I started my day bright and early at the office to catch up on some paperwork. I was behind and neglecting my other clients. I couldn’t stop thinking about the Edwards case… It was the only case I really wanted to work on. I had to put all my energy into thinking about the others who wanted to hire me because they needed help too. Maybe Amber was right, maybe I was getting a little too obsessed. When I go down this road, nothing else seems to matter…

The morning went swift and in no time, it was almost noon. I had completed most of the tasks I wanted to get done as well as the follow up calls I failed to return. Everything was moving along smoothly until Amber quickly opened my door. She gave me a grim look as she said, “Someone is here to see you…” Before she could introduce him, the Chief of Police walked in behind her. Amber stood still looking at me like we were in trouble, not me I was curious to why he was here.

I stood to my feet and examined the tall mid aged man. He was clean shaven and his black gray hair was neatly faded with his police hat cupped under his arm. His bright white crispy short sleeved button up shirt complimented the four stars which sat straight and a line on his shoulders. The Freeside Chief of Police was in full uniform from head to toe and he cleaned up nicely. Honestly, he wasn’t a bad looking man, it was his asshole personality that did the trick. The Chief walked towards my desk and stopped mid way. I decided to sit back down in my chair, he was lucky I decided to stand up in the first place… “Chief Bernard, what do I owe this pleasure?” I say in a smug way. I point to the chair that was behind him, “Please have a seat.”

He looked behind him and walked backwards to plop down in the sofa. “I’m just going to get to the point. I have a press conference to get to in an hour.” Chief Bernard exhaled hard like he was annoyed. His voice was deep and shallow, “The CSI team that was assigned to investigate the train crash along with three of my dead officers found something interesting. When they were combing through the brush they discovered a small blood trail. After they collected the sample and tried to run a match to who it could belong to, nothing came up. So when ran the sample with possible relatives a surprising match popped up. Your father Derek Mitchell… you should have seen the look on those officers faces when he popped up. At first they thought he was still alive!”

I sat there just watching this jerk off slap his knee laughing at himself. I knew where he was going with this but nothing was going to keep him from finding out the truth to what’s going on. Chief Bernard had a reputation of being a blunt, insensitive asshole but he supposedly kept this city safe. My dad and Bernard went to the Police Academy at the same time and were partners before he was promoted. According to my dad, he and Bernard also went after my mom at the same time too. He would say he was glad he was victorious otherwise Bernard would have been my dad. Every time I think about that, it makes me sick to the stomach…

“So, I got to thinking, it can’t be Derek because he’s dead. May he rest in peace… He did however have a next of kin which is you.” The chiefs smile quickly faded to a sharp mean look that made my head jerk back a little, “I’m only going to tell you this once, Douglas killed himself and we’ve closed the case. I don’t want to hear anymore about you investigating this, otherwise that sample CSI found will be enough probable cause to throw your ass in jail.” I still said nothing as I watched him struggle to stand to his feet. His round beer belly was to blame which he tried tucking in… When he almost got to the door the chief turned around and faced me once more. “Oh! I forgot to tell you. Your father’s old partner, you know Sean Wayne, the one you sent to prison is getting out next week.” He lowered his voice as deep as he could go when he said that. He wanted me to feel his excitement of my dad’s murderous ex partner release.

Now I got really angry… I could dish his lame ass attempt to intimidate me into stop investigating the Edwards case, but bringing up my father’s killer? “You’re fucking lying! Get out of my office!”

“Don’t you want to know how? Apparently, there was a technicality with the handling of the evidence that was found against him. Something to do with the evidence that used was tampered with… go figure? So, when he filed for his appeal again, they granted him a chance at another trial with the new findings on his case.” The chief spun his index around in a circle while looking around, “Looks like you may have built this business off of false pretenses… I wonder what would the people say when they found out you really didn’t solve your father’s cold case. Hmm?” He smiled big from ear to ear. “Have a good day.”

Asshole! What a piece of shit! I slammed my fists on my desk furious by the news. How could this be?! I will not let this distract me from finding the truth about Douglas and my father… I will also not let that poor excuse for a police officer to destroy my business and lively hood. I know Chief Bernard had something to do with this but why now? What did he have to gain from releasing my father’s murder? This technicality was kept under the table like a secret weapon waiting to be used. These Syndicate assholes will not win nor scare me anyway…

A few moments later I could hear Charlie saying hello to Amber as he walked down the hallway. He had a confused look on his face as he walked in. “What was that prick Bernard doing here? I hate that guy!”

