Having Fayth

Long live the queen

Fayth

I only half listened while Ren and Axel spoke with an officer at the front desk. "Officer, the suspect is her stepbrother. She only needs a few minutes to talk to him." Ren tried to reason. The officer put on a good show of how its against protocol and how he could get in trouble. I would have believed his good guy routine if it weren't for his reaction to Axel.

"Don't act as if we aren't long time friends, Reed." Axel said effectively breaking the officer's mask and gaining my attention. "I know you and your buddies are on the take. So, why don't you just pop on to the back and bring him into a room so we can have a few words and then we will be out of your hair."

The officer paled but didn't make a motion to do as he was asked. "I could lose my job. It would cost you." The officer stated trying to hold together his macho bravado, but I saw threw it just as I'm sure both men had.

"How much?" Axel asked pulling out his wallet. The slimy urchin peered down at the bills as Axel thumbed through his money. The skeezeball was looking to make money off information on my father's murder? My simmering anger flared to a boil again.

I marched over to the men, grabbing officer Reed by his tie and jerked his upper body over the desk. My other hand held my knife and I tapped the point against the wooden desktop. "Here's the deal, Officer," I stressed the word like it was something dirty and bitter on my tongue. Fucking crooked cops. "You are going to bring him into one of those cute little rooms you have back there for questioning, or my friends here are going to release all the information they have on all your shady dealings to your boss, your bosses' boss, and even his boss as well, until they reach the righteous soul who hasn't succumbed to the depths of greed that you and your buddies have. Am I clear?"

He swallowed as his fingers twitched towards his gun on his hip. Axel pulled the officer's gun from his holster, "I wouldn't do that if I were you." He said looking back at officer Reed. He dropped the clip and emptied the chamber like he had done to mine before we left.

"Do what the lady asked." Ren spoke from behind me. I released Reed when he nodded his head fervently.

He turned to scurry off to the holding cell when Axel called out to him, "Oh and Reed, turn the cameras off." Reed's eye's widened, but he only nodded again and continued his journey.

Ren had located the file they had on my father's murder a few desks away. I flipped it open and spread the papers out while I scanned through them for anything useful. They had financial reports. His phone was missing. The officer's statements claimed that Blain was found in the kitchen standing over my father's body. Blood was on his hands. More blood and the weapon were found in Blain's room. He couldn't account for a small window of time. the window being the time of death. There appeared to be a struggle in Blain's room as well as the kitchen. My father was stabbed eight times before he succumbed to his wounds, the preliminary autopsy report speculated. My fingers dug into the papers as I braced myself on the desk. Seeing the pictured of his body sprawled out on the kitchen floor, his shirt caked with his own blood laying in a thickening puddle of crimson shook me to my core. I released a scream so loud it made my stomach ache, but it didn't stop e from releasing another as the tears filled my eyes and blurred my vision. I shoved the papers away from me and made to run back to the cells. Ren caught me around the waste and spun me around attempting to calm me. "Let him explain, Fayth. You know that not everything is as it seems." I glared back into his eyes. "If he killed him, he will pay." I growled out not even sure of what exactly I meant in that moment. He released me and looked me over worriedly as if he didn't know me anymore. I looked away trying to organize my thoughts and take a breath to calm myself.

I was escorted back to the interrogation room where I was assured Blain would be waiting and the recording devices would be turned off. "Are you ok?" Axel asked while Ren rolled his eyes. I nod my head curtly. "You only have five minutes. Get your questions asked and get out. We have to leave before the next shift comes on duty." Axel spoke quietly before stepping out of my way so I could open the door.

"Fayth!" He stood from his chair and attempted to approach me as the door shut. The sight of him dressed in a gray jumpsuit with his hands cuffed in front of him almost made my heart clench. Almost. But then the images of my father's dead body laying in a pool of his own blood with stab wounds scattered all over his torso, his eyes dull and piercing as they staired back into the pictures, and the reports stating Blain's bloodied state and the murder weapon threw my walls up just as quickly as they came down.

