"They were headless!" Whitley said, pacing in front of John Blaine's oversized office desk, he moved his uniform covered arms exaggeratedly.

"Jesus." Stifling a grimace, Starsky looked upward and set his gaze on the all-too-familiar ceiling. Perfect lines of recessed tiles stared back at him, sterile and white, illuminated by sporadic rectangular frosted florescent lights. Despite the abrasive lighting, the office was inexplicably dark—it had always seemed so damn dark— and small. Ebony colored, flat, carpet covered the floor, complementing gray walls, offsetting the sheen of various interdepartmental awards and expensive picture frames hung prominently around the room.

"Beheaded," Whitley continued zealously. "I found the heads first, the bodies were nearly a mile away!"

The plush leather loveseat groaned beneath Starsky's weight as he shifted, swaying the long blinds disguising the rectangular window—a normally overt view of the sixth floor hallway—behind him. His stomach fluttered, his throat burned with bile, as the gruesome images rose from his memory. He could do without his partner's animated summary; he had read the report and reviewed the collection of grisly photographs; he had a perfect image of what the crime scene had looked like when Whitley stumbled upon it days ago.

Three men had been decapitated, their heads abandoned and hidden in a dark alley behind yet another decrepit bar. Carefully impaled by wrought iron fireplace pokers, they were propped up like flags against a dented, foul-smelling garbage can. Their eyes were open, clouded over by death, but their mouths were closed, held shut by a pristine line of woodworking staples. The wounds had bled, leaving their chins encrusted with trails of crimson that intermixed flawlessly with the lines of long-dried blood that had oozed from the long, linear scars carved in their respective cheeks.

The discovery was horrid yet amazing. Blaine had been right: Starsky could hardly believe what had been found; though, his disbelief had more to do with Whitley making the discovery rather than the ghastly corpses themselves.

"I still can't believe it!" Whitley exclaimed. "Talk about a hunch. I swear, Starsky, you really are something else. I will never understand why Dobey ever let a guy like you off his team."

"David's intuition is as solid as they come." Leaning back in his office chair, Blaine tented his hands on the chest and evaluated Starsky carefully.

"It's more than that," Whitley insisted. Shaking his head, he hesitated in the middle of the room, indicating at Starsky with twin fingers. "It's incredible, how he knows where to look every time. He found the first two bodies without any help from anyone—"

"That's not really true," Blaine interjected gruffly. "The first body was the result of a complaint, that poor girl stumbled upon it before he did." Brows furrowing, his gaze froze momentarily on the Henley Starsky had donned that morning. His lips twitched slightly with a hint of a humorous smile, and Starsky could almost hear the silent rebuke—only half-chastising—lingering on the tip of Blaine's tongue: We're gonna have to talk about your choice in apparel, buddy. Your job title would suggest that a specific uniform is required when you're on the clock.

Starsky had tried to wear the appropriate wardrobe but after emerging from yet another too-cold shower he had found both of his uniforms still missing. It seemed Hutch had forgotten—yet again—to pick the clothing up from whatever dry cleaners had been entrusted to clean them.

Dressing in plain clothes, Starsky had briefly wondered if it had been a conscious over-site on his wayward husband's part. Perhaps, Hutch had purposefully avoided gathering the required uniforms in an effort to keep Starsky away from work—and Blaine—a failed attempt to prevent him from experiencing this very moment, from entering the claustrophobic confines of his superior's dark office, again.

Though once comforting, Blaine's office had become unsettling, quickly transforming from a safe familiar place to one he feared in an instant. Captive to building, uncontainable panic Starsky had allowed Lucas Huntley to usher him away from the dark room, Blaine, and the Metro building. His reaction had been irrational—Starsky knew that now—but his anxiety was as governable as it was reasonable. Fierce and compulsive, there was no avoiding the unsettling behavior his violent fear would lead him to display, or the eventual discomfort accompanying yet another truth realized too late.

Blaine wasn't his enemy; he wasn't someone to be afraid of. There was nothing the man wouldn't do to protect him. But the memories of their distant improprieties were something to be feared. Fed by intense shame and guilt, they had become powerful motivators, leading to destructive behavior executed with the intent of self-preservation.

