Chapter 22: Coat Rack

Stefan's POV

I stood at the podium with the driver's statement in my hand and watched the side door close behind her.

She had said, I need air.

I had said, Take it.

My legs wanted to follow her so badly that I put my free hand on the lectern.

For three years I had been the kind of man who took things.

I took the quiet, and the silence, and every choice she might have made about what she knew.

I took them because I was afraid of what she'd choose.

So I stayed where I was.

It was the hardest thing I have ever done, and nobody in that room would have called it brave.

People came to me in a stream, donors in black tie with their hands out and their eyes wet.

A woman I'd known since I was ten said, "Stefan, we had no idea, you poor boy."

I said, "Thank you," and meant nothing by it.

The young officer from Alder Road stopped beside me with a notebook.

"We'll want you at the station tomorrow, Mr. Kingsland. Your mother's lawyer is already asking for a bail hearing."

"She'll get one."

"Your father's name will come up."

"Good," I said. "He earned it."

He nodded and went.

I looked at the glass doors, and the steps beyond them, and the woman standing at the top in the red dress with her back to the room.

I took one step.

Then I saw her shoulders.

She wasn't crying.

She was standing very straight with her chin up, waiting, and I understood that she was waiting to see what I would do.

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