Chapter 462: Shirking Responsibility

Chapter 462: Chapter 462: Shirking Responsibility

Under the watchful eyes of their neighbors, Morrison and his girlfriend were taken into custody by the police and put into a squad car.

Mr. and Mrs. Morrison followed closely behind, occasionally muttering, "Our son isn’t like this. There must be some misunderstanding."

Noticing the mocking, gossiping gazes of the people around them, the elderly couple’s faces flushed beet red, and they quickened their pace.

Some people noticed Ms. Crawford following them, accompanied by a female police officer who was holding the Morrisons’ young granddaughter.

"Hey, hey, Officer, what’s going on? Why were those two arrested? Can you tell us what happened?"

"Crawford, did you two have a fight? Why did the police suddenly show up?"

Heath Hale and Barry Quinn stepped forward, blocking the crowd’s view of Zoe Sawyer and Ms. Crawford. "Sorry, folks," they said, "this is an active police investigation, so we can’t disclose any details."

Zoe Sawyer gestured for Ms. Crawford to keep up, and they quickly left the area.

Once they arrived at the police station, Mr. and Mrs. Morrison saw their son being led into an interrogation room. They anxiously tried to follow but were stopped by a nearby officer.

When she saw Ms. Crawford approaching with her children, Mrs. Morrison stepped forward. She was just about to ask Ms. Crawford to put in a good word for her son when Heath Hale blocked her view.

"Ma’am, for the sake of the children’s mental well-being, it’s best we don’t discuss this right now.

Why don’t we wait for the police to reach a conclusion?" Heath Hale’s tone was gentle, but he stood firm, blocking Mrs. Morrison’s path to Ms. Crawford.

Mr. Morrison had just turned around when he saw another officer take a step to the side.

He hadn’t moved far, but it was enough to completely obscure Ms. Crawford and her two children from view.

The next moment, Mr. Morrison saw another female officer lead the trio into a reception room off to the side.

’Well, that’s just great,’ he thought. ’Now there’s no one to talk to even if I wanted to.’

In the reception room, Ms. Crawford sat on the sofa, clutching her two children tightly. She looked at Zoe Sawyer with a grateful expression and said, "Thank you all so much. If you hadn’t discovered this and stopped them in time, something terrible would have happened to my children."

Thinking about what might have happened, Ms. Crawford couldn’t hold back her tears.

She was gripped by the terrifying feeling that she had been on the verge of losing her children.

’But it’s over now, so there’s no need to dwell on it. The important thing is that the children are safe.’

Sensing their mother’s fear, the two children leaned in and kissed her cheeks, comforting her in their own way.

"What are you planning to do next?" Zoe Sawyer asked Ms. Crawford.

At the mention of this, Ms. Crawford’s expression turned venomous. "I will never forgive them," she said through gritted teeth. "I’m going to file to modify the custody agreement and make sure they can never, ever see the children again."

’That’s a very real possibility,’ Zoe Sawyer thought. ’Given the heinous nature of this case, Ms. Crawford will most likely get what she wants.’

Meanwhile, Morrison and his girlfriend had been led into separate interrogation rooms.

Morrison, who had been acting tough the whole time, finally began to panic when he saw the stern-faced officers.

’Am I really going to get convicted and sentenced for this?’

’No, no, I have to think of a way out of this!’

’If I’d known, I never would have used WhatsApp to talk about it. It would have been more of a hassle, but we should have just discussed it secretly in person. Then it wouldn’t have been detected, and they wouldn’t have any evidence against me.’

The more Morrison thought about it, the more he regretted his actions, and he began to unconsciously pick at the skin around his fingernails.

The faint sting of pain from his fingers finally snapped him out of his spiraling regret.

"Have you figured out your story?" the interrogating officer said, slamming a hand on the table. "Good. Then stop wasting our time and confess everything."

The sound was jarringly loud in the room, and Morrison flinched.

"It’s a misunderstanding, officers! It’s all a big misunderstanding! We were just shooting our mouths off, just messing around. We never actually intended to kill the children."

"As for the kids’ room, I was planning to replace that part. I only broke it to make it easier to remove. In fact, that’s exactly why I told my parents not to take them in there—I was afraid they might touch it and fall."

"How can you take a spur-of-the-moment conversation seriously?" The more Morrison spoke, the more self-righteous he sounded, until he finally leaned back smugly in his chair.

Seeing his defiant act, the two interrogating officers frowned impatiently. "A discussion that goes on for several months isn’t ’spur-of-the-moment.’ You have shown clear homicidal intent."

"Who would take a discussion like that seriously? You’re just blowing things out of proportion."

"My girlfriend and I were just talking. The kids are fine, we never laid a hand on them. None of what you’re saying has anything to do with us," Morrison continued to deny.

He had it all figured out. The children were unharmed, and they hadn’t actually done anything.

He figured he could use his position as their father, have a nice chat with Linda’s mother, and maybe even be forgiven.

The interrogating officer was about to lose his temper at Morrison’s brazen attitude, but just as he opened his mouth to speak, there was a knock on the door.

Captain Crowe walked in, holding a statement. He said to the interrogating officers, "All right, the other one has confessed. She’s claiming a history of mental illness, saying all those chat logs targeting the children were sent during a psychotic episode and didn’t reflect her true intentions.

She also claims she didn’t know he was married when they first started dating and that she was a victim who was coerced and deceived by Morrison."

Although she had come up with plenty of excuses, Captain Crowe and his team had quickly poked holes in her story using the chat logs.

First off, she couldn’t provide any valid medical records. Moreover, the recovered chat logs showed her repeatedly reminding Morrison to delete sensitive messages. She had also denied the crime multiple times at the beginning of her interview.

Furthermore, the recovered chats revealed a conspiracy with Morrison that spanned several months. During that time, she repeatedly urged him to act quickly, emphasizing that both children had to be killed at the same time.

Captain Crowe also had his team question her colleagues and neighbors. They confirmed that she showed no signs of mental illness in her daily life. Her thinking was clear when answering the police’s questions, and her responses were coherent and to the point.

With this evidence, Captain Crowe dismantled her attempt to feign illness to escape interrogation and extracted the truth from her self-serving, blame-shifting statements.

Realizing she couldn’t get away with it, Morrison’s girlfriend finally broke down and confessed everything.

By the time Captain Crowe came over, he already had her full statement.

He had overheard Morrison stubbornly denying everything, clearly trying to stall, which prompted him to knock, enter, and deliver his little speech.

If Morrison knew that his girlfriend had not only confessed but had also thrown him completely under the bus...

...what would his reaction be?