Chapter 17
Chapter 17: The Aftermath
Marcus is taken to the police station after the alley shooting, where Detective Morales interrogates him about the night's events. He learns Coach Harris was shot in the arm and Darius is in critical condition. Lena arrives and they share a tense, emotional reunion. Morales reveals the wire went dead during the gunfire, meaning they lost critical audio evidence. She presses Marcus for details about Darius's confession and the masked men, but Marcus struggles to piece together who is pulling the strings. When Marcus and Lena are finally left alone, the burner phone buzzes with a new message from the Unknown Sender proving they know exactly where Marcus is inside the police station.
The ambulance lights painted the alley red and white, strobing against the brick walls like a heartbeat that wouldn't quit. Marcus sat on the bumper of a police cruiser, a shock blanket draped over his shoulders that some EMT had put there without asking. The foil crinkled every time he breathed. He couldn't stop shaking, and he hated that more than anything else—the way his hands wouldn't settle, the way his teeth wanted to chatter even though the cold had stopped mattering ten minutes ago.
Detective Morales stood fifteen feet away, talking fast into her radio. Her face caught the strobing lights in sharp intervals: jaw set, eyes cutting back to him every few seconds like she was afraid he'd vanish. Two uniformed officers had cordoned off the alley entrance with yellow tape. Beyond it, a small crowd had already gathered—people in jackets and pajama pants, drawn from their houses by the sirens, standing in clumps and craning their necks. Someone was filming on their phone.
Harris was loaded into the second ambulance. Marcus watched the paramedics work around him, one holding pressure on his arm while the other secured an IV bag to the rail. The coach's face was gray, slack with pain, but his eyes were open. He turned his head as the gurney rolled past, found Marcus on the bumper, and held his gaze for three long seconds. Then the doors closed and the ambulance pulled away, siren wailing into the night.
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