A/n Thank you so much for the support of this fic. I was really struggling with this chapter, but I hope it turned out okay and you all enjoy it!
Your thoughts are always appreciated! ;)
MBRB'xoxo
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"Jesus Christ, Gene. He's not telling us everything that he knows! It's written all over his face!' Alex yelled as she followed Gene through the front door, slamming it firmly behind her and throwing her bag down on the table in the hall with fury right next to the keys that Gene had slammed down moments before.
'Not every bloody case is as complicated as you wish it to be, Bolly. The man shot 'imself. Got in a tonne of debt, realised he was up shit creek without a paddle and put a bullet in his head. There's no case. No investigation. No flaming murder. Just one woman with one less child and a poor bastard who needs to shovel the brains off the floor of that hotel room, okay?' he gulped down the glass of whiskey that he had poured as he had been trying to stop himself shouting the words at Alex and instead keep his voice level. He had, in fact, failed and as Alex stood in the doorway of the kitchen, arms crossed and chest heaving, he rolled his eyes. It was the first time that they had brought their working arguments home and he knew that this one wasn't going to go away too easily.
A suicide had been called in early that morning and the prospect of a whole load of paperwork that he would need to fill out was not a happy one for Gene but they had gone to the scene none-the-less and found exactly what they had been expecting - white male in his mid 20s with the inside of his head decorating the walls and a gun lying happily in the palm of his hand. Gene had taken one glance at the body and had decided that it was case closed. This was suicide and that was that. Alex, however, had seen the young man with everything to live for and had wondered what it was that could have caused him to blow his brains out in a rather expensive hotel room. After trying to bring it up with Gene and being shot down numerous times, Alex had spent the rest of the day looking into the life of Matthew Hunter. She had found out that he had gotten himself into reasonably high debt with the local dealers and had decided that she'd ask a couple questions to his mother whilst delivering the death message. Ruth Hunter had turned out to be a middle-class single mother who doted on her son and was devastated that he had supposedly killed himself. She swore up and down that it was not his style and Matthew was one of those people who, no matter how hard times got, loved living. She had told Alex that there was no way in hell that he had killed himself and had begged her to find out who had taken her son away from her.
'Any woman with a junkie son is going to deny that their precious child has blown themselves to kingdom come' Gene had sighed as she stepped into his office and began to explain that this may not be as open and close that he had originally thought.
'She won't believe it, Gene. She told me that he loved living. He had a girlfriend who he adored and a group of friends that he thought the world of. She says he wouldn't have done that to them. She said he seemed fine when he came to see her yesterday. She said th-'
'She said, she said, she said, Bolly. Did she, by any chance, say that he was up to his eyeballs in debts and needles?' Gene had asked impatiently, waiting for an answer and then turning back to his paperwork when it didn't come. Alex perched on the edge of his desk and took a deep, calming breath before speaking.
'That's another thing. She said he was clean. He called her everyday and came to see her at least 3 times a week because he only lived around the corner and she had never, not once, seen any sign that he was on something' The pointed look that's he was giving him caused Gene to roll his eyes and throw his pen down onto his desk.
'Are you telling me that he didn't owe his local dealers more money than he could earn in a year?'
'No bu-'
'And are you denying that we have seen numerous cases before where a teenager has got themselves in trouble and taken the easy way out?'
'Of course not, bu-'
'I don't want to hear any more about this, Alex. I know you want to be there bloody hero every day of your life and catch the baddie - we all do - but there's no baddie here, Bolls. The bad guy is already splattered over a wall so shut ya lipstick and go do some flaming work' he sniffed haughtily for good measure and then gave out a pissed off sigh as he glanced down and saw his pen had left a nice black ink stain over his forms where he had thrown it down. As Alex stood up and made her way to the door she felt her jaw clenching and tension building in her shoulder. She knew that there was something off about this 'suicide' and she was determind to get to the bottom of it and Gene being a twat was not going to stop her from doing so.
'Bloody woman' she heard him mutter as she was about to open the door of his office and her blood instantly boiled and before she knew it, she was spinning on her heels and fixing Gene with a cold stare.
'You know what, Guv. Do not 'bloody woman' me because YOU threw your pen down and because I want to actually do what the police are supposed to do and investigate a possible murder' the room was in momentary silence as Gene took in her words before he very slowly stood up from his desk and made his way to the space right in front of Alex, his chest puffed out and eyes shining.
'I have told you before, Drake. This is not a murder and you're wasting police time by 'investigating' it'
'It's not a waste of time!' they were nose to nose again and were drawing the attention of the rest of CID who loved a good Hunt-Drake argument to liven the day up.
'Yes it flaming is! And I forbid you to do anymore for this case. You bring the file to me right now and then you sit your arse down at your desk and go through missing persons reports for the Moore case' Alex's look of indignation was one that would have made a lesser man stand down and let her do what she wanted, but not Gene. In reply, Alex ripped open the door of his office and stormed through the checkered CID, throwing a killer look at Webber as she passed her desk which promptly wiped the smug smile off her face.
'Inspector Drake. Where the hell are you going? Drake. DRAKE' but she didn't look back and the slam of his office door signalled to the rest of the team that the argument was now over and they would have to keep their heads down for the rest of the day.
