Scene of the Crime

Monacco Mansion - Vista Glenn, Las Vistas

“Make a right at the next street and then it’s the fourth house on the left,” Isabella instructed.  Blake did as he was told keeping one eye on the road and the other on her, giving special attention to her left knee, which hadn’t stopped shaking since they got into the car.  The closer they got to their destination the more it shook and he began to wonder if he should worry about her stomping a hole in the floor.  It finally came to a halt when he stopped his SUV at the front gate of a structure that looked more like a hotel than a house for any one family. She took and audible breath and pressed a few buttons on a small remote control that she’d fished out of her purse and the large iron gates creaked open allowing him to pull through into the concourse.  Before he could turn off the engine, she hopped out and began charging towards the house. 

“Hold on,” he called out of the window as he dug through the glove box.  Reluctantly she paused and watched the bright glow of the flashlight he had procured move with him through the pitch black and up to the doorway where she was standing. “Let’s go,” she said as she punched the security code into the keypad on the door.

“Wait a minute! What do you think you’re doing?”

“I’m going inside.”

“Not before the police get here.  Whoever broke in could still be in there.”

“Did you see any bent bars on the gate?  Any broken windows?  Was the door kicked in? No one is in there.  The alarm system on this house is old and it’s probably just a glitch. I’m going to reset it and tell the police not to bother.”

“No the door wasn’t kicked in, but you’ve got a couple of miles of fence around this place and about a thousand windows.  I think it’s possible we could be missing something.”

“Well you can sweep the perimeter if you want; I’m going inside.”

And with that she pushed the door open and stepped into the darkness beyond. Blake stepped in a moment later, the beam of his flashlight swallowed up by the vastness of the foyer. She felt around on the wall for the light switch but came up empty when she flicked it up and down a few times.  “Lexie must not have turned the power on yet.”

“Or someone cut the power,” Blake said as he walked further into the house, pointing his flashlight into the darkness with one hand, holding her back with the other each time she tried to walk ahead of him.  They checked the living room first, then the dining room and then the kitchen; each of them only containing random pieces of dust covered furniture and stale air. Isabella started toward the great room but Blake pulled her back again.

“Stay behind me!” he commanded in a hushed tone.  “We still don’t know if we’re alone here.”

“Well we could see a lot more if you let me light the candelabra by the fireplace.”

“Fine,” he said, pushing her back behind him.  “Which way is it?”

“To the left.”

He led the way with his flashlight until it cast a glare off of the metal screen of the fireplace. Defying his hold on her arm, Isabella moved ahead of him and began feeling around for the large box of matches that should’ve been on the mantle. A gentle beam of light began to stream through the large wall of windows in the back of the house as the clouds moved away from the moon.  Finally Blake could make out the outline of a sofa, a coffee table, and two chairs. He shined the flashlight toward Isabella, who was fumbling with the box of matches.  Offering his help would only elicit more of her stubborn resistance, so he decided to take a look behind the thick curtains framing the bottom windows; it was the perfect place for an intruder to hide. 

He pointed his light toward his destination and had only taken a few steps when his foot slipped across something wet on the floor. He stopped short to steady himself, pointed the light on his feet and immediately jumped back when his eyes registered the sight.  Before he could say a word, amber candle light filled the room and the entire horrible scene was illuminated.  He rushed back to Isabella, desperate to prevent her from seeing it, but it was too late.

“Oh my GOD!!!”

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Stevens Residence - East Bank St., Downtown Las Vistas

 “I don’t think we should’ve done that,” Pierce said, interrupting her thoughts again. Sloane was trying to identify what the unusual, pulling ache was in her stomach.  Was it guilt?  Is this what real guilt felt like? It couldn’t be since she didn’t necessarily feel bad about what she had done. Strange, maybe, but definitely not bad.  Maybe it was anxiety, the worry that someone would trace it back to her.  Could you go to jail for something like this? Breaking and entering was a crime, of course, but what about the rest of it? She hadn’t thought about the rest of it.  Once the idea popped into her head her movements had been on auto pilot.  It was only after they had left the Monacco compound that she realized this lead weight sensation in her abdomen.

“Sloane, did you hear me?  I think we went too far this time.” The sound of his feet shuffling as he paced the floor, the beer swishing back and forth in the bottle he was drinking out of,  his voice whining incessantly, this damned pit in her stomach:  it was all driving her crazy. There were things she needed to think about and things she didn’t want to think about, all these hundreds of things floating around her head, needing to be sorted out and he just kept talking.  There had to be a way to shut him up.

“Stop!” she commanded, trying to control the edge in her voice.  “I told you we have nothing to worry about.  We’re the last people in the world anyone would suspect. I had to do this, there was no other way.  I thought I explained all of this to you; I thought you understood.”

“You told me that something had to be done, but I never thought it would be something like this. And I don’t understand, at all.  I don’t see why something this extreme was necessary,” he said taking another swig of beer. The look of worry on his face only angered her more, but she pulled it back. Charm would be a much better weapon to wield.

