Page 12 of I Know She Was There

I relayed the story, leaving out the part about hearing voices. No reason for them to know that.

“Is that everything, Ms. Case?” asked Skinny after I’d finished. His voice bounced loudly around the room.

I nodded. “Did you find Mel—the woman I saw in the upstairs window?” I stifled the urge to drag my top teeth across my lower lip.

The officers exchanged a look that fell somewhere between wary and disbelieving, then both looked back at me.

“The house was empty, ma’am,” said Chubby.

“Then she must have been taken to the hospital.” I sighed. “Thank God.”

“No one was in the house because nobody lives there,” said one of them. I didn’t know which one. I was too focused on the words floating in the air between us. “We searched through our database and discovered the couple who resided at 21 Pine Hill Road recently sold the property.”

I thought about the interior of the place. I didn’t recall seeing furniture. But then why was someone in an empty house...? I shook my head. “I don’t understand.”

“Neither do we,” said Skinny, moving nearer to my left elbow. “The place was dark and tightly locked. We had to use special tools to get inside. There was nothing in any of the rooms—no furniture or personal effects. In fact, the place looked as clean and empty as a newly constructed house.”

Chubby puffed up his chest, stared me down. “We have some questions for you.”

I nodded. “Yes, of course.”

“Have you ever filed a false police report, Ms. Case?”

“Filed a... what?” I studied the officer’s features, but they blurred before my eyes. “Surely you saw the blood. It was trailing down her neck. Some must have dripped?—”

“We saw no blood, and it’s a crime to file a false report,” he said, his face looming in front of mine but blurrier than before.

I shook my head. “I didn’t. I wouldn’t.”

“Mr. Trembly reported a crime at your behest, Ms. Case. A crime that did not occur.”

“I didn’t say it was a crime, just that I saw her. She was in the room in the upper?—”

“We walked through the entire house, Ms. Case. No evidence of a fatal accident, a murder, or anyone residing there.”

“It can’t be. I’m telling you; I know she was there.”

“There is no evidence of that,” said Chubby. He stepped closer, as if his nearness would help him make his point. “If you ever file a false report with our office again, we will arrest you. Do you understand what I’m saying to you, Ms. Case?”

I shrank back, horrified, too afraid to speak.

Skinny looked around my shadowy living room, his gaze resting on the prescription bottles on my coffee table.

“Whose medication is that, ma’am?”

“Mine.” My voice was barely above a whisper. “My name is on the bottles.”

He walked closer to the coffee table. “May I look?” When I nodded, he lifted one bottle, read, then examined the label on the second before putting both where he found them, next to the third bottle he didn’t bother to pick up. “These are potent drugs, Ms. Case. Have you taken any of these pills this evening?”

“Only after I was hit on the head.” I turned and pointed at the back of my skull. “Someone clubbed me in that house. Knocked me out. I woke up in the p-pond with this big knot on my head and?—”

“Ms. Case,” he interrupted. “We have no way of verifying this information.”

“B-but it happened,” I sputtered.

“I suggest you come to the police department later, after the effects of the drugs wear off. You can tell us about your injury and anything else you recall about your night.”

I nodded, too shocked to say anything else.They don’t believe me. I watched them turn and walk out my front door. I had no intention of going to police headquarters. It was my word against theirs—cops in the department convinced I was some sort of lunatic who wandered the streets at night and concocted stories about what I saw inside the houses I passed.

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