Project Helix 005

Chapter 4 continued

The police station was located in an ancient building. It was dwarfed by the skyscrapers surrounding it but kept their looming presence at bay with its deep rooted gravitas. It had been built in a time were architecture was intended to impress generations instead of a current design rend feeding the pride of a contemporary architect. Its massive stone walls stained by centuries of rain had if anything only gained in majesty by the passage of time. While the towers surrounding the station had been built to look large and imposing making the people who entered them look insignificant in comparison, the police building had beed designed to instil awe in those who beheld it. 

It was a temple built to pay respect to law enforcement. Columns as thick and large as century old oaks holding up a massive stone ceiling that could only be hold aloft by a supreme effort. Every aspect of the construction was there to demonstrate great force used with utmost care. This appearance of power was broken by the tall arched windows which allowed for the people outside to clearly view the inside of the building and for the interior that would have otherwise been dark and foreboding to be flooded with bright daylight. This wasn’t an empty display of power, it was a declaration of intent. 

While Hartley had relaxed and was leading the way without ever looking back, his partner McLean was still not convinced by neither Franklin nor Amy and was trailing a few steps back watching them carefully for any suspicious behaviour. She reminded amy of a feline that was smelling a rat. 

Amy had passed this police station hundreds of times living in the City and had often paused to admire the architecture, but she had never been inside of the station before. Even when she was still training to be police herself she had been sent to a station in the impoverished north of the city. A late twentieth century shit hole of a neighbourhood that had been built around the idea that there was nothing more heartwarming that the look of houses that had all been built out of the same standardised slabs of concrete which could be given individual character by how they were put together. There had even been plans to allow the inhabitants to wait the concrete in colours that pleased them and would allow for even more fanciful variation. In the end though city planning had decided that the choice of colour of ones house was a power to great to be granted to the great unwashed masses of the cities slowly declining middle class and left it all grey. In the end the entire quarter ended up looking like the sketchbook of an autistic cubist painter. 

 It had been planned prison for the poor. Move there and you were free to leave of course. But you were also free of money, free of job offers, free of a decent credit rating. The police station there was more like a fort. An ugly grey, cubist fort reinforced to withstand a siege by the unwashed masses. However the unwashed masses there were far to broken to revolt, being pushed forward by the dream of prosperity to go on with their lives one more day, because their break would surely come. 

Being stationed there as rookie police served to immerse the new generation into world of addicts and petty criminals. Most people who went there were stripped of their faith in humanity in months. Amy had not been one of them. She saw the shit hole but kept wondering whose fault it was that it was there in the first place. It was there where she decided that she would not become part of the executive branch of a state that let things devolve into what she was seeing there. She was not going to be willingly turned into cannon fodder for a state that was working so very hard to abase its citizens turning them into cattle kept under conditions that would have been illegal when applied to livestock. 

However the place she was now in was completely different. Everything insight was bright and clean. The large rooms with their high ceilings and massive walls radiated authority. Measuring those working there and seeking help while making those being taken there as suspects feel insignificant. It had its intended effect on Franklin whose usually square shoulders had slumped significantly. His usually magnificent expression had become demure. Amy was by now hard pressed to find the handsome man that had entered her office that morning in the nervous wreck in front of her. 

Her own feelings were more complicated. In part she was impressed by the police station, feeling reassured that places like these existed. On the other hand it was feeding the ambers of her resentment, slowly reviving the flames of an anger she had thought she had left behind a long time ago. In away this station was a sham. It was one of the central stations that housed the police force for the wealthier neighbourhoods of the northwestern part of the city. The people who mattered, if they ever came into contact with the police would come here and be presented by something much closer to what everyone expected from the police. Nearly non of them would ever witness the soul crushing pit she had spent her rookie time at. Thus inconvenient questions from these kind of people were artfully prevented, while no negate a shit about the complaints of the criminally poor. 

Hartley and McLean lead them into an interrogation room that was four walls a metal table bolted into the floor and several chairs. 

“Tea? Coffee?”, Hartley asked. McLean just frowned at the offer. 

“Tea.” Amy said. Franklin just shook his head falling into a chair.

Hartley left the room. He paused at the door. He cleared his throat to catch the attention of his partner. His expression told her to stop being a dick and come with him. She grunted and followed him out of the room. 

After the door had closed Amy turned back to Franklin. 

“You didn’t do anything Christopher.” she said.  “So relax. Be wary of Hartley. He is going to be the one who is going to tempt you into cooperating with him, who will promise you to make everything easy. The sentiment might be true, but he’s also looking to ‘beat’ you. For him you are probably a game of psychological chess. He’ll try to make you ‘come clean’. This will tempt you in telling him shit that will compromise you. So keep your mouth shut. Don’t get drawn into a conversation. It might be pleasant but you will walk into traps without realising it.”

“But I didn’t do anything.” Franklin said looking up for the first time. He looked at Amy. “I didn’t do”, he repeated, “anything. I wouldn’t. Linda was crazy and I was glad when it appeared that she was finally not a part of my life anymore. But I… I actually had hoped that she would find some peace and move on with her life… and now…”, he hung his head again.

“I know that Christopher and I believe you. But those two detectives out there are not looking for a way to prove your innocence but for a way to find someone who is guilty.”

“I’m not guilty!” Franklin shouted, slamming his fist on the metal table in front of him. Amy was startled by that sudden outburst. It looked liked there was some residue of steel to be found in Franklin’s soft soul after all. 

“The all you have to do is try to relax. Once the two detectives return I’ll stay with you here for a while, enjoy my horrible tea and make sure that they treat you well. Once I’m sure that I can leave you with them alone for a few minutes I’ll excuse myself to go and call Mrs. Ashford Stone.  You’ll see, you’ll be out of here before it is even dark outside.”

