AN: Thank you guys for reading and to the few that reviewed thank youuu so much. Brendan makes a small appearance in this one lol. I hope you enjoy =)


"Oh come on Ste are you really going to get a drink at 11 in the morning?"

"Yes Doug I am. I barely got any sleep last night and it's going to be a long day. Need something to keep me going."

"It's called coffee, ever heard of it? Besides alcohol won't help, you'll end up worst."

"Well then I'll get some food...and then a drink. Now stop whining and get a move on."

They both had spent all last night going over reports for the hit and run case and didn't come up with much. They knew the car color and specifics about the front lights, so today was going to be spent walking around searching for a car that matched that description. But Ste wanted to start off his work day with a cool beverage...alcoholic beverage. Ste knew exactly where he was going. There was only one club/bar he went to. Chez Chez. He happened to know the owners sister, Cheryl Brady, who was the assistant manager. They met about 4 years ago when he barely had a year under his belt as a cop. He was at the station turning in paperwork and then a rainbow of colors came bursting through the front doors. She talked so fast that Ste gave her a blunt "Slow the fuck down lady." He wasn't that professional back then. Turns out Cheryl's older brother had been arrested and she was there to speak to the arresting officers. Ste didn't ask much questions just pointed her in the right direction. Since then they randomly bumped into each other throughout the years and got close about a year ago. He considered her as one of his close friends. She always invites him to come to the club to relax and whenever he does its free drinks for him. So why wouldn't he come now.

"Hi Love!" There she was dressed in the most eye blinding pink dress you have ever seen. Ste assumed she was wearing 7 inch heels, but she was behind the bar so he couldn't see.

"Hiya Cheryl. How ya been?"

"Doing alright. Hi Doug. Did y'all want a drink or anything? Wait are you working? What did he do?" Cheryl went from joyous to worried in a second.

"What? Who you talking about?"

"Well you got your badges out so I'm guessing y'all are working. Here to ask him questions or something."

Ste stared at her confused for a bit till it finally hit him. Brendan Brady, older brother of Cheryl, owner of Chez Chez, and a complete nutter to be honest. Ste didn't really speak to him much, maybe twice in his whole life. Not to say he hasn't seen him quite often. In and out of the police station. He never dealt with him, it was always other officers. Always being brought in for questioning. Always being released hours later. He was a weird one. Twitchy, cold, angry, tempered, mysterious, unreadable, mad. And definitely dodgy. That's when a light bulb went off in his head.

"No Chez I just wanted a drink that's all. You worry too much."

"Well that comes from being Brendan's sister. Sorry. So what can I get ya."

After a couple minutes of drinking and chatting about useless things, Ste decides to get to work.

"So how was it yesterday here? Thursdays aren't that busy huh."

"Pretty dull really. We had a few rushes come in."

"Least you were well staffed right?"

"Yep it was Warren, Jacqui, Ash, and I. Don't know why I got so many people on Thursday. Silly me I hate doing those rotas."

"Why doesn't Brendan do them? He seems like he can manage that."

"You give him too much credit." They both start laughing with each other. "But no you got a point he should. I'll mention it to him when I see him later."

"It'll relieve some of your stress at least. Why havent you brought it up earlier?"

"Don't see him that long. It's just a quick hug and that's about all the conversation we have."

"He's the owner. Is he not here every night? At least for a few hours where y'all can sit down and talk."

"Some days. We switch off every few days. Like this week he did Monday and Tuesday. And I did Wednesday and Thursday. He had a meeting this morning so I'm just covering for him till he gets back."

"You know when that will be."

"Any second now. Noon."

Ste ended up stalling there till 10 minutes before 12 and then told Cheryl they were off to work.

"See ya chez. I'll text ya later yeah?"

"Yeah love be safe."


Doug takes the lead and starts walking down the street.

"Hold up Doug let's wait here for a second."

"What for? We already wasted an hour that we could have been investigating."

"Who said I wasn't investigating in there?" Ste sees a car pull up to the side of Chez Chez and he looks over at Doug and winks. "See."

