Sun hits me right in the eyes this morning. Piercing right through my eyelids to make sure I’m not late. Today the kid gets to do her first interview. Let’s see how that goes. Just like yesterday she’s a real go-getter in the morning. Probably been up two hours before the start of shift to do her hair and shit. She greets me with a cup of coffee and while clasping tightly to a brand new note pad which has writing smudged as the title. Interview notes. Looks like someone came prepared today. Guess I can let her talk to the witnesses while they get our perp to the station for questioning.

“Good morning Hanes.” She starts off my day with. At least she dropped the whole “Sir” shit.

“Hey Kid. Ready to do some interviews?” I asked knowing full well that she’s been up all night just thinking about it.

“Absolutely. In fact I have the sister of the perp in room 3.”

“Good. Go talk to her.”

“Uh… Don’t you want to come with?” I tell her while taking a sip of my lukewarm coffee.

I see her clutching that notebook even tighter.

“Nah I figure you already know how to talk to people.”

I could tell she was disappointed but I’m not there to babysit her. Besides, I have to try and look up the call I got last night. Someone’s been watching me and I need to find out since when.

Thirty minutes go by and I still don’t know what I’m looking for. Someone in the force? Someone who seems like a bystander? Maybe there’s a link in the recent cases. Couple gangbangers, some family homicides, and an occasional corner street hold up gone wrong. Nothing has seemed all that out of the ordinary. If anything it’s been a little quiet for this time of year. I don’t know how I can miss someone tailing me. Why would they even bother? I must be one of the most boring pieces of shit there is out there. Maybe it’s a prank call. Some kid who found my number in the yellow pages and thought it would be funny to mess with me. All I know for now is that whatever this is. It’s not over.

I hear a very gentle knock on the door.

“Hi Hanes. The perp just arrived.” Ashe tells me in a soft tone.

Something bothering her?

“Alright. Let’s go do this. I’ll let you start but I’m cutting in if it gets to be too much for you.” I tell her while making my way around the desk.

“Yes sir.”

Sir? I thought we got past that. Maybe something really is bothering her.

When we get to the door I feel a tension in the air. Almost like we are back in the house. Something heavy presses on my shoulders and I hear Ashe take a deep breath for composure.

“Hey Kid…” I turn to look at her with one hand on the handle. “You can do this.”

She gives me a subtle nod and we come in the room. There’s the man all patched up on the side of his face with a couple of drops of blood seeping through the cloth. His eye looks glazed over like there isn’t a soul left in his body.

“Mr. Cassidy. I’m detective Haley Ashe and this is my partner detective Scott Hanes.” She states while stiffening up her back.

The man doesn’t move. Just stares blankly straight ahead and slightly down.

“Mr. Cassidy, do you understand me?”

“Yes.” He answers in an impatient tone.

“We are here to talk to you about the events that transpired yesterday at approximately 10:15 in the morning.” She says trying to sound like an authority.

“Ok.” He answers. Body still not having moved an inch.

“Do you recall the events to which I’m referring?”

“Yes.”

“We would like to hear your side of the story.” She says while sitting down in front of him.

There’s a silence as the man continues to stare in the distance.

“Mr. Cassidy. Are you willing to give us your side because based on the evidence we have here this case seems pretty clear.”

“It is.” He answers, finally lifting his eyes to stare at Ashe. You can feel her discomfort in the air.

“What is Mr. Cassidy?” She says trying to keep her focus.

“It is clear. I killed them.”

“Why did you kill them?”

Another silence comes as he looks back into the distance lower to the ground.

“Because… she failed us.”

“I’m sorry Mr. Cassidy I don’t understand.”

“She… She killed our child.”

“She killed your daughter?”

He begins clutching his right fist over and over.

“Our other child.” He answers.

Ashe looks puzzled.

“There was only one child in the house. Which other child are you talking about?”

“Our second. She killed it. I didn’t even get a say.”

“Do you mean an unborn child Mr. Cassidy?”

“Yes.”

“Did your wife have an abortion Mr. Cassidy.”

“She might as well have!” He snaps at her, making her jump out of her skin.

You can see her heart racing through her shirt but she keeps cool.

“Did Mrs. Cassidy have a misscariage?” She asked, trying to hide the tremble in her voice.

“She failed us.” He says in a quiet tone again.

“So Mrs. Cassidy had a misscariage and you killed her for it?” She asks while starting to get heated.

“What would you know. You’re nothing but some stupid dumb bitch who’s probably been busted for years!”

And that’s my queue.