“What about the other one?” Franklin asked.

“The other one?” Amy wasn’t quite sure what he was talking about. “Oh you mean the bad cop?”

He nodded.

“Much easier to deal with. She will be an arse and try to intimidate you. Talking about bending the rules, preferably around your neck. Just keep silent. Don’t get cheeky with her type, they usually tend to hold grudges, her you can tell basic shit, she’s probably to angry to be clever. Still try not to talk to much. And please do me a favour. Stop looking like such a victim. It makes me want to punch you, so it won’t help with her either.”

The last part didn’t really help. Franklin shrank even more, tempting Amy to slap some sense into him. She turned around to regain her composure when the door to the room opened up again. McLean held the door open for Hartley who entered the room holding four paper cups in his hands. 

“I thought I’d bring you a tea, too, just in case.” he said to Franklin as he put the cups down on the table pushing one towards Franklin.

They had just finished going through the opening formalities, about to open the very promising looking file lying conspicuously on the side of the table when the door to the interrogation room suddenly opened. A young woman in a business dress so smart it made everything else around it look out of place entered the room with a fierce expression on her face.

“Detective McLean and Hartley?” she asked. 

“Who the fuck are you?” was McLeans answer who got up immediately getting ready to throw the new arrival right back out again.

“Who let you in?” asked Hartley who remained seated but whose expression instantly hardened, his hand inching instinctively towards his weapon. 

“I am Amanda Welles, I am Mr. Franklin’s lawyer. I want to inform you that I have already filed a complaint against both of you”, she said with a cold voice, “for harassing my client, not allowing him his right of attorney and trying to force him into a false confession before he can be properly counselled.”

“You are his lawyer?” McLean said looking at her then looking over to Amy, venom in her eyes. 

“Yes.”  Welles answered.

“Then who the fuck, are you?” McLean asked Amy.

“I am his private investigator.” she answered with a thin smile, ignoring her own advice not to get fresh with the bad cop in the room.

“You are his what? You are this close to get arrested too.” she spat.

“Really? What for?”, Amy asked.

“You put Mr. Franklin under arrest.” Welles asked one eyebrow arched. 

“No. Not under arrest.” Hartley said his eye now also cold resting on Welles. “He is here to clarify a few points for us…”

“Pretending to be his lawyer is going to get you into big trouble miss.” McLean said to Amy.

“I never said I was Mr. Franklins lawyer. I said he was my client which is the truth. I have no responsibility for your actions.” she answered still sporting her thin smile. 

“Get out!” McLean said.

Amy shrugged and left passing Welles whose reptilian eyes followed her out of the room. 

She was glad having gotten out of there earlier than expected. This day so far had only given her one question after the other and it was about time to get some answers. Not having to baby sit Franklin had given her precious time. It also helped enormously that she had not to pose as his defending counsel. She might be able to weasel her way around for a while based on her semester of law and her police training, but that would only get her so far. It also carried the risk of causing Franklin additional trouble. 

She left the police station wondering how Ashford Stone had known to send one of her attack dogs to save the day. Was it the gas repairman? Or was Franklin himself tagged like the good little pet he was. 

She was favouring the repairman theory when she felt a hard object being pressed against her back.

“Mrs. Anderson.” a male voice behind her said in the tones of someone commenting on the weather. “I am pointing a military grade auto injector at your back. I am going to ask you to be so kind as to come with me, there is someone who would like to have a word with you. It would be best if you just came along. If you do not cooperate I will have to sedate you. That will be unpleasant for you as well as for me, for I will have to carry your unconscious body away to get you the medical help you poor woman obviously require. Either way you will come with me. Please be so kind and chose the easy way.”

Amy chose the hard way. At this distance the weapon or auto injector or what ever was very close to her, but she was only one quick side step away from sweeping away the hand holding it and giving the guy behind her a proper thrashing. 

She spun around. She felt a sharp pain in her back. The man in front of her, a mountain in form of a human in a casual suit looked surprised as Amy’s arm hit his hand with unexpected force sending the object in his hand scattering over the side walk onto the street under the wheels of a car. His expression then went from disappointment to that slight annoyance. 

‘It was a release trigger…’ Amy thought as a cold wave of numbness took over her body. 

She fell. Caught by darkness. 

Project Helix 004

Chapter 4

“Don’t say anything.” I Amy said to Franklin who opened his mouth to answer. “No.” Amy said putting up her index finger for emphasis. “As long as the kind police officers are here you are to keep quiet. Once they are out of earshot we have a little talk. We’ll take it from there. OK?”

Again Franklin was about to say something. Amy cut him short with a pointed look. He nodded instead. 

“Good.” said Amy. “Now,” she turned to the police officers whose mood forecast had just taken a turn for overcast weather with spontaneous gales of unwelcome third party interference, “please lead the way.” Amy smiled her best lawyer smile all teeth and sociopath eyes. 

The officers led the way back down to the street radiating a field of law enforcement as they moved through the corridors Amy could feel how the building itself caught its breath doing its best to look innocent while the spy holes in the doors looked the other way when they past in front of them only to look after them when it appeared that they could get away with it. The officers led the way with Amy and Franklin trailing after them. 

Franklin who usually looked like an olympian God, had shoulders that did their best to slump as best as they could defying their divine birth right. While Franklin’s face was now marked by grief and pain. 

They took the strains on their way back down which for Amy meant that the detectives were of the perceptive and competent type, making the situation more complicated that it already was. 

“I need to talk to my client in private.” Amy said as they arrived in the street. 

“Go ahead,” said McLean not showing even the slightest pretence of moving.

