CHAPTER THREE

I heard Justin inhale sharply before saying “The cause of death had been poison, an extremely rare type of poison, this man had been dead for five days before the kidnapping, he also had a number of broken ribs, missing one finger and multiple stabs in his leg which would suggest that he had been tortured then poisoned after he died he had been beaten up more beyond recognition and dumped at The Vintage.” Who used poison to kill? After torturing someone so much, why not use a different method, I know it seemed cruel but poison wasn’t a usual method especially if you’re going to beat torture and beat them after they’re already dead.

“Track down the poison.” I said to Justin as I headed back to my apartment around 6 pm, I had been stuck in traffic and my irritation grew a hundred folds, none of it made sense. Why leave a dead body after taking the twins, I can only think of one reason why anyone would kidnap the twins, ransom.

When I reached my apartment I had immediately dived into the employee files and security footage and spent the rest of the night doing so for the second time this week.

As the morning progressed, the anxiety had been bouncing off the walls at the Seattle Police Station I could practically smell it. A number of people would be brought in for questioning today; the first batch consisted of 10 people, starting with family and close friends.

The Hudson’s were orphaned at the tender age of 15, however Jeremy and Lilly Hudson had left a substantial amount of money and one of the largest chains of hotels around the West Coast of the United States for their twin boys. Grayson and James Hudson had no known blood relatives in the West Coast, out of the United States maybe but unfortunately none on this side of the world. I mentally crossed off the possibility of this being the act of an inner-family plot to extract vengeance.

I stood in the dimly lit, relatively compact room adjacent to the interrogation room, glancing into two-way mirror I got my first look at my main suspect, Tristen Micheal sat tall with his hands clasped together on the table in front of him and his eyes trained on the mirror in front of him. Tristen had sharp features and had been sporting a slight beard, His hair had been tied into a ponytail at the base of neck.

When I walked into the interrogation room, the sound of my heels echoing through the room Tristen turned his head towards me and immediately stood up and stepped forward with an out-stretched hand. “Good morning Detective Rush, my name is Tristen Micheal. Good friend of Grayson and James” I gave his hand a firm shake then started to shrug off my blazer and place it on the back of the chair. “Don’t forget to add in business partner as well” I said in a nonchalant tone as I started to put my curls up into a bun with my pen.

Tristen’s eyes had been following my every move quite closely, as I opened up my diary “Right, Mr Micheal let’s start off small. According to my knowledge, the twins and you share the top floor at The Vintage. I would like for you to tell me all the events of July 16^th starting from the time you opened your eyes” I said while braiding my fingers together on the table that sat between Tristen and I. His eyes had been trained on my lips the entire time I spoke.

“Well, I opened my eyes then continued to lay in bed while checking my social media accounts, are you familiar with social media Detective?” he leaned forward in his chair as well and seemed to mimic my actions. “Mr Micheal’s,I ask the questions not you.” I decided to humour him “but yes I am familiar with social media now if you don’t mind, please proceed.” I gave him a sarcastic smile before leaning back in my seat.

“Understood Detective, I got ready for the day around 9:30am, then proceeded to my office on the fourth floor, the twins and I had a meeting with a potential investor. Unfortunately the investor had cancelled but the twins and I still had lunch, we made plans to have supper at one of the restaurants that we had been considering on investing in. We discussed more hotel business before I went to meet a good friend of mine at her apartment, I called the twins later during the day and cancelled supper as I had spent the rest of the afternoon and night at her apartment.”  I nodded in understanding before taking down some notes, I asked a few more questions about their partnership and more about the twins, if anything seemed out of the ordinary with them recently. Tristen had been co-operative the entire time. 

At the end I stood up and so did Tristen, he extended his hand for a handshake. I slipped my hand into his intending to have a brief handshake but Tristen had other ideas, he caressed my hand with his thumb before reaching into his blazer pocket and pulling out his business card, flipping it over and gesturing to his personal number at the back “If you need anything else Detective, please feel free to contact me, anytime.” He had a smug look on his face before walking out of the interrogation look.

The rest of the interrogations flew by, the staff stories seemed to check out, nothing out of the ordinary besides the power outages.

Soon enough, I had been taking off my heels as I entered the door of my apartment and pulling off my shirt while walking towards my bathroom. Cold showers really did wonders for the body and mind. I started going over the events of today the minute the ice cold water hit my back, so far we have acquired security footage, spoken to all close friends, staff and guests who were at The vintage the night of the kidnapping I have also brought home the recording of the “interrogations” to make sure there are no parts being left out between what we have been told and what we would be seeing on the security footage.

We just had to find out more about the poison and the woman who paid quite a large sum of money for a single bread knife that had been stuck in a corpse a few months later. Justin had been searching the entire black market and checking with several contacts on the street to try and find a lead. It seemed like a dead end but right now it is our only potential lead on the case. With the Captains words ringing in my head, the pressure had been a thousand times more.

I continuously played everything in my head until finally I realised that it was quite coincidental that the power outages occurred throughout the day and night, there had been some fault with the main circuits that kept causing power outages which explains how the kidnappers managed to bring in a corpse and drag two gown men out of the hotel.

Nothing is a coincidence, especially when millionaires are involved. I started to shiver from the cold, just then it clicked, the kidnappers must have had someone working on the inside. I wrapped my robe around me and allowed it to return the warmth to me body, I entered my office and began searching through the employee files, the person on the inside must have been recently hired. My blue eyes skimmed across the words, bingo!

Edward Rodriguez, employed three weeks ago, arrived from Rio De Janeiro with a student visa four months ago.

I dialled Justin on the way to the closet putting the call on speaker and tossing the phone onto the silk sheets. I grabbed an over sized t-shirt and a pair of shorts, summer really is dreadful at times. “Hello, Detective? Is there an emergency?”Came Justin’s groggy exhausted voice from the outside the closet. Pay back’s a bitch Justin, I could have texted him but revenge is much sweeter.  

“I need a background check on Edward Rodriguez, email me all the details within the next half hour” I said before cutting the call, just as I heard Justin’s exhausted sigh. I walked into the kitchen barefoot, contemplating whether I should make an iced coffee or normal cappuccino either way caffeine is caffeine.

I let my hair air dry as I checked my emails and continued watching security footage. We had the whole police department on this case but I preferred going over these things myself after an incident that occurred during one of my first investigations, one shouldn’t rely on anyone but themselves. According to employee records Edward Rodriguez hadn’t been at work the day and night of the kidnapping but the security footage would beg to differ.

My computer beeped finally, Justin started catching up.