"Ah clever. Go on."

Brendan steps out of the car and briefly leans rest his head on the top of the car.

"Rough morning?"

Brendan doesn't even look up at Ste as he gives a muffled grunt into his suit jacket.

"You could say that. Steven. Douglas. What can I do for ya?"

Doug doesn't speak just keeps quiet throughout the conversation as its clear that he and Brendan don't see eye to eye. Ste clears his throat and looks around the place like he's never been there before.

"Nothing was just leaving your club and thought I should be courteous and say hello."

"Well that's...nice of you. Since you said it you can go now."

"We will. Got work to do. But hey that's a nice looking car you got mate. I being thinking of upgrading my car, me. You should see the miles it has. Must be a new record. How's this run for you?"

"It's fine I guess it gets me where I need to go."

"Looks fast. Funny tho seeing how you dress I would have thought you would get a car that stood out you know. But plain gray really?"

"You saying I dress weird? I like my cars to be toned down. I don't want to look like a dick driving a yellow corvette or anything."

"This your only car then."

"Why do you ask?"

"No reason. You look like you would collect them."

"No just this one. And if I ever go on business trips there are rentals."

"Oh right. Anyway I'll let you get off. Cheryl said she was waiting for you to get back."

"Yeah. She's a good sister. Always has my back. So have a good day DI Hay and DI Carter. I hope you find what it is you're looking for."

"What makes you think we're looking for something?"

"I'm not stupid. You make think you're clever kid but you're not. You don't talk to me unless you're investigating something. Let's be clear, word travels pretty fast around here. Have a good day mate. Have fun looking for that car yeah." Brendan gives them both a wolfish smile and then within a second he is back to being a blank canvas. Brendan heads up the stairs and enters his club.

"He creeps me out." Doug finally speaks.

Ste opens his notepad and writes down 'BRENDAN BRADY' in capital letters and underlines it 3 times.

"Alrighty let's get a move on."


They spend hours upon hours searching for any car that might resemble the description and find nothing. They go through parking lots and still nothing. There are tons of black cars but they don't come close to the color they are looking for.

"The guy isn't stupid he probably got rid of it already or is storing it somewhere."

"Yeah this was a long shot Doug. Guess lets go back to the station and hope they have something new."

Ste takes the lead this time as he pulls out a granola bar he had in his pocket. He starts munching away till he's phone goes off. He starts fumbling for it and ends up dropping his phone.

"Ste! You had that phone for 2 weeks now and you're already gonna bust it." Doug picks it up and answers it for him. "DI Carter." Ste keeps on eating looking around for nothing in particular until he hears Doug finish the conversation.

"Who was it?"

"Anne. There's been a body found in the flats down town."

"Of course there has. Run."


They bolt off in the direction of the scene and when they finally get there Doug leans on the wall to catch his breath while Ste subtly falls over on the ground saying he's tripped on a rock as an excuse. When they come back to life they head into the flat. DI Minniveer is writing something in her notebook when they approach her.

"Alright Anne. What's up."

"Hey Ste. Hi Doug. So murder."

"NOOO. And here I thought it was a partay!" Ste moves a little to emphasize.

"How on earth did you become the top DI? It boggles the mind."

"Shut up. Ok serious what we got "

"24 year old male. Name is Joshua Ridgefield. Nurse. We found his scrubs in the bedroom. Shot at least 5 times close range. There's to much blood to see the exact number of shots tho. We see about 3 stab wounds on the neck. His eyeball was almost cut out. His fingers and toes are cut off, and we haven't found them yet. And as you can see they set him on fire, and then put him out. Don't know the exact time of death. But around 12 hours ago."

"That's lovely isn't is?"

"STE!"

"I'm kidding. Sarcasm."

"Anyway there is one bullet wound right on the back of his head. So it was an execution style murder. But we don't know which one of these caused the death."

"Violent murder. He must have been hated. Or gotten on someone's bad books. Did you find any bullet shells. Or knife."