I didn’t look up right away, I was still sizzling from what that prick told me. “He knows I was there at the train crash that night. They found some of my blood and followed the trail to the forest. He wants me to stop investigating Douglas or he’s going to use it as probable cause to arrest me. I’m not going to stop investigating this case because he tried to intimidate me. He doesn’t fucking scare me…”

Charlie huffed laughing at what I was saying, “Well that’s good to hear because I may have found a lead. I got to thinking about Douglas side kid, Ernesto and started digging. Douglas was giving him money in large amounts for the past three years. I found a whole bunch of random bank accounts that were linked to ours of the accounts the Syndicate owns.” He crossed his arms over his chest and looked disappointed for a moment.

“Speaking of missing accounts. If I could only find those missing written ledgers, I bet that’s the biggest piece to solving all of this.”

I didn’t say a word… I needed to keep those ledgers to myself for now. I don’t know why but I kind of felt bad for not speaking up about finding them. He was handsome standing there thinking. Wrinkling his gray Army shirt from crossing his arms. His face scrunched up as he tried to piece things together. I felt comfortable and relaxed around him but Amber was right I had to keep my distance. This school girl crush had to end in order for me to focus of possibly what’s to come… “So, about Ernesto’s account, what did you find?” I changed the subject from the missing ledgers, I had to.

“I was going to say how about we pay him a visit? Maybe he could shed some light on what happened to him. He might give us some useful information.”

“I don’t know Charlie; I have other clients that need my help too. I have a lot of paperwork to follow up on. Maybe tomorrow?” I was a bit skeptical. Charlie had to superior backup, get out of jail free card that I didn’t have.

Charlie sat on the edge of the chair that was closet my desk. He put his elbows on his knees as he leaned forward as far as he could. “Now look, don’t let that douche bag get in your head. This case takes first priority.”

“Maybe for you…” I responded with an attitude.

Charlie smacked his lips, “I won’t let anything happen to you. Look Ally, I need you.”

I didn’t show it but I was melting inside. His green brown eyes were piercing right through me. I had to look away in order to focus and think it through. A few seconds, I huffed and replied, “You have one hour… I can spare one hour Charlie and that’s all.” I stood to my feet and pulled down my light blue button-up shirt. I grabbed my jean jacket from around my chair and head towards my exit. He hopped up too and quickly followed behind me. I briefly stopped at Amber’s desk to update her to where I was going. She looked at me then Charlie and replied, “Uh-huh, sure…”

“I’m serious, one hour. I promise I’ll be back then.” I clapped back. Amber smacked her lips and rolled her eyes as she picked up the phone to answer a call. We all knew I wasn’t going to be back within an hour… The ride to Ernesto’s house was all the way across town and I had a feeling we were going on hunch that he’ll be there. Charlie didn’t say much on the way just his plans on what he was going to say to the kid to get him to talk. I however, did not have a good feeling about this…

We had to go to the part of town everyone called, ‘Little Mexico’. It was a tight knit community where everyone knew one another. So, when we rolled into that part of town, we were getting a lot looks. Charlie drove slow through the neighborhood looking for the address. I noticed some parents were pushing their kids to go back inside when we passed by. Others started doing the same like they knew something was about to happened. Did Charlie notice how everyone suddenly scattered back into their homes? When I turned to look to at him, he was focused on finding the house… “We’re here.”

We pulled up to a small little ranch style orange house at had red trimming surrounding it. The house was kept up and looked beautiful from the outside. The lawn was nice and neat and the rose bush was neatly trimmed. That didn’t fool Charlie, he accused himself when he reached over to glover department and pulled out a small pistol. I gave him a confused look as I thought we were just coming here to speak to the boy. “What is that for?” I asked.

He didn’t say anything right away until he got out of the car, “Just in case…” He looked around in a full circle before walking towards Ernesto’s front door. I walked behind Charlie a little paranoid for how quiet and attentive he was being. He walked on the porch and opened the screen door. I waited on the sidewalk behind him as he knocked a few times on the door. A few minutes went by with no answer. I started to turn around thinking we must have missed him but that was not Charlie’s plan. He dashed around to the back yard and stopped at the gate. In shock, I ran after him wondering what in the hell. I also stopped in front of the gate when I noticed why he stopped. The lock on the gate had been cut open. There was a piece of it laying on the ground inside where the backyard began. Someone had already been here…

Charlie pulled out his pistol from his waist and slowly pried out the wooden gate. I followed close behind wondering secretly to myself why didn’t I just go back to the car. Charlie peeked through the windows as he passed by then kept walking. When we reached the backdoor, it was open. Again we both stopped in our tracks before peeking inside. Everything was so quiet, I didn’t know what to think. Charlie looked over his shoulder and whispered, “Stay here.”

