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I looked desperately at Claire.

‘Do you need a minute, Jessie?’ she said softly.

‘No,’ I murmured. ‘I thought you – the police – would think I’d killed him.’

‘Did you kill him?’

‘No,’ I said as clearly as I could.

‘Did you want to kill him?’ Detective Beaufort asked.

‘I wanted him to stop hurting me.’ That wasn’t an answer to her question. We both seemed to know that.

‘He was hurting you?’ she asked, her tone a little more gentle now.

I nodded.

‘Did he rape you?’

‘No,’ I whispered.

‘But he was physically abusive,’ she clarified.

‘Yes.’

‘You don’t have to tell me about it now, if you don’t want to,’ she said, leaning forward a little. ‘But I’m here to listen if you do.’

I shook my head. ‘I don’t know if I can.’

‘That’s okay. I have a few more questions. Can we keep going?’

‘Sure,’ I croaked.

‘Did you tell anyone about the abuse? Did you maybe ask someone to kill him for you?’ Detective Beaufort asked.

I wondered where Brooke was. What they were asking her. I wondered if her parents were already on a flight down to Atlanta to pick her up, and what would happen to her then. My breath hitched, and I could feel the clawing panic creeping over my chest.

‘Jessie?’ Detective Beaufort prompted, shaking me out of my downward spiral.

‘No,’ I said again. ‘No, I didn’t kill him, I didn’t ask anyone to kill him for me and I don’t know who killed him. I don’t. I’m sorry.’

‘Okay, Jessie,’ she said. ‘We’re going to arrange for you to be sent back to Seattle. Seattle PD will want to talk to you since this is their case.’

‘I’m not …’ I’d already been arrested. ‘Being charged?’

‘We’re not detaining you, no. Since you’re a minor, we’ll make sure you get home safely.’

I wanted to scream. This was all wrong, so wrong, and I didn’t know how to tell them that going back to Seattle and my mom was worse than anything they could do to me.

I looked desperately at Claire. ‘Is Brooke coming too?’

‘I’m sorry – as I said, I can’t tell you anything about Brooke.’ She’d put her notebook away in her leather backpack and it looked like she was getting ready to go. I couldn’t understand how the conversation could be over already.

‘But … but …’

This didn’t feel right at all. The panic rose up inside me again, clutching at my throat.

‘I don’t understand,’ I said, my voice catching and breaking.