I shake my head. “I’m not sure about the address, but—”
Max’s nerdy dad side comes out. “Kumar, could you tell us what address you have on file?”
“As soon as you come back with the police—”
“They have JP’s address,” I lie. Max doesn’t need to know that I can’t pay him. Maybe he’s staying around for more than money, but maybe not. Regardless, I can’t afford to lose him.
But Max isn’t dumb. He can fill in the blanks. “Why do they need a police report?”
“Uh…” I can’t tell him that I need a search warrant to look at the bank records so…“I’m going to report my assault. Can you believe I didn’t do that earlier?”
He smacks himself in the forehead. “I guess I just assumed you had.”
Max is the only thing I have going for me. I can’t lose him. It’s just a little lie. Or two or three little lies. I’ll straighten it all out as soon as I file that police report. I’ll have money and everything will be fine.
Still, I can’t believe I just threw a bag of cash on the ground. God hates me.
34 Or maybe I just have issues with money?
CHAPTER
THIRTEEN
The closest police station is downtown in a big, official building, right across from the courthouse and a Starbucks. We park two blocks away. It looks nice but it smells like pee and the smell of weed is looouuud. As we approach the courthouse, there are more people who are obviously lawyers and fewer people who obviously peed on the side of a building in the last twenty-four hours.
I need some way to get rid of Max while I file this report. He doesn’t need to know I’m broke. Maybe his first paycheck will be a little delayed, but I’ll figure something out. Which means I need an errand…
“Max, while I’m filing this report, will you run an errand for me?”
I scramble for ideas. He’s very thoughtful so I bet he’d be happy to pop on down to the drug store to get some headache medicine. The coffee shop is too close so it would only take a minute.
“Sure. Let’s divide and conquer,” he says.
Not sure where I’m going with it, I say, “We passed a library a few blocks back…”
“Genius. I bet a librarian will have some great ideas for how to research some of these issues.”
Not. But Max is really cute so I’m like, “Great, you talk to a librarian and I’ll talk to the cops. We’ll compare notes after.”
Librarian versus cop—he doesn’t even notice that sounds funny. I wave and watch him walk down the street toward the library.
After taking a number and waiting for what feels like most of my life (and it really is a healthy percentage of my life, considering I was born only two days ago), the last woman I want to see comes out. She has an “I don’t have time for your bullshit” look on her face before I even open my mouth. I don’t think I have the right vibe for her. Her first name is Denise and her last name hard to pronounce, so I know what I’m going to call her.
“Follow me,” Officer Denise says, pointing to a chair across from her desk. She leans back and takes a sip from a Styrofoam cup of coffee and says, “What seems to be the problem?”
I explain everything—waking up in the hospital, the memory loss, the bloody cape I tossed, the eyewitness account of me being pushed into an ice sculpture, my possible disagreement with Lauren Montcalm, and lastly, the fact that my accounts have been completely drained and closed.
“So we have a possible assault and…I’m sorry about the money, but I can’t do anything about your debts.”
“No, that’s just it. I think someone stole it.”
“Why do you think that?”
“I woke up in the hospital with no wallet, no ID, no money.”
“How much do you think was stolen?”
“I don’t know. All of it. I don’t know how much I had to begin with, but I charge a ton for matchmaking so I think I was flush.”
It sounds bad when I say it out loud in a police station. Most things probably sound bad in a police station. The truth sounds the way your face looks under the unforgiving lights of a truck-stop bathroom. She jots down a few notes on a yellow legal pad and asks, “Do you know anyone who might have a problem with you? Do you have any enemies?”
God. Enemies—that sounds so gangster. “Like I said, I have a few guesses. Right now my biggest lead is Lauren Montcalm.”
“Wait a minute. Are you talking about the artist Lauren Montcalm?” she asks.
“Yes! I had a recovered memory that I asked her for money.”
“A recovered memory?”
I nod. “The doctor said they would come back to me in flashes, like visions.”
She recoils at the word visions. “Oh boy. Anything else?”
I pull up Kobra’s Instagram profile and explain my issues with him.
“He’s a major problem,” she says.
“Wait, you know him? Who is he?”
“He’s a major meth dealer in the area. We’ve never been able to get charges to stick, but he’s definitely dealing.”
No surprise there, except I wonder how I hooked up with him in the first place. “Is he dangerous?”
“You don’t get to the top of the heap in the drug world through pacifism.”
I nod vigorously. I bet Kobra lied to me about being an international trader when I vetted him for the app.
“What about this boyfriend?” Denise says boyfriend in a tone that is anything but innocent until proven guilty.
“He’s in Switzerland.” Why does everyone have to assume it was JP?
“Was he in Switzerland the night you were injured?”
“I don’t know.”
“Speaking of your boyfriend, why can’t he help you find your residence?”
“Again, he’s in Switzerland.”
“Don’t you talk? Doesn’t he have a phone?”
I take a deep breath and shrug. “I don’t know. I just…”
“You don’t trust him, do you?”
I look down at the desk. “Of course I trust him,” I lie. I mean, I sort of trust him. “I really don’t think that he hit me over the head.” JP is all I’ve got going for me, except Max.