Free The Tenderness of Thieves by Donna Freitas

fine.” I let out a big breath. I kept forgetting I needed air.
    “Are you?”
    “Sure.”
    There was a pause on the other end and then, “I don’t know if you’ve seen the news.” He stopped. Waited for me to confirm or deny. When I didn’t say anything, he continued on. “Don’t get discouraged. The police are going to find out who did this.”
    “I know,” I said. But I didn’t.
    “Maybe you and I could go down to the station and talk to them together,” he suggested. “I’d be more than happy to do it. In fact, I’d like to be able to—”
    “I’m actually headed there today,” I said, not letting him finish, tears already pricking my eyes at his kindness. He was always so kind and this was of the fatherly variety, which made it even more potent. It’s the kindness that kills you sometimes, I’d learned. “I’m okay to go alone.”
    “But you don’t have to.”
    “Thank you for offering. I mean it.”
    “All right,” he said, but he didn’t sound confident that what I wanted was what was best. “Jane, Martha and I would love to see you. We want to have you to the house for dinner, though I know you haven’t wanted to come here ever since . . .”
    A single tear made its way out of my eye, despite my fighting against it. It slid down my cheek, a lonely raindrop. “I’d love to see you, too. But I haven’t been able to get myself over there. I’m sorry.” My last two words were all but lost, my throat too tight to allow them air. Professor O’Connor started to say something else, but I couldn’t let him. I had a difficult day ahead, and I didn’t want to break down completely. “I’m sorry,” I said again. “But I have to go. Okay? Thank you. Thank you for calling. Really.” The phone made a soft
click
when I pressed the hang-up button with my finger. I held it there a moment, in a daze of sorts, before I placed the receiver in its cradle.
    To think that the very first moments of this morning held so much promise. Now the heaviness in the air only felt like it wanted to steal my breath. Suffocate everything. Take all the goodness this day might have had away.
    • • •
    I reached the police station quickly, more quickly than I’d wanted to.
    Like everything else in our town, it was down by the wharf. It wasn’t a pretty building, but it wasn’t ugly, either. A nondescript concrete and glass structure that someone had painted dark blue a long time ago, whether to match the color of the ocean or the uniform was unclear. There were tall windows on the side that faced the water, to keep an eye on the happenings on the wharf, I supposed.
    I was sweating underneath the long-sleeved shirt I’d put on, instinctively, before leaving the house. There was something about heading here that made me feel exposed and vulnerable. Like maybe jeans and a big shirt could hide me from view. I hadn’t always felt this way, not when I’d come to visit my dad, but now everything was different, and the station had become a place not where I’d find family but where there were cops who needed something from me. Police with hopes that I could somehow give them a break in a case gone cold. Where now, when I walked through their door, what everyone would see was not simply Calvetti’s daughter—they would see that, too—but Calvetti’s grieving daughter who was also a witness.
    A witness.
    This was running through my head when I reached for the metal bar across the door to let myself in. I hesitated, holding it half-open or half-shut, depending on how you looked at it, waiting for someone to let me off the hook and tell me to go home. That I wasn’t needed anymore because the police figured out who was responsible for the break-ins, or because some other witness had come forward. For a quick second I thought I saw Handel reflected in the tall panel of glass, far behind me on one of the street corners, but not far enough that he was too small to make out. When I turned to see if it was