Officer Eliza Dunn had a more selfish reason for her suggestion. Between the sights she had seen and the putrid smell emanating from the sobbing girl, she had grown increasingly nauseous. She barely made it to the toilet in time to hurl up her lunch. She quickly rinsed her mouth and grabbed the hand towel on the rack. She squirted some liquid soap onto the towel, ran it under warm water and wrung it out. As she carried the towel out into the hall, a tall, slender, grey-haired man called to her.
“This is a crime scene, Dunn,” he scolded. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“I walked around the blood, Captain, I just—”
“You just compromised it, dammit!” He shouted. “After nearly a year on the force, you should know better, Dunn...what the hell were you thinking?”
Officer Dunn bit down on the inside of her cheek and mustered up the strength to keep from crying. She did know better, yet she hadn’t been thinking. This was, by far, the worst crime scene she had ever stepped into. She regretted every second of the short time she had spent in the room with the bodies. It had rattled her to the core and as much as she had tried to be strong and keep herself together, she knew it was just a matter of time before she’d fall apart.
Captain Charles Quimby hadn’t liked her from day one. It wasn’t just his old-fashioned, chauvinistic tendencies. It was because she lacked the requisite strength, resiliency and confidence for the job. She always seemed unsure of herself. Sure, she was intelligent, sure she had aced her exams, but book smart meant nothing in tough crime situations.
“Well?” The lieutenant indignantly waited for a reply.
She felt the sting of tears in her eyes, yet she refused to cry.
“I...I just wanted to get a wet towel so the little girl could be cleaned. There’s blood and—”
“I don’t give a rat’s ass about the little girl!” Captain Quimby shouted, his booming voice startling Officer Dunn.
She took a step back as if she feared him. It made Captain Quimby all the more disgusted by her presence.
“Get out of here,” he spat. “Take the mother and the girl down to the station and get all the information you can from them.”
Officer Dunn quickly walked away, her head bowed, hiding the tears leaking from her eyes. It was the most humiliating experience of her life and she had to remind herself again why she joined the force. As she approached the front door, she wiped her face, preparing once more to assume the brave-cop persona. She stepped through the door, walked a few steps and froze. She looked around frantically for Patty and her daughter. They were gone.
“Shit!” Officer Dunn cried, tears welling up in her eyes all over again. She was really going to hear it now.
~2~
Patty knew she should have waited for the officer, but she was too worried about Jake. She had to find out how he was and if he was going to survive. The ambulance hadn’t left too long ago. She was sure that she could catch up. She would clean Amber up at the hospital.
Once again driving recklessly, with Amber barely strapped into her booster seat, Patty drove at excessive speeds until at last she could see the back of the ambulance. She followed it to the hospital and even through the “ambulance only” entrance of the emergency room section. A security officer was at her side before she was able to grab Amber from the back seat. Amber had resumed her high-pitched wailing.
The security officer took a step back upon seeing and smelling the blood-smeared child. He thought the girl must have been injured and wondered why she hadn’t been transported in an ambulance.
“Ma’am,” he started to say but the look Patty flashed him cut him off entirely as she ignored him and raced into the hospital behind the paramedics. She was summarily stopped by another security officer. Unlike his older counterpart outside, this one over-zealously informed her that she was not supposed to be there.
“This section of the hospital is off-limits to unauthorized persons,” he callously stated, without a shred of compassion. He looked down at the loud, dirty child squirming within Patty’s arms.”
“Is she hurt?”
“Yes,” Patty lied, hoping to gain admittance to the emergency ward where they had taken Jake.
The security officer made a grunting sound, clearly displeased by the disruption of his routine. Patty followed him as he walked over to the heavy, locked double doors. He swiped his card through a small terminal on the side of the wall and the doors began to part. Patty took off running to find Jake, calling out for him as the security officer shouted out to her. He dashed after her.
Patty surprisingly ran a good distance before the security officer caught up to her, grabbing onto her shoulders and pulling her back.
