CHAPTER TWO

There's no question that something is wrong. Even before Alex has gotten out of his car, the vibe of the station feels off. It's not the usual quiet hub of mid morning activity; there's a buzz, an undercurrent, surging through the place and the general gut feeling that Alex gets as he comes in through the back way and heads for the lockers isn't good. He doesn't even make it to the changing rooms before he's stopped and diverted- by their Detective Inspector, of all people.

Carlie initially just gives a nod of recognition to Alex as she hurries past him in the hallway, but not a second later she's rapidly backtracking and slipping in front of him to block his path. "Hey," she says. "Do you have any where important to be this morning?"

"I just got here. I don't know."

"So no, then," she decides. "Don't worry about your uniform. Just clock in and get down to Evidence."

"What's going on?" He gestures around them, indicating the eerie feel of the station as a whole.

Carlie's expression is set into one of grim determination. "Body," she says simply. "Found next to a canal late last night. Single gunshot to the head- execution style. Not quite sure where it's going to lead, but-" her expression sours "-MIT are taking over, they've asked us to assist in some of the initial ground work, and after the debacle of the last time we co-oped with them, we need to be a bit more schmick this time around." She checks her watch and makes a face. "I have a press release to get to; try and control some of the circling sharks gracing our doorstep. If you bump into Steph on your way down to Evidence, tell her she's on the same assignment. And if you see anyone who's looking a bit lost for something to do, take them with you as well."

"What exactly am I doing down there?"

"Murray should still be lurking; he can give you a full rundown, but it's basically just organising evidence and personal effects into boxes and labelling. Sorting. Making everything so neat and tidy and simple that there couldn't possibly be a problem with MIT understanding it. We're just not going to give them anything they can complain about."

Alex nods. "So just sorting? Not going through it?"

"Use your judgement. See how things go. See how many helpers you have. They didn't specify how much of the legwork they wanted us to do, so maybe just gloss over stuff that might be important. Give them a head start. Okay?"

"Ma'am."

They part ways, Carlie marching for reception to deal with the journalists, Alex merely poking his head into the male locker room to dump his bag and officially start his shift. He takes the scenic route down to the basement but doesn't come across Steph or any other potential helpers.

Murray is on his way out as Alex heads into the evidence storage area. The rather monosyllabic Detective Sergeant gives Alex a curt nod and a vague wave at one side of the room, supposedly indicating where Alex is to start with his sorting. Alex wishes that he'd pressed Carlie for a bit more of an instructional guide as Murray slinks off back to CID and leaves him to guess his way to a starting point.

Thankfully, no doubt given the ridiculously early nature of the investigation, the evidence isn't piled boxes and boxes high. Alex isn't quite so grateful to whoever is in charge of organising the evidence area, as it's a jumbled up mess of incoherent boxes and folders and archived junk that should have been sent to auction or charity already. It takes him a good fifteen minutes to just find the first box with the relevant date on it, and upon opening it he finds what has to be the personal effects collected off the dead body.

Off the main storage room is a smaller area with a couple of desks and computers. It's meant to be a sorting and processing space, but as Alex enters and finds a line up of half empty coffee cups and irrelevant paperwork, he starts to think he's found the holding up place for the more senior members of the station, where they've been disappearing to in order to try and catch up on paperwork in quiet. He clears a space, trying not to gag at the state of some of abandoned beverages, and sets the box carefully down on one end of the desk beside a computer. Gloves on, he starts to sort through the contents.

Everything's already been bagged, but there's a very official looking pink Post-It note delicately placed on the top of the items which requests photographs and a detailed running sheet, so before Alex can proceed he has to hunt down the required items. It doesn't take him long to find the camera (thankfully plugged in to charge, which makes a nice, convenient change to the usual) or the forms, but a working black or blue pen is another story entirely. There's an ample supply of red pens and pens that don't work, and five minutes of furious searching later Alex finally finds a brand new black ballpoint pen hiding on the floor underneath the second desk.

