DISCLAIMER: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc., are the intellectual property of the respective author. The original characters and plot are the property of Stephenie Meyer. No copyright infringement is intended.
-Chapter Fifty-Two-
Yanked out of the SUV and marched through the Federal building, they tossed me into a room and closed the door. The lock clicked over, and I stood there, rubbing the soreness out of my wrists. There was nothing in this small, five-by-five-foot space besides four walls, a table, two metal chairs, and an overhead camera in the far corner. The red light was blinking, and they were watching me. I didn't care. Fuck them. They weren't getting shit out of me.
I promised Edward.
"Don't even agree to take water from them," he had said. "That's how they get you."
It seemed absurd to deny a simple amenity, but he explained that the first one was free, but after that, everything has a price. There was sense behind his logic, no matter how off the wall and paranoid it made him sound.
He was crazy and deranged, with a fucked-up mentality, but he's mine or was…Fuck! No! He is mine!
His absence grew stronger with each passing second, tearing me apart from the inside out. The depressing effect of the coke amplified my grief as it circulated its way out of my system. I felt anxious, flicking my tongue on the roof of my mouth and shaking my leg, jittery and uncontrolled. My thoughts were wild, hovering between violence and despair. I wanted to curl up into a fetal position and rip out every one of these fucking cops' throats simultaneously. Instead, anger and sadness drowned me, a slow pull into an abyss of madness.
It was only going to get worse.
As minutes turned into hours with no one coming in to question me, I wondered how the FBI caught us. Did the senator find out we were in his house and alert the feds? Were they watching us, and if so, for how long?
None of it made sense.
I was sure, almost overly confident, along with Edward, we would get away scot-free.
We should be on a beach right now, with our toes in the sand, kissing and making love in the surf. That was the plan. A happily ever after? That was what he fucking promised me.
Damn him!
Why couldn't we just run to Mexico with his family as I wanted? Why did he have to be so stubborn with this stupid vendetta against his father—and for what? Nothing!
Look at us now, Edward, we're arrested, and you're gone! I can't hear your voice, see your smile or kiss your lips. The heat of your touch has faded, and I'm going fucking crazy in here without you. I need you to breathe.
So suffocating.
Edward, you bastard, can you fucking hear me? How could you let this happen to us? How could you let them take you away?
God, it hurts.
So fucking much.
I was dizzy and nauseous, my world spinning wildly out of control. Falling into the nearest chair, I pressed my forehead to the table's hard, cold surface and wrapped my arms around my waist, hoping to suppress the aching pain. I needed to compose myself and expel Edward from my brain; this was not the time to freak out and lose my head. I was stronger than this.
Fucking keep it together, kid.
As I clenched my fists, the nails embedding into my skin and nearly drawing blood. I sat up as the door opened. A man walked in, one I'd never seen before. He was older, tall, and lean, with heavy facial hair. The gray suit he wore was stiff and pressed. I disliked him instantly.
"Hello, Bella," he said, waiting for me to say something, but I kept my mouth shut. Finally, he nodded and took a seat. "My name is Agent Garrett. I'm here to help you in any way I can, do you understand?"
I stared at him, unmoving and not at all amused, but on the inside, I was laughing.
Help me? Really? Doubtful.
Pulling out a manila folder from underneath his arm and opening it on the table, he took several pictures and splayed them in front of me. I glanced, not looking down but recognizing them. The photos were the same ones Alice showed me last week of the senator and the Chicago mob boss, Petrolia, Pecora, or something. I still can't remember.
He stuck a finger out and pointed to a picture. "Do you know these men?"
I shook my head.
"Are you sure?" He drew out the last word, knowing that I wasn't being hundred percent truthful. They only caught Edward and me red-handed, stealing the money and assuming the alias the senator and his men concocted.
But I wouldn't be swayed or easily won over. I crossed my arms over my chest and slumped down in the chair.
He was frustrated. I could see it in his eyes as he asked me question after tedious question. Some I knew the answers to, and others I didn't, but the guy tried to persuade me to talk to him for about an hour, using various tactics, like dangling my freedom or making empty promises.
He was a chatty man, and during that time, I'd learned about how they caught us, or not us, per se. It was the senator and the mob bosses they were looking to snag. The FBI had been investigating them and their involvement in organized crime for a long time.
