AN: Sorry for the lengthy interval between posts. I've been dealing with a virus that won't leave me alone, and have been spending most of my time binge-watching ER and trying not to feel like death. Thanks for sticking with me, and thanks for reading!
Ranger had someone take Connie home while he and I cleared the building, looking for any traces of Dickerson, beyond his mold and found nothing. When he didn't turn up, I called Morelli.
"I sort of have a body," I said.
"Of course you do," Morelli said, "How much of this story am I going to get? All of it? 70%? 20%? Did you move it because it was inconveniently located, and now you can't find it?"
"You're getting all of the information, and I didn't move the body. Animal from the Muppets did."
"You know what?" He said, "I'm lying here, in bed, not alone and instead of being pissed off that I think you're yanking my chain about this, I am considering the fact that you're probably serious, and looking forward to the day where you call me at four in the morning with something normal, like I dunno, a quadruple homicide. Just tell me one thing, did you do anything illegal to find yourself at this crime scene?"
"Nope," I said. "I Ubered here."
"Well, there's a silver lining I guess."
I told him where we were and hung up the phone. Ranger was on the phone with someone, when I heard sirens coming towards us. As soon as they pulled into the lot Ranger led them to the scene and then came back to me.
"I'm going to the hospital to speak to Bernadette's doctors. She's going to need to be told, but I don't want to do it without them giving me the okay," Ranger said. "Tell Morelli I'll be by to give my statement."
"As soon as they let me, I'm going home to sleep," I said. " Don't wake me up unless you absolutely have to. In fact, take Lunch Box to play with Julie today, so I don't have him pulling my hair when he wants a banana."
"Will do," he said. He kissed me goodbye and went to the Cayenne in the parking lot.
I sat down on one of the steps leading into the warehouse and closed my eyes for just a second when Joe knocked on top of my head.
"Wake up," he said.
"I'm not sleeping," I said.
"So the drool is the result of dental work then?"
I wiped my mouth and then glared up at him. There was no drool. "You're an ass."
"I try," he said, "So you have a mold of a dead guy?"
"I'm 98% sure he's dead," I said. "I mean he was wounded and tied to the thing, and then he was shot, and then vacuumed. He's probably dead."
"Yep," he said, "You're right, he's probably dead. So when did you see this happen?"
I gave him a rundown of our evening, minus Connie's boobs and Dracula and he looked like he was torn between wanting to laugh and utter disbelief. I believe the word 'dumbfounded' was invented for an expression just like his. "Muppet Babies?"
"Muppet Babies," I said. "Animal shot at Connie and me, and then Ranger said something about Kermit and Miss Piggy and maybe Rowlf the dog."
"Where is Ranger now?" Joe asked.
"He went to go check on Dickerson's wife. She's in the hospital and might not be stable enough for bad news."
"I'll need his version of things," Joe said.
"I can't promise he'll say much."
"He never does," Joe said. "I'm going to need copies of everything you have from this case."
I nodded again, and Joe looked over my head and waved to a Detective I didn't recognize. The Detective came towards us, and my jaw dropped. Joe closed my mouth for me, with the back of his hand.
"Stephanie Manoso, meet Detective Buckerson, or Bucky," Joe said. "He comes to us from Boston."
"You're shitting me," I said.
"I'm not," Joe said.
Bucky looked like a pissed off Mark Wahlberg if he were, I dunno, standing ten feet away. It's not like Marky Mark is known for being tall either; I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that he was only 5'8" Bucky was all around smaller. If he were five four, I'd be surprised. It was like he was built perfectly to scale, which of course led to the question, was everything to scale? Why my mind went there, I have no idea, but it was like he was used to this because he glared at me.
"Everyone thinks it," Joe said out of the side of his mouth.
"Pleasure to meet you," Bucky said. He looked like Mark Wahlberg, but he spoke like someone had kicked his larger doppelgänger in the jewels. His voice was weirdly high and sounded incongruous coming out of his mouth. I was expecting something deeper.
