Part 9
The next morning, the hospital room felt like a fortress under guard. Two police officers stood outside Eva’s door, ensuring that no one—especially anyone associated with Marlene—could get near our daughter. Eva was eating a small bowl of gelatin, the color finally returning to her cheeks, though she still flinched whenever she heard a loud noise in the hallway.
Jack and I had barely slept. We sat in the two vinyl armchairs next to her bed, holding hands, bound by a shared sense of survival but fractured by the horror of what we had allowed into our lives.
Around 10:00 a.m., Detective Miller entered the room. Her face didn't carry the usual professional detachment; she looked deeply troubled. She signaled for Jack and me to step out into the hallway.
"What is it, Detective?" I asked, my heart immediately spiked with adrenaline. "Did something happen? Did she get bail?"
"No, she’s being held without bail," Miller said quickly, putting her hands on her hips. "But we have a major problem. Marlene is refusing to speak to anyone except the two of you. Her defense attorney is trying to claim that the evidence found in the vanity was planted, and Marlene is implying that she has a hidden safety deposit box containing the original signed financial documents—documents she claims Jack signed willingly."
"That’s a lie!" Jack snapped, his voice echoing in the sterile hallway. "I never signed anything!"
"We know it’s a lie, Jack," Miller said gently. "But if she has hidden assets or copies of these forged documents somewhere else, she could tie this case up in legal technicalities for years. She wants a face-to-face meeting with you and Elena in the interrogation room. She says she will tell you where the remaining files are, but only if you hear it from her mouth."
I looked at Jack. His face was set in stone. The weak, confused man who had stood in the hallway two nights ago was gone. In his place was a father who had almost lost his only child.
"We'll do it," I said, stepping forward before Jack could answer. "We'll look at her. We'll get the truth."
Two hours later, we were escorted into the basement of the county precinct. The interrogation room was small, cold, and lit by a harsh fluorescent bulb that buzzed incessantly. Marlene sat at the metal table, wearing a bright orange jumpsuit, her hands chained to a bolt in the center of the table. Without her elegant clothes and makeup, she looked older, sharper, like a vulture stripped of its feathers.
Yet, when we walked in, her eyes flashed with that same arrogant, terrifying amusement.
"Well, look at the happy couple," Marlene mocked, the chains rattling as she leaned forward. "Brought back together by a little family drama. How is the little brat? Still crying over a little scratch?"
Jack didn't sit down. He walked right up to the edge of the table, leaning over her, his shadow completely engulfing her small frame.
"You are going to tell us where the rest of the documents are, Marlene," Jack said, his voice dropping into a low, terrifying growl. "And then you are going to spend the rest of your miserable life rotting in a concrete cell. You murdered my father. You tried to murder my daughter. You are a monster."
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Marlene threw her head back and laughed, a dry, rattling sound that made my skin crawl. "Your father was a weak, pathetic old man who would have left me with nothing after years of cleaning up his filth! And you, Jack, you are just like him. Weak. Predictable. You brought me into your house because you felt guilty. You made it so easy."
She turned her venomous gaze to me. "And you, Elena. So proud of your little nursing background. You didn't even notice your daughter fading right under your nose. I put those drops in her milk every single night while you were busy reading your books. You failed her."
