Thank you to everyone who's added this to favorites and alerts! Next chapter will probably take a few weeks as well, I'm afraid, but I'm getting back into the groove of things.
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December 9, 2038
Detroit was rarely peaceful in the hours chasing midnight. Patrol officers set out to travel their normal routes with the expectation of finding trouble, people with less than noble goals were looking for opportunities, and rebellious teenagers were sneaking out of their bedroom windows.
In the parking lot of a cheap motel on Camden street, thick layers of snow that built up earlier in the evening were finally melting away for lights along the building to reflect off the pavement. Two cars remained on the lot, both in front of a long wall opposite the rooms, where an old mural was chipping away from the brick.
"It was generous of you to let your partner leave."
Room 101 was at the very end of the line of rooms, putting it closest to the street, and inside were two men experiencing very different nights.
Agent Thomas Ivers was balancing atop the floor AC unit with a plastic cup of water in hand. He leaned his head against the glass window behind him, repeating a mantra to himself to not kill his current, and temporary, companion.
Seated at a small table by the end of the dresser was celebrity lawyer and recently arrested Malcolm Otto. He sat poised, wearing a suit that could buy three of Ivers', and he watched the federal agent with a complete lack of self-awareness. He continued to prod the agent, saying, "He's not like you and I. He hasn't yet let go of the dream of a family."
Ivers lifted his head off the glass and stared. He wasn't sure what game Malcolm was playing now, but the lawyer had been attempting to goad him into a reaction all night. "We're nothing alike," Ivers argued, sounding just short of exhausted.
It was clear by the raised brows and the downward tilt of his head that Malcolm did not believe him. "No? You have people waiting for you back home?"
He didn't, and it was a sensitive topic. When he didn't give an answer, Malcolm hummed. "I thought as much. Granted, you aren't entirely wrong," He paused to straighten his back and pull at his suit. "I'm single because I'm rich, and commitment would waste so many opportunities."
Ivers couldn't resist rolling his eyes. "That's the reason," He muttered, stretching out his arm to place his water on the nearby end table.
Malcolm picked up on the sarcasm, but assumed it to be there for a different reason. "Do you know what you need? A vacation," He said, gesturing to the agent. "Turn off the phone, get a massage, go for a swim on a beautiful island somewhere."
"I'll put it in the suggestion box," Ivers muttered.
"It will do you wonders. It certainly does for me."
Ivers saw this as a perfect opportunity for a return jab. He knew the comment about a vacation wasn't a purposeful kind of taunt; Malcolm was just so far disconnected from the cost of the real world that he believed it to be a reasonable thing. That didn't make it any less irritating to hear, however, so Ivers took great pleasure in retorting, "Not anymore. All that 'fun' of yours is over for good now."
The former lawyer was unfazed. With an amused huff, he replied, "Why, because I'm going into witness protection? What hell that will be."
"No fame, no fancy restaurants. Just you and your handler in Nowhere, Nebraska." Ivers shrugged, and smirked. "If someone doesn't get to you first."
Leaning forward over the table, Malcolm said, "That's what you're here for, Agent." He stood from his chair and moved deeper into the room toward the bathroom door on the left. "I get bodyguards, a quiet home, no annoying clients to pester me..." Once he reached the door, he turned toward Ivers one last time, musing, "Sounds like just the thing to freshen the spirit."
As he disappeared into the bathroom, Ivers rolled his eyes and started to try to relax against the window, when a knock at the motel room door stopped him.
A middle-aged man in a police uniform stood outside with his gloved thumbs on the edge of his belt. Upon coming face to face with the agent, he gestured to himself, and introduced, "Agent Ivers? I'm from the precinct."
Ivers had been expecting the backup, so he relaxed his shoulders and let go of the door. "You couldn't have gotten here soon enough," He grumbled, walking away.
The officer followed him into the room, shutting the door behind him. "He that annoying?"
"Imagine an obnoxious bastard with too much money," Ivers began, moving to the end of the bed to grab the television remote. Turning around to deliver an exhausted stare, he said, "He would want to strangle Malcolm Otto."
The officer gave him a small, sympathetic smile as he walked past. He looked over the room and started to settle in, making note of the occupied bathroom and the fast food boxes on the counter by the mini-fridge. Standing by the end of the second bed, he turned around while reaching into his belt.
Ivers didn't have time to register the presence of the gun.
Leaving the bathroom, Malcolm looked up to find Agent Ivers laying across the floor at the foot of the first bed. He clutched a bleeding wound as he struggled to reach for his own firearm, but the police officer had planted his boot against Ivers' wrist. He was removing his leather gloves, dropping them next to a silenced pistol on the dresser behind him.
Malcolm continued adjusting his suit's cuff links. "You're late," He chided.
"I had to handle things at the precinct," The officer replied without sparing so much as a glance. Reaching into his pocket, he slipped on a latex pair of gloves, and finally knelt down by Ivers' dying form. He grabbed the agent's wrist and pulled his gun from its holster.
Malcolm didn't care to watch to the process of manipulating a murder scene. He also wasn't satisfied with the explanation, so he focused on straightening his tie as he taunted, "We all have our responsibilities. If you can't manage yours, our friend would benefit from hiring someone who can."
"Funny," The officer muttered. Placing Ivers' gun in the agent's hand, he aimed at Malcolm and confessed, "That's what he said about you."
Hours into the morning, an Oldsmobile pulled into the parking lot of the Eastern Motel. Two police vehicles were already there, with CSI pulling equipment from one of the trunks. On the curb by the rooms stood Ben, the lieutenant of CSI, talking to two patrol officers.
Hank and Andy climbed out of his car and began to approach. "Ben! What do we got?" Hank yelled.
Ben looked back, offering half a wave in greeting. "As soon as I find out, you'll be the first to know," He answered.
"CSI hasn't set up?" Andy asked with furrowed brows, watching the few officers who were prepping outside.
Ben shrugged and scowled a little as they stepped up beside him. "There was a murder in some gated community an hour ago. Press are outside and everything - slows 'em down. You know."
Hank sighed, "Guessing the coroner's not here yet, then." Being up as early as they were, with the sun beating down on them, was already a big enough of a headache. Having to compete with the department's resources was the last thing he needed today.
"You'd be right," Ben replied. He turned his focus back to the patrol officers in front of him. Officers Chen and Lewis had been partners for a few years now, and were used to stumbling into scenes like the one in the room behind them. "Chen was just telling me about the call."
A serious young woman, Chen glanced over the detectives and shared her account of the events. "Room 101 didn't check out this morning so the receptionist went to the door and saw one of the bodies through the window. We were on patrol nearby when he called."
Hank spoke up. "Did you see anything when you got here?"
"Besides the bodies?" Lewis, a usually jovial man, retorted. Shrugging, he answered, "Everything looked normal."
Andy tilted her head to gesture to the small lobby building across the parking lot from them. "Do we have the receptionist from night shift? How'd they not hear anything?"
"Wilson's bringing him in for a statement," Ben told her.
Chen interjected with a theory of her own. "One of the firearms has a silencer on it, so at most, they may have only heard one shot."
Hank nodded, and started for the motel room with Andy. "Thanks. We'll let you handle the rest, Ben."
"I'm on it."
Walking into the room felt a little like they were the first ones to discover the crime. Only two officers were inside, one photographing the bodies and the other filming the room. The scene had been left untouched, and evidence had yet to be marked for relevance. CSI was getting a late start, and with the coroner still on the way, Hank knew the case was going to be trouble even before the victims were identified.
Both bodies had their faces hidden. A black trench coat obscured the body closest to the door, and he was turned onto his side. His arms were stretched down to his waist, and a gun rested in the palm of his right hand.
The other body further into the room was clad in a nice suit, laying on his stomach with a silenced pistol off to the side. Most curiously about him were his hands. He wore leather gloves, but his left hand had left behind a distinctive red trail. A bloody '7' was written on the floor by his head, his index finger resting at the tail end of the number.
The two detectives split up, Hank slowly making his way around the room as Andy knelt down by the first body. She placed a careful hand on his shoulder and rolled him over just enough to see his face.
Recognizing the agent who investigated the CyberLife bombing was like being doused in cold water. Even colder was what this meant for the other body in the room - if this was Ivers, where was Warren Walsh?
She looked up at Hank with wide eyes and said, "This is a federal agent."
He spun around. "What?"
"He was at the precinct after the CyberLife bombing," She told him, jumping to her feet. Stepping over Ivers' body, she rushed across the room and leaned down, trying to peer at the face of the second victim.
Seeing who it was brought equal parts relief and shock. As Andy let go of the breath she was holding, Hank bent down and recognized the man in the suit. "Shit- Is that Malcolm Otto?" He hissed.
Andy nodded, and he cursed under his breath. As if the list of problems he had today couldn't get longer, now one of their biggest arrests of the year was dead. In addition, they either had another victim out there, or a suspect who was likely fleeing. "Ben!" He yelled, walking toward the door.
A second later, the lieutenant popped into the doorway. "Yeah?"
Hank waved a hand and sighed, "This is a federal agent and a witness."
Ben had a similar reaction, looking at the scene with the expression of a man who was in over his head. "I'll call Fowler. He'll let the agency know."
"Uh, Lieutenants?"
Officer Lewis had called out from the curb, and the three of them looked out to see a black unmarked vehicle pulling up behind one of CSI's cars. A young man in the driver's seat watched everyone as he parked, and opened his door.
It was just who Andy needed to see.
"I'll take care of it," She piped up before either of her superiors could comment, and then she rushed out the door.
Agent Warren Walsh neared the motel room surrounded by local law enforcement with nothing but apprehension. Upon spotting Andy, he sped up, yelling out her name. She was quick to meet him halfway, where she grabbed him by the arm. "You need to come with me."
She pulled him away to the sidelines, out of earshot of the other officers, and although he was confused, he allowed it without a fuss. Once she let him go, they turned to face each other and Walsh asked with growing panic, "Andy, what the hell is going?"
"Were you watching Malcolm Otto?"
He frowned, beginning to refuse her. "I can't talk about that-"
"Yes, you can. Now you can," She interrupted.
He paused. Clearly something went wrong while he was gone, and confidentiality was no longer a priority. "Yeah," He sighed, giving in after a tense moment. "Yes. My partner and I were watching him." He was afraid to ask, but he knew he needed to. "What happened?"
