Masenia Chapter 13 Interrogations (Patreon)

Chapter 13

Interrogations

8:32 AM

“I understand you have had a rough couple of days.” Detective Quinn began.

“Am I going to need a lawyer?” Anita asked, as something clearly seemed to be bothering her. Normally she would press, but she was just here to ask Anita a few baseline questions about her twin sister. A sister who could very well be her true in to identifying a crime.

“No, this is just me asking questions. You can leave at any time.” Detective Quinn admitted.

Silence.

“I am mainly here to find out what happened to your sister on Monday?” Detective Quinn.

At that, Anita’s face completely changed. “I take it she has changed since her altercation, on Monday?”

“What altercation? You mean with dad? It’s not what you might think. She just woke up in an off mood. Then dad saw her trying to access her phone before school hours and he took it away. After that, she just sort of broke.” Anita said.

“Wait, I’m confused, this was after she awoke in the ditch?” Detective Quinn asked.

“Oh, then? I guess it would make sense that the school would finally investigate that.” Anita began.

“Let me cut you off. This is not related to the school’s investigation. If they are conducting their own, then that is on them. I am actually here on account of a more serious string of crimes that I suspect your sister might have somehow witnessed, and been knocked out in relation to.”

“Crimes? Here, what is it, a form of vandalism?” Anita scoffed.

“Well actually, now that you mention it, I could see how some might attribute it to mere vandalism, but the desecration of animals is a big deal, I assure you.” Detective Quinn explained.

“Wait? The desecration of what?” Anita asked.

“Of animals, we have uncovered no less than eleven animals at different points throughout the neighborhood. One was apparently found in your backyard.”

“My? Backyard?” Anita asked.

Detective Quinn nodded, “I think it might be in retaliation for what your sister might have seen on Monday. Tell me, was there anything odd about your sister when she returned home on Monday evening?”

At that Anita looked flustered as she apparently recalled more than one thing that was off, it the ticks and micro expressions that were flashing on her face were anything to go off. Finally, she answered, “honestly, what wasn’t off about her. She looked like Hell.” Anita said.

Then Detective Quinn was not prepared for what happened next, as the girl started crying. “She, she looked like Hell, and it was all my fault. I, I left her, and she was bleeding and distracted in a ditch. This was after she had already passed out once during school…”

What happened next was a long drawn-out cry, of a scared sister, who clearly felt burdened by what they had done. Detective Quinn used that moment to go over and comfort the teenager who had been so brave until moments ago.

Snooort.

The girl was a sobbing mess, and clearly needed a tissue. At that, a quick look around found a box of tissues that seem to pop up on school grounds like pimples on the student’s faces. Still, she was glad for the box, which is also why she didn’t mind hosting these types of investigations here.

“I felt so bad, and she didn’t say a word to me. Not that I could blame her. Then she put those bloody rabbits paws by my face and I screamed at her, calling her crazy… I’m, I’m a terrible sister.”

“Shh, no, you are fine. This is scarry, and you both are just having a hard time dealing with it.” The detective said, finding herself being more of a comforting mother in this interview than she even was to her own children. Of course, her children were a set of two mixed German Shephard-Lab Mixes that failed out of the K9 unit.

With that, Anita finally managed to go off.

“She then spent all day yesterday at the doctors, then specifically asked to see me after school, but then I didn’t even talk to her. Instead, she was just out back on the porch meditating, or doing something else. Though if there was a crime she witnessed, then maybe it was her way of trying to tell me, without getting me fully involved…” Anita stammered.

At that the Detective nodded. “Why do you say that?”

“Well, if the crimes happened last night, then she might have made it so I wasn’t there. I was so mad about missing practice and potentially being benched during the game, that I didn’t even think about it, also there were the…” Anita trailed off.

“The rabbits feet?” The Detective asked, having picked up on the disdain that Anita had when she spoke about them.

“Yes.” Anita answered.

“When did she get those?”

“I don’t know, I think she had them when she got back, clutching them tightly in her hands.” Anita said, holding her hands in a protective gesture over her body, with her hand, likely demonstrating the way her sister had held those very same rabbits feet.

“And this was when she got home, after she went missing on Monday afternoon?” Detective Quinn said, making sure to write this all down, even making a note of the defensive posture of the arms.

“Oh gods, is that a clue?” Anita asked.

“I am afraid so. We have on authority that two full rabbits were slaughtered and left to rot in a yard.”

“Oh gods, were they missing their feet?” Anita asked, her hands going up to cover her face.

“No, I shouldn’t give away too many details, but we are looking for full sized animals that were slaughtered. So, if your sister found these paws, it might mean she knows who conducted these crimes. Did you see her talking to anyone? Or did she mention anyone?”

Tears.

Anita was close to crying again, but she fought back the tears and just shook her head. “No, she won’t talk to me. Worse, I think this was around the time she learned about her boyfriend cheating on her, but if she found out, she won’t talk to me about it.”

“Her boyfriend?”