First up is a wallet. It's black leather, beaten up and in need of replacing. Perhaps it's been hung onto for sentimental value; there's a monogrammed WF in flowery calligraphy etched into the bottom right corner. Alex photographs the front and back, gets a close up of the monogram, then flips the wallet open. It looks fully stocked, with nothing obvious missing. He takes a shot, then sets the camera down and starts to pull out all of the wallet's contents. Driver's licence, bank cards, library card, loyalty cards, money… Everything is accounted for. So not a mugging gone horribly wrong, then, he guesses. He picks up the driver's licence and glances over it.

William Farley. Barely out of his mid twenties.

Dead.

He takes the rest of the photos that he needs, then replaces all of the items into the wallet and returns it to its evidence bag. The process is much the same for the next few random items. There's a notebook with nothing legible written in it, most of the pages blank and the few that do have some scribbled writing on them have had the ink run due to the early morning rain. Some pens. A torch. Voice recorder- blank, unfortunately. Alex works methodically through the box until he gets to the last item: a mobile phone.

It works, which is always a good place to start. Alex turns it on and it immediately powers up, screen bright. He wonders briefly if the phone was found turned off, or if whoever had picked it up and bagged it switched it off. As the home screen loads- no passcode; silly but helpful- and Alex notices the full battery bar, he decides it's probably the former. A bit odd. He puts the thought to the back of his mind; he's here to sort evidence, not deduce anything from it. That's MIT's job. Going through the phone might well be a step too far, but he's curious and Carlie had said to use his judgement. And his judgement says 'Go on, have a flick through'.

The contacts list is sparse. Single names only. No one obviously identified as a family member: no 'mum' or 'dad' contact label anywhere. Alex exits out of contacts and brings up photos. Nothing. Nothing on the camera roll. Nothing even in recently deleted. He's frowning now.

The call log is a bit more interesting. There're a couple of calls in and out from one of the contacts- Lenny- over the past couple of weeks, but that's about it. Until last night; a No Caller ID is logged half a dozen times. And they're late last night. Really late. Alex can't bring up any more information, but after checking the messages on the phone and finding just one, unopened, requesting to check Message Bank, he dials it in and listens. The time stamp matches the final unidentified incoming call.

Steph comes into the room. She might have even asked him a question. Alex has no idea, because all of a sudden his world has shrunk to take in just the message playing, and the all too familiar voice relaying it.

Shit.

On his way to his work station, Hex tosses a cursory glance in through Zan's open office door as he passes. It's nothing more than a gesture, his boss usually anywhere but behind her desk, so he ends up doing a double take and quickly retracing a few steps when his mind catches up with his eyes and realises that today is an exception. His brief knock on the doorframe is more of a graze of his knuckles, and he's already standing in front of the desk by the time Zan glances up from her computer.

The frown on her face seems to be left over from whatever she's been staring at on her monitor, but the line creasing her forehead does deepen ever so slightly as she catches Hex's expression. Before he can get a word out, she says, "Is this about-"

"Yes."

"Shut the door." She waits until he's complied and returned to stand expectantly in front of her desk. "You know I hate doing that," she says. "Sending you guys in unprepared, no notice."

"So why is that exactly what happened last night?"

"I didn't have a choice."

Hex scoffs.

"It came from Baker," Zan says flatly. "Directly from Baker," which Hex thinks is supposed to be a bit of an olive branch, a touch more information than he was given the night before, but all it does is make him cringe.

Hex knows Thomas Baker. Well, knows of him. He's a balding, middle-aged man with a spare tyre for a middle. No one really seems to know what his job actually is (including, it seems at times, Baker himself), but he'd done a lot of sending emails and popping up at important meetings when Hex had still been at Five, and he's obviously linked in some administrative capacity to the Secret Service- which is another tick in the box that supports Fletch's mutterings about 'secret bloody squirrels'. Great.

"So it was for… Five? Six?"

Zan shrugs. "One of them. I'd assume, anyway. Baker doesn't get his hands dirty for much else."

