They don’t want her to think of this as an interrogation room. Cassie knows that, just like she knows, objectively, that the blood has been scrubbed from her hands. They took pictures first—so many pictures of her hands, her clothes…
The blood on the walls.
Cassie wasn’t there for the crime scene photos. Of course she wasn’t, but she can read between the lines. Behavior. Personality. Environment. The BPEs are reliable when nothing and no one else is. They are constant.
Behavior. The detective pulls a chair over to her side of the table. He got her chips and a Coke, and he hands them to her now.
Environment. This is a police station, and not a well-funded one. For the detective, it’s his place of business. She’s the new element here, the thing that has the potential to throw him off-kilter.
She’s a kid.
She’s quiet.
She’s not crying.
“Is my mom dead?” Cassie’s voice is low, but she beats the detective to the first question.
“We don’t know, sweetheart.” That answer comes quickly. The truth takes a little longer. “At this point, it seems likely.”
Personality. Cassie forces herself to ignore the ringing in her ears and think. “You have kids.” This time, the words that come out of her mouth aren’t a question. The detective, she thinks, is probably divorced, and he probably has daughters, and it’s probably hard for him not to bring his work home.
He sees his kids when he looks at her.
“I have two little girls—Ally and Maura.”
The names don’t fit together. He picked one, the ex-wife picked the other—or maybe one is a family name.
“I’m not your daughters,” Cassie states clearly. She knows she’s probably staring at him too hard. “You can ask me whatever you need to ask me. I saw people at the theater. I can describe them to you.” She doesn’t pause, because she knows that if she does, he’ll tell her to slow down. “My mom doesn’t date, but she does meet with clients one-on-one. She’s a mentalist. Do you know what a mentalist is? People think she’s psychic, but she’s not.” That seems important, when Cassie thinks back on the blood on the walls, the floor…
Too much blood.
“Maybe she fooled the wrong person,” Cassie thinks out loud. “Whoever did this—they meant to. They planned it.” Cassie sees it every time she closes her eyes. She sees it even when her eyes are open. “I need to go back there.”
For the first time, her voice trembles. She hears it, and the detective does, too, and Cassie senses immediately that he’s relieved. Relieved that she’s showing emotion. Relieved that he can comfort her. Relieved that he can treat her like a kid.
“I need to see the evidence,” Cassie insists. “The pictures you took. Are you interviewing anyone?”
She sees his answer coming, as he places a gentle hand on her shoulder. “Breathe, sweetheart,” he murmurs. “Just breathe.”