“Don’t worry about the reasons why.  What matters is that you would do this for me with no questions asked. That means so much to me,” she said as she grabbed the bottle out of his hand and pulled him towards her by the waistband of his pants. She circled her arms around him, slid her hands up underneath of his sweater, and nibbled at his neck. Aroused, he laced his fingers through her hair, systematically moving his hands down the length of her body and stopping at the small of her back. She yanked them off of her and abruptly pulled the sweater over his head and threw it to the ground.  They continued to tear at each other as she nudged him backward, finally pushing him down onto the bed.

Finally she had silenced him, but all of the thoughts that consumed her before had been replaced with an overwhelming carnal itch that needed to be scratched, immediately. She climbed on top of him and leveled her weight on his pelvis, as if it had any real power to keep him down, and began grinding her hips against him.  She loved being in the driver’s seat like this, especially with Pierce.  He absolutely annoyed the hell out of her and at times she couldn’t stand the sight of him, but there was something about that deep, almost infuriating distaste that ignited a level of passion in her that disturbed and excited her at the same time.

He reached up to grab at her breasts but she smacked his hands away and began attacking his neck again.  He reached for her again and she sat back up, this time smacking him playfully across the face, an action that seemed to heighten his pleasure even more as a deep moan escaped his lips.  A devilishly satisfied smiled crossed her face as she continued to tease him to the point of frustration.  These power struggles were the only part of their relationship she enjoyed, if for no other reason than the fact that she always won.

But all of a sudden he grabbed her by the waist and flipped her on her back, his weight coming down on her heavily.  He quickly unzipped his pants and moved the crotch of her panties to the side, pushing himself inside of her before she had a chance to object.  He moved quickly and forcefully, the action was so sudden that it took her a few moments to get her barring.  The acrid scent of alcohol on is breath made her stomach turn as he panted in time with each thrust.  A terrifyingly familiar sense of panic began to run through her and she instinctively began to scoot her hips away from him but he had her pinned and her resistance seemed to entice him all the more.  He paused for a split second and playfully grabbed her arms and forced them over her head as she tried to push him off of her.  She jerked her face from his lips when he began to pepper her face and neck with kisses.

“No, stop.  STOP!!” she screamed as she finally yanked her arm free and slapped him across the face.  He recoiled; holding his cheek, a thin stream of tears fell from his eye in response to the stinging blow.  “What the hell is wrong with you?!” he shouted as she slid back to the headboard of the bed, hitting it and the wall with a forceful thud.  “Stay away from me!  Don’t you fucking touch me again!”  Pierce scooted away from her, angry, puzzled, his face red and still throbbing with pain.  He got up from the bed and turned back towards her ready to explode again, but when his eyes caught hers he realized that they were filled with tears, some of which had begun to fall down her face and collect under her chin.  She was shaking, arms clutched around her body, defensive and ready to strike like a wild animal caught in a trap.

He didn’t understand.  Just seconds ago she had been tantalizing and teasing him.  She had initiated this encounter and turned on him; it didn’t make any sense.  He moved towards her again and he could see her limbs stiffen as she pressed herself tighter against the wall. And then suddenly as the last few minutes flashed through his mind he realized where his hands had been, the way her body had pushed back against his, everything that he had assumed was a part of the usual cat a mouse game that she played with him, the fact that every other time they had been together she had been the one in control, all the pieces began to fit. 

“Sloane. Look at me,” he said as he eased closer.  Her eyes shot up, casting a piercing glare of raw fear and anger, looking through him. They held this stand off for several minutes while he continued to talk her back to reality.  “It’s okay Sloane; I’m not going to hurt you.  You’re safe.  Look at me.  You’re safe.”  She continued to stare at him bewildered and afraid and as his words penetrated, the man she thought she saw, the monster that had hurt her, began to vanish. She blinked fresh tears from her eyes clearing her blurred vision and blurred thoughts and gasped when she saw Pierce’s eyes staring back at her.  She hadn’t been seeing him, hadn’t even been in the present moment and didn’t remember where real time began and the past ended. When he thought it was safe, he sat down on the bed next to her and put his hand just shy of her knee. 

“Are you okay?”  She jerked her leg away from him and recoiled further into the headboard. 

“I’m fine.  Just get out.  Now.  GO!” 

“I’m not going anywhere until you tell me what happened.” 

“Nothing happened.  I’m just not in the mood to screw you anymore.  I told you to stop and you didn’t so I had to make myself clear. Maybe next time you’ll listen.”  He let out a sigh and put his hands to his head. 

She had done a horrible job of keeping her secret.  He had found her out; the proof of it was written all over the look of pity on his face.  All of the questions she knew he had, all of the explanations she didn’t want to give; the whole thing made her sick inside.  She couldn’t go through this again, even if he was just a lackey and a warm body on a cold night, she couldn’t handle one more person scrutinizing what had happened to her or worse yet, blaming her for it.

