The police arrived within a few minutes of the call, bringing an ambulance, though it would do no good, not with what little was left. After the official call had been made, a detective was quickly summoned to the motel to question the manager.
The detective was young; no more than 25. He introduced himself to the manager as Detective Eric Black. By this point, the manager was quite hammered, having nearly finished the bottle.
"You make it a point to drink on the job, sir?" asked Black, his notepad out, hurredly scribbling notes.
The manager looked at him through bleary eyes, "No, but I'm making an exception tonight."
"Can I get your name, for the record?" asked Black.
"Sam Quentin," he drunkenly replied.
"Did you see the victim tonight?" the detective asked, trying to ignore how trashed the man was; truth be told, he could understand.
"Yeah, when he checked in," Quentin replied, sliding the register to the cop, pointing out the line where he'd signed.
"Was he alone?" Black asked, trying to decipher the name scrawled on the ledger.
"Nah, he was gonna get laid," Quentin told him.
"He had a girl with him?" asked the officer.
"I don't know," Quentin said.
"Sir, you just told me he was getting laid," Black replied.
"Look man, that kid had an ear to ear grin on his face," Quentin replied, sounding rather bored, "There's only one reason a kid grins like that. He was gonna get laid."
"But you never saw his companion?" Black asked.
"Nah; he probably had her in the car," Quentin said matter-of-factly.
"You saw the car?" Black asked, hoping for a solid lead.
"Nope," replied Quentin, taking another pull off the bottle.
"Sir, would you please refrain from drinking during the interview?" Black said, getting frustrated. Quentin put the bottle down with an irritated sigh.
Black stepped back from the counter, getting the attention of one of the junior officers on the scene. "Hey, Pulaski," he said, "Start rounding up the hookers; looks like a pimp got a little carried away." Black turned back to the manager, "Look, sir, you're drunk. You sober up and we'll talk in the morning." Black pushed open the door and headed out, back towards the room to see how the forensic people were doing. Plus, he had other people to interview. Someone had to have seen or heard something.
"Wasn't no pimp," muttered Quentin, "It sure as fuck wasn't human at all." But Black hadn't heard, as he'd already left. "Fuck," mumbled Quentin, turning off the "vacancy" sign. He didn't want to be bothered any more tonight, not by customers, and not by cops. All he wanted to do was drink, and forget about tonight, and the horrible memories it was bringing back.