"You can't possibly go to work like this." She said as he sat on the sofa of his living room whilst she stood by, having just changed the bandage on his arm. His wound had opened up and bled a bit from his run in with Jamie, and AJ was just begging him to stay at home, so she could look after him.
"No, AJ. I have a job to do. I have an ongoing case I'm in charge of. I can't just take a day off." He told her as he finished up wrapping his wound in a clean bandage, shirt off whilst he sat on the couch. He was so glad that AJ had told Jamie. To be honest, he thought she would have chickened out. He hated how upset she looked, and he hated the way Jamie looked completely shocked and helpless whilst looking him in the eye. At the end of the day, he'd been sleeping with another man's wife, he had to take some guilt from AJ. It wasn't all her fault. But for what it was worth, he was glad things were said and done. He knew it would take some time for AJ to come round. She'd been so used to being with Jamie for so long, she might not have known his way of life, but it was something new, and he was excited to really let her in now, freely.
He stood up after wrapping his arm, putting his shirt back on as he began buttoning it up, "Why don't you stay here today, get some sleep. Make yourself… at home." He smiled as she gave a small smile his way, "I think you need some time to yourself, after everything that has gone on. I won't be home late. Call me if you need me." He said as she nodded.
She guessed he was right. Maybe she needed some time to relax and to doze on and off on his comfortable couch. She had so many questions for him now. Like, were they officially dating? Was she still going to stay next door? Did they just jump right into each others arms now? Given the fact she had just broke it off with her husband minutes ago. Did she wait until the divorce? Oh the divorce… This wasn't as easy as she thought it would be.
"Ok. But please, don't come back with another bullet wound. Stay safe." She asked him, it was all she asked of him today, to protect himself and come home to her safely. She could say that now. He was coming home to her. Into her embrace. Not in secrecy anymore. It felt wonderful. Even though she was still thinking of Jamie and how upset he must have been feeling.
"I will." He nodded, "You get some sleep. You look exhausted." He cupped her cheek as her heavy eyes shut at the feeling of his touch. She hadn't been to sleep in twenty four hours, and as well as having to deal with so much in those twenty hours, she really needed to go lie down, "I'll see you later." He smiled as she opened her eyes back up, feeling and seeing him lean forward to press a small kiss on her lips to which she enjoyed with a sigh of satisfaction.
Although she had caused deep upset to the man she once loved, and still cared about, she couldn't ignore the excitement of this new promising relationship with Phil. The whole reason she left her husband. HER HUSBAND. Was because Punk had gave her a deep reason to. Love. The unconditional kind. The kind of love that never faded out, the way her and Jamie's had. Although feeling guilty, both of them as a matter of a fact, they were both still incredibly happy that they could be together now, without having to sneak around.
Punk had made his way to the station, wounded arm and all, to find his team already out and around town searching for Stuart Cunning, the deadly serial killer who had re offended just a few nights ago, and was on a mission across town to hurt more and more people. Punk felt a great deal of pressure, especially when innocent people's lives were on the line.
"How are things going, Phil?" Carl asked Punk who was sitting at in his office, flicking through different files of his, "What did you do to your arm?" Carl asked as he noticed Punks bandaged up arm.
"I got shot." Punk said, like it was an every day occurrence.
"Are you ok to work? You can go home if you like, I'll keep the case covered." Carl said with sympathy as Punk shook his head.
"I'm fine." He insisted, "I nearly had him. He's keeping himself well covered up and disguised. But I almost had him. He got nervous, took an unbalanced shot at me, got me down and got out of there. Haven't heard word about him since." Punk said.
"Alright, well since you're clearly struggling. I want you stay here today, take into account his victims, try and figure out what they have in common. This guy might be targeting certain people. Think about where they were killed, he might have a specific place. Just go over everything and see if you can find a pattern. You'll have no idea how much it will help us." Carl said as Punk sighed.
"I'm fine. Honestly. I can go out." Punk told him as Carl shook his head.
"No. I don't want my best guy on the force getting any more injured. You'll stay here." Carl ordered, "And you'll be happy about it. Show me that smug smile." He played as Punk just rolled his eyes, collapsing on his chair behind his desk where he was apparently going to be staying at for the full day.
He hated being at his desk, he may have well just gone home to work there…
"Can I just take all this and head home?" Punk asked, pointing to all his paper work scattered over his messy desk. He figured that if he wasn't going out on the beat with the guys to track down or patrol the streets, then why the hell did he need to even be at the station? He could look at his files on the case whilst lying on his sofa.
"Of course you can. You should be at home, Phil. You have a shot arm. You're crazy to think I would have let you go out like that." He said, "On you go. Get home." He ordered as Punk nodded, gathering his things and heading back home. AJ would no doubt be pleased.
He got home around dinner time after picking up take out on his way home, to heat up later for them for dinner. He dumped his folders and files on the couch whilst heading upstairs to change into something more comfortable. He walked into his room and smiled to himself as he seen AJ sprawled across the double bed, hugging into the covers tightly as if admiring the bed she was now allowed to sleep in without feeling guilty. She looked at peace, and so drop dead gorgeous. He noticed she had taken her wedding ring off and sat it on the bedside cabinet.
He had no idea how they were going to work their way around this. He figured he would just leave it to AJ and Jamie, to sort out divorces and everything that came along with it. He figured that he and AJ would just begin dating, they way they had longed to. She was welcomed into his home, as he assumed he was to hers, it wasn't like they lived far away from each other…
He left her sleeping, not wishing to wake her. He stripped out of his uniform and changed into sweats and a t-shirt, heading back downstairs to finish his obvious homework.
