The ARC Chronicles Collection

Chapter 8

Dressed, Eva sat on the edge of her bed, oblivious now to what had happened the night before, the only thought in her head being she had been so careless and stupid. She had given her details, and the faceless woman on the other end of the line had asked her to remain where she was. They would send somebody to bring her in.

In the back of her head, Eva’s logical mind informed her the central office for Worcester was only a couple of minutes drive away, up the road that passed the hotel. It was no more walking distance than the bar she may or may not have visited.

After what seemed an agonising amount of time, Eva’s hearing registered footsteps outside her room. A short loud knock made her jump.

“Miss Ross? This is the Worcester Police Department. May we come in?”

Wary now, with paranoia threatening to overcome her, Eva approached the door with caution. “How do I know you are who you say you are?”

“Put the door on the latch and open it, ma’am,” said a female voice.

Eva did as she was told and through the c***k in the doorway, she could see a short blonde woman dressed in a tight grey suit, holding up her WPD shield. Working with mentally ill prisoners, Eva had seen her fair share of police ID, and as reluctant as she was, she opened the door to them, letting it swing ajar as she turned away.

Doing so caused her to look once more at the bed, the scene of the attack. She let out a whimper and almost fell to the floor, but the woman caught her, deflecting her into one of the chairs.

“Mrs Ross, I am Detective Tina Svinsky, and this is Detective Mike Caruso.”

The words barely registered. Eva looked past the woman to find a white-haired man of below average height wearing a blue suit that appeared three sizes too big. He nodded, unspeaking, and resumed scanning the room.

“I called as quickly as I could,” said Eva by way of an explanation.

“No judgement,” Svinsky replied, holding her hands up in a suggestion of innocence. “You are the victim in this, but it would probably be better if we got you out of here. Would you like us to escort you home?”

“No! Absolutely not!” The vehemence in her own voice surprised Eva as much as it did the detectives, and caused a look between the two. “Well we can always do this at the station. It is quite close and you will be safe there. Are you up to that?”

“I… Yes. Why not?”

Svinsky nodded at her partner. “You ok to hold the fort?”

Pulling out a pair of what looked to Eva like surgical gloves, he replied, “Sure. Crime scene unit is en route so I’ll just poke around until they get here.”

Eva was led through the corridors into the elevator. Her mind was still a mess, trying to recall any image or sensation of who or what assaulted her the night before. When they reached the lobby, it was clear the arrival of the police had already drawn some attention, and Eva noticed strange and sometimes hostile looks from many there who had presumed she was the cause and was being arrested. The bartender from the night before had a smug look on his face, but even he said nothing. Perhaps they remained silent upon seeing the terror that shone through on her face, she wondered.

Detective Svinsky did her the courtesy of making a show of no cuffs. This calmed any potential outbursts. A criminal would be in cuffs, everybody knew that.

A car waited outside the lobby, and Eva was ushered into the front passenger seat, instead of the caged rear of the vehicle. This was enough for most, and the congregation in the lobby looked again to the elevator and stairs, seeking a new target for their growing wrath.

Detective Svinsky took her place behind the wheel, and drove off with no further comment. They moved out onto the road, and no more than a minute later, the police station came into view. Svinsky chuckled.

The noise was enough to break Eva out of her mood. “What?”

“Well it certainly beats walking.”

“I guess.”

Svinsky glanced at her. “Look Eva, we will do our damndest to find out what happened to you, but you must remember time is a great healer. Things will get better. It’s hard to consider how that is the case right now, so all I want you to do is concentrate on anything that happened last night or this morning. Chin up, girl. I usually find corpses, not live victims. You are at least alive, so that puts this as a rosy day.”

“It certainly doesn’t feel like it,” countered Eva.

The detective pulled up to the front of the building and signalled a colleague to take the car. Eva felt the numbness of shock, the detachment, as if she were looking through someone else’s eyes. Through sheer reflex she moved into the building, barely noticing the yellowed corridors, the out of date seventies wood panelling of a building still stuck forty years in the past.

