Authors: Andrew Hess
“With me,” a smooth calm voice said from behind Rodney. We turned and saw Detective Thornton strutting towards us with his navy blue suit jacket draped over his shoulder. “I hear we’re going to be spending some quality time together Detective.”
“I’m only going so I can question Ms. Fuller. You can have your turn when I’m done.
“Okay, we’ll play it your way.” The sly smile reappeared on his face. He was enjoying every minute of this. “Hop in Detective; I’m driving.”
The top slowly retracted from Detective Thornton’s silver Audi. His devilish grin soaked in my look of surprise as the car lurched forward. We pulled out onto the road and took off. The wind whipped my hair back as Thornton pressed harder on the gas pedal. I couldn’t contain my excitement. I loved to speed. I loved going fast. I just wish I was the one driving.
We pulled into the D.C.P.D. parking lot and zipped around to the back. My hair was a curly nightmare. Strands were standing up on end, hair was plastered to my face, and was now a frizzy mess due to the wind and the heat of a hot summer day. I flipped down the visor and checked the mirror. There was no way I could go into an interrogation room or even the station looking like that. My fingers worked swiftly, tucking strands behind my ears and pulled it into a ponytail.
“You okay,” Thornton asked.
I sighed heavily which was mixed with happiness and relief. “Never better,” I replied. I jumped out of the car and followed him into the station.
He held the door open for me.
How chivalrous?
That was a bit of a shocker. Officers stood and stared as I walked into their domain. I was a trespasser. They didn’t like that I was there and the feeling was mutual.
“Right this way Detective,” Thornton said as his hand pressed the small of my back. I walked faster to get away from him, but he quickened his pace to keep up. “This was way,” he continued. This time he grabbed my wrist and pulled me closer to him.
I ripped my arm away from him and shoved him against the wall with my elbow tucked under his chin. “Keep your hands to yourself,” I admonished. Yeah that’s right; I put him in his place. Someone needed to.
“Take it easy Detective Ryan,” a voice said from down the hall. I couldn’t see who was there, but I stepped away from Thornton anyway. “He’s harmless.” The man continued walking towards us. He was tall, but just shy of reaching Rodney’s height. A big bushy blondish gray mustache hung over his lips.
Who the hell was this guy? Was he a lawyer, a co-worker or…The man stood next to me, allowing me to get a better look at him. Shit, this was Detective Thornton’s boss, his superior. This had to be Lieutenant Michael Guinn.
The towering man barely glanced at me and then stared back at Detective Thornton. “You’re late. The woman and her lawyer have been here for almost an hour waiting.”
“Sorry sir. The briefing ran a little longer than expected.” He looked to me to confirm his story. I don’t know why, but I nodded in agreement.
“Fine, just get in there and get that woman to spill her guts about Ambrose. I want to know everything she knows about him and about that night.”
There was something about Lieutenant Guinn that made him appear more intimidating than any altercation I endured with my Lieutenant. Yes he was taller and that did impose an intimidating factor. But there was something about his voice. He didn’t shout or holler at us. He didn’t curse or slam anything to illustrate his point. There was nothing more than a controlled anger built into his voice that sent goose bumps all over my body.
We followed Lieutenant Guinn to the interrogation room. It was a little bigger than ours, but otherwise looked the same. We peered through the one-way mirror and saw what was casually referred to as a blond bombshell sitting there in tight black dress pants and a white tank top. She looked like they dragged her from her house while she was in the middle of getting ready for work. Next to her sat a man dressed in a crème colored suit with an olive green tie. His white hair, beard and glasses gave me the impression he was well into his sixties.
“I’ll take the first crack at her,” I said.
A firm grip wrapped around my wrist preventing me from moving towards the door. “No, this is a partnership.” Lieutenant Guinn released my hand and stared a hole through me with his muddy eyes. “You either both go in and work together, or you can watch from here while Detective Thornton questions her.”
