Today's Promises (Promises #2)(52)

“Christ. Thank God she’s all right.”

I’m down the stairs and out back in no time.

“Jaynie…” I wrap her in my arms the second she’s out of the car. “Where the hell were you all day, babe?” I stare into her eyes and brush back a lock of hair. “You didn’t answer any of my calls, and I must’ve made about fifty. Fuck, I was going crazy with worry, sweetheart.”

“Flynn, I am so, so sorry,” she breathes out.

I hug her again. “Babe, what happened?” I ask.

“I f*cked everything up,” she chokes out against my shoulder. “I should never have gone back to the Lowry place.”

Oh, shit.

“Jaynie, what’d you do? Why in the hell would you go back there?”

“I couldn’t let you go down for us,” she cries. “Keeping Allison in prison wasn’t worth you going to jail, Flynn.”

Uh-oh, this sounds bad.

I draw back and say quietly, “We should talk about this inside.”

We’re all alone, but still, the alley is no place for a conversation like this.

Back up in our room, Jaynie proceeds to tell me everything. She reiterates how she couldn’t let me go down for planting evidence, and then details how she went to the barn and dug up the towel and the knife.

She tells me how Detective Silver showed up and caught her red-handed, which leaves me muttering, “Fuck, f*ck, f*ck,” as I scrub a hand down my face.

“He figured it all out, Flynn,” she says quietly. “Every last bit of it.”

“I could’ve warned you he was coming,” I mutter, “if you’d picked up before you got there.”

“I had no cell service,” she replies, which I know is the truth. “And, besides, it’s not like you knew what I was doing.”

She’s right on that one. Had I known I would’ve stopped her.

I blow out a breath. “Just thank God you’re okay.” And then it hits me, the full implications of her story. “Wait.” I peer over at her, confused. “How are you even here with me in this apartment? How are you not down at the police station, under arrest? Not that I’m not overjoyed that you are here, but how are you here?”

“Detective Silver let me go” is Jaynie’s easy-going response. Like this happens every day, the police letting criminals go.

“He let you go?” To say I’m in a state of disbelief would be an understatement.

“Yes,” she replies.

“Even after he admitted that he knew I stole the blood and that he’s aware we created fake evidence?” Before she can reply, I add, “Oh, and let’s not forget you were tampering with that fake evidence, pretty much right in front of his face.”

“Yes, I was,” she admits.

“Yet, after all that, he was willing to look away?”

“Yes, Flynn, that’s pretty much how it all went down.”

“Why?” I ask. “Why let us off the hook like that?”

She shrugs. “I don’t know, but let’s not question it too much. Let’s just be happy we finally have someone in our corner.”

Shaking my head, I reply, “That’s fine with me. But I’m still shocked. He always claimed to have our backs, and—”

“He definitely does,” Jaynie finishes for me.

Arching a brow, I say, “You do realize there is one bad thing in all of this, right?”

“That Allison will walk now,” she replies. “Yes, I know. But she would’ve walked anyway, if I’d destroyed the evidence.”

“Would you have, though?” I eye her intently, searching for the truth of how far she was willing to go. “Or were you planning on planting that shit somewhere else?”

“I never got that far,” she answers, looking sheepish and guilty as hell. “Detective Silver showed up prior to my deciding.”

Sighing, I say, “Well, it’s over. And it’s probably for the best all the way around. It’s not like it was real evidence.”

“True.” Jaynie crosses her arms and shakes her head. “God, though. I hate that there was nothing up there, nothing real, to keep Allison behind bars.”

Suddenly feeling more optimistic than I have in ages, probably due to the fact we received a huge break today, I say, “Hey, you never know. Maybe Detective Silver will feel compelled to look around one final time. And maybe something will turn up if he does.”

Jaynie then hands me her cell, and says, “Forget about maybes, Flynn. I think we should call him, beg him if we have to, but let’s make sure he takes one more look before he closes the case.”





Jaynie



We call and ask, but Detective Silver makes no promises one way or the other. He does tell us the usual: “If I decide to go back to the Lowry property, you two will be the first to know.”

“Fair enough,” Flynn replies.

Exhausted from the day and all that’s happened, Flynn and I decide to go to bed early. We’re asleep within minutes, but I awake hours later with a start.

Flynn is up in an instant as well. He’s that attuned to my night terrors.

“Bad dream?” he asks, propping himself up on one elbow.