The Sound of Broken Glass

Charles Hastings has been murdered and Jackson Graves is trying to find out who did it.

Detective Jackson Graves had seen blood before. Blood on pavement. Blood on carpet. Blood smeared across broken windows like some frantic painter’s brushstroke. But there was something different about the kind that seeped into expensive rugs and trailed off into dark paneled studies.

Ashcroft Lane was the kind of neighborhood that dressed its secrets in tailored suits. Manicured hedges lined pristine sidewalks. Porch lights glowed like halos. The quiet here was cultivated; money didn’t just buy privacy, it bought silence.

Jackson parked the unmarked cruiser beneath a leafless oak and stepped out into the chill. November air had teeth. He zipped his coat and approached the house at 117 Ashcroft. Two stories of tastefully lit wealth. The porch light above the door flickered slightly. The door itself hung open, just enough to say: Something went wrong.

He announced himself: "Detective Graves, Boston PD," and pushed the door open.

The first thing he noticed was the vase. Or rather, the lack of it. Shards of glass littered the floor in a semicircle, surrounded by water and the limp bodies of cream colored tulips. A dark stain bled into the edges of an ornate Persian rug.

He followed it. Into the study.

Charles Hastings’s body looked too large for the desk it collapsed over. His face was slack. His eyes were glassy. A letter opener protruded from the base of his neck at an upward angle, as if someone had driven it there during a moment of sudden rage or clumsy self defense. A glass tumbler lay nearby. Scotch. The smell lingered beneath the scent of blood.

Jackson surveyed the room without moving. Walnut bookshelves. Leather chair. Glass case above the mantel, conspicuously empty. The revolver it once displayed was gone, but its shape remained outlined in dust.

He knelt beside the desk. A framed photograph lay on its back. He turned it over. Hastings, mid 40s. A striking woman beside him. A young man in uniform between them. The son, probably. Marines. All of them smiling, frozen in time.

From the hallway came the sound of footsteps on the porch.

“Detective?”

Officer Ray Thomas stepped inside, cradling a notepad. Twenty-six. Eager. Still thought justice was a straight line.

“Secure the scene,” Jackson said. “We’ve got a homicide. Get a list of nearby security cams. Anyone who has a doorbell camera, I want a look at it.”

Ray nodded and retreated.

Jackson turned back to the photograph. Three smiles. One family. Now one murder.

The sound of broken glass echoed faintly behind his ears, a memory or a warning.

He’d seen plenty of crime scenes.

But something about this one felt personal.

And he didn’t yet know why.

Jackson hated waiting on forensics, but he hated guessing more. Back at the precinct, he commandeered a corner of the conference room, the crime scene photos spread out like tarot cards trying to read the past in blood, glass, and silence.

“Hastings was a corporate lawyer,” he murmured to himself, reading from the background file. “Handled mergers. Big money clients. No known enemies. No recent threats.”

Yet someone had stabbed him with enough force to drive a six inch letter opener through the vertebra.

A knock came at the glass.

“Got something,” said Officer Thomas, stepping inside. He handed over a flash drive. “Doorbell cam from two doors down. Timestamped around 11:43 last night. It caught someone heading toward the Hastings place.”

Jackson plugged it in, clicked through the footage. The street was dark but clear. A figure approached the house; male, tall, wearing a dark hoodie. His pace was nervous, fast.

“Can’t get an ID,” Thomas added, “but maybe facial rec can enhance it.”

“Run it,” Jackson said. “Check traffic cams on Ashcroft too. I want to know if he walked in from somewhere or got dropped off.”

Thomas nodded and left.

Jackson leaned back and stared at the blurred image on screen. A visitor. Late at night. Not forced entry, so someone knew him. Family, maybe. A friend.

He picked up the photo again, the one from the study. The son. Military. Proud. A thin line of tension behind his eyes, as if he were already used to bracing for impact.

Jackson flipped through the victim’s call logs. Two calls stood out.
First: 10:04 p.m. to Monica Hastings.
Second: 11:22 p.m. to Jacob Hastings.

Both answered. Both short.

He picked up the phone and dialed the number.

It rang four times before a groggy voice answered.

“Yeah?”

“Jacob Hastings?”

“Who’s this?”

“This is Detective Jackson Graves with the Boston Police Department. I need to ask you a few questions about your father.”

A long pause.

“What happened?”

Jackson waited. “Where are you right now, Jacob?”

“Camp Fairfield. We had drill this weekend. Just got in late.”

“I’m going to need you to stay put. We’ll be sending someone to pick you up.”

Another pause. “Is he okay?”

Jackson didn’t answer. He just ended the call and stared at the screen, where the blurry figure kept walking toward the Hastings house like a ghost returning home.

The forensics report came in just after noon.

“No defensive wounds,” the tech said. “The angle of the stab suggests the victim was seated and didn’t expect it. Clean entry. No hesitation. Also, prints on the letter opener were partial, but one clear enough for a match.”

“Whose?”

“Not in the system. But we got a hit on the glass tumbler. Lip print and partial thumb. Belongs to a Monica Hastings.”

The wife.

Jackson stared at the framed photo again. The woman beside Charles had the kind of beauty that didn’t age out elegant, reserved, with eyes that didn’t quite smile. A lawyer’s wife. A soldier’s mother. Now a potential suspect.