“In private, means alone.” Amy said sliding into the arms of sarcasm her old friend. “Why don’t you go on ahead and sit in your car for a while?”

McLean snorted. “And leave you and the suspect alone so that you can run away?”

“Running away…”, Amy exhaled. “On an open street. On foot. While you are sitting in a police car? And your friends at the precinct can ask the guys monitoring the CCTVs to track us while we make our mad dash to… where? The country?”

McLean took a step towards Amy her hands clenching into hosts. Hartley put a hand on his partners arm stopping her. “Let them. They are going to huddle together anyway. They might as well start here.” McLean turned towards her partner still stony faced. “And if they should try to escape,” he added, “you can shoot them with tranq darts for resisting arrest. Both of them.” he said looking Amy in the eyes when he said the last part. McLean unholstered her weapon deactivating the safety without taking looking away from her prey, saying all she had to say with that gesture before going to the police car. 

“Please, don’t do anything stupid.” Hartley said, in the voice of a man who had a lifetime of people choosing to be stupid behind him but had not given up hope just yet. He to turned away joining McLean in the police car. 

“Turn around,” Amy said when the car door closed behind Hartley.

“Why?” asked Franklin.

“Because I don’t want to risk discovering that the cops have some hidden lip reading talents.” Amy replied talking to a grey concrete wall that was attempting to maintain its innocence by hiding behind graffiti, only to appear more scandalous because of it.

“Can they do that?” Franklin asked.

“I have no idea. And I don’t want to find out.” Amy said, stealing a glance at Franklin, his gorgeous looks going a long way to restore her patience. 

“You are also a lawyer?” Franklin said turning towards her admiration in his eyes. 

“Face the wall.” Amy snapped. “And no, I am not a lawyer.”

“But you told the police that I am your client…”

“Because you are my client. They just seem to assume that I am your lawyer.” Amy said.

“You also sounded a lot like a lawyer.” Franklin said doing his best to keep looking at the scandalous wall. 

“It is one of my many talents.” Amy said. “And you are lucky that I am because I can keep you out of trouble until your real lawyer appears.”

“I don’t have a lawyer.” Franklin said.

“Of course you have, you just haven’t met him yet. I promise you that Lady Ashton Stone will not leave you without legal protection.” 

“Are you sure.” Franklin asked.

“Of curse I’m sure. That woman is madly in love with you.”

Franklin tried turning into several shades of red until he settled on the one that let him look the most smashing in his embarrassment.

“Now that we have that out of the way,” Amy said hoping to finally arrive at her actual point, “Who the fuck is Linda Curtis?”

Something broke in Franklin as Amy asked the question. The pain in him had found a way out and it would not be denied by his looks. The weight of the world dropped on him crushing the light out of his eyes, for a brief moment stopping his entire body. A flash of the numbness of death. When Christopher Franklin started talking again it was clear he wished that moment had taken him with it.

“Lind is… Lind was my ex.” he said tears now flowing down his face. His body shaking as he kept himself as much under control as he could. “We…” he paused for a long time. “… it was complicated.”

“Do you still love her?” Amy asked. She wasn’t sure if she was twisting a knife in a wound with her words, but she needed to know what the situation was and in the worst case scenario she hoped that Franklin’s grief was so great that her words would not add significantly to his pain.

“Love her…” Franklin considered her words. “No. I still care a lot about her, I wished we could have been friends and I had hoped that one day we would be….” he paused again. Tears streaming down the creases of his face broken by sadness. “She was. I don’t know. To aggressive? She kept pushing me. Never let me follow my dreams. Kept putting me down for having a vision and trying to get there. She always told me off. Tried to pressure me to be ‘realist’. You know? Put all the things I rally, deeply care about aside and just lead a productive life.” He turned his face towards Amy who hadn’t the heart to tell him to face the wall again. “Productive for what? I would have produced… what exactly? For who? I would have existed. But I would never have lived!” He turned back to the wall eyes cast down. “So… I left her. She didn’t take it well, she wasn’t the kind of person who takes no for an answer. Strange really. How someone who compromises so much to live a life as expected can be so uncompromising in nature. She became increasingly aggressive. Or at least it felt that way so I cut her out of my life. It was only meant to be temporary. But now she… she’s dead.” at this point Franklin started to cry openly sobs shaking his body as he sank to his knees rocking softly as he put his arms across his chest, trying to give him an embrace that the world right now just didn’t want to provide.

Amy stepped towards Franklin, crouched next to him and put an arm over his shoulders. She tried to think of something to say something comforting. But there wasn’t anything. 

She cast glance over to the police car. Hartley was leaning back in his seat haven taking an interest in the ceiling while McLean was still watching them her fierce determination slowly melting away. 

“Look.” said Amy. “I know this is hard but please don’t talk to the police. For now you will only talk to me and your lawyer when he arrives. OK?”

Franklin nodded.

“I have ask you a few more questions, but than can wait until we are at the precinct. Remember I am here to help you. Don’t trust the police, right now they are looking for a murderer, that makes them twitchy. Especially when they think they have found a promising suspect. The may be threatening or nice or business like or all of the above, but you will stay silent. They will be trying to get something out of you by any means possible.”

“But I didn’t kill anyone!” Franklin protested.

“I know.” Amy lied although she was inclined to believe Franklin. “But depending how the clearance rate of homicide is this month and how much pressure the department is under, they’d rather take the innocent in their hand than go chasing for the guilty in the wild…”

“They wouldn’t do that.” Franklin said. “They are the police…” 

“They shouldn’t. But they will, if it means keeping their department from punitive measures for not being effective enough in their police work.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Which makes you a good man in my book.” Amy said. “Now come. Let’s get this over with.” she extended a hand to Franklin and helped him up.

