The Black Knight
Miami was muggy and hot; the type of weather where you could feel the sweat of the others around you clogging your skin. The clouds dismally floated like balloons, fat with warm air vapour waiting to combust - the mood of many of her citizens.
Deb.
Dexter.
And pretty much all of Miami Homicide, who were in danger of having their balls served to them on a poor-mans platter.
Two full days had passed since the high schooler's body had been found, and there had been no new leads or developments. The saying, 'no news is good news', definitely didn't resignate. As the Fox news presenter so eloquently put it on last night's late news, 'there isn't a man, woman or child in Miami, whose heart weren't bleeding for their city's fallen angel, and her family, and eagerly wait for her killer to be brought into the light and given his justice'.
Which was bullshit in the reporters mouth, because as over televised as it was, no parent had come forward about a missing daughter, no school about a student, and no eye witnesses - not even the person who found her body. Miami eagerly waited the, 'all clear', so they no longer had to keep their pent up daughters under lock and key.
No news was good for the news networks however; and the longer the media had no new developments to broadcast, the further they stuck that red hot poker up the law enforcements ass'.
Lucky Deb, addressing the media came under her job description - both of them.
And Dexter... Well, you could argue that his balloon had already popped, and that he is now loose hot air trying to desperately put himself back together.
07:30
It's the second day Deb has left the house for work with a heavy heart and silver scarf wrapped and knotted around her neck, to disguise the heavy bruises left by her brother. Her watch, and a chunky aquamarine and silver bracelet do their best to hide the ones on her wrists.
Her hip, her neck, her wrists, her head, and most of all her heart, aches, with every move.
All the consequence of him.
All a far time from fading.
She has Harrison planted on her hip. Not the side with the plump plum-purple and rouge bruise from where Dexter'd gripped her harshly in the lift. Nevertheless, her weighted bag still knocks painfully against it as she tries to manoeuvre everything out the front door.
She had checked only two minutes ago, but still, she wants to be sure. Freshly post-assault, on Thursday, she had only just managed to catch Harrison in time.
It's clear though, and she hurries to her car.
What did it even mean though, him leaving it outside for her...?
Was it a message of what was to come...?
Was he planning on doing that to her...?
She rolls her eyes at herself, tears forming. It's ridiculous as fuck that she's scared to even come out of her own house. To walk carefree in her own city.
She spent two hours on her treadmill last night. She does it to keep fit; and physically she is. But she feels there are too many emotional walls that make her unfit for Harrison.
Someone nervous about stepping out the front door is not what he needs.
She sniffs, and slightly loosens her grip on him. But that only causes him to tighten his.
...
"You 'k Mama?" Harrison asks between Clarence lodged in his mouth, as she fastens him into his car seat.
Her sorrowful eyes stare through her large overt Jackie O sunglasses to focus on her nephew's impartial stare -like his father while he was slowly sucking her life away.
"Yeah Little Man, I'm fine", her mouth smiles, and she hesitantly pats him on the shoulder, as if she is scared to touch him, to pass on her weakness.
"Dada 'urt you?" he asks, as one would ask for Cheerios.
But this is the second time he has asked her since he stopped Dexter from strangling her to death - and she is sure that is what would have happened. But this isn't why she took him. For him to exposed to such horrors; in fact, the exact opposite.
She sighs, and perches on what's left of Harrison's passenger seat. She removes Clarence out of his mouth, and kisses both his palms before leaning in and resting them on her heart.
"Harrison, I want you to listen to me very carefully, OK?" she enunciates each word slowly.
He nods.
"Your Dada he is..." she turns her head to stare out the opposite back passenger window as she fights to find the right words. "Sometimes he forgets how strong he is and how weak Mama is", she explains, making eye contact with him again.
His eyebrows furrow at her answer.
"But did 'urt you?", his frown intensifies, reminding her even more of Dexter. She blinks her gaze away.
"No", she lies for the third time, despite everything, she doesn't want him growing up hating his father. And his son seems to be the only thing that is making Dexter hold on to whatever sanity he has left. "I've already told you baby, he didn't hurt me... I was just... surprised, and so was he, which is why he ran away".
"Surp'ise, like surp'ise birthday?"
"... kind of", she leans in to kiss the frown lines from his face, "don't think about it", she pleads. But moving back she finds that they are still there. So changes tactics and attacks him with a myriad of tickles.