"Sorry," I said and shook his hand, "I've been up since yesterday morning, and I'm a little punchy."
"Is it possible you hallucinated the muppets?" Joe asked.
"Me and Connie, sure. We'd been doing the stakeout thing for way too long," I said, "But Ranger saw them too."
The weird distortion that you get when a cassette tape is wearing out came out over the factory speakers, and then the Muppet Babies theme music started again. "Is that Grease?" Joe asked.
"Listen," I said.
"Well that's just fucked up," Joe said. "And totally destroying a large part of my early childhood."
"Pretty much," I said.
"Is it from Grease?" Bucky asked.
"No," Joe said, "Have you never seen Grease?"
"No," he said.
"That's just not right," I said.
"I try to stay away from that sort of shit," Bucky said.
"I hear you," Joe said, He squinted at the mold for a bit, and frowned. "You're sure it was Dickerson you saw? That mold is a lot cleaner than I would expect it to be."
"Yes," I said. "I mean we tried to cut him free before we got shot at."
"By an Uzi, and you didn't even get grazed?"
"Better to be lucky than good?" I said on a yawn that started small but suddenly felt like it was never going to end, to the point that I started panicking a little bit, like I was going to be stuck yawning for the rest of my life, never being allowed to inhale.
Joe briefly stuck his finger in my gaping mouth, effectively ruining the yawn. It was as infuriating as being interrupted just before an orgasm. I mean I was starting to feel light headed, but the yawn had to end soon right? He didn't need to wreck it.
"What the hell," I demanded. "I don't know where that finger has been."
"I was worried you were going to turn blue and pass out," he said. "I'd never be able to explain that to Ranger."
"Why?"
"Cupcake, I wouldn't be able to stop laughing," he said. "Go home."
"I can't go home," I said. "Ranger's gone, and Connie and I had to take an Uber here, and my phone is dead."
Joe looked at Bucky, "I'll be back in half an hour. Tell the techs I want them to see what they are able to produce with the mold after they have processed it."
"I'm on it," Bucky said. "Are you taking the lead on this?"
"You can have the lead, but I want to be kept in the loop."
Bucky nodded and waved us off, and then Joe drove me back to Haywood. He parked in front of the building before I had a chance to doze off. "I'll need you to give Bucky your statement after you've had some sleep. Please for the love of God do not give him a hard time," he said.
"I have to know," I said. "You've presumably seen Bucky in the showers at the gym or in the locker room or whatever… Is everything to scale?"
"I haven't seen him for myself," Joe said, "But rumor has it, he's hung like a bear."
"Why aren't you taking the lead on the case?"
"I've been filling in for the Captain while he's been on leave for the last little while. I'm playing at being the boss."
"Fun," I said. "I thought working a desk made you nutty?"
"Oh it does," he said. "This was a nice change, so thanks for that."
"How much longer are you stuck there?"
"Another week," he said, "Though I gotta say, as crazy-making as it is, I'm not unhappy about the regular hours. I haven't worked them in years, and I forgot what it felt like to be well rested."
"Now you're just bragging," I said. I got out of the car and went towards the building and fobbed my way inside. Julie was sitting at the front desk, with Lunch Box sitting on his perch behind her, supervising her work.
"Look what I taught him!" She said. She turned around and said, "Hey Shrek."
"Get out of my fucking swamp!" Lunch Box yelled in a perfect Shrek impersonation.
"While normally I'd be all over that and think it was cool, I was shot at by muppets today, so I'm going to need a little while to appreciate it," I said.
"Oh wait, before you go. Hector cloned that computer you borrowed, and he removed all passwords. He said Ranger said you were going to want to go through it, and the original is going to have to go to the police. I'm making copies of everything you have from the case. I'll bring them up to you when they are done."
