Life after Goodbye novel · Chapter 16 of 24

Chapter 16: Walking Out

The police came in through the main doors while Chelsea was still screaming.

There were two officers in dark coats and a plainclothes detective with a notebook.

Cormac had called her on Thursday, and she had been waiting in her car since eight.

"Chelsea Dorsey?" the detective said.

"I didn't do anything!" Chelsea twisted against the board member's grip. "She's insane. Ask anyone. Kendrick! Kendrick, tell them I'm a good person!"

Two hundred people watched her call his name.

Kendrick stood up slowly from his chair.

"Don't," he said.

It was only one word, and it was not loud.

Chelsea stopped struggling.

"Kendrick, please. You said you'd always look after me."

"I said that." He looked at her without moving. "I said it to a girl who cried a lot. I didn't know what else I was saying it to."

The officers took her by the elbows.

She went out between them, sobbing, and her white dress dragged on the carpet.

At the doors she turned her head once to look for him.

He didn't look up.

Cormac came back in through the kitchen, out of breath, his tie pulled loose.

"She had a car in the loading dock," he said to me. "I got a plate number. I lost her."

"Give it to the detective."

"I did." He looked at my face. "Are you all right?"

"No."

"Good," he said, very gently. "That's the right answer."

My father sat at the head table with Ansel beside him, both of them staring at the frame.

My father lifted a hand and waved me over, and I went.

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