Woo hoo! Another chapter so soon! it just goes to show how strange writer's block can be... lol
Rookie Blue returns tonight! How brutal were the last three weeks, huh? Damn!
Remember, I'm not the owner of Rookie Blue or any of its characters, though I wish I was! Then I'd be able to meet Missy! :)
[Chapter 9]
The Black Penny was still quite full of police officers and detectives when Luke nearly stumbled out of the cab in front of the bar. He turned, threw a few tens at the driver and walked purposefully, albeit shakily, toward the front door.
Sam had his arm around Andy's shoulders, listening contentedly to Tracy's retelling of an interesting arrest she had made earlier that day, when he saw something out of the corner of his eye that he would have rather not seen that night: Luke. Normally, he wouldn't have worried about the detective's presence in the bar, but seeing how noticeably drunk he was, barely able to walk straight, and how he looked at their table with a determined gleam in his eye, Sam knew he needed to stop him before he got any closer to Andy.
Kissing her temple briefly, he rose from his chair and put a hand out, stopping Luke dead in his tracks.
Luke blinked a few times, then said, "I have to tell her."
"You've told her enough, buddy," Sam replied, patting Luke on the shoulder roughly and trying to turn him away from Andy's direction of view. His hand stayed on Luke's shoulder in a move that would have told a sober man to back the fuck off. Of course, Luke hadn't been sober for hours now.
"No, no, I have to tell her something important," Luke continued, attempting to swerve out of Sam's grip but failing miserably.
"Why don't you tell me, and I'll tell her, alright?" Sam said, trying to appease the drunken man before him. Normally, he would have already told Luke off, but something about this particular bout of drunkenness told Sam to be a little easier on him. Luke's eyes weren't completely without purpose; he was there for a reason and it looked important, at least to Luke.
"But I need to tell Andy…" Luke hiccupped, the taste of whiskey returning to his mouth. He swallowed, then said, "the Slasher…" and put his hand over his mouth, looking ready to puke.
Sam was shocked. What did Luke know about Andy's potential connection with the Yonge Street Slasher? He had to know.
He needed to get Luke out of the bar before he made a scene and potentially revealed some damaging information. He glanced around; all of their colleagues hadn't yet noticed Luke. Sam wanted to keep it that way, so he patted Luke's back less roughly this time and began to guide him to the back alley exit.
"OK, let's get you some air, buddy. Alright?" To an outsider, Sam looked like a concerned friend, but to Andy, who had been watching the whole exchange, knew that there was more to it than that. But instead of following her ex-fiancé and current boyfriend out of the bar, she decided to wait for Sam to return to ask him about it. She had had enough of Luke's professions of love to last a lifetime. Her mind returned her to that night when she was taking down tequila shots, preparing herself mentally to ask Sam out, when Luke barged into their conversation…
"Sorry to disturb you. Andy, can I talk to you for a minute?" Luke asked, his face full of contrition.
Andy looked at him incredulously, like she was amazed that he had the nerve to interrupt their conversation. It could have been the tequila's influence, but instead of telling him off like she normally would have, she sighed and said, "Yeah, sure." She turned back to Sam, giving him a small smile. "I'll be right back."
Sam nodded silently, trying not to grimace at his frustration, and watched as Luke and Andy walked away from him and took seats at an empty booth to have a talk that Sam wished, even in his buzzed state, he could hear with perfect clarity.
"So, how are you doing these days?" Luke began, his hands folded neatly before him on the table.
Andy smiled politely and replied, "Good. You?" It wasn't that she particularly cared; she was only trying to be pleasant. There was no sense in being rude, despite the fact that Luke had stomped all over her heart only a few months before when he had cheated with his ex, Jo.
Luke took a deep breath and closed his eyes. When he opened them, she could tell he was a bit nervous. "Andy, I don't want to beat around the bush," he started again, reaching toward Andy's hands across the table. "I miss you, Andy."
