Prologue
8:30 AM
Monday
August 20th, 2016
The sirens wailed loudly. Their screech made my ears ring. It hurt, especially when it was this early in the morning.
“Hey! Shut those sirens off! It’s too goddamn early for that racket!” I yelled at the nearest officer.
“Y-yes sir!” A nearby officer saluted me and ran towards the cars. He looked young, probably just recently joined the force. I sighed. Looking at the cops around me made feel depressed. They were all so young, full of youth. Meanwhile, here I was grumbling and complaining like an old man.
I shook my head, trying to clear my drowsiness. I dragged my feet towards the entrance of the apartment building. The building had a red brick exterior. Ten stories tall. Good, friendly neighborhood. Not a lot of crime in this area.
I saw an officer sitting down in a chair through the windows in the lobby. When I got close, he sat up and ran up to meet me.
“Sergeant Brown!” The officer who greeted was a young man. His name was Sean Sheer. Caucasian. 23 years old. Blonde. Handsome. Tall. A personality that made him many friends. Recently joined the force. Worked under me for about a couple of months now. He’s not the type I’d expect to become a policeman. Too talkative and happy.
“What’s going on, Sheer? What could be so urgent that I would need to be waken up at 8 o’clock in the morning?” I growled at him. Sheer was smiling when I asked him. When he heard my question, the smile dropped off his face.
“There’s been a murder. Apartment 501. John Jeste. 40 year old man. The cause of death is a knife wound through his heart. His wife, Jane, found his body in the living room at 7:50.”
“Fuck. It’s a Monday morning, and we already have a murder to deal with. This city’s getting worse every week.” I groaned. And this was supposed to be a quiet neighborhood. I walked towards the elevator. Sheer followed.
“I assume that the wife was the only other person in the apartment at the time of the murder?”
“No sir, there was one more person. Oliver Ontagne. 41 years old. Friend of the victim.”
We entered the elevator. Sheer hit floor 5.
“Why the hell is he in their apartment at 8:30 on a Monday morning?”
Sheer shrugged. “We haven’t asked that yet. Also, we have footage from the security cameras. Oliver Ontagne and John Jeste entered the building at 2:58 AM. He then entered apartment 501 at 3:05 AM. From then and until the time of the murder, no one left or entered apartment 501. Looks like the wife and friend are the only suspects.”
I shook my head. “I wouldn’t say that, Sheer. You’re already forgetting other possibilities. There could have been a third person.”
Sheer cocked his head. “Oh? But no one else entered or left apartment 501.”
“True. But camera footage isn’t always perfect. Someone might have fed it loopback while the murder was being committed.”
Ding! The elevator rang out as we arrived at the fifth floor. The elevator doors opened.
“We’re here. 501 is just around the corner.” Sheer stepped out and beckoned me.
* * *
When I entered 501, 3 cops were standing around. One was trying to comfort a sobbing woman. Another was talking to a tall, middle-aged man.
“Oh, Sergeant Brown! You’re here!” One of the cops ran over towards me.
“I’ve heard the bare details. Murder. Knife wound. Wife and friend present at the time of the crime. No one left or entered 501 during this time.” I repeated the details that Sheer told me.
“Anything else to add?” I asked.
“No, sir. Everything’s been left untouched. Scene is exactly as we found it.”
“Alright, I’ll take it from here.” I nodded. I looked around the apartment. The entrance door opened up to the living room. The dining room was up ahead in front of me. To my right, there was another room. I could see what looked like a kitchen in there. The woman was standing in there. To my left, there was a hallway. The bedrooms must be that way. I redirected my attention to the living room. The entrance was on the south wall. On the middle of the west wall, there was a TV. A flat screen. Bigger than the one I had back home. Opposite the TV, along the east wall, there was a couch. Between the couch and the TV, there was a table. And lying on top of that table was the body of our victim, Mr. John Jeste.