"They can't do this. They can't just chuck stuff at us- at you, to give to us- with no information."

"I know. I said that to Baker."

"And?"

Zan just looks at him.

Hex shakes his head. "This sort of back door, underhanded crap is one of the reasons I left the Service."

"I know," she says. Hex isn't the first former spy through her doors, not wanting to leave it all behind but at the same time no longer wishing to be in it up to their neck. "It was a bit of a mess."

"A bit?"

"A total fucking cock up, but what could I do, huh? I gave you what I had, Hex- all of which was passed to me about five minutes before I handed it to you. You weren't the only ones running blind."

"But we were the only ones in there, Zan. Where were you last night? Huh?" He eyeballs her. "Did it even have a risk assessment done? We weren't even given the targets name, let alone particulars. It might not be such a problem being ignorant behind a desk, but it's a totally different deal when you're actually out there, breaking into someone's house in the middle of the night." She goes to say something but he cuts her off. "Next time you agree to take on a job like that, how about you go and do it yourself. I want background, Zan. I want information. I want to know what the hell I'm getting involved in, and what I'm asking Kit- and Fletch- to follow me into. It's one thing for the public to be kept in the dark and not trust what we're doing, but it's another thing entirely for your own team to be given the same treatment. Don't bundle me up and make me a part of it."

There's a heavy pause, which Zan eventually breaks with a genuine sounding, "Sorry."

Hex merely grunts.

"I'd like to assure you it won't happen again- believe me- but-"

"It definitely will."

"Oh yes. Even before the week is out." Her smile is apologetic. "Unfortunately, we have to work with them. We wouldn't even exist without them, so…"

"We have to play nice?"

She pauses to consider that, then says, "I'd say more 'play silently'." Her focus turns back to her computer, but she's not done with their conversation. After a couple of clicks on the mouse, she gestures for Hex to step closer and swivels the monitor around as much as she can, so he can see the screen. "This is all that they've given me. And," she adds dryly, "it only hit my inbox fifteen minutes ago."

"So super helpful."

"Totally."

Hex scans the screen. There's not even any need to take control of the mouse; the entire dossier (if the scraps of information pasted into a PDF can be assigned that title) is a single page that fits on the screen without the need to scroll. The name at the top of the page catches Hex's eye first: Linden Frost. So he'd been right there, at least. Next to the name is a colour photograph of a young man with dark brown hair, and eyes that match. He looks younger than Hex thinks he is, and a quick glance at the truncated personal details that follow on down the page proves that theory: only twenty one, and already got the Secret Service on his back. What the heck is he into? That particular question isn't answered by the intel pack, so Hex turns to Zan, figuring that she'll anticipate his query without him needing to spell it out.

"Don't have a clue," she says, a rather bitter undertone encircling her words. "Need to know- and we, apparently, don't need."

Paulo is three quarters of the way under a car when someone clears their throat. Before he can even think of saying 'Just a minute', he's seized by the ankle and dragged backwards out. Still on his back, he blinks up at the person, expecting to see his boss or one of his co-workers, but finding, instead, the youngest of his sisters.

"Morning," Rosa says cheerfully. She inspects her hands, grimaces, and rubs them briskly on the front of her black skirt. "I was around so thought I'd pop in and say hola."

"Uh… Hi." Paulo sits up on the board, draping his arms over his knees, and gives his little sister a knowing look. "Now that's out of the way, what do you want?"

"Just to say hello."

"Let me rephrase that: what do you really want?" He wags a finger at her as she goes to protest again. "I have known you for nineteen years, Rosa; you can't lie to me."

"I wasn't lying," she protests. "I was just… taking the longer way around."

"And now we've arrived. So what do you want?"

Rosa inspects her nails, scuffs her shoes against the concrete floor of the garage, glances around the workshop, blows out a big breath of air, then finally gets to the point. "I need a favour," she says.

Paulo plays it up, heaving a weary sigh and running his hands through his curly hair before realising that probably isn't a smart move, given all the grease and grime smeared on them. "See?" he says, shaking his head. "I can read you like a book. It's never just a drop in and a chat. There's always another motive, there's always something you want."

