Page 21 of Black Hearts
But another part of me didn’t want that. That other part of me wanted the Scott who’d been sent after him to catch him, find him, and drag him back to the mansion so I could hash things out with him.
And then a very deep, very dark part of me wanted my father to pay in the only way he deserved, to have his death in the same basement so many other people had lost their lives in. To have the Scotts end him. Not so much poetic justice as it would be cold, hard retribution.
I didn’t know which part of me was stronger, which part would actually get what it wanted, and at this point, I didn’t know if I should even care. Being stabbed and left for dead by the one man I used to think would keep me safe above all else might’ve left me a little jaded.
When the police arrived, they wanted to talk to me alone. Jaxon clearly didn’t want to leave me alone with two male officers, nor did Will and Bennet, but when I gave them a smile and told them it was all right, they managed to hold it in and give the officers and me some privacy.
“Sorry about them,” I said. “They’re very protective of me.” Protective, possessive. Same thing, right?
The two officers gave me trained smiles. I wouldn’t exactly describe either of them as warm or kind, but they were cops. They didn’t have to be, I supposed. One was tall and thin, one was short and stout, the yin to the other’s yang.
“That’s all right,” the taller one said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a small pad of paper. He and his partner stood at the foot of the bed, both pairs of eyes solely focused on me, now that the door was closed and we were alone. “Your boyfriend told us a little about what happened, but I need to hear your side of it, Miss Osborne.”
I didn’t think I’d ever heard anyone call me that before. I didn’t think I liked it.
Keeping everything Jaxon told me before in mind, I started to tell the two officers what happened. How my father was always very controlling, how he never liked me going out—not quite the whole truth, but pretty stinking close to it.
“What about your mother?” the shorter officer asked, hands on his hips. He, apparently, wasn’t taking notes. That was up to the taller guy. “She didn’t try to stop your father from doing any of this?”
“She’s been gone for… years,” I whispered, fiddling with my hands. “My father didn’t like talking about her. I never really asked questions. I didn’t want him getting mad at me.”
“Would you say your father has an anger problem?” the taller one spoke.
Uh, they knew he stabbed me, didn’t they? Tori must’ve rubbed off on me, because my first instinct was to give them a smart reply, but I managed to swallow it back and instead say, “Yes. He locks me in my bedroom when I do something he doesn’t like. He goes off, and it takes him a long, long time for him to calm down.”
“Has he ever laid hands on you before?”
“No, not before this. I mean, he’d grab me and drag me into my bedroom, throw me in there sometimes, but that’s it.”
The shorter cop asked, “Can you describe the events that led up to the stabbing? Any and every detail you can remember.” As he spoke, his partner was busy jotting things down, and I wondered if I’d already given him too much information.
I mean, they had to know that my father wasn’t a good guy, and fathers didn’t just stab their children out of the blue. They should know at least a part of the picture, even if they couldn’t be told the full thing. Anything involving the Scotts had to be kept secret. I wouldn’t be the one to spill the beans on them and what they did, even if I did think being hired as contract killers was wrong.
I told the police what I could, being as descriptive as possible. It was like reliving it all over again. How he locked me in my room, how I woke up to see my father standing in the darkness. I said that he came to me, choked me, smothered me, whatever you wanted to call it, and the next thing I knew, I woke up in the basement, fixed to a bed, wearing a nightgown that I wasn’t wearing before.
The more I said, the more intently the two officers seemed to listen. This wasn’t just a stabbing. No, this particular crime involved a whole lot of crazy.
And then I told the policemen what happened after I woke up in the basement. Most of what my father had said. I recapped the whole thing, though I kept the part about what he’d said about my mom to myself. I did say how he’d mentioned how disappointed in me he was. I might’ve fibbed a little, told them my father blamed Jaxon for me being impure.
Lastly, I told them how he stabbed me and left me for dead because I couldn’t be what he wanted me to be.
Yeah, when I said that, the two cops exchanged glances. Just a quick look, but I caught it, and I knew I’d painted my father in the worst light, in the craziest possible way—which was good, because he was crazy.
“And how did your boyfriend know to come find you when he did?” the taller cop asked, his pen finally slowing in its scribbling. Those dark eyes of his were on me, watching, waiting. I wouldn’t say he was suspicious, but they were waiting for something. It was almost like he knew there were parts of the story I wasn’t telling him and his partner.
I shrugged, or I tried to. Being propped up in a hospital bed wasn’t helping my body language much. “Luck, I guess. He hadn’t heard from me in a while, so I’m guessing he and his friends came to check in on me. He’s… he’s known about my father for a long time.”
The shorter cop nodded. “From what the doctor tells us, you’re very lucky your boyfriend decided to swing by. You’d be dead if he hadn’t found you.”
At that, my stomach burned. Or, I guess I should say, the wound. I didn’t like hearing that. Still, I managed to mutter a quiet, “I know.” As far as I was concerned, I’d told the two cops the whole story, so now it was my turn to ask a question: “Do you think you’ll catch him?”
“We’re doing our best,” the taller one said. “We have our best detectives looking to bring him in. I haven’t heard anything, but the moment he resurfaces, we’ll be there. We got a car near the house, waiting for him to come back.”
I kept my mouth shut at that, even though I didn’t think he’d come back. To come back to that house after doing what he did to me would be suicide. My father wasn’t the Hillside Stalker because of luck. No, he was smart when it came to running and hunting, and when it came to avoiding having any evidence that would point all fingers at him.
They asked me a few more questions, but after they got what they needed, they thanked me, told me to get better, and that they’d be in touch again soon. I didn’t know if that meant they’d have more questions for me or if they’d need me to come into the police station to write an official report. Or maybe they only said that because they’d need me if they caught my father.
I didn’t think they would, though. The more I thought about it, the more I believed the Scotts would get to him first.
