Chapter 28.

“Did Rick have any sort of romantic relationships or love affairs with anyone in secret that you are aware of?”

“No.”

“Has there been anyone acting differently around you after Rick’s death?”

“Well… actually, that’s not quite accurate. My boss has been acting a bit differently, but that’s just because she’s trying to keep the workplace in order.”

“I see.”

“Did you see Rick entering his home when you dropped him off that night?”

“He definitely entered the building. As for whether he entered his unit I don’t really know. Was there any footage of him entering his unit?”

“There was footage of him entering. However, the only strange thing was his fingerprints weren’t on the door knob. Did you notice whether he was wearing gloves that night?”

“No he wasn’t when he left my car.”

Ah. Wait a minute. Wait a damned minute. There were no fingerprints on the doorknob? Didn’t I use my sleeve to open the door? Did I wipe away the fingerprints in the process? But that would be evidence for myself that I’m not insane and I definitely did go to his place after all like I thought. So it really wasn’t just some delusion of mine. Then the footage of me being there must have been doctored and manipulated or somehow deleted by someone for reasons unknown to me. But why would that be the case?

With such thoughts in mind, I stumbled upon a question I never considered before. Who was my boss anyways? For her to be able to get information on me as easily as she had and also be informed so quickly of Rick’s death, wasn’t it strange? I don’t know how old she was, but she actually appeared a fair bit younger than I was. Was she in fact a well off daughter from an upper class family who was getting some experience by taking up the position as the owner of one of their companies?

“Uhm, Seth, I have a question. Do you know the identity of my boss by any chance?”

“Her? Haha. Sorry. If you don’t know already, I can’t say.”

“So she isn’t just an ordinary owner of an electronics repair company?”

“Why do you ask?”

“I was slightly interested in her was all.”

Seth simply returned a mysterious knowing smile before he shook his head and said, “I’ll give you a word of advice, you should give up on any strange thoughts you might be having. Your luck with woman isn’t good to begin with, you shouldn’t gamble with your life like this.”

“I’m not interested in her like that.”

“Oh? Then what is it that you were interested in? You’re not going to drop a bomb and claim she was involved in some kind of conspiracy, right?”

“Nah. No way would I ever make an outrageous claim like that.”

If I did, judging by how quickly and easily my information was leaked to her, I’d probably be dead if she really turned out to be another psychopath. I’m not ready to court death just yet. It would definitely be better to just play dumb and distance myself from it all instead of getting involved anymore than this.

Even though I thought that, I still tried imagining myself in her shoes out of sheer curiosity. Let’s say she was in fact a psychopath, what type of psychopath would she be? The type of psycho to cut someone off cold turkey the moment they did something disadvantageous to her image that outweighs that individual's utility? Wasn’t that precisely the meaning behind what she told me before?

Then, could Rick have had some dirt on her? Did he himself have some sort of unspeakable secret that could have disadvantaged her in some way if it was made public? But if that was the case and she did get rid of him, why would she try to use me as a scapegoat? If I had gone home that night instead of staying at a hotel and I didn’t have any sort of alibi, wouldn’t I have basically been guilty? But if I was discovered as a murderer, that would have caused trouble for the company like she said.

Is that contradiction the very reason why she did it then? She was willing to take the hit for me being discovered as a murderer and the scandal that resulted from it was of less significance to her when compared to her secret being discovered?

Honestly, I was inclined to believe this was more likely rather than believing that it was the work of a ghost.

While I was lost in my stray thoughts, Seth reconfirmed a few of the things I previously made in my last statement while I mechanically answered on auto pilot. After half an hour of questioning, he wrapped things up and brought his questioning to a close, “Thank you for your time Dio. I’ll be in contact should anything else come up. Here’s my card in case you ever need to contact me. If you remember anything or come across anything that may be related to Rick’s death, no matter how insignificant you think it may be, please let me know.”

He looked to be defeated and exhausted by the time we were finished. It didn’t appear as though he’d gained very much from anything I’d told him. I felt a bit bad, but if I carelessly misspoke regarding things I was only speculating about, I could end up in deep shit. Forget about losing my job, I may very well be the next victim on the list.

After I took his card, the two of us stood up and prepared to leave the room. When I got up and turned around I noticed there was something written on the chalkboard that was directly behind me.

‘She killed Rick.’

There were only three words written on the chalkboard. If there was one thing I could be certain of, it was that when I first entered the room, there was definitely nothing written there. For it to be written without me hearing a thing, the only time I could imagine it being written would have been when the door slowly creaked open on its own when I was hallucinating. It was the only time I could think of where the sound of the chalk moving across the board could have been missed if it was disguised by the squeaking door. If that was true though, then was it really a hallucination like I’d previously assumed?