His Twisted Smile

by Chris Thompson

  It was interesting, but things could change in a person’s mind - even the longest held of convictions should the right situation present itself. He didn’t press the topic any further.

  “And I assume she had never had any incidents with drugs?”

  Isabelle shot Gordon a deathly look.

  “I’m not trying to offend you but, if I’m going to help you, I need to ask questions you may not like.” He explained to her.

  “My daughter has never had a sip of alcohol let alone taken drugs, Mister Crane. For them to tell me she was high on cocaine was all the proof I needed to tell me she was murdered. She would never willingly take such a thing.”

  “Did the police say what the cause of death was?”

  “While under the influence of drugs,” she recounted, “she tripped and fell, hitting her head on something in the alleyway which caused her death. They never told me if they found what it was she supposedly hit her head on, but it’s absurd. She was dressed like… like some kind of prostitute. She never owned those clothes, Mister Crane, and yet they don’t believe me.”

  It was the kind of thing he’d dealt with in the past, and the events could’ve been entirely as the police had said. But looking into the grieving woman’s eyes, there was something Gordon couldn’t shake; a feeling that if her daughter was all the things the police claimed, then this woman would’ve known. Or maybe Gordon’s judgement was a little clouded by embers from his past, which flared up as old memories were rekindled. He finished his drink before speaking again.

  “So, you’d like me to check things out? Make sure no corners were cut?”

  “I want you to find the man responsible for killing my daughter and whoever helped him cover it up!” Isabelle snapped again. “But if you can’t accomplish that, then find me enough to compel the police to reopen the investigation.” She was passionate and raw, wearing her emotions on her sleeve. She was the kind of woman Gordon was drawn to, but he set those thoughts aside. She was to be his client, and he would do everything in his power to give her the answers she needed.

  “I charge fifty dollars per case hour worked, plus expenses.” Gordon informed her.

  “Money isn’t a problem, Mister Crane. I’ll give you every penny I have if that’s what it takes to find the truth about my Millie.” She responded earnestly, leaning forward and placing one delicate hand on his desk. “Just promise me you’ll look - that you’ll really look. Don’t just go along with what the police report says; don’t blindly believe that my daughter could’ve done the things they say she did in the week she was missing.”

  There was ferocity in her expression that caught Gordon’s breath for a moment. Slowly, he nodded.

  “You have my word.”

  Isabelle finished her drink and placed the glass on his desk before reaching into her purse. She pulled out a wad of cash two inches thick and put it beside the glass.

  “This should get you going.” She stated objectively, before placing a piece of paper on top of the money. A glance revealed it contained all her contact information, from her address to her phone number. She stood up and Gordon mimicked her, moving around the desk to escort her to the door.

  “Where was your daughter staying before she went missing?” He asked as they walked slowly along the corridor.

  “She lived with me.”

  “After I’ve started making enquiries I’d like to come by and see her room if you have no objection. It’ll help me get a feel for what she was in to.”

  “Whatever you need, Mister Crane.” She answered almost absently.

  “Do you have a ride home?”

  “I called a cab and told him to wait for me after I saw you arriving back. He’s parked just down the street.”

  “I could get my umbrella and escort you if you’d like.”

  She stopped at the door, her hand outstretched and wrapped around the handle.

  “When they couldn’t find an answer for why my Millie was gone, I stopped caring about escorts, rain and things like that, Mister Crane.” She said as she looked up into his eyes. “I died with her. For me to have some semblance of life, I need to know the truth.”

  Gordon knew exactly what she meant.

  “I’ll be in touch.”

  She opened the door and stepped outside, walking down the dingy corridor to the stairs. Gordon felt the urge to go after her. He thought of the things he could say; the parts of his past he could reveal which might help her. But as he shut the door, Gordon realized none of what he could tell her mattered right now. She was caught in limbo and the only way out was to be given answers. Gordon hadn’t worked a homicide case in a while, but if there were answers to find, he was going to get them for her.

  Chapter Two

  Gordon decided to work on his new case while he waited for his previous client to turn up and collect her pictures. His method to starting an investigation of this type was to learn as much as possible about the victim, their family and their friends. His reasoning was that if Millie was supposedly on drugs, and he found out she had a friend who also dabbled in drugs, then it seemed logical to suppose she might have procured the drugs from or through them. Of course, Gordon didn’t know if she did have a friend who was into drugs, but it was a place to start, and the only way he knew how to work was to proceed as mechanically as possible through the investigation: the victim, then his or her friends and family, and then start chasing down every scrap of information. To begin with, Gordon did a simple internet search for Millie Reese-Smyth. There were quite a few results and Gordon had to read them carefully, dismissing those that had no bearing on the investigation, until he found one from a Carlson Flats newspaper. It was a small story, which probably wouldn’t have run to more than half a printed page that briefly recounted the supposed facts of the case.