Starsky could count the number of times he and Hutch had made love in the apartment above The Pits on a single hand, but the times he and John Blaine had done so seemed to be innumerable. The number of times he had told Hutch the truth about where he was going, who he was meeting and why was singular; a poorly detailed, knee-jerk disclosure spat with the intention to wound his drunken husband the night before. But there was no limit to the lies he had told Hutch over the years, or the forced, all-too-casual, explanations of where he had been: I went to get a beer at Huggy's. I went for a drive. Everything's okay, babe. I just needed to get away, clear my head. You understand, right?

Starsky hated to admit he was capable of such despicable behavior, or that he could cultivate so many easy lies. The truth was that sometimes, back then, being partnered with Hutch—at work and at home—had just too much. Hutch asked for too much, he expected too much. Guarding his own deep secrets, armed with quick wounding quips and sardonic defensives, occasionally he wasn't a safe place, wasn't a safe person to seek respite in. And there had been times when Starsky had wanted—had needed—to feel safe without having to ask, without having to explain the intensity of the need or the traumatizing events the feeling was born from.

Blaine had never asked, he had never expected him to explain why his presence had been needed.—Dear God, he had actually needed him? Was there a time when he longed to feel Blaine, when he needed his strength to ground him, to hold him in place when he felt as though he was moments from drifting away?

His dependency on Blaine had been Starsky's greatest shame, but even so the secret gave him something. Keeping it contained, he controlled it in a way he couldn't with any other aspect of his life, and in an odd way it made him feel powerful; it made him feel capable and whole. Hutch didn't have to see him at his weakest; he didn't have to see anything Starsky didn't want him to see; he didn't have to know anything Starsky didn't want him to know. And back then—before Simon Marcus and the darkness had entered their lives—he hadn't. But now Hutch appeared to know everything, and worse: he didn't seem to care.

He didn't care about Starsky's mother's illness, the hereditary sickness Doctor Evan's had eventually denied Starsky shared but that Aunt Rosie and Uncle Al still harbored fear that he did; he didn't care about Starsky's indecent behavior with John Blaine; he didn't care about Starsky's job, his nightmares, or lingering fear; he didn't even seem to care about Jack Mitchell's supposed sudden death.

And with all the things that Starsky was sure his husband didn't care about there was another list which itemized the few unsettling things that Hutch seemed to have fierce affinity for. The basement was most the glaring, though the pictures hidden in his wallet were a close second. Hutch didn't carry pictures of anything in his wallet—not of family members, or even Starsky and Lucky—he never had.

"It was a great discovery, Whitley," Blaine said, his voice deep and smooth, his gaze still locked on Starsky. "You should be proud of the way you stomached that scene."

Unnerved by Blaine's persisting silent stare, Starsky turned his attention to his hands and almost groaned. Gripped tightly between his index finger and his thumb of his right hand, he had been absently twisting his wedding ring. The unconscious action was an overt display of trepidation if he ever saw one. A silent tell hinting at the unrest and anxiety hiding just beyond the surface of his forced calm demeanor. He was nervous—he knew that—and judging by the way he was looking at him, Blaine knew it too, as their years together had left him able to read Starsky effortlessly; he was acutely conscious of even the smallest shift in Starsky's mood.

Twisting the ring once more, Starsky wondered if Blaine knew he hadn't wanted to face him.

Did he realize that he wasn't the man he was anxious to see?

After his morning conversation with Lucas Huntley, he had intended to briefly check-in with Whitley before collecting the Camaro from Metro to track down Hutch. He didn't know what he was going to do or say when he found him—Demand detailed information about Jack Mitchell's death, perhaps?—all he knew is that he needed to.

Meeting Whitley a few blocks away from Metro, Starsky's plans had suddenly shifted. His partner had no intension of letting him slip away without getting a proper update on what had happened during his absence, or before accompanying him to a meeting Blaine had demanded they both attend.

"Yeah, well, you know I didn't find that scene on my own." Whitley grinned, nodding at Starsky. "But I have to admit when you texted me to check up on that alley I thought you were crazy."

Starsky's stomach lurched as he frowned at his partner. "What?"

