"Mr. Marshall, I'm sorry to have to tell you this... but your brother Neil was murdered earlier tonight while questioning Joe Darke."
Jake hadn't really heard the words -- just the meaning. He knew something was wrong when they called him down to the department... but he hadn't thought it could be anything like... this.
They gave him Neil's personals in a box -- things not considered evidence due to the sudden nature of the crime. Jake took Neil's cell phone, the framed photographs from his desk, Neil's cactus, and drove his brother's car home.
Everything felt very numb. As if it wasn't really happening. Jake could feel himself going through the motions, but somewhere in his mind he thought for sure that this wasn't real. Maybe... maybe Neil was playing a joke on him. Neil liked pranks.
Jake turned the cell phone off, set it on the coffee table, and called it over and over again to hear Neil's voice.
They were supposed to go out and party that night because of Neil's award. Neil's goddamn award. But Neil had to be a hard worker and he had to question that Darke now and...
He was dead because of it.
Jake went to the alcohol cabinet, stared at it for a long time, and closed it. He didn't feel like drinking. Drinking was what he and Neil were supposed to do together. Jake didn't much care for drinking out of sorrow. It was something you either did to pass the time or because you were celebrating something.
Jake wanted to pass the time. He wanted to pass the time until Neil came back, laughing, telling Jake he "should have seen the look on his face". But Jake knew better -- somewhere in the back of his head.
Instead, he went to take a shower.
Standing under the hot water, Jake sighed, closing his eyes and resting against the tile. He hadn't cried yet, and he felt it build up, but the tears just weren't there -- and they weren't coming.
It didn't make sense.
Getting out, Jake wrapped the towel around his waist and went to the bedroom the two had shared.
Laying there, wet, in the bed, Jake stared up at the ceiling, thinking. He thought about Neil, when they were young together -- Neil coming home with homework, wanting Jake to help him, and Jake making fun of him for being too stupid to figure it out on his own. He almost laughed at the memory. Neil had always been the smarter one. Jake remembered Neil's first girlfriend, how he'd come to Jake for advice on women, and how Jake had told Neil he must be doing something right if all the girls were always asking for him. He thought about the day he'd gotten angry at Neil for copying everything he did, and the way Neil had looked away and sighed, telling Jake he did it because he looked up to him. Jake remembered crying about that -- but he couldn't cry about this.
And then Jake thought about Angel. He wondered if anybody had told her. He actually reached for the phone, got halfway through dialing, and then stopped, dropping it to the floor. Maybe tomorrow.
...If he said it out loud, that would make it real.
The demotion came almost too quickly. Neil's death had been practically covered up. Jake had tried to get close to the details but nobody would give them away. He'd had the only two things he loved in life taken away in an instant, and Angel was nice company, but she had so many other things -- and men -- to attend to.
And Jake was lonely.