His body was facing up, towards the ceiling. His eyes were closed. He was wearing a nice dress shirt and long khaki pants, obviously dressed for a day at work. His shirt was completely white. One might not even notice that anything was wrong with him, if it wasn’t for the fact that the hilt of a knife stuck out in his chest, where his heart lay. I knelt down next to the body.
Strange. There was barely any blood.
“Hey Sheer, cause of death was the knife through the heart, right?”
“Yeah.” Sheer nodded.
Shouldn’t there be more blood if the victim was stabbed through the heart? I looked at the hilt of the knife. It was black. The grip was shaped to allow fingers to easily grip it. It looked like an ordinary kitchen knife. The blade itself was completely embedded into the body’s chest. Interesting. Looks like there were no signs of struggling, otherwise the blade would’ve been slightly dislodged.
“Fingerprints?”
“None, sir.”
“Any other signs of wounds or bruises on the body?”
“None that we could find.” The officer who greeted me answered.
I stood back up.
“Let me talk to the victim’s wife.” I gestured towards the sobbing woman. The officer nodded, and we walked towards her.
The woman was standing in the kitchen. Her makeup was smeared due to the tears flowing down her face. An officer was trying to comfort her but to no avail. When I entered the room, he looked up and nodded at me.
“Mrs. Jeste? I understand that right now must be tough for you, but I need to have you answer some questions.”
“Sniff..sniff… al-alright then.” Mrs. Jeste looked up at me.
“Thank you. Now, did you notice your husband acting strangely or differently?”
“N-no. I didn’t notice anything like that. He was the same as usual. Working late nights. Waking up early for work. Nothing really different happened recently.”
“Okay. Can you tell me about the other man that happened to be present at the time of the crime. Mr. Oliver Ontagne, I believe.”
“Ah yes, Oliver. He is-” Mrs. Jeste suddenly cut herself off. “He was a friend of my husband’s. They both started working at the same company at the same time, so that’s how that started.”
“I see. What was he doing in your apartment this early in the morning?”
“Oh!” She raised her right hand to her mouth. “Oliver and my husband went out with some other friends for some drinking last night. They came back very late, around 3 AM I believe. My husband could barely walk, so Oliver helped him come back to our place. Oliver still had his briefcase and everything, so I didn’t want him walking back home carrying all that. We live a few miles away you know. So I told him to stay the night.
“He had his briefcase?”
“Yes, from work, I presume.”
“Right after work, they go straight to a night of drinking?”
She shook her head exasperatedly. “I won’t act like I understand. Don’t ask me.”
Hmm. So they worked, then went to have a drink. I turned back to Mrs. Jeste.
“A knife was used as the murder weapon. Do you know if this belonged to you or your husband?”
She shook her head. “I’m sorry, but I didn’t even look at…” She trailed off.
“Ah yes, I completely understand. Of course, you didn’t.” I quickly moved to reassure her.
“But the only knives I have are in the kitchen. And none of them are missing. I don’t think my husband collected knives or had a hobby like that. John didn’t really like weapons at all. He got nervous whenever he saw blood.”
“Okay. I understand. Mrs. Jeste, where were you and the others during the time of the crime?”
“My husband was alone in the living room. I was in the kitchen preparing breakfast. I had the door open, but I had my back turned to the door so I didn’t see anything. I also didn’t hear anything, though that might have been because I couldn’t hear over the sound of frying bacon. And Oliver had excused himself to the bathroom when I went to the kitchen. I was in the kitchen for around ten minutes. I went to the dining room and placed the food down. Then I entered the living room, and that’s when I found my husband…”
“And Mr. Ontagne was?”
“When I screamed, he rushed into the living room from the guest room. I don’t really know what else he was while I was cooking.”
“And after, what did you do?”
“Well… seeing my husband like that…I think I fainted.”
“You fainted?”
“Y-yes. When I came to, the police had already arrived. And then things just kinda went by very quickly. I still don’t think I quite understand it all.” She answered miserably.
“I see, well thank you for answering my questions. For now, just rest.”
