Free Held by You by Cheyenne McCray Page B

her head. “Then Carl just died. Before I could do anything, he died.”
    “You said you just got home.” John’s features were unreadable. “Did you see anyone? Did you pass anyone on the road on your way home?”
    “No one.” She shook her head again. “Carl was the only one here and I didn’t see any other vehicles once I got off the highway and turned onto the road to the ranch.”
    “What about on the highway?” John asked. “Did you notice any vehicles coming from the direction of your ranch?”
    She strained to remember but nothing would come to her. “Maybe. I don’t remember much that happened before I got here.”
    “Who gave you the black eye and split lip?” the deputy asked.
    “Carl did.” Hollie’s throat felt raw as she spoke. “When I got home last night, close to midnight.”
    The deputy gestured to Carl’s body. “Did you give him those scratches on his arm?”
    She looked confused and turned her gaze on the body. “Yes.” She looked back at the deputy. “When he hit me I started to fall and scratched him when I was catching myself.”
    “Did you kill him in retaliation for hitting you?” the deputy asked.
    “I didn’t kill him.” Shuddering, Hollie rubbed her arms with her palms, feeling unbelievably cold. She started shivering violently.
    “She’s going into shock.” John looked at the deputy. “She needs a blanket.”
    The deputy didn’t move but called out to someone to bring a blanket. Hollie continued to shiver, feeling as if all the blood had drained from her body, just like Carl’s blood had poured out of him. She barely felt the blanket that someone draped over her shoulders and arms. In her daze, she realized it was John.
    “Sheriff McBride,” the deputy said, his voice sounding far away.
    Hollie and John looked up. John nodded to the sheriff, his brother, before turning his attention back to Hollie.
    “We’re interviewing a possible suspect,” the deputy was saying to Sheriff Mike McBride. “Hollie Simmons, the victim’s stepsister.”
    Suspect? Hollie blinked and looked at the deputy. With incredulity she said, “You really think I killed my stepbrother?”
    John turned his gaze on the deputy, his eyes narrowed. He said something in a low, hard voice to the deputy, but Hollie was in too much of a daze to grasp the words.
    The deputy looked angry and the sheriff stepped in. “I’ll take care of this, Deputy Schmidt.”
    Schmidt steeled his expression, gave the sheriff a nod, and turned away.
    “Tell me what happened,” Mike said as he crouched beside John. Even though she was still in a kind of fog, Hollie found it easy to see the striking resemblance between the brothers, but there were differences. The main one was that John seemed more hardened and weathered than Mike did.
    Hollie repeated the story to Mike. She found strength in John’s presence as she spoke. She clenched her fingers when she told him about trying to stop the blood flow and realized that John was holding her hand, even though it was coated in dried blood. Mike asked her about her bruised and swollen face, and she explained that, too.
    “Was anyone else here when Carl Whitfield struck you?” Mike asked.
    “Freddy Victors was.” She felt a wave of heat wash over her as she remembered the things Freddy had said to her. “He threatened me sexually.”
    John’s hand tightened around hers so hard she winced.
    “Carl also destroyed your property?” Mike asked.
    She nodded. “He trashed the house from top to bottom. Destroyed so many of my things.”
    Mike glanced around. “You say it happened last night?”
    “I spent hours cleaning it up,” Hollie said. “I didn’t stop until I finished, which was after dawn.”
    “Is the debris in the garbage from your home?” Mike asked.
    She looked at him, puzzled. “Yes.”
    “You said the gun is yours,” Mike said. “It’s registered to you?” When she nodded he said, “How did it come to be in the foyer?”
    “I don’t