“Mayor Bradley was arrested at his townhouse early this morning on murder charges,” announced the newscaster as footage of the arrest flashed across the screen. In it, Bradley could be seen being pulled out of the house in his pajamas, his hands cuffed behind his back.
In the background, his wife held a hand over her mouth in horror as she watched her husband being put into a police vehicle, her children watching from the windows with frightened expressions.
“When pressed for comment, Bradley only said that he is innocent and that he will prove it once he has his day in court.
But there are those who say the Mayor is guilty as charged, and are rallying to see that he never see the light of day. One such person is Ashley Collins’ mother, Rosemary Collins, who was staging a protest outside of Bradley’s multi-million dollar home at the time of his arrest.”
The camera cut to footage of Rosemary being interviewed in front of Bradley’s home while protestors shouted in the background.
“If you ask me, the man should have never been elected Mayor in the first place. He was a damn crook from the very beginning and I don’t know what people saw in him,” she said.
“And what do you hope the outcome of this trial will be?” the reporter asked, holding a microphone in her face.
“That my daughter gets justice,” Rosemary sniffed.
“And what’s justice for you, ma’am?”
“Fry ‘em,” Rosemary said with a flat expression. “Fry him like bacon on a skillet. And Lord, I want to be there when they do. Ashley will be watching from heaven, smiling right along with me. You can bet your sweet ass on it.”
The reporter looked like he was holding back a laugh, knowing that would never happen even if he was found guilty.
We’d heard all we needed to hear, and Mason closed down the screen on the laptop. We were watching the clip on youtube. I looked up at him from where I was snuggled against his chest and smiled.
Once we escaped across the border, we’d taken Mason to a hospital where they basically just slapped a bandage on it and told us to go. Thankfully the blood had just made it look a little worse than it was.
“Well will you look at that?” he murmured, kissing me on the forehead. We were lying in a King sized bed after just making love, staying in one of the best hotels Mexico City had to offer. The luxurious suite was at the top of the building and had sweeping views of the city. I absolutely loved it. “Justice was served after all.”
“You think he’ll get the death penalty?” I asked, running my finger across his bare chest, enjoying the feeling his flesh.
“Of course not. But hopefully he spends the rest of his life in jail trying to repent for what he did.”
He kissed me again. “Thank you for sticking with me in this. The easy thing would’ve been to just turn me away or let me stay a night and send me off, but just know that I’m grateful for it. And I’m sorry you couldn’t use your fifteen minutes of fame to boost your career.”
“Why would I abandon the man that I love in his time of need?” I asked. “Even if he deserved it by leaving me all alone at the worse possible time.”
“Ugh. Don’t remind me.” Mason massaged my arm gently. “I don’t know what the hell I was thinking.”
“Maddy was definitely something else,” I said.
Mason groaned. “Please.”
I grinned. “Well hopefully she gets put in an Asylum so she can some help. She definitely needs it. ”
Mason laughed. “It’s called a mental institution.”
“Even though she doesn’t deserve it, I do hope she gets the help that she needs.”
Mason pulled me into a warm embrace and kissed my forehead. “God, let’s hope so.”
A few days later . . .
“I have a surprise for you,” Mason announced from the table he was sitting at with his laptop in front of him. He’d been typing for the past hour, driving me absolutely crazy.
I suspected whatever he was doing was important, because when I complained at him to type more lightly, he just ignored me and typed even faster.
I looked up from the newspaper I was flipping through. I didn’t know why I was reading it, it was written in Spanish, but I could make out a few words here and there and it was kind of an interesting way to try to learn another language while Mason was absorbed with whatever it was he was doing.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“Well, I can tell with how you’ve been acting that a life on the run just isn’t for you, even though you won’t come out and say it.”
Damn, I thought. Was it really that obvious? “Well, you’re kind of right to be honest. Why, what’s the plan?”
Mason grinned. “You’re not going to believe it.”
“Tell me.”
Mason grinned even wider.
He loved withholding information from me until it drove me insane. But I assumed this must be good news — I hadn’t seen him this happy in a while.
“Well I was thinking about what you said about Dad, about him finally realizing I’d done the right thing. Well, I gave him a call, and he’s helped broker a deal for my legal troubles.”