Chapter 24
When Lucas arrived downstairs for lunch, he discovered Matt, Emily and Barry were already down in the restaurant sitting at a table. They waved him over.
"Hi, we were just discussing about whether we should go and fetch you for some lunch. Obviously we don't need to now!" Matt explained. "Come on, let's get some lunch."
"You just got down here?" Lucas asked.
"Yeah, lunch is served from 11:30 in the hotel." Emily explained.
"Let's hope that the lunch is better than the breakfast anyway!" Barry joked.
***
Lunch was better than breakfast and soon the group were tucking into an unlimited supply of sandwiches, fruit and cake. They were half way through eating when Benson and Paulson interrupted.
"I'm sorry to disturb you, but I need to ask Mr Wolenczak a few questions privately." Benson explained.
"Well, actually Lucas is a minor. I'll have to be present too." Matt explained.
Benson nodded his assent and the two brothers followed the policemen into a private room the hotel had provided them with. Lucas and Matt sat opposite the two detectives.
"Well this may bring up some bad memories for the both of you but understand, I have to ask them, OK?" Benson asked. The pair nodded. "Now Mr Wolenczak, can you think of any reason why anyone would want to hurt Mr Sunderland?"
"No, not that is alive anyway." Lucas replied.
"I'm assuming you're talking about your father, Mr Wolenczak when you said that?" Benson asked.
"Yeah," Lucas softly asked.
"If at any point in this conversation you don't want to answer a question, don't feel pressured to answer it." Paulson intervened. Lucas nodded.
"How long have you been receiving threatening notes like Baz's?" Benson asked, watching for Lucas's reaction.
"I… I haven't been receiving any notes," Lucas said, shocked that he had found out so quickly.
"See now I think you're lying. I think one of those notes we showed you yesterday…" Here Benson laid the two notes on the table in front of them so Lucas could see them. "…Actually belonged to you. So would you like to change your mind on your previous statement, or are you going to stick with what you said?"
Lucas didn't say anything; he sat and stared at the notes, wanting them to disappear. After a while when he realised they weren't going anywhere, Lucas pointed a shaky finger at the first note and simple said,
"Mine!"
Benson sighed with relief. His shot in the dark had worked. Lucas felt embarrassed at having admitted about the notes in front of Matt, but was surprised when his brother pulled him into a tight embrace and began to rock him reassuringly. At first Lucas resisted, but then he relaxed into it.
"We'll talk about this later," Matt whispered.
"OK, now these questions are going to bring up some bad memories for Mr Wolenczak in particular." Paulson warned. The pair nodded, still locked in their embrace. "Now we have to do background checks on all the people involved or related to the patient, in this case it was Mr Sunderland. We did one on both of you and…Well, we know about Mrs Cynthia Adamson, formerly Wolenczak. She was your mother?"
"Lucas's real mother, but she married my dad so she was my mum too." Matt responded for Lucas.
"And she was murdered was she?" Paulson continued.
"Yes," Matt replied, since Lucas looked petrified. "Can we take a short break now alone? I don't think that he is going to answer any more questions in his present state." The detectives consented and left the pair alone to talk.
Matt looked down at the shaking bundle that was his brother. He looked traumatised from the first mention of his mother. It was apparent that he, like himself and Baz, hadn't gotten over the death of his mother and Matt wished that Baz was here. He had always been good with Lucas in these types of situations and Matt was too scared of making mistakes. Knowing he was likely to say something wrong, he gently rocked his brother and mumbled words of comfort hoping he would calm down.
***
Outside the two detectives were talking about the interview.
"How did you know about that note being his?" Paulson asked.
"It was a shot in the dark. I just figured it out from the kid's reaction last night and the hesitation in answering. Last night when we showed him that note, his eyes almost fell out of his head in shock. I think that he gave the note to Mr Sunderland to investigate and someone thought he was getting too close to the truth and silenced him in the only way they could." Benson reasoned.
"Do you think we pushed him too far?" Paulson pondered. "He seemed to get agitated at the mention of his mother's murder."
"Well, that would happen if you were the only witness to your mothers murder," Benson sighed, nodding his head towards the room. "He still can't remember anything today and that murder has become an unsolved mystery. I heard they were gonna reopen the case soon."
"Well, I hope it's not too soon, for his sake." Paulson sympathised.
***
"You feel like talking to them now?" Matt asked. Lucas shrugged his shoulders. "I've got an idea; we'll talk to them as long as they only ask us questions that will help Baz. OK?" There was only another shrug of the shoulders in response from Lucas and Matt sighed. "You're not talking are you?" There was no answer from the troubled teen, who leaned closer into Matt. "I'll take that as a no then."
***
Matt carefully explained to the detectives that they couldn't interview Lucas and told them the reason why. They were angry at themselves for having pushed the young man so far but knew there was nothing they could have done to prevent them. Bidding Matt farewell, they left the hotel. Looking at Lucas, Matt said,
"What am I going to do with you?" Before they walked back to the restaurant together, where the others were worriedly waiting for news.
TBC…