Mrs. Jeste nodded and leaned back against the wall. I looked around the kitchen. A frying pan was lying on top of the stove. I looked closer. Bacon grease and oil. I looked away.
On the counter, I saw a knife rack. One knife was missing. I looked around. There was a cutting board. On top of it lay a knife. So all knives were accounted for. I took a closer look at the knife on the cutting board.
The knife’s blade shined brightly. It looked like taken great care of. No notches or marks. Almost unused. The grip… it looked rather strange. It didn’t really look like it could be held very easily. Actually, there wasn’t much grip at all. It looked like it would slide around very easily in my hands. I walked over to the trash can. I looked over back at Mrs. Jeste. She was busy talking to the other cop. Good. She wouldn’t see me then.
I bent down and opened the trash can. Not much in here. A few crumbled tissues. The ends of carrots. Potato skins. Nothing else.
I stood up and left the kitchen. Sheer followed close behind.
“So, what do you think, Sergeant?” Sheer inquired.
“I’ve got a faint idea, but I’m not finished yet. I need to hear all the details.” I replied.
“I see, I see.” Sheer nodded.
“Why are you asking? Think you know what’s happened here?” I asked him.
“Yeah well… looks like the wife is the most suspect right now, isn’t she? I mean, Oliver was the one to bring him back right? He could’ve killed anytime during then, but instead he brought the victim back to his apartment. Doesn’t really make any sense if you ask me.”
“Completely disregarding their possible motives, huh?” I smirked.
The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.
“Hey, that’s what you told me to do.” Sheer replied, a pout on his face. Ugh. Don’t pout. You’re a full grown man in his 20s. That’s not cute at all.
“Motives can’t always be explained or even found. The person to commit a crime would most likely make sure any motive would be hidden in the first place. That’s what you told me.”
I nodded. “Well, it’s good that you listened. Now let’s go talk to Mr. Ontagne.” I moved towards the dining room.
When we entered the room, a man in a suit was already facing towards us.
“Mr. Ontagne, I presume. Name’s Brown.” I stretched out my hand.
Oliver took my hand and shook it. His handshake was firm. They say you can learn a lot from the way a man shakes a hand. Always sounded like a load of bullshit to me. I thought it just gave people an excuse to squeeze another person’s hand as hard as they could.
“Greetings.” Oliver’s voice was cold. Understandable. A close friend of his was just murdered, and the only suspects were the victim’s wife and himself.
“I’d like to ask you some questions, Mr. Ontagne.”
“Go ahead.” He nodded. “Don’t have much choice.”
“Alright then.” Ignoring the last part, I asked my first question.
“What were you doing here so early in the Jeste’s apartment?”
“Me and John were out for a round of drinking with the boys. John drank himself silly, so I brought him back. Didn’t want poor Jane worrying about him.” Oliver said the last sentence with a little animosity. He was making it clear that he believed Mrs. Jeste was the murderer. How quickly people were to turn against each other.
Anyways, Oliver and Jane’s stories matched up. Which made sense. It would be an amateur mistake to get this simple part wrong. Which means our killer is at least using his or her head.
“Mind telling me just what the three of you were doing the time of the murder?”
“Well, we woke up around...7:30 I believe? After getting dressed and ready for the morning, I went to the bathroom and Jane went to the kitchen. John was in the living room watching some TV. After finishing my business in the bathroom, I went to the guest room. Had to make a call to my family. They were probably worried sick about me, since I didn’t come home.”
“You didn’t call them when you got back to this apartment?”
“Well, I was drunk out of my mind. Completely forgot to call. My wife gave me an earful, so I won’t be so quick to forget again.” Oliver grimaced.
“Ha. I understand.” I patted his shoulder, thoughts of my own wife surfacing. “So when you went from the bathroom to the guestroom, did you see John in the living room?”
“No, the guestroom has its own bathroom, so I never went back into the hallway. I only came out when I heard Jane scream.” He shook his head.