"We got some bullet casings. I think the knife used was just one of the victims kitchen knife and there's 2 missing from the knife stand there, so the murderers most have took them. We also collected the empty match case that they left behind."

"Wait wait. You said murderers. As in plural."

"Yeah sorry Ste but I think you got at least 2 people here."

"Fucking serious. So now were dealing with two murderers. Does this match up to the murder in the park?"

"Has similarities. Remember they cut her fingers off as well. But this victim isn't posed. So may just be a coincidence."

"Great so I might be looking for 3 killers. I wish he would just kill me sometimes. Look was there anything else found. Drugs, notes, money?"

"Nope. Oh and hey there was no forced entry so he knew his killer. The techs are still looking around the flat for any evidence."

The three of them ended up splitting up and looking around at areas that they were allowed to go into. Ste went into the bedroom and looked around. There was blood everywhere. On the bed. On the walls. The floors. It's like the room was painted all red. Hair was stuck on the floor. Glass was lying around from broken vases. It was a struggle to the death. Ste wondered if maybe the victim was able to hurt the killer and maybe their blood was somewhere around here. Or maybe he had their blood under his fingernails. He got excited until he realized that the victim didn't have his fingers anymore. The tech woke him up from his train of thought.

"DI Hay got something." He held up a note with his gloves that was tucked in a drawer in between a journal.

"Thanks. Let me look at it real quick." Ste grabbed it with his own hands covered in gloves and read on.

'Storage 101. 6AM'

Well that didn't help much. Only thing it told him was he was alive at 6 AM. Ste handed it back to the tech and went back to the living room.

"Hey Anne who called this in?"

"Anonymous caller. No one was even around when we got here. Only a couple of the neighbors came out. Officers asked a few questions and didn't get much from them."

"Doug we might have to speak to them see if they seen anything strange recently. Oh wait Anne you know of any storage units around here. It'll have to be a big place, housing maybe 150 units or so."

"Hmm. Only one nearby is about an hour and a half away. I can give you the directions."

"That will be great. Ta."

Anne stepped outside to clean up and get her phone to find the address.

"Why you looking for storage units Ste?"

"Tech found a note in the bedroom. The victim here was to be at storage unit 101 at 6 AM today so we need to find this unit and see if anything is inside."

"Maybe it was just a meet up."

"Eh maybe but I want to see if there was cameras there or not. Maybe catch the killer on tape."

"You think the person that he may have met there followed him here and killed him."

"Maybe. Maybe not. But don't have anything to go on until they take the body and examine it more thoroughly."

As soon as Anne stepped in Ste stopped talking.

"Here ya go Ste directions. Why you need them anyway?"

"I'm planning to store my brand new stereo system in there and have a storage party all night long. Woop woop!"

"You're impossible you know that right. How do you put up with him Doug?"

"You just block him out really."

"Shud up you two. Thanks Anne we have to go tho. We are still investigating the hit and run case from last night. Call me if you find anything else. Thanks again."

"You're welcome. Both of you watch yourselves out there ok. Be safe."

"You too." Ste waves and they remove all the protection they were wearing and clean up before they step outside the flat.

"So Ste why didn't you tell her why you needed the storage address. She's gonna find out anyway"

"No she won't. She doesn't have access to the evidence after its been collected. And it's already in the van being taken away"

"Ok but you didn't answer my first question."

"You talk too much Doug. Someone needs to shut you up. I'll give you a word of advice of what someone taught me years ago before I even became a cop. Never give out to much information to people you think you know. Because those people you think you know might end up being the complete opposite of what you knew. Be aware Doug. Watch for clues. Because you might not notice it at that exact moment but there are clues people drop to their true self. You just gotta pick up on it." Ste looks around the flats one more time and shrugs his shoulders. Ste looks back over to Doug who still looks confused so he adds on. "That and you don't know who is friends with who around here. Can't have things going all over town right." Ste pats Doug on the shoulder and starts walking away in the direction of the station. Doug stares at him as he casually strides down the street.

"Right."


What did y'all think? Too long? Too much dialogue? Let me know. Review. Thanks =)