He Killed Me Then Loved Me novel · Chapter 23 of 24

Chapter 23: In Front of the Donors

Hallie's POV

"Officer," I said. "That's not what happened."

The young policeman looked from Everard's bloody forehead to Phillip's split lip.

"Ma'am, step back."

"My name is Hallie Preble. He tried to run me down on the front steps of this hotel, and two hundred people watched him do it."

Everard sighed, a long weary sound. "She is the girl my son has been seeing. They are both very upset."

"Sir, stay where you are."

"I am the head of the Chichester Foundation."

"I'm the old woman in the green dress," said a voice behind me, "and I heard you say you cut the brakes."

The donor with the green silk shawl pushed through the crowd.

"I heard it too," said a man in a white tie.

"So did I."

"I have it on video," said a young woman with a phone held high.

I watched the policeman's face change as the voices stacked up around him. They did not stop.

A donor's husband said, "He shoved his wife into the gravel." A waiter said, "He took the keys from the valet and threatened her." Someone near the back said, "Play the tape for him."

The policeman's hand came off his holster.

"Mr. Chichester," he said. "I need you to turn around."

"This is absurd."

"Turn around, sir."

Everard looked at the faces. He looked at Lucille, who stood in the gravel with one shoe off and her pearls lying around her feet.

He looked at me.

I walked up to him until I was close enough to smell the scotch.

"I remember my mother's hand," I said quietly. "On my chest in the dark. She was trying to keep me safe."

He stared at me.

"You don't get to forget that," I said. "I don't, and now nobody here will."

For the first time, Everard Chichester said nothing.

The policeman turned him around and closed the cuffs.

The click was loud on the quiet drive.

The lighter lay on the wet floor of the wrecked car. Another officer picked it up with a glove and dropped it in a clear bag.

Everard watched it go.

"That was my father's," he said.

"It's evidence," the officer said.

Everard's driver was caught at the curb, trying to leave in the gray sedan.

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