Project Helix 003

Chapter 3

Amy had decided that her first step was to go to Christopher Franklin’s apartment and have a look at the boiler with anger management issues. Someone would be there to assess and repair the damage but it had be arranged that he would not start before Amy had arrived at the scene and had had a look around. 

Franklin had offered her to drive her there but Amy had declined. She said that she still had to follow up some other casework and would join him in about an hour. 

That had been a lie. 

Apart from her collection of Scotch she had been high and dry for the last two weeks or so. The cold clammy weather was not one the inspired either idea of wild forbidden liaisons nor did it foster the the whispers of jealousy. People were to busy snuggling up at home very much hoping not having to leave the house at all. 

What Amy was doing instead was taking public transport. Going with Franklin would have been faster and vastly more comfortable however travelling her traditional way gave her time to think. When she was a pupil, perfect grades or not, the bus had been an ally. One of the few moments of the day where she was free to socialise with her few friends and to take care of the homework she did not deem worthy enough to spend any quality time on. 

Later as she was a student it expanded its role as mobile office giving allowing her more time to cram. There was never enough time for that back in those days. And after she was done with the university and opened her eyes to the world again she noticed that it was there where she could see the City and the life pulsing through it the clearest.

 Here in the buses that the metropolitan administration grudgingly granted the city grumbling about a marked lack in profits or down in the ancient metro that dates back to a time where excavating tunnels under the city to allow trains to run free was consider in term of human achievement, Amy was immersed in the blood of the City. In  car she was encapsulated in a bubble of her own reality. Hopping from one glistening point of interest rising from the urban murk to the next never coming into contact with anything else.

It was important for Amy not to lose contact with the wider world. It was easy to keep track of things happening somewhere else, but in ones own home especially if it was a continuously expanding metropolis like the City it was easy to forget that she was surrounded by many interconnected worlds existing in parallel. 

She needed this to stay connected, to stay grounded. She’s been the unwitting prisoner of her social world bubble for far to long. She would not get pulled into a new one. Not without a fight.

So there she was standing uncomfortably in an overcrowded bus. She was surrounded by people who wither still kept the dream going that everything around them was happening for a good just reason and that they just needed to keep working hard until they at last would be able to harvest the fruit of their labour. Others had their dreams already crushed, burnt out husks with no fight left in them. Some of them knew what had happened to them. Life, society their culture had crushed them, burning their remains to keep itself running, others did not even know that, they were just wondering what had happened to them, what happened to the days where they still were looking forward to something. What they all had in common was that they kept going. Not knowing anything else. 

Amy looked at them feeling rage and pity fighting over the drivers seat of her heart. These people thought that they were free and thus that everything that happened to them in their lives was somehow their own fault. Amy had been one of them once. But she knew that they were all just indentured servants. Their freedom only lasting as long as they kept working, being productive doing as they were told. Once they stopped the bills, the mortgages, the needs of their families came and either crushed them or put them back in line.

This was the reason she left her bubble as often as possible. She needed to see these people. She had to be constantly reminded of what the world around her really was like lest she forget like the others. She mustn’t be complacent. She had to keep her mind sharp. And this, this helped her. 

After she managed to secure her self a place to sit down she turned away from the people and looked out of the window looking at the city, glistening with rain and its lights. As her gaze turned outwards her thoughts turned inwards, towards her new case. The one thing that caught her attention the most was how ridiculous the alleged murder attempts were. 

Tampered with break lines… could have been an accident or simply a technical failure, seeing that Mr. Franklin was still alive they had either not been altered to kill but to scare or by someone rather incompetent. The latter fit well the ridiculous cleaning liquid at the gym plot. The boiler was more similar to the motorbike attempt in that it at least attempted to look like an accident. 

What would be important to know was the chronology of events. The boiler was obviously the last one. Now if the bottle of acid was the first one it might als have been the only one an event that had shaken Franklin enough to make him see ‘murder’ when his brakes needed inspection. However the timing of events was more then suspicious. Also what about the motive? Why kill Franklin in the first place? Or if this was only an attempt to scare Hellen Ashton Stone why the repeated attempts without any demands attached to them. 

Amy’s face lit up with a broad smile. This didn’t make the slightest bit of sense. Wonderfull finally a real case worthy of a proper detective. As the grey City passed before her in all its depressing majesty, Amy started considering buying a trench coat. For the first time in a very long time she was in a good mood. 

About half an hour later Amy arrived at Christopher Franklin’s apartment. Her dreams of classic Bogart style detective glory had faded far enough away that she could focus on her work again. 

She was surprised to find that Christopher Franklin lived in a part of the city that was dominated by big grey blocks of concrete trying half heartedly to look like human homes and failing to do so with the same lack of enthusiasm. This part of town was from a time when the municipal government had come up with some grand plans for affordable housing that were based on deeply rational thought. Carefully planning out how to best accommodate as many of the poor in as little space as possible in the most affordable manner. That this plan had been devised and pushed for by one of the largest contracting business in the region was of course of secondary concern. In just a few years the human silos had been erected, the cities poor unceremoniously dumped in them and then forgotten. 

Until of course these blocks slowly turned into place were crime rates were steadily increasing, vandalism slowly eroding what little amenities had been there in the first place. After that the administration had left with the political rhetoric version of ‘this is why you poor people can’t have good things’ leaving it to rot. 

Navigating this labyrinth had been hard when it was new. Most houses sharing the same number differentiated either by a letter or worse by a euphemistic nickname for the building. By now most of the external identifiers were gone, making it exceedingly heard to find the right building. Even after Amy had found what she though was the proper house she was confronted by a metal plate adorned with dozens of buttons that were marked only by numbers. The metal and glass display that once had house the paper correlating numbers to names had been broken open by someone who had had a very fundamental need for a sheet of scrap paper. 