It doesn't disappoint and she laughs heartedly at his giggles, his body and face contorting with glee, and just like that her mood lightens, and she thinks, that today might be a good day after all
08:47
Deb decides that she is going to sit and wait out the traffic to get to her LT spot, because she is in that kind of mood.
But soon her mind drifts to Dexter, and the cold emotionless look in his dead, withered, brown eyes, as he slowly slipped life from her, and she turns into the nearest spot..
In the lift - alone.
Thank fucking fuck it's Friday, Deb sighs. She decides she is going to do something special with Harrison this weekend, something to put his mind at ease, like a regular three year olds should be. It's still troubling him, what he witnessed on Wednesday night. He is a lot quieter, no matter how many times she says, 'Dada didn't hurt Mama'.
...Maybe she'll drive them to Orlando to see Astor and Cody - but then the bruises
Angel is waiting outside the lift when it's doors open. He stares at her expectantly.
"Good morning", Deb asks warily, and starts walking down the corridor. She raises her eyebrows and pulls a face. He looks worse than her, if that is even possible.
"Good morning?" he mumbles behind her, as if reacquainting himself with that word, and quickens to walk in pace with her.
Deb slows, "...can I help you with something?"
Angel slows with her and shakes his head, and shrugs his lips, like he is confused by her question.
"...OK", she half chuckles, resuming pace to her office, Angel in tow.
"Late night?" she asks, a wave of guilt washing over her when she spots Quinn, and their newest detective to homicide, transferred from Vice, Miller, both napping on their desks with paper work strewn around them. Nothing more important in their worlds than their work and finding justice. It was only a couple of months ago that that was her. Underpaid for all the tireless and sleepless nights, endless hours of desk work and phone calls, life constantly on the line while on the field.
It was a far cry from what her life was becoming. And a part of her longed to return to that simplicity, that excitement.
Angel laughs good heartedly, "more like very early morning".
"Anything?"
Angel lets out a frustrated ghust of breath - no.
"Shit. You would hope that a school, more so parents would know when their child has been missing for two days".
She stops to lean over Quinn.
"Maybe she isn't a child?"
She reaches for the abandoned phone receiver, inches away from his hand, back.
"The uniform a costume?" she toys the ides in her mind before looking up in the direction of hers - well Angel's office. Although neither have moved their stuff in or out. Maybe he is waiting for her to make the first move; to be honest, she is not looking forward to being so far away from her colleagues that she has has come to know and love as her family... well, what's left of them.
"Maybe - Who the fuck is that is my office?" she points.
As long her stuff is in there, it is still her office.
"Lieutenant Winslop, Miami Vice", Angel introduces.
Oh, she squints at the blurred figure.
"...What's he doing in my office?"
Angel proudly smiles and nods at the same time, like he is just about to tell her the cure for cancer.
"Miller. Miller found links between the dead high schooler", she frowns at Angel's impersonality, but then again it's been a late night, "and a few other cases she investigated on while in Vice over trafficking".
Deb frowns, pissed off she is only just hearing about this, but at the same time relieved, because trafficking has nothing to do with Dexter.
"Links how?" She clears her throat, mouth dry, palms sweaty in anticipation.
"At the moment, nothing more than the visual similarities between the victims".
Deb twitches her lips. Hardly a cause of celebration, or for her to put her mind at ease over Dexter.
Angel must notice her dissatisfaction because he adds how it is at least a start.
"It is", she says as assuring as she can. "Do we know anything more about who the vi-"
"No, forensics hasn't come through yet-"
Because its one member down.
"-but should soon...".
She nods and smiles, grateful that Angel hasn't asked her where Dexter is. "Good. Good work, and so...", she motions back to her office, "he is in my office because..."
"With both your permission, we would like for Vice and Homicide to work together. Get this son of a bitch as quick as possible...".
What else can Deb do but nod and agree, "but, that's a decision you could have made, LT", she smiles.
...
"Lieut-", Angel starts to address but is cut off.
"Morgan-", Winslop orders, stops, chuckles, holds his hands up in an apology that Deb can see straight through.
"I'm sorry. Force of habit. Lieutenant Morgan", his hands rest on the hips of his belt, while his cool eyes judge her closely, "soon... to be captain of homicide, I hear".
Deb tries to force a smile at the man she used to work under, who takes the opportunity to inspect her, up and down.
