We All Start As Strangers

Tiger, Tiger

___________________________________PART FOURTEEN__________________________________

I shuffled my thighs along the cold, stiff metal of the bench in the police station. I listened closely; they made a tiny shuffling sound as the fabric of my pants ran along the edge of the metal. Back and forth it went

Chhh, chhh, chhh, chhh.

I continued shuffling my thighs impatiently, waiting for an officer to come by.

“Can you stop?” Donovan asked, slapping a hand down on my thigh. “It’s starting to get annoying.”

“Sorry.” I grumbled slightly annoyed.

I stopped and started tapping my thumbs together, restless. I kept thinking nervously about how we were going to be arrested, but soon an officer calmly walked in and guided us to a questioning room.

“Donovan Trevors and Ciera Stargell?” He questioned, looking at us with a bare, emotionless face.

“Yes sir.” We coordinated.

“So you both were said to be murders of Evan Stargell and Gare Matthews? Oh and it appears, Ms. Stargell, that Evan, he was your father, correct?” He nodded at me.

“Yes sir, but uhm, we didn’t murder anyone. If anything, we were witnesses.”

“Indeed.” Donovan chimed in.

“Well,” the officer sighed, writhing around in his seat, attempting to get all too comfortable as if we were going to be here all day. “Then who did you two see murder these two men?” he held up the profile pictures of Gare and my father. I looked at my father with a quivering lip, tears started to roll out my eyes.

“Gare murdered my dad.” I croaked, trying extremely hard to swallow the aching pain that was causing me to cry. The officer sat up, listening intently, he waved a hand signaling me to proceed.

I drew in a breath, but before I could speak, “It’s true” Donovan blurted.

“Hush.” the officer pointed to Don. “Go on now Ms. Stargell.”

I nodded, drawing in another breath to speak. “I was in the hospital because I slipped and split my head open,” I continued. “I’d been kidnapped by Gare, because I’d got an unknown letter, and my dad had no idea. He traced me, and found me in that hospital. Once he showed up, Gare and him started fighting. Donovan and some other man were fighting too. He has scars to prove it. Gare shot my dad there in the hospital.”

Donovan looked at me, reached down, and grabbed a hold of my hand, squeezing it tight. The officer nodded, looking through his files.

“It says here your dad owned a large bank,” he said to me. “Is this why Mr. Matthews may have wanted to kill him? To take his money?”

“I’m assuming so. That’s where we found Gare, in the bank with a few other men. They had bags of stuff, but, it didn’t seem like money.” I squeezed Donovan’s hand and he spoke up.

“They left it there, too.”

“I see,” The officer kindly and open-eyedly stared at me. “And I was told that Ms. Stargell beat Mr. Matthews.”

“In defense.” I mumbled.

“She was defending me.” Don explained, the officer looked confused. “Gare and I were fighting. He had a gun to my head, and he shot at Ciera.”

“So I had to protect him.” I added, pressing myself close into Donovan’s chest. He ran his fingers across the top of my hair, kissing my head.