Only You

Ch 6

“I swear! There was a group of men, they were shooting someone and they held me in the middle of them!” I tried to stand my case, yet the three males in front of me just looked at me like I was crazy.

Waking up to someone tapping me on the cheeks and asking me if I was alright, was embarrassing as it is. But to hear these policemen call my claim absurd, makes my blood boil.

Not only did they surround me with questions in their eyes, but they also looked at me like I was a wasted woman. “You took the alcohol test on me, I’m not drunk! I swear on my life there was a group of men and they tried to kill me. There was someone there too before they caught me!”

“Look, miss. I understand you aren’t drunk but here’s the thing, you sipped alcohol before…” he paused, exchanging looks with the other two men, “This… so-called shooting and almost death experience for you. It just doesn't make sense. And there was no proof of anyone there but you." he made hand gestures and air quotes for the whole sentence, mocking me with a bored tone.

“How is that possible? I swear!” the men sighed and the oldest among them, gestured to someone behind me, “Here’s the proof,” a younger office in blue came, placing a laptop in front of me.

“We asked a few men to check the open CCTV there when you were still out cold. That’s what it showed us,” looking at the screen, my eyes almost bulged out.

It showed how I was walking along the club, my steps flimsy, and towards the alleyway like it was no one’s business. As I walk further down the road, I suddenly stopped by the wall and creep there.

It caught me creeping as I scaled the walls, my body hunched over the area yet not what I witnessed. Wow, I hate to admit, but I do look drunk. Damn it! What is happening?

But in the end, the camera didn’t see what I saw, even if the space was wide enough to film it. I swear what I saw and what I followed! But how… how did this camera not catch it!

“But… but…” I was speechless when it showed me, sitting alone, sitting down in the middle of that alleyway like a drunken person, talking. It didn’t even make sense…

“If… if I was drunk as you said… then why’d you come when I speed-dialed 911? How did you even find me?”

“The operator heard a scream and something close to violence on the end when you didn’t talk. According to them, since you had your location on, they managed to track you down before contacting us,”

“Wow, so you came to me and then what… found me lying down on the floor like a stupid drunkard? My hands were tied! I got hit with the end of the gun multiple times! The clip didn’t show you how I got these injuries!”

Pointing to my only proof, the men in front of me did as much of a scoff. The officers in front of me looked no older than thirty, the one who showed me the clip was probably forty but heck, they were being irrational. They should be listening to my claim and not act immaturely.

“Miss, you were creeping against the wall. You acted like some spider then suddenly you were acting like a cat on the cold dirty floor. Your injuries were from that,”

Scoffing back, I have never felt so misjudged. How dare they! I wasn’t bluffing and I know it. Holding back my tears, I wanted to go home and rest. The night was supposed to be a night for me to let loose, yet nothing was close to it.

“Is that why you didn’t even call for a medic to clean my cuts?”

“Please miss, we’ve had more absurd people coming here and making claims. Only not as crazy as you who speed-dialed 911,”

Glaring at these policemen, I bit back the curse and punch. I badly wanted to cuss and hit someone, my eyes hot as I held back the tears. No, I won’t cry in front of these snobby, know-it-all men. If they didn’t believe me, then I will find someone who does.

“You-”

“Someone called for me? I heard there was a possible gang case and witness?” a deep and familiar voice called out suddenly, cutting my words. I could have had a whiplash with the way my head spin, but it didn’t matter, not when I saw who it was.

“Rowan!” I did one thing I thought I'd never. Latching myself to him, I cried and gripped him like my life depended on him. It didn’t matter to me that we were strangers. At that moment, I just needed a familiar person to be with. Even if I hated him.

“Sofea?”

***

“Look here,” his gruff voice made me look up, shaking a bit. “Your cuts need to be cleaned or they will get infected. Here,” he gestured me closer and without warning, held my chin softly. He inspected the small cut before dabbing the cotton ball.

The beating of my heart grew, he was so close. Yeah I know, I was the one hanging onto him a while back, making everyone in the room froze. Like literally. But now, as he and I stay seated in front of each other inside this room, it felt different. I am the frozen one right now.

I don't even know where he brought me to. All I know was that he said some words to those know-it-all officers, to the watchful eyes of the blue-men, and we were gone. All the while his hands around me gripped tightly.

“The officers outside are the patrolling team. They’ve experienced a s**t load of crap sometimes and some were similar like yours. That’s why they didn’t believe you,”

He muttered softly as he put a band-aid over the cut on my lip and went straight to see my injured forehead and knees. Which now had dried blood. “You sure there was a group of men, and they did this to you? Are you sure it looked like a gang activity?”

"You think I lied too?"

"No, because I have this policy to check when so-called witnesses come to us with these claims. So tell me,"

Nodding, I showed him my wrist, red and throbbing lines along them, identical. “They had me tied up, 20 to 40 minutes tops. So I’m not sure why when the police arrived, the rope was no longer there. And yes, it sounded like some gang activity doing or exchanging something,”

He put the cotton ball away, took my cold wrist, and trained his eyes there. His brows almost touching as his fingers lightly trace the lines. “I believe you... but Sofea, what were you doing there? If the operator didn’t hear you screaming and whatnots. Do you know what could’ve happened to you?”

Looking at him, I could almost say he looked pissed but also worried. But why would he? He barely knows me and we’ve only ever met once. “They wanted to kill me,” at my words, the hand holding mine, stiffened. His blue eyes harden and for a split second, I wondered if I said something wrong.

“Rowan?” I tried to take my hands back but his hold was firm. Firm but not hurting me. “Do you remember what happened? I want to know what and how you ended up there,”

“It’s a long story though,”

“I want to know everything, from the start,”

Gulping at his sudden behavior change and the way he pressed the word everything, I began to narrate how I ended up at the club and the alleyway. It could be the alcohol in me or the fact that his scent was messing with my mind. But something was different about Rowan.

This Rowan wasn’t the same guy that met me at my parents' last two months. This was a serious policeman who is worried over a victim and citizen. This person was different than the one that tried to convince me to marry him.

“Okay… I will take this case. Actually, those that you mentioned are the ones that I’m looking for, if I'm correct. But to hear that they are close, heck-” he sighed and seemed bothered by what I just informed him.

“Your case?”

“Yes, the reason why I wasn’t here in LA is because my chief sent me to a location where we believed those men are operating. But it turned out, I was chasing my own tails,”

“Tail? But who could’ve given you the info? I mean, it’s not like your chief did it on purpose,”

“He didn’t but we got intel and someone anonymous tipped us about their whereabouts there. I didn’t want to go, but he made me and had me leave my team behind,”

“You were in another precinct without your team? Then how did you operate?”

“I was a one-man team… but that’s out of the discussion. For now… we have something else to talk about,”

“What? What else do we have to talk about?”

“About this trouble you got yourself into and our marriage,”

I have never seen someone so serious. I mean, was he seriously serious talking about that when he just feed me with his assistance? And what? Why are we back to that again?