3 Another Attack

"Well, I didn't see that coming. Do you?"

Jay looked at the woman who had been occupying his mind for two days. Since they had separated in the café, he didn't see or hear anything from her. When he would ask about her from her brother, Mark would just say:

"Don't worry she'll contact you."

He focuses in the woman beside him, she was wearing a jersey shorts and a t-shirt. Her hair was pulled back in her, emphasizing her rounded face. She had her glasses on, that she said she had, which confirmed the color of her eyes.

"Please don't tell me you like me." She suddenly said.

"What?" Jay's voice came like a croak. "No…no… I'm…" writhing himself from actually stammering at the girls' remark, Jay watched Mary's lips widen into a very sweet accomplished smile. Her eyes were glowing from amusement that he had just provided.

He cleared his throat together with his thought. Jay look back at the mutilated body of a dog hanging loose on a tree. "What do you mean by, 'I didn't see this coming.'?"

Jay watched her shrugged, removing her glasses and directly looking at him, "Come closer Jaybird I can't see you." She motioned towards him. Though puzzled Jay complied with her request. If there is one thing that he had learn from their meeting two days ago, that is she could damn well name what he actually needed. However bizarre her ways were. All he has to is to get used to the woman's absurd way in everything.

Leaning closer to Mary, Jay looked at her directly in the eyes, "Is this close enough?" he asked leaving a few inches to breathe between them.

Giving him a smirk, she said, "I didn't know you needed to be this closed to see things."

"What?" appalled at her comment, resisting the urge to strangle the odd woman in front of him, Jay started to step backward. However, before he resigns himself away from her, she reached out and grabbed his nape down, they look at each other intensely, he cringed as he gazed at the humorless eyes of the woman in front of him. He felt like she was angry about something and he just couldn't put his finger as to why.

"Look at me." She whispered not coating the hostility in her voice. "You're disappointing me Detective Sullivan." Her tone was harsh and without any hint of her usual playful mockery. Its' as if he was looking at a whole different person. Someone he could not dare defy. "Look at me and look at me clearly. Tell me that it is my work that is hanging in the tree and praise me. Tell me that I have done a good job. Tell me that you were watching me as well. Tell me that you understand why I did that to your dog." She was gasping for air when she releases him.

"Everything okay?" Gabriel intercepted as he watched the two. He had no idea who Jay was talking with, but he was sure about one thing, this woman can turn his partners' world upside down. He just never knew or thought the she could actually flip the whole world upside down.

The woman put her glasses back and look at him. She looks like a child, and she look somewhat familiar to him. "Gabriel," Jay interrupted as he mused at the woman in front, "meet Mary Williams, Mary Detective Gabriel Crate."

"Nice meeting you Ms. Wlliams." Gabriel said extending his hand for a hand shake.

Jay watched Mary as she looks at him. "I'm surprised you had manners." She commented full of sarcasm. Jay tried to look for the Mary that was talking to him a moment ago. "I couldn't say that at my end Gabriel." She then said pointedly at the hand extended to her.

Gabriel withdraws his hands looking at Jay questioningly. Breaking the awkwardness of the moment Jay coughed and directed his attention to his partner. "Do we know the owner of the dog yet?" he asked.

"That family." Gabriel nodded at the house across the street. Looking at its angle it would give a clear idea that whoever did this make it clear that the owner of the dog would see what he had done.

Jay's eyes narrowed at some realization that had dawn at him.

"You know the dog-"

"-was missing an eyeball." Jay cut off Gabriel while he looks at Mary who gave at him a smug look.

"Took your precious time?" She asked him arrogantly with an eyebrow raise at him.

Jay was somehow confused into how the woman know that much. Gabriel on the other hand was perplexed in the exchanged between the two. Curious into their exchange, Gabriel cleared his throat and look at Jay. "Mind if you share the details?"

Understanding the confusion in his partners' side Jay nodded and once again look at the direction of the house. "Where's the owner?"

"Inside the house. They refuse to say anything. You know there is the other angle."

Jay looked at Gabriel sharply. His heartbeat started hammering in his chest.

"That's right your victims' family had a hard time socializing and mixing in the crowd, even hated by some of the neighbors." Mary started, "And there was this tiny little rumor that the husband is having an affair with the widowed neighbor. To add more into it there's this grape vine about the son being a user and being into a gang." She looks at Jay deeply as if she was conveying more into him more than her words. "Take what you want detective."

Abashed by the knowledge that Mary had, Jay felt the need to know the woman better. Better than comfortable. He could not trust her, but she was always one step ahead of them. And he couldn't deny her word anymore. He needed her. Grabbing her elbow in not so gentlest manner and yanking her close. Jay seared his eyes in her brown eyes, "You are going to talk to me, woman."

A rumble of controlled laughter echoed in her throat. She wasn't even flinching. There wasn't any trace of fear in her eyes. Leaning closer to his ears with that leering smile that Jay ached to erase from the moment he looked at her, she whispered back, "Touché, Jaybird."

