Chapter Twelve #3
There was silence, and finally, Timothy spoke.
“Goodbye, Ethan. I’ll miss you. Be safe, and take care of him, Gene,” he said.
Ethan didn’t let his man say anything.
“Goodbye, Granddad.”
And then, he hung up.
Well, that call was…something.
Only, Gene didn’t dig. Ethan had told him he was working through shit, and he knew he was there if he needed him. So, he only asked one question.
“Anything else on the victims?” he inquired, redirecting it all back to working.
It seemed like the safest bet.
Ethan smiled at him.
“That’s what I needed. Well, I needed bed and my man, but I’ll take what you just did for now.”
Gene put his lips beside Ethan’s ear.
“If it’s any consolation, you can ride me in a car, too. Beds are nice, but laps are nicer.”
Hell, yeah, they were.
The mischievous, and somewhat hopeful look, made him laugh. Clearly, someone was hinting.
Ethan was about to say something salacious to flirt, but he was interrupted.
They were interrupted when someone cleared their throat, and when they did, both men looked over.
And there was a detective standing right there.
Oh, goodie.
Just what they did NOT want to deal with at that moment. The universe was just tossing shit their way with this one. Gene wasn’t a fan of this town now either.
It was killing the sexy vibe.
What did a man have to do to sexually harass his partner in the privacy of their own breakfast booth?
“Am I interrupting?” Dannie Pezzimente asked.
Gene stared him down.
“Yes. What do you want?” he inquired, that edge clearly present in his voice.
The man pointed at the seat that was vacant across from them.
“Can I talk to you both?”
Ethan laughed.
“Oh, well, this should be priceless. So far, we’ve been cock-blocked by an ME when it came to working, overly schmoozed by a homicide captain, given the cold shoulder by two detectives who opted to pout, and then someone called out the media on us, but by all means, sure.
Have a seat. I can’t wait to hear this.”
Oof.
That said it all.
Still, Dannie sat.
“First off, I’m sorry my partner was cranky with you.
She just hates not being in control of a case.
It pisses her off. As for our boss, he’s a lunatic, and we think he’s medicated most days.
We can’t control him. As for the media, we don’t play games like that.
We didn’t call them out on anyone because then that makes us look bad, that we couldn’t handle this case.
Also, by now, you’ve researched us, and you know we close cases.
We’re good detectives, despite what you’ve seen happen here. ”
Ethan and Gene didn’t care.
They closed cases, too.
For them, that was the actual job, and you didn’t get consolation prizes in their world when you dropped the ball. You also didn’t stand in like looking for stars and ribbons when you did your job.
If you fucked around, you ended up dead.
When neither man said a word, he continued.
“I wanted to find you because I saw the news, and you’re all over it. I knew immediately that you were going to think we burned you.”
Gene laughed.
“Oh, we did.”
He figured as much.
Honestly, he’d think the same thing.
“Well, it wasn’t us. I was with my partner most of the night, as we were trying to help with this case. We were at the office and after this morning, we were out trying to help.”
Well, that explained why he looked tired.
“And where is your partner now?” Gene asked.
He was honest.
“We clocked out when we realized you were NOT going to let us help. It seemed best to crash and regroup. Like I said, we wanted to help.”
Well, yeah.
“Honestly, why should we let you in?” Gene asked. “You’ve only had these cases a day before us, and you didn’t really give us anything new. If you want to help, bring us something…I don’t know, helpful.”
Dannie rolled his eyes.
There was a lot of that going on here at the table.
Clearly.
“Well, you’re not the friendly one. Does that make him the nice one?” he asked, pointing at Ethan. “Is this good cop bad cop?”
Blackhawk laughed.
“Yeah, it’s always good cop and bad cop, but I’m the dick. He’s the nice one. He just doesn’t like you or your partner. We get mean when we walk out of a school and have six reporters up our asses.”
Well, who wouldn’t?
It was clear they didn’t plan on backing down.
“After we saw you at the office, when you were leaving the captain’s office, we ran out to talk to Phylis’ neighbors to see if they saw anything, or if she came back.”
They listened.
“We wanted to do our part to show you we did try to work this case. None of them saw anything weird in the days leading up to the abduction. The one neighbor is seventy and nosey as fuck. She doesn’t miss a thing. She saw the husband leave, and Phylis get a ride to someplace.”
They said nothing.
“She never came home, and then the melee started when her husband did.”
Neither man moved.