"You texted me the night I found the bodies." Whitley grinned.

"No, I didn't," Starsky said uneasily.

"Yes, you did," Whitley insisted. Exuberance wearing thin, he looked at Starsky oddly, as though waiting for him to advise him of joke's punchline. "It was nearly three days after you found the burned body. I remember because it was really odd. I didn't hear from you for days, and then you texted me at four in the morning."

"I didn't do it," Starsky breathed. He couldn't have texted Whitley—the notion was laughable. After his meltdown at Rosie and Al's Hutch had taken him home and captive to confusion and dread, nightmares and anxiety, he hadn't been aware or conscious enough to do such a thing.

"You were really upset after finding the burned man; Hutch took you home, remember?" Whitley prompted. "You were MIA for the next two days. I texted you ton of times to check in, but you didn't respond. And, then, out of nowhere, in the early hours of the third day, you texted me and said I should go check out that alley."

"You didn't text me," Starsky whispered, his breath feeling cold in his chest. "And I didn't text you." There was no way what Whitley was saying was true; he had no memory of texting his partner, of reading or receiving messages that would have automatically been saved for later reference. He hadn't sent or received a thing—he hadn't even had his phone.

"You did," Whitley repeated, his tone softening. "Look, man, I have the message, I can show it to you if you really don't believe me."

"That's enough," Blaine grunted. "It doesn't matter who texted who, all that matters is what was found. There are rumored to be six missing men together, six missing felons. It seems you boys have found five of them. It's hush-hush, but Dobey's team has officially taken the cases. Ryan hasn't announced anything to the public and don't think he will, but it is beginning to look like Bay City has serial killer."

"Someone's killing felons," Starsky whispered, slightly unnerved by Blaine's veiled eyes. His expression was guarded, his tone almost too even. There was no hint of Whitley's curiosity or excitement in their superior's demeanor.

"It can't be the work of one man," Whitley contradicted. "The MO's are all so different. One guy was cut up, the other was burned, and these two were decapitated. Man, that scene was ugly too; none of those guys had their heads removed with a clean cut. I talked to pathology, they told me that the evidence suggests that all the men were still alive when their heads were chopped off. Whoever killed them didn't have a weak stomach, that's for sure."

Blaine nodded at Starsky. "Why don't you dust off your old Zebra stripes and explain to your still green partner how the homicides could still be the work of the same perp?" he said sternly.

Starsky didn't want to but did anyway. He was surprised by how easily the information came back to him, how smoothly the details suddenly seemed to fit together. Of course there was only one killer, it was the only thing that could possibly make sense. "The places they were found and where they disappeared are connection enough. All bars, right? They went missing behind the same seedy establishment…" he paused and snapped his fingers, the hopeful movement meant to jog the fragmented memory of the name of bar. It didn't work, and he shook his head in frustration. "I don't remember the name," he admitted and Blaine's brows furrowed. "But it's just like Callie Baker's been saying: someone has a grudge, and Bay City PD, the city as whole, hasn't been paying attention because nobody cares about a missing felon. Smart choice if you're looking for a victim, I suppose. They'd be just about be the easiest group to target. I mean, if they're reported missing who's going to look for them? PD is going to spend the minimum time possible on the missing person's report and investigation, and Ryan'll sweep it under the rug. Shit, that's what he did with all reported missing felons up until this point. The only reason the Zebras are taking over is because the bodies are turning up and they can't ignore it anymore."

"But come on, man, a serial killer?" Whitley scoffed. "That sounds a little over the top, a little too much like TV, like the ridiculous plot of a cop melodrama."

"Don't be so quick to dismiss the details in front of your eyes," Blaine said. "The homicides are brutal; they would suggest that the killer has a grudge. They did something to them, or someone else this person cares about. Although they don't seem to be linked on a personal level, don't forget that the all the missing men served time for after being convicted of the same disgusting crimes."

"But if it's the same perp, if it's a serial killer, then why kill the felons so differently?" Whitley asked. "Don't these types of killers usually want to claim some notoriety for what they've been doing? Wouldn't they be leaving some kind of universal clue, some kind of mark to claim the victims as their own?"