“Let go,” she yelled as she tried to escape his clutch.
“You lied to me, didn’t you?”
“I need to see my husband,” Patty replied frantically before abandoning her struggles and breaking down in tears.
The security officer exhaled loudly. He was clearly annoyed.
“Let’s go,” he said, yanking her arm back toward the exit.
Patty complied. She didn’t have the strength to resist. The security officer escorted her outside and glared at her angrily.
“If that’s your vehicle,” he said curtly as he motioned to her platinum-colored Lexus GX 460, “Get it out of here now before I have it towed away.”
Patty nodded, feeling overwhelmed. She dropped Amber onto the booster seat, climbed into the driver’s seat and drove off without bothering to strap either of them in. It was a short drive over to the emergency parking lot on the side of the hospital, she reasoned. She was in a parking spot in less than two minutes. A minute later she was at the reception desk and frantically begging the receptionist for information about her husband. Between her ranting and Amber’s wailing, they were causing quite a disturbance.
Finally, a more sympathetic woman stepped into the reception area to talk to her.
“If you calm down, I’ll do my best to help you,” she promised as Patty, feeling intensely overwhelmed, began crying.
The petite brunette guided her to a quiet sitting area off to the side. Patty sat down and attempted to place Amber in the adjacent seat, but the girl tightened her grip on her mother and held on as if her life depended on it.
“I’m Anne Warren,” the woman introduced herself softly. “Why don’t you start by telling me who you are.”
Patty began massaging Amber’s back in an effort to silence her shrill cries.
“I’m Patty Bentley,” she replied after Amber’s cries hushed to a less obtrusive whimpering. “I need to find out about my husband.”
“Okay, what’s your husband’s name?”
“Jake Bentley, the paramedics just brought him here. I don’t know what’s wrong with him. I don’t even know if he’s still alive,” Patty answered nervously, desperately trying to keep from crying again.
“Why don’t I go and get some information for you while you get your little one cleaned up. It looks like she cried so much the poor girl threw up on herself.”
Patty nodded without explaining the mess covering Amber’s body. Just thinking about it made her want to strip Amber’s clothes off and discard them for good.
“The restroom is right there in the corner,” Anne said as she pointed to the partially open door across the room. She stood up and placed her hand on Patty’s shoulder.
“I’ll be right back,” she assured her, then walked back to the hall accessible only to authorized personnel.
Patty stood slowly and walked sluggishly toward the restroom. Her head was starting to throb and she was too overwhelmed to keep worrying about Jake. At the moment, Amber needed her attention. She would get her cleaned up as much as possible then wait for Anne to give her information about Jake. It was simply beyond her control.
The bathroom was small but seemed to be clean. As expected, Amber tested the limits of Patty’s patience, wrapping her legs around her mother’s waist and holding on tenaciously ea
ch time Patty attempted to sit her down upon the countertop near the sink.
“Amber, do you need to be so difficult?” Patty shouted, as she frowned and pried the fidgeting, hysterically crying child free from her body.
“Stay still or you’ll fall,” Patty warned Amber as the miserable girl kicked her legs tempestuously and reached out to her mother.
Patty stepped over to the sink further away and looked at the unfamiliar person staring back at her in the mirror. Her hair was unkempt and she had the disgusting slime smeared on her face, shirt and arms. She looked nearly as dirty as Amber. Without wasting another second, Patty cleaned herself off using an excess amount of the liquid soap. She washed her hands first, making sure to thoroughly clean under her fingernails. She next washed her face then rinsed her arms under the warm water. She grabbed a long sheet of the industrial paper towel hanging from the dispenser on the wall and dried her face and arms. She added some soap to the dampened paper and rubbed at the soiled spots on her shirt. It wasn’t perfect but much better than before. She ran her hand over her head and finger-combed her hair into place.
With the easy part of her task complete, she turned her attention to Amber, whose teary face was beet red. She was wailing s loudly that Patty expected hospital personnel to burst in to assist the seemingly abused child.
