Page 219 of Finding Us
I smile at him, but my body is shaking. “Hey. Sorry I’m late.”
I give him a look, reminding him to pretend everything’s normal.
“Hey.” He gets my message but he still looks worried because he can feel that I’m shaking. He puts his arm around me as we walk.
“Are you her boyfriend?” the cop asks.
“He’s my husband,” I say.
“Oh.” The cop looks at us, like he’s trying to guess our ages.
I point to the gate. “So I saw a guy go out this gate and then I heard the fighting. I didn’t even know there was a gate here until today. Where does it go to? The street?” I try to play dumb so he won’t think I was anywhere near the crime scene.
“It’s not meant for students,” the cop says. “It goes to the faculty parking lot. And there’s a maintenance building back there.” He opens the gate.
“Okay, well anyway, that’s where I heard it.” I turn to leave, taking Garret with me.
“Wait.” The cop stops us. “Come here. I might need you to identity the guy you saw going through the gate. The one you think was involved in the fight.”
Garret squeezes my hand. He’s giving me a look like he wants an explanation but I can’t give him one. Not right now.
I’m realizing this was a really bad idea. I never should’ve said anything to the campus cop because now I’m going to be involved in whatever this is. I’ll be interviewed by the real cops and then there’ll be an investigation. And whatever comes after that.
“We really have to be going,” I tell the cop.
“It’ll just take a minute. You made me come all the way over here. You need to at least show me where to look.” The guy sounds annoyed. Seriously? Like he really has anything better to do? He just sits in the security guard station all day.
I hesitate because the killer might still be out there, although I’m sure he’s left by now. Why would he stick around?
“Are you coming?” He holds the gate open.
“Yeah. Okay.” I follow him through the gate with Garret right behind me.
“It sounded like they were over there.” I motion to the parking lot as we walk past the maintenance building.
“Nobody’s out here,” the cop says, walking ahead of us and scanning the lot.
“Maybe they’re in their cars.”
The cop checks some of the cars and as he does, Garret leans down and whispers, “What the hell’s going on?”
“I’ll tell you later,” I whisper back.
“They must’ve left.” The cop turns and walks back toward me.
I take a few steps to the right so I can see the area where the two bodies are lying. But they’re not there. I know they were between two cars but I wasn’t really paying attention to what the cars looked like. Maybe I have the wrong spot.
I walk around a little, checking between the other cars.
“What are you doing?” I hear the cop ask.
“Nothing.” I turn and smile. “I saw a cat running under the cars but she ran off. I really like cats.”
Garret’s looking at me like I’m crazy.
“Whatever fight you think you heard, it’s over now.” The cop motions us back to the gate. “Let’s go.”
He uses a key card to unlock the gate and when we’re back on campus, he just walks off.
