Total pages in book: 117
Estimated words: 108342 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 542(@200wpm)___ 433(@250wpm)___ 361(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 108342 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 542(@200wpm)___ 433(@250wpm)___ 361(@300wpm)
“Oh, God. That came out all wrong!” She giggled. “I meant nothing on the canvas… and the water made me… hell, just forget it. I’m making it worse.”
He shook his brush in her direction, and she felt her cheeks heat up.
“See? I could have said something about that, but I’m just gonna let it go.”
Warm all over, she started laughing all over again, then resumed painting again to the tune of ‘Shape of You,’ by Ed Sheeran.
“Nikolai?”
“Yup.”
“The night Clark Johnson disappeared, the police questioned you about that evening. Your activities and whereabouts. You stated you were at work, and the police did in fact find footage showing what appeared to be you entering your shop.”
“Mmm hmmm.”
“Is there a back door to that building?”
“Yes. You already know there is, or you wouldn’t be asking me.”
“True… but I wanted to confirm. So, it’s still possible that you could have left.”
“It’s also possible that I have three big toes on my left foot and a dog named Nutsack. What’s your point?”
“Yes, it is, Mr. Comedian, but things like that can be verified, too. Nice attempt to sidetrack the conversation. Anyway, the point is that you could have exited out of a different door to go to the beach that night. Then you could have returned to your shop after the murder, re-entering through the back door.”
“Problem with your theory is that I left out the front door to go home, too.”
“There’s no footage to prove that.”
“It got corrupted. Not my fault. Wasn’t even my street camera. But my phone was already—”
“…on. Looked at and on the date and time in question, it was traced to the shop.”
“Right.”
“But there are similar crimes, too, and from my understanding, you didn’t have alibis for all of those.”
“I wasn’t at that beach then, or now.”
“Why do you think four of the people the police spoke to stated that you were there at the beach that night, Nikolai?”
“Jesus, I don’t know. I can’t answer that.” His voice rose ever so slightly, and his complexion deepened. He kept painting, looking straight ahead, but it was more than apparent that something she was saying, or perhaps the way she was saying it, was getting under his skin. Guilty people didn’t keep consistency in their stories. Nikolai’s story never changed. It didn’t matter whom he was speaking with, even after all of the months that had passed, he was consistent. “Maybe one person thought they saw me, and the others just agreed. The witnesses were also intoxicated.”
“Are you attempting to discredit them?” Hammer. Hammer. Hammer. See if he continues to stay consistent…
“They discredited themselves when they told the police I was down there, alone and actin’ suspiciously. The police are also assholes in this situation. As soon as my name was tossed into the ring, the cops ran with it. It happened all because of a bunch of drunk people pointing their finger at me, and now, because they have no other suspects, they won’t turn me loose.” When he faced her, fire sparked from his eyes. “I. didn’t. do. it.”
“Could it be that—”
“I offered those bastards my phone.” He slammed his paintbrush on the table and his face flashed with indignation. “Turned it right over. I told ’em to look at the video tapes of all the shops and businesses near the beach, everywhere. I told ’em to show me where I was on that beach, near that beach… hell, show me where I was even ten miles away from that beach. They couldn’t. They wanted to search my house—I said absolutely not unless they had a warrant. They dropped it.
“That’s a matter of principle—no invasion of my privacy—but everything else I gave them access to. I told them. They said that sounded suspicious, me saying that, not wantin’ them in my house. Destroying my shit. I said it sounded like they were grasping at straws. I offered to take a lie detector test, so they hooked me up to that funny machine. They said it came back inconclusive. I think I passed, and they lied. I offered to take it again, but they never called me to do so. They lied and tried to say I was some place I wasn’t. Told me they spoke to people who know me, who claimed I’m just the type to do something like that. More lies. Nobody was interviewed specifically about me, and if they were, they sure as hell didn’t say that. They wanted to frame me so bad, so they could put this case away and pretend they caught the ‘bad guy.’” He put his fingers up in the universal sign for quotes.
“They didn’t catch shit,” he continued. “The police couldn’t even catch a fuckin’ cold if they tried.” He snatched his paintbrush from the table then and carried on.
She sat there, mulling over his words. He’d rattled down—verbatim—the list of all that had transpired as if it were written on paper for him to read aloud. She’d watched his police interview half a dozen times, carefully studying it. His body language and tone. What he said and didn’t say. He pretty much kept his composure until he began to grow tired—repeating himself, over and over again as the hours passed in that little room. She also noticed he’d refused their offer of coffee, snacks, and other beverages. Was he avoiding leaving his DNA?