"For Pete's sake, stop cramming those words into my ear! I know that I'm one of the suspects, a major one instead. But you cannot just nark that on my face every damn second!" William shouted, losing his already so withering patience, slamming the glass table ruthlessly.
Jeffery was shocked? Yes, indeed. The officer looked at the crazy man before him perplexed.
It would have made more sense for him, Jeffery, to have shouted like that, given that he'd been doing nothing but asking everyone all the very similar questions again and again since the morning.
He looked through the one sided glass window, knowing they were being watched. Gesturing some weird hand-sign that probably meant 'he was done for the instance', he headed out of the investigation room.
Jeongguk who had just came from the surveillance-camera control room, passed an assuring nod towards his partner.
To say he was irked by William, would be an understatement.
Not only did he just shout like he owns the place, but he was even trying to bribe the investigation department with his business tactics, according to Jeongguk.
"Let's give him a break. How long have you been interrogating him anyways?" He asked Jeffery, who looked at his watch and showed his index finger indicating, an hour.
Jeongguk nodded and took a deep breath. The recorder quickly dismissed himself from the room at his senior's lease. William strode out of the white room into the computer-area with a scowl. Buttoning his coat, he passed nothing more than just a grimace towards the officers as he left, leaving just Jeffery and Jeon in the room.
Jeffery broke the silence with an exasperated sigh.
"How did the meeting go?"
"Useless." Jeongguk snapped, annoyance evident in his tone.
"They are freaking asking us to cut it with the interrogations and quietly announce it as a suicide if the evidences don't show up"
He said gruffly losing his temper, and Jeffery could feel his shattering soon
"But why?! Why do they want to cover it off as suicide for freak's sake?"
"The Wrethmeirs cannot risk running their family name. Having strong political support for sure they'll try to squeeze out their best. The Mayor seems to be at good terms with William too.
Quite good terms."
He said the last part faintly, thinking deeply to point the loophole.
"He showed up yesterday, didn't he? The Mayor?"
"Yes he did. Seems like he is the one who pressured Officer Bails for all this. I don't think we have much time Jeffery, before they turn the tables."
"How was it with the Harris-guy?" Jeongguk asked, referring to Mr Harris, Nathaniel's secretary.
"He seems little off. Well honestly, at this point every one seems off." He sighed before continuing.
"That man has been working with Nathan for twenty years now, and he claims that Nathan had been depressed for a time now. And he is the only guy among all those whom we have investigated for so long, who said , "William and Nathan had a stronger bond than they ever showed" "
This caught Jeongguk's attention. He had ordered Mason to dig out every possible information about Harris, everything including professional and personal. But the report was yet to come.
Jeongguk's thoughts drifted to the investigation that proceeded the day before, once they had observed Nathaniel's room. It was one hectic day.
(Last day.
At The headquarters.
6:00 pm)
Jeongguk and Jeffery had a meeting with Officer Bails, as informed, but rather than getting some sort of information or clue, all they got was a hinted-advise of not being adamant to call it a murder.
Officer Bails had hit around the bushes the entire meeting but Jeongguk said it straight and clear, once they were out, "they want us to declare it a suicide."
It bothered them, yes. But they were positive that it was a murder.
The CCTV footage proved it all.
When the surveillance was checked, that of the-staircase - leading to Nathaniel's floor, they spotted an elderly woman- Beth, carrying two glasses and a Macallan Sherry Oak bottle, intact.
Jeongguk had felt a sense of pride, and they checked all the cameras leading from the staircase to the kitchen and the cellar. They left no nook and corner unchecked.
Upon interrogating the house staff, they discovered that the cellar had no camera inside it, though it had one facing the south door, and it was enough to ensure who went in and out of the cellar.
Beth was a trusted servant at the Wrethmeir Mansion since a few decades. Even her deceased daughter had worked at the mansion.
They didn't feel it right to pressure the elder woman too much and accepted whatever she told them without a bargain, including how the maids sometimes dislocate the cameras, at the time of weekly dusting, and that they do not indulge themselves with those 'ceiling's electronic-eyes' , as she calls them, because they once ended up damaging one such expensive cctv.
But the officers didn't let the deal with security -head slide that easily.
The thing that bothered was 'how come did they not notice one of the cameras facing the wrong side?!'
William looked like a psychic wolf once he discovered about the loophole in his security system.
They don't know how he dealt with his security-head later, but it seemed as if he'd chop his head off ,once they left the headquarters.
The next person to enter Nathaniel's room after Beth was none other than William.
He accepted that himself let alone the staircase surveillance's proof stated the same.
But when asked about the bottle, he looked perplexed.
"The bottle Mr Wrethmeir, the scotch whiskey that he was drinking. "
"I dont exactly remember spotting a bottle in the room. The drink was poured before I even reached there." Such a diplomatic answer indeed.
For a businessman he surely had a poor memory. It made Jeongguk question himself when he opined the said man as an observer.
Either he was hiding or he genuinely didn't know.
And when he was speaking about the bottle, he truly looked confused as if was clueless about the whole bottle libretto. Or he simply was a natural, at pretension.
It was now necessary to find the bottle. Or at least some way from where the poison had been obtained.
