Breaking Free (3 page)

“I don’t believe you.”

“You don’t believe I love you?”

The tension in the room was so thick, it would take a machete to cut through it. I had no idea what I’d done to piss her off, though. I’d told her I loved her and wanted to spend the rest of my life with her. She should be happy. Unless she didn’t love me as much as she claimed… Maybe she really was playing me.

“Yes, but—”

“What the fuck is with you?” I asked, sitting up. “Is this all a game to you? Do you enjoy fucking with me? Are you just leading me on, pretending to care about me so you can reel me in and then destroy me?”

“What are you talking about?” She looked stunned. “Do you seriously think that?”

I knew I should keep my mouth shut, but it was too late. The rage was consuming me, blocking out any sense of reason or fear. “What the hell am I supposed to think? I saw your fucking ex feeling you up in the middle of the goddamn dance floor tonight!”

She threw up her arms, turning her back to me. “Are we back to that again? You know what? You’ve got a real problem. You need help.”

She wasn’t the first person to tell me that. My old man had suggested anger management classes the last time I was hauled into the station on an assault charge because some guy had spilled a beer on me in a crowed bar.

“Yeah, I’ve got a problem. You’re my problem! I’m sick of being with a woman who treats me like I’m not worthy of being seen with her.”

“What are you talking about?” she asked, stepping back, closer to the door. “I was with you in public tonight. I danced with you in front of my ex. I introduced you to my friends. I don’t know what more I can do to prove that I’m committed to you and this relationship.”

“I told you what you can do—marry me. Prove you’re serious about building a life with me.”

“You know I can’t do that,” she said, her voice softening. “And it’s not because I don’t care about you.”

“You care about me?” I exploded. “I thought you loved me.”

“I do, but I won’t be bullied into getting married.” She made her way to the door. “You know what? I’m not doing this anymore.”

I was out of the bed and across the room before she could reach for the door handle. Grabbing her shoulders, I said, “What the fuck is that supposed to mean? You’re ending it?”

“Yes.” She peeled my hands off her. “This isn’t healthy for either of us. It’s too much, too consuming. I’m not ready for this kind of relationship.”

“Maybe you should have thought of that before you made me fall in love with you!”

“I didn’t
make
you fall in love with me. That was your choice.” She opened the door a crack, and I slammed it shut, making her jump.

“You were the one strutting around your parents’ pool in those goddamn string bikinis, giving every guy on my crew a raging hard-on. You were the one asking me to take a break so I could cover you with sunscreen! You were being a fucking cock tease. Every one of those guys wanted to get in your panties, and you knew it.”

“How do you know they didn’t?”

My blood reached its boiling point, so I did the only thing I could—I put my fist through the drywall.

She screamed as she grabbed the door handle. “You’re an animal!” she shouted, running down the hall. “Stay the hell away from me. I don’t trust you to be anywhere near me.”

I couldn’t very well go after her without clothes. I ran across the room to scoop my jeans off the floor. I was just fastening the button when my next-door neighbor appeared at my door in a tattered bathrobe and stained white T-shirt.

Scratching his bald head, he said, “What the fuck’s with you two? One minute you’re fucking like rabbits, and the next it sounds like you wanna kill each other.” He looked at my bloody hand. “You didn’t hit her, did you? ‘Cause if you did, I’m gonna have to report that. My old man used to beat the fuck outta my mom, and that’s not cool.”

“Fuck off, and mind your own business, Morrison.” I usually ignored the dead-beat, but I was ready to take my anger out on anyone who crossed my path. “There must be a bottle of gut-rot with your name on it somewhere.”

Wagging a finger at me, he said, “I make it my business when I see a man roughing up a woman.”

I pushed past him, nudging him with my shoulder. “I don’t have time to fuck you up for saying that right now, but if I were you, I’d lock my goddamn door tonight.” I didn’t really intend to beat him up, but I didn’t appreciate him sticking his nose where it didn’t belong and implying I’d ever lay a hand on my woman in anger.

I flew down the stairs. I’d already wasted too much time on Morrison. She could have hailed a cab and been halfway down the street already. I tore out the door, looking for any sign of her, but the street was deserted. Fuck. It was too late. She was gone.

