"Interview resumed at 17.50 hours. Officers present, myself Detective Thom Smythe and DC Vanessa Beckham," he intoned measuredly towards the microphone.
After placing a white polystyrene cup of steaming coffee in front of Oliver, he noticed the suspect eyeing the cup with a smug superiority. "Something the matter, Mr. Ulster?"
Oliver snorted rudely. "You think I'm going to drink that so you can get my DNA off the cup? Nah, man." He sat back, leaning against his handcuffed hands, pleased with himself.
D.C. Beckham leaned forward and snapped her fingers. "Mr. Ulster, we have your fingerprints on the front door of Miss Moore's residence already," she suggested, like she was talking to a brain damaged amoeba.
"And your DNA from your blood," Det. Smythe informed him. "Taken from one very sorry looking, dented frying pan. She belted you good," he chuckled underneath his breath.
Blushing furiously, Oliver glared at the female constable. "Fuck you," he snarled.
Smiling, she shook her head and looked him right in the eye. "You're the one who's fucked, Oliver."
Oliver's eyes swiveled across to Det. Smythe, whose blasé facial expression only confirmed his associate's statement.
The barrister offered no advice, even as the young man's expression became more desperate by the second.
Wiping his clammy palms against his jeans, Oliver Ulster finally began to comprehend the depths of trouble he'd fallen into.
Thom thought, like most boys new to the business of cracking heads, that Oliver thought the woman would be a pushover, if she were anything like most. Except, Mallory Moore had obviously needed to defend herself before. Oliver had probably been too excited to wave around his new pistol at the poor woman to really think his boss's hit over.
Now that it ran through his head like a record skipping, Oliver's face visibly filled with dread.
_____________________________________
On the other side of North Yorkshire, Elisabeth let herself into her girlfriend's apartment. Having driven Dawn back to the school, she left her class in the capable hands of Sister Eileen, and driven the hour home. Claudia's shift as a paramedic had ended after tending to Oliver and the other injured man, and she should be long home by now.
Fatigue seeped at the teacher's shoulders after the stress of the day, and Elisabeth rolled her neck to release the tension.
Finding no sign of life downstairs, she stealthily took the stairs two at a time. "Claudia?" she called softly, lest her woman be sleeping.
Pushing open the bedroom door, Elisabeth melted at the sight of her bare skinned girlfriend curled up and fast asleep in the middle of the bed. Claudia's long, dark hair fell in a loose pleat on the pillow beneath her head.
Kicking off her trainers and quickly stripping down to her underwear, Elisabeth moved across to the bed. Lifting the duvet, she slid in under the warm bedding, and inched across the sheets until she was face to face with Claudia. She watched the sleeping woman for a moment, and reached across and stroked her hair.
"Hi," Claudia mumbled sleepily.
Elisabeth smiled. "Hi yourself," she whispered, moving her hand down to stroke Claudia's cheek.
"You don't just appear in my bed this early in the evening, Sørensen. What's up?" Claudia teased, and opened one eye. Elisabeth rarely did anything without motive, that they both knew. She rubbed at her eyes in an attempt to wake up.
"Busted," Elisabeth acknowledged as she leaned into her hand, which was propped up by her elbow. "I just wanted to know what happened at Mallie's cottage yesterday. You know, not the edited version for delicate, teenage ears."
Suspicious sea blue eyes wrinkled in mild irritation. "Some posh twit and his shit for brains friend apparently pushed their way in and attacked her. What else is there to know?" Claudia divulged begrudgingly.
"She had an ice pack to her jaw when we got there," Elisabeth coaxed for more information. "Was it fractured do you think?"
"It could have been," came Claudia's honest answer, with an exasperated sigh. "But she wouldn't go to the A&E for an X-ray, so I couldn't tell you for sure."
Utterly confused, Elisabeth shrugged. "Why not?"
