Rachel wasn’t sure whether to thank him or spit in his face. She said nothing. She knew fighting would get her nowhere. But her heart hammered.
“You can’t let my children see me like this. In handcuffs,” Rachel said.
“You should have thought about that before you faked your identity to question a witness in a murder investigation,” Tally said.
“I didn’t know Wickersham was involved in the investigation. I was just following a hunch. Please, Detective Tally,” Rachel said. “You don’t know what my kids have been through.”
“Let’s get one thing clear, Ms. Marin,” Tally said, pulling onto the highway. Snowflakes dusted the windshield. Rachel was cold, and she could feel the handcuffs sticking to the blood still caked to her hands and wrists. “You’re the reason you’re in this situation right now. Not us.”
“I’m just trying to do the right thing,” Rachel said.
“And a boy is on his way to the hospital, and he might not make it,” she said. “Did you do the right thing with him?”
“That boy helped ruin a woman’s life,” Rachel said. “You know it. You obviously spoke to him and know about Albatross. The only innocent person in this equation is Constance Wright. And it took a long, long time for someone to finally fight for her.”
“We’re fighting for her,” Serrano said.
“A little too late for her,” Rachel replied coldly.
Then there was silence. Tally drove them to the station. Rachel rubbed her wrists together to keep circulation flowing, but her fingers were growing numb. The ride was pure agony.
Finally they pulled into the Ashby police station. Tally came around back and dragged Rachel out of the car.
“Take her inside, book her, and put her in holding,” Serrano said. “I’ll go get the kids and bring them back here.”
“Eric is in class,” Rachel said. “Social studies right now, then history next period. Please be discreet. He’s been through enough.”
“What exactly has he been through?” Tally said.
Rachel merely said, “I’m asking you, Detective, to look out for my son and daughter. They did nothing wrong.”
Serrano could tell she was holding back, hiding something. He nodded and said, “I will.”
Then Serrano got back in the Crown Vic and drove off.
“Guess it’s just me and you,” Rachel said, smiling politely. Tally did not return the warm gesture.
“Let’s go.” Tally led Rachel into the station, her hands still cuffed behind her back. Suddenly Rachel felt nervous. She’d spent time with these people. They’d been kind to her after the Robles break-in and Aguillar-Steinman incident. And now she was being hauled into the station like a common perp.
As Tally led her inside, Rachel saw Lieutenant George. He gave Tally a look that said, She’s back again?
“Is this necessary?” Rachel said to Tally. “The handcuffs.”
“Oh, so you expect special treatment now?”
“No, it’s just . . .”
“Just what?”
Lieutenant George walked over to them. “Back again, Ms. Marin?” he said.
“Misunderstanding,” she said, but her voice let him know it wasn’t.
“Fine example you’re setting for Eric and Megan,” he said, shaking his head. She opened her mouth to curse him out but stopped. She felt ashamed. The lieutenant had shown her children such kindness. And he wasn’t wrong.
Tally led Rachel to the booking desk, where the clerk wrote down her name and address, took her fingerprints, and confiscated her purse and other belongings. They removed her bloody clothing and gave her a pair of sweatpants and a sweatshirt that looked like they’d been passed down among various incarcerated women since the 1920s. They also gave her a pair of socks. She desperately wanted to refuse them—Lord knew how many grungy feet had worn them—but she was still frigid from the ride over. So she turned the socks inside out and promised to bathe herself in Clorox the moment she got home.
Then Tally walked Rachel to a pair of holding cells at the far end of the station. She opened the door to one sepulchral chamber and gestured for Rachel to enter.
Rachel balked.
Three other people occupied the small cell, which Rachel estimated to be about eight by twelve, with metal benches bracketing each gray stone wall. The floor was an off-green, pea soup–ish color, made from an epoxy coating that adhered directly to the concrete underneath, preventing inmates from picking or peeling at the material, which could then be used as a makeshift weapon.
“Detective,” Rachel said. “You know I’m just trying to do the right thing. I never wanted that to happen to Sam. You and I are on the same side.”
“You say another word without getting your ass in that cell, I’ll add resisting arrest to your docket. You’re totally unhinged, Ms. Marin.”
“I never claimed to be fully hinged.”
Tally glared at her. Rachel sighed and entered the cell. Tally closed the door. The lock clicked into place.
Rachel looked around. She’d been arrested once, as a teenager. Three of her friends had closed down a bar on a road trip to New York and were stupid enough to smoke a joint outside. A cop happened to walk by, and the next thing Rachel knew, she was high as a kite and in the back of a police car. They released her the following morning and dropped the charges—a night in a holding cell was enough time served to pay for a public joint—but it was the last time Rachel smoked anything other than meat.
Still, that night had stuck with her. She never thought she’d be arrested again. Deep down, though, she knew she’d been playing with fire. The Drummond ruse. Going to Wickersham’s office. At some point, she’d have to answer for all of it.
Rachel observed her fellow cellmates. A fortysomething scraggly-looking white woman paced back and forth, scratching at the back of her hand. She was either a hooker or a meth addict or was just having a really bad hair day. A young black man with scraped, bleeding knuckles stood in the corner, looking anxious. And an older gentleman sat silent and contented on one of the metal benches, as though this was his usual spot to drink a cup of coffee and feed the pigeons.
She detected a faint whiff of perfume on the black man. No wedding ring. And other than his knuckles, there were no other scrapes or bruises. She immediately knew he’d punched a guy who’d insulted his girlfriend. His eyes darted around the station. He was expecting someone to come for him. But nobody had. The girlfriend was cheating on him. Poor guy. His day would only get worse.
The woman wore a lime-green halter top under a leopard-print jacket. Her stomach bore old cigarette burn scars. Her pale, blotchy legs were covered in sores. The cigarette burns weren’t deep, so it was more likely she had developed a habit of falling asleep with a lit cigarette in her hand and dropping them on herself than actually being burned by someone else.
The older man confused Rachel. He was in his seventies and wore brown corduroy pants, a chunky cable-knit sweater, and polished Cole Haan shoes. His hair was neat and parted. He wore thin wire-frame glasses. He looked like somebody’s kind grandfather or maybe a small-town pharmacist. Not someone who looked comfortable in a holding cell.
“What are you in for?” Rachel asked him, unsure of whether she’d broken some sort of unspoken jailhouse code of conduct.