“What did you do after discovering the body?”
“Well, Jane collapsed, so I called 911. The cops came by very quickly.”
“Do you know what time it was then?”
“Well I remember it being very close to 7:50 when Jane screamed. When I found the body, I pretty much instantly called the police.”
“Yeah, we received a call at 7:50, sir.” Sheer spoke up.
“Alright, Mr. Ontagne. I’ve one last question. Do you work on the weekends?”
Oliver narrowed his eyes. “Um, no. I don’t. John didn’t either. Not really part of our job descriptions.”
“I see. Well thank you, Mr. Ontagne. Rest assured, I’ll get to the bottom of this.”
Oliver nodded.
I turned away and looked around at the dining room. Though there was only one place I really looked at. The dining table. Three plates of food. Bacon. Eggs. Sunny side up. My favorite. Not much else to look at here.
“Let’s go, Sheer.”
“Yes, sir.”
We left the dining room, and I walked towards the hallway with the bedrooms.
“So… think you figured it out yet sir?”
“That tone in your voice makes it sound like you figured it out yourself.”
“Heh, well I think I did, sir.” Sheer smiled charmingly. “Would you like to hear?”
“Indulge me.”
The hallway had two doorways. One led to a large bedroom and the other led to a smaller room. The smaller room was the guest room and that’s where I needed to go. We entered.
“Well, here’s what I was thinking. Things just weren’t adding up on the wife’s side. I noticed you looking at the knife on the cutting board in the kitchen. That knife definitely did not belong in the kitchen. The blade was way too high quality. And the grip was very strange. It was almost like… someone removed the actual grip.”
I smiled. “Good thinking. That’s what I think too.”
Sheer nodded eagerly. “Yeah. The grip was probably very high quality too. Something that would’ve made it stand out too much. Like leather or something like that. So they removed it to get rid of any suspicion. I believe that Jane Jeste bought this knife in order to murder her husband. However, during the actual murder, she got mixed up and ended up using a kitchen knife instead. Now she had another problem. There was a knife missing from the knife rack in the kitchen. Anyone would be able to link the knife in her husband’s chest straight back to her. So she used the knife she bought as a the replacement knife. She took off the grip to make it less suspicious. She cooked up breakfast and placed it down in the dining room. And this is where she messed up again. She didn’t actually cook anything that required a knife! She only made bacon and eggs. So she never even needed to place a knife on the cutting board in the first place. But by doing so, she revealed her hand. How about that?”
Sheer beamed at me.
“Not bad, Sheer. Good reasoning.”
Found it. I picked up a briefcase from underneath the bed.
“Huh? What’s that, sir?”
“I do believe that this is Ontagne’s briefcase. The one he brought back from work. Mrs. Jeste told us about this, remember?”
“Work? Wait, wasn’t yesterday a weekend? Oliver told us that he didn’t work during the weekend. So did Mrs. Jeste lie? This must be John’s spare briefcase.”
I opened the briefcase up. Scattered papers. Nothing really to point out the owner of this briefcase.
“I don’t really think that this has anything to with the case sir. It’s just a briefcase of papers.”
“Indeed.” I walked towards the window and opened it up. I stuck my head and looked down. “As I thought. Come over here, Sheer.”
“Okay?” Sheer walked over and looked out the window. “It’s a dumpster sir.”
“Yeah, get some men and look inside.”
“... You want us to go dumpster diving.”
“Just look at the top, Sheer. Don’t look inside the actual trash bags.”
“Alright, fine. I’ll be right back.”
* * *
“Alright here’s what I found sir.” Sheer had a glum look on his face.
“Hey, Sheer.”
“Yes?”
“Do you mind stepping back a bit? You kinda smell.”
“...” Sheer’s lips made a thin line across his face.
“Ha ha! Lighten up, Sheer. It’s just a joke.” I slapped his back. “Come on, tell me what you found.”
“... Other than the trash bags, I found some trash. What else did you expect? Just empty bottles and cans. Also food. Most of it moldy and old.” Sheer glared at me.