Now Andy was the one to hesitate. She had to be stern here, for everyone's sakes, but she was about to make this one of the worst days of Walsh's life. "Malcolm Otto and Thomas Ivers were found dead this morning."
To say it was like a knife in the chest would have been an understatement. "No...," Walsh whispered, shaking his head.
"It was a single shot to each of them," She pushed.
His hands went to his temples, and he ducked his head in anguish. "Shit...!"
Andy remained stiff. "Listen to me," She demanded, bringing back his attention. "This looks like either Otto managed to hide a gun from two federal agents and was killed in the altercation-"
"No. No, that can't- that doesn't-" He stopped his rambling protests, realizing she wasn't yet done. Lowering his hands, he asked, "Or what?" When she didn't answer right away, he narrowed his eyes and pushed, "This looks like either a gunfight or what?"
"Where were you last night?"
It was a question he didn't want to hear. Leaning back, he asked, "You think I had something to do with this?"
"No, I don't-" He'd started to move away, shaking his head, and she waved a hand after him. "Warren!" She raised her voice, making him stop in his tracks. "I cannot help you if I don't have the facts. Now answer my question."
"I-" He let out a big sigh and dropped his shoulders. He was still reeling from the news as he tried to recount his night. "I went to see someone. A- A woman. Thom told me he'd call in an officer to cover for me."
"I need a name."
"No, just..." Pulling his phone from his pocket, he told her, "I need to call the office and report this, and then just take my phone. Look through it. I don't- I don't care."
It was enough for Andy. She nodded, saying, "All right. After your call, you need to wait at the scene until we're ready to talk to you. You should submit to a GSR test, and hand over your car keys-"
He looked up from the screen of his phone with a pained scowl. "I know how this works," He cut her off.
"Lewis will sit you down in a patrol car," She told him, turning to wave a hand for Officer Lewis to approach them. She moved to return to the room, but stopped a few steps away. Despite all the dirty memories, she still felt for him. She needed to offer him her sympathy, she just didn't know what the boundaries were that made compassion inappropriately intimate. "I'm sorry," Was all she could think to tell him.
Ben and Hank were waiting by the motel room door. "What the hell was that about?" Hank asked as she neared them.
"I was getting his alibi," She said simply. It's all she would share for now.
"Well?"
"He was seeing a girl."
Hank rolled his eyes and started to turn away. "Oh for f..."
"He's handing over his phone after he calls the agency," She explained.
"Which means we have even less time to do this," Ben warned them. He nodded his head toward the room, walking back in to help his team get as much information as they could before a larger agency swooped in to take it from them.
"No, you won't have to come down to the station to confirm that."
Andy sat at the DPD, watching Hank conduct his phone interview with the woman Walsh claimed to have visited. If Hank's flat expression was anything to go by, she was not a very patient woman. Andy was also able to glean that the alibi for Walsh checked out, as she expected it would.
As Hank navigated through his interview, Andy spotted Desta Delgado marching into the bullpen. She made a bee-line for the two of them, coming up to the side of their desks.
"All right. Thanks for your time, Ma'am," Hank ended the call, trying not to sound too eager.
Delgado waited for the phone to be put down, then asked, "Malcolm Otto is dead?" When his nod confirmed it, she urged, "Where was he?"
"The Eastern Motel on Camden," He answered.
They could see the news was a big blow. Inhaling a deep breath, Delgado revealed to them, "He asked for a meeting this morning. The FBI was supposed to be escorting him to our offices."
This caught Andy's attention. Sitting up in her chair, she asked, "A meeting for what?"
Delgado shrugged, and she spoke with a frustrated edge in her voice, "I assumed it was about Sharon Weaver. All he said was that he had valuable information on an active case."
"Had being keyword," Hank quipped.
The women delivered pointed stares, and he threw up his hands in defense. "What?" He complained before moving on. "And the FBI was escorting him. It looks like he and Thomas Ivers killed each other. Warren Walsh was conveniently gone at the time."
It was a name Delgado knew, and she looked to Andy as Hank continued, "His girlfriend confirms he was with her, so the alibi checks out for now."
"Warren Walsh was the other agent watching him?" She repeated.
Hank was unaware of the silent conversation going on between the friends. "Yeah, you know him?"
It was time for Andy to come clean. She knew she was going to have to, but she was putting it off with a small, self-deprecating hope that maybe the FBI would take over before it mattered. That was taking a longer time to happen than she'd expected, so she heaved a heavy sigh as she said, "She knows him through me, and it's also why I can't be on this investigation."
Turning his gaze onto her, Hank furrowed his brows. "What?"
"It's a conflict of interest."
He tilted his head down as he tried to discern her reasoning through expression alone. "Why, because they worked the CyberLife bombing?"
She shook her head. "No-"
"Good, because that would be stupid."
She rolled her eyes, and finally confessed, "I dated Walsh."
It wasn't what Hank was expecting. He didn't know what he was expecting, but it wasn't that. Everyone had their social circles outside work, including Andy, but he'd never picked up any queues that she was interested in having a love life. It was so out of character to him that all he could do was stare a moment, before exclaiming, "You dated our suspect?"
"You dated a fed?"
"Sh-" Andy jumped in her chair, spinning around to see Reed had been walking by at the exact worst moment. "When did you get here?"
He smirked, eagerly moving to stand next to Delgado. "Just before he said you dated a fed- You dated a-"
"He wasn't with the FBI at the time!" Andy yelled over him, already fed up with his taunting.
Hank ignored their childish bickering and pushed her for more information. "Well how serious was it? Just the one date, or a couple weeks, or what?"
Shifting awkwardly, she mumbled, "We were living together. It was-"
"Ohhoho shit!" Reed laughed.
"Andy-"
She stopped Hank before he could go into a lecture or a rant. Narrowing her eyes up at him, she argued, "It's not like I knew this was gonna happen. It was six years ago!"
That threw him for another loop, but then he did the quick math, and realized he wasn't her partner at that time. "Six years ago?" He went quiet, and sent a pointed look at the man standing nearby. "So it was Reed you didn't tell," He mused.
Reed's mood died in a flash. Straightening his back, he frowned and shook his head, walking away with a grumble.
Andy watched him leave and then focused on Hank. "It was never relevant, so I didn't bring it up. Now it's relevant."
"You think?" He asked, tilting his head.
"Just take me off the case. I'll... do paperwork today. Or something."
It wasn't an option for Hank, who needed all hands on deck. "No, you won't. We don't have the manpower to deal with this right now and I'm not going to Fowler. You're staying on this case." He pointed at her, adding, "At a distance. I'll handle Walsh. You find footage, witnesses - anything you can about who came in and out of that hotel room. Okay?"
She looked to Delgado for confirmation that it was acceptable, and received a satisfied nod. "I can do that."
With that solved, the DDA spoke up with a theory of her own. There had to be a reason Malcolm Otto was killed before he met with her. "I'm not sure Sharon Weaver isn't involved in this."
Andy shook her head, dismissing, "Sharon got what she wanted. She wouldn't come back to kill him."
Delgado wasn't buying it, but Hank stopped them. They didn't have time to discuss it - they needed to act. "You want to take this on, you can look into Weaver yourself, all right? Knowing Richards, he's probably still trying to track her down anyway," He delegated, pulling his jacket off his chair as he turned to leave the bullpen.
If Connor kept getting calls for help from law enforcement, he was going to start going into work with Hank every morning to save himself some time. A few days ago it was Delgado, and now it was Hank who was the one to call. He said there was an urgent case that needed Connor's attention, and he would be waiting at the medical examiner's office.
Every request was welcome, but also came with a bit of concern. Would these cases be in jeopardy if, after the new year started, the president ruled androids defective machines? He supposed it was a vote of confidence from the DPD if they were willing to take that risk for his help.
Hank was waiting in the hallway outside the coroner's office. When he heard the front doors open, he turned and met Connor halfway. "Hey."
"What's going on?" Connor asked, noting Andy's absence and chalking it up to a division of workload.
"Malcolm Otto and one of his handlers were killed last night," Hank told him with a sigh. "It looks like they killed each other, but I'm not convinced. And I know the FBI's gonna swoop in and take this over at some point, so we need to get as much evidence as we can now."
The news took Connor by surprise. It was obvious Malcolm was going to have enemies after all the deals he was trying to make with the DA, but that was precisely why he was in FBI custody. For a federal agent to be killed alongside him indicated an experienced killer.
He could understand why Hank would want to investigate before the case was taken, but he also knew that could incur the wrath of their superior officers. "Is the captain okay with this?" He asked.
Hank shrugged off the concern. "He can take it up with me if he's not."
"Do we know who the dead agent is?"
He nodded. "Thomas Ivers - apparently he was on the CyberLife bombing."
Connor recognized the name, and he remembered the younger man who was there alongside him. "Yes, he and Agent Walsh, who I'm assuming is your main suspect if he was on the same job?"
Mention of Walsh brought out a scoff from Hank. He threw a hand up in the air and turned away, grumbling, "And there's the real kicker." As he began to pace in the hallway, he complained, "Andy dated Walsh, so now I've got her on a wild goose chase for another suspect while I handle the real case."
What Hank had said so casually was a shock to the system for Connor.
Andy hadn't attempted to hide her disdain for Walsh when he was in Detroit. Connor assumed it to be due to a combination of her general dislike for the FBI, and maybe a bad first impression on a case from her past. This was... difficult to fathom.
How serious was the relationship? What happened to them? And why didn't he already know about it?
It was an odd feeling to experience for the first time. There was a concern gnawing at him, trying to twist his thoughts and put worst-case scenarios in his head. If he had someone to talk to in that moment, they would have helped him identify it as another form of insecurity.
"They had a relationship?" Although he kept the turmoil below the surface, he couldn't hide the shock from his voice.
Hank had no idea what was going on. Shaking his head, he replied, "I don't know the details, and I don't want to know. But seeing as I'm down a detective, you want to jump in on this one?"
There was no way Connor was turning down the opportunity to investigate Warren Walsh. "Absolutely."
Hank noticed the odd amount of confidence with which the question was answered. He had no time to comment on it, as a woman's voice rang from the office door, "Lieutenant?"
"Yeah!" Hank called out, turning on his heel. He walked down the hall with a still somewhat distracted Connor in tow. As they entered the office, the lieutenant added, "Hit me with it."