"They are," Blaine said flatly, his guarded gaze frozen on short beard covering Starsky's scared cheek.

"Not necessarily," Starsky said matter-of-factly. Ignoring Blaine's statement, he looked at Whitley. "It's likely they want to throw us off. The differences in MO's are meant to make us question what we know, if anything, for sure."

"What do we know for sure?" Blaine asked.

Whitley and Starsky looked at each other. Dull blue eyes holding vivid green, Starsky's contentious frown prompted Whitley to answer. "We know their names," he said. "Matthew Avery was the first felon, uh, victim, to be discovered. The second…" he paused, glancing apprehensively at Blaine, as though asking for permission to continue.

"Go ahead." Blaine assured curtly. "It's fine; you can tell him."

"Tell me what?" Starsky asked.

"Well," Whitley sighed. "The second guy you found, the burned body, the dental records came back with a positive ID. He's one of the missing felons too." He looked at Blaine, his uneasy expression begging for assistance.

"Jesus, Whitley," Blaine barked. "Just spit it out already! You're making this way harder than it has to be."

"Stark," Whitley blurted. "The guy's name is Cameron Stark."

Mouth hanging open, the air left Starsky's chest in a muted gasp. But it wasn't the name that bothered him, rather something else. How could the charred man be a felon? How could he feel such strong affinity and friendship for a man whose crimes would lead him to have been slain in such a horrible, excruciating way?

"That doesn't…" he whispered hoarsely. He should have known the charred man was a felon. Given the conversation, he should have comprehended such a glaring detail before being told in such a direct way. But he hadn't, and somehow he couldn't bring himself to believe the truth now. "That's impossible. You… you made a mistake. You're wrong about this man!" He wanted to stop speaking, to keep the irrational words from leaving his mouth, but he was powerless to stop them, and helpless to keep the hysteria from his voice. "You have to be wrong about him. John you don't... you don't understand... this can't be true!"

Leaning forward, he inhaled a thick, shaky breath. He felt gutted by the words—devastated by a horrible realization he wanted nothing more than to deny. With all the things the charred man had known—all the unpleasantness he seemed intent on making Starsky consider—why wouldn't he have told the truth about who he was? Why wouldn't he have shared what he had done?

Watching Starsky carefully, Blaine nodded at doorway. "Whitley, hit the road," he ordered curtly.

Whitley's face contorted with discontent. "Why do I have to leave?" he demanded, looking helplessly between Blaine's fierce stare and Starsky's devastated eyes.

"Because I said so," Blaine growled. "Go. Now."

"He's my partner, you know," Whitley said, staring at Starsky a beat longer, seemingly waiting for him to come his aide—searching for an indication that whatever confusion had overcome him would be easily forgotten, quickly erased, instead of absorbed. "Whatever concerns him affects me too. I have rights, and so does he."

"I'm only going to tell you one more time!" Blaine threatened, pointing a stubborn index finger at the door.

"I don't understand it," Whitley seethed. "Why does everything have to be a big-fucking-secret when it comes to him? Everyone knows he has issues. Why can't the two of you just admit it, instead of trying so hard to cover it up! So, he's a little off, he's here isn't he? And I'm here, too! I'm his fucking partner, Blaine!"

"I'm your superior and I told you to leave!" Rising from his chair, Blaine towered over the desk and looked at Whitley with fire in his eyes. "Get out."

"I have every right to be here," Whitley maintained, lowering his voice to a near whisper as he walked backwards toward the door. "I have every right to be privy to this conversation. Maybe more than you do, considering what Dobey said."

"Close the door behind you." Blaine stared at Whitley until the command was eventually obeyed and the door was pulled shut with much more force than necessary. "That fucking kid," he groaned, sinking back into his chair. "I should write him up for noncompliance. What a little shit; I can't believe he thinks he can talk to me like that."

"You like it," Starsky whispered numbly. "You always were a fan of the fiery ones. They keep you on your toes, make life a little more exciting. He really didn't have to leave, you know? You heard what he said, everyone already thinks I'm nuts."

"Yeah, well, that doesn't mean you aren't entitled to a little privacy. The detail about that guy, it shook you, and you don't need an audience for what comes next."

