by Andrea Speed
Roan sighed and wondered how to best put this. It took Roan a bit to understand it too, but Sean was a stammering mess, terrified of him and his transforming face and diseased blood. “From what I was able to get out of Sean, it seems Jamie had met someone she was seeing but hadn’t told you about yet: Michael Brand. Switzer, his cop partner at the time, found out and discovered that Jamie was a pre-op transsexual. Switzer knew Sean casually and passed this on. Sean didn’t want a fag in the family any more than Switzer wanted a fag as a partner, so one night Sean and Switzer beat the shit out of Jamie and bullied Michael into silence. Jamie turned around and filed a charge of police brutality, but named Michael. Probably because Sean wasn’t a cop, and probably because Jamie wanted to force Michael out, make him fess up about his asshole partner and half-brother. But you know what happened instead: Switzer and Sean killed Jamie, and Michael just gave up.”
Grey listened with his head tilted to one side, listening like a parakeet. The same amount of understanding appeared in his sleepy eyes, but it seemed to connect. “So Michael Brand knew.”
“He must have. Suspected is hard to swallow, especially since he must have known that Sean and Switzer beat Jamie.”
“He was dating Jamie? Why didn’t he do anything?”
Roan shook his head. “That I can’t say. But having met him, I’m gonna say he’s been broken. By who and why I don’t know. It’s possible Jamie’s death sent him into a spiral, and he simply didn’t want to—or just couldn’t—rat out a fellow officer.”
Grey’s head straightened up, and his eyes seemed to darken. Is this what his opponents on the ice saw? It was wonderfully intimidating. “Where’s he live?”
“No, Grey, that’s not how we’re doing this.”
“I’m paying you, yeah? I just want his address.”
Roan shook his head. “Hurting him won’t bring Jamie back. It probably won’t even give you any satisfaction—he’s too easy an opponent.”
“Michael or Sean?”
“For you? Both. At the same time, with a head start.”
He seemed to consider that, chew it over like it was a piece of gristly meat. “How come you can’t go to the cops and tell them this?”
“I can. I will. But Sean’s confession to me was under duress—it wouldn’t hold up in court. Also, he blames Switzer for everything, which I know is a lie, but it’s his word against my sense of smell. It’s only been legally cleared for identifying people’s scent and blood—I’ve never been legally cleared for smelling lies, although I can. Unless Sean confesses to them—or Michael fingers his brother, which I wouldn’t bet money on—there’s nothing to tie him to the scene, especially since Switzer is now dead. If he was alive, it would be easy to turn them against one another, but Switzer took the easy way out.”
“You shot him.”
“Yes. That was easy.”
Grey was still rolling this around and didn’t like the taste of it. “Under duress? Did you torture him?”
“Do I look like Jack Bauer? No, I just scared him so badly that he started talking. He even pissed himself, which is why I may smell a bit like piss.”
Grey gave him a lazy half smile that was somehow very unsettling. “You scared him that badly?”
“I have my moments.”
“We could use you on the team. Stand you at the blue line and have you stare down the opponents.”
“It would be extra comic too, since I can’t skate.”
“We’ll prop you up.” He wiped his fist across his mouth, and the dark shadow had yet to leave his eyes. He was still calculating the odds of finding the Brands and beating them to a pulpy mush. “You telling me they’re gonna get away with murder?”
“Not exactly. Sean is gonna go down for assaulting Holden; I got him arrested for that. And since he’s a repeat offender, most likely any judge will throw the book at him. Also, since I let it be known that he hurt Holden, it’s possible there are friends of Holden's behind bars, friends that will make life very ugly for Sean as soon as he’s in the door.”
“But what about Michael?”
“Michael’s already dead. I’ve never seen such a miserable ruin of a man. Killing him would probably be a mercy; it’s more punishment to keep him alive.”
Grey gave him a dubious look. “I don’t like this, Roan.”
“I’m not crazy about it either. But there’s a couple of other things still in play.”
“What?”
“Best you not know.” Mainly because Roan honestly had no idea what he was talking about. He just had to make up something to keep Grey from going off and beating the Brands down to a bloody carpet stain. He could point out he had worked so hard to get this far in his hockey career, and he couldn’t just toss it away because of these assholes, but Roan wasn’t sure such a pitch would have worked. Would it have worked on him? “Let’s just let it play out and see what happens, okay?”
Grey’s look remained skeptical, but finally he sighed and his shoulders sagged as he sank back into the couch. “Yeah, okay. And thanks for giving me the info. You did in days what the Eastgate PD hasn’t done in over a year.”
“The Eastgate PD are hopelessly corrupt. Luckily, it looks like the fallout from the Switzer case is going to take the chief down, and maybe some others. Switzer was rotten to the core, and his rot spread on contact. A housecleaning is what Eastgate needs. Maybe with officers who are actually going to do their jobs because they’re being watched, the case will finally be cracked.”
