The Florist

Carry On

            Mel’s arms pumped with rage as he jogged to the police entrance. He didn’t even notice the look of shock on Capri’s face when he yanked her ex-boyfriend by his collar. Vasu screamed in agony.

            “Yo, man! What the … police brutality! Police brutality!”

            “Mel, what are you doing?” she cried to no answer.

            A crowd gathered inside as he pulled Vasu into the station. When he placed him in front of Gaia, he asked for confirmation. “Are you sure this is the guy?”

            “Yes.”

            “What? What did I do?”

            “Vasu Jó,” Mel started whilst placing handcuffs on his wrists, “you are under arrest for the murders of Zinnia Woodruff and Augustine Velar.”

            “What? You got to be kidding me! I didn’t …”

            “You have the right to remain silent. I suggest you shut the hell up!”

            Capri’s eyes filled with tears as she watched her new boyfriend arrest her former. She wanted to jump to the defense … but she didn’t know who to support! Her body tickled with faint and then, much like the day she saw Nia’s dead body, everything went black.

                                                                                            §

            Mel’s concerned and handsomely chiseled face was the first to greet Capri when she came to. He slowly helped her up and guided her to the chair at his desk. Officer Moser brought a cup of water at Mel’s request.

            “Thanks, Gil.”

            “No problem. Are you all right, Miss Winters?”

            “Yes, thank you,” she assured while pacing her sips.

            “Officer Moser kept you from hitting the floor this time.”

            “Thank you.”

            “Don’t mention it. Perrin, do you want me to question the perp or the Monte girl?”

            “The perp can sit there and stew for a while.”

            “No,” Capri voiced with a sigh. “I’ll go talk to Vasu.”

            “You say what?”

            “If he’s got answers, I want to hear ‘em.”

            “Capri, are you crazy? He’s in cuffs right now for killing your best friend!”

            “Allegedly.”

            “I don’t give a … I’m not leaving you alone in a room with him!”

            “I’ll go with her,” Moser offered. “I’ll stay close and keep an eye on her.”

            “There. You see? It’s settled.”

            “Capri …”

            “Mel,” she challenged. “This is something I have to do. Say you understand.”

            He sighed reluctantly and nodded in support. They exchanged glances before Officer Moser took her to where Vasu was being held. Once he watched them disappear behind a wall partition, Mel made his way to Gaia Monte.

                                                                                            §

            “All right, Miss Monte. Detective Ward didn’t do a good job of filling me in on your conversation, so if you could run through it one more time for me, that’d be great.”

            “Okay, sure. My boyfriend lives on the same floor as those girls who were killed, but at the end of the hall. I saw Vasu leave with Nia’s roommate and … I saw him come back without her.”

            “Okay, now, wait a minute. How did you know Nia?”

            “From parties!” she beamed. “You couldn’t go to a party without knowing who Nia was, and if you didn’t know, you would soon find out. That girl was the life of every party.”

            “Did you attend the one that happened the night before she was killed?”

            “No, we couldn’t go. My boyfriend and I were going to breakfast with his grandparents, so we had to be in bed early. But, on our way out the next morning, I forgot my purse and had to run back to his apartment to get it. That’s when I saw Vasu. He was standing outside of Nia’s apartment. By the time we came in from breakfast, you guys were just starting to allow people back into the building.”

            “And you said you saw him outside of Augustine Velar’s apartment as well, correct?”

            “Yep,” she nodded. “When I left out for work the next day.”

            “Did you hear any conversation between Vasu and either of the ladies? Anything of an argument or …?” he asked while she shook her head.

            “I can’t say I was paying that close attention, but I can say this: every apartment I saw that guy leave, somebody was found dead shortly after.”

                                                                                                §

            When Capri walked in, Vasu sighed in relief. For a time, she sat and stared at him as he sent a look of confusion back to her. In the end, he was the first to break the ice.

            “Can you tell your little wannabe boyfriend to get me out of these cuffs? I get it. He wants you and he can’t have you because I got you …”

            “What the … what?”

            “…but he can’t put me in jail for being jealous!” he laughed.

            “Is everything a freaking joke to you? Two people are dead, and there is a girl out there right now saying you did it! How is this funny?”