“Mark Price, but she has been acting weird about him since before school on Monday, almost acting as if he was dead to her. Which is odd, if you know anything about her. She was crazy about him. I even tried to warn her about his cheating, but she wouldn’t believe me, stating I always hated him. I did, she wasn’t wrong, but that was because he was a cheating scumbag.” Anita confirmed her true thoughts on the boy.

At that, Detective Quinn nodded, suddenly drawing more inference from Dispatcher Price’s comments earlier.

“One last question, where were you last night?”

“In my room.” Anita answered.

“Is there anyone that can corroborate your story?”

“My twin, Maria.” Anita said, a quick cascade of emotions flashing over her features.

“You two still share a room?” Detective Quinn asked.

At that Anita looked like she had been slapped. “This was a recent thing. We had lived together until our older brother Juan failed out of college. Since he moved back, we have been forced to move back into the same room together.”

“Ah, that has to be awkward.” Detective Quinn said with a grimace.

“Yes, I mean, my sister is great and all, but that is a bit too much, you know.”

“And circling back, that is how she was able to leave the rabbits feet on your pillow?”

Nodding, “Yes.”

“I take it with the two of you being roommates, your ability at a social life outside of each other is rather limited?”

“YES!” Anita agreed emphatically.

“Do you remember anyone going to your backyard last night?” The detective asked.

Anita paused, for a second, but then shrugged her head. “No.”

There was something there, maybe she saw a light and dismissed it, or something, but there was something to that look. Still, it is clear she would have told if there was anything. “All right, here is my card. Please call me at anytime if you remember anything else.”

“Sure.” Anita said, grabbing the card and taking a moment to compose herself. Then without being prompted, Anita saw her way out.

Detective Quinn took the next few minutes gathering her notes on the discussion. Early in her career, Detective Quinn would have gone head long into asking the primary source her questions. In this case it meant, she would have gone straight into asking Maria questions, of course, had she done that, she would have only gotten the surface thoughts of Maria. Now she had a few points to go off of.

• Rabbits Feet?
• Tuesday, calling for Anita, what did she know?
• Did she find out that Mark Price had cheated on her?
• If so, what did this do?

There were a whole new set of questions that she could ask her lead source, and now thanks to having started with a few periphery witnesses, Detective Quinn had more leads to pull from. While she inwardly was champing at the bit to call in Maria here, but the detective knew that the girl had been through a lot recently, and it was very likely that she was the victim of a crime. Which was why she only wanted to call her in once. This was done for a few reasons, first it would keep Maria out of the public eye, as her getting called multiple times to a detective who is investigating an ongoing case on school grounds would likely cause her to be put in more danger. Whereas if she was called in once, and asked very pointed questions, the interview would be over quickly, and hopefully not draw too much attention to her.

“So, who do I call next? Is it the boyfriend, or the school nurse who also called the cops on the student who passed out in the classroom and then walked off, only to then pass out again. Maybe you are just digging too much into this, but the rabbits paws, that has to be a clue, right?” Detective Quinn muttered to herself, debating with herself, then after hearing the testimony of the twin sister, Quinn was more than certain her hunch was correct.

Cough!

That cough was done by the school’s chief of security Walter "Woody" Woodward made sure it was known that he was still in the room. In fact, he was the only reason why Detective Quinn was allowed to conduct her investigation here on school grounds, a fact the detective was immensely grateful for, especially considering he had remained silent as a ghost the entire time in the background.

Hearing the cough, Detective Quinn turned her attention up to the aged Woody, who looked more like a man ready for second retirement than being the head security guard for a high school, even for a smaller high school like Washington High.

Detective Quinn watched him for a moment, then finally nodded, “okay, I’ll ask. Who do you think I should call in next?”

At that the old security guard shrugged, but then gave his opinion anyways. “I think you should go for the boyfriend. Makes sense to me that he might know something.”

Hearing that, Detective Quinn found herself nodding. “Can you call him?”

Woody just nodded, his white and silver hair shaking slightly at the movement.

***

9:14 AM

“So, Mr. Price. A few basic ground rules. You are not suspected of having committed a crime. Nor are you in anyway implicated. At this point your cooperation here is strictly voluntary, and you can walk away at any time. Do you understand?”

The boy, a tall thin kid with a disheveled appearance nodded. He had a bit of nervousness to him, but overall seemed confident, at least this was the first impression that Detective Quinn had of him.

“Can I ask what this is about?” The boy asked somewhat nervously.

At that, Detective Quinn nodded. “This is a fact-finding mission about a crime that happened earlier today.”

“Oh that, it was nothing. I don’t what to press charges.” The boy said, a bit nervously.

“Charges?”

“Yeah, for what happened in the parking lot.”

At that Detective Quinn looked at the boy, trying to find out what he was going on about. “You seem to have me mistaken, I am not aware of what happened in the parking lot this morning. I am here on what has been happening to one Maria Alvarez.”

Grimace.

At that statement, the boy visibly winces.

“Good, I take it by that expression you are aware of who Maria Alvarez is?”

“Yeah, she is, or rather was my girlfriend.”

“Was?”

