Checking my messages, I read the ones from Liam. Dalton’s been taken to the hospital, Hunter went home to Lennon after he gave his brief statement, and he and the cops are now waiting for us in the living room. I take Sophie’s hand and kiss her knuckles.
“You sure you’re okay to do this?”
Sophie nods without hesitation. “I’m sure. I wanna get it over with for now.” She knows this won’t be the last time she has to talk about it.
Leading us downstairs, I try to mentally prepare myself for what is likely going to take a couple of hours. They’ll make sure my story matches Liam’s and Hunter’s and ask Sophie about every detail she can recall. I don’t want to relive this because it feels like déjà vu. The fact that my name is going to be involved again means it’s only a matter of time before my father comes barreling through my door.
“Miss Corrigan, I’m Officer Fisher, and this is Officer Gaunt. He’s going to observe while I take notes.”
“Hello.” Her voice is soft as she shakes his hand. “You can call me Sophie.”
“Of course.” He looks at me. “Mason, I presume.”
“Yes.” I shake his hand next.
Yep. Déjà vu.
At least I’m not getting cuffed and thrown into the back of a cop car this time.
I sit next to Liam with Sophie on my other side. We clasp hands, and when the silence takes over, it’s then I can see the blue and red lights still flashing outside. I imagine all our neighbors are out on the sidewalks, trying to figure out what happened. Kilan is going to freak when he finds out. The house he was trying to sell is now a crime scene.
“So Liam and Hunter have told us most of what happened, but I’d like to get your version.” Officer Fisher directs his words toward me. “Can you start from the beginning?”
I clench my jaw, thinking back to when Sophie first mentioned Dalton. “Well, I guess I should start with how I got arrested for killing his brother.”
The officer nods, clearly not fazed. He’s probably heard and seen so much shit in this city that nothing is out of the ordinary.
Several minutes later, I discuss how we went looking for Sophie, and when we got the text messages. Then I talk about how I recognized the dildo statue from Kilan’s house and Liam’s plan to go in first since he had a gun.
“What dildo statue?” Sophie asks me quietly, her brows pinched together.
“The one that Hunter knocked over,” I say. “I’ll explain later,” I tell her with a grin, then I direct my attention back to the officer. “Kilan was a friend of ours, and we partied together a lot, so we recognized it immediately when I saw it in one of the pictures he sent.”
“Can you tell me what you saw when you entered the house?” he asks. “Walk me through the events as you remember it.”
“Dalton had his gun pointed at Sophie’s head, spewing all kinds of threats at her. She was duct-taped to a chair and completely helpless. Just by looking at her, I could tell he’d hit and touched her. He’d sent pictures, so I knew she wasn’t able to defend herself. I went in after Liam and Hunter, and once the statue fell, Dalton shifted and directed his gun toward the other room. That’s when Liam shot his shoulder, and the gun fell from his hand. I charged forward, knocking him down, but he continued to struggle against me and reached for his gun. I tried to restrain him, but he continued to put up a fight, so Liam shot his leg. After a minute, Hunter held him down as I went to free Sophie. Liam held him at gunpoint while Hunter called 911, and I got us out of there. Then I brought her here.”
Recalling everything wasn’t easy, but I’m not going to let my best friends down, knowing my statement is needed to keep them out of any legal trouble. Sure, Dalton is the criminal here, but not calling the authorities as soon as we knew she’d been kidnapped could come back to bite us in the ass unless we have a solid case as to why we couldn’t. I’m not sure threats will be enough even though we all know what he was capable of.
“Got it, thank you,” he says as he finishes writing his notes. “Now, Sophie. I know this isn’t going to be easy for you, so we’ll take it as slow as you need to. According to Liam, you left the house earlier today with Maddie and Dalton. Can you tell me what happened after that?”
She swallows and nods, and it’s then I realize one of us needs to fill Maddie in on what happened if Lennon hasn’t already.