“Where is she?” he asked.

“Checked into a hotel in Back Bay last night. The Four Seasons.”

Jackson was already grabbing his coat.

The suite was upscale and sterile, all white linens and bottled silence. Monica Hastings answered the door in black slacks and a cashmere sweater, her blond hair pulled back, dark circles beneath her eyes like bruises she wasn’t showing.

“Detective Graves,” she said before he introduced himself. “I assume this is about Charles.”

Jackson stepped inside. “Mind if we sit?”

She gestured toward the couch. “You’re here because I left.”

“You’re here,” he corrected, “because your fingerprints are on the glass he drank from right before he was killed. And because you didn’t mention seeing him last night.”

Her composure didn’t crack. But her eyes shifted slightly, a flicker like a cloud over glass.

“I didn’t kill him.”

“Then help me understand what happened.”

She hesitated, fingers twisting a ring on her hand.

“He called me. Around ten. Said we needed to talk. About Jacob. He sounded…off.”

Jackson waited.

“So, I went. I shouldn’t have, but I did. We sat in the study. He poured a drink. I didn’t touch mine. He talked about the past. About how things had gotten so far off track. Then Jacob showed up.”

Jackson’s jaw tightened. “At what time?”

“Just before midnight.”

“Why?”

“Because Charles called him too.”

Jackson nodded slowly. “Go on.”

“They fought. Argued. Jacob wanted answers about money, about the trust Charles had set up but never honored. He’d promised to help Jacob start a business after the Marines. It was supposed to be there. It wasn’t. Charles got angry. Said some things he couldn’t take back.”

“Then what?”

“I left. I couldn’t take it. I thought they’d cool down. I didn’t...” her voice broke for the first time, barely audible. “I didn’t think he’d be dead by morning.”

Jackson stood. “We’ll need Jacob to confirm that.”

Back at the precinct, Jacob Hastings sat stone faced in Interview Two. Not handcuffed, but not free either.

Jackson stepped in, file in hand, photograph tucked beneath.

“You were at the house,” he said. “Your mother confirmed it.”

Jacob didn’t flinch.

“He was drunk,” Jacob said. “I wasn’t.”

“You fought.”

“Yeah.”

“You left him alive?”

“Yes.”

Jackson leaned in. “Then who killed him?”

Jacob looked up, and for the first time, the soldier’s mask cracked. “I thought it might be her. Mom. I found out he cheated on her. Repeatedly. The trust? It was emptied years ago. Legal fees and hush money. I came to confront him. But she had more reason than I did.”

Jackson paused. “She didn’t kill him.”

Jacob narrowed his eyes. “Then who?”

Just then, Officer Thomas stepped into the room.

“Detective,” he said quietly. “The facial recognition results just came in.”

Jackson excused himself, reviewed the enhanced still. It results matched with an Elena Voss.

“Where is she now?” Jackson asked.

“She bought a ticket at South Station ten minutes ago. Bus to Philadelphia. Gate 14.” Officer Thomas responded. then continued, " I took the imitative and looked into her. She was Charles Hastings former assistant that was fired two months ago.

“Pick her up. Now.” Jackson commanded.

Elena Voss sat alone on a hard bench at South Station, fingers clutched around her purse. Officers approached from both sides. She didn’t resist.

Later, in the interrogation room, Jackson sat across from her.

“Elena,” he said gently. “We know you were there. We have your prints. The camera caught you. Tell me what happened.”

Tears spilled freely. “He laughed at me,” she said. “Said I was nothing. That I’d never be believed. He turned his back and walked to the bar, like I was just...background noise.”

Her voice cracked. “I saw the letter opener. I don’t even remember grabbing it. I just...he turned and I...”

She broke down, hands trembling.

“I didn’t mean to kill him.”

Jackson found Jacob alone in the holding room, seated in the corner with his hands clasped between his knees. He looked up when the door opened, eyes wary, jaw tight.

“She confessed,” Jackson said without ceremony.

Jacob didn’t speak. Just blinked, slow and hard.

“Elena Voss,” Jackson continued. “Your father’s former assistant. We ID’d her from enhanced doorbell cam footage. Her prints were on broken glass near the body and matched a partial left on the letter opener. She snapped. Claimed she just wanted to confront him. Didn’t mean to kill him.”

Jacob closed his eyes. “Jesus.”

Jackson waited.

“I thought it might’ve been my mom,” Jacob muttered finally. “Or maybe even me. I’ve replayed it a hundred times since you called.”

“You were angry,” Jackson said evenly. “But you walked away.”

Jacob looked up. “I left him breathing.”

Jackson nodded. “You did.”

Silence settled. Jacob looked away, jaw clenched.

“I loved him,” he said at last. “Even when I hated him.”

Jackson didn’t respond. There was nothing to say to that.

Ashcroft Lane remained quiet. Wealth polished over the cracks. But the sound of broken glass didn’t lie. It spoke of moments that couldn’t be undone. Rage that slipped the leash. Secrets with sharp edges.

In the end, it wasn’t money or betrayal or even war that killed Charles Hastings.

It was a silence stretched too far.

And the sound of it finally shattering.