Ulterior Motives

Mysterious Records

Cheryl sat down at her desk, ready to get to work on Toni's case again. It had been 2 days since she had visited her uncle in Austin, and yesterday had been her day off so she hadn't worked on the case for a while.

Deciding to put the Austin lead to the side, Cheryl grabbed the rest of the photos of Toni's room that she hadn't worked through yet. The first one was a picture of the inside of the girl's wardrobe.

She had some dresses, but also some more casual clothes like sweatpants. Overall, there wasn't anything unusual that the cop could see, so she put it to the side.

The next photo was of the shelf above the window by her bed that had the vinyls on. After admiring her taste in music once again, Cheryl read through all of the titles, seeing if anything seemed to be out of the ordinary. Other than the fact that her taste in music seemed to be quite old school, she couldn't find anything.

There was a knock on her door, interrupting the redhead's thoughts.

'Come in,' she called.

Officer Davis' face appeared, his blue eyes searching Cheryl's face for permission to enter. She nodded, so he stepped into the room, walking up to her desk.

'How is the Topaz case going?' He asked. Cheryl had almost forgotten that he was working on the case alongside her, she was grateful that he had let her take the lead though.

'It's okay, a little slow,' she replied, 'so far I found the picture of the rose and the fingerprints that I told you about, then I found a crossword that was half completed, with one of the words saying Austin. Then I found a key that traced to Austin so I went to follow it up, but that led to nothing, so now I am revisiting old photos of her room.'

'Austin seems to have some significance to her, but isn't it strange that she left that key,  rather than taking it with her?' He questioned.

'That is strange I'd never thought about it like that before,' Cheryl realised, beginning to rethink whether it was a true lead at all. Maybe she had planted it there to try and throw everyone off her scent.

Officer Davis moved closer to Cheryl's desk, taking a look at the photo she was looking at of the vinyls.

'Old taste in music,' he commented.

'That's what I thought,' she told him, 'I also found it quite strange that she didn't have a record player anywhere in her room, I couldn't see one in the rest of the house either.'

'Maybe you should ask her-,' he cut himself off.

'-Look at this,' he instructed, pointing to the first vinyl on the shelf, which was 'I will always love you' by Whitney Houston.

'What about it?' she asked, confused.

'All of the other records are in alphabetical order, from 'Airplane' to 'Wannabe', but this one is just placed in front of the first one, not in its place,' he pointed out.

'That is so right!,' she exclaimed, 'how didn't I notice?'

'Because you're just not as awesome as me,' he joked, walking to the door.

'Thanks for your help,' Cheryl told him, choosing to ignore his insult.

So this meant that maybe the song 'I will always love you' meant something to the young girl.

Deciding to follow up this lead, as well as ask whether the family had a vinyl player, Cheryl dialed the number for the Topaz house.

'Hello, it's Officer Blossom,' Cheryl said into the phone.

'Hi, do you have an update for us?' Mr Topaz asked, anxiously anticipating the redhead's response.

'I do, a colleague of mine pointed out Toni's record collection,' she explained, 'at first I didn't notice anything out of the ordinary, until I realised that all of her records are in alphabetical order, other than 'I will always love you' by Whitney Houston. Do you have any idea if this could mean something?'

'I'm not sure we can help you there,' Mr Topaz began, 'she was always very secretive about her collection, she never let anyone touch them. She never listened to them either, we don't own a record player.'

'How bizarre, would you mind if I came to your place to have a closer look at the records? Maybe there is a clue in one or something,' Cheryl asked, eager to find out the truth to this innocent seeming collection. It held all of the secrets and wasn't keen on letting them go.

'Absolutely, we're not home right now, but we can be back in ten,' the kind man said.

Cheryl thanked them and put the phone down, grabbing all of the things she'd need before going to see Officer Davis, since he was the person who had found the clue in the first place.

She knocked on the wooden door, opening it after she heard his voice giving her permission. She found him sitting at the desk, with no papers in front of him, looking very innocent – too innocent?

'What the hell are you up to?' Cheryl asked, giving a nervous chuckle.

'Nothing!' He exclaimed, keeping a straight face, 'what do you want?'

'I was wondering if you'd like to come to the Topaz house to investigate the clue that you found about the vinyl's,' she offered, still slightly skeptical of his mischievous demeanor.

'I though you'd never ask,' he joked, standing up and sliding his blazer on from the back of his chair.

~~~

Author's Notes:

Hmm - what could this strangely placed record lead to?
Or do you think the cops are just clutching at straws at this point, hoping to find something from nothing?
I would really appreciate it if you voted, it helps me out a lot ☺️
Thanks for reading!!