Page 58 of Another Love, Another Time

Auggie

I pull up to work, hoping to catch River before we go in. By the time the moms left, I barely had enough time to run home, take a shower, and change clothes. I had to leave before she came back to the house.

I want to make sure she’s okay. I need to talk to her, and I don’t want to put it off any longer. Now that we have everything out in the open, I’d like to discuss where we go from here.

I have a lot of groveling to do; I just hope she gives me the chance. I can’t lose her again. Everything is so crystal clear now. How the fuck could I not see through Melissa’s bullshit? I’m a detective, for crying out loud.

I shake my head in disappointment. When I head inside the station, I hear Mackey ask, “Is it true River broke psycho’s nose?”

I whip my head around and narrow my eyes. “How do you know about that?”

“Oh shit. It’s true, then. She had it coming.” He holds his fist up and laughs. “Psycho came in this morning and filed a report against River. As soon as River got here, the captain pulled her into his office. They’ve been in there for about ten minutes.”

I stop listening and immediately head in the direction of his office. I can’t believe this shit. River can’t be in trouble. Mackey’s right; Melissa had this coming.

I walk in without knocking. My captain looks up, and River turns around, eyes wide. I don’t wait for either of them to say anything.

“I don’t know what Melissa said, but River was just defending herself,” I explain. “I witnessed the whole thing. She’s lying.”

My boss rolls his eyes and gives me a stern look. “I know, Auggie. It doesn’t matter. I still have to question her. It’s standard procedure.”

“Well, I’m willing to write a statement on River’s behalf,” I say.

“Good to hear, but I don’t think that will be necessary. I’ll let you know if we do.” He looks at River. “I think we are all done here. I’ll let you know, River.” He nods. There’s a hidden meaning to his words that I don’t understand. She nods in return and gets up from the chair.

As we walk back to our desk, I ask her, “What was that?”

“He had questions about last night. I answered them,” she answers simply.

“No,” I start, but I realize that whatever it is, she doesn’t want me to know. I have to respect that until I can earn her trust again. I’m grateful she trusted me with the knowledge of who attacked her, and I need to trust that she made the right decision not turning the guy in.

I went to school with JD since elementary, and I would have never guessed he could have been capable of doing something like that to River. I still want to beat the shit out of him, though.

We reach our desks, and the guys start acting like they’re in a boxing match. River just shakes her head and laughs. Mackey comes up to her side and puts his arm around her. A stab of jealousy hits me even though I know he would never go there.

“Now I know why Baxter calls you ‘Rhondy.’” Mackey laughs at his own joke, and River follows along. She doesn’t try to remove his arm. “She fucking deserved it, though.” Mackey looks down at her. I feel my hands fist on both sides.

She nods. “You have no idea how long I’ve wanted to do that. It felt good.” She chuckles.

“Are you in trouble?” he asks.

She shakes her head. “No. It was considered self-defense since she was on my property without my permission. The captain spoke to some of my neighbors, and they confirmed that they heard me telling her to leave. Plus, Auggie confirmed my statement.”

He lifts the arm off her shoulders, and I feel like I can breathe again.

He raises his hand up for a high five, and she returns it.

“I’m predicting a lot of pats on the backs and high fives today,” he says with a smirk.

“There are a lot of people who don’t like her. ” Finished, he walks back to his desk.

“You ready?” I ask her.

“Yeah. Let me run to the restroom. I’ll meet you in the truck,” she tells me.

~~

We’ve been running around all morning, following up on leads. We work well together, bouncing ideas off one another. She hasn’t brought up last night, but we really haven’t had time. Most of our conversations pertain to the leads we’ve followed up on.

We both start getting hungry, and she wants to stop at Java Jive for lunch. It’s one of her favorite places to stop when we are out. Of course, she argues with me when I pay for our meals. When we pick out a table to sit at, she tells me she has to run to the restroom.

While sitting at the table, I’m shocked to see someone from high school, one of Melissa's ex-boyfriends. He was with her the night of Logan’s bonfire, the one she said had cheated on her.

After that night, he gave me dirty looks at school, which never made sense if he had cheated on her.

Seeing him today is one hell of a coincidence, especially after everything that came out last night.

He catches me looking at him, and his eyes widen. I don’t think he’s seen me since high school either. I think I heard he moved away for college.

