Chapter Text
The phone dragged him out of a drunken sleep and Marshall rolled over on his back, muttered a curse when he hit a heavy body next to his.
He barely remembered picking someone up, or coming back here, or fucking her, neither. He prayed she drove because he couldn’t afford another letter in his file. They’d try to bump him down to uniforms again and fuck if he was gonna wear a monkey suit ever again in this life. It wasn’t his fault his life went down the crapper after he made detective; he was almost sure it wasn’t.
“You gettin’ that?” an annoyed voice groused from under the threadbare comforter and Marshall almost told her to get it her damn self if she wanted to so bad. He wondered if women would ever stop reminding him of Kim. It might help if he’d quit going home with blondes.
He finally reached over to his landline because he was too cheap to get a cordless and coughed into the receiver before he could help it.
“Goddamn, Mathers, you fuckin’ someone or what? Thing rang twenty times.”
“Or what.” Marshall croaked rubbing his face and blinking at the water spot on his ceiling.
“Well zip up the trouser snake. We got a cold one and a suspect in the box.”
“The Rose Killer?”Most of the fuzziness evaporated when he said the name the fuckwad reporters had made up for the murderer. He sat up and blinked hard, willing the headache and nausea away. They caught a suspect?
“He knows all the details but he’s got an alibi. It’s hinky as hell. You gettin’ down here or what?”
“Yeah, yeah.” Marshall got up naked and walked to the bathroom trailing the cord behind him and didn’t bother hanging up when he pissed.
“Corner of fifteenth and Lafayette and, fuck, Mathers, are you peein’?”
“Yup.” Marshall barked, scratching his ribs.
“You got no fuckin’ decorum, you know that? Jesus Christ.”
The dial tone hit his ear and Marshall hung up the phone and put it on the commode.
“Leave.” He said when he walked back in the bedroom and the woman putting on her hose shot him the finger. She had long stringy blond hair with dark roots, a big nose, and raccoon eyes from where her mascara smeared.
She exited in a wiggle of hips and slam of a door.
“Bye.” Marshall said to the empty apartment reeking of cheap perfume and stale cigarette smoke. His hamster Beretta blinked at him from the corner of the fish aquarium that was it’s cage and let out a pellet.
“You got that right.”
In fifteen minutes he was in his beat to shit Toyota Camry and on the way.
*~*~*~*~*~~*
3:15 a.m.
1156 15th Avenue
Detroit, MI
The body of the victim lay in an alley, posed like all the rest. The victim's arms stretched out on either side amidst the garbage, his legs lay together overlapped at the ankle and there were precise cuts in a line across the victims brow; the crown of thorns. All victims had been naked except for a swath around their waist and at the victim’s bare feet lay, obscenely out of place in the refuse and dirt, a cluster of red roses still dewy from the florist. The victim had longish dark hair; they all did; the oldest had been twenty-one, the youngest seventeen. Marshall could not stop seeing his brother Nathan laying there with roses near his poor dead feet until he polished off a bottle of vodka that evening.
What a fuckin’ waste.
“Same M.O.?” Marshall asked flashing his badge and stepping under the police evidence tape. He wore his street gear: hoodie, Piston’s cap, loose jeans and Jordan’s. What he liked most about making detective was dressing as he liked, especially when he told the chief it helped his cred with the snitches and the pimps. Like he could have dressed any other way; trade in one monkey suit for another.
“You look like crap Mathers.”
“Yeah, good to see you, too. Same M.O.?” he repeated and Poblanski nodded with a sigh.
“The very one. Homo freak with a Jesus fix.”
They’d classified them as hate crimes on pressure from the city’s Gay and Lesbian Rights Task Force, but it made no sense to Marshall since there was evidence of semen in the rectal canal and the victim’s mouth. The precinct’s profiler had spouted off a bunch of psychological mumbo jumbo about it making perfect sense, and, whatever. The shit did not add up to him.
“Any signs of struggle?” Marshall asked, even though he knew the answer was no. No scratches, no skin under the fingernails, not so much as a bruise anywhere but the area of sexual contact. It’s like these kids gave themselves to him on a silver fuckin’ platter and said,“Kill me! Ask me how!”
“You know there ain’t.”
“Anyone see anything?”
“It’s the bar scene. Goddamn meat market. The bartender said he ‘might’ have seen the victim with a ‘hot guy’ that had blond hair. That’s it: hot guy, blond hair. We got DNA but nothing to match it and no hits off CODIS.”
“We got a suspect?”
“Yes and no.”
“Don’t gimme that. We got someone or not?”
“Yeah, but I told you – hinky.”
“Explain.” Marshall kept himself from bitching at forensics so they’d hurry the fuck up and finish. He wanted the kid covered. The crowd kept gawking and he saw two news vans out front, probably more of the print media lurking around. He didn’t want the kid’s family to see anything on the news before they identified him.
