Charlie White (theshaman) wrote in btvsal, @ 2010-09-28 12:13:00 |
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Current mood: | weird |
Entry tags: | charlotte valentine, place: la, ~august ridley |
Typical?
Who: Charlotte and August
Where: Random street near Charlotte’s home
When: Monday, September 27th - Evening
Charlotte hadn’t had the best day at work today; one of her co-workers had been “axed”. Literally. Leaving her with his case-load. She took on the extra work like a champ and didn’t complain, but still, she wasn’t overly happy about it. Was it odd that she didn’t particularly care that the man died? She pondered thoughtfully, before realizing that she didn’t even know his name. What kind of human being did that make her? As she thought about it she made her way down the sidewalk, walking home for the evening, her heels clicking on the concrete distinctly.
She held her briefcase at her side and wore her usual tight skirt and revealing dress shirt combination, although the slight difference tonight being that she had her hair loose over her shoulders and didn’t have her reading glasses on. She paused in her steps briefly when she heard two people making amazed-yet-horrified sounds and looked over to what held their attention. What she saw was a man atop of a large building, eyes closed...then he wasn’t on the building anymore. She barely had time to step out of the way before he thudded on the sidewalk with a sickening crunch in front of her, his limbs spread at odd angles, blood pooling around his head. Several people squealed with horror. What did she do, you ask? She took a step back from the blood and pulled a small cigar from the tin in her bag, lighting it, she muttered, "Typical."
About an hour and a half later, Detectives Jacob Mitchell and August Ridley finally appeared on the scene to survey the body, evidence, and question the witnesses. August pulled up to the crime scene in his battered Chevy pick-up and hopped out of the cab just as Jacob did and walked with him to take a look at the body. At first glance, it looked consistent with a great fall but they wouldn't know until the coroner submitted his findings in full later. The two detectives went over the scene and then divvied up the witnesses.
The first name on Auggie's list was a Charlotte Valentine from what he saw from his notes. The Werepanther watched her a moment from his vantage point near all the other flatfoots and uniforms. She seemed a little too calm for someone who practically served as a landing pad for a jumper. Her behavior set off a warning bell inside August's head, but that didn't necessarily mean anything. The attractive blond could just be one of those people that dealt with death well.
Auggie approached the smoking woman, noting it was actually a slender cigar between her fingers rather than a typical cigarette. The detective noted and filed that information away. As he pulled his badge from his belt, which was right next to his gun, he held it up to show Charlotte as he quietly asked, "Are you Charlotte Valentine?"
"Yes," she replied, pursing her lips together thoughtfully, quietly assessing him. She briefly thought that he was too young to be a homicide detective, but then, most people would have thought that she was too young to be a lawyer, so she didn’t hold that against him. She took a drag of her cigar, politely pluming the smoke away from him. For someone who worked in an evil law firm, she always worried about little things like that. "Detective...?"
"August Ridley." He pulled out his card and handed it over by way of greeting and answering her inquiry. Auggie flipped open his little notepad and pulled out a pen from the casual brown blazer he wore. He glanced at her again and then said, "Why don't you tell me what you saw, Ms. Valentine."
She read the card carefully and pocketed it, figuring she may need to get in contact with him later. Charlotte considered her answer carefully, although she felt fairly certain that what she witnessed wasn’t a direct result of something from her work and the last thing she wanted was to be thought of as obstructing justice. "Fairly simple, detective. The man was on the roof, he stepped off and gravity took over."
"So you found nothing out of the ordinary?" August asked Charlotte, jotting down her previous answer. He looked up, "Does the name Ronald Archer sound familiar to you, Ms. Valentine?" It had been confirmed by the uniforms on arrival that Mr. Archer was a, now former, resident of Charlotte's apartment building.
Again, Charlotte thought about her answer. In all honesty, she didn’t know people outside of work. She tried to get to know people more recently, but...not hard enough, obviously. "His eyes were closed," she offered. That was one thing that she found slightly odd. Maybe he’d been sleep walking? "And no, that name doesn’t sound familiar." She sounded...so detached when she said that, as if death was something she saw every day.
The detective wrote down Charlotte's strange answer, thinking, Well, that explains why he was in his PJs when he fell or jumped. She didn't seem broken up about this at all. August studied the blond a moment in silence before commenting, "You don't seem terribly upset by Mr. Archer's demise, Ms. Valentine. Why is that, if I may ask?"
She took a drag of her cigar, and again, made sure to plume the smoke away from his face. It was funny how she seemed unconcerned that someone had just died, but was so courteous with the living. "This is Los Angeles, detective. People die all the time," she replied coolly. "Certainly a lot more than usual, recently, don’t you think?"
He kept his face carefully neutral at her "innocent" question. The loss of Warren and his parents was hard to deal with when he was alone, with nothing to do but think. August answered her question with one of his own, "Would it change anything if you were to know that Mr. Archer was a resident in your apartment building?" The detective checked his notes, "I believe he lived in the apartment just above yours."
"It wouldn’t," she replied, perhaps a little too quickly. She stubbed out her cigar and tossed it in the nearest trashcan, before elaborating. "My job doesn’t exactly afford me the luxury of...human attachment." She pulled a card from her breast pocket (which was placed strategically, come to think of it) and handed it to him. It had her name, contact numbers, and Wolfram and Hart’s logo on it. "If you know anything about the company, I’m sure you understand why." She let him interpret that however he would.
August was male and couldn't help that his gaze lingered just slightly on Charlotte's...assests before he gaze flicked to the card he'd taken. He immediately took in the Wolfram and Hart logo, his gaze darting up to meet the blond's again. Of course he understood, but he'd never understand the why. As the shaman for his Pride, Auggie hated going to the lawfirm's building, it wreaked of bad mojo and played havoc on his mystical senses, as it were. As a cop, he hated the lawfirm for keeping many a criminal out of the frying pan.
He gaze dipped down to the card in his hand again just before he slid it into the inner pocket of his blazer. August wasn't going to get anything else out of Charlotte and they both knew it. Still...his question to himself was, was Archer's death purely a coincidence or something connected to Valentine's place of employement? Only the evidence would prove that.
"Thank you for your time, Ms. Valentine. I won't take up any more of it. You have my card if you remember anything else and I have yours if I need to ask you any follow up questions."
"As I said, detective. Gravity. I personally don’t believe that foul play was involved." Well, foul play that involved Wolfram and Hart, but that went unsaid. She had always been careful with how she worded things. It might have been why she was an up-and-comer within the company. She offered him a tiny, sad smile and nodded once, knowing when she was being dismissed. "I’m more than willing to answer any follow-up questions that you might have. I’d prefer it if you contacted me through my personal number. It’s on my card." She pursed her lips together, hoping that he understood that she was being cooperative here, before giving him another brief, courteous nod, and walking off, her heels making that distinct clicking on the sidewalk.