“Maybe. But I won’t hold my breath, ’kay?” He rubbed his eyes and added, “Fuck, I’m tired.”
“Go back to bed. I shouldn’t have come over so early. I was just buzzed.”
“I understand, man. I get that way after a really good game.” He levered himself up, and Roan stood as well. They shook hands, and since he was convinced Grey wasn’t going to run off and do something stupid just yet, he left.
Could Grey let it be? Could Roan? The entire drive home, he wondered. Michael really was pathetic; as much as he wanted to beat the shit out of him, he couldn’t shake the persistent, nagging feeling that Michael would probably enjoy it too much.
People got away with murder every day. It was sad, but it was true. People fell through the cracks and murderers escaped, not because they were criminal masterminds but because they got fucking lucky. It wasn’t right, it wasn’t fair, but it was reality in its ugly, stinking glory. It was just a bitter, barbed pill to swallow.
The buzz wore off as he fought the morning traffic home, and by the time he reached the house he was ready to pass out on the floor. He’d been up all night and a headache was blooming deep inside his brain, a dull ache that he knew would become a full-blown migraine later on. The sun lightening the sky was making it worse. He popped a couple of Percocet before going up and taking a quick shower to wash the remaining scent of blood and piss and fear off him. Dylan was a lump under the covers, apparently sleeping, and he tried his damnedest not to wake him up.
He dried off hastily and slipped naked into bed, but he woke Dylan, or Dylan was already awake but playing dead, because he had just pulled the covers up to his shoulders when Dylan rolled over and snuggled against him, pressing up against his back and draping an arm around his waist. He was nice and warm. “Do I want to know why you’re coming home just now?” he mumbled.
Roan closed his eyes against the light bleeding in around the fringes of the curtains, and he could feel the painkillers taking hold, wrapping the pain in his head in cotton wool, softly pushing it down. It was a lovely feeling. “No, I don’t think so.”
“I was afraid you were gonna say that.” He sighed, his breath a warm rush on Roan’s neck. “How’s Holden?”
“Last time I called, still stable. He’s doing better than the guy he stabbed in the leg.”
“Karma in action?”
“Maybe. Or maybe just a vital lesson in being careful who you fuck with.”
“Did you know he carried a knife?”
/> “Holden? No, but I can’t say I’m surprised. He was a street kid, after all.” He was settled into his soft pillow, and between that and the heat of Dylan’s body, he was drifting off already.
“I thought he was a preacher’s son.”
“That too. He’s been a lot of people.”
“The cops get the other guy, the one who ran?”
“I got him.” Roan knew the fact that he was half asleep was why he admitted that; otherwise, he’d have just said the cops grabbed him and left it at that.
“I kinda figured,” Dylan admitted. “You didn’t partially transform, did you?”
“Why would I do that?”
From the way Dylan sighed heavily, he already knew. “I’m too tired to get mad at you right now. But we’re having an argument later.”
“I’ll pencil it in.”
You knew you’d probably been in a relationship too long when you were actually scheduling arguments. But you know, right now he was too damn tired to care.
14
The Commander Thinks Aloud
Roan was having a very nice dream about Paris licking honey off his chest when he was woken up by Dylan saying his name and gently shaking him, a hand on his back. Roan didn’t look up from his pillow, just grunted a “What?”
“Umm, Detective Murphy is downstairs. I think she wants to arrest you.”
“She just threatens to do that all the time. Don’t worry about it.” Of course she usually did it over the phone. Doing it in person was kicking it up a notch.
“What did you do?”
“Nothin’.”
Strange how much you could pull from a single moment of silence. Dylan wasn’t at all pleased, with him or with that answer. Dylan sighed and then, lowering his voice, spit out every word like a bullet. “What. Did. You. Do.”
Yeah, they’d been together too long. Was there any bullshit he could sneak past him? Wait a minute—had he ever snuck any bullshit past him? “It’s probably about the guy who attacked Holden.”
“What did you do to him?”
“Nothing.”
“She’s here about nothing. You expect me to believe that.” The chill in his tone could have given him frostbite.
Roan turned over onto his back and risked looking up at Dylan, who was sitting on the edge of the bed. He was fully dressed and freshly shaved, his hair glossy black and neatly brushed, dressed in loose jeans, an orange T-shirt with a black “Om” symbol on it, and a black denim jacket. Roan didn’t have to look down to know he was wearing his red sneakers. It was Dylan’s attempt at levity when he was doing something that could otherwise be kind of depressing. That confirmed it was Wednesday. “Hon, I’m telling you, I didn’t do anything to that guy. I wanted to—believe me, I wanted to put my fist through his chest cavity—but I figured killing one person was enough for a week.”
It was so unfair. He knew it would make Dylan flinch, and he did. Dylan looked away and rubbed his eyes, his shoulders slumping in exhaustion. “I don’t—I hope this case is over with soon enough. It’s been a nightmare from the beginning.”
“Tell me about it.” He reached out and touched his arm, just about the only part of him he could reach at the moment. “I promise, it’s just about done. Okay?”