            “You don’t actually think I killed them, do you?” he asked. Her frozen demeanor gave him his answer. “Oh, come on, Capri! You can’t really … why? Why would I kill them?”

            “I don’t know, Vasu. I’m still trying to figure out why you went back to the apartment in the first place.”

            “I went to talk to Nia.”

            “About what?”

            “You and me,” he told. “You were acting real distant in the car, so I went to ask if she had any ideas of what else I could do to get you back.”

            “And? What advice did she give you?”

            He sighed with a wary shrug. “She didn’t. I mean, I – I didn’t see her.”

            “She was already dead by the time you got there?”

            “No. I mean … I didn’t see her.”

            Capri’s eyes wildly searched the room before she screamed, “What are you talking about? You just said you went to the apartment to see her, and now you’re saying you didn’t go see her. You’re not making any sense!”

            “Look, you’re just going to have to trust me when I tell you that I didn’t do it.”

            “Trust you?” she laughed. “I wouldn’t trust you with a bucket of water if my ass was on fire!”

            “Capri, Nia was my friend. Most of all, she was your friend. I would never do anything to hurt you,” he told gently. When her face dropped in consideration of their history, he changed his tune a bit. “Well, I wouldn’t hurt you intentionally.”

                                                                                                §

            Mel said his goodbyes to Gaia before guiding her out of the station. He immediately headed toward the interrogation room that held Capri and Vasu. Along the way, Chief Paige caught his attention. If it weren’t for Captain Grayson summoning him as well, he would have kept walking.

            “How can I help you gentlemen?” he asked closing the door behind him.

            “I was just telling the chief here about the progress y’all made on The Florist case. He wanted to applaud your efforts.”

            “Thank you.”

            “And when you track this Florist down, bring him to me,” the chief ordered. “I want to see him.”

            “Oh, you’ll see him … at the same time as everyone else, when we bring him into custody,” Mel told.

            “That bastard killed my only daughter and I want to get my hands on him before anyone else does!”

            “This isn’t a street fight! You don’t think I want a chance at this guy, Silas?”

            “Oh, what are you going to do? You couldn’t even protect my daughter when he killed her!”

            “Here we go.”

            “And I’ll keep going until you make things right! You had one job, one job: to keep my little girl out of harm’s way.”

            “Out of harm’s way? You were the harm, you and Ashlynn! If you two would have been better parents and took care of your daughter instead of having me try to make up for years of neglect …”

            “What did you say?”

            “She might still be alive!” Mel argued. “Paige lived recklessly because of y’all, not me.”

            “You should have tried harder to keep her happy!”

            “Paige didn’t want to be happy; she wanted to be miserable because that was all y’all ever showed her! She was constantly trying to sabotage our marriage. I knew it, you knew it, Cap knew it, and everybody knew it!”

            “I know I trusted you with her and now she’s dead.”

            “You entrusted me with her; there’s a difference! Ashlynn didn’t want the responsibility of being a mother so she ran off. You never wanted to be a father so you married her off to me. The big fool, right? Because I actually loved Paige. I thought we had something real, something honest, and something worth solidifying before God. I took those vows and meant it. But you used me, all of you. I played the fool for your whole damn family!”

            “What are you saying, Mel? Are you saying my daughter deserved to die?”

            “All right now, that’s enough!” Captain Grayson yelled. “This has got to stop. There will be no slandering in my office, especially over something that is no one’s fault. Silas, Mel was Paige’s husband and he’s had a hard enough time dealing with her death as it is.”

            “I don’t care!”

            Captain Grayson immediately stood to his feet. “This is not your house, Si; it’s mine, and when you’re in my house, you play by my rules. If I say the conversation’s over, that’s the end of it. You don’t like it, there’s the door.”

            “You’re taking the wrong side, Randy.”

            “This ain’t about sides; it’s about pain and loss, and you’ve both experienced some. You’ve got your crosses to bear with your parenting skills or lack thereof. Whether or not that played a part in Paige’s death is neither here nor there, but you don’t need to blame Mel. He’s the last person that needs a finger pointed his way. You know that to be a fact. Now, I been a comrade of yours for quite a while, Silas, and I know some other facts that’ll prove my point. You want to hear them or are you going to lay off of my detective?”