He’s talking to a girl who looks to be our age, but I can’t see her face. He gets out of his seat and walks over to my table.

“Hey, Auggie. Long time no see.” He gives me a big smile.

“Hey, man. It’s been a while. Since high school?”

He shakes his head like he can’t believe it but laughs. “Yeah. It’s been at least since then.” He’s silent for a minute, like he’s contemplating something. “You know, I wasn’t a big fan of you in high school.”

I furrow my brows. “I knew you didn’t care for me, but I never knew why.”

“You didn’t? I thought it was obvious.” He gives me a moment to think.

He finally has mercy on me when he says, “The morning after Logan’s bonfire, I saw Melissa get out of your tent.

I had been looking for her all night. She had picked a fight with me the night before, and by the time I went after her, I couldn’t find her.

” He shakes his head again. “Turns out I should be thanking you.” He laughs.

I explain, “She told me she caught you cheating on her with one of her friends, and she needed a place to sleep.”

He laughs again. “I always knew she had a thing for you, but when she pursued me, she said all the right things. I should have stayed the hell away from her. I think when I found out she had been with you, my pride was hurt more than my feelings. I don’t know if you remember Liza; she was my girlfriend before Melissa, but she broke up with me before I got with Melissa.

“I loved Liza, and I was heartbroken when she broke up with me out of nowhere, without an explanation. So, when Melissa started hanging out with me, I got with Melissa to hurt her.”

He glances at his lap in shame, but when he looks up, he’s smiling.

“But things have a funny way of working out. After I broke up with Melissa, I stayed away from other girls. Liza was a year younger than us, but it wasn’t until my sophomore year of college that Liza and I reconnected.

When I asked why she broke up with me in high school, she told me that Melissa had blackmailed her into it.

Her parents didn’t want her to date, and I guess Melissa had taken pictures of us together and threatened to tell her mom and dad.

“Melissa scared the hell out of her; she didn’t know what to do, so she broke up with me.” He’s still smiling. “It all worked out in the end. We’re married and have a little one on the way.” He points at his wife at their table, who is now looking at us, and I notice she’s about ready to pop.

I think about everything he just told me.

If I wasn’t already convinced that Melissa forced herself on me that night, I’d be convinced now after talking to her ex-boyfriend that she set the whole thing up.

Hell, at this point, I wouldn’t put it past her to be the reason River couldn’t make it that weekend.

“Yeah, I was kind of late to the game on that one,” I say, then mumble, “Fucking late as hell.” I continue, “Congratulations, by the way. That’s great!”

“Thanks. I appreciate it. I just wanted to come say ‘hi’ and bury the hatchet.” He holds out his hand for me to shake.

“Consider it buried.” I reach out my hand and shake his hand. Then, he turns and walks back to his table, where his wife sits. They must have called our number while I was talking because River is bringing our food to our table.

“Who was that?” River asks as she places our food on the table and pulls out her chair. I don’t want to bring up anything about the night I lost my virginity, but it happened. She knows there’s no use in sugarcoating it.

“Believe it or not, but that was one of Melissa’s ex-boyfriends. Actually, that’s the guy she went with on the night of the bonfire.”

River’s eyes widen in memory of my story. “What did he want?”

“Well, he wanted to bury the hatchet.” I go into detail, telling her what he said about the blackmail and her picking a fight with him. She doesn’t seem surprised by any of it. She just listens intently.

“You don’t look surprised,” I tell her.

She takes a bite of her wrap, and she shrugs. “Because I’m not surprised. At this point, I don’t put anything past her, but this makes me think. If she did this to people other than you, me, and JD, we may be able to build a case against her.”

I think for a minute. After everything she’s done, she deserves to be put behind bars. She is obviously not remorseful, and she has gotten away with everything for way too long.

“I need to reach out to one of my first partners,” I say. “We were only partners for a month, but after that, she transferred out to another district. It’s possible Melissa blackmailed her to get her to transfer.”

“Melissa said something like that to me the other night,” River adds.

“That’s what she wanted, for me to submit a request to change partners.

I told her ‘no,’ and she said I’d be sorry.

The only thing she has on me would also put her behind bars.

Reach out to your old partner and see what she says. We may have a case.”