She handed me the laptop, and I took it upstairs. I went to bed and crashed without opening the computer. I slept for seven hours and woke up feeling more human. I made myself some coffee and opened the laptop, and went back to the file that Dickerson wanted us to look at.
Inside the Black Socks folder, there was a file labeled, Bernadette. The Bernadette file listed her medical condition and all of the research he could find on it. There were documents written in German, Russian, and French, with their English translations. There were possible treatment options, and lists of medications.
Then there was the medical chart. Dickerson recorded absolutely everything about his wife. He had a fancy temporal thermometer that didn't require contact with a patient to take a reading, and every morning before she woke up, and every night before she went to sleep, he recorded her temperature. He took pictures of her outfits every day, with entries of what that day's air temperature was when she left the house. There were bills from a private investigator, whose only purpose was to follow Bernadette around all day. He kept note of who she hung out with, where she went, how often she went to the bathroom. All of this was recorded into a spreadsheet, and her medications were adjusted according to what was on each page.
It was like Dickerson was stalking his wife with the best intentions. It wasn't really any different than Ranger putting trackers on me without my knowledge, or having me followed for my own good, but I'm willing to bet she had no idea this was happening, or she would have been pissed. It was working though. Prior to their marriage, she was prone to six or seven episodes a year, and with Dickerson's stalking, she was down to just one in the last two years.
I made a note to call the private investigator to see what happened with her on the weekend so I could find out what put Dickerson in such a panic. Ranger came into the apartment and looked at the computer.
"Hey," I said. "You only have me followed when there's a threat right? You don't have someone stalking me all of the time do you?"
"Only when there's a threat," he said. "And I usually tell you about it, and if I don't, I make sure you can spot your tail. Why?"
I showed him the files, and he looked at the computer for a second, and he closed it. "I need to ask you to drop this," he said.
"What?" I said, startled, "Why?"
"Because this isn't our problem anymore. Whatever Dickerson was involved in, was with some dangerous people and it's a police investigation now."
That didn't make any fucking sense. Ranger has never asked me to back off of something before unless I've been injured or something. If it's really dangerous he gives me protection, and he helps me put a stop to it, but he doesn't tell me to back down. I was about to say something when I realized that Ranger's expression was wrong. It looked like it did the night he came to my place the night after he jumped off of a bridge to save me, and he was shaken. That's when I noticed the smell of smoke on his clothes.
"What happened?" I asked. I sat as he told me of his afternoon, and when he was finished, I gave him a hug.
"I need to be able to focus on this. I need for this to be my priority, and I can't do that if you're in danger," he said.
I nodded, and I turned around and closed the laptop. I put it in the box and I took it out into the corridor and put it on the floor. I sent a text to Minnie telling him to put the box into storage, and I turned around and went back inside.
"Did I tell you about Dracula?" I asked.
"Dracula was at the factory?" he asked.
"Nope," I said and told him about Connie and my freak out in the car.
"Do you know what my favorite part about that story is?" he asked.
"That we thought the child locks would keep a vampire out of the car?"
"No," he said, with a chuckle, "Though that was good. That you were going to take on the vampire. Of course you were."
"It might kill me, but I'll stay out of the Dickerson thing," I said. "Your head needs to be here now."
"Just until I can sort this shit out," he said. "If the police have made no headway after I've got this mess cleared up, then have at it."
"What would you like me to do?"
"I'm working on something for the government that requires a lot of research. Something you're singularly gifted at."
"Do I have the clearance for it?"
"I'm working on it. For now, we can work on a need to know basis," Ranger said. I nodded, and I meant it. I would back off. He wasn't asking me to leave it because he thought I was in over my head, he was asking me to back off because he wanted to have my back and right he was needed somewhere else.
I was able to keep my promise until the middle of August, but when I broke it, it totally wasn't my fault.
AN: I was vague about what happens with Ranger at the end of this chapter because to give any more detail would have been a major spoiler for something that's still a ways off in the Molly Von G story.
