by Harper Shaw
“So, now you don’t know where I got your gun, which was the same gun used to kill a high school friend—a high school friend you spent all afternoon looking for. And you don’t know where I got the gun from?” Faruq tsk’d. “It’s really not looking good for you.”
“Faruq,” Rebecca said, resorting to his first name to try and create some sort of friendship with him. “You have to believe me. Someone is setting me up, and that same person tried to kill me…”
“With a spear gun,” Faruq said. “Common weapon, yeah? Lots of murders done with a spear gun?”
“Which is why I couldn’t make it up,” Rebecca answered vehemently. “Why would I say a spear gun? I would have just said the fucker stole my gun and chased me if I was making it up? Think about it, Faruq. What motivation would I have to say someone in galoshes was trying to kill me with a spear gun?”
He leaned back and tapped his finger on the table.
Rebecca could tell he was mulling it over, clearly not wanting to bite at the lead she was giving him. He believed her, though. At least in part. And that’s all she wanted. She just needed him to mull it over, maybe mush it during the night.
“I didn’t have my gun on me,” Rebecca continued. “Where did you find it?”
“It’s an open investigation,” Faruq muttered. “You know I can’t tell you that.”
“I really want to know where my gun was,” she countered. “If someone was in my parents’ house, I think I have the right to know. Especially since that person probably murdered Chad.”
Chief Bradshaw kept tapping the table with a finger. It was starting to irk Rebecca, the constant tapping, but she couldn’t snap. That would be worse for her and just give Faruq ammo against her in court.
“Just tell me where you found my gun,” Rebecca said gently, using her own version of classic police interview tactics. “That’s all I need from you, Faruq.”
He held up his finger, stopping her.
“It’s Chief Bradshaw,” he said, “and you can probably tell me where I found it.”
They stared at each other, each silently daring the other to break first.
The door burst open, and both Rebecca and Chief Bradshaw looked up, annoyed at the interruption.
Rebecca was pissed. She was just starting to get through to Faruq and somebody had interrupted her.
Her lawyer, Thomas Gardner, strode through the door.
“Gardner?” both Faruq and Rebecca said at the same time.
“What are you doing here?” The unison was scary, and they each shot each other a side-eye.
“Don’t say another word.”
Chapter Thirteen
“Don’t say anything else, Rebecca,” Gardner said. Scraping the metal chair next to her, he took a seat in the interrogation room and set his briefcase on the floor to his right. She could tell he probably wanted to ask Rebecca why she hadn’t waited, why she kept trying to talk to the police in the first place, but she knew he wouldn’t understand.
Biting back a grumble, Rebecca decided the best course of action would be to quiet down and let Gardner pull her out of the hole she’d dug for herself, though she still didn’t like how they were accusing her. She knew she hadn’t done it. That the dark figure had.
“Chief Bradshaw, you need to release Rebecca now. Her owning a Ruger isn’t enough to charge her on, especially when half of the town owns one. Don’t you think? It is an extremely common gun to own, and my client was merely exercising her second amendment rights to have it. Of course, it is your prerogative to take it into evidence to help your case, but it is not enough to charge my client on, and you know it.”
“Listen, I am willing to give your client a chance to change her story so she doesn’t have to go on the record as a perjurer in court, but she stays while we process things. The fact that she fled the scene is more than enough. She even admits to it.”
“I told you that I didn’t —”
“Rebecca,” Gardner said. “Stop.”
Huffing, Rebecca went silent once again.
“Chief, you and your department will release her now unless you want to show me anything else you have.” Gardner sighed and pulled a sticky note pad from his briefcase. “Looks to me like this is it, though. And I don’t want to have to sue Hilton Head PD for violation of constitutional rights.”
Balling his fists, Faruq’s jaw tightened. He looked at Rebecca and then back to Gardner. He seemed to be changing his mind. Maybe it was because they’d known each other so long ago. Maybe it was because she was a fellow cop. Maybe he just didn’t want her neaby.
