Chapter 210: The Interrogation
Moana
When we arrived at the police station, Edrick helped me out of the cop car and held me closely as we walked inside.
Once we were inside, I immediately noticed that the other people who were there suddenly got very quiet and started giving Edrick and I strange looks. I tried to ignore it, but it was hard to do that when I had spent the last two days at work being whispered about. Only this time, I didn’t know whether they were whispering about my “unluckiness” as a late bloomer or whether they were whispering about the warehouse incident.
Either way, I felt myself getting somewhat sick as the officer led us down a narrow and fluorescent-lit hallway to the interrogation room.
We stopped outside the door and he opened it, letting me in. It was a small room with a metal table in the center, a couple of chairs, and a fluorescent light on the ceiling. I could see a camera in the corner of the ceiling and a “mirror”, which I was certain was a one-way mirror. I instantly felt even more sick as I wondered just how many people were watching this.
Suddenly, just as Edrick was coming in after me, the officer stopped him.
“Sorry, but I’m going to have to ask you to wait outside,” he said. He sounded amicable, but his words made me nervous, and I could tell that Edric was just as nervous.
“You promised that I could be with her,” Edrick said somewhat angrily. “Why can’t I be with her now?”
“I said that you could come to the station with her,” the officer clarified. “But the interview needs to be completed with just her. She’ll be fine; this will only take a short while.”
Edrick looked at me with concern in his eyes. I felt terrified, but I hid it well and nodded at him, even going so far as to shoot him a reassuring smile before the officer closed the door.
“Take a seat,” the officer said, gesturing to one of the chairs. I sat down sheepishly, holding my purse in my lap as he sat across from me and pulled out a notebook. “Now… Let’s begin. Can you tell me, in your own words, what happened that night before the police arrived at the scene of the crime?”
“Y-Yes,” I replied. Slowly, I began to recount my experience that night. I started with the taxi ride, followed by discovering that Kelly was actually driving the taxi. But then, just as I was about to tell the officer how I was hit in the head and woke up in the warehouse, he stopped me.
“Hold on,” he said, holding his hand out as he furrowed his brow. “You said that you took a taxi at…”
“Midnight,” I said.
“Why were you taking your daughter in a taxi headed away from Mr. Morgan’s penthouse at midnight?”
As the officer asked this question, I swallowed. I didn’t know where to begin… If I revealed everything about Olivia, then it would potentially mean that the fact that I wasn’t Ella’s biological mother would be revealed to the public, which could cause a lot of problems. Not only that, but it could potentially get me in trouble for an attempted kidnapping. Of course I knew that Edrick wouldn’t press charges, but once again, that sort of information being given to the public could be disastrous.
“I… I…” I stammered, my heart racing. I felt myself get even more sick.
“We’ll come back to that,” the officer said. “I’m sorry for interrupting your story. You can continue now.”
Swallowing again, I started to tell the rest of the story. I told the officer about how I was hit in the head, and how Ella tried to run away. I then told him about waking up in the warehouse, tied to a chair with Ella beside me, a bright white spotlight in my eyes, and a… a…
Suddenly, I felt even more sick as I tried to say the word that I couldn’t seem to get out: gun.
“Are you alright, Miss Fowler?” the officer asked. “Keep telling your story.”
“I-I’m sorry,” I said quietly. “He was holding a… a g-gun…”
As I spoke, I felt my vision begin to fade. The image of Ethan’s twisted grin while he held the gun up to my head flashed through my mind. I felt myself slipping away from reality, being transported back to that horrible night. I saw Ella’s sleeping little body tied up to that metal chair. I saw Edrick’s head split open, blood pooling up on the floor around him. I saw Kelly, turning around in the driver’s seat, sneering at me as she went on a tirade about killing us. I felt Ella burying herself in my side, and I heard her little terrified sobs.
“Ma’am?” the officer said. “I need you to cooperate, otherwise this is going to take a long time…”
“R-Right,” I said, snapping back to reality for a few brief moments while beads of sweat began to form at the nape of my neck. “As I was saying, he was holding a gun to my head, and there was a bright light… H-He told me that he was going to kill me and Ella because he w-wanted Edrick to suffer…”
Once again, my voice faltered. My throat felt dry and cracked, and I reached for the glass of water sitting in front of me. I drank several gulps, but it didn’t help.
“Suffer for what?” the officer urged. “Did Edrick do anything to Ethan at any point?”
I shook my head. “No, that’s the thing,” I replied. “Edrick didn’t do anything. Ethan’s mother killed herself… Well, Michael probably did it, in all reality…”
The officer furrowed his brow and wrote furiously on his notepad. “Michael who?” he asked.
I felt my eyes widen. I had said too much. “M-Michael Morgan,” I replied.
“Hold on.” The officer set his pen down and folded his arms across his chest. “That’s a very serious accusation, Miss Fowler,” he said. “Are you accusing Michael Morgan of murdering Ethan’s mother?”
This was too much. I suddenly shook my head, feeling shame for bringing it up. I had said too much, and for all I knew, Michael was connected to people in the police department. Ethan had said that his mother’s murder was covered up. What if the cops helped? What if they would tell Michael that I was trying to rat him out?
As all of this whirled around in my head, I felt myself getting more and more dizzy. Suddenly, I felt as though I would throw up. I stood, clamping my hand over my mouth as vomit began to bubble up. The officer jumped up as well; he was saying something with a worried look on his face and was holding his hands out to me, but I couldn’t hear what he was saying over the ringing in my ears.
“I-I don’t feel so w-well…” I murmured. I saw a flash of Ethan’s face. Ethan was the cop! No… I was just seeing things… I looked up at the mirror then, and jumped when I saw Ethan standing behind me, holding the gun to my head. I whirled around, but he wasn’t there. I started hyperventilating.
“Miss Fowler? Miss Fowler!” the officer said.
My knees buckled under me, and everything went dark.
