She glanced at the paperwork again. “Robert McAllister,” she read aloud. “Is this your current address?”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said automatically. Most people didn’t call him by his full name anymore. To the people he rode with over the years, he was just Ghost. A nickname earned from coming and going without explanation, from never staying long enough to build roots.
Still, Robert noticed the way she stood. The way she shifted her weight slightly onto her back foot. The way she tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear as she focused. He had seen those gestures before, in a tiny girl who used to sit cross-legged on the floor with crayons spread out around her.
“Sir,” she said, breaking his thoughts. “I need you to step off the bike.”
Her tone was firm but polite. Duty, not suspicion.
He nodded and did as he was told, swinging his leg over slowly. His joints protested, but he ignored the ache. His mind was racing now, memories crashing into one another.
He remembered holding his daughter as a baby, her small hand wrapped around his finger. He remembered whispering promises late at night, promises to always find her, no matter what. He remembered the night her mother left. No warning. No note. Just an empty apartment and a silence that never truly lifted.
He had searched. For years. Through paperwork, late-night calls, chance encounters. Eventually, the leads dried up. Life went on because it had to. But the searching never really stopped.
“Please place your hands behind your back,” Officer Chen said.
The words barely registered at first. Then the cold metal of the handcuffs touched his wrists.
Her badge glinted again in the fading light. Officer Sarah Chen.
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