Medical Examiner Kendrick was a stern woman, though often more polite than her boss. "I won't be hitting you with much, I'm afraid," She warned Hank, leading them into an office with empty exam tables and toward the back wall of refrigerators. She reached for two adjacent doors as she explained, "The story's pretty much what it looks like. Each body had one shot in the chest. Bullets appear to match the firearms on the scene. Residue was on Ivers' dominant hand, and on the glove Otto was wearing."
The first thing Hank noticed after she pulled out the tables and moved the sheets was a distinct lack of operation marks. "Why haven't they been cut open?" He asked, waving a hand over them.
Placing a hand on the edge of one of the tables, Kendrick said, "I'm not conducting a full autopsy on either body."
He frowned. "Why not?"
"Bandey's orders."
Of course it was that old bastard. Looking to the door to the back offices, Hank stepped aside and yelled, "Bandey!"
She rolled her eyes and droned out, "He's not here."
"Oh, real nice-"
"This will be a federal case soon, correct?" She asked.
He knew where she was going, but he couldn't let that stop them. Leaning in, he argued, "Don't you want to get involved before the FBI steam rolls us?"
"We want to not get reprimanded by the Chief, Hank," She scolded. "If the FBI trusts us to do the autopsy, we'll be glad to do that for them. Until then, these bodies, and whatever clues they may contain, will remain as-is."
"Oh come on." He waved her off, and focused on his partner next to him. "Connor, you picking up on anything?"
Connor had been studying the bodies from a distance, and the original assessment seemed accurate. There were no signs of a struggle that he could see, but there was something peaking out from behind Malcolm Otto's head. "Maybe," He said, stepping forward and looking up at Kendrick. "May I?"
She pursed her lips and stared at him. After a small debate with herself, she gave a reluctant nod.
He placed his hands on the sides of Malcolm's head, and gently turned it over. As suspected, he spotted a laceration through thick hair. "He was struck on the back of the head," He informed, pointing to a marking he knew they wouldn't be able to see until a closer examination was performed.
Kendrick leaned in to look at the spot in question, offering, "He likely went backwards and hit his head on the fall."
Connor shook his head. "This was a sharper instrument, and it would have been powerful enough to render him unconscious."
That was a bigger piece of information than he realized, and Hank knew it. Holding up a hand, he said, "He tried to write on the floor in his blood after he was shot. He wouldn't have been able to do that if he was out once he hit the floor. There had to be a third person involved."
He'd hoped that would spark Kendrick's interest, but she was not a detective. With a snarky smile, she told him, "I'll let the FBI know."
"Damn it, Kendrick!"
"All right, this is the footage from last night."
Andy's first stop in her search for witnesses, and hopefully another suspect, was the Eastern Motel. She found the manager in the lobby, filling in for her receptionist who was given the rest of the day off. A quick chat confirmed that the night receptionist hadn't seen or heard anything after the agents checked in at ten. Their unmarked vehicle sat outside in plain view from the street for a few hours, and shortly after midnight, he saw it drive away.
Security cameras were positioned around the parking lot and were always running. They could be viewed from any authorized device, and so now Andy stood by the front counter as the manager pulled up six camera angles on a computer.
Six cameras for a motel with two floors meant only a few of them would provide what they needed. Room 101 was picked up on two: a wide angle from the second floor on the right end of the L-shape, and a more focused camera in the corner of the formation on ground level.
Two suited agents and Malcolm Otto could be seen arriving at the motel at 11pm. At midnight, Walsh left, and the second floor camera caught Ivers standing in the room doorway still alive.
One more hour passed, and as the timestamp in the corners hit 1:00am, the screens for these two cameras went dark.
Andy shot her head back in confusion. "What happened there?"
The manager was already scrambling to the keyboard. "I don't know. It looks like they failed," She said with a voice laced with nerves.
"How old is this system?"
The front door to the lobby opened, and a lanky man in overalls walked in with a ladder and a toolbox. As he set up underneath a dead light bulb, the manager continued to struggle with the computer. "Five years, I think, but the cameras were just replaced last summer." Turning toward the maintenance worker, she pointed to her desk and asked, "Pat, what's going on with this?"
Pat shot them a glance over his shoulder and upon seeing security footage, he gave a big shrug. "I don't mess with that. We contract it out," He said, planting his boots on the third step of the ladder.
"To who?" Andy pushed.
He was digging his hand into the light fixture while he hummed in thought. "Uh, Diebling Security, I think?"
"Oh, here!" The manager blurted. The black screens went away, and they were once again showing the building. "They came back on... an hour later."
They watched the screen for several seconds, the manager fast forwarding through time. The angles were same, and just as it had been before the weird occurrence, activity was non existent.
"And nothing happens," Andy mumbled. Thinking on the timeline, and accounting for any additional factors, she asked, "Was there any guest activity between midnight and three?"
The manager was quick to shake her head, but she pulled up a bare guest log to prove it. "Nothing was logged, not even check-ins."
Pat hadn't appeared to be listening until he commented, "No one's actin' up around here when word gets out a cop car was out front." It was a good point, but then he looked down at them as he started descending his ladder. "Why not talk to Alfie?"
It wasn't a name Andy knew, but it was for the manager. With a frustrated sigh, she said, "Sheldon was supposed to get rid of him!"
All Pat could offer was a shrug as he closed his ladder. "He doesn't bother anyone."
"He bothers the guests!"
Andy held up a hand to stop them. She didn't have time to witness this spat. "Who is Alfie?"
The manager shook her head and explained, "He's this homeless guy who sleeps outside the motel. He's nosy and paranoid."
Nosy and paranoid was just what Andy needed right now. Focusing on Pat, she asked, "Where can I find him?"
Minutes later, he was leading her across the parking lot. "Hey, Alfie!" He yelled before they even reached the end of the wrap-around. With a shrug toward Andy, he explained, "If he's not here, there's a soup kitchen a couple blocks down he goes to."
Room 101 was the last room on the left of the L-shape, and at the back corner on the curb was what looked like a pile of debris at first glance. This was intentional, because the man who put it together wanted to be overlooked. The end of a large sheet of cardboard rested against the wall at an angle, wide enough for someone to fit underneath it. Over that was half of a tarp, which obscured most of the makeshift home and what was inside it, while also providing further shelter from the rain.
Pat didn't move any closer than the curb. "Alfie!"
There was no response, so Andy started making her way toward it. Reaching out, she pulled the tarp to the side to get a glimpse of the tent's inhabitants, but the cardboard was large, and all she could see was the end of a sleeping bag. She grabbed the cardboard and lifted it away from the wall, which revealed the full sleeping bag, and the lifeless body that lay atop it.
The reason Connor was so eager to assist Hank was because he knew what they would end up doing after the 'autopsy:' interviewing Warren Walsh.
They sat on opposite sides of an interrogation table. Walsh was handcuffed to the surface, but you wouldn't have thought so based on his composure alone. Elbows on the table, with a steady gaze, he looked almost as though he thought he was questioning them.
Connor was confident he could change that.
Him being there was already an unexpected twist for Walsh, who looked between them with a confused frown. Pointing, he asked Hank, "Why is the android here?"
Hank was opening his mouth to speak, but Connor took it upon himself. "The android is one of the best interrogators in the country and is able to detect even subtle changes in heartbeat and body temperature," He rattled off with a straight face.
Walsh tilted his head so he could shift his focus to Connor. He didn't know why he was suddenly feeling like this was a personal attack, but whatever problem Connor had with him, he wasn't going to back down. "Are you here to brag me into a confession?"
"What would there to be confess?" Hank interjected. He didn't know what the hell the strategy was, but Connor worked with the FBI before he was with Detroit police. Maybe there was something he knew that Hank didn't.
While it may have elicited a reaction out of Walsh, it wasn't going to get them anywhere. He tried to convey that as he explained, "I know I'm a suspect, Lieutenant, but I'm not an idiot. I've been on the other side of that chair. I know more about how this works than most of your officers do."
"Then make this easy on us and give us every detail about last night."
He heaved a large sigh and ran a hand over his forehead. He had nothing incriminating to hide, but he knew leaving the hotel, no matter the reason, was unprofessional. "Tess works late. She was off around eleven, and called me at midnight. We weren't going to be in town much longer so Thom told me to see her while I still had the chance."
Connor tilted his head and inquired, "Is it normal to abandon your post?"
Walsh may have known it wasn't smart, but he wasn't about to allow himself to be lectured by a robot. Shooting him a sharp glare, he pushed a finger into the table and argued, "Otto wasn't a high-priority case. We had no reason to think he would flee, and no one was supposed to know we were at that motel. It was just a babysitting job."
Hank had the next question. "He wanted to meet with the DA in the morning. Do you know what he had to say?"
The glare turned annoyed now, as if it were a stupid question. "If I knew that, he wouldn't have had to meet with the DA in the first place."
Hank shrugged. He shifted in his seat and returned to his earlier line of questioning. "So you went to see your girlfriend, and you stayed there all night?"
There was a faint wince on Walsh's face, but it wasn't one born of guilt or sinister motives. It was almost childish. "She's not... We just-" He stopped himself, realizing his relationship status didn't matter. Putting himself back on track, he said, "I was with her all night. We woke up at six and left her place together."
"And how did Otto get hold of a gun?"
What was left of the boyish façade dropped quickly. He stared Hank in the eyes with the kind of conviction guilty people didn't have. "He didn't," He insisted. "I'm telling you the truth. Thom and I both personally made sure Otto had nothing on him. Someone showed up and planted that gun."
Inside his pocket, Hank's phone started ringing. He stood from his seat and moved to the corner of the room to answer it, leaving Connor at the table.
Much to his dismay, he found himself believing the agent. Walsh's vitals were steady and his answers was earnest. Even if he was a little arrogant, he probably wanted to solve this case more than anyone.
Bringing his phone to his ear, Hank whispered, "What is it?"
Andy didn't waste any time. "We got another body."
"What?"
"He's on the lot, at the side of the building. I'm pretty sure they were a witness."
There were a number of thoughts swirling in Hank's head. A third body confirmed this wasn't a gunfight. It also gave him a chance to keep the case at the department if the victim wasn't involved with the FBI.
The door to the interrogation room opened. Everyone looked to see a familiar face saunter into the room with Officer Wilson following after him.
Hank's day was about to get worse. Cursing under his breath, he muttered into the phone, "We'll talk later."
Special Agent Richard Perkins stopped at the end of the table with his hands clasped behind his back. He spotted Hank turning to face them all, and gave a short, disrespectful greeting. "Detective."
