Page 70 of Fourth Point Of Contact

“And why would you do that?” He leaned back against his desk, crossing his arms over his chest as he stared at me.

“Because I was running from my fiancé!”

“Was he hurting you?”

“No, but I sort of pissed him off when I rubbed his clothes with insulation.”

His eyes narrowed at me, so I hurried on. “He had it coming. He cheated on me the day after he proposed! What was I supposed to do?”

Patrick snorted from behind me, but I ignored him. He wasn’t doing me any favors right now.

“Can’t say I disagree with you there—if it’s true,” the cop said.

“It is! And he got rid of all my things, so I had to sneak into his office and find out where he sent all my stuff. But then he walked in on me and found me hiding in his closet at work, so I took off, but his goons followed me.”

“They chased you down, huh?”

“Yes! And I got to the airport and snuck past security?—”

“Piper—”

I ignored Patrick and finished my story. “—and traded clothes with a stewardess.”

“How’d you manage that?”

“A girl said I was walking her to the gate. She was only like fifteen, so they bought it.”

He nodded, and again, Patrick tried to intervene, but I pressed on.

“So, then I ran into Patrick and he took me with him, but when we were being chased, we stole a plane and took off. Except,somebodydidn’t know how to fly the plane and wenearly hit another plane mid-air! We had to jump out and I didn’t even have a parachute! He just latched me to him with a makeshift harness!”

I heard Patrick groan behind me, but pressed on.

“And then we were almost eaten by a bear! I lost my best friend’s shoes that she made me promise to return to her, and then he stepped in front of the bear for me and nearly got maimed to death?—”

“Was this before or after you lost your shoe?” the office asked.

“Before and after,” I cried. “I lost one when we were jumping out of the plane. And then I had to basically carry him to a cabin and break in so we could survive the night. It was horrible!”

The cop nodded, eyeing me warily. “Is that so?”

“I swear! Every second of it. It was horrible!”

“So…vandalism, theft, stealing private property, destroying private property, breaking and entering…am I missing anything?”

Confused, I looked back at Patrick, who was pinching the bridge of his nose again.

“What?”

“Just racking up the list of charges,” the cop chuckled. “Thanks for the help.”

I opened my mouth to ask what the hell he was talking about, but the door slammed behind him as he walked out. “What just happened?”

Patrick chuckled, leaning back against the wall. “Well, you just gave him everything he needed to get that prison sentence you thought you were going to have.”

16

PATRICK

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