"Whitley's already seen me at my worst." Starsky's chest tightened with bitter anger as shameful memories rose to the forefront of his mind, colliding with the irrefutable rumors echoing through Metro's thin walls. No one believed he should be here; no one thought he was stable enough to carry a gun and badge, but it wasn't until this moment that he wondered if they were right. "Like he said: I'm not really known for keeping my shit together anymore. He heard me scream and cry in two separate alleys on two separate days."

"You didn't cry in the second one. I remember because, at the time, you were very intent on ensuring I was aware of that detail." Clasping his hands on the desk, Blaine regarded him worriedly. "Why do you care who that burned man was, David?"

"I don't."

"You do. Why does it matter to you if he was another felon or not. Who is he to you? Why are you so attached to him?"

"I'm not."

"You are," Blaine said knowingly. Pursing his lips, he looked at his desk and shook his head as long silent moments passed. "You know if you're not okay, you can tell me, right? If there's a problem, if you're struggling with the job or anything else, you can always come to me for help. I'm always here for you, you know that."

"Thank you, Uncle Al," Starsky retorted quickly. Blaine's expression was unnerving. His forced even tone was gentle—too gentle—and dread gathering in the pit of his stomach, Starsky couldn't help feeling that something was terribly wrong. Why did Blaine make Whitley leave? And why was he being so careful now? "Don't try to act like my father, John. Given everything we've shared, it's not a good look for you."

"Okay," Blaine agreed, conceding too easily. "You don't want me to treat you with kid gloves, I get it. But you need to stop acting like I need to. What happened yesterday? You wouldn't come into the office and you left in a hurry."

"I was confused."

"And now you're not? That was quite a scene you caused. We're lucky Huntley was the only one who caught it."

"Are we?"

"David, don't do yourself a disservice and ask questions we both know you already know the answers to. I know you've heard the rumors circulating the hallways about you and me, the last thing we need to be doing is giving somebody something to latch on to. We called it quits years ago, but Ryan isn't going to care about that. What happened back then can still come back and hurt us, both of us."

"I know that."

"Then why did you act the way you did? And why did you leave with Huntley, of all people? What the hell could the two of you possibly have to talk about?"

"Don't ask questions we both know I'm not going answer," Starsky whispered. He didn't have the courage to admit he had told Huntley the truth, or the strength to endure Blaine's disappointment over such a disclosure. Blaine didn't trust Huntley, and Huntley didn't trust Blaine. Their relationship had been taxed from the start, strained by incompatible personalities, fractured by past friendly competitions that had gone irrevocably wrong. Starsky didn't have the nerve to tell Blaine he had confirmed everyone's suspicions, that he had absently given Huntley the upper hand in the strange tug-of-war they had been engaging in for years. "That conversation was private."

"I'm sure it was," Blaine said grimly. "What the hell is going on here, David? What's happening to you? One second you're fine and next you're not. You send cryptic text messages to Whitley in the middle of the night and then claim not to remember the information you disclosed."

"I didn't send that text, John."

"Don't lie to me, buddy. I saw it myself. You sent Whitley directly to the bodies of those three men."

"I didn't," Starsky insisted uneasily. If he didn't send the text—if he hadn't had access to his phone—that left only one other person who did: Hutch. But he couldn't tell Blaine that; he hated Hutch enough as it was, and Starsky wouldn't dare awaken more suspicion surrounding his husband's actions. He didn't want to think about how Hutch had known that the bodies were in that alley, or why he had sent Whitley to find them.

"I don't know how you would have been able to send Whitley to that alley without already knowing the bodies were there, and I don't know why you would have sent somebody to the scene if you did. You've been struggling to keep it together lately. Your absences are glaring; your mental decline since discovering Matthew Avery's body is worrisome to say the least. Your behavior is alarming. You seem to have no control over your actions or reactions, and even more startling, you seem to have no awareness, no memories, of your irrational behavior after it's passed."

"Why am I here, John?" Starsky asked, his tone slightly bitter. He felt like a chastised child; they didn't need to be talking about this. Why couldn't Blaine dismiss his behavior as he had done so many times before?

