A Curious Murder

It was all fine until Jayde Fallon was found dead at her residence. With the window broken to the outside and the victim’s hands bleeding, but no trace of blood was to be found on the glass shards. Jayde had a kitchen knife sticking out from the chest. Her emerald green orbs were staring blankly into space. Her raven black hair was matted with blood due to the fact her forehead had a huge gash which was sticky with blood. The room was scattered with books and other such things. All the drawers were flung open which suggested robbery.

The cop who was assigned the case was named Darrius Thorne and he got to know from the neighbours that Jayde had been a simple young woman with simple needs. She had a few friends but lived alone. Her parents had died in a car crash seven years prior, when she just turned 22. Her parents hadn’t had any siblings so she was left alone with no family. She used to work in a reputed company and despite being in a junior position, she received decent pay which was enough to sustain herself.

The police suspected that a group of people had broken into her house through her kitchen door as they had found various footprints in the backyard apart from that of Jayde’s. The scattered belongings strewn on the floor indicated that Jayde had probably put up a fight and had ended up getting stabbed. But what had Jayde owned that was worth getting stolen?

Mr. Thorne had managed to contact Fallon’s friends and had interviewed them. A girl named Sarah Williams had said, “What? Jayde? But she was a wonderful person. Why would anyone in their right minds do that? “Sarah looked distraught. After all, her best friend had just been murdered. Next came Brooke Hart who started balling her eyes out when she heard the news. “She was such a simpleton, she held no grudges, the poor girl had no family either. “The cops could get nothing else out from her. Last was Zoe Watson who took the news surprisingly well. She didn’t cry, she didn’t go on listing all of Jayde’s good qualities, rather, she chose to remain silent. Thorne raised his eyebrow suspiciously but then Zoe said “she was fine, I guess, but then she did have imperfections. She was way too modest for one. Even with the amazingly beautiful necklace which she inherited from her mother, - “But she was interrupted by Darrius. “Hold on! What necklace are we talking about young lady?” Rolling her eyes, Zoe answered with a hint of annoyance in her voice as if they should have known about the necklace,” Well, it is this gold chain with an infinity symbol with studded diamonds on it. It is pretty expensive. But Jayde never wore it. She said that she couldn’t afford to wear it.” She answered while shaking her head. Having nothing more to say, Zoe was allowed to leave.

Immediately Thorne turned to face his assistant, James Watkins.” This Zoe girl strikes me as pretty suspicious. She didn’t react like most normal people would which strikes me as shady. Also, when she talked about that necklace, she had hunger in her eyes. As if she would do anything to get the necklace. So keep tabs on these three women, especially Zoe.” James nodded and ran off to inform their seniors of their findings.

And so the investigation started. The description of the necklace was sent to various police informers as no trace of it could be found in both Jayde’s home as well as in her bank locker. After hearing about the murder, the bank manager had consented to the cops looking into the dead woman’s locker but to no avail.

The mystery became more tangled with each passing day but no more clues came to light while nothing else could be deciphered from the clues they already had.

After nearly a week of revisiting the clues, they finally got a strong lead. Turns out that a notorious criminal gang had been spotted in the area where Jayde happened to be living in, that too on the night of the murder. But this particular gang always managed to escape the law’s clutches due to lack of evidence as they would always had cleared the clues and placed red herrings to distract the police even further. This also explained as to why this case had close to no evidences. But it was unlike the gang to leave the body of a victim in a place with many chances of the body being discovered. That is when it clicked in Thorne’s brain. A patrol squad had been sent in that area due to increasing robberies and maybe the gang had to flee before they could hide Jayde’s body because they had heard the sirens. It all felt so correct!

He shared his thoughts with Watkins who thought that his speculation was correct. But his spirits were slightly dampened by the fact that the three girls had done nothing out of the ordinary. But they rose again when he heard that Zoe had been sending letters out more than a normal person should. This again struck him as queer.

“Watkins, call Zoe here. We need to talk to her about this letters business.” Said Thorne. Watkins nodded and gave him a salute and left.

But when Zoe told them the truth about the letters, they were shell shocked.

“Zoe, what is the deal with the letters? You post them almost every day!” Thorne exclaimed.

“Those are letters for my grandma. She finds phones or ‘little voice boxes’ as she calls them, weird. And I don’t deem it your business to find out to whom I post letters to. I am pretty sure it is legal.” She replied coldly before leaving and muttering something about people wasting her time.

As more days passed, the senior officials were suggesting that they close the case. Word of this spread and soon Sarah Williams could be seen marching into the police station saying that they couldn’t close the case until the murderer was caught. But two days later, they found a new lead.

Brooke Hart was seen meeting up with a contact of the criminal gang.

Reinforcements were soon called and those two were cornered. Brooke suddenly collapsed on the ground in a sobbing fit. She finally managed to splutter out, “I only wanted her necklace to be stolen so I contacted my brother here.” She gestured to the man behind her.” He asked the gang mates to do it and they ended u-up…up killing her.” She was now sobbing harder than ever.

James asked her in a voice barely above a whisper,” And why did you ask them to steal?”

“I desperately needed money for my mother’s cancer operation. She was on deathbed. But asking for money or taking a loan would have been too shameful. But I regret everything now. I have been since the day I heard Jayde died. That is why I was crying. And yes, the gang told me she had put up a fight. A good one too.” She started crying again.

After comforting Brooke, the cops were able to arrest the wrongdoers, doing justice to Jayde.