Part 32 (1/2)

It doesn't matter how many times I've thought those words in the last few minutes, each time they're like a punch in the stomach.

He wants to kill himself, and I had no idea. No idea. I thought I understood, and I was so d.a.m.ned proud of myself for that, for doing the research, for trying to understand what he's going through, because I wanted to be the one who got it.

I wanted to be the one who helped him.

No, I wanted to be the one who saved him.

The thought is like grinding a fist on my punched stomach, and it's all I can do not to double over and retch. Save him? Really? How pathetic is that? How arrogant is that? I couldn't save the Porters. I couldn't save Sandy or Gideon or Maria or Aaron or Lorenzo. I didn't do a d.a.m.ned thing for any of them. But by G.o.d, I was going to save Max. I'd be the one person who believed in him, and I'd do more than believe in himI'd storm out of that hospital and I'd clear his name, and I'd set him free.

Free.

To kill himself.

Because that's what he wants, and I never saw it. Never had any idea. Oh, but I understand his situation. Really I do.

No, I don't. I had no idea what he was going through. I saw the despair and the hopelessness. I saw the frustration and the rage. I saw the absolute agony in his face when he talked about strangling his friend, about what it felt like to do that, to live with doing that, to live with knowing he could do that again.

I saw the fear when he kept warning me to be careful around him, and I knew he was thinking he could do the same to me, but I didn't really understand what that means to him. To say ”I like this girl” and ”I want to be with this girl, but I can't, because I don't know if I'll wake up in the night and wrap my hands around her throat and maybe I never will but I can't live with the possibility.”

I can't live with the possibility.

I still want to save him.

I think that's the worst of it. I still want to take his hand and tell him he can get through this. That I'll help him. We'll come up with a strategy, and he'll see things aren't as bad as he thinks, and it'll all be fine. Right as rain.

Complete and utter bulls.h.i.+t.

It will not be fine, and whatever he decides to do about that is his choice. Not mine. Not his mother's or his father's. Because this isn't about us. Those notes aren't a cry for help. He isn't angry and looking to hurt someone. This is about him. Entirely about him. And I don't want it to be. Because I care about him, and I don't know how to care about someone who's thinking of ending his life, how to take that risk when everything already hurts so much, when I'm barely walking through life myself.

I'm huddled in my corner of the backseat now. He's retreated to his, and that's as clear an answer as any. He doesn't want my help. Doesn't need it. And I feel so alone. I feel like I finally found somethingfound someone, found what I needed to get through all this, someone to lean on and laugh with and talk toand ... no. That's not what I found at all. I'm sinking, and I didn't grab a life preserver, I grabbed an anchor, and either I let go or I sink with it, and I don't want to let go. I don't want to let go.

I feel something touch my fingers, and I see Max's hand, his pinkie hooking mine. I lift my gaze, and he works on something like a smile, he works so d.a.m.n hard at it, and I ... I burst into tears.

It's not what I want to do. It's the last thing I want to do. But I see his expression and the tears come, and he moves fast, stretching in the seat belt, his cuffed hands taking mine, and I fall against him and he whispers, ”I'm sorry, Riley. I'm so, so sorry. I don't want to hurt you. I never want to”

”That's enough,” Buchanan says. ”Get away from her, Max.”

”Just a moment,” Max says. ”Please. I'm still handcuffed. Just give me a moment.”

”I said get the h.e.l.l away from her, you psycho”

”Stop that,” I snarl, pulling away from Max. ”Act like a d.a.m.ned professional.”

”Excuse me?” Buchanan twists in his seat. ”Don't you tell me”

”Enough,” Wheeler says. ”You get back from him, Riley. You too, Max.”

His voice is oddly rough, like he's lowering it, and that doesn't matter, because as soon as he speaks, I don't hear Riley and Max. I hear Miss Riley and Maximus. And I stare at his profile. I stare as hard as I can, my heart thumping.

When Wheeler first got into the car, Max made a smart-a.s.s comment and Wheeler had given him a look, and that look ... something about that look ... I'd flinched, because in that flash of a second I'd seen eyes behind a gray mask. It had pa.s.sed in a blink. Memory playing tricks on an exhausted mind.

”So you can talk,” I say, and somehow I manage to make it sound casual, though my heart thuds like it's ready to burst from my chest.

Wheeler grunts and turns his attention to the road.

”How long have you two been on the force?” I ask.

”What? Are you questioning our credentials now?” Buchanan says, and I struggle to hear another voice in his, to hear Predator, but it's not there.

”I'm just making conversation,” I say.

”Twelve years,” Buchanan says.

”And you, Detective Wheeler? Now that we've established you're not mute.”

”Fifteen,” Wheeler says.

d.a.m.n it, I need to hear him talk ... in more than one-word answers.

”And before you were on the major crimes squad? Any other units?”

I don't hear the reply, because as soon as I think of other units, I think of the SWAT team, which makes me think of hostage negotiations, and a memory flashes. An audio one. A voice on the phone, a little distorted.

The hostage negotiator.

I look at Buchanan. Even as the theory was forming in my headthe unbelievable theory that Wheeler is GrayI thought Buchanan played no role in it. He clearly wasn't Predator. But there was another person involved that night. One I was certain survived. The man on the phone. The fake hostage negotiator.

CHAPTER 35.

I look over sharply at Max. I'm trying to figure out how to tell him, but his gaze is fixed on Buchanan with such intensity that I know he's caught something too. He looks over at Wheeler and he's searching, a little hesitant now, and when he notices me watching, he pulls back fast, and I can tell he's second-guessing.

I tap the gray vinyl on my door handle. I point to the gray lettering on my s.h.i.+rt. Then I direct my finger to Wheeler. And Max's eyes close with such relief that he swallows and nods. He's not imagining the connection. And as soon as that first flicker of relief pa.s.ses, his eyes fly open with such an ”Oh, s.h.i.+t!” look that it ignites my own panic.

We're in the car with Gray.

Gray and his accomplice.

They aren't really police detectives. They fooled everyone at the hospital. The real police got Max's story, and they knew it wasn't him, and they lost interest and ...

The manifesto.

It was in the papers. The papers blamed Max. The papers mentioned the manifesto. There's no way in h.e.l.l the police wouldn't be questioning me and preparing to arrest Max and ...

And if the police are investigating, and these are the only detectives we've seen ...

They're not pretending to be cops.