"It's Lieutenant," Hank snapped. He nodded toward Perkins' face and with a smug grin, said, "I see your nose has healed."
The agent showed no reaction, but a prolonged stare was enough to betray his wounded pride. "Uncuff him," He ordered, looking down at Walsh.
Officer Wilson shot a silent apology to Hank as he reached for the handcuffs. Hank moved to protest this, pointing at the handcuffs, "He's a witness."
"He's a federal agent, and the FBI is officially taking over this investigation," Perkins was swift to reply. As the cuffs attached to the table were undone, he shifted his annoyed gaze down to Connor. His face turned into a sneer, and he said, "Still contaminating your work with this thing, I see."
Connor was more than happy to return the heated glares, but he knew Perkins was just trying to provoke him, and he wouldn't give in.
As Walsh stood from the table, rubbing his wrists, Perkins' ire returned to Hank. "At least you've gotten rid of your more disobedient officers," He feigned a compliment, wearing a taunting smirk to match.
"Detective Hope is in the field investigating your agent," Hank corrected, glaring at the both of them.
Beside his superior officer, Walsh perked up. He went on the defensive, leaning forward to say, "There's nothing to investigate!"
Perkins tilted his head to the side but kept his eyes on Hank. He wanted to ensure his insult made the impact he intended as he said, "Don't waste any more breath on these people. They'll be gone come the new year."
Mention of the president's declaration cut past all the other petty jabs, and even seemed to unsettle Walsh, who lingered while Perkins headed for the door. He struggled for the right thing to say. He knew he was a villain to the DPD, not just because of the case, but because of the animosity between agencies. He knew that wasn't going to change with him.
"I didn't kill my partner." It was all he could manage. With nothing better, he stepped around the table and followed Perkins.
Connor moved to his feet and turned to watch them leave. "If I never see Agent Perkins again, it still won't be enough," He muttered under his breath.
Hank snorted. "Tell me about it." Nudging an arm, he said, "But it's not over yet. Andy found a third body at the motel. Go help her out. I'm going to look into Otto's dying message."
Andy was kneeling down beside Alfie's body, doing a superficial examination as she waited for Hank.
He had probably been dead for several hours now. He was face down and aside from light red lines under his chin, he bore no obvious cuts or markings of a fight. There were various pieces of electronics and tools in a small pile by the head of the sleeping bag, no doubt his collection of possessions. Nothing appeared to be touched, and there was no space for anything notable to be missing.
She was trying to get a closer look at his face when movement from the property next door caught her attention. A board attached to the chain-link fence clanged against metal as if it had been lifted from the bottom and dropped back down. She could hear rustling leading away from her as something, or someone, crossed the yard.
Making sure no one was in her immediate vicinity, she replaced the cardboard and tarp over Alfie's form, and followed the noise.
Next door to the motel was an old, abandoned house. Boards were tacked up in place of window panes, bricks on the exterior were covered in grime and half-ripped posters, and the wrap-around porch had spaces missing where wooden planks were rotting. The grass was left unattended, and a For Sale sign planted in the corner had a number written on it with half the digits smeared away due to exposure to the elements.
The fence was newer, though, likely a measure by the owners to keep out troublemakers. She could see a large hole underneath the board, a strong indicator that troublemakers had not been deterred. She grabbed a portion of the links and gave it a small shake. Seemed sturdy enough. Latching onto the links high above her head, she pulled herself up toward the top bar. In two sweeping moves, she was throwing her legs over and dropping to the ground on the other side of the fence.
Even at the edge of the yard, she could hear a floor creak inside the house. She made sure she was the only one in the yard as she approached. Reaching the front door, she planted her palm against the wood and cracked it open.
"Hello?" She called out, sliding in sideways through the narrow gap in the door.
A small table was to the left, next to a fireplace and the entrance to the kitchen. Various debris scattered around the floor, and ahead of her were stairs leading to the second floor.
"I'm with the DPD. I just have some questions."
There was no response, and she heard no more movement. She let go of the door and moved further into the room, passing the staircase and the table. After peering into an empty kitchen, she turned and walked along the side of the staircase toward the steps.
By the time she registered the sound of a door opening beside her, a figure was already halfway out of the hidden cupboard.
An android wielding a butcher knife lunged for her with a wide sweep of his weapon. She lurched backward, stumbling into the middle of the room to dodge him. "Hey, whoa, I just want to talk!" She yelled, not yet bolting for the door.
"Out! Away! Go away!"
His attacks were wild and relentless, and she was never able to catch her breath. The second her foot would hit the floor after ducking one attack, another was fast on its way. She tried to steer her momentum, maneuvering around him toward the furniture on the left side of the room.
He finally went in for a jab rather than a swing, so she sidestepped the blade and went for his arm. She managed to get him into a wristlock, and slammed his hand into the corner of the table behind her. There wasn't a crack, but the sound was similar enough, and the force threw the knife out of his grip. A boot to his stomach sent him into the staircase, and Andy took the opportunity to kick the knife away.
He recovered quicker than she expected. He climb to his feet and rushed her, shoving his body against hers. She went down with a loud thud, and he was immediately on top of her with his hands at her neck.
"FBI! Stop!"
She may not have been able to see Warren Walsh standing in the doorway, but she recognized his voice. The android jolted in surprise, and upon seeing another human, this one aiming a gun, he jumped off of Andy. Landing on his rear, he scooted back until he hit the staircase wall, their fight forgotten.
"Put your hands where I can see them!"
His hands shot up into the air but his head went down. He tried to make himself seem smaller, bringing his knees closer to his chest. "Stop. Stop. Hands where you can see them...," He kept repeating to himself in a hushed tone.
Walsh maintained his aim on the android as he entered the room, coming up behind Andy. "You good?" He asked.
Andy slowly sat up, rubbing her sore neck. "Yeah. Fine."
The entire altercation had been stupid - she made too many mistakes. The first was not having her firearm out immediately after jumping the fence, and the second was forgetting how quickly androids could move. Even if he wasn't an 'advanced prototype' like Connor, he still had that advantage over her.
"Who is this?" Walsh asked regarding the android.
"I was trying to figure that out," She grunted, pushing herself to her feet. She retrieved the knife from the floor, and the android flinched at the sight of the blade. Tossing it onto the table, Andy turned and faced him.
Now that she wasn't worried about being stabbed or choked, she was able to see him more clearly. He was thin and blonde haired, and a deep gash ran along the left side of his face, with skin missing around it, and blue veins streaking out across his cheek and forehead. His left eye was a dark blue, damaged to the point she doubted it worked anymore.
"What's your name?"
He didn't lift his gaze from the floor. "Ralph doesn't want any problems. He was just defending himself," He whispered, shaking his head.
"Ralph?" She asked, assuming the android was speaking in third person. "All I want is to talk."
"Humans don't want to talk. They want to cause pain and take Ralph away."
It was safe to piece together why he felt that way. Even without the injury, it wasn't exactly a big leap. "I don't want to take you anywhere," She said with a resigned sigh. Unsurprisingly, he didn't believe her, but when she saw him glance up at Walsh, she waved a hand toward the agent. "Put the gun away."
Walsh did a double take. In disbelief, he asked, "What?"
She scoffed at him. "You don't think we can defend ourselves?"
He did, but that didn't mean putting his gun away was a good idea. The stubborn frown on her face told him there was no use fighting her on it, though, so he put the safety on and holstered his weapon. "There," He said, holding up his hands in an exaggerated shrug.
Andy's focus shifted back to Ralph. "I'm looking for someone who hurt a couple people last night over at that motel, and I think you may have seen them."
Recognition flashed on Ralph's face, and fear was quick to follow. Ducking his head behind his arms, he protested an accusation that hadn't been made. "Ralph didn't want anything to do with them! He heard a fight, but he didn't do anything. He thought they were looking for him, and he just wanted to be left alone."
"But you did see something," She pushed.
"Maybe... Maybe he did," Ralph tried to give a defensive shrug, but it was stiff. "That man always sleeps there, always talks to himself, but he was actually talking to someone last night. Another human."
Walsh didn't know what man Ralph was talking about, but he knew it sounded like a witness. "And you didn't hear my voice, right?" He asked, pointing to himself.
"It was someone else," Ralph confirmed.
Andy glared at Walsh for interjecting and stressed, "What did they say?"
"Room 101," Ralph started. Lowering his arms to his knees, he continued, "He asked about the other humans at the motel, and the man told him, 'Room 101.' Then he walked away, and there was a loud noise."
"What did the humans look like?" She asked.
He shook his head and mumbled, "It was dark. Too dark, too quick. Ralph didn't want to be seen so he hid. Hiding usually works."
As he shifted his body away from them, curling into himself, Andy could tell the interview was over. He had given them all he was willing to, and she had a suspicion it was also all he knew. It wasn't as much as she wanted, but it certainly helped. "Okay," She said, and headed for the door.
Walsh didn't understand why she was done when they should have just been getting started. "Are we really leaving it at that?" He asked.
Coming to a stop after opening the front door, she shifted on the balls of her feet to look at him. "He's not gonna be any more helpful, and what do you mean, 'We?'"
She didn't wait for his answer. She left the house and he cursed under his breath, taking off after her. Storming off the porch, he called out, "Who's this other victim the FBI doesn't know about?"
Without stopping to address him, she threw out over her shoulder, "It's not your jurisdiction!"
"I'm not an idiot, I know it's related!" He argued, glaring at the back of her head. "Just like you know Thom and Otto didn't kill each other!"
At this, she stopped. She turned to face him, and he was met with a hard frown. "We are not talking about this."
With a great huff, he exclaimed, "Come on, Andy, you gotta work with me here."
"Oh, do I?"
He frowned, and went into a lecture. "The DPD has a head start, but as of twenty minutes ago, the FBI has jurisdiction. Can we just focus on the job and not play turf wars with each other?"
The question had her rolling her eyes. "This isn't a turf war! You're the main suspect!"
At his wit's end, he threw a hand into the air and yelled, "So help me find another one!"
"Andy?"
They looked to the source of the voice and found Connor standing where Walsh had torn away the board hiding the hole in the fence.
He did a quick scan of the scene in front of him, taking note of the tension that lingered after a fight, and the fresh marks on Andy's neck. Luckily for Walsh, it was easy to conclude they were caused by the shadow moving in the windows of the house, and not by Walsh himself.
