Close: A New Adult Thriller by M.H. Young Read Free Book Online Page B

I’d left the night before, it wasn’t hard to convince them. No one wants sick wait staff near their food. I had yet to call my mother and spent a lot of the day thinking about if I should tell her, and what I would say. I picked up my phone about twenty times, but couldn’t bring myself to call.
    Then, there were all the times I picked up my phone and Drew’s card. I desperately wanted to hear his voice, and was kicking myself that I had put off the interview to the next day. I lay in bed, looking at his cell number that he’d written on the face of the card, but what would I say if I called him? That I couldn’t stop thinking about the way his jaw had felt on my temple, or the way he smelled of soap and citrus?
    I went to sleep early, having kept my comfort-pjs on all day. Kish stopped by to see if I wanted to eat, but I couldn’t be bothered.
    I woke to a knock at my door. I picked up my cell phone to check the time. It was just after nine. I’d have to get moving if I was going to be in time to do the interview with Drew.
    “Who is it?” I asked as the person knocked again.
    “Kish. Can I come in?”
    “Sure.” I stumbled across to the door to let her in, thinking that now even her usual jokes about it being a serial killer or Freddy Krueger were a thing of the past, and feeling sad that things were already starting to change in ways I couldn’t have imagined.
    As I opened the door I remembered that I’d forgotten to ask her about coming with me this morning.
    She hugged me and came in. The way she looked at me had changed too. It was the way you looked at a little kid in a wheelchair or an injured animal. Normally she would have breezed in, full of gossip and chatter. In the cold light of day, I could see the transformation more clearly. Overnight, a change had settled into her. In her eyes, I was different. The old Laura was dead, replaced by another Laura. She couldn’t joke with the new Laura in case she said the wrong thing. All she could feel for new Laura was pity.
    There was one other thing that lay between us. We both knew that it could just as easily have been her who was the victim, with me cast in the role of the supportive friend. I asked myself if I would have treated her differently. Would I have looked at her with the same mix of guilt and pity? I was afraid of the answer.
    “Can I get you anything?” Kish asked. “You want to go get breakfast?”
    “I can’t. I have to go give a statement.”
    I could have asked her to come with me, but I didn’t. It was bad enough as it was. I didn’t want to her to hear every last detail. I was starting to remember more of what had happened. Little details were coming back to me; horrific details. I could see Bentley leering at me, as he forced his tongue into my mouth. The thought of it made me want to throw up. I didn’t want Kish to have all that in her head. It was bad enough that all that stuff was in mine.
    “You want me to come with you?” she asked me.
    The question surprised me. I could tell from the look on her face that it had taken a lot for her to ask, that she probably didn’t really want to come with me, but that she had offered anyway. As gestures of friendship went, it meant more to me that she didn’t want to do it, but had asked anyway. Perhaps she felt obliged. Perhaps she knew she would feel bad about it later if she didn’t. None of the reasons mattered to me in that moment.
    I gave her a hug. “No, but could you give me a ride?”

 
    Fifteen
     
    “You sure you don’t me to come in with you?” Kishani asked as we pulled up outside the police headquarters. This time she said it with the eagerness of someone who already knew the answer.
    I was wearing jeans and a grey hoodie, my hair pulled back into a ponytail. Before we left, I had put on some eyeliner and lip gloss. It was only when I got into Kish’s car, a brand new Prius, that I realized that I’d put on makeup because part of me didn’t want to look like