Unseen Eyes (Part 4)
When I arrived, an officer was stationed outside Felix's hospital room. Inside, Old He was wrapping up his interview.
I peeked through the door. Felix sat on the bed, both hands swathed in bandages, face pale, stubble darkening his jaw, eyes hollow.
A moment later, Old He closed his notebook and stepped out, pulling the door shut behind him.
I briefed him on the crime scene. He rubbed his chin.
"Run with your instincts," he said.
---
Two days later, our canvassing team reported that on the day of the incident, Felix had burst into a hotel and gotten into a physical altercation with Warren.
Hotel staff described it this way: around 9 p.m., Melissa and Warren had entered the lobby together, heading for the front desk. Before they could check in, Felix stormed in, grabbed a chair, and hurled it at Warren.
The attack was so sudden that Warren couldn't react. He went down, bleeding.
Melissa threw herself at Felix, sobbing and begging him to take it home. But Felix wouldn't let up. Warren fought back, and it took two security guards and three bystanders to separate them.
The front desk threatened to call the police. Felix yanked Melissa away and left in a rage.
Warren, pinned against a wall, was beside himself—cursing, vowing to kill Felix.
When staff asked if he needed help, he shook off the guards, pulled out his phone, and stormed out of the hotel.
---
Meanwhile, the forensics report came in on the crime scene, but Warren's autopsy would take longer.
I didn't want to waste time. I asked Felix to come to the bureau for further questioning.
In the interview room, his dark circles were even worse.
I asked if he'd been sleeping.
He shook his head instinctively, then nodded. "I keep seeing her. If I hadn't gone out for beer, maybe she'd still—And that animal, Warren. How does he just get to die?"
I let the comment pass and asked him to walk me through the evening in detail.
Felix was cooperative. According to his account: he'd discovered Warren taking Melissa to a hotel and confronted them. After returning home, he demanded to know why she'd betrayed him. Melissa wouldn't answer—she just stared at her phone.
He snatched it from her hands and saw Warren's messages. In a blind rage, he grabbed her. She scratched his arm—hence the skin under her fingernails.
Per witnesses, around 10 p.m., neighbors heard a man and woman shouting.
Warren's phone records showed that at 22:00, he'd texted Melissa: "I want to see you."
At 22:01, she replied: "We're done."
This aligned with Felix's account.
Felix said that although he'd been furious, he couldn't bring himself to really hurt her. Unable to contain his anger, he'd stormed out, greeting the security guard on his way, and walked to a convenience store for beer and a bite.
The guard confirmed that Felix left the building at roughly 22:20.
At 22:01, as Felix was leaving, Warren texted again: "I'm downstairs."
Melissa responded: "Go away. I don't want to see you."
At 22:24, Felix appeared on the convenience store's security camera. He bought two cans of beer and left. Empty beer bottles with his fingerprints—and the clerk's—were later found in a trash can nearby.
At 22:31, Felix returned to the same store and bought a cup of instant noodles, which he ate inside. He didn't leave until 22:50.
"What happened after that?" I asked.
Felix pressed his palms to his face. "I went home. I knew Melissa must have been tricked by Warren. Whatever happened between them, I could forgive her. I wanted to talk it through. But when I opened the door—Warren was—that animal—"
He'd found Warren crouched over Melissa like a beast.
"Get off her!" Felix shouted.
Warren scrambled to his feet, yanking up his pants.
That was when Felix realized Melissa wasn't moving. Her face was swollen, her skin mottled blue-red.
Instinct kicked in. "Don't move!" he yelled, reaching for his phone to dial 911.
But Warren lunged for the fruit knife on the coffee table and slashed Felix's arm.
Blood sprayed. Warren, wild-eyed, charged again—and stepped in the blood pool. His feet slid out from under him. The back of his skull connected with the glass corner of the coffee table with a sickening crack.
He didn't move again.
Felix abandoned Warren and rushed to Melissa. He performed CPR, but she never responded.
Twenty minutes later, he called the police.
When he finished, Felix buried his face in his hands. "That animal deserved worse than dying. He never even got to pay for what he did to her."
---
Felix
My plan had been perfect.
But the fear kept spreading.
In that cramped, airless interview room, under the flat gazes of two detectives, my ears rang without pause. Sweat soaked my palms and nearly stained my trouser legs.
I wasn't lying—not entirely. My grief over Melissa was real. My hatred for Warren was real. My remorse for everything that had happened was real.
I'd only changed a few details.
I wanted to protect myself. Was that so wrong?
When the detective—the one named Ryan—slid a photograph of the fruit knife across the table and asked whether Warren could have brought it to the scene, I kept my expression neutral.
Seven parts truth. Three parts lie. That's how a lie becomes the truth.
I'd rehearsed it from the moment I walked into that room: everything except the most critical piece would be the truth.
I told him the knife was Melissa's.
He considered this for a few seconds, then asked, "If it's Melissa's knife, why are Warren's fingerprints the only ones on it?"
I shrugged. "She was fastidious about cleaning. Maybe she'd washed it that day."
He asked if I'd been on the balcony at any point that evening.
I shook my head truthfully.
He fell silent, tapping his file folder against his palm. "You weren't on the balcony, which means Melissa must have done the laundry herself. Why would a neat, orderly woman mix dark and light colors and throw in a bath towel?"
I bit the inside of my cheek. "Maybe she was in a hurry to go out and didn't bother sorting."
He stood and began to pace. "Doesn't that strike you as odd? She was supposedly in a rush to get to a hotel. Your arrival was unexpected, which means she must have planned for at least three hours with Warren. If she had time to start a load of laundry, why not choose the two-and-a-half-hour cycle with the dry function? Why leave the clothes sitting wet?"
My temper frayed. "How would I know what she was thinking?"
Bang! He slammed the folder on the table without warning. "Felix, you're lying!"
My body jolted. I looked up instinctively—just as he swung the folder at my head.
I threw my arm up to block it. The folder tapped the outside of my forearm, nowhere near my bandaged wound.
I knocked it away, fury surging. "What the hell are you doing!"
He asked, entirely calm, if that was how Warren had cut me.
I froze.
He went on. "An ordinary person confronted with a sudden attack raises their arm to block, just like you did. Which means—help me understand—why is the cut on your arm angled inward?"
My blood roared in my ears. My face burned. I clenched my fists and forced myself to stay calm. "He charged at me. My attention was on Melissa. Not reacting fast is perfectly normal."
"You want me to believe that a man intent on murder, wielding a knife in his right hand, chose not to stab you, not to knock the phone from your grip, but instead sliced your left forearm—while you were completely unaware?"
I demanded to know why not.
He smiled—an odd, mirthless smile. "You can spin a story, I'll give you that. But your crime scene management is a joke. The plates in the kitchen rack are bone-dry, yet the sink still has water in it. You used it, didn't you? To wash Warren's blood off the trophy."
"That's slander!" My heart hammered so hard my hands went numb. Even my voice stretched thin. "What sink? I never touched the sink! What, now the sink having water is my fault too? Next you'll blame me for the rain."
"Fair enough," he said. His tone pivoted. "When did you use the towel to clean the trophy?"
That was an obvious trap. I wasn't falling for it.
"I didn't clean any trophy! I was cut—I grabbed a towel to stop the bleeding."
He asked, "The towel from the sink rack?"
I couldn't keep the snarl out of my voice. "From the bathroom!"