"Hank sent me to help you with the third victim," He spoke, focusing on Andy. "Is everything all right?"
She seemed relieved to have a quick exit from her previous engagement - much to Connor's delight. "Yeah," She muttered, approaching him. "FBI was just offering to cooperate on our cases."
Walsh stayed where he was, watching her walk away. "And does the DPD agree?" He pushed.
The glare she shot him was the kind of look that ended arguments. Turning away, she ducked through the hole in the fence and left the yard.
Walsh would follow anyway.
Back at the side of the motel, Andy returned to where she found Alfie. She pulled at the tarp and cardboard, and revealed where his body was hidden. Connor was the first to step in and investigate.
On the pavement next to the sleeping bag was the faint outline of a shoe print left behind by dirt. He leaned over the body and spotted a matching pattern on the fabric by the waist. Tactical boots. Size twelve.
As he knelt down and rested an elbow on his knee, Walsh and Andy stood back and watched. Walsh was far less accustomed to Connor's presence, and he asked quietly, "Are you really okay with this?"
Andy didn't move. "What, policework?"
He gave a small pout and whined, "You know what I mean."
Connor picked up Alfie's right hand and gently turned it over, examining a faint band of discoloration on the skin. Victim wore a watch. Tilting the hand back, he found dark blue fibers under the nails. Wool and polyester blend.
How close he was getting to the body was exactly what Walsh was talking about. He waved a hand in indignation, muttering, "This is contamination of a crime scene."
Andy had enough. She may not have been able to remove him from the scene, but she didn't have to listen to him, either. "I'm not going to take criticism from the guy who's looking at a triple murder," She remarked, brushing past him to join Connor.
He was looking at Alfie's head. At first glance, his ruffled hair seemed to be natural unattended bed head, but at a deeper level, he could see a shape forming that indicated he'd been pressed against something. There weren't many signs on his face and neck, but a few scratches were under his chin and his lower lip seemed to be swollen.
He looked up at Andy, stating, "It appears he was strangled." Glancing toward Walsh, he got an idea. He stood and approached the man, holding out a hand. "May I?"
It took Walsh a moment to understand he was being asked to reenact the murder. "Uh... Sure," He agreed. With a stiff shrug, he turned his back toward the android.
"Get on your knees, please."
Walsh sent him an awkward glance, and then looked to Andy in doubt. With arms crossed, she rose a brow and said, "You heard him."
His shoulders dropped in resignation. As he lowered onto his knees, he sighed and started complaining. "Just remember this later when you want to complain about how feds aren't being helpf-uegh!"
Connor had moved behind him, and in the middle of his sentence, wrapped an arm around his neck. The android clasped his hand on his wrist to put the man in a firm chokehold, and delighted in squeezing a little too hard. Walsh was startled by the swift movement. His eyes widened as he reached up for the arm under his chin, repeatedly slapping his palm down as a signal to let go.
Connor did not let go.
"The instinct is to grab the arm that's choking you," He explained, restraining the man in front of him with ease. "In doing so, the victim managed to scratch his neck, as well as collect dark fibers underneath his fingernails from the killer's clothing."
He let go and Walsh slumped forward, catching himself with a hand on the ground. "You couldn't just say that?" He spat out.
Connor shrugged. "You were a visual aid," He said simply, then looked to Andy. "There were also footprints belonging to a tactical boot."
She repeated the evidence to herself as she pulled her phone from her pocket. Tactical boots and dark clothing were signs the murder wasn't random. This killer knew where they were going and was prepared to be stealthy. The method alone hinted at a professional background, and malfunctioning cameras weren't a coincidence.
She believed in her heart of hearts that it wasn't Warren Walsh. This meant that it was someone else with an equal level of experience, and she hadn't forgotten that Agent Ivers called the department for backup.
Things were only going to get worse from here.
A text from Ben was waiting for her, and after reading it, she said, "Ben's on his way to take this over, and then we'll talk to Alfie's friends."
Walsh climbed to his feet. "His friends? You think they'll know anything?"
Andy looked up at him, and narrowed her eyes. She'd already let him hear more than she would have liked. "I haven't agreed to this," She rejected, returning her phone to her pocket.
His jaw dropped. Pointing to Connor, he exclaimed, "I just got choked by your robot!"
With a quirked brow, she warned with dry sarcasm, "Keep calling him that, see if it wins me over."
He took in a breath but resisted letting out the frustrated sigh. Holding up his hands in defense, started to negotiate. "Okay, then how's this- I have a car, and I know your bike's not here. You really want to pay for a taxi because you're stubborn?"
Connor watched her step closer to Walsh. He recognized the start of another fight brewing, but he was more than happy to sit back and let this one play out.
"What is the FBI saying about this case?" She asked, her tone skeptical. "Because you wouldn't want to work with the DPD if the agency actually agreed with you on this. Does your superior even know you're here?"
Walsh scowled. "You let me worry about my superiors."
The lack of an answer was an answer. "I'm right, aren't I?"
"Why does it matter?" He asked with a strained voice. He needed her to understand this was personal. Pointing at his chest, he contended, "I want to know who killed my partner. Would you sit by if it was Anderson?"
She did understand, though, and it was why he couldn't be on this case. It wasn't about turf wars or pride. It was for his own good. Glaring, she asked, "Would you let me on the case if it was?"
He went to deny the accusation, but couldn't get out the words. It would have been a blatant lie, and they both would have known it. "No," He finally confessed. Looking away, he mumbled, "It would jeopardize the case and make you a bigger suspect."
She waited a moment to let his own words to sink in, and then she left him there.
"Well I talked to Lieutenant Richards."
Having finished her visit with SID, Delgado wanted to discuss things with Hank. She found him standing at his desk in the middle of trying to solve his own mystery. The screen on his computer was open to documents gathered from Malcolm Otto's law firm and home, and an open box sat on the desk.
"What are you looking for?"
Hank scrolled down list of collected evidence on his tablet. "Otto wrote a 7 on the motel floor in his blood. I was hoping to find something here that would tell me what the hell that means." He paused to shrug, showing that so far he had not been successful. "What did Richards know?"
Delgado was sad to say she didn't have much more luck. "SID hasn't seen or heard from Sharon Weaver since she left," She said.
"What about the bar Andy found that Manfred kid at? The Rivershack?"
"They've been watching it, and nothing," She said. "I'm going to try to talk to her old coworkers. She seems to still have contacts there, and I doubt I'd stand out as much as I would at the bar."
It seemed a good idea to Hank. He glanced up at her, asking, "You need an officer with you?"
"No, this needs to appear casual," She replied as she started to walk away.
Delgado didn't make it past the divider before Hank noticed something peculiar in the evidence logs. His brows knitted, and he brought the tablet closer to his face. "Wait a minute..."
She stopped and looking back. "Hm?"
He didn't answer at first. Dropping the tablet onto his desk, he grabbed the edge of the box and tilted it over. Inside was what he initially expected to find: an empty wallet and the now crumpled suit Otto changed out of when he was first detained. What he needed to find wasn't there.
"Where's his phone?" Hank asked, dread brewing in the pit of his stomach.
Delgado returned to his side, looking over the possessions he'd laid out. "Wouldn't it have gone to the FBI?"
"It's not even on the list," He shook his head, holding up the tablet to show her the logs.
"Maybe we didn't collect it."
His frown deepened. "No, I was the one who booked him. I confiscated his phone."
As she attempted to offer other reasons, he switched to another file on his tablet. It was a timeline of all the activity related to the locker for Otto's case. There weren't many events documented, which made suspicious check-ins easy to find. Before all the necessary evidence had been transferred to the FBI, the locker had been accessed by one person.
He mumbled something to Delgado about leaving it to him before heading to one of the bullpen's side offices.
Officer Pierson was having a light chat with her partner and coworkers when the door to their office knocked and opened. A few looked toward the visitor but they went mostly ignored until Hank yelled, "Pierson!"
They all watched her turn at the sound of her name, but then went back to their conversation as she removed herself from the group. She weaved around the tables and came to a stop in front of Hank. "Yes, Lieutenant?"
He stepped completely into the office so they could speak in quieter tones. "You accessed the Malcolm Otto evidence day after we arrested him. Why?"
Confusion flashed on her face. Shaking her head, she murmured, "N... No, I didn't. Does the log say that?"
"It says it was your ID."
Her face flushed. She didn't know why it mattered, but she knew whatever it was, she had nothing to do with it. The idea that someone was using her ID around the precinct brought other concerns to mind as she tried to express her innocence. "That can't be possible. I didn't-" Cutting herself off with a specific realization, she asked, "Wasn't he arrested around Thanksgiving?"
"The day after."
Her body relaxed, but the suspicion in her face remained. "I was off work with my family that weekend. I didn't get back into town until Monday," She explained.
He tilted his chin upward, scrutinizing the officer. His gut instinct was to believe her, but he needed more than her word. Holding up his tablet to show her the screen, he asked, "Then you won't mind showing me the travel expenses for that?"
True to Pat's word, the soup kitchen was at the end of the same street. It was a small rectangular building that had seen many renovations over the years, until Urban Farms bought the property in 2036 and repurposed it into a place to help feed the growing homeless population in the city.
Andy and Connor scanned the faces at all the tables. They navigated the eating area, coming out of the crowd toward the other end of the kitchen. A line formed at the food counters, running the length of the building.
The other volunteers seemed to follow the lead of a woman at the head of the line. She worked with dedication, and she was tuning out her surroundings until two new faces came up to the counter in front of her.
"First-come, first-served. You gotta start at the back," She droned out, pouring soup from a pot into a recyclable bowl.
Andy shook her head. "We're not here for food. We're looking for someone."
The woman reached over the spit shield to drop the bowl onto someone's tray, and lingered in her upright position. Eyeing them both, she asked, "You debt collectors?"
Pulling her jacket up, Andy revealed the badge on her hip.
The woman wasn't surprised, but she wasn't pleased either. "Cop's not much better," She said, returning to her work.
Andy wasn't going to take it personally. "Do you know Alfie? He sleeps out at the Eastern Motel."
"I don't do names. I just give out food."
"He's dead."
The woman stopped.
As she tried to pick her pace back up, Andy said, "I need to talk to his friends, see if they've heard anything."
"Talk to Jo. She's been around - knows everyone. Red hair and a yellow coat, can't miss her."
They looked around the room, and Connor found both colors poking out near the end of the counters. He pointed to her and Andy nodded to the volunteer in thanks.
