Page 114 of A Forgotten Mistake

She slowly looks over at us.

I ask her, “You remember your friend Anthony? The guy Christa was dating? Do you remember his last name?”

“You’re making a mistake,” she says.

“You don’t want to figure out who is killing people? Are you involved? Is that why it’s a mistake?”

“You’re making a mistake,” she repeats.

“How?” I ask.

“You’re making a mistake. I don’t want you to die too.”

“No one has to die if you tell us what’s going on,” Gabriel says. “We are here to protect those who could get hurt. We are here to keep more people from dying.”

“Abby, at one point in your life, I was the only one who could save you, and you trusted me. What’s different now?”

“Everything,” she responds. “Because destroying monsters makes more of them.”

Abby closes her eyes and probably thinks we’ll believe she’s asleep, but she can’t hide the tears slipping out.

“Let’s go,” I say, knowing that she’s not going to give me any answers.

I guide Gabriel away from her room with a hand on his back.

“‘Destroying monsters makes more of them,’” I muse, then pull out my phone and call Michaels.

“Oh joy. Just who I want to interrupt my dinner for,” he grumbles.

“I love talking to you too,” I say. “Were you around when Abby Brown’s father died? He was part of the crimes department, so you might not have interacted with him much. He was dealing with narcotics and stuff at the time of his death.”

“I didn’t know him well, but obviously I knew about his death. Homicide honestly wasn’t surprised. He had this confidence about him. He seemed to think that he’d intimidate people to drive drugs out of the city and it ended up getting him stabbed to death in some back alley.”

“Were you on his case? You were homicide at that point, right?”

“I was.”

“Did he have… anything he was hiding? Something that was swept under the rug? Possibly to keep the police from looking bad?” I ask.

Michaels grows quiet. “Why do you ask?”

“I mean, I was only with Abby for a short while, but she adamantly did not want to go back with her father. She repeatedly said he was a bad man, that he was a monster. She… kind of led me to believe that he hurt young women. She was… the best way to describe it is that she was relieved when he died. It was like this black cloud followed her everywhere she went, but the day he died, she acted like she could breathe for the first time.”

“There were… rumors that someone found a few videos of an unidentifiable man engaging in… sexual acts with women who seemed to be intoxicated or possibly drugged. I always assumed it was a rumor because it was never submitted for evidence and no women ever came forward. It also never directly showed him, so there was no proof that they were videos of him.”

“Did you ever find any recording equipment?”

“None. What’s bringing this up? Did Abby say something to you?”

“I’m just throwing shit at a wall to see what sticks,” I say. “I’ll let you know if I figure something else out.”

“Are you going to let me know or are you just going to run wildly at a theory and expect a cake at the end of it?”

“That one,” I decide before hanging up.

“Why do you refuse to end calls with him properly?” Gabriel asks.

“I don’t know, Gabriel. It’s like my body refuses to speak to him for one more second than it needs to. It’s as though it’ll hurt if I try.”

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