Midnight, In the Storm [on temporary hiatus]

Three - Game plan

It was lunch hour, the town center became a flurry of movement within minutes. Audree stood still, an unmoving stone in the flowing river of people, eyes set on the exact spot she'd last seen the assassin.

Had he actually come all the way to taunt her?

Teeth gritted, fists clenched, she considered the underlying warning in his appearingly light-hearted gaze.

Snap out of it.

Slipping on a laid-back facade, she strode into the building - chin leveled, shoulders eased - but on the inside, she was a distraught bundle of nerves.

***

Located smack dab in the center of the old town's buzzing metropolis, the Vethernbel Police Department was a whitewashed structure with splashes of navy blue and gray. It's interior just like any police headquarter, just less active.

A familiar platinum-blond male officer waiting by the front desk nodded as she entered, "Ms May Laurent, splendid, you're on time."

He extended a hand, "I'm Inspector Juan Myers."

Observing that he was rather juvenile looking for such a high rank, she recognized him to be the cop who'd approached her first, taken her gore crusted hands from-

She reigned back a shiver, she didn't bring herself to go back there, couldn't - though she was aware that she might as well have gotten accustomed to... all the blood and gore if she were to even stand a chance against her mother. She recalled he'd guided her to the ambulance with words of comfort before handing her to a nurse.

Offering a hint of a courteous smile, Audree took it, heeding the firm yet light grip. "Audree May Laurent, I'm assuming you're the Inspector on the case?"

They let go. "Yep, we'll just ask you a few simple questions, not here, it's too open. Follow me, a separate interrogator will be doing the questioning. I believe you'll share with us every detail you caught that night?"

Hair glinting in the bright lights as she nodded, her heeled black ankle boots clacked against the polished floor - another attestation of the city's now-suspicious lack of reported crime, a peculiarly clean police station. She inspected it, the floor didn't look routinely scrubbed as to... erase some particular stains - unlike some other stations she'd been in with clouded and scratched tiles.

Ack. Why was she studying the damn floor? Yeah there were indications but then again, her guard was down - she would've been an open target if in public.

Averting her gaze from the ground, she straightened and began covertly mapping the structure and possible escape routes of the building as she was led from the lobby, through a gleaming metal door.

Concealing her ulterior motive of investigating the odd police badge she'd noticed at the scene of murder, Audree kept her searching glances short and steered clear of letting them linger or wander exceedingly.

Then her gaze snagged on something - an object that triggered a memory... from the last night.

Coincidentally - or perhaps not - a glistening police badge sat on an unoccupied desk, and it looked freshly polished.

A few more steps ahead, a door stood ajar, her silent footsteps trailed the Inspector's resolute strides as he aimed for the waiting door. The latter exchanged casual salutes with a lone dark-haired, fair skinned woman who appeared to be in her mid-thirties, seated poisedly by a single iron desk - noticeably nailed into the concrete floor - and left the room with a small smile to Audree.