The Aftermath

19

Detective John Roads didn't like what he saw when Tom Blake was shown into interrogation room 3 at the Oceanside Police Department. He didn't like it at all.

Detective Robert Green showed the group into the room and asked an officer to bring another chair. There were two women with Tom Blake; that damn bitch of an attorney Charlie Davies, and some other redhead who Roads had never seen before. "Who is she?" he demanded.

"My assistant, not that it matters to you." Charlie told him, "You are not the detective on this case, why are you here?"

"Observation." Roads answered.

"Then observe, and don't interrupt." Charlie told him, "Any interruption from you and we leave. We have had enough of you interrupting my client's life, and now it seems that his family has been endangered by your ego."

Roads' face turned red with rage, and he was pressing his hands on the table to rise from his chair and tear into Charlie, when Green said, "Sit down and shut up Roads, or leave. Up to you."

Roads glared at him in disbelief. "Is she running this interview?" he spat.

"This is not an interview." Charlie informed him, "It is a statement. My client will make a statement about what he knows about the murder of his mother and where he was at the time her murder occurred."

"How does he know what time it occurred?" Roads asked.

"I guess we are leaving then, since you can't shut up." Charlie said.

Detective Green stepped forward with the fetched chair and said, "Please Ms. Davis, Detective Roads will leave the room and observe from the observation window. There will be no other interruptions."

Roads was about to say The Hell I Will when reason asserted pressure on his tongue. If he blurted any more at this bitch he would be lucky to be able to stay in Oceanside. Standing, without a word, he strode out of the room and into the next door which was the observation room – behind the mirror glass.

Finding the speaker-switch he flipped it on in time to hear Detective Green give his full name, rank, the date and time, and then introductions. The other redhead's name was given as Teri Mast. She was a fine little piece of ass, but Roads was too pissed off to fully appreciate her at the moment.

Tom Blake's story was short and to the point. Roads watched him closely as he made the statement, looking for signs of falseness, and listening for voice inflection.

According to Tom Blake, he was at the casino last night until 11:00. He then drove home and ordered a pizza delivered to his house. The pizza arrived after midnight, about 12:15, so he gave the driver a good tip for making him work the extra time. Samantha, his wife, was woken up by the delivery and came downstairs and talked with him until nearly 1:30am about their trip to Paris next week – Roads smiled at that, and then stopped when Tom volunteered that the trip was now obviously canceled since there was a funeral to attend and his mother's affairs to be put into order.

Tom Blake ended by saying he then went to bed, and was asleep by 2AM. At 5:30AM he was woken by a reporter calling him to get a statement about his mother's murder, and the fact that he was wanted for questioning. "I didn't say much to her. I think I stammered some apology and hung up the phone."

"Thank you for the statement Mr. Blake and I'm sorry for your loss."

"Is my client a suspect in his matter?" Charlie asked.

Green was silent for longer than Roads liked, and then said "No, no I don't think so... pending of course checking your story which shouldn't be difficult to do. If the times and places match up, it would have been physically impossible for your client to be near the murder scene by the time of the death, let alone have the required time to commit the murder. But again, this is pending conformation of your story Mr. Blake."

Son of a fucking bitch! Roads screamed inside his mind, Not a suspect?! The man had three hours to drive from his house to Oceanside and cut up a drugged woman! That was more than enough time!

Detective Green was obviously not very good at his job. That was alright, because Roads was, and Tom Blake was lying. He wasn't lying about where he was last night, he was lying about the call from the reporter – why lie about that? Because Tom already knew about the murder. He rang his own phone, to wake up his wife, and then faked the conversation. Roads nodded his head and wrote this down in his notebook.

Roads smiled. "I'm going to have your head on my wall yet Tom Blake."

After the group left, Roads waited a while in the room, going over the statement Tom Blake made. He read his notes, and made more notes.

First he would clock the trip and make sure of his theory. Blake said he was in bed by 1:30am. Roads figured that gave two and a half hours for Blake to commit the murder and get away from the area. With lights running and no traffic, Roads made the trip to the construction site in twenty-five minutes.

A theory crossed Roads' mind. What if Blake went and got his mother before he went to the casino? What if he got her, drugged her, and put her in the back of that SUV he drives? With that done, even if it took him forty minutes to an hour to get up to the construction site, he would still have close to two hours to cut the woman up, and leave the area. That's how he did it.

Pleased with this theory, Roads now needed facts to back it up, and he would find them. Tom Blake was a murderer and needed to be put down, or there were going to be more murders, while men like Detective Green and the FBI chased their tail.

Roads came out of the observation closet and found Green standing in the hallway looking at his note book, "You need to get a warrant to search Blake's SUV as soon as possible."

"Why would I do that?" Green asked calmly, not looking up from his notebook.

"Search for hairs from Beth Blake's head." Roads continued.

"Blake isn't a suspect any longer." Green informed him, "Didn't you find the speaker switch in there?"

"I heard you, I just didn't believe it. Blake had plenty of time to get from his house up to that construction site, and kill his mother, if he already had her drugged in the back of that SUV." Roads pressed.

Green looked up from his notebook and scanned Roads from top to bottom and then back to Roads' eyes, "He's not a suspect." Green repeated. "I heard from my commander that once you got an idea in your head you wouldn't let it go. I see he was right now. Sorry to have bothered you." Green told him and started to walk away.

"You son of a bitch! You can't keep me out of this!" Roads snarled.

"Yes, I can." Green answered and closed the 'Authorized Personnel Only' door behind him.

Roads walked into the glaring sunlight of Oceanside's summer afternoon. He shaded his eyes with his hand and found his car. After getting out of the parking lot, down to the on-ramp and out on the freeway, he lit a cigarette and cursed Green for six miles. "No fucking way am I being kept out of this. Blake is not going to walk away again! Fuck!" he growled into his windshield. The inside of the car smelled like sweat and ash. He cracked the window of the car and started putting together a plan to get Mrs. Blake's case brought down to San Diego, tying it to the other five Coroner Killer murders.

He would get the case. Damn right he would get the case. It was going to take some ass kissing and calling in a few favors, but he would get it pulled from Green. "Fucking moron."