Amy took out her cell phone and called Franklin who answered almost immediately. After a bit of back and forth Amy learned that she was in fact standing in front of the wrong house and that she had to walk around to the back and to another building that had somehow ended being enclosed by other buildings on all sides. Why waste all that open space on lawn or other frivolities anyway. 

Amy had wanted to take the lift but when the doors opened and she saw and smelt the inside of the thing she decided that she had still to much to much self-respect than to use that mobile torture chamber. The stairwell was dark, smelly and horrid, much better than the lift.

She did not know what she had expected from Franklin’s apartment but it certainly wasn’t what she was seeing now. Behind a door that was mostly just layers of peeling paint was a small comfy flat that seemed to belong to a different house in a different building. There is was again dignity growing in the most unexpected places. 

“The boiler repair man is already here.” Franklin said. “He is actually waiting for you Mrs. Anderson.” he opened a door showing Amy into bathroom that looked like it had been shelled. On one wall the boiler the charred remains of the exploded boiler were still frozen in mid explosion, bits of piping and metal sheets radiating outwards from where one of the gas pipes pointing towards shattered tiles. There where metal fragments stuck into the walls, floor and ceiling. The sliding door of the shower was heavily damaged, however Amy did not fail to notice that the worst damage had struck the wall opposite of the boiler while it had mostly done cosmetic damage to what lay to the sides of it. Might be coincidence, Amy thought, but worth keeping in mind nonetheless. 

The repair man was waring a deep blue overall, that looked suspiciously as if it had been put together by a proper designer, making it look more like an uniform. The repairman automatically looked more competent just wearing it. 

“You Anderson?” he asked looking up only shortly from the ruins of the boiler. Taking a double take when he noticed that Amy was a beautiful young woman. Amy let the admiration wash over her with the practised patience of the tragically pretty. 

“Yes.”, she answered when she noticed that the man in front of her was again master of most of his mental faculties. “And you are?”

“I’m Carlyle. I was sent here by Mrs. Ashton Stone to have a look at…” he pointed at the boiler, “this. She wanted my professional opinion.”

“So?” Amy asked. “Found anything interesting?” she shifted her stance into something slightly more authoritative.

“Well,” Carlyle said, “the first thing that is obvious, is that this thing here is as old as the house itself. From a perspective of energy efficiency this thing is a piece of crap. It uses gas to create an open flame, the flame heats water in the pipes and you have hot water. Only that most of the heat is wasted and goes out of the chimney.”

“OK. So its old and wasteful.” Amy said. “Is that also the reason why it exploded?” 

“No.” Carlyle said. “That’s the main reason why this should not have happened. This thing here,” he said knocking on a bent metal pipe with a wrench. “has the technical complexity of banging a couple of stones together. If enough soot builds up in the burner it will start to produce carbon monoxide and risk suffocating everyone in the bathroom. But that’s about it. Everything about this thing is massive and simple. I had a close look at all the pipes while waiting for you to arrive and they all look solid. There isn’t more than a bit of surface level corrosion. The part that actually exploded got destroyed by the detonation. However there is nothing here that would lead me to believe that this was an accident.” Carlyle said giving Amy a significant look. 

Amy arched an eyebrow. “Do you have any proof that this was caused by tampering?”

“No proof so far. But a professional opinion. If you want to have a look yourself go ahead, once you are done I’ll have a more through look at it and will take some samples back to the company where we can run some more tests. Those should produce some more evidence.”

Amy had a quick look at the boiler. However for her it mostly looked like contemporary art. “All yours.” , she said to Carlyle. She left the bathroom and was about to ask Franklin who had been standing in the corridor looking anxiously in what exactly had happened on the day the boiler exploded when the doorbell rang. 

Franklin opened the door revealing a man and a woman both sharply dressed. “Are you Christopher Franklin?” the man asked.

“Yes.” he answered, “and you are…?”

“I am officer Hartley,” the man said, “and this is officer McLean.” 

“What is this about? Did something happen?” asked Franklin who now was throughly confused. 

“Do you know Mrs. Linda Curtis?” the woman, McLean asked.

“Yes. why did somewhat happen to her?” Franklin asked.

“I am very sorry to inform you,” Hartley said with a frown somewhere between sympathy and suspicion, “that Mrs. Curtis was murdered.”

“What?” Franklin asked his voice braking slightly. 

“I have to ask you to come with us to the precinct Mr. Franklin. We would like to ask you a couple of questions.” Hartley said watching Franklin very closely. 

“You can’t possible think…” Franklin could not bring himself to finish the sentence.

“Right now we aren’t thinking anything.” said McLean with the professional coolness that is considered that minimal baseline for politeness. “Right now we are following every possible lead as we intend to find Mrs. Curtis’ murderer as quickly as possible.” there was an edge in her tone that implicated that Franklin was obviously guilty if he did not come with them. 

“OK.” said the deflated franklin with a weak voice. “Just let me get my things. I’ll be right with you.”

As Franklin passed Amy she put a hand on his arm and said, “Don’t worry Mr. Franklin I’m coming with you.” Franklin smiled weakly as he got his coat from the wardrobe. 

“And you are?” asked officer Hartley.

“Mr. Franklin is my client.” Amy said hoping to evade the question. 

Hartley regarded her with the look most police officers only reserved for the cockroaches and lawyers.

Projekt Helix 002

Chapter 2

The Ashford Stone residence was less palatial than Amy had expected. It was a large house in a neighbourhood of the city from a time when ‘middle class’ had meant more than being comfortable enough to live in a small house that one could call ones own in thirty years, as long as no ones job got out-sourced into a developing nation. 

