Page 33 of Quiet Protector
After exhaling a big breath, Isabelle returns her focus to the security officer. “Please inform Hugo that you have not seen me this afternoon.”
She clamps her hand around mine before sprinting for the glass revolving door of her building. “We need to reach Megan before Isaac’s team. She may talk to me. I’m less intimidating.”
That was my exact thought when I asked Phillipa to head to Megan’s hotel room after she unearthed her location by tracking her movements via the CTV cameras around Ravenshoe.
“I already have a friend on the way to her hotel—” My sentence is cut off by my cell phone buzzing in my pocket.
While digging it out, I hit the unlock button on my keys before gesturing for Isabelle to climb into the passenger seat. My heart beats in an unnatural rhythm when I see how many times Phillipa has attempted to call me the past twenty minutes. Since she didn’t leave a voicemail, I open her unread message first.
Phillipa:Don’t go to Megan’s motel. She’s dead.
When my eyes snap to Isabelle, instead of shocking her with the news of Megan’s death, I’m the one left reeling. Isabelle is no longer climbing into the passenger seat of my car. She’s being thrown to the ground by two officers double her weight and height.
When their knees landing in her back steals the air from her lungs as forcefully as it does mine, on instinct, I race to the other side of my car. I knock one officer off Isabelle with a stern punch to the face before grabbing a second officer in a sleeper hold. He’s out in less than the time it takes for a third officer to attempt to subdue me by pressing his gun to my temple.
Rookie mistake.
It takes me five-seconds to disarm him before I set my sights on the fourth officer pinning Isabelle to the ground by his big, bulky frame. Even outnumbered, I hold my own for the next six or seven minutes, only lessening the severity of my attack when Isabelle is handcuffed and placed into the back of a marked cruiser by a female officer.
As much as I believe the officers are in the wrong, I can’t hit a girl. I just can’t. Furthermore, I’m stunned by the officer’s disclosure that Isabelle is being arrested for the murder of Megan Shroud. Phillipa’s message was only received fifteen minutes ago. That’s nowhere near enough time to unearth a suspect, much less execute an arrest warrant.
“Get Isaac,” is the last thing I hear Isabelle say before my feet are pulled out from beneath me, and I’m pinned to the grimy sidewalk by three officers climbing onto my back while a fourth aims a taser at the vein working overtime in my neck.
* * *
Ten minutes after arriving at Ravenshoe PD, and twenty minutes after being arrested, the rattle of a key being slotted into an old lock jingles into my ears. Believing it’s an officer hoping to trick a confession out of me, I keep my eyes planted on my feet.
Inquisitiveness trickles through my veins when a gruff voice says, “For a man who swore an oath to defend the Constitution of the United States, you sure do get yourself in a lot of trouble.”
My curiosity shifts to shock when the face in my head doesn’t match the one peering back at me when I lift my head. From how rough his voice was, I thought Detective Carter was Harvey.
Even though I’m shocked, I’m too frustrated to hold back my retaliation. “Should you be quoting constitutional rights when you work in one of the most corrupt police departments I’ve ever come across?”
My anger loses some steam when Detective Carter doesn’t attempt to refute my statement. He either knows every word I speak is true, or he believes his department has nothing to answer for. Both responses are unacceptable, but before I can tell him that, he nudges his head to the open cell door. “You’re free to go.”
“Who paid my bail?”
Detective Carter enters my cell, his swagger highly noticeable. “Who said anything about bail?” He straightens my crinkled dress shirt with more aggression than what’s needed before lowering his eyes to my bruised knuckles. “Bail is only needed for criminals, don’t you know?”
After returning his eyes to mine, he waves his hand across his body, wordlessly offering to show me the way out. Although my suspicions are still high, I gather my coat from the bench my ass went dead on within two minutes of sitting on it, then enter the hallway.
Prisoners gripe about favoritism when I shadow Detective Carter past three overcrowded holding cells. I do a quick scan of each cell to make sure Isabelle isn’t in one of them, but within seconds, I realize Ravenshoe PD must separate their male and female lockups.
When our trip has us veering past the four officers I fought earlier, I tilt my wrists to ensure my cuffs sit low around my hands. Since I’m detained, the rigidness of the metal will make up for the restrictive range of my swings.
Confusion hits me for the second time when our walk past Ravenshoe PD’s breakroom occurs without incident. I thought Detective Carter was walking me to my death. I had no clue he’s actually showing me the way out until he stops me at the back-exit door to remove my cuffs.
Once he has the cuffs latched to his belt, he swings open the double-bolted door. “Have a wonderful night, Mr. James. We can only hope your short stay was a pleasant one.”
The suspicion thickening my blood drops to a safe level when my glance out the door has me stumbling onto a blacked-out Navigator. Assuming Phillipa used her family name for the greater good, I gallop down the back stairs of Ravenshoe PD before sliding into the popped open back passenger door.
Confusion steamrolls into me when I fail to detect Phillipa’s floral scent. This smell lingering in the air is spicy and masculine with the slightest hint of garlic.
Dimitri chuckles out a breathy laugh when I test the durability of his car’s locks. “You’d have a better chance of shooting out the bulletproof windows than getting its lock mechanisms to budge. I paid out the eye to make this thing a tank, but the quality of the product was worth its exorbitant price tag.”
After working my jaw side to side, I drag my eyes to Dimitri. “What do you want, Dimi—”
“Information.”