Gene had only seen Alex in passing for the rest of the day and was perfectly aware that she was going against his orders and interviewing, but he had decided that he was going to let the stubborn cow do what the hell she wanted. She was a law unto herself and his options were to a)spend his entire day screaming at her to do what he says and for her to go ahead and do it anyway or B) let her do what she wants in the first place and save himself a whacking great headache. And so he had sat back and watched with one eye on CID and one eye on her as she had brought in the kids bedraggled looking girlfriend and his bedraggled looking girlfriends current boyfriend - it seems teenagers move on fast when it comes to the ways of love. She had filled him in as she had climbed in the passenger seat of the Quattro, saying how the girlfriend didn't seem to be too crazy about Matthew and her and her other fella appeared to be pretty close. She also told him how it wouldn't surprise her if it was the girlfriend, Samantha, who was the addict and her boyfriend seemed to know far more than he was letting on. Which was exactly how it came about that Gene and Alex came home with both of them being pretty pissed off. Alex was sre that she was on to something and was furious that Gene wasn't giving her the time of day, and Gene was livid that she was still flaming well talking.
'Alright Gene. One more question and then I'll let this thing drop' she told him through gritted teeth, moving further into the kitchen as he poured himself another drink. 'Why, if he was going to kill himself, would he pay for a fancy hotel room that he can't afford, just so that he could kill himself in it?' Gene looked down at her, his chin raised slightly and his eyes narrowed. He sniffed before saying;
'Because he wanted to go out with a bang' he said, his eyes brows raised with slight humor at the irony of his words. But Alex didn't find them funny. Letting out a furious scream, she turned away from Gene with her hands twisted in her hair for a second before turning back to him and glaring at him, fuming.
'No. No, I'll tell you why he did that, Gene. He wanted to impress that girlfriend of his and so spent money he didn't have to please her. And my theory is, it wasn't Samantha who turned up, but her other boyfriend who blew his brains out, wiped his prints and then put the gun in his hand so that the half-wit officer that was assigned the case would think it was suicide' She breathed heavily, her eyes flashing as she realised that she was now stood directly in front of Gene and they were nose to nose once more.
'Did you just call me a half-wit, Inspector?' he asked, his voice dangerously low and controlled. It was in that second that Alex knew she had overstepped the mark. She let out a little exhastperated sigh as she said
'No, I didn't mean-'
'Oh I think you did. And I'll tell you what, Drake. I've had about enough of you today. I specifically told you to drop this case and get on with the work you were supposed to be doing, and yet you, DI Drake, decided that in my kingdom, my word is not law. In fact, my word means nothing and so you decided to defy me and go ahead with dragging people in for interviews. Do you really think that's proper conduct? Or is it that you think that because you're shagging me, you can get away with disrespecting your senior officers orders?' his hands were firmly planted in his pockets and his shoulders were back, demanding attention and courtesy.
'I did not 'disrespect' you' she told him stubbornly. She resented him saying that she was taking liberties because they were sharing a bed. 'And I would have done the same thing to any senior officer. The only difference is, any other DCI wouldn't have completely shot me down, and wouldn't have been so flaming pig-headed and would have listened to what I was saying!'
'They wouldn't have listened to you because you were speaking a load of bollocks!'
'Ohhh, fuck off Gene!' she yelled at him, finally having enough of him. She could feel the anger radiating off him and if she hadn't been so tightly wound herself, she would probably have tried to calm him down with soothing words and quiet tones, but as it was, she was highly pissed off. As she turned away from him and headed for the kitchen doorway, she ignored his demands that she stay where she was and not turn her back on him but as she felt his hand tightly wrap around her wrist and felt her body be sharply turned to face him, she had no choice but to 'stay where she was' and listen to what he was saying.
'You are going to stay here and listen to me, Drake. Just because you come into work with your low cut tops and your hooker heels does not give you the right to do whatever the fuck you want. Today was the last time that you are going to be able to waltz around like it's you who owns the place and not me and that starts right now' he fumed, jabbing a finger at the floor to indicate 'now'.
'We're not at work. I am not beneath you now, Gene. We're equal as soon as we step out that office' she shouted at him, her face milimeters from his.
'Wrong. You've brought this shit home, you've brought work into the house, you're responsible for this. My house. My car. My rules. You woman, me man' he spat at her, his grip on her wrist tightening as he shook her slightly by the grip that he had on her. She felt herself become blinded with fury at his words, his sexist comment taking only a splitsecond to sink in before she felt her hand whipping up and catching him sharply around his cheek, filling the room with a loud cracking noise and shocking them both into silence. The silence was only breif as Alex yelped, feeling herself being yanked towards him and then slammed backwards against the wall of the kitchen, the air being forced from her lungs on impact and the sight of Gene's fist being raised and coming towards her. It was the combination of her loud yelp and her terrified eyes that brought him quickly to his senses and stopped him dead in his tracks. His breath came quickly and forcing its way across her face as he tried to get a grip of his temper. Alex stood stone still as he let out a frustrated growl and slammed his fist into the wall next to her shoulder and then fixed his eyes on her once more.
'I wouldn't hit you, Alex' he said, his shoulders slumping and his grip on her wrist loosening as he ran both his hands over his face and rubbed his eyes, his head screaming at him 'but you almost did, didn't you?'. Her deafening silence was worse to him than anything she could have said and he found himself wishing that she was shouting at him uncontrollably again. 'I wouldn't' he repeated in almost a whisper, dropping his hands from his face and staring into her eyes which were still wide. He could see her chest heaving and her hands shaking as they hung by her side, but she still didn't say anything. Gene turned and stepped away from her and braced himself against the counter that he was now infront of, hanging his head before he spoke once more. In a voice so quiet she barely heard it, he said;
'What's happening to us, Bolls?' He wasn't sure if it was a rhetorical question or if he was expecting a reply, but he still found himself surprised when she broke the awful silence that stretched between them with a scared and broken whisper.
'I don't know'