“And what about the new?”
“The new?”
“The new food. The food that was new. What food was it?”
“Oh the new food. Well, I found some roasted potatoes and diced carrots.”
“There we go!” I slapped my subordinate's back again. “There’s your missing breakfast.”
“Huh? Missing? What do you mean?” Sheer asked.
“Remember how you said Mrs. Jeste made a mistake with the knife? She placed a knife on the cutting board but never actually made anything that needed a knife. Well here’s what needs a knife.”
“Oh! I see! The potatoes and carrots!”
“Yes Sheer.”
“Wait, does that mean... Ontagne is our culprit? But what about the knife in Jeste’s body? Isn’t a knife from the kitchen? How else would he have killed John? Only Mrs. Jeste could get that knife.”
I shook my head. “No Sheer, Oliver did not use that kitchen knife to kill John. He used the knife on the cutting board.”
Sheer’s eyes widened. “But how did they switch places?”
“Let’s replay this from the beginning, Sheer. The three woke up around 7:30 AM. They got dressed up and readied themselves. Then John went to the living room to watch TV. Jane went to the kitchen. And Oliver went to the bathroom. Jane was cooking. John was watching TV. And Oliver was getting to ready.
Oliver left the bathroom and entered the living room. He killed John with the knife before he could react. Then Oliver quickly left the room. Jane, after preparing breakfast, entered the the room. She screamed, and then she fainted. This is where Oliver worked his magic.”
“Wait! Didn’t Oliver tell us that right after Jane found the body, he called 911. We have the records. Jane found the body at 7:50, and Oliver called at 7:50. So what time could he have had to do anything?”
“Sheer. Who told you that Jane found the body at 7:50?”
Sheer opened his mouth. After a pause, he closed it.
“Oliver did.”
“Yep. Oliver presumably lied about when Jane found the body. Not a very big lie. He probably only needed a couple of minutes to prepare the crime scene.”
“So what did he do?”
“Well, Jane had fainted. Both Jane and Oliver confirmed this. So Oliver was free to do as he pleased. The first thing he did was switching the knives. He pulled the knife out of John’s chest. He switched it with a knife in the kitchen. Realising that the knife would look out of place, he removed the grip. He probably placed the grip somewhere hidden in the apartment. Considering how small it was, it would be unlikely that we would find it.
The second thing was altering the breakfast. He removed the potatoes and carrots and threw them out the window into the dumpster below.”
“Ohhhhh. That made Mrs. Jeste look even more suspicious.”
“Correct.”
“But how do you know Mrs. Jeste cooked the potatoes and carrots? I mean anyone in this apartment building could have made that.”
“The trash can in the kitchen. There were potato peels and some carrot remains in there.”
Suddenly, clapping rang out through the room. I looked back towards the source of the sound.
Oliver Ontagne was standing in the doorway to the dining room.
“Amazing, Sergeant Brown. You’ve seen through me. A perfect performance.”
I sighed. “Take him away.”
The other officers grabbed Oliver by the shoulders and dragged him away.
“Wow, sir. You even made the culprit admit it. You nailed it.” Sheer congratulated me with a bright smile on his face.
I sighed again.
“What’s wrong, sir?”
“Nothing. I just have to take care of some loose ends. Go tell Mrs. Jeste we found her husband’s murderer.”
Sheer nodded and left to the kitchen. I looked back at the table in the living room. Lying there was John Jeste’s body. His white shirt was barely stained with the blood from his wound. He looked quite peaceful. As if he wasn’t even able to recognize the fact that he was dying.
* * *
12:00 PM
Monday
August 20th, 2016
“Oh, you’re still not done with me, Sergeant?” Oliver Ontagne smiled at me. He was sitting down in a chair across the table from me. His hands were handcuffed behind him.
“Unfortunately not.”
“What more could you want? Motive, perhaps? I guess I was always a little jealous of John. I never could-”
“I don’t care about that.” I interrupted Oliver. “There’s something else I need to talk about.”