Stretching her long legs, Elisabeth's girlfriend exhaled lengthily as the conversation was beginning to become uncomfortable. To put it lightly, Claudia didn't particularly care for Mallory Moore. However, she'd never let personal feelings get in the way of her job. Still, Elisabeth's friend had always put her to the test.
"She would barely let me examine her," she retorted, trying to end the interrogation there.
"Maybe she was in pain?" Elisabeth suggested, though she suspected that she knew the real reason.
Claudia shook her head. "I know someone who has been smacked around when I see them," she conveyed with a stiffening of her body like a board. "She did this the whole time. Mallie is terrified of being touched, babe. You know she doesn't like to be touched."
"Well, the attackers have been arrested." Elisabeth concluded softly, surprised that Claudia had come to the point so succinctly and without much other information. She already knew that Mallory hated to be touched, but didn't elaborate. Instead, she focused on snuggling closer to her girlfriend.
The medic nodded and yawned. "I hope they kick the shit out of them in jail. I'm tired of seeing the aftermath of men and their fucking anger issues," she mumbled, half asleep already.
Elisabeth dropped her hand beneath the duvet, linking her fingers with Claudia's as her girlfriend's eyes fell closed. She loved this woman so much. It was easy to see why Mallie would take on an armed idiot and his sidekick with a damned frying pan to protect Dawn Rose. But, that meant Mallie loved Dawn, which presented a whole other can of worms.
After resting with Claudia a while, Elisabeth kissed her on the lips ever so gently. “I'll be back later,” she crooned, before getting up as soundlessly as possible, and headed back into the night.
_____________________________________
Elisabeth idled her SUV to park in front of the green painted wooden door. Pursing her lips in thought as she exited the cab, she took in the cottage exterior. She'd rarely paid attention to it before.
She knew her friend well, but had always considered the home to be just that - a home. Now, Elisabeth took another look.
All sorts of wildflowers grew in huge patches under the windows and across the lawn, and the shutters were stupidly adorable with hearts cut out of the panels. Mallie's home looked something out of a fucking fairy tale, except Elisabeth knew better. Inside weren't seven idiot dwarves singing hi-ho. No, this was a dragon's lair dressed up prettily to avoid the suspicions of any neighbours or colleagues, and possibly to lure unsuspecting maidens in to eat for dinner. At that thought, she snorted.
A woman's voice on the radio blared out of the open windows, warbling a cover of a creepy 90's song. Elisabeth knocked on the door, and was startled when it creaked open slowly. It was completely unlocked and unlatched.
'Yeah, that's Mallie. Almost get knocked off the day before? Fuck you, I'm airing out the house,' Elisabeth thought, shaking her head.
Stepping into the entryway with her hands up in defense, she called out warily. "Mallie? Hey, Mal?"
There wasn't any response, so she walked slowly into the kitchen where the speakers were blasting music from Mallie's iPhone. Scanning the playlist, Elisabeth stuck out her tongue and grimaced slightly. It was full of wah-wah love songs, heavy rock, and industrial. It was recipe for Mallie to make herself feel like an consummate piece of shite.
Scrolling down, she finally changed the headache inducing song to something remotely tolerable. Still, as Fiona Apple began to play, Elisabeth winced. "Faen," she cursed in her native language, and tried to switch it again before even she felt depressed enough to cry.
"Leave it!" Mallory yelled from the living room, and Elisabeth took her hands away from the iPhone, her cheeks burning in guilt.
As she walked into the living room, Elisabeth swallowed the urge to gasp. More than a few beer bot
tles littered the coffee table, and the once pristine table runner was covered in the ashes of cigarettes that had escaped the piled-up ashtray.
Mallory lay supine on the couch, clutching a bottle of liquor in one hand and puffing away at yet another cigarette with the other. Her battered cheek had bruised to purple and yellow overnight, and she was clad in ripped black jeans and an undershirt that had twisted in her sleep.