She was shown into a room that belied this impression. Large bay windows opened on to a small garden, fenced off from the outside world. The sun shone through the foliage, highlighting the autumn leaves. Eva sat on a sofa that smelled new, surrounded by pale pink walls. The room felt false, meant to offer comfort, but its ultimately sterile nature could not be disguised. The garden reminded her of the fact everything would soon end one way or another.

“Would you like tea? Coffee?” Eva thought she recognized the voice asking the question.

She turned to find a face from the past, looking her over with concern. “I know you… Miss Grouse?”

“Just call me Brenda, dear. It has been a long time since the library in high school. I can see you have been in the wars; otherwise you would not be here. What can I get you?”

“Tea, please.”

“Sugar? It will help calm your nerves.”

“That would be nice.”

As Brenda poured, Detective Svinsky returned. Through the door, Eva could see Detective Caruso, a concerned look in his face.

“We just need to go through a few basic details with you, Eva, if you feel up to it?”

Eva sipped her tea; the sweet liquid tasted good. “I don’t mind. I don’t remember much but I will help where I can.”

“Okay, then. Well, we have your name and address, and from that, we can see you are married to Brian Ross, of the same address. Would you like us to contact your husband for you?”

The fear began to return. He was still out there. “No. No, I don’t want him involved.” Eva glanced at the detective to see a look of concern on her face, mixed with a steady gaze of observation. It was a look she had no doubt she used many times. Empathy and study.

“That is fine. This is a delicate time. Do you have any next of kin you would us to contact, instead. Someone to offer you support?”

“No, nobody nearby. My family moved to Wyoming and I haven’t spoken to my parents in years.”

“So that makes your husband your only next of kin.”

Eva shuddered. “No!”

Again, the look of suspicion. “Eva, was it your husband that did this to you?”

Even the simple questions left Eva feeling confused. “I don’t know. I have no memory of who did this to me. I was drugged. Somebody must have used GHB on me. Look, by now I am sure you know I am a psychotherapist at Worcester State Hospital. I am fully trained and versed in drugs used in the treatment of patients. I wrote a thesis on the subject for God’s sake. Gamma-hydroxybutyrate has effects similar to alcohol, and I can guarantee there’s not a person in this station who does not know what alcohol does to you in great quantities.”

“We will need to take a blood sample then to confirm this.” Detective Caruso had slipped in unannounced.

“You aren’t allowed in here.” Svinsky protested.

“That’s red-tape protocol bullshit and you know it, Tina. Look we need to get this sorted as quickly as possible to ensure the drug doesn’t dissipate in her system. Mrs. Ross, if you don’t mind, I would like to have one of my colleagues test your blood for drugs, GHB or otherwise.”

“Please do, if that is what it takes to convince you all.” Eva held out her arm. “Go right ahead.”

Caruso ushered in a blonde woman wearing a white coat with a crime scene kit. The woman looked at her for a moment. “Dear Gods, Eva. It’s Julie. Julie Bilous.”

“Julie Bilous? You were in my postgrad course in Boston.”

Detective Caruso rolled his eyes. “It seems everyone from your past is ending up in the same room. Let’s get on with this.”

Eva allowed herself to be ministered to by her old colleague. She had her hand cleaned and finger pricked by the police doctor.

“It’s not Brian up to his old tricks again is it?” Julie said in a conspiratorial whisper, seemingly unaware Detective Svinsky was right next to them.

Eva remained quiet, but the tension in her body was clear for anybody to observe.

“Are you absolutely sure there is nothing else you wish to tell me, Ms. Ross?” Svinsky asked. “We don’t appreciate having our time wasted by domestic disputes if there is no apparent victim.”

“I am not wasting your time.” Eva persisted. “It’s just… Well my husband hasn’t been the most faithful of people in the past.” Eva refrained from further comment, aware there was a small crowd growing in the room.

Finished, Julie smiled at Eva and left, followed closely by Caruso who now appeared to get the hint.

“Would you care to elaborate?” asked Svinsky.

“Ever since high school, my husband has had an inferiority complex. He knew he didn’t equal me intellectually, so he sought other ways to prove to himself that he was a man. I was just very forgiving. He proved himself many times. It wasn’t him. Whatever happened here was far too clever for Brian. He can’t plan that far ahead. At least not most of the time.”

“Are you saying this time could have been different?”