Days had passed since I last saw Maura. I’d gone crazy looking for her, calling, texting, even driving by her house. Something told me she was in trouble, but it wasn’t until the cop showed up at my door that morning that I realized we were on a parallel course to hell.

I listened to the cop’s lies, refusing to lose my temper. I knew that’s what he wanted.

“Just admit it, Cooper. You kidnapped and raped her. You were the last one to see her. Your skin was under her fingernails. Your semen was inside her. There’s no one else to pin this on.”

I tried to control my urge to heave all over the table. Maura had been kidnapped, raped… brutalized.
I did this
. My anger had driven her into the arms of a psychopath. I let her leave my building alone.

The cop and I had been going in circles for hours. I was tired, hungry, and mad as hell, but he wasn’t going to break me. I refused to tell him what he wanted to hear. I hadn’t done it, and nothing he said would get me to say I had.

“I think it’s time for me to lawyer up.” I knew I should have asked for a lawyer the minute they brought me in. As the son of a career cop, I knew their tactics too well, but I’d foolishly believed honesty would set me free. Obviously I was wrong.

The detective glared at me as he got up and tapped on the two-way mirror. He slowly turned to face me. “Just tell me why you let her go. You killed all the others. Why not her?”

The detective and I both knew he was crossing the line. I’d asked for a lawyer and anything I said from this point on would be inadmissible in court, but that didn’t prevent him from hounding me, which told me they believed they’d found their man and had no intention of looking elsewhere.

I didn’t have much use for the police since they’d shot and killed my brother during a high-speed chase three years ago. Billy was high and behind the wheel. He needed to be taken off the streets because he was a danger to himself and others, but he didn’t deserve to die. He was just a kid who’d fallen in with the wrong crowd.

Bile rose in my throat, and I had to swallow it back. “What the fuck are you talking about?” I fisted my hands, thinking how much I’d love to be inside the ring and taking my aggression out on an opponent. “I didn’t kidnap anybody. I didn’t rape anybody. I sure as fuck didn’t murder anybody.”

A slow smile spread across his face as he ran his tongue over yellowing teeth. “We’ve been looking for you for a long time. You were good at evading us, but I knew you’d screw up eventually. You messed with the wrong woman. This one was tough. She fought back. Is that how she got away?”

“We had sex. She liked it rough.”
So did I
. “My skin was under her nails because she scratched my back.” I turned around, unbuttoning my plaid work shirt before peeling it off. “See?”

“That could have easily happened during the attack.” The cop sounded unimpressed.

I rolled my eyes as I sat down. “She’d have clawed my face, my chest, my arms, not my back.” I knew I was wasting my breath. Nothing I said was going to change his mind. “My semen was inside her because she hates condoms. She’s on the pill.”

The image of someone taking Maura forcibly charged through my mind again. If I found him before the police did, he’d wish he were dead. I’d show the bastard no mercy. He hurt the woman I loved. No way would he get away with it, and he sure as hell wouldn’t pin it on me.

The cop sat across from me and leaned in. “Okay, Cooper, let’s say I believe your story. Why’d all those people say you went ballistic at the bar when she rejected you?”

“She didn’t reject me.” I drew a deep breath. We’d covered this already, but he obviously wasn’t satisfied. He hoped to trip me up, thought I’d get confused with my lies. But I was telling the truth. “I saw her slow dancing with her ex-boyfriend. I got pissed. We argued. That’s what people saw.”

He narrowed his eyes. “You expect me to believe Maura Lancaster was slumming with you?”

Maura’s family owned half the town, and she’d been bred for success. Class oozed from her pores, and everyone knew her name.

“I don’t care what you believe. It’s the truth.”

“Fine, let’s assume I believe you,” he said, looking amused. “How did you say you met again?”

I clenched my teeth, wondering how many times I would have to repeat the same story. “I was part of a crew working on the pool house at her family’s estate.”

“Right, and how long have you been seeing each other?”

“A few months.” It felt like a lot longer. She’d confided in me, and I’d told her things I’d never shared with anyone. Once the masks came off in the bedroom, we were free to be ourselves. After rounds of exhausting sex, we’d lie in my bed and talk for hours. She told me what it was like growing up in a privileged family, and I told her what it was like being the son of a cop.

