Page 64 of Give Me Redemption

“Okay.” I nod. This is crazy. Who is this woman, and where the fuck is Dalton? “You’re right. You were hesitant when I said I wanted to take things farther. I should have known then.” How can she stand here and deny the chemistry between us? I’m not stupid. It’s so thick, you can almost reach out and touch it. But if she wants it this way, then so be it. I’m not the type of man to beg.

I sneer and shake my head. “You’re losing it, Dalton.” I head for the door, passing by the tied-up trash bag on my way out. Fuck her trash. I slam the door shut and take the stairs to the lobby.

She thinks she can treat me that way after I’ve been nothing but open with her? After I carried her to her fucking bed? She doesn’t know me. She doesn’t know how quickly I can shut this shit off.

I’m done.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Harlow

I look toward the door after him before casting my eyes down and looking at the files scattered. He touched these. He looked at these.

Does he know now? Would he have said?

I grip onto them, but some papers are hanging from the bottom and they slip out and crash to the floor.

I shake my head and collapse. Tears rush out, too, and I cry into my hands. When’s the last time I cried?

I don’t cry.

I’ve fucked everything up.

Everything.

I reach and start picking the papers up, one by one, frantically trying to put the puzzle pieces back in place as tears blur my vision. I grow angry. Angry at myself for falling for this guy when I knew from the start this was just a job. Pissed at Davy for making me take this case when he knew I didn’t want it. I become livid as I look over each puzzle piece, knowing I’ll never have the complete puzzle. I’ll never be able to solve this shit.

The man who took her is careful, so careful we haven’t seen a damn thing on him. No DNA, nothing that could lead us to Chloe.

I pick up a folder and throw it across the fucking room. Grabbing a pillow, I put my face in it and scream to the top of my lungs.

___________

Hours tick by, with four glasses of numb the pain. I’m not sure I’m in the now or floating above myself. When I was a kid, I had a hard time sleeping after Chloe was taken. Shit, I still don’t sleep. The doctor gave me sleeping meds, but sometimes they’d make me sleepwalk and I’d end up outside in my nightgown under the streetlamp, staring up at the light, as if it held all the answers I was looking for.

After all, the streetlamp saw everything that night. It watched me unlock the window, turn back to Chloe, and put my finger over my mouth as she giggled. Because that wasn’t like me. I wasn’t a bad kid, and we both knew it.

It was something new and exciting, so we thought it was funny. The trusty lamp that kept our street from being dark and scary witnessed as I slid the window up, took hold of the edge, and flung myself over. I hit the ground with a soft thump before turning around and slowly looking up over the windowpane back at Chloe. This made her laugh again with her blankets up to her chin.

“Let me go with you,” she asked.

“You know you can’t. I’ll be back before you know it.”

She huffed and fell back on her pillow. “I hate being a kid.”

I laughed, but then felt bad. “Maybe I should just stay then?”

“No.” She sat up. “Go. I’ll make sure Mom and Dad never know.”

She was so much younger than me, but somehow, in her own way, she was wiser about the world. My nose was always stuck in a book, and my hand always being pulled by her to get out and do something. Well, I got out and did something, and the soft glowing streetlamp had eyes on it all.

After shutting the window, I slipped away into the night. I met up with some friends and we took off to another neighborhood where someone was having a party. I felt out of place, not like myself.

I was offered alcohol and even a joint. I turned them down, even though the peer pressure was strong. Those people were supposed to be my friends. The one thing grown-ups don’t warn you about is when you get older, you move the fuck on from childhood friendships.

You don’t hang out with the same people throughout your life. Or at least I didn’t. Part of me knows why. After Chloe was abducted, I was locked in a cage.

That night at the party a boy from school tried to kiss me and go down my pants. I let him kiss me, but I didn’t let him go down my pants. I wasn’t that girl. I left after he got mad and told the other kids I was a tease. I was so angry at myself for even going, knowing I didn’t want to in the first place, but the anger I felt at the time was nothing.

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