Okay, so I'm going to start out this chapter with a warning, as there is a bit of a dark twist in the second half of this (trying not to give too much away) so if you think that might upset you then you may want to avoid. Otherwise, let's do this thing.
xXBalorBabeXx, Yeah, I'm not a big Brock Lesnar fan either. But hopefully 'Dog Lesnar' is a character you'll like!
SkittlezLvr79, Haha, yep, this case is definitely going to be a little different from the norm, starting right now! Also, I totally couldn't resist Dean collecting animals. I figure that since he's kind of a stray in this story too, he would want to help others in need (plus I love wrestlers as dogs!)
Skovko, Well, I think Roman will have to Reign in (see what I did there?) Dean's compulsion to collect animals. Plus, after this chapter they're going to be a bit too busy for catching strays!
Wolfgirl2013, Many thanks as always! Glad you're enjoying it!
Yippi-kay yay motherfucker, Yay! Welcome back! I love Roman calling Dean babe too. Plus it's a super useful writing tool for showing them bonding (so many thanks to the real life Dean and Roman for that one!) also, this story is going to be bromance central, so stay tuned!
Cheryl24, I am ALL about wrestlers badly disguised as dogs, so you are very welcome! I also make no apologies to the real life Seth. He IS a feisty toy breed and I'm not changing my mind!
Mandy, I'm keeping everything crossed for you lovely! Hopefully a bit of drama in this chapter will take your mind off work for a bit. You know I'll always have Dean/Roman bromance for you!
XwwecoyoteX, Ooh, well this possibly becoming a favourite story so soon is good enough for me! Dean and animals are my favourite things too (also chocolate and cake!) Loads of drama coming up in this story and more Roman and Dean bonding as well, can't wait to share it with you all!
HannonsPen, One stakeout coming right up...plus with added Brock and Seth goodness, so you can't say I don't give the people what they want!
Minnie1015, Just call me the bromance queen with a capital 'B'. Well, I have to make up for it now we don't get it in real life (although I'm hoping for a candid on an Instagram or a Twitter somewhere, come on guys, give a girl what she wants to see!) so in the meantime allow me to vividly invent it!
Not-that-kinda-gurl, I aim to please! Although the cuteness factor might hit a bump with this chapter. Still, I hope the drama makes up for that!
Phoenix lord of rebirth, Aww, thanks. I do love mixing serious and funny. It's not good to be serious too much of the time after all! Plus I LOVE writing these two getting to know each other, so there's a little bit more of that here too!
Okay then, remember the warning...
FIVE
In the end Roman decides to leave his wife a voice message, which starts with a badly hidden sigh of relief about the fact that he doesn't have to tell her in person the actual reason that he's going to be late. Although not that he does it on the voicemail either, which Ambrose picks up on.
"Is she gonna be all pissed?"
"Who?" Roman blinks, pushing Brock's head away from him since the big bull mastiff in leant in over the seats, panting foul doggie smelling breath all over him and slinging drool around like he's handing it out for free. Seth is sat on the dashboard in front of him growling at every single thing that goes by and so really, in between Dean and the binoculars and not to mention his own pretty hefty Samoan bulk, the clapped out station wagon is nearly full to capacity. Although luckily the damn hand raised pigeon isn't in there. Which is one small mercy.
"Your wife," Dean shrugs back, clearly trying super hard to sound casual, "I kinda noticed you said that you were gonna be workin' late, but you didn't like, say you were out on a stakeout. So is she like, gonna be pissed?"
Roman blinks at him,
"Wow. You're good babe."
"Private detective," Dean grins in response, looking ridiculously proud for a second. Kind his kid had done the first time she'd tied her laces, or the first time she had ridden her big girls' bike, "Why do you think I got into this gig uce?"
At some point in the long intervening eight hours since Ambrose had asked about the whole babe thing, it had somehow already become the agreed upon nickname. Even though explaining why he'd said it had been awkward.
"Uh," Roman had started, scratching his own neck, like the movement had been catching, "It's just something I call my friends. Not sure why, but I grew up watching cop show, so that could be it."
