Chapter One
Knock,
Knock,
Knock,
Loud knocks arose Ash from her slumber. She groggily trudged down the creaky staircase to the old wooden door, wondering who would want to meet with her this early in the day. As she slowly made her way to the piece of wood, she heard the person beating on the door mumble something to themselves.
She turned the rusty knob and prepared herself for the stranger on the other side.
"Hello?"
She croaked out. She was too exhausted to be polite, and the intruder had rudely awoken her from her peaceful sleep with their absurd knocking.
Taking a glance at the person on the other side, she realized there were not one, but two people standing on her doorway.
A man and a woman to be exact. They wore navy blue suits, with a strange symbol on the chest. From what she could see, the man had been the one to awake her with the furious knocking, seeing as he had his hand in a fist, holding it up as if he were about to knock again.
He had dark chocolate brown hair and sky blue eyes. He lowered his fist and cleared his throat,
"Ahem, your Mrs. Stones, I assume?"
Ash raised an eyebrow and nodded. She was still wary around them, she didn't even know their names, yet they knew hers.
"Yes, and who might you two be?"
This time, it was the woman to speak.
"We apologize if we awoke you, we just had a couple questions."
The woman spoke sincerely enough, she had a soft voice that appeared calming, but still held a formal and strong tone. Her dark brown orbs contrasted with her short, boy cut pale blond hair.
Though they looked as if they didn't mean any harm, she refused to let them into her house to answer the questions they had wanted to ask.
"May we come in?"
The man asked. She reluctantly opened the door a little wider, but not enough for the two bodies to squeeze through.
"First… I would like to know your names."
"Ah, I'm Gregory Jones, and that's Alice."
He pointed to the bleach blond woman to his left. "Alice" bobbed her head in agreement. Deciding they weren't dangerous, and thoroughly scanning their forms for any harmful weapons, she hesitantly opened the door for them to come in.
After setting them down at her small dining table, and asking them if they wanted any tea, she took her steaming cup of hot liquid and sat on the opposite end of the table.
"So… what were these 'questions' you so desperately wanted to ask?"
"Yes, about that, we came to see if you had any information about Mr. Dallen"
Her heart tightened when he spoke of the deceased man. She looked down, unable to look into their eyes.
"What do you need to know?"
"We heard that you were the one to last enter his house, and you knew him personally, correct?"
Gregory spoke, determined to get answers. She looked up, and decided that giving away the information couldn't be that hurtful.
"Well, I had just been in there for a short period of time..."
"Yes, but what did you see?"
She took a deep breath before responding,
"Dusty floors, papers, scratches-"
"Scratches?"
The detail seemed to catch Alice's interest as she questioned the young girl.
"Why would there be scratches? They said there was no signs of a struggle."
She mumbled the last part to herself as she went into her own world trying to find a reasonable answer to the out of place detail.
"Thank you for your time, you were very helpful."
"Uh, thank you?"
Ash responded, slightly confused at the sudden behavior.
"Yes, yes" She mindlessly said as she and her partner speed-walked out of the house.
She heard the door slam shut as she sat there, her once steaming hot tea now cold.
Big thanks to Queeny to make this possible!