He tugged lightly on Dylan’s jacket, and Dylan finally looked back at him with a small smile that faded quickly. He reached out and stroked Roan’s chest tenderly. “What’s been happening lately… I don’t like what this case is doing to you. On top of everything else, it seems like too much.”
Now that he didn’t get. “What d’ya mean you don’t like what the case is doing to me? What’s it doing to me?”
Dylan grimaced in that way he did when he knew he’d said something he really didn’t want to have to explain. His fingers lightly traced shadows over Roan’s skin, and it was wonderfully distracting. “You’re getting reckless. You may not change on a schedule anymore, but that doesn’t make you bulletproof.”
“I know, and I got the bullet wounds to prove it.”
“Not what I mean and you know it.” Impatience flashed through his eyes but didn’t stay long.
Roan hated that Dylan worried about him, especially since he didn’t think he was worth worrying about. “I swear, I’m keeping under control, and I’m not doing anything stupid. It just seems that way when the cameras catch me.”
Dylan fixed him with a skeptical look, lips thinning to a hard line, but he decided to accept that for now, or at least postpone the argument. “Just be careful, okay?”
“Okay.”
Dylan leaned in and kissed him on the forehead before getting up and leaving the room. Through the open bedroom door, he heard Murphy shout from the living room, “Don’t try and hide, motherfucker!”
“You want me to come down naked?” he shouted back, finally bothering to get out of bed. He was still tired, but he knew Murph wasn’t going to leave it alone.
“You do and I’ll shoot you!”
“Now you’re just giving lesbians a bad name,” he accused, grabbing a pair of boxers from his dresser and putting them on. He had to piss like a racehorse, so he went and did that before stepping into a pair of jeans. He didn’t bother putting on a shirt, because if she was going to arrest him, he was going to go shirtless, barefoot, and bellowing, like any random redneck on Cops. Or Ronnie Dobbs, patron saint of bellowing shirtless rednecks.
As he came down, Murphy came over to meet him at the base of the stairs, dressed in a demure navy suit with a cream-colored blouse and sensible shoes, her arms crossed over her chest and her toe tapping impatiently. Her expression was sour enough that if he didn’t know her, he might have started shitting his pants. Her badge was just visible on her belt, but her gun was still hidden. “I hope Dylan didn’t leave on my account. Did he leave on yours?”
“No, it’s Wednesday. He always does charity work with the temple, bringing meals to the ill and the elderly. He’s the only bartender I know bucking for sainthood.”
Her brow furrowed in consternation, deep enough that she almost forgot to be pissed at him. “The temple? Beth El?”
“No, the Buddhist temple. The one on Park Street?”
“Oh. Yeah, I didn’t think he was Jewish.” She shook her head and got back to being angry as he walked to the kitchen to get a drink.
He was too tired to brew anything, so he just got an organic ginger ale from the fridge. Organic ginger ale—the kind he picked up in health food sections of stores—wasn’t anything like that Canada Dry shit. This had real pieces of ginger in it, and it was spicy. It also gave him his appetite back when migraines or too many downers took it away. Luckily Dylan liked it too and didn’t question why he bought so much of it.
“Sean Brand has been raving about how you are a vampire. He’s probably going to end up at Rosewood for a psych eval.”
“If he thinks I’m a vampire, he should.”
The look she gave him could have burned paint from the walls, so he turned to paw through the cupboards for breakfast. Or was it lunch? He checked the time on the stove’s clock. Yeah, lunch. What did they have in the freezer? “He says your eyes changed and your teeth grew, and you were inhumanly strong and fast. Everybody thinks he’s trying to get declared incompetent, but I know what happened. If Sikorski wasn’t off on leave, he’d know too. What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”
He looked at the box in his hand and said, “Nuking a sandwich.”
The death glare she gave him indicated she didn’t think his honesty was funny. “Look, asshole, I get that you’re a superhero—”
He scoffed. “No, I’m not. I’m a freak.”
“Fine, you’re a superfreak. But if you don’t want everybody to know about it, stop showing off. So far you’ve been fucking lucky. Most people think those YouTube videos are fake, and most are willing to believe you took out the skinheads by simply being super-athletic. But you are pushing it. Do you want to be exposed?”
“You know I don’t.” Superfr
eak? Yeah, he was super-freaky, yow.
“Then get a cape and a mask, Batman, because you can’t keep doing this. The legal system can hardly handle people who turn into big cats five days a month—we can’t handle you.”
“A superfreak.”
“A guy who can change at will, who can turn it on and off like a faucet.” She threw up her hands and sighed, her body language betraying total frustration. “You’re special, and that’s cool, but if you keep acting like you are, everyone will know. If Peter’s informant is to be believed, word is already getting around about you on the streets.”
“What are they saying about me? Beyond kitty fag.”
“They’re saying you should be avoided at all costs, that there’s something not right about you, and that there isn’t an ass you can’t kick.”