“You don’t leave town,” Faruq said to her. “You’re still a person of interest.” With that he tore out of the room, the door shutting so hard it shook the walls of the room.
“Whoo,” Gardner said as he turned to Rebecca. “You know, you’re one of my most troublesome clients. Why you couldn’t just stay in at night and visit old friends in the daylight is beyond me.”
Rebecca rolled her eyes.
“And stop talking when you don’t have to. It only hurts us.”
“I’m innocent, Thomas.”
“Yeah, well leave proving that to me.”
After a moment, Rebecca and Gardner left the room and headed out to the main foyer portion of the police building. She wasn’t surprised to see her parents waiting for her. Her mother went in for a hug but flinched when she saw the muck covering Rebecca. Then she retracted.
“You’re out, sweetie,” her mother said, her tone still happy.
“Yeah,” Rebecca answered. “Sorry about all the trouble, by the way.”
“I’ll follow up with you all sometime tomorrow. And, Rebecca, remember you can’t leave town until they clear you or try to charge you.” Gardner shook Rebecca’s father’s hand. “Talk to you soon.” He left the building.
“Time to go home.” Rebecca’s mother led the way out of the police station. “Oh, and, Rebecca sweetie, your father has some towels spread in the back of the car to make sure you don’t… track anything. Make sure to take your shoes off and put them in one of the garbage bags before we pull off. I don’t want anything getting on the carpet.”
“Of course, Mom.” To Rebecca’s surprise, the ride home wasn’t nearly as painful as she’d imagined it. Her parents didn’t talk much the entire time. Of course, this only allowed her to focus on Chad and what she’d seen. When they got home, she was grateful to be free to head into the house and shower.
After turning the shower on, she began to peel the stinky, slimy clothes from her skin and settled them in another garbage bag her mother had given her. They seemed salvageable, but Rebecca didn’t want them to be. She’d rather burn them with the pictures of tonight in her head.
Getting into the shower didn’t make anything better. It took two long latherings of soap to get the stench and stain out of her skin, but the soap couldn’t do anything for her mind. And while the pelts of the hot water distracted her from the physical pain, she could still feel the anguish in her chest. It had only grown now that Chad was gone, too.
Rebecca didn’t stop running the water over herself until it turned cold. Then, and only then, did she step out of the shower and wrap herself in a towel, feeling just as dirty as when she stepped in as she gazed at herself in the foggy mirror. Dressing wasn’t as painful, but her head continued to scream.
When she walked out of her bathroom, Rebecca saw she had a visitor in the form of her mother. The woman sat on the bed with one glass of wine in her hand and another on Rebecca’s nightstand.
As she sat next to her mother, Rebecca tried not to eye the beverage.
“This has been a night. Hasn’t it?” asked her mother.
“Yeah, it has,” Rebecca admitted. Twisting her fingers, she added, “Sorry about that by the way.”
“We don’t consider you a burden, Rebecca. Your father and I love you very much, and we’ll do whatever needs to be done while the police and these Griswalds go on their witch hunt.” Burden hadn�
��t been the word Rebecca was thinking of, but that was Phyllis Morgan for you.
“Thanks, Mom.”
“Here, Becca, have a drink. It takes the edge off.” Her mother held the other wine glass out to her. It was filled nearly to the brim with something that looked red and sweet.
“No thanks,” Rebecca said, waving it away. “I don’t think I should do any drinking, not until the case is over, at least. We wouldn’t want the police or Monica’s parents trying to do anything with that, you know?” she deflected.
“That’s a good point. Smart thinking.” Her mother still took a long guzzle from her own goblet. “Well, sweetheart, I’m going to call it a night. I’ll see you tomorrow?” She downed the rest of the drink.
“Of course.”
As she left, Rebecca’s mother was sipping on the glass meant for Rebecca, not that Rebecca minded too much. It was better that way.
Glancing at the clock, Rebecca noticed how the long night had only amounted to a little after eleven at night. With Chad’s death still looming, Rebecca wanted to call Jennifer. After a small debate with herself, she took the risk and began dialing Jennifer’s number into the phone in her room. She waited, listened to the beeping of the line. A click.