“Got a call on this one at eight p.m. if you can believe it. Someone gave us the intersection said to get there as fast as we could and hung up. That’s it. If he’d a mentioned the Rose Killer maybe the suit at the phones wouldn’t ‘a blown him off. After, the genius remembers and we track down the number; it’s from an apartment and we show up, find the guy asleep.”
“That’s plenty of time, man..”
“Guy wasn’t alone. Had his girlfriend with him and she swore he was at a restaurant at the time of the killing and then at home. Waiter remembered him; the maitre’d. He’s a regular. It checks out.”
“That’s fuckin’ impossible.”
“You tellin’ me?”
“Where is he? The station house?” Marshall could feel himself iching to get his hands on this guy. He could break him; he knew he could. One uninterrupted hour and he’d know.
“Look, Mathers…”
“I’m the goddamn primary, Les. Don’t start with me.”
“No, I know that, no one’s freezing you out.”
“You bet your ass they ain’t.”
“Only we got circumstances. We got kind of a situation here…” They were at the squad car and red flags began to go up when Les started using words like ‘circumstances’ and ‘situation’. Marshall didn’t like them. They were words his partner started to use then he channeled the brass dicks upstairs.
“What fuckin’ situation?”
“Aside from the fact that the suspect has an ironclad alibi, you mean? The suspect's kinda famous. Had some hit songs a million years ago.”
“I don’t give a fuck if he sang for the fuckin’ pope!”
“Yeah, I know, but it’s high profile…”
“I’m going.”
“Look, Mathers, come on, I’ll be in there with you…”
“Later.”
“Mathers! Goddamnit!”
Marshall left his partner sputtering in the street and revved the engine out of the crime scene.
If the perp had an alibi they couldn’t hold him for long. If the perp had some money he made a thousand years ago he was a flight risk, too. They were on borrowed time.
*~*~*~*~*~*~
The precinct looked sad under the yellow street lights, a squat, cinderblock building that looked smaller than it’s four stories. The parking lot was always full, even at almost four a.m. and the squad cars hunched down asleep in the garage next door behind the chain link fence with the razor wire. No rest for crime in this town, ever.
Marshall swung into a parking space with ‘reserved- administration’ on the front and sped out the car hanging his badge from a chain around his neck.
He’d move the car before the boys upstairs came in after their designer lattes.
*~*
“Gimme the file. Where you holding the suspect?” Marshall asked the rookie at the desk, nodding over a can of Coke.
The kid sat up like someone shoved a poker up his ass and almost knocked over the Coke on a bunch of reports. Marshall couldn’t tell if it was because the kid was five seconds from a wet dream or if Marshall’s reputation preceded him. Bruce Marshall Mathers , the Third and the chip on his shoulder. “Which one?”
“THE suspect.” Marshall leaned over and bore into the flawed green marbles of the kid’s eyes and saw the vulnerable Adam’s Apple move under the black tie clip. The file was handed to him and he snatched it.
“Holding Room Five. Chief Dellamore…”
“I’m interrogating the suspect.”
“But Chief Dellamore…”
Marshall left the flustered kid at the desk and stalked down the hall.
*~*~*~*~
Before he went in he took a few seconds, and he didn’t have many, to watch the perp from behind the one-way glass and review the suspect’s info.
Couldn’t see much. He already didn’t like what he did see.
Early-to-mid-twenties, lanky, almost skinny, but not quite. He sat on the folding chair, legs stretched under the table wearing faded jeans and trainers with no socks; the suits that picked him up hadn't dicked around. A leather jacket that had seen better days but wasn’t off the rack, and some kinda thick knit scarf with tassels, no less, rounded out the fashion statement. That’s all Marshall could see besides the spill of blond hair, girl-long, falling all over the grimy surface of the interrogating room table, over the bent arm that cushioned his head, one hand visible in a loose fist, long fingers graceful in sleep.
The arrogant fucker was asleep.
Marshall flipped open the manila folder. Mr. Taylor Hanson was cutting some serious Zs in there. Twenty-five, still a kid, six-one, hair blond, eyes blue.
Most guilty perps did not, in Marshall’s experience, sleep when they got caught. The usually fell into the scared crapless pile or the I-can’t-wait-to-talk-about-it pile. When Bundy got busted he didn’t shut up for twelve hours.
But that was just speculation. Marshall could speculate with the best of them, but this was different. This guy knew something; Marshall could feel it in his bones, something big. He was gonna find out what it was.
*~*~*~*
The door shut in a slam and Marshall watched the perp startle out of sleep, hippie blond hair falling into blinking blue eyes and tops of his knees banging the bottom of the table.
Marshall stared at him a minute, watched the graceful hand sweep the hair off his face between thumb and forefinger, and for a second, just one, thought someone had fucked up major because this couldn’t be a guy. No way.
