little fuzzy, but I stole their car and took off, but with the snow—I only just learned to drive a few weeks ago—I lost control. I remember getting out of the car and just running. Then nothing.”

“That’s probably when you passed out. My brother got a slight concussion when he was playing football. He doesn’t remember the entire fourth quarter,” Mirabelle says.

Fable seems to relax at that. “Oh, good. I was worried…well, you know.”

Mirabelle nods. I want to order my dispatcher out of my office because I want to be the one to console her. Still, Mirabelle has gotten more information from Fable than I have. I’m too angry right now to help, and I know that.

There’s a knock at the door, and Frank pokes his head in.

“Hey, boss, did you want me to bring that dude in?”

Fable looks up at me, worry etching her beautiful face.

“We’ll go to see him,” I say. I want him behind bars since her father’s men tend to have violent tendencies.

I walk over to her chair and wait for her to rise up. She looks up at me, her mouth trembling.

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