Somehow along the line, a note of caution seemed to enter his gaze. “I didn’t kill her,” he said, “and saying I would like to isn’t the same thing.”
“No, it isn’t, but it sure does give us something to think about.”
“You’re just cops,” he replied. “You’re not paid to think.”
She stared at him in surprise. “And yet all you’re doing is insulting us.Smart.”
He just glared and took another swig from his bottle.
“You should have left it in the paper bag,” she noted, “then it looks more authentic.”
He looked at her in confusion, then at his bottle and back at her.
She walked over to the window, looked out, and asked, “When did you last see Chelice?”
“You probably already fucking know, if she went to you whining and crying about me beating her up.”
“Is that what she told you that she would do?”
He just shrugged and didn’t say anything.
“I still need to know when you saw her last,” she repeated.
“I don’t know. I just went to bed,” he said. “I was pissed off and fed up, so I went to bed.”
“What, so when you woke up, she was gone?”
He nodded. “So don’t ask me what time that was because I didn’t go to work that day. It was Sunday morning,” he added, “and I was sleeping off a drunk.”
“Ah, so that’s it. You got mad drunk, beat up your girlfriend, and she takes off while you’re sleeping. Then you wake up to find your world has changed, and you’re not happy about it. I’m so sorry,” she said, with mock sympathy.
He glared at her, shaking his head. “It wasn’t like that.”
“Glad to hear it,” she murmured. “So what was it like?”
He shook his head again. “You wouldn’t understand.”
“Try me.” She walked over, gingerly picking a pathway through the mess on the floor. “Do you live like this all the time, or only when there is trouble in paradise?” She motioned at the mess around her. “There’s like two-day-old food here.”
“Yeah, Chelice never cleans up,” he snapped.
“But she hasn’t been here,” she corrected him.
He replied, with a mocking tone, “Yeah, back to that again.”
Kate nudged him. “When did you last see her?”
“Saturday night,” he snapped. “That’s when we were fighting.”
“Oh, and that’s when you beat her up.”
He glared at her but didn’t say a word.
She nodded. “And did you try to call her?”
He just shrugged.
“You need to tell me,” she stated.