“I like your old man,” he said, shaking his head. “He’s a damn fine cop.”

I was surprised by the shift in conversation. I knew he was changing tactics, playing another card to try to get me to open up. I wouldn’t take the bait, but my stomach lurched at the mention of my father. A part of him had died the day we lost my kid brother. This accusation would put the final nail in his coffin.

“I hate to think what this will do to him. He mentioned you’re into fighting. Mixed martial arts, isn’t it?” He chuckled as though we were old friends sharing war stories over a beer. “How’d you get into that?”

“I got tired of being arrested for street fighting.” I wasn’t kidding, and he knew it. “This way I can beat the shit out of someone and go home to my own bed at night. It’s a win-win.”

He smirked. “Except for the guys you take out.” He raised an eyebrow. “I watched some of your fights online. You’re merciless.”

“I don’t step in there to lose.” I cracked my battered knuckles. “Winning’s the only option.” There was always money on the line, but my undefeated record had more to do with my pride than the paycheck.

“I hear ya.”

Before the detective could say more, a suit walked in and sized me up before he sat with a heavy sigh. “I hope you weren’t harassing my client, Jones. We’ve been down that road before, haven’t we?”

Instead of appearing intimidated, the cop smiled. “No, we were just making small talk. Coop’s old man is one of our own. He and I go way back. Isn’t that right, Matt?”

I cringed at his use of my first name. Only my parents and Maura called me by my given name. To the rest of the world, I was just Coop. “If you don’t mind, I’d like to have a word with my lawyer, Detective.”

“Sure.” He stood, collecting his recorder and file. “But don’t worry, we’ll be seeing each other again real soon.”

“Okay,” the suit said, sliding a business card across the table. “Name’s Michael Rhodes. You wanna tell me how the hell you got into this mess?”

“A girl—”

“Isn’t it always?” He twisted his lips, looking as if he’d just bit into something sour. “Don’t mind me. Ex-wife’s giving me a hard time about visitation.”

I thought about reminding him I had bigger problems, but it wouldn’t do any good. He didn’t want to be here any more than I did. “My girlfriend was raped. They think I did it.”

“Hmmm, so I hear.” He opened his briefcase and extracted a pair of glasses. “Seems they’re trying to pin more than that on you, but maybe you’d better start by telling me about the girl.”

I recited the same story I’d told the detective. “I’m sure Maura will tell them the truth once-”

“That’s part of the problem. She’s not sure who attacked her. She said the man was wearing a black ski mask. He jumped her while she was trying to hail a cab.”

I swallowed, acid burning my mouth.
God, this is my fault
. I lived in a seedy neighborhood. I knew it wasn’t safe for her to be on the streets by herself at that time of night. With or without pants, I should have gone after her.

“What’s wrong?” Rhodes asked. “You look a little pale. Something you want to tell me?”

“She was leaving my place. Did she tell you that?”

“I haven’t spoken to her. I just read the report. She said she was leaving a friend’s place.”

“I was the friend.” But I was so much more than that.

“Interesting.” He pushed a pen through his fingers, making an annoying clicking sound against the table. “This young woman, she comes from a very prominent family. She’s a college student, isn’t she?”

“Yeah, so?”

Checking a file, he said, “She’s a few years younger than you.”

“She’s legal, if that’s what you’re getting at.”

He rubbed a hand over the scruff on his chin. “Still, her parents may not be happy when they find out about this. You think that may be the reason she’s trying to pin this on you, because she doesn’t want her to parents to find out she was with you voluntarily?”

“Pin it on me?” I knew my brain wasn’t firing on all cylinders due to exhaustion, but surely he hadn’t meant to imply Maura was blaming me. “She said I did this?”

“She says she doesn’t know who did it.”

“Then what makes you think she’s pointing the finger at me?”

“Her parents are in the interrogation room with a detective now. They’re trying to convince the police you’re the only logical suspect.”

“And she’s going along with that?” I raked my hands through my hair, wanting to rip it out by the roots. No way could the woman who’d told me she loved me a few nights ago be accusing me of rape now. “I don’t believe it. Maura wouldn’t do that. We’re tight.” I glared at him, daring him to challenge me. “Real tight.”