"Holy shit," Elisabeth stammered. "What're you doing?" She gulped deeply as she noticed her friend was also bra-less, and one breast was precariously close from saying an accidental hello.
Rolling her eyes and laying her head back on a pile of throw pillows, Mallory twiddled the cigarette between her lips and took another drag before exhaling the smoke in Elisabeth's direction. She did it on purpose to raise her friend's hackles. "Oh this? You know me better than to ask. This is me not giving a fook," she slurred and snickered.
Elisabeth tugged at the bottle in Mallory's grip, nodding and stepping out of the pathway of the smoke. "I can plainly see that. Give me this," she huffed impatiently as the Mallie made an infuriatingly pathetic pout and tugged back.
Still, Elisabeth wasn't going to give up this tug of war. She pulled at the bottle and glared at the self-destructive woman. She had seen this kind of behavior in Mallie before many years ago, she wasn't about to let a repeat performance happen.
"Stop!" Mallory's voice was irritated when she realized her friend truly meant to abscond with the liquid courage. "I need this," she pleaded, her mood swinging rapidly as she blinked back tears.
"For what, shutting down your damned liver?" Elisabeth remarked as she whisked it away towards the kitchen, along with the empty beer bottles. "Get your filthy arse in the shower, Mallie. You stink like a nightclub, and you'll feel better for it. You have to be in fighting condition now."
Wobbling as she stood, Mallory scowled. "Si vis pacem, para bellum," she spat angrily.
Popping back into the room, Elisabeth crossed her arms and scowled back. "Word vomit what?"
"Nothing," Mallory seethed, running her hands through knotty, sweaty hair. She stomped past Elisabeth and up the stairs, not pausing even when she stumbled, her ankles loose and wobbly from being drunk. She merely pushed off the wall and continued on her way towards the shower without looking back.
Staring after her, Elisabeth ran a hand down her face in equal amounts of relief and frustration. Mallie liked control. She had none right now, so she was taking control back by giving the world a giant middle finger. The problem with that kind of thinking were the dangers that came along with it. One could find themselves in real hot water if you let your guard down too much while instructing those who would take you down to take a long walk off of a short pier.
The woman upstairs was a ticking time bomb, and Elisabeth needed Mallory's bomb squad. She had a sinking feeling when she realized that it was no longer her, but in the hands of an eighteen year old with less maturity than the drunk upstairs.
"I'll be back in a few, Mallie!" she yelled up the stairs towards the direction of the shower running.
She needed Dawn Rose, and fast.
_____________________________________
After a fitful attempt to nap through the afternoon, Dawn reluctantly opened her laptop at the sound of an incoming Facebook notification. Still feeling badly shaken from her research last night and into the wee hours of the morning, her eyes flickered across the page to the group notice: "END OF YEAR HOCKEY MATCH BROUGHT FORWARD"
Reading down the page, Dawn learned the match would now be played tomorrow instead of the day after final exams in a week and a half. This was due to Coach Sørensen returning to Norway for a wedding, which clashed with the original date of the match.
The comments of her classmates rapidly appeared underneath the post, and Dawn followed them for about ten minutes before freezing in astonishment at what she was reading.
Felicity McGovern: 18:12 on iPhone
Woo hoo… and I didn't even see Dawn wearing a ring
Lisa Harper: 18:14 on Xperia J
Do you think the nuns are invited? LOL!
Felicity McGovern: 18:17 on iPhone
Can you imagine Sørensen on the wedding night? "Harder girl harder! Really Dawn, this isn't good enough." ROFLMFAO!
Lisa Harper: 18:19 on Xperia J
I'm giving you an F!
LMAO!
Felicity McGovern: 18:21 on iPhone
F is for… FINGERS ;)
"Now Dawn, which part of your anatomy can I touch without getting arrested?"
Serena Windsor: 18:22 on iPhone
Oh my God you two, I think I've just pissed myself. Can you see Moore now? "That's my piece of ass, Sørensen!" LOL, catfight! Rawr!
