Chapter 3 - The Interrogation Room
The interrogation room at the county police precinct smelled of stale coffee, industrial floor wax, and decades of silent human misery. The single metal table in the center was scratched and dented, reflecting the harsh glare of the overhead fluorescent tube.
Eleanor sat on one side of the table, her hands neatly folded over her handbag, refusing to wear the orange jumpsuit but stripped of her jewelry and her phone.
Detective Harris sat across from her, his expression a mask of professional disinterest. I stood behind the two-way mirror in the adjacent observation room, watching every micro-expression on my mother’s face.
“Let’s review the timeline again, Mrs. Hayes,” Harris said, sliding a printed medical report across the table. “According to the attending physician at Fairfax Memorial, the infant Leo was suffering from advanced febrile dehydration and deliberate withholding of prescribed medication between December 14th and December 22nd. That isn't a family dispute. That constitutes felony child endangerment and criminal neglect.”
Eleanor didn't flinch. She picked up the medical report with two fingers, scanned it with apparent boredom, and slid it back across the table.
“The girl is incompetent,” Eleanor said smoothly, her voice dripping with calculated disdain. “She leaves windows drafty. She doesn't sterilize bottles properly. I was merely exercising my legal prerogative as the family matriarch to correct domestic failures. If the child suffered, it was because Sophia panicked and refused to follow my instructions.”
“Your instructions included locking her in the guest room and smashing her phone?” Harris asked, raising an eyebrow.
“I confiscated communication devices to maintain household discipline,” Eleanor replied without missing a beat. “In our family, we maintain standards. If Lucas chose to marry a fragile, middle-class nobody who folds under minimal pressure, that is his cross to bear. But I will not have my grandson raised in squalor.”
In the observation room, my hand pressed flat against the cold glass. I could feel the heat radiating from my own palm.
“She’s not even blinking,” Captain Ruiz murmured, standing beside me with her arms crossed. “Sociopathic detachment. She genuinely believes her social standing places her above statutory law.”
“She’s buying time,” I said quietly. “She thinks her corporate defense attorneys can stall until Monday morning, get a sympathetic family court judge, and tie us up in injunctions for months.”
“They won’t get the chance,” Ruiz replied, tapping the folder in her hand. “We just received the forensic mirror of Audrey’s laptop. Guess what we found?”
I looked over at her. “What?”
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“A coordinated email thread between Eleanor, Audrey, and a private family law firm in Richmond dating back six months,” Ruiz said, her eyes flashing with cold satisfaction. “They weren't just trying to control Sophia. They were engineering a staged psychological evaluation to declare her mentally unfit, strip her of parental rights, and transfer full guardianship of Leo directly to Eleanor—backed by a forged codicil to your grandfather’s will.”
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