Chapter 74 The Lies We Tell

• The leather seat squeaks as I shift, the only sound breaking the heavy silence through the suffocating tension in the air as we speed down the highway. I sit in the back seat, my hands clasped tightly in my lap as I watch Marcel out of the corner of my eye. He sits beside me, exuding an air of restraint, his features tight and his gaze intense.
• In the front seats, Rick and Frank sit rigidly, their eyes fixed straight ahead. They had been waiting for me outside the detention center, ushering me into the car as Marcel spoke with Sam before he walked back into the building, likely to tend to Levi’s situation.
• Marcel hasn’t said anything. Not about what happened with me and not about Levi, and frankly, I can’t take the silence anymore.