The Penalty Box (Vancouver Wolves Hockey #3)(87)
I looked up at the television. There was a shot of an apartment that I barely remembered. Police were putting up yellow tape and a police van was pulling up in front.
“That’s weird.”
The news reporter stepped in front of the camera. “As you can see, police are taking this missing person’s report very seriously. This young woman seems to have been abducted in the middle of the night. Her friends and family say that it’s extremely unlikely that she would go anywhere without her phone, and it’s reported that she didn’t take any ID or her wallet. At this time, the police are considering this situation highly suspect. This case is eerily similar to the Jody Cameron case. Jody is a young nursing student who went missing without a trace in the new year. Police are looking to see if there is any connection between the two women.”
Charlie looked worried. “I wonder what happened to her.”
I debated my options, wondering if it would be overkill to hire a full-time security team to watch the house.
She glanced up at me. “You dated Sabrina before me, right?”
I clarified. “She gave me a blow job once. I woke up to her going through my phone. That was the one and only time I hooked up with her.”
I didn’t like the look on Charlie’s face when I said the word blow job. “That was months ago. Way before I met you.”
She nodded. “Yeah. Fine. All water under the bridge, right?”
*
I was coming out of the shower when Charlie walked into the bathroom. She had a scared look on her face.
“Mica, the police are here to talk to you.”
“What for?”
She swallowed. “They want to ask you about Sabrina.”
I got dressed and found none other than Detective Wallace, standing in my living room, looking out over the view.
“Quite the place you have here.”
“What do you want?”
Charlie moved to stand beside me.
Detective Wallace turned and gave me a benign smile. “Why are you always at the center of my investigations?”
“Shit detective work?”
“What do you know about the disappearance of Sabrina?”
“Nothing.”
“Did you have a relationship with her?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Positive.”
He hummed. “So, can you explain why these text messages were the last messages on her phone?”
He started to read from his own piece of paper. “You’ve been a very bad boy. You told me you were going to tell your wife about us. Tell your wife about me, or I will. That was our deal. I’m your little addiction. I’ll be in front of the antique-style clock at noon tomorrow.”
Beside me, Charlie gasped.
Fuck my life.
I looked at Charlie. “It’s not what you think.”
Detective Wallace look pleased with himself. “Are you denying that you had anything to do with Sabrina’s disappearance?”
“She’s not part of my life. I had nothing to do with her disappearance.”
“Hmmm,” he hummed. “We’ll see about that, won’t we?”
*
After he left, I followed Charlie into the bedroom. “Can we talk?”
She spun around and looked stressed. “What’s going on?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know.”
“Are you telling me you had nothing to do with her while we were married?”
Anger made my eyes narrow. “Are you really fucking asking me that?”
She flushed. “Answer the question.”
“I didn’t cheat on you. I would never cheat on you.”
But I could see the doubt in her eyes before she shut the bathroom door in my face.
*
It pissed me off that Charlie thought I could cheat on her, much less harm another human being. I drove her to work in silence, and she wasn’t exactly talking either.
When I pulled up to the front of her building, I tried once more. “Sabrina was a pest, but I didn’t cheat on you. Not once. I would never cheat on you.”
“What is going on, then? What about those texts?”
“She sent me those texts, and I told her to back off.”
“Why don’t the detectives see you telling her to back off in the texts?”
This conversation was going in the wrong direction. “I met up with her and told her in person.”
Charlie’s eyes went wide. “Excuse me?”
“In a public place. I told her to back off and leave you alone.”
“She told me that was your pet name for her,” she cried.
What the actual fuck? “What pet name?”
“Your little addiction. She told me that is what you called her. She said that you flew her to your away games, and that she was with you when you called me.” Charlie was fighting tears as she tried to open the car door.
I grabbed her arm and forced her to look at me.
Desperation tinged my voice. “That never happened. There were no pet names, I never flew her anywhere. She is a troublemaker, and I told her repeatedly to get out of our lives.”