Read Online Between the Cracks and Burning Doors: Book 2 of The Extraction List Series by Renee N. Meland - Free Book Online Page B

days.” I had to fight away the dots dancing in front of my eyes. I had seen the man in the picture before, right before Maureen and I stripped him naked and burned his clothes.
    “Haven’t seen him.” I hoped the officer didn’t hear the shake in my voice, or see the trembling in my fingers.
     
    After Officer Keegan had safely made his way down the street, I told Nick to lock the door behind me and make sure that the three of them stayed in the upstairs apartment with the curtains drawn until I got back.
    I don’t remember walking to Maureen’s house, I don’t even remember flying up the steps and opening the door without knocking. I pretty much blacked out until I found her in her room and pushed her against the wall.
    “What the hell? A cop ? You didn’t tell me we were burying a cop .”
    She tried to get away from me but I blocked her with my arms on both sides. “I didn’t know, I swear!”
    “Don’t lie to me.”
    “I swear.”
    I beat both my fists against the wall next to her. Plaster from the ceiling rained down into her hair. “Okay, fine, I knew. But I needed your help. You wouldn’t have helped me otherwise.”
    I released her. “Yes, I would have.”
    I walked over to her bed and sat down, facing away from her. A dead father, a dead mother, and now I had helped a cop killer.
    Maybe jail won’t be so bad. Can’t be any worse than living with Dad. At least I wouldn’t be the only one getting the shit kicked out of me.
    I stared at the wall. Maybe if I had run, just taken the car and drove, maybe then I could have made it. Every different scenario, everything I could have done, played out in my head.
    But I couldn’t help but notice I wasn’t leaving Maureen’s bedroom.
    She sat down by my side, staring into space right along with me. “The late shift…at the police station. They take turns coming in; each gets one night a week. No one else is at the station so they cover for each other. Or so they tell me.” She squeezed the bedspread tightly in her hands, and swayed back and forth. “Can I ask you something?”
    I said nothing.
    “When you killed your father…what did it feel like?”
    My arm fell around her before I told it to. “As I hit him…I felt like…like I could finally breathe. Like I had never breathed until that moment…like I was taking out the devil himself.” I paused for a moment, but forced myself to continue. “Then he stopped moving and I wished I could take it all back.” She leaned her head on my shoulder. “Like no matter how much I felt like my life had just started… when the life left his eyes it felt like mine had stopped all over again.”
    “Even if nothing changed…even if you still lived there and he was still…him…would you take it back if you could?”
    Without hesitating for even an instant, I said, “Yeah. Without question, yeah.”
    She looked up at me. “That’s the thing. I wouldn’t.”
    We just sat there in the quiet for a long time. The only sound between us was her steady breathing, and the creaking of the antique wooden floors as the world continued beneath our feet. The smell of lasagna wafted up through the walls. She smiled a mischievous smile at me. “I guess that makes us murder buddies, huh?”
    A smirk passed over my lips. “Murder buddies?”
    “Yeah! Come on, friends have to have similar interests and all, right?”
    “Well I don’t know how interested I am in it. And I doubt you are either.”
    “True, they did just kinda fall into our laps. But still.” She jumped off the bed and extended her hand. “Does my Murder Buddy want to stay for lunch?”
    I took it and followed her downstairs.
    I didn’t look at her while I ate. Several of the children sat around the table with us, all with straight backs, chewing with their mouths closed. I couldn’t help but notice all the seats were still full. “I thought there were twelve of them. I took three. There’s still twelve here.”
    I could hear her scoff at me