After many years of listening in on phone taps and stake-outs from afar, they finally got a break. An informer, a man with close ties to the senator, contacted the FBI and told them about the secret bank accounts, the laundered money, and the controlling of the polls. It was only by dumb luck they were watching that particular bank on this specific day, waiting for the senator to withdraw the stolen money. They were closing in on him and knew he was going to run.
Instead, Edward and I showed up, trading one crook for the other. They knew our activities, from the assault on Phil to the robberies. It was when the extortion with the senator that they started looking at us more closely.
They captured this generation's Bonnie and Clyde by accident, taking this morning's investigation in a new direction.
"Look," he said with a tired sigh, gathering the photos and slipping them back into the folder, "I know the game you're trying to play here, Bella. Clam up and refuse to answer my questions. It's a good plan. Smart one, even." He leaned across the table. "I bet he taught you that, didn't he?"
My heart pounded, and I felt the air sucked out of me. The mere mention of him affected me in a way I hadn't expected. My whole demeanor changed, and I was alert, my eyes wide and attentive, glancing at the door and the wall next to me. He was close. I could feel it.
The next room, maybe.
All my promises and rules went out the window.
"Where is he?" I blurted out.
Agent Garrett was startled by my voice, hearing it for the first time, feral and threatening, and it took him a moment to respond. "He's here. Being questioned, just like you."
"I have to see him," I said, jumping to my feet and charging the door, but the asshole locked it. I jerked at it, frantic to see him, to feel him. The tears were rising to the surface and the gnawing, hollow throbbing pain in my chest, where my heart lies, intensified.
Fuck! Let me out!
"Bella," Agent Garrett said, placing a hand on my shoulder, "You can't see him right now. It's not possible. Just come back and sit down."
"NO!" I shouted, shrugging off his condescending touch. "I need him. Don't you understand?"
"You think this is love that you're feeling? I've been doing this job for a long time and I know guys like him. They see a pretty and young, impressionable girl, like yourself, take advantage of her trust and get her into all kinds of trouble."
I shot him a scowl, drilling an imaginary hole into his lopsided skull. "I'm not a victim."
"No, you're not," he said. "But you deserve better than what he's got to offer."
This guy was using the same tactic the cop in Phoenix used the night we boosted the Lamborghini, and if it didn't set me straight back then, it wouldn't work now. The obsessive and deadly love I had for Edward had multiplied to an impossible and insane level since that night. No one could convince me to give that up.
"I'm going to level with you," he said, gaining my attention. "I don't need a confession. We have enough evidence to convict you both."
The thought of Edward in a cell for the remainder of his life killed me. I rested my forehead against the bitter wood, so depleted and forlorn. "Arrest me, please, and just let him go."
"You're willing to trade your freedom for his?" There was disbelief in his voice.
"Yes."
"You're eighteen, Bella—a God damn child! You haven't even begun to live. And you're trying to tell me that piece of shit," he pointed at the wall to my right, "is worth spending the rest of your life in prison for?"
"He is not a piece of shit!" I snapped, narrowing my eyes in contempt. "And you have no fucking idea how much he's worth it to me."
There was a tense moment between us, the good guy and bad guy, going head to head and coming to an impasse. He wasn't going to get what he wanted out of me, and he knew that. I was a lost cause, corrupted into a life of crime with no intent of turning back.
He saw me for what I was now: a hardened criminal.
"How about I give you some more time to think about the rest of your life," he said, grabbing my hands and cuffing them behind my back, cinching them tight. He dragged me away from the door and forced me into the chair. "In the meantime, would you like some water?"
After hours of silence and refusing to eat or drink, they had no choice but to charge me with one count of grand theft auto, several counts of armed robbery, three counts of aggravated assault, and one count of extortion against a US Senator.
Twenty-five years to life without the possibility of parole would be the likely sentence for these felonies.
Any hope for a deal by giving up information about the senator, the one they truly wanted, was squashed a day later when they received a care package in the mail, courtesy of Edward Cullen and Bella Swan. They had everything they needed now to make an arrest, and we no longer were of any use to them.
It was typical and our shitty luck. In one, sure swoop, we'd managed to fuck ourselves twice.
