Hard Life

Everything for money

Prologue

My name is Harley Prentiss and I'm one of the grandchildren of the millionaire Dr. Roylott. I have 3 cousins Myra who is married to Brinkerhoff, Justin and William. Myra and Brinkerhoff are acrobats at the Metropole theater at Columbus Circle, Justin works in a printing office and William works at a big company; but all their lives turned upside down when they attempted to kill my grandfather just for money, I never agreed with that, I loved my grandfather but I'll tell you his tragic story.

It all started when my cousins filed for bankruptcy and discovered that my grandfather was a millionaire that could save their ass. They saw their chance of money, so they started planning a way of killing him without looking guilty of murder. Justin and William wanted the murder to look like a suicide, so the asked Myra if they could go to her lake house and hang my grandfather there. Myra invited me and I innocently accepted. When we got there my cousins got together in a room and Brinkerhoff told me that they were going to talk about "grown-up" stuff because I was the youngest one, but obviously I wasn't going to leave so I heard behind the door and they said:

-"Let's start planning Roylott's murder." - said Brinkerhoff.

-"Look this is the plan; Myra its going to strangle and hang him with his own scarf."- said Justin and William.

-"And... what are we going to do with Harley?" - Said Myra.

-"We are going to ..." - said Justin.

I couldn't quite hear what they were saying anymore, so I turned around to go tell my grandpa when they came out of the room.

-"Where are you going Harley?" - asked Myra.

-" Nowhere why?"

-" No reason" - she said and they all kept on walking.

When the night came we build a fire, it was nice outside. Though I wasn't enjoying it because I was alert to every single thing they were going to do to my grandpa, but what I didn't know was that they were going to drug me and pass out.
(This that I will tell you next is what the detective Gideon told me)

They took him to the fire and it was very cold so Myra asked my grandfather if he wanted his scarf and he told her that he wanted it , so she ran to my grandfather's bedroom and grabbed it, everything was already decided when she put it on his neck she strangle him as planned. Then with the help of Justin and William they hung him in his bedroom. After the crime was done everyone went to sleep and when the morning came Myra called the police department. When I woke up my head was killing me and I tried to get out of bed when I heard Myra call the police claiming that my grandfather had committed suicide.

When the detective came I had no idea what had happened or how much my grandfather had suffered. Detective Gideon and his partner began to investigate and question everyone that was at home. Myra was the first questioned and looked very calm, the partner ruled her out just by the simple fact that she had called, but Gideon was not so sure about that. Then they questioned her husband Brinkerhoff, he felt a little nervous, took a few seconds to answer questions and he was sweating as if he had ran a marathon. The third one interrogated was William, he had the same attitude as Myra, even, one might say that he was suffering from my grandfather's death. Justin was next and he looked quite selfless yet he was eager to finish.

The last one to be interrogated was me, to start the detectives believed I was guilty because they noticed I was a little distant from my cousins and I also didn't want to leave my grandfather so I looked like a perso not with regret. However, when they began to question me I told them the whole truth and they found all the evidence they needed, everything matched perfectly, the knot that my grandfather had on his neck was not a knot that eveyone would use, it was identical to those that Myra used to wind her legs in the fabric so she didnt fall, plus all of my cousins had discovered that my grandfather was a millionaire and they needed the money to avoid falling into bankruptcy. Everything matched, the detectives had everything on a silver platter, my cousins were arrested and lost everything, that was an image that will always stay with me.

The murder of my grandfather was something that left me shattered and in disbelieve. My cousins, who I lived with for 17 years of my life, because of greed can become twisted CRIMINAL MINDS...