FUCK!
Regarding Zach in distaste as he crushed his empty soda can against his chest, O’Neill raised one eyebrow. “You always did have a motive, didn’t you?”
Zach scowled, his gut twisting so violently he was sure inside of him, deep where it most hurt a man, he was bleeding. “The car was reported stolen,” he ground out, rising to his feet. “Check your goddamn files.”
“Her mother once took out a restraining order against you, Detective,” he pointed out, and tossed the can into the wastebasket. “Or should I say, Stalker?”
His blood curdled in his veins. For a moment he wanted to smack his CO’s face in.
Clinging onto the few threads of control he had left, he said, “I’d never hurt her. All I did was try to see her.”
“It was Zach’s red Camaro. And was Zach driving his Camaro?” Sue Ellen asked through the screen, more demanding. “Was he the driver, Paige? Is he the killer? Is Zachary Rivers the killer?”
Paige covered her ears, releasing a low, anxious sound.
Wide-eyed, Zach watched her. Her sudden silence, her hesitation to deny this, was so wrenching he could barely stand on his feet.
“Is he the killer, Paige?”
She spoke in a hiss, “I don’t know!”
Floored, Zach fell into the chair.
She didn’t know. She wasn’t sure. Did she think it was him? Had her memories been distorted? Corrupted? Did she believe he would ever, ever, do anything but want to love and cherish and protect her?
“Paige,” Sue Ellen soothed. “Don’t be afraid. You’re safe here. I know it may hurt to remember because you trusted him. Didn’t you? You loved him?”
Her head jerked up and down in a mockery of a “yes,” her hands cradling herself as if her brain were bursting. She was weeping so hard Zach became enraged. He wanted to slam his fists into a wall, tear into that room, and demand that this charade stop.
And then she broke through his anger, his sanity, his already-shattering composure, and whispered, as though she only meant for him to hear, “Zach.” More like a plea, like when she’d called him last night, when he was inside her, their bodies entwined.
An awful suspicion took hold of him— and the back of his neck pricked with alarm. He approached the monitor with a harsh, ominous scowl. His chest felt crammed with foreboding even as his heart began to pound. Protect, protect, protect.
“Your wife has taken this a little too far, Lieutenant.” His hands opened at his sides, and his fingers tingled, for her, for his guns. “Want to tell me why?”
Lips thinning in distaste, O’Neill stopped recording. “Not looking so good for you, Detective,” he said with asphalt-dull eyes.
“SO IT WAS ZACHARY Rivers who killed your father?”
Paige couldn’t stand it. The woman’s words were ringing in her head, deafening her ears, robbing her e
yes . . .
Her stomach recoiled in protest, and her skin crawled in denial. No. It wasn’t Zach. Couldn’t, wouldn’t be, wasn’t. Why did she ask? Why did she insist?
If she weren’t writhing in her own pain she’d be flinging herself at the woman, screeching out, Liar!
“It was him, Paige?”
God, would she shut up!
She scrambled in her mind to get a look at the driver, saw his face only feet away as the car rammed into them, and then raised her voice until she yelled at the hypnotist in return. “No!” she cried. “It’s not Zach. It’s not! It’s . . .” Who was it? “The driver was . . . he wore a stocking over his face but he was bald. And Dad said there was evidence in an envelope, and that I should get it to the district attorney. He said that . . .” O’Neill is dirty.
Her body tensed. Her entire system jolted back to full consciousness. O’Neill.
Bald. Stone-faced O’Neill.
If you dare open your mouth I swear to God I’m going to break your boyfriend into little pieces. And then I’m going to break you.