I slammed my palms onto the dark oak of Jaden's desk and leaned over his desk, glaring at him with intent anger. He looked up at me with a slightly confused expression. The corner of his smile twitched and his brows lifted apologetically as soon as he noticed that I was not there to joke. I could see in his icy blue eyes that he was sorry.
“What were you thinking?” I demanded with my dark hazel glare.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said with an awkward laugh. He rubbed the back of his head, his hand brushing against the blue ends of his neatly cut blonde hair. He really was a horrible liar.
“You scared me half to death!” I lectured. “What were you thinking, sneaking up on me like that in the station when you knew I would be alone, and why on earth would you then run off like that?!”
“Woah there,” he said, leaning over in his chair and looking me over with a quizzical expression. “Sneaking up on you? Why would you think I would do that?”
“Don’t play dumb with me,” I said, my tone edging towards threatening. He seemed sincere, and he never really did seem so with a lie, but who else could it have been in the station? “You left that note in the box under my badge. It was obviously you in the station.”
Jaden let out a nervous laugh. “Yeah, but I put that there before I even left the station. Why would you think I was actually in the station when you were there?”
“Who else could it have been then?” I asked.
“Wait, what? So you actually saw someone in the station?” he asked with concern.
My fears returned instantaneously. “I did. So you can stop playing dumb.” I was beginning to worry and wondered if it could have been someone else in the station, but I was sticking to the theory that it had been Jaden. It was a simpler explanation—and a less concerning explanation.
“It wasn’t me, Lily. I swear.”
I looked at him. He seemed to be telling the truth, but as much as I wanted to believe him, I didn’t want to accept that truth. “You know if you were there, you really should admit it,” I said wearily. “Don’t have us go into a useless investigation.”
Jaden rolled his eyes. “Do you honestly think that I would put everyone here through that just to avoid a little bit of lecturing from you? We have enough on our plates as it is!”
I dropped my head forward as I let out a sigh.
“Now what?” Jaden asked.
I stood up and rubbed my temples with my fingertips. “I’ll let the chief know. I have to talk to him anyway. The bakery has been blocked off and they wouldn’t even let me in.”
“I heard about that actually,” Jaden mentioned. “Not that they wouldn’t let you in, but that it’s under strict watch now. Mrs. Jones has been furious. I don’t think I have ever seen her mad before. I didn’t know that she could get mad.”
“Do you know what happened?” I asked.
“A young woman apparently went over to Roy’s last night in a panic. I think she was your case actually. The one you were mentioning that had some memory loss. Well, she told the chief that she went back there to try and remember and I guess she noticed something strange.”
“What?” I was shocked; I didn’t know what else to say. If the woman brought the chief’s attention to something real in this case, I would have to cover it up. Getting that done would be an extremely difficult task now that the whole area was being watched and blocked off to the general public. This was way too much attention for that case in particular. If only I had gone down to the bakery earlier, I might have been able to avoid the whole situation.