  Millie Reese-Smyth, a twenty-two year old woman, was found dead in an alleyway – which Gordon knew to be approximately four months ago. It was deemed an accidental death and, after revealing the bare minimum of details, the journalist who had written the article made mention of the fact that her mother was distraught and didn’t believe the official ruling. There wasn’t much more on the subject of Millie’s death, perhaps because they didn’t have any more to report or because it wasn’t a newsworthy story; in other words, it didn’t help to sell newspapers so they’d cut the story short. Gordon continued searching. He eventually stumbled upon Millie’s social media pages. They were still operational, perhaps because her mother hadn’t had the heart to take them down or, more simply, because she didn’t know how to. He scrolled through the history and saw post after post offering tributes, condolences and prayers; there were however, a few posts by clearly disturbed individuals who made disrespectful comments that would have distressed Isabelle had she seen them. To ensure he was not too eagerly dismissing them as morons, only to discover later they could well prove to be a suspect, Gordon turned to their profile pages. They were poorly filled out, meaning they were likely just trolls or goblins; Gordon wasn’t entirely sure what the correct term was.

  Further down, Gordon eventually found the last posts Millie herself had made. She seemed happy, with each post relating to her upcoming trip and what she hoped to find as she explored America. She had put her car in for a tune up to make sure she wouldn’t have any problems and was ‘looking forward to putting the top down and driving with the wind in her hair’, in her own words. Gordon smiled as he read some of the posts. She seemed like a sweet, innocent girl and something in the personality she exuded reminded him of his own little girl, though she had obviously been a lot younger than Millie when she… Gordon didn’t finish the thought; instead, he refocused on his task. Millie’s friends had suggested various clubs in different states she could visit, but she appeared uninterested in any of them, seemingly more attracted to experiencing the changes in the landscape or checking out historical aspects of the various towns and cities on her route. Some of her more rambunctious friends even suggested trying to find a man
in every state, a suggestion that seemed to offend her as she rather curtly reminded them of her promise ring and the vow it represented. Interestingly, it didn’t seem to be a religious decision; instead it was just a personal thing she’d chosen to do. Gordon didn’t judge her either way, neither applauding nor disapproving her choice, but the more he read and the more pictures he saw of her, the more he understood why her mother had a hard time believing she was high on drugs and had been sleeping around just before her death. A hard time believing but, in Gordon’s experience, it was not something that was impossible. People could change gradually or suddenly, given the right opportunity and enough temptation. Could she have met someone the night she went missing who turned everything she believed in on its head? Could that person have then led her to try some new things and, in the haze that followed, had she died accidentally? It had happened before, so often that to discover that particular sequence of events was correct wouldn’t come as a complete surprise... except to Isabelle. She had asked him to prove the things people were saying about her weren’t true. Gordon wondered how she’d take it if it turned out that the things they were saying were true.

  Gordon clicked on one of her pictures at the side, bringing it up to full screen. Millie was as beautiful as her mother, inheriting her eyes, complexion and the shape of her face. If the two were side by side they could almost have been mistaken for sisters; at least, that was Gordon’s opinion. He liked to think he was a good judge of character, capable of looking at a person and seeing if there was a suggestion about them of malice or deception. Obviously, it worked better when face to face with a real person but, as he sat in the glow of his laptop screen sipping his fifth drink of the night, he couldn’t see anything about the girl other than her innocence. Gordon had intended to continue browsing through her social media and then, perhaps, to see what information he could glean about her mother when the power suddenly cut out, taking his internet connection with it.

  “Damn it.” Gordon muttered. Moments later there was an urgent knocking at his door. Gordon grabbed his cell phone and set it to flashlight mode before moving towards the door to answer it. The hallway was as dark as his apartment, so he shone just enough light to see who had summoned him without shining the blinding light his visitor’s face. Doing so, he was able to illuminate the figure enough to find out it was his previous client.

  “Your power’s out.” She informed him unnecessarily. She was a vaguely sweet looking woman, despite the fact she had a rather long face, named Josie Neagle.

  “Thank God, I thought I’d gone blind.” Gordon replied sarcastically, opening the door wider.

  “You said you got what I needed?” She questioned, ignoring his comment.

  “Yeah, let me get my camera.”

  Gordon left her at the door and returned to his desk, grabbing the camera and bringing it back. He turned it on and opened the pictures before handing it to her.

  “It’s as you suspected. That should be more than enough for you to get a quick divorce.”

  “I see.” She commented as she clicked through the pictures. Josie appeared neither upset nor angry by what she saw. If anything, she looked disappointed. It could’ve been shock of course, but to Gordon, who had seen spouses burst into tears when the betrayal of their partner was confirmed or explode with volcanic fury, her reaction seemed way off.

  “Is something wrong?” Gordon asked with a puzzled frown as she began clicking through the pictures again.

  “You didn’t take any videos?”

  “Pictures will work fine.”

  “And you didn’t take any pictures of what happened next?”

  Gordon’s eyes narrowed at the strange line of questioning.

  “I’m pretty sure you can guess what happened next, Mrs Neagle... more of the same. Is there something else you were looking for?”

  She looked up at him, appearing slightly nervous for some inexplicable reason.