"My, my, my, little Debra Morgan", he continues, sweeping a hand through his blonde curls; "rookie cop, eight years later, you've made your way to captain. Harry would be proud. Just shows, it's not what you know, but who".
11:42
Introductions were brief, a team of twelve combined with Vice and Homicide now agglomerated in the main conference room. Although, with very distinct sides. Miller loiters in the middle.
Angel heads the meeting, Deb perches on the edge of the desk positioned on the left side of the room, doing everything to avert the watchful eye of Winslop, perching on the right.
She inspects the team. Aside from said bastard, she recognises only three others from Vice. A Chino-Latina American, Richards; she is around the same age as her and also joined the force around the same time. It looks like she has tried to die her hair blonde, but has ended up an interesting shade of ginger, which isn't all together unpleasant. Richard's was actually one of the undercover cops that worked the trafficking case with her, that lead her to Rudy, homicide ... and Dexter, the true Dexter, and everything that came with that more bitter than sweet package.
Scrap that - where is the sweet in his truth? Only in his facade.
And so Deb begins to drift off to imagine a life still in Vice; where she in none the wiser about her brother's true colours, or hers towards him.
She shakes her head out of its day dream in frustration, and rather annoyingly makes eye contact with Winslop, who is still staring at her, albeit now with a slight frown on his face.
She scowls at him, and resumes her inspection of the rest of the team. Homicide were actually two members short in the team. Dexter, and Masuka called in sick...?
"OK", Angel starts with a sigh, "so forensics still hasn't come through-", he waits for the disgruntled mutters to die down.
"And neither has the victim's school or her parents"' he lets the statement hang in the air before continuing, "so we're attacking this blindly guys. Miller-", he indicates, and she nods, her twists still bouncing slightly after the movement, "is why we are all here, and before I pass her over to you-".
There is a quiet knock on the door, before its opened. Deb indulges for a moment that maybe it's Dexter...
But it isn't.
13:07
"Miss Lee", Deb hesitantly brushes her fingers on the distraught woman's clothed shoulder, blocking out the image of the dead victim slabbed, skin slightly sagged, on the left of her.
The thirty something year old is hyperventilating, gasping for breath.
Tears and black mascara streaming down her well chiseled face.
She shakes her head, a few loose long black hairs stick to her sodden face.
"No", cries with a heavy East Asian accent, gasps, then lets out a laugh of absolute relief.
"It is not her. No my Elsie".
She laughs again, clamping a hand around her mouth.
Deb shakes her head and the blinds shut the image out.
"I sorry", Miss Lee apologises, her voice going really serious. "It is so bad of me. It is someone's child. I just", she cries, "I'm just so happy it is not mine", she grabs Deb and drowns her tears in her shirt.
Shocked by the sudden and odd embrace, Deb slowly loosens, returning the petite woman's affection. She catches sight of a collection of deep black bruises over her shoulder blades through, and is careful not to put pressure on them.
14:22
"Miss Lee", Deb hears Lieutenant Winslop, seated behind her, address the calmed woman sitting in the chair in front of her. "Before we let you go, is there any more information you can think of that will help us finding your daughter?"
Perching on the edge of her desk, with her back to Winslop; Deb is a bit like piggy in the middle; trying not to fuck off at Winslop for carrying on Miss Lee's meeting in her office, sat in her chair.
"No, like I say, she just didn't come home on Monday evening. When I call her school on Tuesday, they say she hadn't been in-"
"And you say this is normal".
Miss Lee downcasts her eyes, and nods.
"She hadn't been at school all of the week before either".
No.
"The school hadn't called you because your daughters' unattendance is normal"
Miss Lee nods her head and Deb grits her teeth.
"And you have no idea where your daughter may have been?"
She shakes her head; her palms open helplessly.
"And your daughters' father", he glances back at his hand written statement sheet in front of him, "has gone back to the Netherlands".
Deb turns and shoots Winslop a look, who returns it, just as cooly.
"No, I work from six in the mor-", she goes to repeat information Winslop already knows, sighs, "no", and shamefully averts her eyes to the far back corner of Deb's office.
"And you left it until today to-"
"Miss Lee", Deb pipes in, having enough of listening to Winslop berate this woman. "I think we have everything. Let me show you out".
Deb walks a be-trodden Miss Lee to the lift, and calls it for her.
They stand in silence.
"You might want to see someone about those bruises on your back", Deb whispers.