"You're struggling, I was hoping you would feel comfortable enough to tell me why."

"You're joking. I can't share anything with you. I'm your officer, you're my superior, if I say something incriminating, if I admit anything to you and you think I can't handle my job then this will all be over for me. One signature, John," Starsky whispered, repeating the ever looming threat Doctor Lupton had uttered weeks ago. "One little check mark, that's all it'll take to put an end to my time here. And that'll be the end of my career. I really will be damaged goods; I won't be able to come back, ever. I'm sure you understand why I can't I share anything with you." There was a bitterness to his voice now, a biting sharpness increasing with each word he spoke. "You're the one who brought me back here, the only person who thought I deserved a chance, and now you're asking that I share information that you can use against me."

"Are you worried about disclosing something that can be used against you?"

"No."

"Then look me in the eye and tell me you're okay. Please, David, trust me enough to tell the truth."

"I'm fine," Starsky lied.

"Of course you are," Blaine said tiredly. "You have to be, right? You just said it yourself: no matter how you really feel you have to make sure you're acting normal, so that you don't lose what little you have left. But you're not okay, anybody with eyes can see that. You've been through some very intense stuff. That shit at the Marcus Compound, it changed you, in ways I'm not sure you're even aware of. I was wrong not to see that when I brought you back. It was too soon, everyone kept telling me that. Ryan; Dobey; hell, even your Uncle Al. But I didn't want to see it. I didn't want to believe you were incapable of being who you once were."

"What are you saying, John?"

"All of this is my fault. It was my mistake to put you in situation everyone told me you would never be able to handle. You've always been walking a thin line, buddy, and it's about to get a hell-of-a-lot thinner..."

"What are you talking about?"

"... I asked Whitley to leave as a professional courtesy, he doesn't need to be privy to the things you say or chose not to during the duration of our conversation."

"What is this?" Starsky pressed nervously. Palms sweating as the clenched his kneecaps, his heart pounded in his chest as he struggle to comprehend the seriousness of his superior's words and the oddness of the conversation.

"I'm going to ask you one more time. I'm giving you one final chance to tell me how it is before I put all it all on the line. Is there anything you want to tell me?"

"No."

"Okay." Leaning back in his chair, Blaine looked disappointed—grief-stricken—as he rubbed his hand over his chin. "Okay," he repeated, forcing an authoritative tone. "Something is going on with these homicides, David. A pattern is starting to emerge, and I don't want to see it, buddy, I swear to God I don't. My loyalty to you is infinite but I have to act within the confines of my career. The name isn't the only odd thing about that burned up body. Pathology confirmed that he did have a scar on his cheek, exactly like yours. The strange thing is that nobody could have seen it; the burns to his face were too severe to allow the naked eye to decipher facial characteristics let alone anything else." Flattening his palms on the top of the table, he assessed Starsky seriously. "When I joined you at that crime scene do remember what you said to me?"

Fingers rubbing absently over the scar on his own cheek, Starsky shook his head. That was nearly a week ago, how could he be expected to recall such a thing? "No."

"You said he had a scar, that he didn't like people touching it. David, how did you know he had a scar?"

"I didn't."

"You did."

"I couldn't have," Starsky denied. The words were a lie; he had known about the charred man's scar, but he couldn't explain how he had known any more than he could justify his affinity for the man. It just was. "Are you accusing me of something?" he asked uneasily.

"No," Blaine said, though his taxed expression negated the word.

Starsky felt a rush of terror and grief as he was overcome by another irrefutable truth. He wasn't afraid of this office or Blaine; he was afraid of himself and the things he used to do—the choices he used to make when his life felt unbalanced. The charred man was right: he was drawn to Blaine's strength. He always had been and always would be. Blaine's certainty had consumed him years ago, and panic clenching his chest, Starsky wondered if it would do the same now. Though their years together had left Blaine able to read Starsky effortlessly, they had allowed Starsky the ability to the do same. And what Starsky saw in his superior's eyes was devastating.

"What are you doing, John?" Starsky pressed.

"I'm pulling you from the squad car."

"You're suspending me?"