Dawn's eyes blurred with rage and tears, and she tore out of the dorms to the girls' hiding spot. They had to be there... they just had to be.
Just inside the woods, Felicity was hunched over her phone, laughing and tapping out a reply when she was grabbed from behind by the hair and dragged backwards with vicious force.
"You fucking bitch!" Dawn shrieked, kicking at her.
_____________________________________
Elisabeth Sørensen was walking into the side doors to the main hall when she heard the tell-tale, high pitched screams of teenage girls fighting. Looking at her watch, she noted that it was almost 6:30pm. The girls should be at dinner.
Stepping back outside, she tilted her head, trying to hear where the disturbance was coming from. She heard it again, and walked slowly back down the stairs.
"..aaaarghhh!…"
"fucking… kill you!"
Elisabeth broke into a run and covered the parking lot in less than two minutes, hoping beyond hope that what she thought was taking place really wasn't. She rushed down more stairs, and across the grassy knoll towards the treeline, still hearing the fight well before she saw it. A large group of girls had gathered like vultures to surround the fight, jeering and cheering for the fight to escalate as the sounds of slaps and punches echoed the air.
"Let me go, you slag!" Slap!
"Not until you take it back!" Pow!
Elisabeth finally pushed through the feverishly chanting crowd in time to see Dawn punch Felicity in the face, sending the redhead crashing backwards and into a bush. Girls scattered from the brawl's trajectory only to congregate once more to the side. They were acting like pack animals.
"You fucking dyke!" Felicity panted through the hand she held over her bleeding mouth. "I'm going to get you and Sørensen fucked out of here, and that creepy bitch Moore, too!"
Dawn launched herself at the injured girl, only to be restrained by Elisabeth's quick grab to her arm. All 1.5 meters of the teeny blonde vibrated with the need to finish what she'd started, and Elisabeth wished she could hug her or shake her – perhaps both. However, after some of what she'd just heard, that wasn't a brilliant idea.
"What the Hell is going on here, girls?" Elisabeth demanded, shouting over the din. "And why, Felicity McGovern, has my name come into this?" she challenged, still struggling to keep Dawn subdued.
She turned her attention to the girl who was still twisting in her grip. Now more than convinced that Mallie could spot a wildcat in kitten's clothing a mile away, she gritted her teeth in annoyance. "Dawn, please. Calm down, now!"
Felicity shook with anger too, figuring she was probably going to be expelled at this point without her parents' intervention, and pointed accusingly at Elisabeth. "Everybody knows that Dawn slept with one of the teachers the night of the rave," she spat.
"And?" Elisabeth shrugged. 'And? It wasn't illegal. Dawn was eighteen. Faen, Mallie.' she added mentally.
"It was you," Felicity shouted. "We all know it was you!"
Elisabeth's grip tightened on Dawn's arm to keep from releasing the young woman back onto the McGovern girl with full blessing. She responded appropriately, and scathingly. "You stupid girl. Just like in class all semester, you've not bothered to check your facts. Instead, you
just shoot your mouth off."
Despite the pain in her face from Dawn's beating, Felicity's mouth fell open in surprise at Elisabeth's intense gaze.
"You," Elisabeth declared as she advanced on the wretched girl, "You are a perfect argument for natural selection. In fact, I don't know how you've survived to adulthood."
Felicity grimaced as her teacher openly insulted her. "You… you can't say that to me!" the schoolgirl sputtered.
"You might want to take a look at her mobile, Miss Sørensen," Dawn advised, a triumphant grin spreading across her lips.
Trailing Dawn behind her, Elisabeth walked towards Felicity's purse to fish the phone out, and swiped her finger to unlock it. The nitwit girl hadn't even bothered to create a lock screen password.
Peccatum in Carne: Sins of the Flesh (The Three Sins of Mallory Moore Book 1) Page 9