Andy scowled. "It's too late for that, Luke. You know we're done. We were done for a long time, even before you cheated on me."
Luke didn't seem phased by Andy's reply. "Jo meant nothing to me, Andy. I love you. I want to marry you."
Andy leaned back and pulled her hands away from his as if she had been burned by his touch.
"No, you don't. You love yourself, and aren't ready to marry anyone." She shook her head and started shimmying out of the booth they were occupying. "We're done here."
She stepped out of the booth with a bit of a wobble to her step from the tequila, but was pulled back by a strong hand holding her forearm. She turned to see Luke looking down at her.
"Seriously?" she said wearily. She tried moving away from him, but his grip remained firm. Plus, her buzz was preventing her full strength from stopping the whole situation.
His fingers tightened around her arm as he said, "I need you, Andy. You know you need me, too. It was a mistake, what I did with Jo. She doesn't mean anything."
"It doesn't matter anymore. It's over, Luke. Now let me go." Andy tried again to pull away, but was again met with resistance. There was definitely going to be bruises where Luke's fingers dug into her skin.
"No!" Luke said loudly.
Sam, who had been watching the whole scene from his barstool and had gotten up from his seat the instant Luke had put his hand on Andy's arm, took a few steps to where the exes were standing and raised a hand.
"Luke, I'm pretty sure Andy told you to let her go. You'd better do what she says."
Luke heard the words and looked down at his hand, still securely wrapped around Andy's forearm.
"Or what, Swarek?"Luke retorted maliciously.
"Buddy, you know as well as I do that this place is full of cops." To stress his point, he motioned around him with his head. "You really want to jeopardize your career over the fact that you can't keep it in your pants?"
Having his mistake brought up by the likes of Swarek wasn't something he wanted to hear. Enraged, he released Andy and was about to lunge toward Swarek when Sergeant Best stepped between the two men.
"I suggest that you walk it off, Detective. Now." His voice boomed with authority as he glared at Luke. Suddenly very aware of the potential repercussions of his actions, Luke gave Andy one final look, and Sam one final glare, before stalking away and out of the bar.
"You alright, McNally?" Best asked Andy as she rubbed her forearm to get the feeling back into it. Andy released the breath she was holding when Sam began his intervention and nodded.
"Yeah, thanks, Sarge," Andy replied, giving her superior a thankful smile.
Best gave a nod to Sam before heading back to his own table where Noelle and Jerry sat.
Sam stepped forward and briefly touched Andy's hand. "You sure you're OK?" he asked.
Andy nodded. "Just a bit taken aback."
"I can't believe his nerve," Sam huffed, looking toward the door Luke begrudgingly exited moments earlier.
"Yeah, now he fights for me." She laughed humourlessly with a shake of her head.
"He's an idiot," Sam replied, returning his gaze to the beautiful, slightly intoxicated woman before him.
"No, I'm the idiot, thinking that it would ever work with him."
Sam sighed and shook his head. "You were in love or whatever. It happens."
"I don't think I ever really was. Anyway, I think my problem is that I need to pick 'em better, that's all," Andy said, looking up at Sam, whose physical proximity was causing her to remember why she was drinking at all this evening. Something about courage in a bottle… "Uh, I think I actually already have picked better…" she trailed off, waiting to see what Sam would reply. Sam's eyes lit up ever so slightly. Had Andy not been so close, she wouldn't have noticed the change in them.
"Yeah? Anyone I know?"
This was it. She couldn't very well continue without implying to Sam that she was talking about him; it would have been cowardly. Not Andy-like at all.
"Tall, dark, and handsome. Killer dimples." She was on a roll, and she wasn't stopping until she finally said what she needed to say to him. "Want to, uh, get a drink with me?" The tequila had made her brave.
Sam had to chuckle at Andy's drunken awkwardness. "I think you've had enough drinks for one night. But how about breakfast tomorrow, just you and me?"
As Andy's mind returned to the night that she finally garnered the courage to ask Sam out, the two men went out the back entrance to get some air.