My face was turning red hot. Thornton and I had made a deal. Now his Lieutenant broke that agreement and was forcing me to work with him or I would be forced to watch from the sidelines.
“Fine,” I growled.
Thornton opened the door. Again he allowed me to enter first. That angered me even more. He was being nice to me and all I wanted to do was slam the door open or closed. It would at least allow me to get some frustration out and maybe scare the witness into cooperating.
I tried to wipe the pissed off look from my face as Ms. Fuller and her attorney turned their heads towards me. “Good morning,” I said cheerfully. “My name is Detective Ryan and this is Detective Thornton. We’d like to ask you a few questions.”
Wendy turned to her attorney. Her eyes pleaded with him to get her out of there as fast as she could. “What seems to be the meaning of this,” the man asked.
“And you would be,” Detective Thornton asked.
“Wendy’s lawyer.” He removed a card from a metal card sleeve and produced two cards. He handed them to us. The name David Thomas Lynch was in bold lettering. “Now, would someone please explain to me why my client is here and has been waiting for more than an hour?”
I took a seat across from them. I could tell Wendy’s lawyer wasn’t the kind of guy to beat around the bush and I was in no mood to play any games either. “Does the name Blake Ambrose ring a bell?”
Wendy’s eyes opened wide with surprise. She stared at me as she leaned in and whispered something to her lawyer. “My client is enacting her right to attorney client privilege.”
“I thought you were her attorney,” I smiled.
“Mr. Ambrose was my lawyer,” Wendy replied. “My father hired Mr. Lynch recently.”
“Why were either men hired,” I asked.
“Again that is attorney client privilege,” Mr. Lynch said, this time with a bit more anger in his voice.
“Okay, you don’t want to talk to us about how you know Mr. Ambrose. Then maybe you can tell us why we have you on camera at Whiskey J’s?”
Wendy straightened herself up in the chair. “Mr. Ambrose invited me there to go over a few things. I was there strictly as his client.”
Detective Thornton strutted over to the table and rested his hand on my shoulder. “We’re not going to get anywhere like this. Do you mind if I try something,” he whispered. His cool minty fresh breath smelled like he had just popped a Tic-tac in his mouth.
I was rattled and off my game. It had been too long since I interviewed a potential suspect and to top it off she had “I’m hiding something big” tattooed across her face. Whatever she was hiding, she was concealing the truth behind the thick curtain of B.S. that was the attorney client privilege.
“Sure, be my guest,” I said through gritted teeth.
Thornton took a seat on the corner of the desk. He stared longingly into Wendy’s hazel eyes. His hand inched towards her without anyone noticing. “We don’t care about what you and Mr. Ambrose talked about. We’re more concerned with what happened the other night when you two were at Whiskey J’s.”
Wendy was hooked. She was melting with every word Detective Thornton said. “We-we were just having a few drinks.”
“How much did you two drink?” Thornton’s words were soothing and comforting. I was even getting lost in the sound of his voice.
“I-I don’t know. We had a few shots, a few beers. He just kept ordering them like they were free or something.”
“So what time did you leave together?’
Wendy seemed to snap out of her little daze. She leaned back in her chair. “I didn’t go anywhere with him.” That was the reaction I was hoping to get from her during my interrogation. “He got a little too weird for me and I bailed on my own.”
“How’d you get home,” I interrupted.
Wendy craned her neck to get a look at me. “I called a cab. You can look at my phone, talk to the cab company, do whatever. I don’t care.”
“Thank you, I will.” I reached for the phone. Mr. Lynch gave a disapproving glare at both Wendy and then at me.
She mouthed to him “I’m not going down for his death.” He nodded and allowed her to give me her cell. I scrolled to the night in question and took down all the numbers from her call log for that day.
“You said he got weird,” Thornton said calmly, bringing Wendy’s attention back to him. “What do you mean by; he got weird?”
“After a few drinks, he started getting handsy. He kept telling me how hot I looked and how he was so happy we were out together.”
