~~
Trinity
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After Talia left the room, we inspected the body of the dead girl. There was nothing new, aside from the sexual assault that she had endured before she was killed. That had literally been the only difference with this case. Well, that and the fact that she seemed to be a random person that the killer found on the beach.
When we were done with the examination, Talia was still in the office with the girl's soul. I didn't know what was taking her so long, so I decided to call the witnesses in for an interview. The first witness was the girl's brother. He needed to identify her body and tell us what he knew. I didn't know what it was that he would know, but there was something apparently. Though he wasn't present at the scene of the murder.
“Hello Nick, my name is Trinity Gray.” I held my hand out to him when he came into the room. He recoiled at first then pushed through the apprehension that he was feeling to take my hand.
“I..it is nice to meet you, Queen Trinity. I wish it would have been under better circumstances.” The boy was half Fae, and that was easy to tell. He and his sister both had true red hair. It wasn't a color that was normal for humans. I knew instantly that he was something more when I saw him.
.....
I also saw that he was heartbroken. He knew that something happened to his sister, and that the body here was indeed hers. He was just here as a formality.
“M..my sister wanted to meet you. Sh..she knew that you weren't our queen, that is Queen Gloriana. However, like all of our people, she revered you. You are our goddess. And that means a lot to us.”
“I wish that I could have met her.” I spoke somberly as I answered him. “And I promise you, we will find this man that did this to your sister. We will not rest until they are all captured.”
“I feel much better knowing that the Goddess Queen is on the case. You are an amazing woman, Queen Trinity, and I know that you will get justice for my sister.” There was heartache and sorrow filling his voice. It was thick with grief and harder to understand than it might normally have been. I could understand what it was that he was going through. I had had grief in my past as well.
“Can you tell me what you remember from last night? What happened?”
“Well, my sister went to meet Ashlynn at the beach. They were going on a date together. Ashlynn asked her out the night before and Andrea didn't want to wait for it. She wanted to go right away. I called her to make sure she got to the location safely. I worry about her, she is my sister after all, I love her.” He started to cry. “She was my sister, and I loved her.”
“She may be gone, Nick, but she will forever be your sister. And you will always love her, even though she is no longer with you.” He looked up at me with red rimmed eyes then. It was almost as if he was trying to say thank you for the words that I had given him.
“You're right, Queen Trinity. She will never stop being my sister. She will just be in my memories and my heart now.” His smile was bittersweet, but I could tell that he was feeling a little better. “A..anyway, I called my sister and we were joking. She was excited and I told her to tell me how the date went after it. I just wanted to know if she had a good time. Not long after I called her, she told me that she thought that Ashlynn was there, she was going to end the call, but she spoke to someone else before she did.”
“What did she say?” I was guiding him so that I could get the information.
“She said something like, 'you're not Ashlynn'. I was instantly worried and started to yell. I called her name and asked what was going on. Then a man with an accent said, 'give me that'. She agreed and after that the call ended. I don't know why my sister went with him or why she gave him her phone, but I know that she wasn't a meek person. She would have fought him. She would not have let him do this to her without a reason.”
“We will get to the bottom of this, Nick. I promise.” I put a hand on the man's shoulder and squeezed it. It was a little hard since he was almost as tall as Reece, but I managed it. “Would you like to see your sister now?”
“I don't want to, but I have to. I need to know for sure. I already know it's her, but I have to see it with my own eyes for me to accept that she really is gone.” I was glad that we only investigated the body and that the autopsy hadn't been completed yet. That would have been harder on this man.
“Come with us. We will take you over there.”
I walked hand in hand with Andrea's brother until we got to where she was in the morgue. Dr. Long, without a word, opened the drawer and pulled the table out. He didn't extend it all the way, just enough for Nick to see the girl's face and know for sure that this was his sister. After it was partially extended, Dr. Long took the sheet and lowered it so that we could all see the pale face and red hair.
“Andrea!” Instantly, Nick started to lose his composure. “Oh my Goddess, Andrea. Why? Why did it have to be you? Why? Andrea?” He was sobbing now, on the verge of collapsing to the ground. I was holding him up just fine, his weight nothing for me, but Reece and Vincent came over to help relieve me of my burden.
“Come on, son, let's go sit down.” Reece soothed him as he took his right arm.
“Come on, over here Nick. We'll get you settled on the bench. Come on.” Vincent spoke calmly as he took Nick's left arm.
“Why? Why did he take my sister? Why?” Nick was sobbing almost uncontrollably. His words were hard to understand as he screamed through his heartache. “Why my sister?”
Reece and Vincent got the man seated on the bench and together we worked on calming him down. For the most part though, we just needed to let him cry it out. He was still young, and he had just saw his murdered sister, that wasn't easy on anyone. Even my dad was still like that when he thought about his sister's death, and it had been almost forty years. He didn't sob like this, but he would cry at random times when he is reminded of her in some way.
Once Nick was settled down, I had Jackson walk him back out of the morgue and see that he was OK before he left. I also gave Nick my business card and told him to call me if he remembered something else or if he needed me for any reason at all. I didn't want his emotions to become overwhelming. In fact, I was thinking of sending Juniper on a mission to visit some people that have lost their loved ones. She would be able to alleviate some of their pain.
When Jackson came back from escorting Nick, he said that the man was still very distraught, so he was having a uniformed officer, a Merman, drive him home. No one wanted him to come to any harm while on his way. The uniformed officer was going to drive the man's car and then ride back to the station with his partner. I thought that this was a great idea and thanked Jackson for being so considerate of the young man.
“I think that young man is going to need someone to watch after him.” I spoke out loud, but not to anyone in particular.
“I will make sure that he is taken care of.” Doc responded as he looked at the door the man had left through several minutes earlier. “It is my job after all.” I could tell that at times like this, he hated his job. At least this particular part of the job. He seemed to have a lot of hats to wear, just like Reece and I did. There were a lot of responsibilities for people that led others.
“Thank you, Doc.” I turned to smile at him, I was also nodding my head as if I was agreeing with him. “I can tell that you care a lot about your people. I know that it can be difficult to handle things like this, but in times of hardship like this, it is when you are needed the most. They will be relying on you. And your response to this situation will determine how they see you in the future.”
“Well, I guess the pressure is on.” Doc smiled but he didn't laugh. I didn't think that he could bring himself to laugh at the moment. It would have been too difficult with the lingering emotions in the room. “You don't have to worry though, Queen Trinity. I will take care of my people. I will be there for them, and I will make sure that they know they have someone to turn to in this dire time.”
“Do me a favor as well, Doc.” I gave him a serious look, feeling the weight of the situation bearing down on me.
“What's that, Queen Trinity?” He looked curious, but also worried.
“Tell them what happened. What really happened. Tell them that there is a group of killers out there. And tell them to be careful. I don't want to see more people getting hurt because their leaders remained silent. Tell everyone that you can. I will be sending out a notice to all leaders again, but the last time they were ignored. People don't know what is happening in the world. They need to be prepared. They need to be safe. And they can't do that if they don't know what is going on.”
“I understand, Queen Trinity. I will tell them. I will make sure that the word is spread to as many people in the world as I can. I will tell them that no nonhuman is safe. They need to take precautions. They need to protect themselves.” Doc was completely serious now. That was good. I didn't want more senseless murders to happen because the leaders of the various packs and clans didn't tell their citizens like I had told them to. I didn't want to see more of my people lying on these metal slabs with their hearts ripped from their chests. I didn't want any of that.
