Page 39 of Craving Vengeance
Bethany huffed, leaned back in her chair, and crossed her arms over her chest. “Why would it? Why would I care?”
“I don’t know. You just seem bothered by that.”
“Whatever,” Bethany replied with a roll of her eyes and the attitude of a teenager who’d just been set straight by her parents. “You brought me down here to talk about fish?” she questioned, her tone still juvenile.
Spinelli’s eyes narrowed.She’s getting a little testy already. That was quick.Jackson’s twenty-plus years on the force really showed during times like these. Her small frame never precluded her from getting the job done. And her eyes. Spinelli was sure he’d confess to anything if her small dark eyes zoned in on him the way they zoned in on the suspects. She was a strong woman. He always admired her for that. His old partner, Mad Dog, had told him early on to make sure to stay on her good side. Good bosses like her were hard to come by. And though she expected a lot from her staff, she stood behind them one hundred percent when the shit hit the fan.
A knock sounded on the interrogation room door. Both Jackson and Bethany’s heads turned in that direction. Marsh poked his head in and motioned for Jackson. She stepped into the doorway and Marsh whispered something to her.
She looked back at Bethany. “I’ll be right back.”
Bethany shrugged.
Jackson and Marsh entered the room in which Spinelli and Walker resided. Marsh looked like he was ready to explode.What did he find?
Marsh flopped a stack of papers on the table. He fanned the stack.
Yellow highlights appeared sporadically throughout the documents. “What are those?” Jackson asked as she placed her finger on one of the highlighted areas.
“These are printouts of Bethany’s Internet records. Evidently, she has a Hotmail email account she logs into on occasion for personal business during work hours. She was smart enough not to use her work email account, but evidently, she’s not smart enough to know that IT has records of all computer activity generated by all work computers,” he shook his head, “and she’s got a doctorate.”
“What are you trying to tell us?” Jackson asked, cutting to the chase.
“I had IT run their keystroke search program on Bethany’s computer to see if she had any correspondence with ‘Angelfish’ like Williams had. All the highlighted areas are just that, emails to or from someone called ‘Angelfish.’ And just like we found on Williams’ and Carter’s computers, the conversations seem vague, but do reference a particular date and some specific early morning hours, the date being February 14th.”
All sound faded from Spinelli’s ears except for his thudding heart and his hissing lungs. He fought to refill his lungs; it seemed to be a struggle. He knew going in to Bethany’s questioning there was a good chance she was involved in this whole mess. He’d hoped for some sort of miracle that he was wrong. But Marsh had likely just added the final nail to the coffin, and ultimately, he knew he was responsible for the deaths of Rosso, Carter, Williams, and Meyers.
His dates with Bethany replayed through his mind. They were just dates, nothing special. No flowers, no expensive dinners, no weekends away, and no sex. He thought about things he had said to her. He couldn’t come up with one conversation where he’d led her to believe there was more to their relationship than he thought.
The voices of Jackson, Marsh, and Walker eased back into his eardrums, slowly growing louder with each passing moment. Marsh was mumbling something about a Beta fish being temperamental and aggressive. He went on to explain that the females are normally shorter, have thicker bellies, less finnage, and are less vibrant in color than the males. What the hell was he talking about? He was a walking encyclopedia of useless information.
“They’re also known as a Siamese Fighting Fish. They flare out their gill plates towards other fish to show hostility or when they feel threatened,” Marsh added.
“What does that have to do with anything?” Spinelli asked unable to camouflage his impatience.
“Weren’t you listening? That’s what I just explained. In her emails to ‘Angelfish’, she uses the call name of ‘Betta’ fish. I’m just saying that she probably picked that name for a reason. It has a similar behavior pattern to her. Just like Rosso choosing ‘Angelfish’ has a similar behavior pattern to him.”
“Oh.”
“That’s all good and well, we’ve got her, but none of this ties her to Meyers.”
Marsh beamed. He was on a roll. “Those don’t,” he flipped to the last page in the small stack of papers and tapped his finger on the final yellow highlighted section, “but this one does.”
Simultaneously everyone leaned forward to get a better look. Among the hundreds of characters on the page, the word “Eros” appeared highlighted in yellow.
“Eros?” Spinelli questioned
“I had Lisa in IT run their search program on the word ‘cupid’ as well ‘Angelfish’ but nothing came up. Then for kicks and giggles, I had Lisa run the program on ‘Eros’ and voila, here you have it. She typed an email, yesterday, to someone going by the name of Eros.”
Everyone continued to stare at Marsh.
“For chrissake, don’t you guys know anything about Roman or Greek mythology?”
Jackson’s toe tapping urged Marsh to enlighten them further. That was her thing; tapping her toe, and it always seemed to work.
Marsh rolled his eyes. “In Roman mythology, Cupid is the god of desire. His Greek counterpart is Eros,” he paused briefly, “and just a little FYI, in case it ever comes up again, Cupid is known in Latin as Amor.”
“Wait a minute. This morning when I asked you about cupid you didn’t know shit.”
