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Chapter Eighty-Three
Point of View: Nick

The weirdest part about the whole thing of house arrest, for me anyways, was the tightness of the security.

I was laying in bed, and a cop guy was sitting on a plastic chair on my balcony, feet up on the railing, staring out at the ocean. Another was outside pacing in front of the door. A third, I knew, was downstairs by the front door, and two more were out by the gates to the house. All of them had guns.

I pulled the blanket up to my chin and tried not to think about the fact that they were all here making sure that I, the supposed psychotic killer, didn't get out of the house to go brutally murder more people. My ankle bracelet felt heavy and painfully solid.

I closed my eyes, trying to fall asleep, but no sleep would come.

Suddenly, there was a commotion downstairs.

I sat up in bed and the cop on the balcony stood, and leaned over the rail, trying to look down toward the front of the house. "What the hell..." he muttered. He came inside and looked at me, "C'mon, we gotta go downstairs a second."

I got up and pulled the drawstring on my sweats tight to keep them up securely. I always untied it when I wore them to bed so they'd be a little more comfortable. I was typically a boxers only or nude sleeper, but there was no way in hell I was stripping with all those guys in the house.

The officer led the way down the hall to the stairs, where the other cop rushed ahead of us and down to the foyer. I looked over the rail and three cops were surrounding... Kayla.

"Kayla?" I said, quickly moving for the stairs. The cop behind me rushed to catch me, but I was too fast. "Kayla, what's going on?"

Kayla broke away from the cops, who were all being very dainty about how they took hold of her, probably afraid of law suits or something, and she ran to me, tears streaming down her face, and buried her face into my chest. Instinctively, I hugged her close, and rested my chin on her head. "Kayla, honey, what s'matter?" I asked.

"I couldn't handle being around Zoe anymore," Kayla said into my chest, her mouth leaving wet marks against my shirt.

The cops were all hovering, all staring at us. They'd formed like a ring. I felt momentarily as though we were victims on an island and these guys were freaky villagers about to sacrifice us to their pagan gods. But I gotta give'em credit where it's due - as odd as the circle forming thing was, they weren't ripping us apart.

I rubbed Kayla's back. "What happened?"

"She treats me like I'm a child, Nick," Kayla cried, "I'm not a child anymore."

"You're not," I agreed. "Thank God," I added.

Kayla hiccuped.

"Baby, baby," I whispered, "It's gonna be all right. Shh."

Kayla nodded against my chest. "I had to get out of there."

I imagined Kayla leaving. Somehow, the way she was talking, I did not imagine her saying bye to Zoe. "Does Zoe know you're here?" I asked. Kayla shook her head. "Does Zoe know you left?" Kayla shook her head again.

"She thinks I can't leave."

I hesitated, not sure I wanted to hear the answer - imagining Cinderella's step mother locking Cinderella into the attic room in my mind - "Why does she think you can't leave?" I asked.

"She took my car keys."

"She took your keys?" I asked, dumbfounded.

"Yes. See? She's treating me like I'm a kid."

Taking the keys is a little ridiculous, I thought, Considering Kayla is a grown up...

Then I thought of another question. "So how did you get over here then?"

"I took Zoe's car."

"You took the Prius?" Kayla nodded. "And she doesn't know?" Kayla shook her head. "Oh God," I muttered. "Kayla, we gotta call her."

"What? Why?" Kayla asked. "Nick, I don't want to call her, I want to stay here with you. Can't I stay with you."

"I, uh--"

One of the cops cleared his throat, "That'd be a violation of terms."

"Which technically we're already in," commented another cop, motioning to the grip Kayla and I had maintained.

"Yeah," said the first cop, "Technically..." He nodded, and gently pulled me back from Kayla.

Her eyes glossed over.

"Kay, baby," I whispered, standing three feet away from her. I sighed. "When all this is over," I said, "You can stay here then if you still want to, okay?"

She nodded.

"We'll take a vacation, we'll go see some pretty beaches or something, anything you want."

"Okay."

"For now, you gotta call Zoe and tell her where you are," I commanded. "If she figures out you're gone she's gonna freak out worried about you."

Kayla nodded at me sadly.

One of the cops hesitantly stepped forward, "You can come back in a few hours, miss," he said, "But right now your being here is a visitor violation, so we need to ask you to leave."

Kayla nodded again. I could tell she was about to burst out crying again. I sighed. "Baby, it's gonna be okay, all right? I'm sure whatever happened between you and Zoe is either a misunderstanding or she was just trying to help you, okay sweetie?" Kayla's eyes welled up even worse. "I love you," I said.

"I love you, Nick," she answered.

I sighed as the cops led her out the door and sat down on the stairs. One of the officers - the one that'd been hanging out on my balcony - stood beside me. I rubbed my forehead, feeling a migraine coming on from nerves. "Can we go back to bed?" I asked after the other cops came back inside, which told me Kayla was gone.

"Whatever you want," he answered.

I got up and started up the stairs to the bedroom, hoping that Kayla was okay and that she did actually go home to Zoe.