Brian laid in the bed watching the clock, he was wondering how to present this to his mother “Are you going to tell Dad?” he asked finally.
“What” she asked back.
“If I tell you, are you going to tell Dad” he repeated.
“Well,” she shut her lips fast thinking “How important is it too you that he doesn’t know?”
“I just. I know what he’ll say, and after everything that’s happened I just. I, just promise me you won’t tell him.” His swollen eyes stared back at his mother pleading for her sympathy and understanding.
“Alright, I promise” Jackie gave in slowly nodding, it would be hard to keep something like this from her husband, but she would have to.
“Almost more than a year ago I met this women, she was just a friend, helping me out with some things I was working on. She sings really well, and.”
“Brian” Jackie said irritated a little, she was already getting a hold of what her son was telling her, she might as well just say it.
“A week before the wedding, I, we, I was drunk because Leighanne and I got in that fight. I had no clue she was, you know,” he looked sheepishly at his mother “ovulating.”
“Oh for Pete’s sake” Jackie started to cry as she looked away “Brian how could you have even thought about sleeping with her.”
“Mom, just listen” he plead. “After she found out a few weeks later she told me that she would just keep the baby and that we would just not speak of it. At first she wanted an abortion, but I couldn’t do that, so I convinced her not too.”
“So she has the child” Jackie finished.
“No, she died in childbirth, she was supposed to put that the father was unknown, but for some reason she put my name down. So then I had to go and pick up the baby.
“Brian, I can’t lie to your father about this!” she stood up quickly pacing the room biting her nail in her teeth.
“Mom, please” Brian begged “I needed someone to tell about this.”
“Did Leighanne know?” Jackie asked folding her arms.
Brian looked at her distraught face and whispered “no.”
“Did Leighanne Know” She asked more forcefully.
“No, she didn’t know a thing about it.”
“Oh thank you God” Jackie’s eyes rolled to the ceiling as she tried to stop more tears.
“Mom, don’t tell Dad please.” He said again, she shot a glare towards him.
“I’m not going to tell him, you are. Goodnight” she walked over touching the metal railing again before she stormed out the room.
Brian sighed looking around the room, he was stuck here. None of the boys had come to see him yet, no one had but his parents, not even Leighanne’s parents. Nor any of his family “Where was everyone?” he asked himself as he sat alone in the pale room.
“Evening Mr. Littrell” a nurse walked in “I’m just here to give you some medication; it looks like you’ve had a rough first day here.”
“Yeah” Brian tried to swallow, it hurt.
…………..
“Sir, do you have an alibi?” Detective Campbell asked as he sat across from Harold in the small suit he and Jackie were staying in.
“My wife” Harold responded looking at the pictures of the crime scene “What makes you think I have anything to do with this?” he asked cringing at the grotesque images.
“Anyone else see you that night?” the officer asked.
“Detective, I understand you’re trying to do your job, but I was in Lexington, Kentucky at home asleep in my house, in my room, in my bed. I don’t think planes go fast enough to try and get me here to Alpharetta to be an accomplice in this crime.”
“You son, did he call you that night?” Detective Taylor asked.
“No” Harold answered “Again, I was asleep.”
“Did Leighanne call you much?” the other detective asked wryly.
“No, she would call Jackie, and I would talk with her some times.” Harold answered.
“Did she ever sound stressed or upset?” the detectives asked.
Harold turned his head to the window looking out as he chuckled to himself “Are you serious? My son had a knife stuck in his heart, and you two said you found it with his wife. Shouldn’t you be assuming that she’s the one that killed him?” he rolled his eyes irritated.
“That’s what we’re trying to find out, who is guilty.” The detective said calmly “Well thank you for you time, I’m sure we’ll be speaking with you again” Detective Campbell stood up showing his partner to the door.
……
“So wha’d’ya think” Detective Campbell asked as the shut the door.
“Well, I think either the Dad is really anxious about covering for his son, or the child or he doesn’t know?” Detective Taylor looked up before she walked to the elevator. As they reached it the door slid open and Jackie walked out holding her hand close to her head as she walked past them briskly towards the hotel room. She slipped in the card key and opened the large metal handle. She walked inside and shut the door behind her.
“We’ll have to presume he didn’t know” Detective Campbell pointed out, he hasn’t given is any reason to believe he does, at least to believe he is lying. “
The two detectives made their way to their car, before Detective Taylor responded.
“I think we should go back to square one, let’s go back to the scene” she suggested placidly.
Twenty minutes later Detective Campbell shut his door behind him and walked alongside his partner to the crest of the road. Yellow police tape surrounded the area steering curious onlookers away. Campbell picked his way down first mild slope to the tree only a few yards away, the incline of the terrain seemed miniscule until you saw the rocks that jutted out were merely to disguise. Campbell shined his flashlight around the base of the tree as he kneeled peering over the roots while Detective Taylor watched.
“I feel like this place is a graveyard, it has that eerie feeling” she mused in a sad voice “Neither of the people had any level of alcohol, and they still managed to run off the road.”
“I think there was a fight” Detective Campbell felt along the trunk of the tree shining his flashlight as he went “It’s too bad that this kid can’t even tell us his side of the story. I bet he gets a shrink to testify his incapable of testifying to whatever he does know?”
“We don’t know that until he see’s the women, and by how he was acting today, he looks a lot better than he did yesterday. He must’ve been a quick healer” Detective Taylor thought for a moment “Didn’t you say he was afraid of surgeries and stuff, and she threatened to leave him?”
“Yeah” The detective turned to his partner away from the tree trunk “So?”
“Maybe she was leaving him because he had that child. Lot’s of people act irrationally, especially if it’s someone cheating on another person. Brian could have stashed the kid at his parent’s house, because he didn’t want his wife finding out, but then he realized he wanted the first girl more so he murdered his wife, and staged his own near death fiasco.”
“He purposely fell out of that tree, and stabbed himself in the heart?”
“Near the heart. And, quinsidently without hitting anything that would kill himself.” The detective started counting off the information she had “He didn’t want her to leave him again, so he killed her. Then after she died, he realized what he had done, and he tried to kill himself.”
“Stupidly, that sound’s reasonable.” The detective mused looking back at the tree. “I think we’ll learn more from these “band-mates” than anyone else. Let’s get them to tell us something.”
Author's Chapter Notes:
Another chapter's up
Give me your thoughts :)
Give me your thoughts :)