And to a great relief or a greater headache, the report associated with Nathaniel's recent business and purchases clearly listed the order of Strychnine import from Khader Enterprises-offering powdered strychnine directly from Mumbai, India.
The export from India was legal, but it definitely needed some very high international connections and money ofcourse. Nathaniel had them both, in excess.
The relief in this was, poison was ordered. And that too, was delivered in the mansion itself.
The headache was, the purchase was dealt under Nathaniel's name.
This had given advantage to the Mayor ofcourse, as his suggestion of claiming the case as a suicide gained weight.
But they still convinced the higher authorities to carry out the investigation due to lack of fair evidences.
The whole evening was spent interrogating all the suspects and Wrethmeirs ofcourse.
Only to have short listed them, including the Wrethmeirs along with Harris who usually spent his days with Nathan in his offices.
Harris, he surely was not good at hiding his mental state.
He sweated like a grilled chicken during the investigation. He was nervous. More than what he showed.
The way he defended William's bond with his father contrapostive to what others ever told about them didn't do him any good either.
Even Janice accepted that William and Nathan never got along.
Indeed he, as a secretary was closer to Nathan but any doubt couldn't be risked taken lightly.
The only person who seemed adrift, to him, from the entire fiasco was Janice.
Jeongguk just couldn't digest the fact that she would even participate in such foul-up.
But again, he couldn't let any thing about even her, slide.
He kept reminding himself again and again,
"It's in the past. She's not his. She's not the Janice he knew."
Or at least that's what he told himself even if every muscle in his body trembled just to have her in his arms again.
Not for a moment or a day.
But forever.
When she had ingressed the interrogation chamber, he debated whether to grab her by her jet black hair which irked him, or to kiss away that void in her eyes.
But he settled down with the questions, as any sane man would .
But was he sane?
"Why were you not present in the party that Nathan threw the day before his death?" Jeffery asked.
"I had an appointment with my doctor."
She indeed had. A monthly checkup that she and her son Jaden never misses. When Jeongguk went through her appointment file, of that day, which had readings of her last two appointments as well, he noticed the ample amounts of painkillers and massage gels she had recently been prescribed to.
When he asked her about them, he saw her eyes flicker ruefully, but that disappeared as quick as a blink of an eye, that he wondered if it was even there to begin with.
"I had an accident five years ago, which left me with a rod in my left hand. It troubles at times. The painkillers help in case."
To say he was shaken would be an understatement.
He could feel something in him, that was left of his shattered soul, break.
She looked away as soon as she had said that.
Something even worse than injuries was associated with that incident, that he was sure of.
Though he was with her only for a year, but it was not about the number of meetings or the amount of time that you spend with a person, it was about how intense your feelings were for each other, how strong the bond was.
And for his part, he could say, it was intense. He knew her that much, to tell that she didn't like the subject being agitated.
With few more questions such as her bond with Nathan and her business associations, they let her leave. It was already a hectic day, and so far they had no strong evidence.
She was a psychology major. Did her bachelor's and PG after having child. And was now working as a Guest Professor at School of Psychology, Birmingham University.
Apart from that she even managed a few restaurants under the Wrethmeirs. But nothing that she did, made her frequent visits either William or Nathan.
For William's part, he was either abroad or in office, as the staff said. But recently, he'd been at the mansion itself.
"It seems like this family is withered." Jeffery stated, once they were alone in the room.
Jeongguk passed him a questioning look.
"The Wrethmeirs, though they live in the same house, nothing strikes as a family in them. It seems all business."
He was right. Jeongguk had noticed that the moment he set his foot inside the mansion.
It screamed of prosperity and pride indeed, but the element that makes a house a -Home, was absent.
With a nod Jeongguk excused himself, and once he was out in private, he dialled a number.
"I have a favour to ask." He spoke once the other line went live.
"I need you to dig out everything possible, about Janice Wrethmeir.
She got into an accident five years ago, that to be specific about. Travis Parker, Orthopedic surgeon, he's the doctor she's been referring to." He spoke remembering the exact words that were mentioned in her appointment file.
°-°-°-°
《Back to the present》
Getting out of the computer room, Jeongguk heaved out a sigh. Jeffery had left to grab a coffee,
William was standing in the lobby, his phone on his ear. He looked frustrated.
This made him wonder about the recent call records he had received earlier. It was Nathaniel's log book, all the last phone calls were either to his secretary, or some business associates.
But the surprising part was not even one phone call was with William. They didn't talk. To say they had better bonding than what they showed seemed a blatant lie.
"Sir, here are the details about Bob." Mason said, handing Jeongguk a file, that had the details about the said person.
Under the name, Bob Levensque, there had been frequent phone calls and fund transactions every month, by Nathan. He was not in the business records, neither was any other relative known about the said guy, but when they had asked Harris about him,
he stuttered.
Harris was hiding something that was for sure.
What? That he will find out soon.
As he took in the information mentioned in the file, a slight relief crossed his features.
With glint in his eyes he rose his head up, only to lock his gaze with that of William's.
He smirked as he spoke to Mason,
"Seems like Jeffery can make some good flukes regarding the businessman's affairs."
"Infamous affairs." He added with a sigh of relief.
~☆~
What do you think,
could be the infamous affair about?
I hope I didn't confuse you 😅
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Already 36 chapters!!! The drama is yet to occur though ;)
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