I demanded and shouted at the top of my lungs for a lawyer on several occasions, but since the charges against us were broad and each State was clamoring over who got us first, it was hard to get a public defender. Eventually, Arizona won that war, and we would be transferred there by Thursday morning.
While I waited, they stuck me in a holding cell, but not a typical one I'd seen on crime shows. Instead, it was much like the interrogation room, except smaller, with a bed and a toilet. I don't know how many days I was in there, maybe four, but it was hard to tell with no concept of time with sunrise and sunset.
Coming off coke in lock-up was the fucking worst. With a severe migraine, my head split in two, and I vomited into the stainless steel God. I felt like absolute shit. All I wanted to do was sleep, but the cot was lumpy and wayward springs stabbed me in the back. So I spent those nights coming down wide awake and sick.
I was on an island alone with no calls, visitors, or mail.
They refused to tell me what was going on with Edward. I was starting to think he never existed in the first place. The only reminder I had was his name inked into my skin. It was my beacon home.
One day, I told myself. Then, I'll be able to see my name written boldly in black and smell the flesh that kept it warm.
On the bright side, I got my period a few days into my solitary confinement. It was a relief, one less thing to stress out about, and honestly, I couldn't imagine bringing a child into this world where both parents were locked up in prison. The stigma that would follow the kid their entire life for being half and half of a fucked up pair wasn't fair to them.
Then again, it saddened me not to have that part of Edward, even for a second. It was my selfish desire to keep something that was no longer attainable. It was a dream now, a figment of my deprived imagination.
I was starting to forget everything about him.
"Swan," Brewster called. Another fed in a building of hundreds unlocked my cell door and shoved it open. He stepped in and gestured for me to stand. "Hands behind back and face to the wall."
It was standard protocol every time they pulled me out of my cell. It was a rare occurrence that they ever moved me out of this hell hole, but today was Thursday, and I was being transported to Arizona to stand trial for my crimes.
Escorting me out to the elevators, I searched the halls for Edward, but he wasn't there. It was something I did to myself, even though I knew better. They weren't going to allow me that courtesy and were smart enough to keep our paths from crossing.
How long had it been now? Five days? Why did it seem like forever?
It was the worst torture, knowing he was close but feeling like he was on the other side of the world. I've never felt this empty and alone or heartbroken and fragile. Things were bleak, and I tried to hold out hope that maybe I'll see him again, but it was a lie I told myself to keep breathing another day.
When truth does break through my denial—and it will—I know my heart will cease to beat.
Brewster and I came to a stop outside the elevators. There were two federal officers in front of us, but I never glanced up to see their faces. Instead, my eyes trained on the floor, mesmerized by the tiny imperfections.
"That guy is a fucking mess, did you see him?" one douche said to the other.
"The God damned skinhead in holding cell four?" douche two replied.
Ten cell doors down from mine.
"Yeah, that fucking lunatic," douche one said, sighing heavily. "Christ, we had to restrain him the first night he was here. Did you hear about that?"
"Restrain him?" the other douche asked with surprise. I looked up quickly, and he had a confused expression. "He was that violent?"
"Oh, yeah," douche one laughed. "He went fucking ballistic on our men, busting Andrew's nose and cracking a couple of Smith's ribs. It took six guys to hold him down."
"Fucking-A," douche two laughed. "What set him off?"
"From what I hear, it's over a…."
Brewster cleared his throat, and both douches looked back. I felt their gaze on me, penetrating and speculating. The elevator doors opened, and they stepped inside, waiting for us to join them, but Brewster held me back and waved them on. They nodded and continued talking in hushed voices, their discussion getting lost behind the closing of the elevator.
Brewster pressed the down button, and we stood there in silence, his grip tightening on my arm.
"They were talking about my Edward, weren't they?" I asked, already knowing the answer.
"Yes," he said, but that was all he would give me.
I nodded.
It wasn't much, but I savored every detail, replaying the conversation in my head over and over again. By the time the next elevator came, I was shaking to the point of collapsing. The truth finally hit me with an excruciating vengeance. I was never going to see him again. Our brief love affair, severed and ripped away from us, was over—no sandy beaches or promises of a happily ever after.
That was a fantasy.
The prison was my reality.
It was about time I got used to it.