Free Last Chance by Bradley Boals Page B

left, she pulled what looked like a keychain from her dresser drawer and tapped it with her finger. She slid the keychain into her pocket, dried the tears from her face, and made her way to the front door.
    April had her hand on the doorknob, composed herself, and cracked open the door. To her surprise, she recognized the face of Keith Kellington. Mr. Kellington was flanked by four security team members, all of whom were large, intimidating men.
    As he panned down the length of her body, a wry grin appeared. “You April 14561?”
    April backed away from the door and replied to the Sector 1 detective, “Yes, sir, I am.”
    “That’s good.” He breezed past April and made his way into the small living room of the apartment, Southern twang in full affect.
    April asked, “Can I help you gentlemen with something?”
    Mr. Kellington replied, “Yes, y’all can, ma’am.” Keith Kellington pulled out a small slip of paper and read it. “Connor 24612 and Matthew 25871; I need to ask ‘em a few questions about what they saw last night.”
    April positioned herself between Mr. Kellington and the door to her bedroom, “I don’t think the boys know anything about what happened last night. I’m not even sure what happened.”
    Mr. Kellington smirked. “Now, ma’am, you can either go get those two boys yourself, or I’ll make you get ‘em. It’s your choice.”
    April cowered back and flashed a quick smile to the detective as she turned her head to her bedroom door and called out, “Boys, please come out here.”
    Both of the boys emerged from the bedroom, as they tried to avoid eye contact with the team of security personnel that looked them over. April put her arms around both of the boys. “Boys, this nice detective needs to ask you a few questions, so make sure you tell him everything you know.”
    Mr. Kellington thanked April and made his first comments to the boys. “I want you to be honest with me, young men, and if you are, this’ll be real simple for the both of y’all. You understand me?” The boys both replied, “Yes, sir.”
    “We have video that shows both of y’all lookin’ out your bedroom winduh around eleven p.m. last night. There were reported light refractions occurring in the warehouse right across from your winduh. Did y’all see those light refractions?”
    The boys tried not to make eye contact with Mr. Kellington and looked at each other. Connor motioned to Matthew to speak up. Matthew cleared his throat and answered, “Well, sir, I’m not sure who you saw on that surveillance tape, but it couldn’t have been us.”
    Connor jumped in. “We were already asleep at ten, and we know the rules about being out of bed after hours.”
    Mr. Kellington walked closer to the boys, a foot from each of them, and confronted the obvious with a firm and adjusted voice, no accent. “You are not answering my question boys. I don’t care when you went to sleep and I don’t care that you know the rules of the sector. I care that you were both up at eleven p.m. last night and that you saw the occurrence of light from that window.”
    Mr. Kellington made his way into the boys’ room and pointed at the exact warehouse window where the boys saw the mysterious bald man the night before.
    “In fact, this is the perfect spot to see what occurred last night; not a tree in sight. The light must have been blinding coming through this window.”
    Connor sucked back some air and found some courage. “We didn’t see anything, sir; honest.”
    Matthew shook his head in agreement. “That’s right, sir. We must have just missed it. We are really heavy sleepers.”
    Mr. Kellington bopped his head up and down and began to lick his teeth with his mouth closed. His accent returned. “I tell y’all what boys, Why don’t you go on back into the bedroom. I need to have a private talk with, Ms. April, right?”
    “Yes, sir.” The boys walked to April’s room but looked back to her multiple times before they got