Joneses – 6.2 White Hat

Detective Eliza Pancakes strutted into the police station early on Monday morning with her head held high as always. She fought for truth, justice, and the Sim way. There was no mountain to high enough for her to climb to get to the bottom of villainous schemes. She wore a white hat and was proud of it.

“G’mornin, Pancakes.”

However, she hadn’t yet recognized that her proverbial white hat was becoming as black as her shirt from this thing she had for Mary Jones. People in her line of worked called it a hard on. She tried to let it ride like Asia suggested, but as of late, she couldn’t get the woman off her mind. She had to figure out what was going on and fast. That morning, instead of going into the office, she hid out in the lab. Her colleagues rarely bothered her anyway, but most of them stayed away from the lab as it was their least favorite part of the job. They often offloaded their evidence analyzing and logging duties onto the lab technician. Eliza, of course, preferred to do the work herself; she said it made her a better detective. She sat at the computer in the lab and began to browse the web. She typed “Mary Jones Newcrest” into the search bar.

She saw articles about Mary’s charity work and her days as a debutante; they bored her.

Click

Hmmm…what’s this? CEO of Newcrest Science Labs, Arnold Jones, and son-in-law part ways—

“Pancakes…”

Eliza was snapped back to reality by her coworker’s voice.

“Chief’s got something big!”

She groaned. “I’ll be right there.”

(sigh)

At the end of Eliza’s shift, she went straight home—something she had grown accustomed to doing lately. She was thinking about Mary the entire way home and could not wait to begin digging into her past again. Breanne was waiting for her on the sidewalk when she got home, so she promptly got out of cop mode.

“Hello, my dear! What are you doing out here?”

“I was just checking to make sure there were no bad guys around. I think we’re pretty safe,” Breanne said with confidence.

“Oh! Is that so? Well, I’m glad that we’re safe, but you shouldn’t look for bad guys by yourself you know. They get really sneaky sometimes. Have you had dinner?”

“Yup.”

“Ok. You get started on your homework, and I’ll help you while I eat.”

Breanne skipped into the house with Eliza in tow. She settled at the end of the table and took out her workbook. Eliza joined her with a plate of leftover spaghetti.

“Did you learn anything interesting today?”

“Probably,” she said nonchalantly.

Eliza chuckled. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Weeeeell, I was thinking… What if my teacher was one of them? That would be pretty scary.”

“I’m pretty sure the principal does a thorough background check on all the teachers, dear.”

“But you said so yourself that they are sneaky! What if they snuck into the school and use it as a hideout? What if my teacher gets caught and has to go to jail? What’s going to happen to my class? (gasp) I’ll have to drop out of school, and then I’ll become one of them! Mommy!”

“Breanne, stop. None of that is going to happen, ok? Not as long as I have anything to do with it. You’re safe, ok? I will always keep you safe.”

“Promise?”

“Of course, dear. Cross my heart!”

“Ok!” She went back to her homework like nothing ever happened.

Eliza watched her inquisitively. She loved how her mind worked, although she didn’t like her to get worked up over things that were beyond her control.

How did someone so colorful comes from two duds like us?