Page 117 of Conrad

“He’s just looking for money.” And that thought turned him cold.

Yes, he needed to distance himself from Penelope as fast as possible if he hoped to save her reputation.

“She’s not my girlfriend,” he said. “She’s just working with EmPowerPlay. We both are.”

Jenna met his gaze in the mirror, her eyebrows up.

He looked away. His stomach had settled by the time they reached the station, and he spent the next three hours giving his statement and talking to—for the second time today—Weston Winter, who told him to say nothing until he got there.

Which meant by the time he finished with his statement, any hope of a bail hearing had passed, and Jenna asked him what he’d like to have for dinner as he sat in overnight lockup. Apparently, they brought in takeout.

Instead, they let him call Jack, who showed up with a pot roast in a Tupperware container. They let Conrad eat it in the interrogation room with Jack, so he got an update on Missy. Not a broken wrist, but yes, Bouchard had found a lawyer.

And no, Jack hadn’t seen Penelope. Maybe, for the first time, she’d listened to Conrad.

“I’m going to miss practice,” Conrad said to Jack as he finished off dinner. “They’ll suspend me.”

Jack closed the Tupperware. “We’ll get you out tomorrow, bro. It’s going to be okay.”

He didn’t mention the memories that had suddenly crept back to haunt him. Only, this time he wasn’t seventeen, arrested and on his way to juvie hall for interrogation, the horror of Joe Johnson’s screams in his head.

“I don’t think it’s ever going to be okay,” he said and motioned for Jenna to return him to his cell.

Where, probably, he belonged.

* * *

She’d made a mess of everything.

Penelope stood in front of the coffee maker, watching it drip, listening to Conrad’s words yesterday thrum through her.“You should go. Don’t get tangled up in this.”

He couldn’t have meant it the way it’d hit her.

Because she was already tangled up, right? If it hadn’t been for her?—

“You’re up early.” The words from her mother, who came into the room dressed in a pink velour day suit, her dark hair pulled back in a messy bun, diamond earrings and her makeup already applied despite the dawn’s early-light hour.

Penelope sighed and stared back at the lake, where the snow reflected the sunset in a glowing fire, now sliding over the white toward shore. “Couldn’t sleep.”

Her mother kissed her cheek, then grabbed a mug from the cupboard. “Isn’t Annette up yet?”

“I can make my own coffee, Mother.”

Her mother patted her hand. “I know. You’re so independent. It’s nice having you around.”

“I’m not really here, Mom. I just . . . well . . .”

Well, she hadn’t known who else to call yesterday when she’d arrived at the sheriff’s office and met the wall that was Deputy Sheriff Jenna Hayes. Apparently, Conrad didn’t want to see her, words that had left her hollowed out and brittle.

He was panicking. She’d seen the expression he’d worn at the arena and in the cruiser.

And it was all her fault. If she hadn’t baited the guy?—

“I’m sure you will get it sorted out. Lucas is already writing up a press release about Kingston, distancing EmPowerPlay from the fiasco.”

Penelope stared after her as her mother left her mug on the counter—maybe for Penelope to fill—and sat down at the kitchen nook, a padded bench that circled the bay window.

She picked up the remote to the flatscreen.

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