“Listen here you piece of shit!” I say while placing myself close enough to smell his breath.

“Don’t you fucking dare talk to my partner like or I’ll make sure you never get the chair an you have to live the rest of your miserable waste of a life in cell so we can relive yesterday every fucking day of your life until you’re lucky enough to go burn in hell!”

The man stared at me with his one good at a loss. He begins to settle down. This piece of shit never deserved the freedom of that bullet in his skull.

“Now… Are you going to let my partner do her job or am I going to have to get investigated for police brutality?”

Haven’t snapped like that in years. Fuck. Haven’t felt that strongly about something since before I can remember.

I move my way back to the room and tap Ashe on the shoulder.

“You’re in charge here. Control him.”

She looks up at me fighting back some anger. She drops her shoulders then continues.

“Mr. Cassidy. I would like to apologize if I seemed like I was being judgmental. I just want to understand what happened.”

The piece of shit finally looks like he’s ready to talk.

“I don’t know all the details. My wife was in the kitchen. Cleaning some dishes I think. And I think my daughter was outside playing. My wife was about six months pregnant and working hard as an ox to get dinner ready for the week. I told her that she should take a break. The doctor said she had some condition that made it risky to have another child. But there she was. Working hard as ever. Making sure every inch of the place was spotless. I was working in the garage trying to fix a wobbly chair from the dining room when I just got this feeling. Like this weight was sitting on my chest. I thought I was having a heart attack. I really wish I was. I called my wife over and told her there was something wrong. I just couldn’t quite place it. I just had this anxiety building up in my head. She told me I was just being paranoid but I knew something was wrong. I didn’t want to go to the hospital so I just sat down by the tv hoping it would all go away. I noticed that my wife wasn’t singing. She always sings when she’s in the kitchen. That’s when I noticed it. Her stomach looked wrong. It got smaller somehow. That’s when I added things up. There was no baby anymore. I…” He stops for a moment to take in a deep breath. “ I asked her about it. She lied obviously but I knew it was true. She lost it. I don’t know how long ago but my kid is dead. And that’s when I felt it. This anger. It took over me. It’s like I couldn’t control myself. All I remember was staying over top of her lifeless body. The warmth of her blood dripping off of me and cooling as it hit the ground. Then… my daughter came in. She heard the screams and in the panic ran to her mom. I couldn’t let her live through that.”

He stops and grips the bandaged side of his face while shedding a tear.

“I couldn’t let her grow up after seeing what she did. That’s why I had to slit her throat.”

I could tell that the story was getting to Ashe but held back judgement like a pro.

“What did you do next?” She asked

“I finished the chair. Then I grabbed my gun and tried to take off my head.”

He looks at me. “But I moved out of the way just before I could do it.”

The rest of the interview went pretty smoothly. Kid got a signed confession so that makes things easier. We didn’t even need to get a lawyer involved. The rest of the day goes by without a hitch. As we pull up to my apartment she looks like something is on her mind.

“You gonna spit it out?”

“What?”

“You always tense up on the steering wheel before you are going to ask me something.”

“Ok… the interrogation this morning.”

“Ya?”

“Well. Why did he finish the chair?”

“In a lot of cases where a person plans to take their life they finish what they had to complete before doing it. I had a friend back in the day. Just before I got deployed. He finished his exam before hanging himself in the basement. Personally I would have skipped it.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.” She says with those glistening eyes. She always cares so damn much.

“Lost a lot more than that in my life, Kid.”

“Ok I have another question. Was it just me or did he look at you when he talked about killing himself?”

Kid is clever. But she’s not ready for that yet.

“Well I did tell the guy that he was going to hell.”

She chuckled.

“Ya I guess you make a good point there.”

Just as I step out of the car I turn to her.

“Oh… Hey I want to say good job on the questioning. But next time try and approach it a little less like a cop. You get me?”

“I’ll keep it in mind. And I’m guessing going for a drink to mark this momentous occasion is off the table?”

The girl is funny.

“Not tonight.” I answer, closing the door.

“Let’s do tomorrow. I just want to be alone right now.”

She lets out this ear to ear smile.

“Looking forward to it.” She says while driving away.

Kid means well. Figured I’d throw her a bone. She did pretty good keeping it together and I didn’t have to do any paperwork today. That piece of shit is going to rot in hell but I can help feel for him. That anger just takes over. It’s scary how much I can relate to him. All the way down to not being able to pull the trigger when it counts. Looks like the voice can come before the point of anger. Seems they can almost speak to you. Give you that bad feeling before something happens. That feeling of a bad omen.