"I kinda like it," Dean had shrugged, looking briefly kind of thoughtful. So babe it was then.
"Nah," Roman shrugs, grunting as Brock turns around on the back seat and hits him around the head with the base of his tail, "She just thinks I miss the buzz of playing football and she's worried I'm gonna use this detective stuff as a rush. Plus I'm pretty sure she thinks this is Magnum PI or something, with shootouts and murderers. Which, clearly it's not."
Roman gestures through the windshield in front of them to a house on the street that they are facing head on. Or 402 Maple Street to be more specific and the scene of Ambrose's unexplained latest job. It's a nice house. Three storied with garage parking underneath it and a big bay window on the first floor above. The level above that is what Roman guesses is the master, since it has doors onto a balcony with a terrace above, which he can tell since the neighbors have sun umbrellas set out there. Although the house they're looking at seems more abandoned and unloved.
It's six o' five. Which means that something should be happening. But instead there is well —
Nothing.
"My old man I guess," Dean says beside him from pretty much out of nowhere as he peers through a pair of thick binoculars.
"Huh?"
"You asked me why I got into detectin'," Dean offers, throwing in a casual shrug, in spite of the fact that Roman had asked him that question seven or maybe eight hours before, which means he's either been working on his answer or has suddenly just remembered it. But most likely the first, "My old man was pretty like, bad or whatever. Never around an' always in trouble when he was. So I figured I had to be different than he was, an' what better way to be different from a convict than bein' a cop?"
He's waving a hand like it's something and nothing, even though Roman can tell it's clearly not.
"You tried out to be a cop?"
Dean throws a handful of nuts up then catches them. Or, well, he catches one of them at least, before wiggling the packet brazil out in his direction while scrabbling for the lost one.
Roman snorts,
"Nah babe, I'm good."
"So yeah," Dean continues, "I tried to sign up for 'em, but turns out they didn't like, want me or whatever because I got caught spray paintin' a buildin' this one time. Plus I had kinda a pretty bad credit record, an' a couple of evictions or whatever. You know how it is."
He shrugs at that part, seemingly oblivious that the man sat beside him is from a good neighborhood and has no idea how it is to be evicted. Although if nothing else Roman can at least hazard a guess. Provided he doesn't end up being evicted from his current damn house if they can't pay the bills.
"So I figured, what the hell?" Dean throws another nut up, having clearly learnt his lesson from the handful before, "I just decided I'd do it myself or whatever. Solve crimes or right wrongs or help people you know? Not that I do. It's mostly kinda real seedy stuff. But at least I get to be my own boss now."
"And collect dogs," Roman adds with a chuckle, hoping to lighten the mood.
It works.
"Fuck yeah," Dean beams, rubbing Seth's silken hair backwards, which immediately statics up like he's been hit with a thousand volts. Except instead of taking a lump out of him like usual — or trying to at any rate since he hasn't caught him yet — Seth stands up and then growls at the windshield like something else has riled him.
Dean blinks,
"What is it boy?"
"Babe," Roman points, "Look."
A light has come on in the house they are watching. Or the house they are meant to be watching at least, but sort of haven't been, what with the talk of absent parents and failed police careers and that kind of thing. Dean pushes up again suddenly,
"It's about time,"
He lifts the binoculars up to his eyes again, but even Roman can see the female silhouette inside, which is stood beside the balcony doors in the master behind a billowing net drape.
"That's her," Dean huffs, "I mean, without like, the headscarf an' the shades or whatever. But she's the right age an' the right shape, an' her face looks the same."
Roman frowns,
"So she hired you to watch her stand round in her bedroom?"
"Or whatever she's about to freakin' try an' do in there," Dean grunts back, taking a couple of snapshots on a camera as she steps onto the balcony to have a quick smoke. She is dressed in a long white satin looking bathrobe, which billows in the wind and is probably freezing her half to death. Not that she seems too bothered about it.
"What's she doing?" Roman blinks,
"No freakin' clue. But my guess is she's about to do somethin' frisky with a senator, an' she wants the freakin' pictures so she can go to the press."
