Girl, 11 by Amy Clarke (grave mercy TXT) 📗

Ayaan’s expression stayed neutral. “Right this way, Miss Delaney.” She led them toward an interview room, Elle trailing behind.

The lawyer paused outside the door. “I’d like a few minutes alone with my client.”

“Certainly.” Ayaan let them into the room and shut the door behind them, turning to Elle. “You don’t have to stay, you know. But thank you. For all your help. Are you sure you’re not hurt from before?”

Elle shook her head. “I’m fine. Sore, but nothing a long bath won’t fix.” She nodded at the room. “What are you thinking, with this guy?”

Ayaan chewed the corner of her lower lip. It was the first time Elle had ever seen her look uncertain. “I’m not sure. He’s a good suspect, but I don’t like that we didn’t find any sign of Amanda in the townhouse. They’re taking samples from his car now, but it’ll be at least a few days before we know anything. If he’s holding her somewhere else—”

“It’ll be too late.”

“He’s a sex offender with a known relationship to the family and matches the physical description of the man the student said she saw in the area,” Ayaan said, as if trying to convince herself. “It almost has to be him.”

The phone in her office rang, and Ayaan rushed past Elle to pick it up. While she spoke in hushed tones, Elle went to sit in the dark, empty office next to the commander’s. She stared at the clock on the wall. It was nearly three in the afternoon. Amanda had been missing for more than thirty hours. The clock ticked loudly in the shadows, marching forward with no regard for how each second that passed made it less and less likely that Amanda would be found alive. A rush of unexpected panic made Elle light-headed, and she closed her eyes.

Just like that, she was no longer in the police station. She was huddled in a cold, isolated room, alone and terrified. Fear coursed through her body as the sound of the ticking clock was blocked out by a man’s footsteps as he came up the stairs. The door opened on soundless, oiled hinges; it shut with a soft click. He walked toward her. She tried to pull away, but her body would not listen to her mind. The nausea, the pain—it threatened to swallow her whole, blacked the vision in her eyes.

Her phone vibrating against her right thigh snapped Elle out of the flashback. She quickly dug it out of her pocket. Martín.

“Hi.” Her voice was breathless.

“Hey, I just wanted to check on you. Are you all right?”

Elle stood up and shut the office door. “Yes, I’m fine.”

“Are you sure? You sound kind of shaky.”

“I will be fine, Martín. I can handle this.”

For a moment, he was quiet. Then he said, “I know you can, but you don’t have to. You can’t help everyone. You were already so focused on the TCK case that you’ve hardly slept in weeks. Then you started chasing down family for a guy who wrote in to your show and ended up killed. And now you’re adding something new? A little girl’s kidnapping?”

A sharp headache started in Elle’s eye, radiated backward. She leaned forward, elbows on her knees, and rubbed her temple with her free hand. “I can handle it. I’ve hit a dead end with Leo’s case anyway.”

“It’s just, last time you got involved in an active kidnapping, it didn’t go so well.”

Elle was suddenly glad she’d gone into a room where no one could see her. The hollow, trembling aftershocks of her flashback gave way to anger that stiffened the muscles in her jaw. “That was a long time ago, Martín. I have a lot more experience with cases like this now.”

“Mi vida, I believe in you. I trust you, if this is what you want to do. I just don’t want you to feel like you have to . . . to please everyone. I’m only trying to make sure you’re okay. I have never seen you like this, taking so many risks.”

“I’m fine. I don’t need you to protect me.” Elle scrubbed her hand across her face. “I’ll see you at home, if I can remember how to get there without your help.”

“Elle—”

She ended the call, turned her phone off, and slipped it back into her pocket. Her breath was coming in short bursts, and she stopped to inhale, long and slow, through her nose. So many people thought they knew what she could handle better than she did. Usually, her husband wasn’t one of them, though. The TCK case was always going to be a major one, something that required 110 percent of her time. And there was no way she could have known she’d be asked to help with a kidnapping, but how could she say no? If she could help, she had to be here. Martín was probably trying to call her again, but she resisted the urge to turn her phone back on to check. They’d figure it out when she got home.

The sound of Ayaan’s voice at the door made her jump. “We’ve got the presumed abduction vehicle on security camera footage,” she said, her eyes sparking with excitement. “Are you okay?”

“Yep.” Elle forced a smile, jumped up, and followed Ayaan into her office. She dragged a chair around to sit next to the commander on her side of the desk, looking at the windows lined up on her monitor.

Ayaan pointed at the screen. “We’ve got footage from six security cameras at businesses in the area. It’s from the hour before through the hour after Amanda was taken.”

“Have you watched it?” Elle asked.

“Yes, we think we have the van that was used for the kidnapping. At least, it matches the description the bus driver gave us: plain dark blue, with no license plates.”

Ayaan hit a key on her computer, and the videos started at the same time. White digits counted the passing time down to the millisecond in the bottom right