“You’re not letting him go, are you?” Dirkson hissed.
“I didn’t say I was letting him go. But I want to question him without having him wince in pain every five seconds.” She quickly grabbed Dirkson’s beefy arms and drew them behind his back, clasping his wrists together with her small hands.
“Can you imagine holding this position for five minutes, Officer?” she spat, leaning in toward his ear. “What about ninety minutes?” She shoved his arms forward. “Uncuff him now.”
Feeling the glares of both detectives, Dirkson reluctantly walked over to the sofa. “On your feet, Madsen.”
Embarrassed to feel his nose running despite copious sniffing, Grant kept his head down as he rose.
The officer released his wrists, and Grant exhaled gratefully. Through shooting prickles of pain, he covered his face with his tingling hands and tried to wipe away the evidence of his crying.
“Sit,” Dirkson barked, then left Grant alone in his misery.
“Thank you, Officer.” Marilyn nodded, then returned to the futon, scooping up a box of tissues along the way and placing them next to Grant.
“So, after Sophie accused Carlo of killing Logan, then what happened?”
Still looking down, Grant smiled sadly. “I hated him so much for what he did to Lo, and I stupidly moved toward him. I—”
“Mr. Madsen, I want you to look at me as you answer my questions.”
He snapped his head up, showing her his startled glassy eyes, and he nodded, “Yes, ma’am.” With difficulty, he kept his eyes trained on her. “I—I moved toward Carlo, and that’s when he …” She watched his hands twist nervously in his lap. “He shot Sophie. It was all my fault—I provoked him.”
“Go on.”
“Then he, uh, he had the gun to my head, and he forced me to my knees. And Kirsten begged him to let us call an ambulance, but he wouldn’t listen. He just let Sophie keep bleeding.” Grant’s jaw clenched and his hands tightened into fists.
“And then Sophie’s cell phone started ringing. It annoyed the hell out of Carlo, and Kirsten kept saying she would go turn off the phone, but Carlo told her not to move. At one point, Kirsten and I looked at each other, and we just knew we had to do something or Sophie would die—we would all die. So, when Kirsten went for the phone, I went for Carlo. We—we wrestled for the gun, and we were on the floor, rolling around, when I forced the gun between us, between our chests, and I, um …” His eyes remained glued on her but he seemed far away, in the recesses of his mind. “I pulled the trigger.” He swallowed hard. “I killed him.”
Marilyn stared at Grant for several moments, watching the kaleidoscope of guilt, fear, remorse, and relief spin and swirl in his eyes. Jerry Stone had relayed Sophie’s message to Marilyn, and it certainly did sound like a self-defense situation. But the fact that Grant was on parole for aggravated robbery and was a recent suspect for murder meant she could not let him go. She also hadn’t interviewed Sophie or Kirsten yet, to corroborate Grant’s story. If Sophie was still alive.
“Do you have anything else to tell me about what happened tonight?” she asked Grant, her face perfectly neutral.
Grant thought for a moment. “No, ma’am.”
“Stay put, Mr. Madsen.”
He nodded and continued kneading the tingling out of his hands. He knew he’d be back in the cuffs soon enough.
Grant watched Marilyn join Bruce, who was listening to the officers recreate the scene as they found it. They pointed to the spot where they’d found the gun on the floor.
The sound of a body bag being zipped up diverted Grant’s attention to the techs, and he stared at the crimson stain left on the carpet once they hauled the body away. He wondered if Kirsten would ever be able to remove that evidence of the trauma that had occurred in her apartment tonight. Even if she could, she was probably emotionally scarred for life, and it was totally his fault.
Suddenly Detective Fox stood before him, flanked by Detective Hammond and both police officers. “Mr. Madsen, I’m afraid we have to arrest you now.”
He nodded. “Yes, ma’am.” He’d expected this outcome.
“Please stand up and place your hands on this wall.”
“We already frisked him, Detective,” Dirkson said.
“Just being thorough, Officer,” she said. Detective Hammond frisked Grant quickly.
Grant’s stomach dropped with the sick realization that he was returning to prison.
“Let’s go,” Hammond commanded, taking hold of his arm as Detective Fox’s cell phone rang. “Can you hold for a second?” she asked. She spoke into the phone. “Hi, Jerry.”
Grant felt dead tired. But he perked up instantly when he heard Marilyn ask, “How is Ms. Taylor?”
*
In the hospital waiting area, Jerry glanced at Kirsten Holland before resuming his phone conversation with Detective Fox.
“Taylor just got out of surgery to repair the Basilic vein,” Jerry told her, glancing across the small waiting area at Kirsten Holland. “They removed the bullet and gave her a blood transfusion. She’s reportedly stable.”
He exchanged a few more words with the detective before Kirsten heard him say, “Yeah, I’m here with the roommate.” He listened for a moment, and then nodded. “Will do. Keep in touch, Detective.”
After hanging up, Jerry turned his attention to Kirsten. “Detective Fox wants to question you after she books Madsen. You’re not to leave the hospital before she arrives to talk to you.”
Kirsten’s eyes widened and she nodded. The whole situation was so unreal, like being stuck in the middle of some crime movie. But Sophie’s blood had been real, as well as the horrified shouts from Sophie’s father when Kirsten called him to say his daughter had been shot. She was not looking forward to Mr. Taylor’s arrival to the hospital.
“So, Grant was arrested?” Kirsten asked.
“Yep.”
“But he’ll get off, right? I mean, it was total self-defense!”
Jerry sighed. “I don’t know. I don’t have the facts, Ms. Holland.”
“It’s Kirsten, Jerry,” she said warmly.
“And it’s Officer Stone to you,” he corrected gruffly. He watched her blush at his admonishment. “I only let Taylor call me by my first name.”
After a few moments of tense silence, Jerry asked, “How’s the dissertation coming along?”
“Pretty good?” Kirsten said, puzzled. “Did Sophie tell you about that?”
“Yes, she did.”
“She talks about me in her meetings with you?”
“Well, I have to find out who my parolees are living with, if they have roommates—it’s protocol.” He smiled. “She laughed pretty hard when I asked her if you had a criminal record.”
Kirsten blushed again. “I can imagine. Nobody is more law-abiding than me, except for …” She looked embarrassed.