  “I knew it was a stupid idea.” She muttered, looking back down at the camera.

  “Mrs Neagle, it’s late, I’m tired and I spent a good hour in the rain getting soaked to get those pictures. My patience is starting to wear thin.” Gordon declared unhappily.

  “I think it’s best if I just pay you and leave.”

  “Is this really your husband? What’s going on?”

  “Okay, okay.” She responded defensively, handing the camera back. “My… my husband and I thought it would be… fun to… you know… get someone to take pictures of him... in the act.”

  “What?” Gordon thundered, unable to hide his angry disbelief.

  “We know the girl and she was happy to agree to it and, well, we thought it might spice things up a little. Roleplay, you know? We thought it might be fun, you know? You know what I mean, right?”

  Gordon shook his head.

  “No, I don’t know what you mean. I don’t want to know what you mean. Moreover, I don’t want your money for making me partake in your weird, kinky crap.”

  Gordon started to close the door but she pressed her hands against it.

  “Wait!” She called out.

  Gordon opened the door again and grunted angrily.

  “Can we have the pictures?”

  Gordon turned the camera off, pulled the memory card out and threw it into the dark hallway.

  “Good luck.” He said dismissively as he slammed the door and locked it.

  He felt disgusted at what he’d been hired to do. The truth was, he didn’t care what people got up to behind closed doors, but when they tried to involve him that’s where he drew the line. He stomped back to the desk and flopped down on the chair. Sighing with frustration, he tapped furiously on the keyboard as though that might bring the internet back but, stubbornly, it remained offline. He shone the torch at the clock and saw it was after midnight, so he grabbed one last glass of whiskey and took it with him into the bedroom.

  Sitting on the edge of the bed, he sipped his drink and tried to put the infuriating incident out of his mind and refocus on his new case - something that was at least very real. While Isabelle hoped, or rather, was desperate, for him to find answers, it was distinctly possible he would find out the police investigation was accurate and it was a good girl who went bad just once and it got her killed. Gordon finished his drink and lay down in his clothes, his mind in a conflict over which would be the better result.

  Morning came and Gordon discovered the rain had abated, being replaced by the more usual cloudless, blue sky common in Nevada. He shuffled into the kitchen and discovered the power was back on, so started the day by making himself a cup of instant coffee and pouring cereal into a bowl for breakfast before grabbing a quick shower and shave to freshen up. Sometimes he would delay the shower and sit at his desk eating and drinking his coffee while he waited for work, but Gordon intended to drop in on his old partner to find out what he could about the official version of Millie’s death.

  The drive to his old precinct was conveniently short and, as he pulled into the parking lot out front, he felt a pang of nostalgia; he’d made this trip so many times and yet it had been a long time since he had made the journey regularly. Of course, he’d started off from a different address in those days and, as he looked through the windshield, he remembered what he had once had: a family to come home to, the security of constant work and friends he would see on a daily basis. All of that was gone now, but he hoped the small number of people he had counted amongst his friends then, most of whom still worked in the building before him, would help him despite their deteriorated relationship. He pulled his gun out of the holster and placed it in the glove compartment before slipping on his jacket and getting out of the car. It was a tan and terracotta coloured building with large windows on the second floor and smaller ones on the ground floor. Uniformed officers were lingering outside, perhaps catching up before starting a shift or getting ready to go home after a long night on duty. Men and women in formal wear, perhaps detectives, were entering and exiting. Walking
by them, he realized it was the buzz of conversation and the sense that the precinct was a hive of activity that he remembered most and, in maudlin moments, missed. As he approached the front doors he saw a few faces he recognized and offered a wave or nod of the head as he walked by.

  Although it was early in the morning, it was starting to get hot already and Gordon felt a certain amount of relief as he stepped into the air conditioned, plainly decorated main entrance. The desk sergeant, a man named Jonas Reed who had about fifteen years on Gordon, recognized him immediately. He stood up and leaned over the desk, extending his hand.

  “Gordon Crane! How the hell have you been?” Reed asked. Gordon smiled and shook hands with his former comrade.

  “Getting by. How about you? Still warming the front desk I see.”

  “Hey, I’m a year from retirement, so I’m glad to be here.” Reed laughed as he sat back down heavily. He was pushing the regulations on fitness for sure, but it didn’t seem as if he cared.

  “Is Jones in? He passed a woman my card and I figured I should pay him a visit.”

  “Yeah, he just punched in. Do you remember your way or do you need an escort?”

  “I can manage.” Gordon answered with a grin as Reed handed him a visitor’s pass.

  Gordon clipped it on and patted the desk before moving around to the side door, which Reed buzzed open for him. Gordon made a beeline for the homicide department, passing by other departments, offices and side rooms. It was a familiar walk, and once he entered the office where he’d spent so much time in the past, he took a moment to look at the dozens of desks and computers where detectives would try and solve every murder case that came their way, from crimes of passion, which were solved quickly, to the depraved crimes that would take weeks or months of hard work. Some of the latter would never be solved, and Gordon wondered if that was the situation with the case he was tasked to investigate.