Chapter 22: I’m So Sorry

I nodded at Susan as she glanced at me in the rear-view mirror.

“Yeah,” I said.

Hana looked over from the passenger seat.

“I saw it too,” she remarked.

“Was—” Susan began, but didn’t finish.

I nodded again.

“Yeah,” I told her once more.

We were heading to Hana’s mechanic to get her car. Normally, Susan would have just taken it herself, and I’d stay at the bookstore—but things weren’t exactly normal.

Which became even clearer just a few minutes ago at a light. It had just turned green when a car passed us, and in the passenger seat was something—or someone—in a leather puppy hood with floppy ears. It was quick. A blur. But we all saw the same thing.

“Is that you?” Hana then asked.

“Yeah,” I replied. “It’s in my purse.”

Hana was going to reach around to the back seat when I told her whoever it was—it could wait.

When we got to the shop, we waited in Susan’s car while Hana squared things away with her mechanic. Then Susan helped me get into hers. I just wasn’t interested in standing around a mechanic shop in a skirt, heels, and restraints, getting gawked at.

Which, of course, happened anyway as I moved from one car to another—but at least it was quick. As quick as it could be. I had to go back with Hana for obvious reasons, but we were heading to the station anyway, while Susan returned to the bookstore.

On the way back, I also got to see who had texted earlier. Hana pulled my phone from her purse and handed it to me at a light. It was Jeffrey. He’d heard from Agent Myers, and we had an appointment with her later in the week.

That was good news. I’d learned to live with the restraints, but the constant coordination of things—even to just pick up a car—sucked.

I hoped that maybe there was some headway, that Megan and her friends were being indicted and the state would drop the charges against me. But I didn’t kid myself. Things were never as easy as they should be.

Which I was reminded of when Hana had to pull over—her car was overheating. Steaming, actually. So much for getting it fixed.

It had taken a while, but eventually, we made it back to the bookstore. I called Susan, who found us on the side of the road. Hana called her mechanic, and he called the towing company. So, by the end of it all, we ended up exactly where we had started—except, no leather dog hood sightings on the way back.

Honestly, I’d take that any day over standing on the side of the road, people gawking and slowing down, because we didn’t feel safe sitting in a car that was, well ... puffing out white smoke.

I was pretty sure I’d be hearing about calls into the sheriff’s office once I got to work—about a woman in a skirt and heels, seen chained up on the side of the road.

When we finally got back to the store, we dropped Susan off, since Andrew was manning it by himself. Then Hana drove us to the station.

And, as I suspected, people had called about a woman in restraints. I assumed it was about me—expecting the descriptions to be something like a woman in a skirt and heels, in prison restraints, hobbling along the shoulder of the road, and then moving into another non-police car, like I was part of some kind of prison break.

But it wasn’t. The calls weren’t about me. Or Becca. Or even Sophie. They were about someone else.

With Hana knowing nothing about it, I hobbled into Sheriff Collins’s office to let him know. He seemed aware of it—that it was somehow related to the prison situation from last week—but he didn’t offer any details. Only that there was another woman in town, in prison restraints, in transport. And judging by his demeanor, he wasn’t happy about it.

He quickly changed the subject, talking instead about my upcoming meeting with the FBI later in the week—Thursday—since there was some news regarding the ongoing investigation. But he couldn’t say what. Honestly, I don’t think he knew.

The rest of the week settled back into the usual routine. I spent Tuesday and Wednesday with Hana at the station. There were a few more calls on Tuesday—again about that other woman. I logged them and handed them over to Hana, who took them up with the sheriff. But he told her the same thing he had told me yesterday: he was aware of the matter and that we should just tell people from now on that we know and that they’re safe.

The only other information I could find out was that it was related to the prison incident from last week, just as Sheriff Collins had said. I also learned that she was considered high-risk—so much so that she had to be in maximum-security transport restraints at all times. Hana told me that she was an escapee, and usually those individuals were always restrained.

It was a situation similar to mine—well, not the escaping part—and unlike me, this wasn’t just some misunderstanding. It sounded serious. It sounded like she really needed to be in them.

Wednesday was more of the same. People came in all day with all kinds of stories and complaints—only nuttier than usual. The best one came at the end of the day. The weather was awful. Rain was coming down in sheets—not the kind of thing you wanted to be out in, especially driving. So, of course, there were accidents.

One of the deputies mentioned he had just come back from handling one on the interstate just before leaving town. A truck had hit a guardrail. Nothing serious—no one was hurt. But he told the deputy he’d lost control after he glanced into a passing car and thought he saw a woman in the back seat. Bound up like a dog in leather.

The state trooper who later arrived, of course, had to make sure the guy hadn’t been drinking. He hadn’t—just tired, apparently. He was cited and told to park somewhere and get some sleep.

And, of course, Thursday we were back at the station in the late afternoon to speak with Agent Myers. We’d closed the bookstore since Andrew had to be at the shop—which was fine.

But traffic had dropped off anyway, and what was keeping us afloat was the little money I was making working for the sheriff’s office. I just knew we were going to be in trouble in a few months—there was no way we’d be able to cover the property taxes. But the hope was that I’d be out of these cuffs, the charges dropped, and I’d beg my boss to take me back at the department store.

We sat in the same room we normally did. The only difference was that I wasn’t chained to the table.

And that’s when the agent spelled it all out for us.

“What does that mean?” Susan asked.

But she didn’t let the agent answer. She just repeated what she thought she had heard.