Free Burn 2 by Dawn Steele

he tries her cellphone again, but it goes straight to voicemail.
    “Abby,” he whispers, fearing the worse.
    After all, how well and how long did he really know her? He doesn’t know her state of mind when relationship turmoil happens. He doesn’t really know how she would react in a certain situation. He knows how he reacts – badly. And this is the culmination.
    He has to find her.
    Trouble is – where would she go? As far as he knows, she doesn’t have any real friends in New York City other than him. He doesn’t think she will go to Billy Dee.
    His cellphone rings, and his heart leaps.
    Abby!
    He looks at the display, but is dismayed to see that it isn’t her. Instead, it is an unfamiliar number.
    “Hello?” he says hesitantly, expecting the worst. It could be the hospital, calling him to let him know she is in Emergency, being tended to after she had run out into the street and was hit by a speeding cab.
    “Devon?” Patricia Chalmers’ crisp voice sounds on the other side. “Are you occupied this moment? We have to talk.”
     
    *
     
    Devon sits across his lawyer at the quiet diner. It is quiet at this time of day. Pat Chalmers wears a professional-looking suit and skirt over her cerise blouse.
    “You came from court?” he asks her.
    “Yes. We are trying to avoid that for you. I have news from the coroner’s office.”
    Devon tenses. Whatever it is, it can’t be good.
    “What news?”
    “They found traces of sperm inside Rachel’ s vagina.”
    He is thunderstruck. “But I wore a condom.”
    “I know.” She gazes at him plaintively. “There’s that issue you told me about. The one you wanted to keep secret from both Abby and the police.”
    He feels his whole world spinning.
    “What happened exactly?” she asks.
    He pauses, remembering.
    “We were in the playroom. She had just finished spanking me with the paddle.”
    A man at the next table looks up, overhearing, and gives Devon a funny stare.
    Devon flushes and continues, “She untied me and asked me to go with her to the bedroom. I was hard. I had been hard throughout the play session.”
    “Go on.”
    “She asked me to lie down on the bed. At first, I thought she was going to tie me up again.” He is embarrassed because the man at the next table is eavesdropping on every word. He lowers his voice. “But she didn’t. She came back with a condom, which she put on me.”
    “So she put the condom on you? You didn’t do it yourself?”
    “Not this time.”
    “It was her condom?”
    “Yes. I think so.”
    Pat leans back. “Figures. She might have pricked a hole in it.”
    Devon swallows. He feels immensely bad over the whole thing.
    Pat says, “It doesn’t look good on you. The police are thinking you lied. Which you essentially did.”
    “I didn’t lie. I just omitted a portion of the truth. Besides, I was clear with the police that I don’t remember everything.”
    “You said you wore a condom, and yet they found your sperm inside her. ”
    Devon is suddenly extremely tired. He rubs his eyes.
    “OK, I’ll come clean to them.”
    “Remember, I advised you earlier to – ”
    “I know, Mom. Just leave it, OK? I have just too much on my plate right now. Abby is missing.”
    Pat’s eyes go round. “How so?”
    Devon briefly tells her about their fight and what Abby had earlier revealed about taking a job with Rachel Krieg.
    “I don’t know her that well,” he admits. “I know she’s my girlfriend and everything, but we don’t really know that much about each other. I mean . . . she knows what I moonlight as. And she obviously knows about Rachel and me. But I don’t know anything about Abby’s past. And now I learn she’s some rich kid trying to get out of a bad home. But I don’t know exactly what happened except for those burn marks on her palms. I – ”
    “No, Devon,” Pat interrupts. “There are other implications to this. This puts Abby as a murder suspect as well, in addition to yourself.”
    Devon is