“What, are we friends now? Watch yourself, Huntsmen, it almost sounded like you were concerned there for a second.” I tried to laugh but I just ended up coughing, which led to me moaning in pain. I knew he hated it when I used his last name. Not many people knew it, but right now it was perfect for that reason. It showed we did actually have a kind of closeness that he didn’t have with many other people.
“I am,” he said but it didn’t sound sweet or friendly. “You’re twenty percent of my business. If you die, I’ll have less to do. And you know how I get when I’m bored.”
“Oh, yeah, I do. Hey, do you remember that time down in—”
“Nope,” he said cutting me off. I huffed out a laugh trying to smother it as much as possible.
“You must be getting old, you use to remember them all.”
“Think you hit your head too hard and now you’re making stuff up.” Oh, he knew damn well that I wasn’t. “So what are you going to do now?”
I let out a long, controlled breath. What the hell was I going to do now? I couldn’t exactly move so great at the moment. Not to mention that my damn DNA was all over that crime scene. A crime scene that was already being processed. Yeah, it was too late to call Mr. Clean in. I’d have to work it from another angle, or pray that I never got caught for anything. I didn’t have a record and nothing to link the DNA they find to an actual person. I didn’t like that it would stay in the system just waiting for a match, but I wasn’t all that sure how to fix that.
“Give up the jobs and go live in the cabin,” I said but I was only half-joking. Really, it was the smartest idea. Live as closed off as possible and never put myself out there to get noticed for anything.
“We need to get you somewhere safe.”
“Yeah, I don’t think this old lady is going to let me leave. I mean, she was nice enough to pull me inside her place when she saw me crash onto her balcony. And she even called her veterinarian grandson to come and patch me up. But I’m not sure if she is going to turn me in or not. I don’t think she’s made up her mind yet.”
“I’m calling Nadya,” he said and I knew he was about to hang up and do just that.
“No!” I yelled trying to catch him.
“I don’t think you’re in a position to argue. And it’s not like you have that many friends. I’d come get you, but I figured you wouldn’t want me to slack off on the job.”
“Yeah, don’t fucking leave there. I need to know when they release her.”Ifthey release her. I knew it looked real bad her being the only one in that room still breathing. But there was no way they could think she did all that. Then again, sometimes I knew the justice system was fucked up. “Just call me if something changes. I’m not asking here.”
He grunted, then hung up. I took it as he heard me loud and damn clear.
I couldn’t shake off the dizziness any longer. As much as I didn’t want to close my eyes, it seemed like my body didn’t give me a choice.
Interview
Part 6
“Miss Fowler, let me tell you how I see it. You come home. For whatever reason, Mr. Ramos gets angry and takes it out on you. But I don’t think it was just the five of you in the apartment. And I’m having a hard time believing that you didn’t see whoever it was.”
“I can’t tell you what I don’t know. I passed out when he hit me. I woke up scared, saw that he was dead, and I feared for my life, so I grabbed the gun that was laying on the floor next to me. But everyone was already dead and the cops were coming off of the elevator.”
“So you want me to believe that you saw absolutely nothing?”
-14-
Jessica
“I don’t know what to tell you,” I told the detective with the perfectly cut golden blonde hair. I shrugged and leaned back in the chair. “Check my hands for gunshot residue. You won’t find any. I didn’t shoot him. And I have no clue if there was someone else in the condo or not. I didn’t see anything.”
I was getting tired of this. I’d been here for hours, left to sit in this stupid room for far too long before someone even came in to talk to me. I was no stranger to this type of situation, though I’d tried my hardest to avoid them. It might have been a few years since I was in a room similar to this but I didn’t think I was out of practice.
His nostrils flared and I gave not one fuck if he was getting irritated at me.
“You’re telling me you were right there and you didn’t see anything?” he asked in a gritted tone.
“No,” I answered with a shake of my head. “We were talking and he wasn’t happy. He hit me. I passed out. When I came to, I barely had a moment to take in what was around me before you guys started hounding me.”
“You’re not giving me much to go on.”
“I’m not trying to be difficult. I’m telling you what I know.”