Then things came into focus: the tiny bit of shadow on his chin, the square jaw, the way the perp met Marshall’s stare with a level one of his own. Face was pretty like a girl’s, too. Cute little snub nose, perfect mouth, longass dark lashes framing sky blue eyes with smudges under them. But they looked right at him bold as fuck, those eyes. You might think he was a fag until that stare hit you. As if he wasn’t being questioned for murder; as if butter wouldn’t melt in his goddamn mouth. It wasn’t like women didn’t have that stare. Women just checked him out before they got it; human nature.
Marshall didn’t believe in walking in and trying to ingratiate himself right away. That always felt like the most fake thing to do, and he could never pull it off. He liked to watch; wait. A lot could be learned from what a suspect did when faced with silence.
The suspect leaned back in the chair and silenced him back.
Marshall finally had to break the silence first. He hated that.“‘Sup?”
“Should you be in here alone?”
“You got something to be scared about?” Marshall countered.
The guy shrugged and ran hand through his hair again, making it fall in feathers and waves all around his face. His beautiful, haggard, face. That said something.
“No. That’s just what they do on ‘Law and Order.’”
“This ain’t no TV show.”
“No shit.” The words weren’t defensive, or even aggressive, just tired. “Are you going to ask me questions, or what? I’ve been here two hours. My ass is falling asleep on this chair.”
Marshall flipped open the file and scanned the info sheet.
“Taylor Jordan Hanson. Can I call you Taylor? They tease you in school ‘cause of your name?”
“It’s Tay. No one calls me Taylor. Secondly, I wouldn’t know. I didn’t go to school. My mom taught us at home.”
“No shit?” Kim had made noises about that when she first got pregnant until she did a little research and found out what an expensive pain-in-the-ass that could be.
“Nope.”
“You have anything to drink tonight, Tay? Maybe tied one on, got a little loose with your girlfriend?”
“I had a glass of wine at dinner and I don’t have a girlfriend.”
“A’aight. Date? One-night stand? Says here your girlfriend vouched for your whereabouts this evening.”
“Michelle is my roommate. We share an apartment in Rochester Hills.”
“Ex?”
“She’s a lesbian.”
“Oh.” Marshall didn’t ask if that made Taylor Jordan Hanson gay. One myth most people had was that all gay people knew and liked each other. He’d worked a few hate crimes to know that was B.S., and most lesbians and gays were more likely to be segregated than be all chummy.
“And it’s not just her. A whole restaurant saw me. We had a late dinner then stayed for the house band and wine. Then I was home with Michelle. We watched movies then went to sleep.”
“You working with someone? Seting up those kids to get hit?”
“Oh, please.” Hanson dug his hands in his pockets and threw his head back so the long blond hair fell in a caramel and flaxen wave over the metal of the chair. Marshall found himself watching the curve of Adam’s Apple, and the long neck as it disappeared into the knit scarf. His eyes were closed so tight the lashes stuck out in starry points. “Don’t be sick. I called it in because I can’t stand it any more. I know how it looks. I don’t care what you think.”
“Well you better fuckin’ care, people are fuckin’ dyin’!”
“I know that.” Hanson flipped his head back up and the sky blue was midnight, dark and tortured, the smudges under his eye became bruises, the lines around his mouth deepened and he looked both older and younger than before. “Don’t you think I know that?”
Marshall leaned over, right in his space, and Hanson didn’t even flinch, “How did you know where the body was?”
“Because I saw it.”
“You saw the murder? You didn’t call nobody, the fuck’s wrong…”
“In my head. I saw it in my head.”
Marshall stared at him, trying to make the words make any kind of sense.
“I see them in my head.” Hanson whispered, and for a second Marshall looked in those beautiful, tortured eyes and believed.
“Them?” He finally said because they’d been caught in each other’s stare too long before he even noticed.
“I saw others. I think—I didn’t know what they were. I thought I was making this shit up, from fatigue, or…fucked up memories, I don’t know.” For the first time Marshall stepped back and noticed more. The nails bitten to the quick, bleedy looking cuticles around the edges, the skin stretched taut across the handsome face /pretty. Motherfucker’s pretty/ like when someone hadn’t slept in a week, the underlying thrum of restlessness.
“You on something? You using?”
Hanson let out a bitter bark of a laugh and ran his hands over his face then through the hair. Feather. Fall. Marshall bet that drove all the little girls wild back in the day. “No. Not for four years.”
“What was your poison?”
“Cocaine. Look, I know what I saw.” The freaky bottomless stare again and Marshall sat back in the chair playing chicken with their stares. Hanson could win that with anyone, though.
“You’re telling me you’re some kinda psychic?”
“No,” Hanson looked away, the word goosing him so he squirmed on the metal chair. “I don’t know what it is but I can’t…sleep without seeing them, I never know when it’ll happen and you have to stop it, okay? I’ll do whatever you want, but you have to….” His voice, cracked, the bloodshot sky blue became shiny sapphire and Marshall saw the thin string holding the man in front of him together. It was close to snapping, pulled tight, fraying, and Marshall thought this wasn’t the first Taylor Hanson had been strung up like that, but it might be the first time the holdings quit.
Then all hell broke loose.