Page 43 of A Forgotten Mistake

Liam

Present

I park the car outside Abby’s apartment building before we both get out of the vehicle and head inside. Once on the second floor, I knock, but the door is unlocked, so I push it open.

“Well, this just got a whole lot more interesting,” I say.

“I really don’t like the sound of that,” Gabriel mutters as he steps up behind me.

The man we’d been looking for, the one named Mitch who owned the house where the dead body was found, is currently sitting at the kitchen table. He appears to have been stabbed multiple times before he bled all over the table, knocking down several objects around the room in his attempt to survive. It makes me think that whoever stabbed him put him back in the chair after he died.

I look up at Abby who is standing to the side of a second chair that appears to have fallen down during the tussle. She’s wearing a large t-shirt that just covers her underwear and has no pants. Her shirt and arms are coated in blood as she stares right at me.

“Looks like you were quite busy,” I comment as I observe the mess she’s had me walk in on.

Gabriel seems absolutely horrified as he takes it all in and appears to realize that we’ve literally let ourselves into a crime scene that we shouldn’t be anywhere near. “We need to call this in?—”

Abby looks alarmed. “NO! Why the fuck did you bring him?” she asks me, fixing me with her wild eyes.

“Because you woke both of us up when you sent so many texts,” I say. “Where I go, Gabriel goes, and you asked me to come.”

She shakes her head like she can’t comprehend this. “I didn’t do it. Please don’t call anyone. I didn’t do it.”

“Oh?” I ask as I look at her hand. It’s clean of blood where the knife must have been held when Mitch was stabbed.

“I didn’t. I didn’t. Mitch and I were really close. I didn’t do it. Someone’s setting me up.”

Tears are breaching her eyes, just adding to the drama.

“If you really didn’t do it, why didn’t you call the police?” Gabriel asks.

Abby is shaking as she gestures at the scene before her. “You have to be fucking kidding me! If I called the police, they would assume I did it!”

“It really does look like you did it,” I admit.

Her shaking is worsening, and I can’t tell whether she’s just enraged or upset. I’ve never been the best at reading emotions like these. When someone is so far gone that they seem incapable of controlling their emotions, I find myself unsure what to do with them.

“Please, Liam. I didn’t kill him. I need your help.”

I carefully step toward the body, really not wanting to get blood on my shoes. I grab a Kleenex as I walk by and use it to grasp Mitch’s hair to pull his head up. He still has his eyes… butwhy? I had assumed the eyes of the first body were removed for a reason, unless they were done by different people—or did they not have time?

“Liam, this is really fucking risky. We need to get out of here and call it in,” Gabriel says, sounding anxious.

Abby looks terrified as she comprehends Gabriel’s words. “N-No. You can’t, please… Liam. I would rot in prison for something I didn’t even do.”

“What the fuck were you doing that you didn’t notice someone getting stabbed in your apartment and then coating you in blood?” Gabriel asks.

Abby hesitates, clearly understanding why we’re having trouble believing this. “I was fucking sleeping! I had my sound machine on… I must not have heard it.”

“You didn’t feel them coating you in blood?” Gabriel questions, rightfully suspicious.

Tears are racing down her cheeks as she looks at Gabriel likehe’sthe problem. Like everything would be alright if he wasn’t here.

“Were you using again?” I ask.

She stills before shaking her head. “No! I promise. I wasn’t. I didn’t.” Abby rubs her face, smearing blood across it and then looking down at her hands in horror that she’s wiping it everywhere. I’m surprised she didn’t wash it off while waiting for me, but my guess is that she wants me to tell her exactly what to do and how to do it so she doesn’t fuck up the scene. She knows they’d search the sink for evidence. They’d swab the drain and other places she wouldn’t have been able to easily clean up. She knows the only way she’s getting out of this is with my help.

“Liam. Please. Please. I will do anything you ask, but if you arrest me, that’ll be the end. They want to frame me. They want me out of the picture.”

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