“Please Amby,” she begged, “let me get you cleaned up and then we’ll find out about Daddy and get something to eat, okay?”
Amber began choking and coughing from her excessive crying. Patty took the opportunity to start cleaning her while she wasn’t kicking and screaming. She tore off another long piece of the paper towel, ran it under warm water, wrung it out then squirted a good amount of liquid soap to the rough, tan, crumpled paper. She sighed in anticipation of Amber’s outburst once the girl’s coughing fit ended. Then she reached over and tried her best to remove the sludge covering Amber’s body.
It was an arduous labor of love, but after several grueling minutes of resistance and shrill screams, Amber was fairly clean again. She still smelled of the foul substance and there were splotches of it that were impossible to clean off, but it was a huge improvement over her former state. Amber must have either felt better or exhausted herself with all of her nonstop high-pitched bawling. The second Patty lifted her up she rested her head on her mother’s shoulder and quieted down completely. Patty was incredibly grateful. She planted a kiss on the little girl’s clean forehead and exited the restroom.
Anne was already waiting for Patty as she walked back to the row of seats in the corner of the room. Her expression was not reassuring.
“How is he?” Patty asked nervously, her eyes growing misty again.
“He’s alive, Patty, but in very serious condition. How did he get those burns?”
“Burns? What burns?”
Patty’s eyes were wide with terror. What had Hillary done to her husband? A figure entered the field of her peripheral vision. She looked over to see the female officer who was with her at the Morrison house. As Officer Dunn approached, Anne walked off.
“I...I’m sorry for leaving like that Officer, I just had to find out about my husband.”
“You mean the husband that you burned? What happened, Mrs. Bentley? Did you catch him cheating on you?”
“What?” Patty asked, bewildered. “You think that I...that I hurt my husband?”
“Did you catch him cheating on you? With Monica Morrison, maybe?”
“No,” Patty uttered in exasperation. “That’s ridiculous, are you kidding me? I told you, it was Hillary Greyson.”
A tall, middle-aged blonde woman approached them. She looked annoyed.
“It was Hillary, I swear. I saw her. I saw her...it was—”
“Mrs. Bentley,” Officer Dunn said sharply, “I suggest you remain silent.”
Patty’s mouth dropped open as the realization of what was happening hit her.
“I’m Eileen Greenwald from Child Protective Services. Do you have any relatives who might be willing to care for Amber in your absence?”
Patty’s head shook furiously from side to side as long tears streaked down her face. She held on tightly to Amber.
“Mrs. Bentley, I’m placing you under arrest for the murder of Mr. and Mrs. Morrison and for the attempted murder of your husband. Please don’t make this difficult. Ms. Greenwald will take good care of your daughter.”
“No!” Patty shouted, alarming Amber who began to sob.
Patty couldn’t believe what was going on. It felt like she was stuck in a bad dream—a terrible nightmare. How could this be happening?
Ms. Greenwald reached out for Amber and Patty tearfully relinquished her to the tall, stout woman despite Amber’s violent protests. She held firmly onto Amber’s wildly squirming little body as she turned and began to walk away without saying another word.
“I love you, Amby,” Patty shouted to her frantic daughter as she wept. “Everything’s gonna be okay, sweetie, I’ll see you soon.”
But what if Jake died? How would she ever prove that she had no part in the carnage she had seen at the Morrison house? She had no alibi, she had been at home with Amber.
Bombarded with new worries, Patty was in a daze as Officer Dunn started reading her Miranda rights and placing the handcuffs over her wrists.
Before long, she was at the police station being processed. She cried the entire time. Afterward, a young officer with a receding hairline asked her if there was anyone she wanted to call. Still in a stupor, she ignored him. He repeated himself louder.
“I said, is there anyone you would like to call?”