I looked up at him and said, “Yea right. You’re not leaving me out here. I’m coming too.”

He sighed aloud as he slowly creeped inside Ernesto’s home. There was a car parked out front so someone had to be here but the situation wasn’t looking good. There was a strong odor of rotten eggs that overwhelmed the house. I had to cover my nose with my jacket. I couldn’t quite put my finger on what that smell was. “We should get out of here.” Charlie went straight through the kitchen towards what looked like the living room. He acted like he didn’t hear a word I said.

I decided not to roam the house and stayed in the kitchen near the back door instead. I needed the flesh air. I kept hearing a whistling sound coming from around the corner where the stove was. I walked around the corner to take a look and that’s when I saw a mid-aged woman lying on the floor. She was lying in a pool of her own blood… The whistling sound I heard was coming from the stove. The gas was turned on high and was shooting out in full force. I looked up towards the living room and before I could scream his name I heard, “Shit! I knew it. Let’s go!” Charlie yanked my arm pulling me out the back door as fast as he could. We quickly turned the corner and through the wooden gate towards the front yard. He was pulling me so hard I couldn’t catch up. All he kept saying was, “Come on, come on, come on!”

“I’m moving!” I screamed back then BOOM!

The house blew up into pieces and we both flew in the air almost hitting Charlie’s car. Huge pieces of the house flew into the air almost landing on us as we both tried to move out of the way. Charlie rolled over then climbed on top of me shielding me from the debris. The explosion knocked the shit out of me… I had no energy to do nothing but lay there flat on back trying to recover. What the fuck? I whispered to myself. I knew some shit was about to happened.

Everything was muffled but I could hear some of the debris still hitting the ground. When I opened my eyes, Charlie’s face was close to mine. Our noses almost touched… he looked down and stared at me for a few seconds. “Are you ok?” He wiped the soot and blood off my face and asked me again but this time he screamed, “Ally! You ok?!”

I blinked a few times and struggled to reply, “I’m fine but you’re crushing me…”

“Oh shit! Sorry…” Charlie got up slowly and pulled me up to my feet. “You’re bleeding. Are you hurt anywhere else?” He started patting me down like I had a weapon or something. Feeling around my body for cuts or injuries. I yanked my arm back and limped towards Charlie’s now busted up car. The windows were blew out and there was glass all over the seats inside. The debris made big dents all over the hood and the right side and a tire caught fire. He walked along side of me and huffed as he looked at his new totaled car. “Man… this makes number two since I’ve been hanging with you.”

“With me? Every time I’m around you some crazy shit happens! I’m done Charlie! We can investigate this case separately. I’m going to get killed hanging around you…”

He ran after me as I stormed away down the street. People around the area came outside to see what was going on. I could hear the fire truck sirens getting closer as we tried to leave the area. Once again Charlie grabbed my arm pulling me towards him. “Ally wait please! I didn’t know Ernesto’s body was booby trapped. I was trying to find what I could before I realized it. The only thing I managed to grab was his phone.”

We turned down two more streets before I called a cab. “I saw a women on the floor in the kitchen. The stove’s gas was turned on without the pilot.”

“That must have been Ernesto’s mom, Vicky. They planned that just in case someone found them before the bomb went off. It was under his fucking body. I’m sorry Ally I didn’t know it would turn out like this.”

I knew he was sincere but come on… I like the action but this was too much. My clothes were torn to shreds from the back and I smelled like smoke. I had a gash on my forehead and left cheek, top of that I lost my glasses. I was super pissed off but I knew it wasn’t his fault. Whoever got to him first wanted to send a clear message… I turned to Charlie and stuck out my hand. “Let me see his phone. Did you look at it yet?”

He pulled the phone out of his pocket and pressed the button on the side. There was twenty three missed calls on the home screen. The phone was password protection but the notifications still were visible. Charlie looked closer at the phone then handed me Ernesto’s phone, “Does that number look familiar?”

I looked down at the number and immediately got a feeling in my stomach. “That’s Shanti’s number…”