***

"Carlos was the most affected. He was- Detective my… I think you already know that there were so many rumors going around our family, and I couldn't deny any of it." Jay was surprised at the neatness inside the house. With the rumors roaming around the neighborhood he was expecting to find a chaotic house, a more unorganized house. He looked at Mrs. Sanchez again. She was small and she looked so fragile in her seat in the cushion.

"How does your husband respond with this incident?" Jay looks keenly at the picture that was displayed in the fireplace. The pictures gave him the idea of how the family runs. There was nowhere in sight of a family picture. The wedding picture was the only picture that the wife and the husband were together. The rest were all single shots. However, one picture had caught his attention.

"James? He never liked the dog." The woman in front of him said dejectedly. "He never like anything Carlos like." She added.

Disinterested about the confession, more of a complaint by Mrs. Sanchez, Jay focuses on the look that Mary had given him before she walks away. He doesn't care about the perspective of the case anymore. There's only one thing that he believed was the reason of the dogs' mutilation and missing eye, and for now he doesn't have any reason not to believe Mary's statement. However, he still couldn't trust her. She was someone who he had to be careful of. He can't read her at all. As if she was showing only things that she wants him to see. She had the ability to make things blurry and yet so clear. He tries to remember the woman that he had first met the Ramshock Café and compare to the woman who, for a very brief time he had a glimpse at. Its' not as if she was hiding that person at all, but he wonders' how many people had felt the coldness of that supposedly warm eyes when he looks at them. She was at that time, as Jay remembered, was capable of doing anything. And with that he admittedly felt the goose bumps in his body.

"Can I talk to your son now ma'am?" Jay intercepted at the non-stop talking of the woman in front of him.

Carlos' mother look a little bit annoyed for being cut-off of her talk. "What does this have to do with my son?"

"I believe it was his dog that was mercilessly hanged on the opposite side of the road ma'am." Jay interjected indicating the photo that he had seen earlier. "I don't wish to alarm you, ma'am but this could be a threat to your son or to your family, so if I may, may I talk to Carlos?"

The woman gasp and she look more afraid now, Jay could even bet by now that if ever he asks if she had any idea who might do this the woman might suggest a few names. "He was in his room." She said and stood up. She doesn't comment any more about the topic of being threatened. Jay followed the woman upstairs. It was still clean. Jay couldn't detect the hypocrisy of the cleanliness of the house. Turning at the left corner the woman knocks at the hard door with a printed paper, written 'Respect'. She knocks three times more, "The Detective want to talk to you Carlos."

Jay waited for the answer in the other room. He could hear the movement inside the room, but it was in no attempt to open the room.

He watched as the boy's mother produces a key from her pocket and inserted it in the keyhole. Feeling the questioning look of the detective beside her she attempts to explain, "He always does this. So I keep the key beside me. Always."

Unable to voice his dislike of the parenting skill of the woman Jay just nodded and silently promising to himself that if ever he had children in their puberty he would never destroy their privacy. No wonder the boy posted that piece of paper in his door.

As Jay expected the room was a big trash can, just like the feeling of the boy in the room, trash. Feeling a tag of sympathy in his gut, Jay cleared his throat and look at the boy that was looking at him. He was about twenty-three years old. And he was wrong for calling him a boy all this time, for the guy who was looking at him with those eyes was a man's eye. He could feel the need to look at that eye, and drown at its depth.

"What do you want?" There was more hate in his tone than the look he gave his mother.

"This is Detective Sullivan he was just going to ask you some questions so you better answer him honestly." His mother answered not noticing the venom in his voice, or if she did she chose to ignore it.

"What do you want?" Carlos repeated as if he was programmed.

The feeling of needing to push the mother away from the scene, Jay directed the woman, "May I have private talk with your son, ma'am?"

Looking shock, the woman says, "I don't see the need of it. I have the right to know what you two were talking about."

Grounding his teeth Jay grasps for a strand of self-control but even before he could speak Carlos did, "She won't let you talk to me alone detective."

Feeling defeated Jay just nodded and walk in the room. He felt suffocated, by just looking at it. He settled and stops at the study table. There were supposed to be computer in his room, but instead it was just lampshade and book and other paper. He saw a picture frame and pick it up, it was Carlos and the dog. Anyone who looks at the picture would know that the dog was really important to him. "What's his name?" Jay asks without looking at Carlos.

"She was Emily."

Acknowledging his mistakes Jay just nodded and looks at the Carlos in the picture. He was smiling and he seemed so happy, which emphasize the magnetism of his eyes. He looks at the Carlos at the room, they look so different. He suddenly wondered if human usual wear too many mask to cover the real them. And if its' so, who's real and who's the clown? "Do you have any idea who did this?"

There was a long silence in the room. He could almost imagine the controlling mother signaling her son some names. "There are a lot of names I could offer you Detective." He said, "But we both know who we were dealing with here."

Curiously Jay look at Carlos. There was this intense seriousness in his voice and his eyes were talking to him, conveying more information than his last words. "I'm a law student Detective."