Chapter 5 - The Interrogation Begins
By two o'clock on New Year’s morning, the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Substation in Minnetonka smelled of stale institutional coffee, damp wet wool, and industrial floor wax. Outside, the blizzard had reached its peak, howling against the reinforced double-pane windows and banking snow five feet high against the police cruisers parked in the lot.
In the waiting area, Bernard sat on a plastic vinyl chair, his eyes fixed on the television mounted in the corner. The screen was muted, showing the Times Square ball drop in New York City—crowds cheering in colorful paper hats, confetti falling through the neon haze. To Bernard, it felt like an image beamed from an alternate, grotesque reality.
Three miles away at North Memorial Hospital, Toby was resting under warm blankets in the pediatric trauma unit. The doctors had confirmed stage two frostbite on his feet, but Marcus’s rapid intervention had saved the boy from losing his toes. Toby’s skin was rewarming, but he was severely dehydrated, twenty-five pounds underweight for his height, and his blood tests showed severe vitamin deficiencies consistent with long-term caloric restriction. A social worker from Child Protective Services was already stationed outside his hospital door.
A door opened at the end of the hall, and Detective Marcus Vance walked out. Vance was a tired-looking man in his late forties with bags under his eyes and a graying beard, holding a thick manila folder under his arm. He spotted Bernard and nodded, gesturing toward a private conference room.
"Mr. Miller? Come on back."
Bernard stood up, his joints popping with a dry sound. He walked into the small room and sat across from the detective at a laminate table.
"How is the boy?" Vance asked first, opening the folder.
"He’ll keep his feet," Bernard said, his voice gravelly. "The doctors say he’s stable. But his mind... his mind is shredded, Detective. He kept apologizing to the nurses for taking up a bed. He asked them if he was going to get whipped for bleeding on the sheets."
Vance grimaced, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "We’ve got Gertrude in holding cell three. She hasn't said a word since we brought her in. Her high-priced defense attorney, Jonathan Harrison, showed up forty minutes ago and told her to keep her mouth shut. She’s claiming the basement room was a 'sensory deprivation space' prescribed by an online holistic therapist to treat Toby’s alleged violent tendencies."
"That’s a damn lie," Bernard growled. "Toby wouldn't hurt a rabbit. He used to spend hours helping me mend broken sparrows in my workshop. That boy doesn't have a cruel bone in his body."
"We know that," Vance said, tapping the manila folder. "Our forensic tech already pulled the footage from that wireless camera in the basement. It wasn't a therapy room, Mr. Miller. It was a domestic black site. We have over forty gigabytes of video showing that boy being locked in there for eighteen hours at a stretch, eating food scraps off paper towels, and being forced to perform calisthenics until he collapsed from exhaustion."
Bernard closed his eyes, his heart hammering against his ribs. "Then charge her. Lock her up and throw the key into Lake Superior."
"Oh, she’s being charged," Vance said grimly. "We’re looking at first-degree child endangerment, aggravated assault, false imprisonment, and kidnapping. But that’s not why I called you back here, Bernard."
Bernard opened his eyes. "What do you mean?"
Vance leaned forward, resting his forearms on the table. "We’ve been interrogating your son, Raymond, for the last ninety minutes in room two. At first, he stuck to Gertrude’s script. He told us he was just an overwhelmed father trying to support a strict disciplinarian wife. He tried to take the fall for the padlock, claiming it was his idea."
"Ray was always weak," Bernard spat bitterly. "Always looking for someone stronger to tell him how to live. When his mother died, he fell apart. When Sarah left him, he fell apart again. But I didn't think he was evil."
"Weak men do terrible things when they're cornered, Bernard," Vance said quietly. "About twenty minutes ago, Raymond broke down. He realized Gertrude’s attorney wasn't there to represent him—Harrison made it very clear he represents Gertrude alone, paid for by her personal accounts. Raymond realized he was about to take twenty years in Stillwater State Prison as the primary abuser while Gertrude walked on bail."
Bernard leaned in, his knuckles turning white on the laminate table. "What did he say, Detective?"
May you like
"Raymond told us the real reason Toby was locked in that basement," Vance said, his voice dropping to a low, somber murmur. "It wasn't about the turkey, Bernard. It wasn't about discipline. It wasn't even about Gertrude’s sick need for control. It was about money. A lot of money. And something that happened three years ago that you were never told about."
***