It was a house with ambition. Enough space to house a family set in the middle of grounds large enough to let the kids play and roam while leaving enough space to one day maybe house a pool when the kids had grown up.

Franklin had insisted of taking Amy there personally. He did not want to take any risks. On the way there Amy had started considering if he was pretty enough to forgive him his disappointing lack of depth. When ever she was starting to get exasperated, she looked at him and got distracted by something.

He was now leading the way, now that he was back on familiar territory he had regained some very attractive confidence. He opened the door for her inviting her in. 

If the house did not advertise the wealth of its owner on the out side it certainly would not start to do so on the inside. It was far to refine for that sort of vulgarity. It was a warm comfortable place full of wooden furniture and earth colours creating a deeply comfortable atmosphere. The place radiate a elf assured wealth that did not need to prove itself to anyone only worried to cater to its owners needs. 

Franklin led Amy into a small library that his all of its walls behind hardwood shelves filled with leather bound books. There were big leather chairs arranged in a semi circle around a fire place. The room smelled of winter evenings spent reading. 

“Please take a seat.” Said Franklin. “I will go and find Hellen.” As he was about to leave the room he hesitated and turned around. “Can I fix you something to drink?” he asked. 

“I wouldn’t say no to a single malt.” Amy said not letting a situation like this slip from her.

“Of course.” He returned into the room. Opened a small cabinet filled with crystal decanters and tumblers, pouring her a drink. He gave her glass with a polite smile that could have gotten away with murder. 

Amy wondered who would want to kill that man. There did not seem to be much going on behind the facade, because quit frankly there was no need to and in his simple way he was quite charming. But seeing how he was about to marry one of the wealthiest women of the country who also had a reputation for doing the most outrageous things on a whim, she could already see a malevolent form of worry and of course the old classic greed as the main motivators to get rid of old woman Ashford Stone’s newest conquest. 

There were a few things not quite adding up, like the idea that swapping out a bottle with a sports drink for one that looked the same but was filled with cleaning fluid would ever be mistaken for an accident… But either Mr. Franklin was fond of mixing his own cleaning supplies in his own discarded bottles or he was just adorably naive. 

It did mean that the would be murderer was probably driven by a base passion and was thinking he or she were way more clever than they actually were. Amy took a sip from her single malt. It was shockingly good. Even if this case turned out to be nothing but false alarm and adorable paranoia it was already worth it just for the drink. And he connections. Just getting to know Mrs. Ashford Stone would open quite  few doors for Amy. Should she be doomed to be working more cuckold jobs she could at least quadruple her daily rates.

While Amy was slowly drifting away from her case to her daydreams the lady of he hose arrived. 

Hellen Ashford Stone had once been a renowned beauty when she had been young and since then she had fought tooth and nail to keep as much of it as possible. Old age and her had been waging a constant war and so far Mrs. Ashford Stone was keeping an upper hand. She was lithe. But not in the way most other people her age were, mostly because their bodies were slowly being carried away by the constant flow of time. This was a body that had been kept in check by iron discipline. She was wearing a long evening dress, in the middle of the afternoon, that hugged a figure that many twenty year olds would have killed for and while her face marked by age and had a its share of wrinkles each crease and fold was there to amplify the expression of her face. A face dominated by two sapphire eyes that were completely clear and piercing. 

She did not so much enter the room as take the stage. 

Franklin followed her a step behind her.

Hellen Ashford stone shook Amy’s hand magnanimously. “My dear Mrs. Anderson, how kind of you to come to the aid of my dearest Chris.” She turned to Franklin and caressed his cheek with the tips of her fingers. “Isn’t that right my darling?”

“Yes dear.” He said his eyes full of adoration.

“Please  could you make us some coffee dear? I have had such an exhausting morning it would appear that the city would stop moving if not for advising everyone on what to do.” 

Franklin’s brow furrowed slightly. “Yes of course my dear. I am sorry I was not here to help you.” 

“Don’t be silly my love. Someone is trying to hurt you and we can’t have that, now can we?”

He just smiled. As he left Hellen Ashton Stone drifted into the armchair opposite to Amy’s like autumn’s most vain leaf. Once the door to the library had closed her demeanour frosted over. The slightly overworked diva turned into the empress of a global business conglomerate. 

“So, Mrs. Anderson, what has my darling told you so far?” she asked.

Amy was impressed by the ease with which Ashton Stone had shifted roles. “Only that he suspects that someone is trying to kill him.” Amy said. “I asked him who might see him as a threat or an enemy or a threat. But he could think of no one.”

Hellen Ashton Stone’s expression was softened by a brief smile. “Of course he doesn’t. He is such an innocent soul.” She shook her head. “But you and I both know very well that no one gets to a position such as mine without making enemies. I try to avoid it.” She shrugged. “In the end it is unavoidable though. And while I very much doubt that Chris has made any enemies, I don’t think that he is quite capable of doing so. There are enough people who would try to hurt me. My children have grown up in this world and are old enough to take care of themselves. And I have not given my heart to anyone outside of my family for a very long time. Now the Chris is has entered my life there are people who are bound to be tempted to go after what they think of a weakness. This is, of course, utterly unacceptable. So please be so kind and do not only see this as a request from my dearest Chris but also from myself. I am not only very interested in who is out there for my love but also in those who I may falsely consider my allies or god forbid my friends.”

Amy took another, deeper sip from her single malt. This case was quickly growing into the kind of case she had always dreamt of. “I understand.” She said. Before Ashton Stone could start speaking again she added, “I also understand that this is something just between us that I need not worry anyone else with. For all intents and purposes I am working for Christopher Franklin and no one else.”

