Total pages in book: 117
Estimated words: 108342 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 542(@200wpm)___ 433(@250wpm)___ 361(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 108342 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 542(@200wpm)___ 433(@250wpm)___ 361(@300wpm)
“I never said I liked you.”
“You didn’t have to.”
“I am here to talk to you, not about me. To interview you. Now, can I proceed?”
“I don’t know, can you?” He chuckled. She sucked her teeth and folded her arms. “Go ahead.” He waved his hand dismissively. “Ask whatever you want. Let the witch hunt commence. I have absolutely nothin’ to hide.”
“Were you abused as a kid?”
He stabbed his lettuce with his fork, then popped it in his mouth and chewed. “Absolutely not.”
“Were your parents strict?”
“My mother could be at times when I and my brothers were little kids, but nothin’ too crazy. She just wanted us to be respectful to adults, get our homework done, and enjoy life.”
“Did your father ever abuse or verbally disrespect your mother?”
“They had arguments every now and again, but nothing physical, and if anyone was givin’ it to anybody, it was my mother givin’ it to my dad. When she got angry at him, her tongue would unleash.”
“What kinds of things would they fight about?”
“Him spending too much money at some lodge he liked to visit and play card games.”
“Did he have a gambling problem?”
“I don’t believe so. He only went a couple times a month. He never spent up the mortgage money or anything like that, and after a while, he just stopped going altogether. He did that for her. He wanted her to be content.”
“Did your mother have any issues with drugs or alcohol?”
“No. My mother drank a glass of sherry every blue moon, but she definitely never did any drugs. Unless you count the one time she told us she smoked a joint with her best friend at a party when they were nineteen and ended up sick, seeing frogs changing colors and nursin’ a throbbing headache. She believes it had been laced with LSD. Picturing my mom in my head high as hell just cracks me up.” He burst out laughing. “My mom was so straight-laced, that just makes it all the funnier. Every time she’d tell us that story, I’d crack up. She was a play-by-the-rules kinda lady, but she was also sympathetic and understanding.”
At last, she sported a smile now, too.
The interrogations continued, rattled one after another. He was certain her food had grown cold. He continued to eat in between her firing squad of questions. Though she wasn’t letting up and he could barely take a sizable bite of anything before she started up on him again, he’d expected this. She’d warned him, but it was still unpleasant all the same.
She’s just doing her job. I can’t be mad at her for that. In fact, I respect her all the more for it.
They finished their dinner and he paid the bill. It wasn’t long before they were outside the restaurant and he was walking her to her car. She’d followed him on the way over, insisting on driving herself. When she opened her door, he swung it open wider for her. She looked curiously at him as he made his gesture, then got into her vehicle.
“Thank you again, Nikolai, for being open to questioning. I will admit that I enjoyed both the trolley tour and dinner. You take care. I think it goes without saying, I will be in touch for further questioning.” When she reached to close the door, he leaned in and deposited a kiss on her cheek. She jumped in reaction, clearly taken aback.
“Yeah, you take care, too. You say you’ll be in touch? I plan to hold ya to it.” And then, he walked away…
CHAPTER EIGHT
…Two weeks later
Porsche shifted in her bathtub to rest her head on the soft beige pillow. She crossed her legs, enjoying the warmth of the water, running over her feet nice and slow.
The air was perfumed by two Farm Fresh Peach Yankee candles she’d placed on the black bathroom vanity. The lights were low, and a plip plop every now and again from the tub spigot serenaded her. A glass of white wine sat on the side of the tub next to her phone, and her hair was pinned up out of the way as she listened to ‘Friday Night,’ by King George. She swayed in the sudsy water, snapping her fingers to the music.
“…It’s Friday night!” She sang with the music, doing all she could to relax from a long day. A long week. A long month. Putting space between her and the Portland Beach Murders was a task. What started out as a promise to a client that shouldn’t have lasted more than a day or two had opened the door to her old ties of detective work.
I quit the force, and here I am, right back at it. I really have to stop thinking about this for a little while, but it’s so hard.
Besides, she had other cases in demand of her attention, deadlines that needed to be met. She had a shitload of company background checks to plow through, a couple of infidelity cases that would directly affect alimony payments in a divorce, and a corporate fraud investigation she was assisting in. I don’t need any additional work, that’s for sure. And the pay was good. She traveled all over Maine to work, and even took a few cases every blue moon back in Boston.