Chapter 2

"Rise and shine." Det. Hammerson said cheerfully the moment Lilly opened the door. "Sleep well?"

Lilly tried her best to glare at the detective. "No, you kept me wondering all night. How could a case like that run cold? What's different now?"

"That's the beauty of it." Det. Hammerson said quietly. Suddenly, his voice had become less cheerful. "I promise, all will be revealed when we reach the office. At least, everything that we know."

The office was plain and simple, remind Lilly of her own Philadelphia office.

"Hey, there she is." Det. Jeromes immediately got up from his chair. Lilly almost expected him to give her a slap on the back, but none came. "How was your first night in Vancouver?"

"I'm just ready to dive into the case, do what I can." Lilly said honestly.

"Let me introduce you to the team. Here is Det. Robbie Ramones, resident hacker and address/person finder." Det. Jeromes was talking almost a mile a minute. "And over there is Det. Johnny Stelleto, he knows all the stuff that goes on in the city."

"Pleased to meet you." Lilly shook the two detective's hands. She noticed that once again, she was the only female in the room. But that didn't bother her, and it certainly didn't seem to be bugging any of the other guys too.

"Right, so I guess you'll be wanting to hear about the case, am I right?" Det. Jeromes asked.

Lilly nodded.

"So this tale began 8 years ago, in 2004, in a quiet neighbourhood. The whole Wong's family had gone out for the day, the parents separated from their 18 year old daughter. The only one that was home was Mr. Wong's mother. It would be several hours, quite late at night before Mr. and Mrs. Wong returned home to find the grandmother dead on the kitchen floor."

"Autopsy revealed that the grandmother had died due to an overdose of pills. Most likely Tylenol 3." Det. Hammerson added.

"Tylenol 3, don't you have to have a prescription for that?" Lilly inquired.

"Yes you do." Det. Stelleto agreed. "But Vivien, the 18 year old daughter, had gotten her wisdom teeth removed the year before, and received that prescription from her dentist to help ease the pain. She only took a few pills from the whole bottle."

"So naturally, it was thought that the grandmother, Lin Pei Chan, had taken her granddaughter's leftover pills, committing suicide. So case was closed, that was it."

Lilly gave Det. Jeromes a wondering stare. Everything seemed fairly logical to her so far. "So let me guess…you guys think it wasn't suicide?"

"Turns out Vivien is somewhat of an aspiring writer." Det. Ramones sat on the edge of a desk. "Most of them are short stories, poems, pretty good ones I might add. But six months ago, she managed to publish this." He handed Lilly a paperback.

"Skeletons in the Closet." Lilly read the title, and then quickly scanned the back cover. "Big on family secrets, huh?"

"Well, on the surface it seems like a story based on a young girl's ramblings about her own life. It's had a surprising amount of success; apparently there are a lot of people that can relate to the book, or at least the emotions of the girl."

"What caught my attention at least, was what the ramblings were about." Det. Ramones continued.

Lilly was slowly catching on. "A grandmother?"

"Yep."

Lilly understood. "So I guess it seems a bit suspicious after all this time Vivien managed to publish a book possibly about her grandmother. One that potentially reveals all of the hostility and anger towards her."

"That is exactly what we were thinking." Det. Jeromes agreed.

"I also did a little research on her." Det. Ramones said. "Right now Vivien is a med student at the University of British Columbia, just got into residency."

"So any person who was able to get into med school would have had to have a fair bit of ambition and determination." Lilly was starting to fill in the blanks. "With all that anger inside of a normal teenager with that kind of ambition and determination? That may just be a deadly combination."

Det. Stelleto nodded grimly. "And perhaps it was very likely that somehow Mrs. Chan was in the way, and Vivien could see no other alternative but to get rid of her. Permanently."

"However, at this moment we have no solid evidence, only theories." Det. Hammerson spoke up for the first time. "We've interrogated, but so far we've come up short."

"Maybe the best way to take a step forward, is to take a step backward." Lilly suggested.

Det. Hammerson seemed to know exactly what she meant. "Well in that case, I'd say you'd better come and interview our start suspect."