Another thin smile deigned to grace Hellen Ashton Stone’s face, predatory but meant as a sign of respect. She just nodded. 

The door was opened by Franklin concentrating on a serving try laden with porcelain cups. The moment he entered the room Ashton Stone melted back into her previous exhausted persona. “Thank you Chris, you are saving my life.” Franklin just smiled warmly at her. 

“I was not sure if you wanted a coffee too,” he said turning to Amy. “So I just made a big pot of coffee for all of us. May I serve you a cup?”

“No thanks.” Said Amy saluting him with her tumbler. 

“We were about to talk about Mrs. Anderson’s salary, my dear. Please let me cover this expense for you.” Said Hellen Ashton Stone.

“But Hellen,” he protested, “this is my life. I can’t possibly accept that from you.”

“And what could be more precious to me than your life my love?” she asked. “Also do you have any idea what a good detective costs?”

Franklin hesitated for a moment. “No?”

“I pay my consultants a daily fee of 1500 pounds a day.” She said her eyes hardening for a split second casting a meaningful glance towards Amy, who had to use work very hard to keep her business face in place after being confronted by such numbers. She took another sip of her single malt. 

Franklin blanched, he opened his mouth, but Ashton Stone shushed him by placing her finger onto of his lips. 

“See my love? And Mrs. Anderson is not some run of the mill consultant but a professional criminal investigator.” Franklin closed his mouth again and looked at Amy again with increased awe. It seemed that he, like Amy was not used to the price ranges that Ashton Stone frequented on a daily basis. “And did I not teach you not to think in categories of money but in those of quality?” she said now sounding like a slightly disappointed mother..

“Yes.” Franklin said. 

“So as per our agreement I shall pay you a retainer of 2500 pounds a day, Mrs Anderson. Plus expenses of course. I will tell one of my people to get you a credit card for that which you can use for it. Is that agreeable?”

Amy drank the last bit of her single malt while taking a deep mental breath. “Yes.” She said not realising that she had just walked into a gilded trap.a

Project Helix 001

Chapter 1 Amy

Pride is an arse. Corrupting you with its sweet whispers only to kick you in the teeth whenever it feels slighted.

Dignity however, dignity is civilised. Guiding along a path of enlightenment. 

When things go wrong pride throws its toys out of the pram, dignity however holds your head up straight protecting you in its dignified embrace.

This was a lesson that Amy Anderson, private detective, had learned the hard way. She had been proud when she was a child and it only got worse once she moved into adolescence. She had been pretty, athletic and was had good grades. Always working hard, always being a ‘good girl’ and always being proud of it.

Everyone kept telling her clever and talented and pretty she was. That last point should had made her suspicious. Looking back it sounded like the way talked about an especially surprising pet. ‘Who’s a good girl? You are!’ Mixed with surprise that she could also do other things than look nice.

Stuffed full of pride she stepped out into the world and the world didn’t give a fuck.

Turns out grades are just numbers on a piece of paper, and working really hard doing what is expected nets you nothing once you reach the next stage in life. 

First of all she had no real idea what to do with her life once she got out of school. She had always been told what to do up to that point and suddenly she was expected to know what she was going to do next. She felt lost and her As in everything turned into a curse as it meant that she could do what ever she wanted. 

No one had ever asked her what she wanted and by that point she had no idea what that may have been.

Having believed in the system so far and seeing how it might lead to a well paid job she decided to study law. She did it with her usual amount of discipline and nearly burnt herself out. The work load was so large that it could not be done by a mere human. The professor talked about one thing during the lectures but asked completely different things during exams. And most infuriating were the people who got better grades with far less work than she put in. Those idiots did not even understand what they were talking about but had been learning the proper things to regurgitated during exam time. 

She hated them.

And she started to hate herself.

Her life had been based on lies. Very obvious lies once you had reached a certain point in life, but lies that people studiously ignored or papered over with great pearls of wisdom like: 

“That’s just how the world works.”

“Everyone is doing it.”

“It may be a shit system but it is the only one we have.”

Arguments that would had gotten her into trouble if she had used them when she was three years old were now used by the supposed elite of society.

Instead of going properly insane she decided to go crazy. She some generous scholarships keeping her afloat and she decided to do some partying and adventuring why she still had the time. She had been cursed with a deep seated professionalism which prevented her from descending into proper debauchery and so she kept her grades up even if her attention was elsewhere. 

She partied hard, reclaimed much of her lost adolescence and lost her illusions in regards to law. What she saw there was a system that tried to confine the complex ideal of justice into limited definitions which then were savaged by a hordes of interest groups hell bent of making the law bow to her wishes.

She faded out of university and tried to become a police officer.

That didn’t work. Being the underpaid, under equipped idiot who had the pleasure to enforce the law was even less gratifying than being one of the the people supposed to interpret the law. 

By that point she had taken her pride the shed and killed it for good.

She decided that in the end she’d rather be responsible for her own life and try to follow some kind of ideal that was not compromised by outside forces. That way she’d at least have dignity.

She had still a love for the law that she was loath to give up so she became a private detective. She spoken enough legalese to help both herself and her clients and she had been long enough in the police academy to get along with the fuzz. 

Again her dreams had been crushed by the hard rock of reality. She had been thinking of being a private investigator. Being called to solve crimes.

Instead she spent most of her time shadowing husbands, wives, girlfriends, boyfriends for signs of infidelity. Or having a an eye on family members not trusted by someone else from this most holy of societal institutions.

