MuSR / Who is the most likely murderer?

question

Who is the most likely murderer?

narrative

In the glitzy, high-stakes world of casinos, Jamal meets a deadly end by frog poison, leaving Detective Winston to weave through a web of deceit with two prime suspects - Kimberly and Lillian.

Winston stood somberly over the roulette table, the stilled wheel now a chilling reminder of the danger that lay in the house's favor. Jamal's empty chair, a token of a dangerous gamble. Too high of a stake, with a godchild as your appointed dealer.

"Lillian, was it?" Winston began, attempting to keep his tone as neutral as possible. The woman before him, a young biologist specializing in amphibians, nodded as she squirmed slightly under his gaze.

"Jamal spoke highly of you," he said, casting an eye towards her drink. She gulped, but stayed silent.

"He trusted you," Winston continued, surveying the crime scene with his trained eye. "Even was seen taking a sip from your very drink there."

Lillian straightened in her chair. "Always giving him advice," Winston mused, a thought dancing at the edge of his vision. "And always willing to try something new."

It wasn't hard to guess that Lillian had always desired more. The lust for power hung around her like an exotic perfume, intoxicating to those in her proximity. She wanted to be Jamal. Jamal, the casino mogul; his elusive empire tantalizingly within reach.

Outside, the neon lights of the casino blinked erratically, casting an eerie greenish hue over the scene. A darting shadow caught Winston's attention - a strange silhouette of a rare species of frog in a glass tank, well-known amongst biologists for its lethal toxins, shimmered in the glow. An interesting pet for a woman so consumed with desire.

"Lillian, you're a herpetologist, we gather?" Winston questioned, inclining his head towards the amphibian. She nodded, a glint appearing in her eyes. "And you've been studying the toxins of this frog for years..."

Dismissing Lillian, Winston surveyed the casino once more. It was a den of decadence, a palace of transient prosperity run by Jamal, the giver of fortunes, who had no other known kin but a science-smitten child drawn to the perilous allure of her amphibian pets.

One clear fact remained. Jamal had listened to Lillian and she... well, she was next in line for his throne. This was not a conjecture but a simple fact an observer might note, just as one might notice the inescapable presence of a rare poison frog in Lillian's possession.

As Winston made his exit from the pulsating hub of the casino, his mind turned over the night's events. Lillian, pacing the casino floor, her eyes on Jamal, and Jamal's undying trust in his favored godchild. Pieces of a puzzle waiting to be fit together. But that, he left strictly for the reader to sort out.

As Winston strolled through the garish neon lights of the casino, he watched the footage replay on the manager's phone. There they were, tucked into the high stake section; Kimberly, a picture-perfect shuffle of a grandma, and Jamal, joyfully throwing himself into the game with wild abandon.

"Yes," the manager confirmed for him. "That’s Kimberly. Her card records place her at the same table as Jamal that night. She didn't leave until the medics arrived for him."

"Interesting," Winston replied, still not looking up from the phone.

The detective continued his rounds, shuffling further into the labyrinth of the casino. Finally, he found the bar. He nodded at the barman, an inquisitive look in his eyes. "Kimberly brought Jamal a drink that night, didn’t she?"

The barman swiped at an imaginary spill as he raised an eyebrow at Winston. "Yeah, she did. One of those fancy drinks." His fingers drummed thoughtfully on the bartop, "She had it delivered to the table he was playing at. He drank it right away too."

Another loose thread to tuck away, perhaps. Winston next stop was Kimberly's house. Neighbors echoed praises about the grandmother, painting her as a caring woman who enjoys watching her grandchildren. Interestingly enough, each grandchild seemed to know her by a different name, and according to the school records, each had a distinct backstory of ‘grandma Kimberly’.

Winston cradled a cup of coffee as he glanced through Kimberly's research papers. Geological, biological, a vast array of topics. But one caught his eye; a detailed study on various poisons, including how much was lethal. Of particular interest was one paper detailing the extraction methods for poison from a highly dangerous frog species.

Flipping through her mail, each letter addressed to a unique mailing address, one for each city Kimberly had grandchildren. Winston noticed the faint hum of an odd contraption in her basement. Upon closer inspection, it was an ornate humidifier. Sitting inside a glass tank, a small frog, the same species she had written about.

"Got yourself a pet frog, Kimberly?" Winston asked, blinking back a sense of unease.  

"Well, yes, I thought it'd be fascinating to own one," Kimberly answered, her voice steady yet pleasant. "After buying it, I've done a lot of reading on it too."

“I can tell,” Winston said, lightly tapping at the glass, his gaze looking upon the venomous creature inside, through the misty veil, before flicking over at Kimberly for a brief moment, "I can tell."

choices

• Lillian
• Kimberly