“Hello?”
“Jennifer, this is Rebecca. Sorry to call so late.” She wasn’t sorry, really, but she figured playing it off wouldn’t hurt.
“What do you want?”
“Chad’s dead.”
Rebecca waited for an answer, but Jennifer was silent.
“Did you hear me? Chad’s dead.
“I heard you.”
“Well, are you going to say anything?”
“It’s a shame, but Chad did this to himself. I mean, he brought all this bad karma on himself. Even back then, if he hadn’t had a fight with Monica, she wouldn’t have died and caused all of this. He had it coming.”
“He had it coming?” Even for Jennifer, this seemed cold to Rebecca. “Do you think you’ll have it coming next, Jennifer? I know everything you’ve been telling me are lies.”
“Oh, what are you going to do, arrest me? Wait, you can’t because you’re an alcoholic and they kicked you off of the force.”
“Did you kill him? Is that why you’re being so cold?”
“I don’t know… Prove it, bitch.”
The line clicked off before Rebecca could answer.
“Fuck you, Jennifer,” she muttered, setting her phone back down. Jennifer didn’t even deny that she’d been lying, so clearly everything she’d said before was a sham. For now, Rebecca had issues bigger than that. For one, a killer out for her friends and possibly her. Things were only getting worse.
Chapter Fourteen
Even after the night she had, the next day Rebecca knew she couldn’t curl up in her bed any longer. She’d spent the whole morning sleeping and the afternoon lying in bed. Too many questions were left unanswered. Those and half of the ones whose answers came undone were ringing in her mind as she cracked open her eyes to the sunlight. She muttered something about the abnormal brightness as she rolled out of her bed and began stepping into some clothes.
She kept her eyes closed the whole time, giving them a rest while she thought through the night’s events. She had contemplated everything a little before falling asleep, but she didn’t exactly have a plan yet for the day. Having already looped back around to Jennifer, she figured it was time to pay another visit to Bruce’s comic book store. Maybe he would be in the mood to say something honest now that she knew Jennifer was lying and could confront him about it, too.
Peeking out of her bedroom door and into the hall, Rebecca saw that neither of her parents were to be found, something she considered a blessing as she unhooked the keys to her mother’s car and headed out.
Feeling on edge and not caring that it was approaching evening, she stopped at a coffee shop on the way and picked herself up a decaf caramel cappuccino. Caffeine used to just be a pick-me-up after nights of hard liquor, but these days she used decaf to mellow herself out some. Then she was off to Bruce’s.
As she got there, she noticed the lot wasn’t nearly as full as when she’d last come, likely the product of right now being close to closing time on a weekday. She swung the door open and immediately began looking for Bruce. Remembering those posters of Jennifer she’d seen last time, she hoped he was out in the front somewhere.
Then she spotted him and Dennis talking in an abandoned corner of the shop. They seemed to be in the middle of something serious, faces sober and mouths straight lines. Setting her track to them, Rebecca approached the duo and tapped Bruce on the back.
“Fuck!” Bruce twisted around wildly, clearly tense. “Oh, Rebecca, hey.”
“What’s up, Rebecca?” Dennis asked, coming off as much more normal and less suspicious than Bruce, but she could still tell he was hiding something.
“What are you guys talking about?” Rebecca crossed her arms, too tired for the bullshit today. “And just say it. I don’t have time for any more lies from either of you.”
Bruce’s Adam’s apple bobbed as he gulped. He pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose with his right index finger before turning to Dennis.
“We’re not talking about much,” Dennis said. “Happy to see you, though. Bruce didn’t tell me you would be coming around.” He flashed a pearly smile.
“The feeling isn’t mutual,” Rebecca returned.
“Oh well… We could make it mutual. Come out to dinner with me tonight. It’ll be fun.”
“No thanks, Dennis. I’m not looking for fun, and if I were, it definitely wouldn’t be with you.”
“Ouch,” Bruce mumbled. “Double whammy.”