She was free however. Working for no one but herself and enjoying the ability to tell preoperative clients to go and get stuffed if she didn’t like them. Sometime to the protest of her long suffering bank account. But a week of ramen noodles was a small price to pay for the ability to be able to look at her mirror image straight in the eye.

The day so far had been slow. In the morning she had been filing papers and sent out her last invoice. A lone warrior sent against an army of bills, leaving her only with her dignity for company. Amy stared at the frosted glass window of her office. When ever she felt the tug of depression she just looked at that sign proclaiming her “Amy Anderson Private Investigator.” She smiled. Seeing it always make her feel better. Her tiny monument to her hard earned freedom. 

She was about to drift away into a day dream where she’d be a celebrity investigator sought after by the police and the rich and the powerful all looking for her legendary detective skills when a brand shoulder shadow darkened her window. Followed shortly after by a knock so hesitant that it was hard to connect it to the dark shape blocking the light from Amy’s door. 

“It’s open.”, said Amy sitting up straight, quickly rearguing some papers on her table into something she hoped resembled nonchalant work. She was looking up her face transitioning to her business face, she had practiced in front of the mirror since long before she even became a detective. Her business face stumbled when it met the face of her would be client. It was only through years of training that it could recover quickly enough to prevent a car crash expression and shift into a crooked smile-frown that appeared to be trying to hard only to the most observant. 

Lucky for Amy the man in front of her was obviously more used to being observed than doing any of that himself. His face was of the kind that inspired gods to fall in love with mortals or into fits of unending jealous rage. Deep amber eyes that pulled the every gaze into them drowning them in heir depths, framed by a face that combined sharp features into a soft overall shape. Escape the eyes and fall pray to a smile formed by full lips insinuating deeds most scandalous.

This man, Amy decided, was trouble as she struggled to keep her blood pressure within medically acceptable margins. 

“Mrs. Anderson?” he asked, his mellow voice resonating in the room. 

“Yes.”, she said. Clawing her way back into control.

“I” he hesitated for the briefest of moments, “need your help.” He looked deep into her eyes. 

“I think that can be arranged. Please take a seat.”, She   gestured towards one of the two slightly worn chairs in front of her desk. 

The man sat down with one fluid motion. He sat so upright that it was uncomfortable looking at at him. He looked at her with an ease that had been carefully cultivated. While her visitor obviously know how to move and talk to maximum effect, he was straining against his limits. 

“So.” Amy said after her prospective client had decided to continue the conversation with a gorgeous silence. “What can I help you with Mr…?”

“Franklin.” He said, standing up again with a fluid motion offering her his hand. She shook his hand. A soft hand she noted. That toned body had probably never done an hour of honest work in its entire existence. “My name is Christopher Franklin.” He flowed down into his chair again. “And I… I think someone is trying to murder me.”

“Murder you?” Amy asked hoping that the hint of excitement in her voice would be thought of as professional curiosity.

“Yes. In the past month strange accidents have started happening around me. First someone had tampered the brakes on my motor bike. Then someone accidentally placed a bottle of an isotonic drink filled with bleach near my own bottle in the gym. Then the boiler in my bathroom exploded!” Franklin’s well maintained facade started to crumble now. “I only survived that one because my phone rang… Once might be a coincidence. Maybe twice. But now I have no doubt that someone is trying to kill me.” He looked at her pleadingly.

“Do you have any idea who might want to kill you, Mr. Franklin?” Amy asked noting that the there was something peculiarly tempting about seeing this monument of a man looking pleadingly at her asking her to protect him. 

He looked at her with big eyes. “No. I… That’s why I am here. You are the detective, right.”

“That I am.”, She said a smile warming her face. “And as a professional I can tell you that you must have made someone very angry, or envious or perhaps jealous,” she let that one hang in the room for a little extra bit, to no effect, “to make them try to murder you. And if what you are telling me is true I think we can exclude a psychopath who would you kill you just for the kicks. The methods sound to much like someone wanting you to have a tragic accident.”

“Right?” Franklin said suddenly sitting up again. He was thrilled that someone was finally taking him seriously. It was adorable. “It is too much of a coincidence. But I can’t imagine for the world why anyone would want to kill me. I never did anything to anybody.”

“Well let’s just start with the basics. What do you do for a living Mr. Franklin?” Amy asked. 

“I am an actor.”, He said with pride in his voice. “But right now I mostly work as a waiter or if I’m lucky as a singer. You know to make ends meet until I get my first few roles. Paving the way to some proper acting jobs. Right?”

Ah, Amy thought, the Hollywood dream that was keeping the bars and restaurants of the city in business by paying less than minimum wage to the flood of actors that were THIS close to their breakthrough role. 

“So had any luck lately?” Amy asked formulating some early hypothesis. 

“Not in job wise…” Franklin said square shoulders slumping very so slightly. 

“However…” Amy said noticing that there was a source of luck handsome Mr Franklin had not yet mentioned, which might yet provide her with a new juicy idea of what might drive someone to murder.

“Well…” he said a bit sheepishly, “I got to know a woman and we… we are getting married.”

“Congratulations.” Said Amy smiling out of politeness but mostly because she had caught the scent of motive again. “And who is the lucky girl?” she asked.

He looked at her blushing slightly. “Hellen Ashford Stone. You might have heard of her.”

Might have? Hellen Ashford Stone was one of the richest and by far the most eccentric women in the entire city. Since she had lost her last, fourth husband twenty years ago she had sworn to live her life to her fullest and to never marry again. And lo and behold the old dame had found herself a young lover who she intended to marry?

The handsome Mr. Franklin had murder victim written all over him. If Amy could manage to keep him alive long enough to solve the case she would never have to work a single unfaithful bastard case ever again.

Hell she might even buy her dignity a cosy little house to live in.