“How many drinks in was that,” I asked.
“I don’t know I didn’t keep count.”
I knew Ambrose had been drugged and believed it may have happened early in the night. “How long did it take for him to get weird after the first round of drinks?”
“Fifteen-twenty minutes, maybe a half hour.”
That all but confirmed my theory. A trip to visit Dr. Woo should give me the full confirmation I needed. “Did you talk to anyone else at the bar?” I knew she came in contact with our mystery woman. I just needed to know if Wendy knew her.
“Some crazy drunk woman started talking to me about my purse. She wouldn’t shut the hell up about it.”
“Did you know the woman?”
“No, she just randomly popped up and pushed her way between Mr. Ambrose and me.” She kept calling him by his last name which was a clear indication that their relationship was purely professional, at least in her mind.
“Ms. Fuller, would you recognize this woman if you saw her again,” Detective Thornton asked drawing Wendy in again.
“I- I don’t know, maybe. It was dark in there and I didn’t get a good look at her.” That was one of the problems we had as well.
Thornton looked to me. His eyebrows raised as if asking me was there anything more I’d like to add. There wasn’t, not without prying open Wendy’s tightly lipped secrets which she was holding onto desperately.
“Ms. Fuller, you’re free to go,” Thornton said sternly. His nice sweet seductive voice was now gone and he was heading for the door.
“Do I have to?”
“By all means, you can stay here as long as you want,” he replied letting the soothing voice return momentarily. “Provided you tell us more about your professional relationship with Mr. Ambrose.”
Wendy struggled to keep it locked up tightly. She turned to Mr. Lynch and whispered something in his ear. She looked back at us and smiled. “I’ll tell you anything you want as long as it’s just you and me.” She pointed her finger at Detective Thornton and then to herself as if she was pairing the two in some twisted fantasy.
Thornton bent down and whispered in my ear. “I think I can handle it from here. You can wait outside and watch.”
I could not stand that man. Not only was he telling me to wait outside, but he convinced the witness/suspect to throw me and her lawyer out of the room. I wanted to stay there in defiance, but thought better of it. We needed to know whatever Wendy Fuller was hiding. Maybe it would be enough to get the warrants to search Blake Ambrose’s house and office.
I spent two more hours standing in front of a one way mirror listening to Wendy Fuller spill her guts to Detective Thornton. She ignored her attorney’s pleas with her to let him stay so he could assist her. Ms. Fuller didn’t seem to care. Her eyes were solely focused on Detective Thornton. He resumed his position on the corner of the desk. Wendy’s eyes glazed over in a dream-like state. Lust filled her eyes. Detective Thornton seemed to be having a good time using his charm to toy with the woman. Meanwhile, I sat on a hard wooden chair sipping cold sludge which apparently passed for coffee in this station. I was tempted to call a cab and have the driver take me home, but decided to stay in case Wendy gave up some credible information.
Detective Thornton exited the interrogation room with a wolfish grin. He was more than satisfied with the results of his interrogation, but he wanted more. His eyes looked hungrily at me as he approached. “Come on; I’ll take you back to the station.” I was about to say no, but Lieutenant Esposito’s voice kept replaying the words,
play nice Ali
over again in my head.
I reluctantly followed Thornton out of the station catching glares from the other officers that were silently telling me to get the hell out of there. I was glad to leave. I had plans to pay Dr. Woo a visit, but that wasn’t looking like it was going to happen today.
We jumped in the Audi and drove off. I waited for the top to come down, for Thornton to rev the engine and catapult us down the road at a speed that made us feel like we would break the sound barrier. But none of that happened.
“What’s the matter,” Thornton asked.
“Nothing,” I lied. “I’m just looking forward to getting back to my station and filling them in on what we learned from Ms. Fuller.”
Thornton pulled up to the red light. He adjusted himself in his seat to stare at me. “Look, I get it. For some reason you don’t like me. You don’t like that you have to share this case with the D.C.P.D.”