“You’re not off the hook either, Bruce. You lied to me when you said you didn’t know Jennifer was in town.”
Blushing, Bruce elected to stay silent.
“Fine, fine,” Dennis said. “Listen, I’m sorry, and Bruce is sorry, so now we should go to dinner. I’ll bet I can make it up to you, and we can talk things out.”
“No means no.”
“You’re sure?”
“Did I stutter?”
“Come on, Rebecca. Don’t hold the other day against me. I only lied because I wanted to see you. I can tell we still have some spark, and I think it’s worth exploring whether it’s a friendly one or romantic. Don’t you? We have so much history.”
“Gosh,” she muttered, rolling her eyes. “You must have your ears stuffed with Calvin Klein underwear or just have a thick head, Dennis. No means no. I’m not going out with you, and if you know anything, you’re going to tell me right here.”
“What if Bruce chaperones for us?” Dennis proposed. “Let Bruce and I take you out for dinner. We can have some fun, forget about all this case stuff. Believe me, Rebecca, we’re just as stressed about it as you are.”
Rebecca met Dennis’s eyes. As much as she hated to admit it, they seemed earnest. After all, if things went south with her, it was their heads, too. Maybe it was all the stress from the case, but Rebecca was tempted to take Dennis up on the offer and go out on the town with someone, and sadly, these two were all she had besides her parents.
“Fine,” she said, “but know, this is three people going out as friends. Bruce, be my witness. We’re going out as friends.”
“As friends,” Bruce echoed. “Why don’t you guys wait outside while I close up.”
“Got it, Bruce.” Dennis reached over to wrap an arm around Rebecca, but she ducked before he could, not in the mood.
When Bruce was done, they took to the sidewalk to head further downtown into Hilton Head, deciding that the Tex-Mex Bar they spent every Friday at when they were kids would be the perfect place to reminisce and get something to eat. Having only had a coffee today, Rebecca was starving.
Once they seated themselves and ordered some food, Bruce left to get drinks. Dennis took this as a green light to start flirting.
“Gosh, babe, Bruce kept asking me which drink I wanted, but the on
ly thing I see that I want tonight is you.” Dennis leaned over the table and balanced on his elbows. He was handsome, Rebecca would give him that, but they’d left any chance at romance behind when they were seventeen.
“That was actually terrible, Dennis.”
“Yeah, it sounded better in my head, but hopefully our lips can do better talking later.”
“Just stop.” Poking her finger out, Rebecca pushed Dennis away. Just then, Bruce came back with a platter of drinks.
“Okay, so I got beers and a couple of shots each for us to start. I know you said you wanted water, Rebecca, but these are the same ones we used to get. Remember the icebergs?” He set two small shot glasses of the light blue liquid in front of each of them.
“Um, no thanks. I don’t think I’m drinking tonight,” Rebecca said. She couldn’t help but lick her lips, though. “Did you get the water?”
“Yeah, but I thought you’d want to have one with us.”
“Just do one,” Dennis encouraged.
Bruce smiled as they egged her on.
Rebecca knew she shouldn’t, but she could feel her resolve, which had already been worn so thin, disappearing. The first drop of alcohol felt good. It was cold, sweet, and burned her throat. From there she was gone, diving into a pool of shot after shot after shot. It was all such a blur, and she didn’t come up for air until she felt her bladder telling her to. Then she escaped to the bathroom.
As she crouched over the toilet, she could feel her ass sore from having fallen off the wagon, though she knew her drunken state was numbing most of it right now. Fixing her clothes, Rebecca headed out of the bathroom stall and inspected herself in the mirror. It was blurry, but she couldn’t be sure if that was from her or the dirty glass.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” she said to herself. Even now, she could feel the first sense of regret building up inside her. All that pressure that had been building up was released now, so all she felt was drunk and sad.
Ignoring all of the malt and lime sloshing in her belly, Rebecca tried to fix her hair and straighten the bent waistband of her jeans. Someone shrouded in black appeared next to her. Slowly, she turned.