“Well, I think we are still together, she hasn’t declared that we are broken up, but she won’t talk to me about it either.”

“In your own words, explain what happened?”

At that point Mark nodded, going through a long diatribe about how he texted the girl a lot. How he had cheated on Maria, for a girl called Marissa, but had broken things off with Marissa to be solely with Maria and he was certain that she had never found out about his relationship with Marissa, even though the sister knew.

“So, let me make sure I have this straight. You cheated on Maria, with this Marissa girl, and you are certain that Maria didn’t suspect a thing, but the twin sister Anita knew?”

“Yeah, I kind of pitted the two against each other, and made it so Maria believed me.”

“So, you manipulated her.”

“I, no, I just told her she didn’t trust me, and that her sister has always been against me.”

At that Detective Quinn nodded, “how did that make you feel?”

“Feel? I felt terrible, she is the love of my life.”

At that Detective Quinn just shook her head and stared at Mark.

“I mean it. I know it might not seem like that, given everything that happened, but she is it, she is the one.”

“Her and this Marissa?”

“No, Marissa is over.”

At that Detective Quinn followed up on a hunch. “Out of curiosity, when was the last time you spoke to Marissa?”

“Monday afterschool. I told her I was done for good.”

“Here?”

“Yes, right outside the band hall.”

“According to records, neither you, nor Marissa showed up to band practice.”

“Right, I broke up with her, and left. Going home immediately as I didn’t want to be here anymore.”

“And why did you feel the need to officially break things off with Marissa?”

“Because, Maria was pissed, it was as if she didn’t even know who I was. I felt so empty staring into her eyes, that I realized right then and there that she was the one.”

“So, you had this epiphany, broke up with the side-girlfriend, then went home immediately?”

“Yes.”

“Can anyone confirm your actually being at home?”

“No, mom had already gone on her shift.”

At that Detective Quinn paused, not wanting to go too much further with implicating the child of a fellow police member. Especially as a simple warrant to pull cell phone records would prove his location if things ultimately came down that far.

Nodding, Detective Quinn decided to go an alternate route. “So tell me how this Marissa seemed after finding out that she was being dumped for Maria?”

“Okay, I guess. She was never too into a full relationship anyways, so my breaking things off was more for my own sense of closure.”

“Right, because you were the one needing closure in this.” Detective Quinn said, pushing slightly to see if he would bite.

“Yes, this has been a terrible week for me.”

At that Detective Quinn made her stand not wanting to push too far, but needing to find out if there was something to her growing suspicion. “Where were you last night?”

“At home, sleeping.”

Detective Quinn nodded. “Can anyone confirm this?”

“No, but mom would tan my hide if I left the house.”

At that Detective Quinn nodded, not wanting to push too much further. This was to find out about Maria and what has been happening to her. Right now she didn’t have enough to go on to implicate Mark in anything, and even if she did, well, she did not want to be put into that moral quagmire until she got there.

***

11:23 AM

“Good morning Maria, it is still morning right?” Detective Quinn found herself asking, as she glanced at her watch. She had been moving for the last eight hours and it looked like the day was just getting started.

“It is.” Maria answered.

“Right, so I hear you have had a busy week.”

Maria nodded.

“Oh, sorry. I should lay down the ground rules. As Mr. Woodward here will attest,” Detective Quinn said, gesturing to Walter “Woody” Woodward, the chief security guard for the high school. “You are not under arrest, you are not under suspicion of having committed a crime. At any time you are free to walk away.”

“Thank you.” Maria said, as she got up, and made her way towards the door.

“I’m sorry, where are you going?” Detective Quinn found herself asking. Her mind was racing, as she had a whole docket of questions to ask. Questions that all centered around the testimony given by Maria Alvarez right here and now. She had questioned Marissa, the cheating side girlfriend, she had questioned the soccer players, many of whom seemed more than a little guilty with what they were doing over the last few evenings. Now all she had to do was ask her questions, get her testimony from Maria, and then she would be able to take a well-deserved nap.

“You said I can leave at any time.” Maria said, as she made her way towards the door.

“Wait, I am trying to help you. To find out what happened to you on Monday. To find out who is threatening your family.”

“Threatening my family?”

“Yes, we think you were targeted as part of a hate crime. There was a ritualistically slaughtered animal in your backyard late last night.”

At that Maria paused, but then seemed to nod to herself, then gave a half bow before stating one word, “goodbye.”

Then just like that the girl was gone.

Detective Quinn got up, and was about to pester her, to pressure her to testify, to give her something. She wanted to say so much right here and now, something along the lines of, “don’t you know how guilty this makes you look?”

But she stopped herself. First the head of security was just staring at her, no doubt willing to be the first to stand up for her rights, especially as he had sat through all the hours of testimony today. With so many people coming, it was clear that Maria was a victim if anything. “Maybe I shouldn’t have mentioned that she and her family were targeted by a retaliatory strike.”

Detective Quinn had spoken silently to herself, thinking that maybe she was the only one to hear, but she was quickly pulled out of her own sleep deprived thoughts by Mr. Woodward, who responded with, “you think?”