Patty’s forlorn eyes registered acknowledgement of his words and she slowly nodded though she didn’t know who she would call. Amber and Jake were her only family members on the east coast. Her parents and sister were all in California. She was too embarrassed to reach out to any of her friends and neighbors. She figured that left only one person: her lawyer, Myles Arkinbacher. Although he was a Trusts and Estates attorney, Patty hoped that he could refer her to a good criminal lawyer.
Hours that seemed like days passed slowly and at last a balding, clean-shaven man in his late thirties arrived on Patty’s behalf. He introduced himself as Daniel Jefferies.
Patty attempted to put forth a brave front. Within mere seconds she crumbled into a blubbering, tongue-tied fool and collapsed into Daniel’s arms.
“Take it easy, Mrs. Bentley, we’ll get everything sorted out. Please, I need you to tell me everything that happened. Start from the beginning and don’t leave anything out.”
Patty wiped the remaining tears from her face. She took a deep breath and began to tell Daniel everything that had happened from the time she had first spoken to Hillary up until her arrest.
“I know it was wrong of me to leave,” she explained, “but I was just so worried about Jake. Do you know anything about his condition?”
“He’s alive...for now,” Daniel replied somberly.
“The officer mentioned something about burns but he didn’t look burned to me,” Patty said poignantly.
Daniel winced then nodded.
“He’s burned all right,” he said tersely. “His....”
Patty waited for him to finish his sentence but when he wasn’t forthcoming with the information, she pressed on.
“His what?” She demanded.
“Well, his crotch. His penis, his testicles...his genitals have been scorched and damaged.”
Terror filled Patty’s eyes as her eyes watered.
“That’s why the cops suspect that there may have been infidelity involved...that you were jealous...that you—”
“But I didn’t!” Patty interjected emphatically. “I didn’t even know about it.”
“Well that’s what we’ll have to demonstrate. But you have to admit, your story about Hillary Greyson sounds very far-fetched.”
“But I know what I saw,” Patty insisted.
“Could it have been someone who looked like Hillary? Maybe—”
“I don’t know,” Patty said in frustration. “I guess so. All I know is that Jake called me and warned me that Hillary Greyson was coming to kill me and Amber. I didn’t believe it either. As I told you, I thought maybe he was cheating on me, that maybe he was only trying to get me out of the house so that I wouldn’t be able to confront his mistress. But he was just so scared—terrified—like I’ve never heard him before. Thank God I followed my instincts and left when I did. She would have killed us too, I just know it.”
“I think it’ll be impossible to convince a jury that Hillary Greyson—who, by the way, is dead—committed the crimes. Now don’t get me wrong, I believe that you’re innocent, I believe that you believe it was Hillary, but we can’t base our case on that, it just wouldn’t work, Mrs. Bentley. We’ll have to hope and pray that your husband regains consciousness and tells us what happened. But if he dies....”
Patty hung on his words like a drowning man beyond reach of a flotation device.
“When can I get out of here? When can I get Amber back?” She asked desperately.
“Well, I’ll do my best to convince the judge that you should be granted bail. You’re not a flight risk and you don’t have a record so that works in your favor. But given the nature of the charges, it’s hard to predict how it’ll go. We’ll have to hope for the best.”
Dread hit Patty hard and a piteous sound escaped her mouth. She buried her head within her hands and sobbed, feeling completely hopeless.
Daniel patted her shoulder lightly.
“Are you taking any medications?” He asked bluntly.
Patty looked up at him and frowned. She was offended.
“I have to ask, Mrs. Bentley, I have to have all of the facts.”
Patty shook her head slowly.
“No, no medications, and no, I wasn’t drinking, I don’t do drugs, and I’m not crazy.”
Daniel nodded. He didn’t believe that she was guilty of any of the crimes she had been charged with. Still, he couldn’t leave any stone unturned. He had been shocked by one of his past cases, an innocent-looking young woman who had been charged with murdering her boyfriend. She had lied effortlessly and so convincingly, denying any involvement in the murder. But forensic evidence doesn’t lie.
Hillary_Retribution Page 3
