Chapter 79: TELLING LIES FOR HIM

MIA

"Where were you for two months, Miss?"

Detective Kim had one of those faces that gave nothing away, mid-forties, notebook open, pen hovering, and she'd been sitting across from me at my kitchen table for twenty minutes asking variations of the same question in different orders.

I almost sighed at just how grueling this was but I knew it was coming from a place of concern.

Yuna was by the window, arms crossed, watching me.

"I told you," I said. "A cabin upstate. I needed space after a difficult period."

"With Dante Voss."

"We had an argument. I needed to clear my head."

"And your phone was off the entire time."

"I left it off on purpose. That was the point."

She wrote something down while I kept my hand flat on the table to stop it from shaking.

"No contact with friends or family for eight weeks," she said, not looking up. "No social media activity, no financial transactions, no cell signal."

"I paid for the cabin in cash. I wanted to disconnect."

"Whose cabin was it?"

"A friend of a friend. I don't have the contact information anymore."

She looked up at that. "You don't have the contact information."

"I found it through an app that I've since deleted." I met her eyes. "I know how it sounds."

"It sounds like you're saying this situation that left no paper trail."

"It sounds like someone who needed a break from their life and took one." I kept my voice flat. "I'm sorry I worried people. I should have communicated better."

She studied me for a moment and wrote something else down.

Yuna hadn't said a word.

We went two more rounds, the detective asking about my relationship with Dante, how we met, how long we'd been together, whether anyone had expressed concern about the relationship. I answered everything simply without saying too much details that she might find a loophole in.

My brain was screaming at me to stop lying but I just couldn't.

Eventually Detective Kim closed her notebook and gave me a card and told me to contact her if I remembered anything else, which was police way of saying I don't believe you but I can't prove it, and I thanked her then walked her to the door and closed it behind her.

Yuna was still by the window.

"You can go too," I said.

"I'm not going anywhere."

I went to the kitchen and put the kettle on to distract myself.

"Two months, Mia."

"I know."

"You just disappeared. Your phone was off, your apartment was empty and I didn't know if you were alive." Her voice was steady but her hands weren't, I could see them gripping her own arms. "I filed a missing persons report. Did you know that? Detective Kim helped me file it because I was worried sick."

"I know. I'm sorry."

"Stop saying you're sorry and tell me what actually happened."

The kettle started heating while I watched it, thinking8 about how much I could say but that would cost me something I wasn't ready for.

"I went to a cabin," I said. "That’s all there is to it, Yuna."

"That's what you said to the detective."

"Because it's what happened."

"Mia." She came into the kitchen and stopped across from me. "I know you. I have known you for fifteen years and I can count on one hand the times you've looked at me the way you're looking at me right now. You are lying to me."

I kept watching the kettle.

"Did he hurt you?"

I swallowed. We stayed in silence for a while as I willed my mouth to move.

"He didn't hurt me," I said.

Yuna looked at me.

I looked at the kettle.

It was the biggest lie I had ever told and we both knew it. She reached out and put her hand over mine on the counter.

Neither of us said anything.

My phone buzzed on the counter with a notification which made me quickly pick it up and put it in my pocket.

“Good girl.”

Yuna's eyes had almost caught it, her gaze flicking to where the phone had been and then back to my face with a question in it that she didn't ask out loud.

"I'll call you," I said.

She stood there a moment longer, studying me, and then she nodded once and picked up her bag.

"I'm not going to stop asking," she said at the door.

"I know."

She left and I stood in the kitchen listening to her footsteps go down the hall then I took my phone out of my pocket and typed back one word.

“Don't.”

His response came in under ten seconds.

"See you soon."