Letting his coat fall again and disguising the gun, Callan turns around and I cower at the look in his eyes. I already know that he doesn’t believe me.
“Don’t look at me like that,” I plead and he frowns even harder, rubbing his eyes and then he patiently puts his hands on my shoulders.
“Melody, hear me out. You saw a mask, aye that might be right. But you also saw it in a crowd full of masks and what happened to you, happened only recently. Like you said, the memories are still fresh. It is not unusual...”
“But Callan, I did see him!”
“For four seconds,” he says. “Do you know how well your testimony would hold up in interrogation?”
“Oh, don’t be such a cop now...” I cry in desperation when he replies in an icy voice.
“You’re right, I should have acted like a cop with you from the beginning. I should have never listened to you or your fecking wishes. From now on you’re not going anywhere and I’m locking you up in your room.”
14
Callan
Shock erupts on her face, her mouth quivering and she pales, making merealize my serious mistake. Looking like she’s on the verge of crying, she hits me in the chest with the stuffed animal.
“You’re being mean!” she blurts in a choked voice and I inhale, holding my breath before rubbing my neck in frustration.
Fuck! “Melody, forgive me,” I reply, putting my hand on her upper arm, “I shouldn’t have said that.” What the hell was I even thinking? After all she’s been through, she doesn’t deserve me being an asshole to her.
An asshole to others, aye that is one thing but not to the girl that makes my heart beat like this is the first time it’s come alive.
“Then why did you?” she asks, her tone heightened with frantic emotions and I lower my eyes before looking up again, sincerely answering,
“Frustration.”
She does a short nod as if she accepts the explanation. “Did you mean it?”
“Nay,” I answer, “I won’t ever lock you up.”
But I am not letting her go anywhere near crowds. Not after what happened today and not until that psychopath is caught. I still meant what I told Melody though. I never should have brought her here and what happened today is on me.
I didn’t assess the situation correctly. This was my fault. I’m the one who is supposed to protect her and I made a mistake. I thought that she might handle it but it is obvious that she is still too haunted.
Tugging the prize I won her earlier closer to her chest, she whispers, “I still think I saw him. He’s here.”
Four seconds. She saw a mask for four seconds, one that she thought resembled a Venetian mask but it is more probable that she saw one of the many colorful ones and it is possible that she confused it for Romeo’s.
“Did you really see him? Or do you just think you saw him?”
My question bothers her and she furrows her brows, looking down at her shoes, before murmuring, “I don’t know.”
Pulling my arm around her shoulder, I rasp, “Let’s get you home. You’ve had enough for today.” I push the both of us through the mob, holding Melody tightly by my side but I keep scanning the area because there is a persistent thought in my head.
Is it possible that she was right?
My eyes narrow as I look around, searching for what she described but I still see nothing and I search the faces that are without a mask, looking for that specific stare that many offenders have but I see nobody with that gaze.
Besides it is impossible that Romeo followed us here. There was no car behind us for the last five miles of coming up here. And nobody at the police department knows I brought Melody to Fates Falls.
Well... that is not entirely true. Some officers in my team know that I have whisked her away but I told them that I would take her to a small town that is nowhere near this one. I did it as an extra precaution to make sure that the true information accidentally doesn’t spread.
The most obvious explanation is that she imagined, but I am still tense, still throwing suspicious looks around just because it is ingrained in my nature and Melody looks up at me.
“Are you worried? You are, aren’t you?”