Page 144 of Long Way Down

He had a private room, what with being under arrest, and it was quiet save the beep and shush of monitors, and Doug’s slightly-labored breathing. The doctor had said he was on opioids for the pain, but that he was due for a dose and they would hold off until they’d asked him their questions. As a result, sweat gleamed on his brow, and his features were pinched up with pain. He didn’t look lucid, a little vacant around the eyes, but he didn’t look totally stoned, either; pain would keep him sharp, if nothing else.

“Afternoon, Doug,” Contreras greeted, dropping his coat over an empty chair. “Your mom and dad are out in the waiting room, trying to get back here. They seem to think you’ve been framed.”

“It’s a shame we don’t have video to show them,” Melissa said. “But it seems the security cameras at the school weren’t working.”

That had been the most relieving news of the day, so far, when Contreras told her Pongo and Kat wouldn’t have anything to worry about.Did you erase the footage?she’d asked, agog at such tampering from him of all people. He’d shrugged.Technically, no one can prove I did, so…

“You and I, though,” Melissa said, dragging a chair close to the head of the bed and dropping into it, the bandaged side of her face closest to him, “know what really happened, don’t we?” She reached to trace a nail at the edge of the taped-down gauze, and watched, shuddering internally, the way his hateful stare followed the motion with something like relish.

He stared at her, and all that flat indifference of their first meeting, that stoner’s blankness, had been replaced with a feverish ugliness heightened by physical pain. This was a boy fair to bursting with hate – the aimless, agitated, volatile kind that existed without cause, latching onto targets as the moment provided them. It was hideous to witness up close.

His lips were dry, and he had to unpeel them with a crackling sound before he muttered, “Shoulda taken your eye. Bitch.”

Everything inside her wanted to get up, leave the room, and never think about it or its occupant ever again.

Outwardly, she lifted a hand to stay Contreras when she heard him shift forward. She held Doug’s gaze and said, “Would that have been a fun memory for you? While you’re rotting in Sing Sing?”

He bared his teeth at her, half grimace, half smile.

“Maybe you’ll be happy to wind up there. It’s where your idol is.”

He gave a low, hissing sound that she realized was an attempt at a laugh.

She cocked her head, feigning fasciation. “Why Osborn? Heisthe one you left the notes for, isn’t he? Why would you want his attention?”

He wet his lips, for all the good it did, voice dry and rough-edged. “David Osborn is a visionary.”

“Jesus Christ,” Contreras muttered, and Doug’s head shifted on the pillow, gaze lifting to pin ruthless and furious on him where he stood just inside the door.

“He is,” Doug rasped. “He understands what it’s like to be told no over and over again; to be told you aren’t special enough. But he went out and took what he wanted.”

Contreras made a disgusted face. “Oh, cry me a river, little rich boy. Your daddy’s money pays for everything, but, what, a few girls turned you down ‘cause you don’t wash your hair and smell like backstage at a Grateful Dead concert? So, what, that justifies worshipping a rapist and following in his footsteps?”

“What do you know, fucking pig?” Doug shot back. The monitors’ beeping picked up. “Why don’t you go shoot somebody and get away with it?”

“Doug,” Melissa said, shifting forward. She placed her hand on the bedrail, beside his cuffed wrist, though being that near him left her skin crawling. His attention snapped back to her, his breathing elevated, his pupils nothing but pinpricks. “Don’t look at him. Look at me. I’m trying to understand. You obviously admire Osborn. Did he encourage you? Or were you trying to get his attention?”

His gaze slid to her hand, and his fingers twitched, and it didn’t matter that he was injured and restrained; she had a sudden, brutal image of him gripping her hand with his much-larger one and breaking her fingers. Or, worse, dragging her across the bed so he could get closer to her.Should have taken your eye. Her pulse throbbed high and fluttery in her ears, and it was a not-small effort to hold still and wait for his gaze to return to her face, which it did, finally; he looked at her as if she were an exotic animal in a zoo, fascinating and incomprehensible. Likeshewas the one who’d done unspeakable things to others.

“Have you ever met him in person?” she asked.

“No.”

“Ever spoken to him over the phone?”

“No.”

She frowned. “You must have written to him, then.”

“I never talked to him.”

In the back of her mind, the separate bricks of the case, all the little nuggets of evidence, were collecting, and bouncing and trying to shape something coherent. “You were trying to get his attention, then?” Which was one of the reasons they’d kept the notes away from the press. The rapes had been reported on, but not the tributes.

“Do you think it worked?” he asked, mockingly. “I’ll ask him when I see him.” Then he turned his face away and closed his eyes.

Contreras stepped forward to the end of the bed, composed once more. “Doug, eye witness reports place your car at the scene of a murder. A prostitute who was also raped, and had your message for Osborn carved into her back.”

Doug’s lashes flickered, but he didn’t open his eyes.

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