Jo was an older woman, short and stout. Her red hair was a messy bob, and the bright yellow rain coat went down to her knees. She would stand out in any crowd, but in the muted tones of the soup kitchen, her presence was especially loud.
"Jo?"
Hearing her name tore her eyes from the food further down the line, and she shot them a distracted glance. "I'm busy," She shot.
Andy stayed where she was. "We were told to talk to you."
Jo huffed. Tapping the ends of her fingers against the polyester of her coat, she mused, "Who'd I piss off for that to happen?"
"Do you know Alfie?"
"As well as anyone does," She shrugged.
"Have you talked to him recently?"
Her already limited patience was dying. Grumpy and suspicious, she eyed them both up and down and jeered, "You're askin' a lot of questions. He owe you or something?"
Andy shook her head. "He was killed last night, and I'm trying to find out who did it," She explained, revealing her badge once more. It drew a scowl from Jo, who began to turn away, but then Andy identified herself. "I'm Detective Hope with the DPD."
For whatever reason, that seemed to warrant a double take. Jo stared at her as if looking for an answer to a question she didn't bother asking out loud. Whether she found it or not, she finally came to some kind of conclusion with a reluctant sigh. In an abrupt move, she left the food line and waved for them to follow her to the door. "Well I'm not talkin' on an empty stomach. Let's go."
Minutes later, Jo was being handed a fresh hot dog from a street vendor.
Andy paid for the meal as the older woman waddled away to a bench by the curb. By the time the detectives were standing in front of her, she'd made herself comfortable and was holding the paper tray to her chest.
She took a bite of her hot dog and watched traffic build up at the red light. Another sigh left her, and she squinted up at them through the sunlight. "So he was really killed?"
Andy nodded, hands in the pockets of her jacket and one foot resting against the edge of the curb. "Yeah. At the Eastern Motel."
The name pulled an exhausted reaction from Jo, who muttered to herself, "Knew that shit was gonna get him killed."
Connor tilted his head and inquired, "Staying at the Eastern Motel was going to get him killed?"
Lowering her meal to her lap, Jo began, "Alfie got by workin' with cops. He'd hole up somewhere and watch it for a couple days, then pass off information to patrol officers in exchange for cash, food - hell, even that watch of his was payment."
Connor took special note of that. "His watch?" He repeated, brows raising.
"Yeah, some officer gave it to him after some big break he helped them on," She dismissed it with a wave of her hand, not realizing it was vital information. "Everybody called it his little narc badge, but Alfie didn't care." She looked exhausted, like a mother fed up with a rebellious child. "I told him he needed to knock it off. Folks don't let that kind of stuff slide, and cops sure as shit won't keep you safe. No offense."
"None taken," Andy mumbled.
Jo threw up a hand in the direction of the motel and continued, "He only slept around that damn motel because so many people like to hide out there. It was his go-to. All the officers in the area know him."
"So you think someone figured it out?"
Squaring Andy with a hard stare, Jo divulged, "Yesterday morning, he came down to the kitchen telling me all about some big lookout job an officer had for him at the motel. He was supposed to wait for someone to check in, and then watch their room. All night. Now he's dead? If it wasn't that, you tell me what happened."
Andy and Connor shared a heavy glance. The story was damning, and with their already existent suspicions, they knew it was possible.
A ringing phone pulled them from their wordless discussion, and Andy saw Hank's name on her screen. "Hey," She answered.
"Malcolm Otto's phone is missing."
A ball formed in the pit of her stomach. "What?"
"It's not here, and it's not with the FBI!" He yelled. She could hear him slap a box down on a table, and he said, "It's not even recorded, but I know he had a phone. He didn't want to hand the damn thing over when I arrested him. I thought I was gonna have to fight the guy for it."
"Did anyone check into evidence?"
"There's one check-in recorded, and she wasn't here the week her ID accessed it," He told her. There was a small pause before he spoke quietly. "Something's wrong, Andy."
He had no idea how right he was.
Turning her back toward Jo, she closed distance between herself and Connor until their shoulders were bumping. She lowered her phone to her hip so Hank couldn't hear their conversation, and then she whispered, "Someone took Otto's phone from evidence. FBI never got it."
As far as Connor was concerned, it was time to face the facts. "The evidence at both scenes, the cameras, Agent Ivers' phone call, and now this." Tilting his head down, he said, "You know what it looks like."
"Yeah."
She also knew Hank couldn't handle it. Not now, not yet.
Bringing her phone back to her ear, she raised her voice to a normal, inconspicuous volume and said, "I'll talk to Delgado about it, but it's probably just a paperwork error-"
"What?"
His disbelief felt like she was stabbing her own self, but after his push to hand over the SD card to the FBI, he'd backed her into a corner. This was her only option. "Mistakes happen sometimes. I gotta go, Hank."
"Now wait a minute-"
She ended the call, unwilling to let herself waver in this decision. Connor was watching her with an indecipherable expression, and she never met his eyes. "He already wants to walk away now. Imagine what he'll do if he knows about a dirty cop," She mumbled.
With that, she looked over her shoulder at Jo and said, "Thanks for your time. It's been a big help."
Jo didn't seem too convinced, but she shrugged anyway. "Yeah." However, as they started to leave, she called out to them. "H-Hey, wait!"
They turned back, but once their eyes were on her, she lost all courage. Whatever was on her mind was a struggle to try to say, her mouth opening and closing a few times. On the third attempt, she paused and inhaled a deep breath, then shook her head.
"Never mind. Doesn't matter."
It had never been more obvious than now that Andy was hiding something from Hank.
When it came to her and evidence, she was like a dog and bone. She never let go that easily, even when most thought she should. To dismiss something as big as missing evidence, she had to have been pulling strings behind a scene he wasn't aware of yet.
Which meant if he was going to find that phone, he would have to do some unauthorized snooping of his own.
He was standing on the front porch to a luxury property belonging to Malcolm Otto's estate. With floor to ceiling windows all along the exterior walls, and a slanted roof, its style wasn't much different than Kamski's home. This was no surprise. They both had that rich bastard kind of taste.
Were his partner with him, she could have picked the lock and gotten them inside without leaving a trace. Hank was not his partner, though. At the very least, the door didn't splinter when he kicked it in.
He wandered the living room, taking in the monotone paintings and the sleek furniture. Expensive appliances he didn't know how to use lined a counter in the open kitchen, and bottles of liquor were stacked on a shelf by a bar off to the side of the living room. Electronics like computers and televisions were already gone, having been confiscated weeks ago. Drawers were either empty or full of useless junk.
The bedroom was to the right of the living room, and only separated by a wide fireplace and a step up in the floor. Hank moved to that half of the house, eyes drifting over the large queen sized bed in the middle of the room, and a long dresser in the corner beside a floor-length mirror. A desk was in the opposite corner, but it had no storage, and there were two empty end tables on either side of the bed.
A small control panel was on the wall nearby. Hank punched a finger into the screen, and a second later, it lit up with an array of confusing buttons and mysterious glyphs.
Hank... was not a tech-savvy kind of guy.
He cursed and grumbled under his breath as he smashed various buttons on the display, each one spawning a new layer of frustration and anxiety. With every menu he opened, backing out of the one before stopped being a possibility. Every screen had a slider for something he didn't understand, and a notification kept popping up in the corner about the internet connection.
Where the hell did I go? and Who needs a god damn calculator in the wall? and How do you get out of this?
In an incredible fashion that was only ever attributed to the technologically impaired, he managed to turn on the fireplace, close the windows, set the temperature of the house, change the menu language to French, and flush a toilet.
In his confusing attempts to undo the journey, he hit a combination of numbers that resulted in the sound of something sliding out of place behind him.
The closest bedside end table appeared to have a secret compartment, and Hank Anderson somehow stumbled into popping it open. He abandoned the control panel and its messy web entirely, walking over to the table and pulling the drawer open the rest of the way.
There was only one thing inside: a key, with an engraving of the Northeastern Bank label.
Walking into the Ferndale Museum of Art, Delgado sought out various staff members until one was able to point the way to the director.
She was heading for a doorway leading into one of the exhibits when a thin older man turned the corner. He matched the description she'd be given, so she sped up and called out, "Director Averill?"
He gave a small jolt in surprise, watching her approach him. "Yes? Who are you?"
"My name is Desta Delgado. I'm with the DA's office," She introduced, retrieving her badge from her pocket.
"The DA?"
"We have some questions about Sharon Weaver."
His shoulders dropped, and he rolled his eyes. "Of course you do," He muttered, beginning to walk again. He didn't wait for her to follow, but he knew she had. "I don't know how many times I have to tell you people that she's been on a sabbatical since her brother passed-"
"You haven't talked to her at all?"
He shook his hands at his side, trying to release pent up frustration. "I understand this may be a wild concept for the government, but we don't make a habit of harassing our employees," He whined.
Delgado ignored the dig, her expression skeptical. "It's been a month. Surely someone would want to check in on her by now."
Coming to a stop in the middle of the museum lobby, he turned to face her. "Sharon has always had a flexible schedule and relaxed communication. It's one of the privileges that come with working for the Ferndale," He said almost whimsically, gesturing a hand to the scenery around them.
The hand shifted into a point aimed for her, and he stepped closer. Voice taking on a more serious tone, he warned, "And let me tell you something else, Miss Delgado: this museum is a sacred place for many of us. The more your goons show up and disturb it? The less inclined any of us feel to talk to you."
Averill was less passive than she'd expected, and it was easy to see talking would get them nowhere. She threw out one last attempt, saying, "Allow me to take a look at her office, and I assure you, you will never hear from me again."
He shook his head. "Get a warrant." He removed himself from the conversation, giving Delgado no choice but to leave.
As she descended the steps outside, she thought about what to do next. Maybe asking around at the bar wasn't such a bad idea, and if that failed, she could straight to prison and offer some deals to a few of Sharon's former lackeys.
All plans were put on hold when she found Warren Walsh leaning against the hood of her car. Marching up to the driver's side door, she snapped, "You shouldn't be here."
He jumped to his feet, ready to plead his case. "I need information somehow. Andy didn't feel like talking and I'm running out of options."
She yanked the door open and leveled a hard stare over the window at him. She couldn't believe he thought she'd be okay with this. "You don't have any options. You're a suspect."