I held my hand up showing him my palm in a signal for him to stop. The hope and surprised that was shining in his eyes dulled as he froze on the spot. Pointing in the direction of the chair he had abandoned, I curtly spoke, "Blain, we need to talk." I tried to remain calm, but his nervousness had me on edge.

He nodded his head and took his seat. I took the one in front of him. "It's good to see you, Fayth." He tried his hand at polite formalities to which I raised a brow. "Is it?" I asked. "Because as far as the police records go, you're in here for killing my dad." He didn't look surprised. Instead, he looked disappointed as he glanced down at the table and curled his fingers into fists. "Come on, Fayth. You know me better than that. I don't care what led us here, but you know I couldn't have done this. You know I'm not that kind of person." I let his words wash over me going in one ear and out the other. I don't need to be manipulated. I sat back in my chair when he finally looked back up and made eye contact. "People change, Blain. Not always for the good. I should know." I shrugged. "What were you doing when he was killed? The record says you were home asleep. How could someone sleep through having their room destroyed? Or the screams of someone they love being brutally attacked?" I looked him over with skepticism and studied his body language for any of his tells when he lies.

He shook his head with tears in his eyes. "Oh my god, you really believe it's me? Let's not even bother questioning your little gangbanger lowlife of a boyfriend. No. Let's just believe what everyone wants you to believe. What he wants you to believe." His voice rose and shook with equal parts disbelief and heartbreak.

My nose flared in anger as I glared back at him. I could feel the impulse to slap him across the face raise and I was fighting it back as hard as I could. I slammed my hands down on the table between us. "Axel has been with me nearly every moment since the two of you had your little pissing contest. He was also there when Ren told me what happened, and he was just as surprised to hear about my father's death as I was. You on the other hand," my voice raising with emotion. "You were there, in the same house as him. You can't account for a reason you wouldn't wake up during the struggle or the murder. Or even how someone would get in the house with all the doors and windows locked. The murder weapon was found in you fucking bed for Christ's sake, Blain! And you want to point fingers? The evidence points to you and history has shown me that I can't trust you with everything."

He sat stoically for a moment before he responded again. "There are things you don't know. Things I should have told you." I held up my hand.

"Uless it's information on my dad's death I don't want to hear it." I replied waving him off and standing from my chair.

"Wait!" He shouted grabbing my arm so I couldn't move further from him. "We fought ok? He was pissed off last time we talked. We fought in my room. He slammed the door demanding that I leave in the morning. That was the last time I saw him until I woke up and found him in the kitchen. He was already gone. There wasn't anything I could do. I'm telling you the truth! I'm sorry, Fayth. He was my dad too, ok?" His eyes once again appeared glassy with unshed tears as he spoke desperately, but in that moment, I couldn't recognize him as my stepbrother. Right now, all I could see him as is the man who potentially too MY father from me and it had me seeing red at his emotional manipulation to sway me.

I pulled my knife from my holster and held it just below his throat. "If I find out you are lying to me, Blain. You won't have to worry about jail time." I tipped his face up to look into my eyes. "Family or not, I'll end the one who took him from me." and I meant it. I didn't know who to trust or who to believe, but I was sure as fuck going to find out and when I do, the one responsible for his death will pay with their life.

Gone was the angel.

Long live the Queen.

I slammed the door behind me and walked past the guys up to Reed who was sitting rigidly behind his desk. I slipped my knife back into my holster and caught his worried expression. "I left him in one piece. Nothing to explain to your superiors." He visibly relaxed as I made to turn for the door, but I stopped as I remembered another bit of information that Ren had mentioned earlier. "Oh, and Reed," I called back to him. "Put out a missing person on Blain's mother. I want her found." With a sharp nod of his head, I left the police station with Ren and Axel on my heel.