Chapter 7 - The Interrogation
I stood behind the two-way mirror in the downtown precinct, watching Marcus squirm in the metal chair in Interrogation Room A. He was handcuffed to the table, looking pathetic, broken, and terrified.
Detective Ramirez, a friend of mine from a joint task force, stood beside me. "We have them dead to rights, Jess. Serena flipped on him in five minutes. She told us everything—how he ignored the kid, how he let Serena hit her, how he stole the money to buy her silence."
"I want to talk to him," I said.
Ramirez nodded and opened the door.
When I walked in, Marcus flinched as if I had struck him. I didn't wear a suit. I wore my tactical jacket, my badge clipped to my belt. I pulled out the metal chair across from him and sat down, staring at him in silence for a long time.
"Jess... Jessica, please," Marcus sobbed. Actual tears were streaming down his face. "I'm so sorry. Serena manipulated me. She controlled me. I love you. I love Chloe."
"Do not say her name," I whispered. My voice was so quiet it made him freeze. "If you ever say my daughter's name again, I will forget that I wear a badge."
I leaned forward. "You thought I was a paper-pusher. I spent the last eight weeks dismantling an international cartel. I have hunted people who would skin you alive for spare change. And you thought you could hurt my child and get away with it?"
"I didn't hurt her!" he pleaded. "Serena did!"
"You let it happen," I said coldly. "You locked her in a closet, Marcus. You let a monster step on her hands. You stole her college fund to buy a whore a Mercedes."
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I stood up, pushing the chair back. "You are looking at ten years for the fraud, and another five for the endangerment. I will make sure the prosecutors go for the maximum. You will rot in a cell, Marcus. And every day you are in there, I want you to remember that you threw away an empire for a woman who sold you out in five minutes."
I turned and walked out of the room, leaving him sobbing into the metal table.
