---continued from Part 2: https://www.artstation.com/misha/blog/mOPp/on-the-clock-inktober-2019-days-1-8---
Part 3 here: https://www.artstation.com/misha/blog/vP93/on-the-clock-inktober-2019-days-19-end
---ON THE CLOCK (continued)---
At the station I went through the all too familiar procedure. I was sitting in a stiff, metal chair in a variation of “the Thinker” pose with my elbows resting on the stiff, metal desk, awaiting questioning. I wasn’t looking forward to the next couple of hours. They’d come in here, probably in stereo, and ask me about what they thought mattered. They would take turns slamming their fists on the tabletop for effect until I’d tell them my alibi while they’d tell me I was full of shit. Then they’d check it and release me, unapologetically. It was an old story, only this time something was off.
This time, I was the one wearing the bracelets. I was the one chained to the stiff, metal desk. And as for alibis – I was fresh out of those.
They sauntered in, two detectives, one tall and lean in a powder-blue sport shirt with the sleeves rolled up to display powerful-looking forearms. He was flipping through a manila file as he walked into the interrogation room. He passed the file on to his shorter and paler colleague and took up his post, leaning on the wall behind me. I looked at him over the shoulder, he stared at me blankly, his arms folded. He was still and polished like an obsidian statue and made me feel slightly uneasy.
I returned my attention to the other as he tossed the file on the tabletop, sat next to it, and looked at me, his Buddha-like belly straining against the green of his polo. I looked back at him, fighting the urge to rub him for good luck.
“Well, you’re in deep shit, ain’t ya?” This was more of a statement. Probably meant to dispel any notions of luck-bearing.
“Am I?” I asked.
“Is he, Frank?” The Buddha asked of his statuesque, ebony partner.
“Seems so, Phil,” said Frank in a brassy bass. His voice rolled out from somewhere deep inside him and echoed through the room.
“Detective Campbell seems to think so,” said Phil. “He knows these things.”
“Oh,” I said. Couldn’t have found a better retort even if I tried.
Phil flipped through the file for no reason I could discern, he already knew what it said. Finally, he broke the silence.
“Well, tell us what we want to hear, David,” he said. “You know the procedure, don’t you? This room shouldn’t be all that new to you.” He consulted the file again. “Officer David E. McGloin, Third Municipal. You were there for five years before you went private. Wonder why you didn’t last on the force?”
He let the question hang dramatically while he made a show of scanning the file. Turning to me he said, “Conduct unbecoming? Hmmm.” Then he read some more and looked past me at Detective Campbell. “Looks like David, here, likes to drink. Looks like he doesn’t know his limit either. Seems he even tried to serve and protect in an inebriated state.”
“Am I here to have my personal history read to me, Phil? Or do you want it autographed?”
“No, you are here because you shot a man with a ten gauge.”
“Oh, that.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Look, where’s my lawyer?”
“On his way,” Phil said. “Why don’t we pass the time by discussing our crime-scene photographer’s knowledge of composition?”
He took out some pictures from the file and tossed them toward me. “These look familiar?”
I looked at the photos. They were of a dead man in a black leather jacket with a large wound in his chest. The space between the lapels of his jacket looked like it was stuffed with ground beef. I knew his name was Alphonso. I knew I had not liked him alive. I knew I did not dislike him dead.
“Alphonso Scott, for your viewing pleasure,” announced Phil in a loud voice that reverberated metallically around the bleak room. “Not pretty, is he?”
“He never was pretty,” I said. “What’s this got to do with me?”
Phil tossed more photos onto the tabletop. I looked.
These were of a woman in a similar condition to Alphonso. This one bothered me.
“The whore you were supposed to find, right?” Phil said.
“Her name is Terry Sotlas.” I said. Phil put his hands up in defense, palms out. “Was anyway.”
“Yeah, how’s a step-daughter of a future governor end up hooking?” Phil asked.
“You’re asking the wrong guy.”
“No, I don’t think I am,” said Phil. “Just asking the wrong questions.”
I sat in silence, wondering how much they knew. Cops could be damn smart when they wanted to be. Hell, once upon a time I was one of them, and I was the smartest person I ever met.
“I’m still not sure what you want me to say,” I said, cutting the silence.
“You’re full of shit, Dave,” Phil said. I had a funny feeling he would. “Bill Roberts hired you to find her, didn’t he? Doesn’t look good to have your step-daughter hooking when you’re running on a ‘sweep this city clean’ platform, does it?”
I leaned back, cocked my head, and looked at him the way dogs look at answering machines.
“Fine, just sit there and listen. I’ll tell you what I think the connection is here,” Phil began. “I think that there were some problems in the House that old-money built. I won’t speculate on the specifics, but I think it’s safe to assume Terry wasn’t happy with her ‘new daddy.’ Her mother seemed to like this guy alright; he was rich and powerful, with ambitions to become even more rich and powerful. Around the time he decided to run for office, the angst-ridden Terry decided to run away from home. She tried to get in touch with her biological father, but soon discovered that her ‘real daddy’ was a dead-beat junkie that barely remembered he had a daughter. So she was now on her own and realized that there was little she could do with her 12th grade education. She had to resort to… ah… unskilled labor. So…”
Continued in Part 3: https://www.artstation.com/misha/blog/vP93/on-the-clock-inktober-2019-days-19-end