"No, not officially. But I want you as far away from these cases as possible. The less anyone knows about these details the better. We need to put some space between you and these crime scenes. Dobey's team is going to start looking very closely at the homicides and even you can't deny how certain correlations could began to look incriminating. The rumors surrounding your instability are rampant. You discovered the first two bodies and you led Whitley to the other three. David, for all intents and purposes you found every one of those bodies, and every one of those men shares your very distinct scar, a universal serial marking if I've ever seen one. Given what happened to you, Ryan's hesitance to allow you to return, and your ongoing struggle with mental illness I'm worried that—"

"You think I did this," Starsky whispered dreadfully. "You think I killed those men."

"I don't want to think anything. And I don't want Dobey's men to think anything, either, or link you to these crimes. David, people are falsely accused of things all the time."

"Like how you accused Hutch of being responsible for what happened to me?" Starsky spat, giving a voice to the old accusation that never seemed to fade with time. Even amongst all his confusion—his irrational behavior, nightmares, and lingering dread—there so many things he didn't remember, but one thing he did. Blaine's interest, his inane determination to prove Hutch was responsible for his abduction and captivity, had led him to uncover truths better left alone. He was the one who destroyed Hutch's career; he had made it impossible for things to ever be the way they once were.

How different would things have been if Blaine wouldn't have pushed Ryan and Dobey to dismiss Hutch? How different would their lives be if Blaine had left Hutch's past alone? Would Hutch still have felt the need the leave, or would he have had the courage to stay?

"You know, John, you seem to be doing an awful lot of accusing," Starsky continued. "Maybe you're the one killing these men! Maybe you're the one who took me to the Marcus Compound! Maybe you're the one who left me there to die in the darkness!"

"I was trying to protect you," Blaine said, his voice quiet but taxed. "After what happened, I pursued Hutch because it was the right thing to do. He lied about his past and he did you wrong. I don't know if he meant to, what his intentions were when he got mixed up with Simon Marcus, or even if he really had any. But intentions or not, the results were the same. You got hurt. And those events, they changed you, buddy, I'm sorry for not realizing that before. I'm sorry things went the way they did. But I will never apologize for trying to keep you safe, and I will never stop trying to protect you when I can. There is a price to keeping secrets, and a crippling weight that you carry when trying to keep them contained. Hutch made his own choices, he concocted his own reality, and he lied about the horrific events that shaped him the most."

"How the fuck do you know what shaped him? How do you know anything about who he really is?"

"People don't just walk away from that kind of trauma, David. It defines them, changes them deep inside, makes them do things that the rest of us don't understand." Brows furrowing sadly, Blaine's face contorted with deep lines of regret. "Doesn't it?" he added thickly, his voice nearly inaudible.

Starsky scoffed as Blaine's words hit a nerve deep inside him. He felt overcome by helplessness and fear as he realized that it didn't matter what he said—how loud he screamed, how vehemently he denied rumors and veiled accusations— it wouldn't change what it all looked like now. If his irrational behavior didn't incriminate him, then his nonsensical knowledge about the bodies and their locations did. And the scars—oh, Jesus, the scars—his scar and theirs. The deep wounds marring the bodies of the dead men, duplicate linear lacerations that promised never to disappear.

Who do you belong to? Starsky gasped as the unnerving question emerged from the depths of his mind. Why does he want you? Why is he still holding on you?

His own scar an ugly thing, a glaring reminder of the past he wanted so desperately to ignore. But was it possible it could also be something else? A permanent disfigurement, a ritualistic declaration of someone's ownership.

"Go home and sit tight," Blaine urged. "Don't talk about bodies you shouldn't have been able to locate or scars you shouldn't have been able to see. Don't talk about anything you shouldn't know. And for fuck sake, David, if you stumble across another body, if you find yourself in another alley with no knowledge of how you got there, then you leave as fast as you can. You run the other way."

Starsky didn't know if he could abide by the command, and he was unsure if he could summon the courage to return to home. But he was certain that if he followed Blaine's advice—if he continued running—he would never be able to understand who or what he was struggling to escape, and why it was so intent on never letting him go.

TBC

Author Note: I don't say this often enough, but thanks for the reviews. You're all terrific. :D