"You can say no."

"I probably will." He grins. "What's the favour?"

"Dinner. Tonight. Izzy."

Paulo's shaking his head even before she's finished talking. "No. No way. You're not setting me up." He realises what name she dropped and his protests get even more emphatic. "You're not setting me up with Izzy, especially."

Momentarily distracted from her mission by her brother's reaction, Rosa scowls. "What's wrong with Izzy? She's lovely."

"Yeah, but she's also your best friend and I've known her since she was this high." He waves a hand around his knees. "It's weird, Rosa, and I bet she'd say the same thing. Don't you dare."

"Oh you're annoying." The scowl lifts, but only slightly so the effect is still more than there. "It's not a set up. She knows about it. I'm telling you."

"No-"

"Just listen. Okay?" She points a stern finger at her brother. "Listen. I have a date tonight night with Sanchez-"

Paulo makes a face that Rosa opts to ignore.

"-and he suggested we make it a double. His cousin was visiting and so I said that if he brought him along, I'd bring Izzy. Nothing serious, just a bit of fun. The cousin has had to go home earlier than expected, so now we've got a reservation for four tonight and poor Izzy's a third wheel." Rosa pastes on her best puppy eyes and implores her brother for his co-operation. "So what do you think?"

"No," Paulo says immediately. He lies back down on the board and starts to push himself back under the car, but Rosa grabbing his ankle again puts a halt to his escape.

She tugs him back out so that she can see his face. "Seriously? You won't just come along? It's a nice restaurant. Great company. Night out. It's not a proper date. It's just doing me a favour."

"Why don't you just cancel it? Or ditch Izzy?"

Rosa's expression gives him all the answer he needs.

He shakes his head. "See? Set up. Knew it." His second attempt to retreat under the car is once again met by his sister pulling him back out into view. "I have work to finish, Rosa," he grates as she looms over him once more.

"It's not a set up," she insists. "I swear. The restaurant won't let me cancel or change the booking; they've got a twenty four hour window, or something ridiculous. And why on earth would I want my big brother and my best friend dating?" She makes a face like she's just bitten down on a particularly sour lemon. "That horrifies me on a lot of levels."

"So what's this about?"

"Dinner." Rosa spreads her hands, innocent. "That's literally all there is to it. Dinner, and doing me a favour."

For a moment Paulo looks like he's considering it. For a moment he is considering it, but knowing his sister and knowing that what she says and what she means rarely match up- and both tend to never match up to what actually ends up happening- he's not going to be quick to take her word on it. So, with a final, "No, Rosa," delivered in as stern a voice as he can muster, he slides back under the car and puts an end to the conversation.

Rosa huffs. "Right. I'm remembering this the next time you call me up, all 'Oh, hermana pequeña, I'm moving to the city and need somewhere to live; can I stay with you?'."

"I don't sound like that."

"Oh really?"

There's a clang from somewhere off to the side, followed by heavy, clunking footsteps. A second later, Paulo can hear his co-worker, fellow mechanic Sam, ask Rosa about what she was just talking to her brother about. He doesn't need to see Rosa to know she'll be looking for a tactful escape route so, with a resigned sigh, Paulo rolls himself back out from under the car.

"Izzy." Sam looks reflective. "She's curvy, yeah? Really dark long hair? Been round here a couple of times? I'll take the fourth spot if Paulo isn't keen to help you out."

Rosa doesn't even attempt to be subtle with the desperate, pleading look she shoots her brother. He's still not keen, but poor Izzy is a total innocent in the whole situation, and subjecting her to Sam's company is hardly fair. Subjecting anyone but Sam to Sam's company isn't fair. So, with Sam looking at Rosa, and Rosa looking at Paulo, he sighs and shrugs, which is about as much of a definite answer that his sister is going to get.

"You're paying," he says as relief washes over Rosa's face.

"Absolutely," she agrees. "And don't worry about rent money this week. On me."