“No. What I am saying is I was leaving him. If you go to my house, you will find it is boarded up. That was done for a reason since he tried to keep me a prisoner. I was staying at the hotel because I escaped and I have had enough.”

Svinsky was writing all this down on a pad, and without looking up, asked, “Could you tell me about last night, then?”

This frustrated Eva. “I have to tell you the same thing over and over, it seems. I left the hotel. I walked past the exhibition center, and turned up a street. I went in a bar for a drink, but I don’t recall the name. From that point until this morning when I stepped into the shower, it is all a blur. I remember nothing. I will tell you one thing though. It was not my husband. I just don’t know who it was.”

“Well, first things first, I think we should wait for the blood work to come back to see what you might have been given.”

“Detective, I know procedure in this state. Shouldn’t you be conducting a r**e kit? My clothes for example might hold evidence.” Eva held up her hands. “My fingernails and what’s under them?”

Svinsky smiled. “Sweetie, you have been watching too much CSI. We have a backlog of r**e kits filling up a room somewhere in here. If we were to process that, it would be months if not years before we got to you. Besides, you admitted your memory returned in the shower. Any chance of something on the outside of your body giving us a clue has long since gone. I think it best you just wait here until the results come back. There is enough tea to swim in, and cookies aplenty. I will be back presently.”

Svinsky left the room, flicking through her notepad. The door slammed shut as if it were a prison cell. “They don’t believe me,” Eva said aloud.

Time passed. It could have been minutes, but to Eva every moment felt like hours. If she was not racking her brains about the night before, she was worrying about where her husband could be, and about Jenny, the poor girl who was his latest conquest. What kept her going was the steady supply of sugar-enriched tea and the occasional bouts of self-righteousness where Eva remembered that for Jenny to have been at her house meant she had consented. Unlike her experience, that was not r**e.

Understanding the psychological damage that could be done to a r**e victim made her feel a little better. She could use that to bolster herself against the symptoms that usually affected a victim. She would not be beaten by it. The most unnerving fact was that somehow it did not feel like r**e. Humans were predisposed to be afraid of the unknown, and it was the unknown that frightened her more than the act.

At length, Eva could see bodies gathering down the corridor beyond the door. The two detectives were arguing with two others, with occasional glances in her direction. Eventually, Detective Caruso broke free of the argument and opened the door, the others in his wake. All four of them entered the room.

“Mrs. Ross, I am going to be as blunt about this as possible. Your blood results show no abnormalities whatsoever. In fact, they show barely any trace of alcohol. The levels indicate you had nothing more than a few drinks, for what is left in your system. Yet you maintain you are the victim of date r**e. The evidence does not stack up in your favour.”

Eva was lost. “Well how can this be? How come I cannot remember anything about last night if I wasn’t drugged? Do you now think I am making all of this up?”

Detective Caruso was clearly beginning to lose patience. He threw the test result file onto the table in front of her. “Read it yourself. You are a doctor. It reads as clear as day that you were under no influence. Mrs. Ross, are you absolutely certain you aren’t the guilty party here? Are you sure this wasn’t just a one night stand and now you are crying r**e? Are you sure this isn’t just a call for attention?”

“Mike, that is too far,” argued Detective Svinsky. “You cannot make such an accusation based on one set of evidence like that. We don’t even have the DNA profiles back from the room yet.”

“And what do you think are the chances there is only one profile located in the room?” accused Caruso. “If it were up to me, you would be arrested for wasting police time, Dr Ross.”

“Well, it is lucky it is not up to you, Mike.” Detective Svinsky purposefully put herself between the other Detective and Eva, blocking her view of the man. Off to one side, the two lab technicians, by their faces, clearly believing themselves to be the cause of the uncomfortable situation, appeared to want to bolt for it. “What do you want to do, Eva? Remain here in safety to see this out, or find somewhere else to stay?”

“I would like to return to my room at the hotel, please.”

“Not possible. That’s an alleged crime scene. We can see about getting you another room, though.”

“No. Thank you, Detective Svinsky, but I need to be in my original room. I need to try and figure out what happened.”

Detective Caruso butted in, saying, “It is a crime scene, one way or another, until proven otherwise.”

“But how can it be a crime scene if you don’t think there has been any crime?”