He had to resist yelling at that, but he still repeated what he'd been saying all day. "I didn't have anything to do with this," He protested, moving around to stand behind her so the door wasn't between them.
"And it needs to stay that way if you want a jury to believe that," She told him as she tossed her bag into the passenger's seat of the car.
"A jury is already going to believe it. They'll hear that I have a solid alibi, and that the third victim was overheard talking to the killer," He explained with a raised voice.
That was information she hadn't yet received.
She grabbed the edge of the car door and turned to peer at him. Briefly, she battled with herself on whether or not to let him know she was confused, but her curiosity won. If Hank wasn't keeping her up to date, she needed to get the information somehow. "What are you talking about?"
This worked in Walsh's favor. "Andy found a third body at the motel, and a witness to his murder who confirms it wasn't me." Stepping closer to her, he made sincere eye contact and pushed his hand into his chest. "Let me in on this and I can get you FBI resources."
She still wasn't buying it. Even if he meant it, he wasn't in charge of an investigation that involved him, and if it the lead investigator was Perkins, she knew for a fact she wasn't getting any help. That didn't mean Walsh was useless to her case, though. He was genuine enough in his offer for help. Take away the nicer clothes and add some thicker stubble, and he would fit right in at the Rivershack.
Then she thought about Hank's discovery at the precinct. "Did you get Malcolm Otto's phone from the DPD?" She blurted out.
The answer was almost immediate in the form of knitted brows and a cock of the head. "They never told us they had it," He answered, shifting on his feet.
He watched her start to squirm. He wasn't shallow enough to think the entire department was out to deceive the FBI, but they certainly weren't trying to repair the mistake either. With growing suspicion, he asked, "Desta, is the DPD withholding evidence from the bureau?"
It was too late to backtrack, but she didn't have to make it worse. "Forget it. It's nothing," She said, shaking her head.
Narrowing his eyes, he asked, "And did Andy ever mention to anyone that Thom called the DPD for backup last night when I left?"
Another pause from Delgado. Seemed she was as much in the dark as he was.
With a small huff, he turned to leave. "How about you call me when you decide you want to actually solve this case?"
Once she was left standing in the parking alone, she dropped into the driver's seat of her car and slammed the door.
There was a lot of new information to process, and all of it could be narrowed down to secrets within the Detroit police department. She was supposed to be the one they went to with these sorts of things, and yet here she was finding out about bodies and vital evidence through a federal agent.
The frustration bubbled until she slammed her hand against the steering wheel, and the sound was punctuated by a ringing phone in her purse.
She sighed, hoping to release the tension of her body, and then dug into her bag. Without looking at the ID, she answered, "DDA Delgado."
"Why are you looking for me, DDA Delgado?" Drawled an entertained voice.
At first, her brows knitted in confusion. "I don't know who-" The realization hit her. There was only one person it could be. "Sharon Weaver?"
Art dealer and red ice supplier, Sharon Weaver spoke up on the other end of the line. "Congratulations," She joked, "Do you want a prize?"
Delgado had never encountered Sharon, and a part of her was relieved by that, thinking it meant she was somehow safe from the danger. She tried to keep calm as she said, "The police have been looking for you for weeks now, and yet you call me?"
"I could say the same about you. The DPD has been looking for me for weeks, and yet now all of a sudden the DA takes an interest. Why is that?" Sharon pondered. A light clinking echoed in the background, reminiscent of ice cubes in a glass.
Looking up at the museum where the director had no doubt tipped off the woman, Delgado asked, "Who told you I was looking for you?"
"The back and forth is over," Sharon refused, growing impatient. "You wanted access to me, so here it is. What. Do. You. Want."
This wasn't the kind of interview Delgado wanted to conduct, but she didn't see any better option. "Are you aware that Malcolm Otto is dead?"
There was a surprised chuckle, followed by Sharon saying, "Really? No, I wasn't, but thank you so much for letting me know."
"He was supposed to meet with me this morning to discuss what he knew about you."
"Then they did you a favor, because I never worked with that glorified ambulance chaser, and anything he would have had to say about me would have been false."
Delgado scowled and shook her head. "You can't expect me to believe that."
Sharon never wavered, though that was normal for her. "Believe it or not, I don't work with men who show up on highway billboards. It's bad for business. Besides, all I wanted was to make him regret trying to steal from me. He can't very well do that when he's dead, now can he?" She posited.
"He wasn't going to be regretting much in witness protection," Delgado argued. "I suspect you would rather have him dead."
A long pause made her think the call had ended, but then Sharon asked quietly, "He was going into witness protection?"
It was a good try, but Delgado knew how convincing the Weaver siblings could be. As a matter of pride, she wasn't going to let herself be fooled. "Don't pretend you didn't know," She spat.
Sharon didn't take offense, simply saying, "I don't keep track of irrelevant people, DDA Delgado." She rustled a little on her end, as if repositioning herself in her seat. "Out of curiosity, did he tell you he had information on me specifically?"
The question threw Delgado off guard. "N... No, not in so many words, but-"
"Then I've lost interest in this conversation."
Delgado did not understand. "Wha... Wait, but-"
"You want someone who knows what's going on?" Sharon interrupted again. "Talk to our mutual friend."
"Our m-" A dial tone was as hard a rejection as Delgado could get. She looked down at her phone in stunned silence.
Sharon's voice had changed since the beginning of the call. Where she once sounded playful, endlessly amused with toying with her prey, she ended in sharp tones. She was closed off and reluctant, leaving no room to think she would be willing to share information.
Sharon Weaver was afraid. And Andy knew why.
By the time Andy and Connor made it back to the precinct, Hank had grown impatient waiting for them. Spotting them enter the bullpen, he stood and tossed his hands into the air.
"A paperwork error?"
She shrunk back under his angry gaze. "Hank-"
"No, no, no, explain this to me," He shouted, walking toward her. "Did you hit your head between this morning and that phone call?"
"I was just saying that maybe it's not a big deal-"
"When is anything ever not a big deal with you?!"
Her jaw dropped, but as she tried sputtering out a rebuttal, Delgado arrived.
"There's another body?" She yelled, jumping into the mix with a glare focused on Hank.
Hank threw up a hand, asking, "How did you find out about it?"
"Agent Walsh!"
Walsh definitely shouldn't have known, and there was only one way he could have. Hank turned to Andy, but she was quick to offer a defense. "He showed up at the scene. There was no hiding it from him."
Delgado's wrath shifted to her now. "But there was plenty of room to hide things from me?"
Unaware of the surprise phone call that took place, Andy assumed the snide remark to be about the third victim. She frowned, saying, "I don't have to report bodies to you-"
"I'm not talking about the body anymore!"
The three-way argument was getting far too confusing to sit through, and Andy was feeling small under the angry looks of the two people closest to her. Holding up her hands, she finally burst. "Can everyone back off?"
Hank jutted his chin out and snapped, "Try being honest with us, maybe we'll consider it."
She didn't know what she'd done to deserve all this - well, she didn't know what she'd done that they knew about, anyway. She was trying to defend herself, again, when the door to Fowler's office opened, and the captain himself jumped into the fray.
"Anderson!"
He stormed into the bullpen, and everyone could see now that the walls to the office had been frosted in order to hide a meeting between himself and two federal agents. Walsh and Perkins were walking behind him, one looking far more smug than the other.
It was safe to say at this point that all of the DPD were sick of the FBI.
As Fowler closed in on Hank, his brows dipped over a furious glare, and he pointed a finger at the lieutenant. "I put up with a lot from this department - more than any other precinct has to - but this has gone too far."
Hank was not in the mood to deal with this. "It's not a big deal," He sighed.
"You hid a body, Hank!"
"I didn't hide anything."
Fowler's brows shot up, and he leaned forward. "So the FBI is lying? You told them about the body when it was found?" He pressured.
As far as Hank was concerned, he wasn't in the wrong here. Throwing up an arm, he complained, "He was a homeless guy sleeping on pavement in the middle of winter. We have to pass off every possible natural death now just in case?"
"It's got nothing to do with Malcolm Otto?" Fowler questioned.
As far as Hank was concerned, he wasn't technically in the wrong here. His hesitation made Fowler turn to Andy for the answer, and they all knew it was over then.
She tried incredibly hard not to sound like a reprimanded child as she admitted, "I think it does."
Fowler gestured toward her as his stare wordlessly asked Hank, See?
"FBI's taking over, Hank. And I want them to have total access to every report and evidence box you've touched for this case," Fowler ordered. He shifted on his feet, telling the agents, "You won't have any more problems. I guarantee you that."
Perkins gave a curt nod. "At least the administration around here still knows the chain of command, Captain Fowler." His eyes slid over to Hank and Andy. "We'll mention that when we file a report to your chief about the DPD keeping a witness' phone."
He slapped a hand on Hank's shoulder. "Hang in there, Detective," He taunted before turning on his heel and walking out of the bullpen.
Walsh followed without ever sparing any of them a second glance, but Andy knew it wasn't out of arrogance. He was just too much of a coward to own what he'd done.
With the FBI out of the pen, Fowler leaned in close to Hank. Hands on his hips, he threatened, "You ever put me in a position where I have to kiss that man's ass again, it'll be the last god damn thing you do at this department."
On his way back to his office, he waved a hand toward Delgado. She shot Andy one last disappointed stare before following him.
It was just the old trio now, and the silence was heavy.
For Hank, the FBI was little more than another headache. He was used to fighting with Fowler. He would keep doing his job, and the backlash of his decisions would die down and be forgotten about in a few months' time, as they were always were.
Andy was another story, though.
He walked up to her, keenly aware of Connor in the background and the possibility that he was in on whatever was happening. Staring her in the eyes, he started, "I don't know what's going on with you, Andy, but I know you're hiding something." She tried to deny it, but he held up a hand and snapped, "Don't bother."
She shut her mouth, and her eyes darted away.
"Partners are supposed to trust each other. If that's not the way things are between us anymore, then you need to let me know that right now."
Alarm bells were firing off in Andy's head. They weren't the useful ones that told her to follow her gut. No, these were the ones that incessantly screamed about dangerous waters. It was her anxiety, packed with guilt and shame.
Focus on the case. Remember why you're doing this. You're protecting them.
Tightening her jaw, her eyes met his, and she forced out the words. "We're fine, Hank."
As far as Hank was concerned, lying to him was the worst thing she'd ever done.
He looked over her shoulder and saw Connor's sympathetic but helpless expression. So the kid was dismissing him, too, then.