Sam kept a watchful eye on Luke as they exited the bar and headed for the alley. Luke hadn't looked so hot before he suggested they go outside, so he knew he was going to let it all out so to speak, very soon.
Luke stepped out first. Once the fresh air hit his nostrils, he breathed deeply and felt slightly better. At least he wasn't on the verge of puking out all the whiskey he'd had earlier. Typically, Luke was able to hold his liquor quite well, but the heavy amount of whiskey combined with the devastating news he had come to deliver had made him anxious—horrible to combine with alcohol.
There were three other bar patrons outside huddled together having a cigarette. Angling himself and Luke away from the smokers, Sam waited for Luke to take a few more deep breaths before barraging him with questions.
Finally confident that Luke wasn't going to be sick, he began in a quiet but forceful tone to ensure the others couldn't overhear anything. "What do you know about the Slasher?"
Luke scowled. "I should be telling Andy, not you." His voice was loud and boisterous again. Sam shushed him with a motion of his hands.
"No, tell me what you know first. If it's important, I'll tell Andy. And keep your goddamn voice down!" he scolded in a loud whisper.
"It IS important," Luke replied in a subdued tone, sounding more like an insolent child than a highly regarded detective.
"So tell me." Sam wasn't budging, and Luke knew this. He also knew the severity of the news he had to share, regardless of his level of inebriation. Luke sighed in defeat. As the effects of the alcohol were slowly diminishing, so, too, was Luke's determination to speak only to Andy regarding this shocking news. Luke knew that the only way to get to Andy these days was through Swarek, so he proceeded.
"I was going through the Slasher file again tonight, and someone had left Carol McNally's DNA profile in there, too. I didn't understand why until I compared the two. They have similar DNA markers. She was the Slasher's mother."
"Fuck," Sam said quietly. Internally, Sam was fuming; Jerry was going to take an earful from Sam the next time he got a chance. How could he be so fucking careless with DNA profiles?
Luke watched Sam's reaction and came to a quick conclusion. "You knew." It wasn't a question.
"I suspected," Sam corrected with a sigh. "She suspects, too. Goddamnit," he muttered. Sam ran his fingers through his hair slowly and let out a long, exasperated breath.
"Tommy didn't have any other kids besides Andy, right?" Luke asked, folding his arms across his chest. Sam shook his head.
"At least not that we know of," Sam replied, leaning up against the brick wall behind them, his hands in tight fists at his side. "It could have been a kid she had before she was with Tommy, but Andy never really talked about her mother, so we don't know anything about her besides the fact that she left. We should run a background check on her life before she married Tommy."
The sudden sound of the heavy steel door to the bar slamming shut startled Luke and Sam. Sam was relieved that the smokers in the alley had finally gone back inside the Black Penny and were leaving them alone to continue their secretive discussion.
"I can do the background check."
"What I don't understand is why the DNA profiles were together in the first place."
Sam grunted in annoyance. "Andy asked Jerry to compare the two. He must have left the profile in the Slasher's file. I'll deal with Jerry. Did anyone else see the file before you today?"
Luke shook his head. "I was the first they handed it to during our meeting."
He looked at Luke's inebriated face and continued in his training officer's voice. "Good. You cannot, under ANY fucking circumstances, tell ANYONE about this. Do you understand? Not even Andy. We are the only ones who know that she is related to the Yonge Street Slasher. Got it?"
Confusion coloured Luke's face. "But she needs to know."
"Eventually, yes. But not now. This will be too much for her. Not only was her mother's murder made to look like abandonment, but the serial killer terrorizing Toronto is actually her fucking brother. She has time to learn all about this shit when we catch the cocksucker who's out there killing women. That's where you come in, Luke. You say you love Andy—"
"I do, Sam. I want her back," Luke interjected sadly.
"Yeah, not gonna happen without a fight, buddy," Sam replied without missing a beat. "But if you love her, you'll find this sonofabitch for her, and for the citizens of Toronto, before he kills another innocent woman."
