Gone Girl

six

"This is probably the most confusing case I've ever worked on, so I'm going to clear everything up for everyone right now. Maddie was last seen by her family at ten p.m and was reported missing at ten forty two, even though she was not actually missing until around eleven when Emma Patterson stabbed her repeatedly in the chest and ran away. Maddie wasn't seen after that, until her body was found yesterday. Any questions?" Vic explained as he pointed to the edited chalkboard.

"So who's on our suspect list?" Elliot asked.

"For now, we've got Paige. And that's all we have. I don't think we'll ever find any more suspects. I think this case is turning cold," Vic responded with a sigh, shrugging his shoulders. There was nothing they could do about it.

"Autopsy reports came back in!" Ashley yelled, running back into the room, catching the attention of everyone in it. Taking a deep breath, she began to read.

"Maddie Ziegler, age fifteen, died from blunt force trauma to the head on September 20th or September 21st, the blood loss indicates that Maddie was alive and well fed as she bled to death. Stomach lining suggests that she was not eating prior to that. I predict that she was suffering from anorexia. Her tox screen came back negative. No drugs were in her system when she died," Ashley read out loud, her eyebrows scrunching up as were everyone else's. Maddie was alive for over two days after she went missing?

"Maddie was alive for almost two days after she went missing?" Olivia asked, the news shocking to everyone in precinct. "And she bled the entire time?"

"Apparently, yes." Ashley responded, her eyes swelling up with tears. "That means someone must've been going in the woods repeatedly with food and water. This had to be someone who cared for Maddie but resented her at the same time. Someone that had to see a lot of her, and knew her."

"Maybe we're looking at this case wrong," Andrew spoke up, and began erasing everything on the chalkboard. "Maddie was last seen on Walker Road, a street full of houses. After Emma stabbed Maddie, she would've went to one of the houses for help. That meant someone was following her that night and jumped right in to help Maddie after Emma left. Maddie had to go willingly with this person, who had a car. We need to ask Emma if she saw any suspicious cars that night."

"On it!" Vic grabbed his sweater and walked out of the room and on his way to Emma's.

"We need to find out where Paige really was that night," Elliot said. "The tech team recovered the surveillance footage and Paige didn't leave the school until the next morning."

"Yes, but a group of kids did come in through the back entrance. They were last seen in the west staircase until fifteen minutes later when Paige fell down the stairs, and hit her chest on the railing. Blood was already on her shirt, but now her clothes were torn too." Olivia said, scrunching her nose. "What were they doing in there and how did Paige hurt herself?"

"That's not our case, Liv," Andrew reprimanded, sifting through documents. "What did Mackenzie mean when she said 'my dad'?"

"Have you ever considered that Richard Ziegler is Mackenzie's dad, and not Maddie's?" Olivia chuckled to herself.

"That's it," Andrew said. "That's it! What if Maddie's mom had an affair with someone else, and Maddie knew about it? What if Mrs. Ziegler killed her own daughter?"

"Come on, Andrew." Ashley rolled her eyes. "That's a little far fetched, don't you think? Both of her parents were in bed when Maddie left her room. They didn't even know she left."

"There had to be a car following Maddie that night. Who would've known that Maddie was going to that party?" Olivia asked.

"Maybe it was Chloe," Elliot suggested. "Chloe was the only one who thought Maddie was alive, when she was."

"There were some blonde hairs under Maddie's fingernails. Bring Chloe in for a DNA sample."

---

"I didn't kill Maddie!" Chloe cried as Vic brought her into the station after visiting Emma's house. There was only one car on the street that night; a silver infiniti. Chloe's car. Wiggling herself loose from the detective's grip, Chloe walked herself into the interrogation room. She wanted to get out of there as soon as possible.

"Okay, enough with the act, confess and we might give you a deal," Vic said, pushing Chloe into the medal chair, which was very uncomfortable on Chloe's part. She sent a glare in Vic's direction. She didn't like being treated like the criminal she wasn't.

"I'm telling you," Chloe insisted. "I didn't kill Maddie." She rested her head on the table, combing her hands through her hair in distress. Yet she knew no matter how many times she denied their accusations, they wouldn't believe her. So she did the best thing she could do for herself; stay quiet.

"You were at Tyler Evans' party that night, correct?" Vic asked. "That's only three blocks away from where Maddie was last seen. Weird, right?"

Chloe shifted her eyes away from the dull gray table she was situated at. She watched enough Law and Order SVU to know that a few detectives were behind the one way mirror, analyzing her moves. She bit her bottom lip. She could only wish this wasn't a reality.

"I was there," Chloe finally said. "But I slept over at Tyler's house because I didn't have my car. You can ask anybody."

Vic looked at the other detectives who were listening in behind the wall. Elliot and Ashley looked at each other weirdly. If Chloe wasn't in the car, who was?

--

Olivia reported to the coroner who had just dealt with Chloe's DNA, which she grudgingly gave up. The coroner, Alexis, stared perplexed at the complex screen hanging in front of her.

"Everything okay in here?' Olivia asked hesitantly as she made her way into the chilly room where Maddie's body lay. They had to wait for the parents to ID her and then she was on her way to the funeral home.

"Yes," Alexis replied distantly. "I'm honestly just in awe, if anything."

"What's there to be in awe about?" Olivia stared at the screen and didn't know how to decipher anything on it. After all, she was a detective and not a doctor.

"You see, the blonde hairs under Maddie's fingernails do not match with Chloe's DNA, but I found something just as interesting. I heard about your theory of an affair and I tested Maddie and Chloe's DNA. They share similar X chromosomes, but very different Y chromosomes." Alexis typed something on her computer and an image of two DNA strands came up to the screen.

"English, please?"

"Okay," Alexis rolled her eyes. "Maddie and Chloe are half sisters. And by the looks of it, they share the same father."

----

okie dokie who do u think is the killer now???

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