            The two men conducted an intense stare down that made them resemble Gregorian statues. Mel’s eyes grew tired shifting back and forth between the still tennis match before Chief Paige huffed in frustration and stormed out of Captain Grayson’s office. Mel bowed to his boss in gratitude.

            “Thank you, Cap, for taking up for me. I appreciate it.”

            “Oh, I wouldn’t thank me just yet, because I’m getting around to you.”

            “Me? What did I do?”

            “Paige was named after her dad for a reason; with the exception of blowing in the wind like her mother, she’s exactly like Silas. You came to me a lot during your marriage for relationship advice, remember that?”

            Mel sighed. “Of course I do, Cap. You’ve always been like an uncle to me.”

            “And as a good friend of your father’s, God rest his soul, I will tell you as he would have. You endured enough pain from Paige while you were in that relationship. Why in the hell would you inflict more on yourself after she’s gone? Wha – where is the sense in that? At some point, you’ve got to let that go, son, or you’ll never be able to move on with your own life.”

                                                                                            §

            Capri was a twist of the doorknob away from leaving the room before Vasu begged her not to go. She froze in place hoping he would say something worthwhile, something the team could use in solving the case.

            “You know I care about you … right?”

            “You’re wasting my time, Vasu. Just tell me what you know.”

            “I can’t.”

            “And why the hell not?”

            “I don’t want to end up dead! Hell, I’d rather live in jail than die because I was in the wrong place at the wrong time like Auggie.”

            “What do you mean like Auggie? Did you see who murdered Nia too? Do you know who murdered Auggie?” she asked excitedly as he sat back and tightly clasped his lips together. “Vasu, tell me!”

            “If I tell you, I’m as good as dead.”

            “No, we can protect you.”

            “We? What are you, a cop now?” he chortled. “The cops can’t protect me anymore than they could protect Nia and Auggie. And you better watch your back too, Capri.”

            “What is that supposed to mean?”

            “Now that all of Nolan knows you’re in on the team chasing this guy, you’ll end up on death’s list too.”

            “Well, unlike you, I’m not afraid to stand up for what’s right.”

            “This isn’t a damn campaign to be student body president, Capri! This is about life or death. You could get killed behind this. I don’t want to see anything happen to you.”

            “Then help me!”

            His head fell in shame. “I wish I could but I can’t. It’s against the code.”

            “What code?”

            “A code I took an oath to uphold.”

            “What about the code of friendship?” she challenged. “You say you were Nia’s friend.”

            “You know I was Nia’s friend.”

            “Then why wouldn’t you help bring justice to the person who killed her?”

            He shook his head. “Capri … I’m sorry.”

            She nodded in return while fighting back tears. “You’re right. You are … and you’re a coward.”

                                                                                            §

            After wrapping up the conversation with Captain Grayson and Chief Paige, Mel rushed to find Capri. He was surprised to see her standing outside the interrogation room and even more so to find Officer Moser hauling Vasu off to a cell. Capri’s ex-boyfriend yelled for her to save herself. Confused by his warning, Mel asked Capri what happened.

            “He didn’t commit the murders … but he knows who did.”

            “Did he tell you?”

            “No,” she said sadly. “He said that anybody who knows anything ends up dead.”

            “From what I understand, people end up dying after they let him into their house,” he said sarcastically. “You okay?”

            Capri shook her head. “Every time it seems like we’re one step closer to this guy, we take two steps back. We keep running into roadblocks. I – I just don’t know anymore.”

            “Hey, we’re going to get him. Don’t worry. That press conference already has people coming forward with information.”

            “With the wrong information. What good does that do us?”

            “Baby,” Mel smiled soothingly, “any information is good information.”

                                                                                                    §

            Mel asked Capri to recap the entire conversation she had with Vasu to the best of her ability as he drove back to his house. When she mentioned that he said something about breaking a code, Mel abruptly pulled the car over. Her body lunged forward from the impact before bouncing back in the seat.

            “What the … Mel!”

            “Code, code, code, code,” he repeated to himself. “A code and an oath. A code and a – didn’t you say he was part of a fraternity?”

            “Yeah. So?”

            “So what if Nia and Auggie’s killer is one of his fraternity brothers?”

            Her eyes fervently widened at the connection and possible discovery. “That’s why he couldn’t tell me! Oh my G – What are we gonna do?”

            “What do you think we’re gonna do?” he dared putting the car back in drive.