"What do you think I've been trying to do for the past two months?" Luke asked, angered by Sam's implication that Luke hadn't been trying before.
"I just mean, now that we know who this guy is related to, it brings it closer to home," Sam replied calmly. "We need to figure out all the angles. It can't be a coincidence that Carol's remains were found and suddenly her son is out there killing."
After a minute's pondering, Luke closed his eyes and breathed deeply again, nodding solemnly.
"Alright, Swarek. You're right. No one else will know," Luke paused briefly, before adding, "for now."
"It's better this way, Callaghan."
"For Andy," Luke replied, extending his hand to shake Sam's.
"Absolutely, for Andy."
The men shook hands. Though they hadn't actually said the words, they had silently implemented a truce of sorts. They were now both working for a common goal; to keep the existence of Andy's brother a secret. Whether they had agreed upon it for her or their own selfish reasons, they hadn't thought of that. They both knew, however, that this secret needed to be guarded at all costs. At least until they were able to catch the Yonge Street Slasher.
Luke turned and walked out of the alley to hail a cab home. His original mission having been a failure, he decided to take his half-drunk self home to bed to sleep off the remainder of the alcohol in his system. Besides, tomorrow morning, he'd begin investigating the life of Carol McNally, and he needed to be at the top of his game to be useful.
As much as it pained him to admit to himself, he knew that Sam had made a valid point; Andy didn't need to know the truth yet. It was bad enough that she had just laid her mother to rest, but to learn that she was the serial killer's sister would probably shake her down to her very fibres. She was a great cop, and a very resilient woman, but would this news break her? He didn't want to find out.
When Sam returned to the table where Andy and the rest of the rookies were seated, he noticed Jerry had decided to join them as well and was sitting next to Tracy. As Sam approached the table, he couldn't help the glare he shot at Jerry. It was his fault that Luke had nearly told Andy about her connection to the Slasher—had he not left the profiles together, Luke wouldn't have even thought of putting the two cases together.
Luckily for Sam, Jerry didn't notice the glare. It would have been a bit tricky to explain why he was giving Jerry the death glare to all the rookies (and Andy) without mentioning the Slasher.
Sam's fingers lightly grazed Andy's shoulder, alerting her to his return. "Hey, everything OK?" she asked with a hint of concern in her voice. Sam's glare instantly disappeared and he smiled, bringing his arm around her shoulders, where it was before Luke's arrival.
"Yeah, Luke was hammered and wanted to try to talk to you. I told him to leave you alone in very polite way."
There were a few chuckles from the rookies before Luke was completely forgotten and they returned to their conversation.
The group dispersed when last call was announced. Tracy, Jerry, Andy, and Sam left together, walking to their respective cars in the parking lot. The couples walked in companionable silence towards their cars when a cell phone rang. Jerry released Tracy's hand and dug into his jacket pocket to retrieve his phone.
"Barber. Aww shit, another one? Damnit. Where? Alright, I'll be there in ten. Thanks."
Jerry looked up at his friends and frowned. "The Slasher. I gotta go, guys. Sam, can you take Tracy home?"
Sam nodded, feeling a strange chill seep through him at the confirmation of yet another Slasher victim. Without another word, Jerry kissed Tracy, waved at Andy and Sam, and took off toward his car.
The friends got into Sam's silver pick up and headed home. After Tracy was dropped off, Sam and Andy decided to head to Sam's place and spend the night together. They both weren't looking for sex. Instead, they were simply hoping for the comfort of each other's arms after a day that had just been made to feel a hundred times longer by the confirmation of another Slasher victim.
Lying in bed sometime later staring up at the darkness, Andy's voice broke through the silence.
"Another victim. This is getting out of hand," Andy lamented. She pressed herself closer to Sam's side for comfort, laying her arm across his midsection. "This guy's sick."