Hank huffed. "I'm going to Jimmy's." He shoved past her, yanking his jacket off the chair on his way out of the department.
At a desk on the other side of the bullpen, Gavin Reed glanced up from his computer and watched the lieutenant leave.
'It wasn't personal. You gave me no other choice.'
Andy wanted to break her phone when Walsh's name popped up on the screen, and reading the contents of the message didn't help. She shouldn't have been surprised by his poor attempt at an apology. He was never good at them, always making sure he found ways to remind her of her own faults instead of addressing his own. She couldn't understand how anyone thought that would deescalate things.
All these years, and it felt like he was just mocking her now.
She pulled the battery out and threw her phone with a little more force than intended into the freezer. Slamming the door, she dropped her battery into a bowl on the counter and moved to the living room.
Connor had removed his jacket and shoes, and rolled up his sleeves, already at work putting together an evidence board on the coffee table. Physical notes about what they'd discovered so far were scattered around on the surface and adjacent chairs, waiting to be linked together.
Andy sat down beside him, pushing her elbows into her knees. Despite staring at the board, her mind was elsewhere.
The silence was delicate, and they both knew it.
"Warren Walsh and I used to be in a relationship."
Connor stopped in mid-lean over the coffee table, surprised only by the abruptness with which she confessed. He looked back at her, forgetting the board where it lay. Slowly lowering into his seat, he debated on what to say. He didn't want try to feign surprise, but he wouldn't outright admit he already knew, either.
"Oh."
Well. It certainly wasn't eloquent.
She read it with ease. "You knew," She realized, her face falling.
He gave half of a weak shrug. "Hank mentioned it this morning."
Now it was her turn to mumble, "Oh."
She didn't know where to begin, so she started with an explanation. "It lasted two years. We met at the academy and moved in together while I was in the cadet program."
It was... a deeper relationship than he'd expected. "What happened?"
With a small, bitter grin, she mumbled, "Work. Shockingly."
Bringing her arms in closer to her stomach, she recalled the decline of her last serious relationship. "He had his eyes on the FBI, and the bureau was probably going to move him around a lot, so he didn't like that I was laying roots at the DPD. We started fighting, and then Hank offered me a position on the task force." She shrugged a single shoulder. "Warren gave me two choices. Him or my career."
"So he's an idiot," Connor deduced.
Andy would agree, but that part of her that would always be a little soft for old flames tried to speak up on her ex's behalf. "There was no love lost, but-"
"For you," Connor interjected. "If he gave you the ultimatum in the first place, it was because he still wanted a relationship."
Her eyes glazed over somewhat as her mind drifted to the last few months of her and Walsh's relationship. She remembered every night she didn't want to come home. She remembered how they always refused to talk to each other, tired from work and angry from their last fight. She remembered how she had to work twice as hard to get half his support.
Finally she shook her head and said, "That's not love."
With a long sigh, she pushed it out of her mind. She may not have done everything right herself, but she did all the right things, and Warren Walsh had been reduced to a footnote a long time. "It's not a big deal beyond it being annoying, but... I don't know." Focusing on the man next to her, she asked gently, "What are you thinking?"
Connor took a moment to reconsider things, and she turned sideways on the couch to face him.
He'd identified a part of the negativity he was feeling earlier - Walsh was an intelligent man who was dedicated to his work. He was also more clever than people gave him credit for, and a little conniving. On paper, he should have been a good match for someone like Andy.
If they failed, why would it be any different for her and Connor?
He knew he was missing the important details that told him whether or not that was a valid concern, he knew that it was illogical to compare his relationship to someone else's, but that was what insecurity did. It told stories and placed doubt in your heart.
It wouldn't have happened quite the way it did, however, if he'd known sooner.
"Today's been hectic for personal conversation, so I understand why you didn't tell me until now," He chose to open with, making it clear he wasn't angry.
For both their sakes, she wouldn't let him let her off the hook so easily. "I could have told you after the bombing," She said. "I just... don't like thinking about it."
"I don't know what other people would say the right choice is, but someone once told me there's no universal truth," Connor said, repeating the words Natalie once uttered when he was first figuring things out. They were words he told himself often, and about more than just relationships.
Looking up at her, he finally said, "What I do know is that I don't like finding out important things through people who aren't you."
She understood that. Returning his upset expression with a sincere one, she told him, "I'm sorry."
His curiosity was getting the better of them, though, and he asked her, "Do you regret how things went between you two?"
There was no deliberation necessary for that answer. "No. Definitely not," She chuckled, the thought alone exhausting her. Tilting her head, she admitted, "It wasn't all him, though. I did care too much about my work." She shrugged, "But I was new, and ambitious. My goals were more important than the guy in my apartment."
He rose a brow, amusement flashing on his face. "You've been trying to focus less on work lately."
She shrugged and joked, "I think a potential treason charge warrants chilling the hell out a little bit."
He reached to the side for her hand, and gave it a small squeeze. We're okay, and, Thank you.
"I trust you, Andy. I'm not worried about Warren Walsh," He told her. Tilting his head down to lean in toward her, he whispered, "For the record, I support you completely."
She gave half a grin. "I know! It's very sexy."
He smiled a little, and together they returned to the abandoned evidence board on the coffee table.
Andy's expression darkened at the reminder of work, and her arguments with... well, everyone. "Are you cool with what happened with Hank?"
He looked back at her. She appeared to expect a resounding no, but she didn't have to go home tonight and clean up whatever mess Hank had made in his stupor. "Hank is going through something right now. If that could jeopardize this-" Connor paused to gesture a hand over the board. "Then we have to leave him out of it."
"Why not pass it on to the FBI like he wanted? They already know something's up now anyway," She grumbled.
After today, Connor wasn't giving Perkins a damn thing if he could help it. Shaking his head, he told her, "We can't trust whoever's pulling these strings to not have allies in the bureau."
"I guess," She conceded, but he could see the skepticism on her face. He knew it wasn't personal. Everything he said, she already knew - this was just self-doubt. Finally she confessed, "It's starting to feel like I'm reaching for excuses to avoid the truth."
His brows furrowed. "What truth?"
"That it's all one big turf war."
He didn't know what to say to that, and he doubted anything would help.
A soft knock at the door cut through the silence, and Andy let go of Connor's hand to answer it.
Delgado had stopped by, determined to get to the bottom of everything. She was standing in the hall with arms crossed over her chest and a deep frown set into her lips. She didn't bother waiting for a greeting when Andy opened the door.
"I'm not done with you."
Andy had to step aside to dodge Delgado letting herself in. She walked out of the foyer ranting, and Andy quickly shut the door to her apartment.
"Evidence is going missing, the FBI's complaining to the chief, Captain Fowler's at his limits, the most important witness I was ever going to have in my career is dead, a federal agent is dead, Sharon Weaver called me-"
That was a new one. "What?" Andy hissed.
Connor had stood up from the couch as they came further into the apartment, and Delgado stopped in her tracks once she saw him. She started to question why he was there until her eyes went down to the papers strewn out around the coffee table.
Of course he was in on it.
She looked to Andy as the detective moved closer, and revealed, "Sharon Weaver called me after I talked to the director at the Ferndale. She told me to talk to you. That you know what's going on."
Andy glanced to Connor, whose expression told her he was having similar thoughts. If Sharon Weaver was pointing fingers at the anti-android mastermind Stewart Combs was working for, then she probably also believed there was a dirty cop in the Detroit police department. It was as close to a confirmation they'd gotten so far.
Delgado wasn't stupid. She could see they were going somewhere important in their heads, and she wasn't invited. Sick and tired of being out of the loop, she exclaimed, "I'm not Hank, Andy."
The two women made eye contact, and Delgado continued, "Or Captain Fowler, or Reed, or Warren. I'm your best friend. I've had your back since the day we met."
Andy had considered bringing Delgado in on things on the very first day, but as she once told Connor, sometimes her old friend got caught up in red tape. They were just beginning to understand what kind of threat they were sitting on, and they couldn't afford the risk that she would take it to her boss, or the police chief.
Maybe it was time to bring her in, though; they already had Reed on the inside at the precinct and they would soon have Arthur Vick on the inside at Internal Affairs. Eventually they would need help from the DA's office, and there wasn't any other person there Andy would be willing to trust like this.
Holding out her hand, Andy said, "Give me your phone."
Delgado's head shot back in confusion, and she looked to Connor for any kind of clue. When she found none, she gave in and pulled her phone from her purse.
Right away, Andy powered it off and removed the back. The battery went to a bowl on the table where another was already sitting, and the phone itself went into the freezer, of all places.
Andy shut the freezer door and turned back toward Delgado. "You're going to want to sit down."
True to his word, Hank went to Jimmy's.
He sat at the counter sulking over a glass of scotch and staring at the empty space in front of him. Whenever he'd start thinking about Andy or Connor or Fowler, he'd take a sip. Whenever he'd start blaming himself for being an addict in a bar, he'd order another drink. The drunker he got, the more he thought about things.
It was a viscous, unending cycle.
The door at the front opened, but he didn't care. He was four drinks in.
Then a body lowered into the seat beside him. Plenty of spots were open, but they chose that one. He glanced over, ready to tell a stranger he wasn't here to chat, and instead found something worse.
Gavin Reed.
Hank groaned, and went for another sip immediately. "The hell are you doing here?"
Reed pressed his elbows onto the counter top and shrugged. He never looked at the man next to him as he replied, "I want a beer. Is that not allowed?"
Hank shook his head. "You don't come to Jimmy's," He grunted into his glass.
Leaning into the counter, Reed twisted his torso toward the man just a little. He scanned the shelves of liquor as if perusing, and retorted, "Or maybe you get so piss drunk, you just don't notice me, huh?"
The scotch glass slammed down on the bar. If Hank wanted to hear about what a piece of shit he was, he would have stayed sober. Turning his head toward the man, he said, "Go bother someone else."
Reed couldn't do that. Clasping his hands together in front of him, he commented, "I heard what happened back at the precinct."
"Spare me, asshole. Everyone heard it," Hank scoffed. He raised a hand for the bartender's attention, shaking the glass a little as his head went down.
For the first time that night, and with no trace of his usual sarcasm or mockery, Reed finally looked at Hank. He waited for the bartender to refill the glass and walk away, and even then, he spoke in a low voice. What he had to say was for Hank's ears only.
"I know what Hope's hiding from you."