She flicks the finished cigarette off over the balcony then turns around and heads back into the room. Seth growls again and Roman feels his neck prickle, although Brock has pushed through and is panting on it again.
Damn.
Dean is drumming his fingers on the dashboard but in a wild sort of pattern that doesn't seem like a song and he keeps on jerking his head to his shoulder.
"Come on, freakin' do it already."
Roman doesn't ask what. He doesn't get the chance to since the light in the window suddenly flicks up like someone has knocked over a lamp, which throws up a sudden shadow right the way across the bedroom. A long thin shadow that seems to be swaying back and forth and which takes him a second to even figure out clearly.
Although once he has he wishes that he hadn't. Because the shape is a body.
A hanging body.
Dean bursts out of the car at once,
"Shit."
Seth tries to barrel behind him still growling, but bangs into the door as Dean slams it shut and then streaks off over the street like a wild thing, as Roman tries to fight off his damn seatbelt.
"Ambrose, wait — ,"
Because he's Samoan and over two hundred and fifty though, running has never been the strongest of Roman's suits, hence the reason he played defensive in football. Because defence Roman Reigns can do all damn day long.
Half falling out of the car like an idiot, he slams the door in both Brock and Seth's face, then follows the lanky looking figure of Ambrose which has cleared the street corner and has burst up the steps.
"Dean."
By the time Roman gets there, having a heart attack, or possibly some kind of exercise induced stroke, Ambrose is banging on the door with the binoculars and yelling like crazy through the mail slot.
"Hey, open up."
"I'll call the police babe," Roman grunts, sucking deep breaths in,
"There's no freakin' time," Dean slams his shoulder against the door, which doesn't move much and pretty obviously hurts him since he grunts and then puts a foot through it instead. That works, or at least it breaks enough of the glazing that he can reach in clumsily and unlatch the lock, "Reigns, come on."
Jamming his cell between his ear and his shoulder, Roman steps over the bits of the broken glass and then follows as Ambrose practically launches up the staircase, passing the bay fronted room as he goes and carrying on up into the master, where he disappears from view as the call on the cell phone connects.
"Nine-one-one, what is your emergency?"
"We need an ambulance 402 Maple Street."
"Is it for yourself?" the call handler asks calmly, which is probably a reasonable enough first assumption to make, given how god damn heavily he's breathing as he pounds like an overgrown bear up the stairs.
"No, we got a woman who's just tried to commit suicide."
"Okay," the woman on the other end offers back, "Can you tell me if the patient is conscious and breathing?"
"Uh," he falters before rounding the bend and finally blundering through into the master bedroom where Dean is trying to lift up the woman they had seen on the balcony just minutes before, who is dangling from a noose she has tied around the light fitting.
Her eyes are shut and her face looks grey.
"Oh damn."
"Cut her down Reigns, cut her down," Dean is screaming at him, trying to push her body up to give her some air. Dropping his phone Roman darts onto the king size and then reaches across to loosen the knot, which is kind of hard to do with his hands shaking wildly and with his heart in his throat.
"Sir? Sir are you still there?"
"Got it," Roman shouts, ignoring the distant call handler as he manages to pull loose the final thread of the knot. The body folds forward and hangs over Dean's shoulder, which can't be a good sign.
"Sir? Hello, sir?"
Jumping off the bed Roman helps to take the dead weight – even though dead isn't the best word to use – then scrambles for his cell as Dean drops down beside him and checks for a pulse.
"She's not breathin'. Fuck. Fuck."
"Sir?"
"Okay I'm back. No, patient's not breathing," Roman pants heavily into the phone, swiping a hand across his suddenly moist forehead but not able to tear his eyes away from the woman, who looks so kind of peaceful and beautiful and at rest.
"An ambulance has already been dispatched to your location, but in the meantime I'm going to need you to perform CPR."
Ambrose already is, although they both know it won't help her.
They're too late for that.
Dean's mystery client is dead.
So begins the drama. I hope you have questions, because Dean and Roman definitely do!
See you next week!