Sam nodded and held Andy closely, brushing his fingers over the arm that rested on him.
"Yeah, he is."
"What drives someone to do that? It just doesn't make sense to me."
Sam sighed. "It could be lots of things. Or he could just be crazy."
"We need to get this guy, Sam."
Sam could hear the sadness in Andy's voice. He turned onto his side and cupped her cheek with his left hand, rubbing the soft skin with the pad of his thumb.
"We will. Sooner or later, we will."
He leaned in and kissed her lips gently, holding her tightly in a warm embrace.
"I love you, Sam."
"Love you, too, babe."
Within a few moments, he could tell that she had fallen asleep. He, however, couldn't have been farther away from sleeping. He had been uneasy all day, and it had only grown worse after his conversation with Luke, just to be topped by the fact that the now he had confirmation that Andy did indeed have a brother, and he was a serial killer.
He was left with a mind full of questions he'd only get the answers to once the Yonge Street Slasher was behind bars.
Why was he killing women? Had he killed Carol McNally first? What message was he trying to send?
There was no way he was going to sleep tonight.
Confident that she wouldn't stir if he got out of bed, he gently guided Andy's head onto her own pillow, pulled up the covers, and removed himself from the bed. He padded to the kitchen and poured himself a glass of water from the Brita pitcher in the fridge. Full glass in hand, he walked over to the large window that overlooked the street where he parked his car, and stared out into the night through the half-opened horizontal blinds. The night was clear, and the moon was bringing much-needed light to the quiet street. As he raised the glass to his lips, he saw a shadow move behind his car on the driveway. He took a quick sip and took a side step to avoid being seen by who or whatever was out there. He waited a moment until he saw a small black cat pop out from behind his truck.
"Great," Sam said aloud. "Totally paranoid now. There's no one out there, Sam. Get a grip!"
He let out a breath and took another sip of his water. After that sip, he took a gulp of water and was about to turn back toward the bedroom when he saw more movement near his truck. Either there was a cat orgy happening behind his truck, or someone was there. He watched for a moment.
That was when he finally saw him.
Under the cover of darkness, he saw a man crouched there, seemingly taking surveillance of Sam's townhouse. Snapping into cop-mode instantly, Sam grabbed the gun he had concealed under the couch in the living room and ran out the front door, barefooted, to confront whoever it was behind his truck.
When he got to the truck, he found no one waiting for him. He looked up and down the street, keeping his gun at the ready, but it was no use. Whoever had been there had already gone, but his were no doubt the same set of eyes Sam had felt watching him all day.
"What are you doing out here, Sam?" He turned to see Andy at the front door looking concerned. He shook his head, lowered the gun and walked back toward the house.
"I thought I saw some kid vandalizing the truck," he lied. "Kid took off. Nothing's damaged."
"Well, that's good. You need to come back to bed, babe. I felt you leave." She held out her hand to him. He took her hand and frowned. He thought he had been sneaky enough to evade detection, but with Andy, he really never knew what he could get away with.
"Yeah, I couldn't sleep. I'm just wired," he replied as he stepped inside and locked the front door.
A mischievous smile appeared on Andy's face then. "I know what we can do with all of that energy."
"What's that?"
"Follow me and you'll see." She beckoned him toward her, making him smirk.
The strange man forgotten for the moment, Sam followed his beautiful girlfriend into the bedroom and worked on forgetting the rest of the day, with her.
Aaron breathed a sigh of relief and watched Sam from his spot in the bushes a few houses down. He had come close to being found, something his plans didn't account for. High off of his latest kill, Aaron was sloppy in choosing a place to scope out the townhouse. It was something he wouldn't duplicate, though. Besides, he was nearing the end of his killing spree.
His plan was to play with their minds a bit more, and then strike.
His sister would never see it coming.
A/N: I see some people being nominated for RB awards, which is awesome. Where does one learn about them, or where can I vote, or where do I send nominations? Is there a community out there that I'm oblivious to? Help please? :)