He sat on his couch for hours, not even noticing that the day had turned night. The TV was on quietly in the background whilst he sat on the floor, his papers spread out everywhere as he noted things and drew lines to different notes and pictures. It was harder than a lot of people probably thought. His job wasn't just to walk around with a gun in his hand and scare people. He had many different jobs to do, hard jobs, and gathering evidence and figuring murderers out was one of the hardest.
AJ had woke up finally after a good sleep in Punks bed. She headed downstairs, walking into the living room where he was sitting on the floor, tons of paper scattered everywhere. She was so happy to see him.
"I didn't think you'd be home this early." AJ admitted as Punk looked up with a smile, sitting back to take a break from his work, smiling towards her as she leaned against the wall.
"My boss sent me home. Gave me some homework." He said as she laughed, "I brought Chinese food home, it's in the kitchen. Why don't you bring it in?" He asked after glancing at the clock, not realising how late it was.
AJ done just that, feeling quite hungry herself, bringing in the Chinese food into the living room, sitting down on the floor with Punk as she watched him eat whilst work. His job did scare her attention needing soul. She hoped he wasn't the type of man who put his job before his woman. Because that was what she was now. His. His girl. She knew he was just busy at the moment, but she hoped he would always be able to make time for her.
"What you doing?" She asked him curiously, sitting crossed legged at a ninety degree angle of him whilst tucking into her food.
"I'm just trying to look for a pattern between the victims. Usually with serial killers, there's some sort of pattern in either who they're killing, or where they're killing. I've not came across this guys yet, so I'm trying to figure it all out. It'll help us figure out where his next move will be." He told her as she nodded. He was interested in teaching her about his job. She was interested like a supporting girlfriend was supposed to be. It felt so weird to call her his girlfriend, "Did you have a good sleep?" He asked her.
"Yeah." AJ nodded, "I figured out what I'm going to do before I fell asleep." She told him.
"What you gonna do?" He asked, looking over to her as she sat her box of noodles down, dusting her hands off together as she sat up.
"I just… I want to deal with this all in a mature way. I feel horrible for what I done to Jamie. He never deserved that. But I done it because I love you. And… and I'm sure he'd much rather me happy, than keep me with him, whilst not even being in love with him. He will understand. It'll take time. But he will." She said, "I think we should take things slow, just for now, until I get the divorce sorted. I don't want to rush him, so it might take some time." She told him as he nodded, agreeing with what she was saying, "So… we can still go about seeing each other and what not, but lets not… lets not go about telling people just yet."
"It's not like we have much people to tell anyway." Punk laughed.
"I know." AJ said, "But this is a small neighbourhood. If people see us out holding hands, Jamie will find out somehow. We've hurt him enough. Don't you think?" She said as he nodded silently. She did feel bad, but not bad enough to scare her away from being with Phil. She didn't cause all this for no reason. The only reason she was upsetting him, was because she was no longer happy with him. There was no other way about it.
"So I still can't take you on dates?" Punk sighed dramatically as she smiled.
"We can have dates here." She smiled to him, shuffling over to him, cupping his cheeks as she pressed kisses on his cheek, trailing them down to his neck as he turned to his paper work whilst she kissed him.
"I gotta figure this shit out, baby." He told her as she groaned, turning her head as she looked on at all the papers.
There was deadly silence in the air as they both stared at the files. Whilst Punk was thinking about how much AJ being in his home, waking up in his bed, enjoying dinner with him freely was so great and wonderful, AJ was actually looking at the files he had sprawled across the floor.
"Hey…" She knelt up, sinking down and looking closely whilst tucking her hair behind her ears, "These two victims. These are recent?" She turned to him as he nodded.
"She was last night. The guy was a few nights ago." Punk pointed to the study case AJ was holding, "Why?" He asked. He guessed he wasn't really thinking. He could have been missing something on the sheets that AJ had picked up on. He was too busy thinking about how he couldn't wait to start this new chapter with AJ, and how wonderful it was going to be to be together, and circulate that happiness they found in one another freely, without having to feel guilty anymore, or act in secrecy.
"These victims were both orphans." She told him, "What has he got against orphans?" She asked curiously. She wasn't much to take interest, but the interesting fact had jumped out at her.
"He was an orphan. The unsub. He..." Punk flicked through all his paper to find his study case on the man they were looking for, finally coming across it, "Yeah, he was an orphan, but gone missing from the age of fifteen."
"But if he was an orphan, and he knew how it felt, why would he be killing these people?" She asked with confusion.
"Normally serial killers may think they are doing their victims a favour. Or he might be doing it in-spite of these people finding homes and new families, which he never did." Punk said with a racing excitement to call Carl and give him the good information, "Oh, April you are a genius, sweetheart. A genius." He turned to her, cupping her cheeks and leaving a loud smacking kiss on her lips as she laughed, watching him rush away with his phone as she smiled to herself.
It was going to be still very lowkey for them, and very much candle lit dinners at home for dates, but only because she didn't want to rush so quickly into things. If word got around she had split from her husband, and then was seen with another man holding her hand within days, people would be just as disgusted with her as Jamie was. And she wanted to keep things down low for Jamie's sake. She'd hurt him enough. She hoped they could sort out their divorce accordingly, because she was so ready to become Phil's, for good. She knew she had always made the right decision in telling Jamie the truth. She was happy now. Even just sitting here with Punk and helping him with work made her happy. They brought out the best in each other, and she just couldn't wait for them to start this new journey together,
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