The lift arrives, and Miss Lee smiles sympathetically, glancing at the not needed scarf around her neck, and her long sleeve work shirt in this humid Miami weather.
...
Dexter is at the forefront of her mind when she reaches back to her office.
Angry at what he has let her become - not the obvious, but a victim. A victim who she spent countless years in Vice not understanding why these women would just let it happen, let these men get away with beating them, narcotics, trafficking, and other crimes, while they just allowed and observed silently.
But today she has realised, she has become one of those women.
Not only is she unfit for Harrison, but her job.
Her eyes eventually wake up to find the cool eyes of Winslop, watching her carefully. Still sat in her chair; his hands twitch on the edge of her desk.
"Get the fuck out of my chair", she snaps.
He smiles and waltzes over to her, but she refuses to make eye contact.
"She looks a bit like you", he says over the photograph Miss Lee left of her daughter, and lets it drop to the floor.
She hears Winslop close the door behind him.
Instantly, her phone alarm goes off. She digs it out, Harrison's face covers the screen, and in that moment, Deb realises that she will never be rid of Dexter. There will always be something there to remind her.
His son.
21:03
Deb has done her best to make her spare room, which now acts as Harrison's room, as homey as possible. Like how her own mother made hers The double sofa bed, fully pulled out and made with light blue bedding, for a boy. Her desk lamp for a night light; the clothes that she managed to pack in her haste sparsely fill the chest of drawers, and a tan wicker basket is semi full of what toys. His latest artworks from nursery sporadically but proudly presented on the bare white walls.
"Dada come back?" Leaning out of her goodnight kiss, Deb jumps slightly over Harrison's question. Bathed, sweet smelling and ready for bed in only his pull ups, because it is too humid to wear anything else.
"Uhm...", Deb looks into her nephews hopeful eyes, "maybe". She rubs a thumb across his forehead lovingly, happy to see his frown lines from this morning have disappeared after a day at nursery and evening at the beach.
Only a sheet covers his small body, and she tucks it closer to his chin, before ruffling his soft blonde hair, which like his father's does, is starting to curl at then end with its length.
"Your Dada loves you", she leans in to give him a kiss on his forehead, "so much", breathing in his scent.
"'Ou 'ove Dada?"
She pulls away, it's an innocent question, and he seems interested in her answer.
She plants a couple more kisses on his forehead.
"Yes I do", she says truthfully.
22:37
Deb decided to call it a night on the treadmill.
Friday night, and Deb is at home going through paperwork. She never thought she would see the day, but then a three year old is not really an accessory you can take to a bar. Not that anyone was going out either, they all felt pretty shitty about not getting anywhere with this dead high schooler.
With one in front of her; Deb glances at the pile of cardboard boxes she brought back from the office, that she still has to sift through.
She has decided to make the first move, and give Angel his deserved LT office come Monday. Although, she hadn't really unpacked or packed the office with personal affects, so only one of the boxes is actually hers. The rest were La Guerta's paperwork.
She has a small plastic bag to the right of her, filled with evidence to shred, or better, burn. She would just trash all of it, but she is interested to find out what La Guerta has found about her brother, that she is clueless too.
'Shoot him, shoot him Deb'
The gun pointed at her Dexter shakes in her hand.
'Shoot him like the dog that he is'
I CAN'T!
Her mind is, for the second time this evening, wandering back to Dexter and that evening - when it slips back to the present, to take a better look at the image in front of her
She frowns bringing it closer.
Squinting at the faces, she can't believe she recognises.
Her eyes blink in surprise.
"Fuck!"
She drops the photograph.
"Fuck?"
She picks it up again, only to drop it off again.
"Fuckity fuck fuck fuck", she stands abruptly, and makes way to the door to run, barefoot? And where? She doesn't know.
But can't.
Harrison.
Hesitantly, she picks the photograph up again. There, as clear as day is Laura Moser, Thomas Matthews, Matthew's wife, Doris, her father, a very young Dexter, and a few other faces, now aged that she recognises.
Her father's arm is wrapped around Laura Moser.
A proud protective arm resting on Dexter's shoulder.
I don't know where Dexter is? Got any darkly disturbing ideas, of where he would run to, or what he would do to punish himself after he almost killed the most important person in his life? I have a few, but I am open to ideas.
So... Winslop? The photograph? Masuka - ill? Most importantly, where is Dexter?
Sorry for any typos.
Let me know your thoughts