“I know what just happened just now,” he said in a somber voice.  “I want you to tell me what happened before.  What did he do to you?  Or do I even have to ask?” The tears came fast, followed by several muffled sobs that Sloane tried and eventually failed to control.  Before she knew it Pierce’s arms were around her and she was clinging onto him a wave of emotions threatened to crush her.

How could he know? Without a single word of confirmation Pierce had seen what just about everyone else in her life had always missed.  Someone had hurt her badly and unlike her parents, he had seen it in an instant.  But they had been in selfish denial, and though neither one had ever said as much, she knew that they blamed her for what happened and their only concern had been sweeping the “ordeal,” as they called it, under the rug like a clump of dust bunnies that one of their maids had missed.  They had their money and their reputations to protect and she had been the sacrificial lamb of their greed, left to suffer in silence.

But they weren’t the only ones at fault.  Given her temperament and behavior as a teenager she could almost see why their twisted minds couldn’t conceive of something they hadn’t seen with their own eyes.  But as far as Sloane was concerned there was no room for leniency for the one person who had been there, in the same room, watching the whole thing take place.  She didn’t get a pass, not for her silence in the moment or all of the lies she had told after the fact.   

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The color of the blood on the floor was the first giveaway that it was fake, and the slick texture of it provided Reese with proof of that as he rubbed a sample of it between his fingers.  It was something only a trained eye would recognize immediately, so it was no surprise that Isabella had nearly passed out at the sight of it. Of course the handgun in the puddle of that blood pointed at her mother’s picture that had inexplicably appeared right next to it could have been an equally credible reason. 

The blood red spray paint defacing the massive portrait of her family was most likely the reason for the anger he heard in her voice as she explained the situation to one of the cops who was taking her statement, not to mention the fact that anyone would dare call her a liar, not once, but twice. No one called Isabella Monacco a liar and got away with it; that he knew all too well.

He looked up from the red puddle and right into her eyes.  They were bloodshot, puffy, drowning in tears, and full of a fear he had only seen one time before: the night of her mother death.  Only a sick bastard would do something this horrible and that person would either have to be a part of the small group of people who knew the real story about what happened to Patina Monacco or somehow found out from one of them. 

It had taken less than a second to mentally cross out himself and Eden and he couldn't imagine anyone in her family going to such extremes or allowing anyone else to. That only left two people and as much as he hated Nico, he knew that he wasn't capable of something like this. There was only left one person on his short list, one person who not only knew the truth but had been a witness to it.  True, if he thought hard enough he might be able to come up with a possible motive, and given the fact that the mansion was virtually abandoned, anyone would have had time and opportunity. But after all this time: could she really be this cruel?  He would have to do some serious digging before he would believe that.

He stood up, wiped his hands off with a tissue from his pocket and walked towards the small group that had clustered around Isabella: the two officers who had been called to the scene, Lexie, of course, and the dark haired man that hadn’t left Isabella’s side since he had arrived.  Reese had no idea who he was but his close proximity to her made it clear that they were well acquainted. An employee; a business associate perhaps? Whatever the case, he was an unexpected variable that was definitely going to be identified.

He brushed past the mystery man and placed his hand on Isabella’s shoulder; the soft touch eliciting the desired result as she wrapped her arms around him and dissolved into tears again. 

“Are you okay?” He cringed a bit as the stupid but necessary question came out of his mouth.  She nodded and wiped at her wet face.  “I swear, I’m going to find out who’s doing this to you, but until then you need to have security at all times.  You can hire whoever you want but I’m going to post an officer at the cottage and one at your office. And before you tell me, ‘no’ --”

“Reese stop,” she whispered. “I’m not going to fight you; I’ll do whatever you think is best.”

“Good.  I’ll have someone at the house in an hour; in the meantime you need to get out of here. Where’s your car, I’ll drive you home.”  Before she could answer the dark haired man spoke up.  “Don’t worry about it officer.  I drove her here; I’ll take her back home.” Reese turned toward the stranger and tried to keep his expression even.

“Detective Prescott.  And you are?” he said grabbing the man’s hand tightly as he shook it.

“Blake Bolthouse. I’m a friend of Isabella’s,” he said as he glanced at her.  She was too dazed to confirm or deny it.

“A friend who drove her to a break-in call in the middle of the night,” Resse shot back.

“It was either that or let her drive here alone.  You seem to know her pretty well; I’m sure you know how stubborn she can be.”

“I know everything about her, including how to talk her out of a risky decision like this.  Excuse me for a moment,” he said as he walked a few feet away to answer the phone ringing in his pocket.

He spoke to the caller briefly, all the while eyeing Blake as he stood behind Isabella, rubbing her shoulders and leaning in close to whisper something in her ear.  She may have thought he was just a friend but it was clear to him that this Bolthouse character wanted a lot more. He cut the call short and walked back towards the two of them.

“I just got a lead on a case that I need to look into.  Go home and try to get some sleep.  I’ll come over in the morning to check on you,” he said as he pulled Isabella into another hug. He reluctantly let her go and glared at Blake.  “Get her home safe.”

“Don’t worry about it Detective; I’ve got it covered.”

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