“We also confirmed the alibi again for the husband. I know we told you we talked to the boss, but we just left the place and spoke to his co-workers. He didn’t sneak out.
They have footage of him pulling in, parking, and leaving when he said he did.
He works too far away from the factory to walk and not be seen or missed. ”
Well, that cut that work off the list for them. Only, sometimes, it was too little too late.
“Thanks,” Gene said, and then nothing more was said.
The temp there was chilly.
So, the detective took the hint.
Getting up, Dannie pushed his chair back in.
“Then, I’ll leave you to it. If you change your mind, or need some help, here’s my number. Leah and I both grew up here. We were serious when we said this town matters to us.”
Ethan went there.
“Did you go to school with the victims?” he asked, curiously.
Dannie shook his head.
“No. I’m older than Ivey, and I believe she was the oldest of the victims.”
Going into his bag, he pulled out a file.
“One of the techs called me as I was heading home,” Dannie said. “They didn’t get any fingerprints from Phylis’ home, or from Megan’s car, but here are the crime scene photos, in case you needed them. We treated them both like they were, even when we didn’t know where they were taken from.”
He handed him the file and then walked out without another word.
When he was gone, Gene was curious.
“Do you believe that he and his partner didn’t burn us?” he asked. “Because it’s nice to have a little backup. We can cross those interviews off the list.”
Yeah, they could.
Ethan tapped his pencil on the table.
“Yeah, he didn’t come to pump us for information, and he brought a present. That works for me. If we need help, I’m good with him, but I’m not good with the female detective. She’s too aggressive for my style, and she did insult the fuck out of me by saying profiling was made-up shit.”
Yeah, she had.
“She gave me a bad vibe,” Gene admitted. “He might not have ratted us out, but I don’t know if she would or not.”
Yeah, him too.
Instead of dwelling further on it, they wanted to see the file.
Opening the folder, they dug into the crime tech’s work. On the mirror at Phylis’ home, there were three photos, and in them, they could see the dead women.
That was definitely how the cops knew the shit was going down.
“Well, someone is playing games. That’s kind of creepy,” Gene admitted.
Ethan tapped the paper after seeing what was there from Ivey’s home.
“There’s a partial fingerprint in her home. We should fax this over to Salt Lake City to the office. We need that identified. Maybe they can digitally alter it and get us a full print?”
He agreed.
They needed to run every possible lead, and a fingerprint might give them confirmation that shit went down.
“I’ll get it there,” he stated. “There’s a copy shop not far away that offers faxing. I can walk over and send it right now.”
That worked for him.
They’d have to divide and conquer to keep the investigation moving along.
“Thanks. I’ll stay here and work,” he offered.
That was exactly where Gene wanted him.
Just.
In.
Case.
As Gene pulled on his jacket, Ethan flipped to the car’s forensic report, and there was nothing monumental in it, and like the detective had mentioned, there were very few fingerprints.
“That same partial fingerprint didn’t show up in the car,” Ethan stated.
Gene thought about it.
“Well, maybe she was entertaining people, or it belongs to Randal, her ex. We’ll find out once they can digitally rebuild it. I’m going to be hella glad when technology progresses. I bet Damascus still keeps prints in hard copies.”
Ethan laughed.
“This backward berg? Ya think?” he asked.
He laughed.
“Call me if anything pops up,” Gene said, leaning down to give his partner a quick kiss on the lips when no one was looking. “And for God’s sake, keep your ass out of trouble. As in right here where I can find you!”
Ethan winked at him.
“Got it, slightly bossy boyfriend.”
Yeah, well, someone made him that way.
Without another word, Gene headed out. While he was gone, Ethan sat there, drinking coffee, and working on his laptop to see if anything was popping up on the people they’d crossed paths with on this case.
None were.
Great.
That sucked.
He wasn’t finding anything significant that was piquing his interest, and that meant they weren’t getting any more leads.
When his phone rang again, it was a very familiar number.
Gabe’s.
Instead of answering it, he sent it directly to voicemail. There was no way in hell he was talking to the man. After this last stunt, he could fuck all the way off as far as he was concerned.
And he meant that with the utmost disrespect.
Ethan kept working, and when he looked at his watch, he saw that over thirty minutes went by as he was lost in the research.
Time flew when you were having fun.
Not.
As he was sitting there, suddenly Gene popped into his head, and he was wondering where he was. The copy shop wasn’t that far away.
And then it happened.
It was when he heard the squeal of tires, and then the very distinct pop of gunshots.