“Hmmm? What is this something else?”
“Let’s cut through the bullshit. Back in the apartment, you started clapped when I hadn’t even finished talking. You were stopping from getting to the huge mistake you made. That pretty much gave you away.”
“Oh? And what mistake was that?”
“John’s wound. You stabbed him in the heart. Then you switched the knives. Don’t you think there should’ve been much more blood if you killed him with the knife and then pulled it out? Yet his shirt was almost stainless.”
“...”
“There’s really only two explanations. One. You never took the knife out. You never switched the knives. Now this is the most plausible explanation. It explains why not a lot blood leaked out because the wound was always blocked by the knife. It’s not perfect because there should have been a lot more blood still. It also would completely contradict all the other pieces of evidence. The second explanation is that you killed him first, then you stabbed him. There wouldn’t be that much blood if his heart had already stopped bleeding. But then, how would you have killed him? There weren’t any other signs of other wounds. No poison detected. No strangling. No nothing. So once again, how would you have killed him?”
“...”
“But before we answer that, there is one thing that doesn’t really make sense to me, Oliver. And that is the fact that your entire plan revolved completely around the fact that Mrs. Jeste would faint upon seeing her dead husband.”
“...”
“If she hadn’t fainted, then you would have never gotten to tamper with the evidence. And you would’ve become the only suspect. But that doesn’t make any sense to me, you know. How could you hinge an entire plan based on the chance that she would faint?”
“...”
“The truth is, Oliver, I don’t know how the fuck you did it. I’m completely stumped.”
“...”
“No one’s listening right now Oliver. Nobody’s recording. You have my promise. So you can tell me.”
“You really want to know?” Oliver smiled at me.
“...yes. Yes I do.”
“...”
“I don’t think you’d believe me.”
“Try me.”
“...”
“...”
“It’s reopened.”
“...”
“It’s refurbished.”
“...”
“It’s-”
Suddenly, the door opened. Sheer came into the room.
“Sir! A kid just popped in here! He just walked into one of the interrogation rooms!”
I frowned. “Why do you need me? Isn’t just a kid? He’s probably lost. Can’t you see that I’m busy?”
“Well...sir...the kid....he has a weapon.”
“Fuck! I’ll be right back, Oliver. We’ll finish this later.”
12:10 PM
Monday
August 22th, 2016
“What the hell are you doing in here, kid? Shouldn’t you in school, right now?” I growled at the boy across the table. Despite my menacing words, I couldn’t help but feel a little nervous. The boy was twirling a pistol in his finger.
He looked young. Still in high school. Still growing. So what the hell was he doing here? With a gun? I had my own pistol in my hand right now, ready whenever necessary.
“Mister Brown, right? Ahem, I just wanted to congratulate you. I heard that you managed to arrest Oliver Ontagne. Thanks for that. That makes it a lot easier for us.”
“What the hell are you-”
Suddenly I heard a loud bang outside the room. Screams and yelling. I tried to get up from my seat, but when I did, I heard a click.
“I recommend that you sit down, Mister Brown.” The boy had pointed his pistol right at me. Shit. I was too late to point my pistol at him. I sat back down.
“I can see that you’re worried about what’s going on outside. Don’t worry. My friends are taking very good care of Mister Ontagne right now.” The boy smiled at me.
I felt a shiver run down my spine. That wasn’t a smile that belonged to a normal human being. I shook my head. Get a grip, Brown! This is a boy who looked like he was still going through puberty. You’ve met murderers and killers before. Why the fuck are you scared in front of this 16-year-old looking boy?
“Mister Brown. I’m going to make this quick. I don’t have much time left.” The boy stood up. He raised his pistol.
“The world is changing. Something big is happening. You may or may not have heard about it. It’s called an Ability. Let me show you.”
The kid had placed the pistol against his own head. Flashing a smile that chilled, he pulled the trigger.
Bang.