Hate (I Really Don't Like You)

Gerard and Brendon walk back into the office and head over to their teams meeting room, which is a dimly lit room with a large projection screen, a bunch of chairs and a table that’s usually covered with papers.

Hayley is sorting through something that looks boring, while Patrick and Frank are leaning over a laptop looking through footage. Patrick seems to be telling Frank how best to sort through it all when the two enter the room.

“How’d it go? What’d the parents say?”

“Complete bust, the mom knows something, but she’s not spilling it,” Gerard says in response to Patrick.

“What do you mean?” Frank asks, and Gerard remembers his existence for the first time.

“Profiling. It’s his specialty,” Brendon says, and he falls into the rolling chair across from Patrick, “he’s really good at figuring things out about people just be talking to them and stuff.”

“I wasn’t trying all that hard, but I asked her what the relationship between herself and her husband was and she got a little fidgety. Something was up with her, but I didn’t apply any pressure.”

“And the dad?” Patrick asks.

“He was panicky. Nothing sticking out with him. He was just a concerned dad.”

“Well, ‘just a concerned dad’ could just be a good liar,” Frank says arrogantly.

“Stick to your filing kid, and leave the profiling to the expert.”

Patrick frowns at Gerard and says, “You could at least try to play nice. It’s his first day.”

“Oh I’m sorry, is he running on four hours of sleep?”

Frank gives him an unflattering grimace, and Gerard can almost imagine how much he must hate him right now. Maybe he’ll be nicer after another cup of coffee, or sleep. Or maybe he’ll just be an ass to Frank, because it’s fun.

Brendon looks at Frank and gives him a ‘he’s not normally like this’ stare that Frank looks completely annoyed by.

“I don’t know that we’re going to get any more out of the mother until she’s calmed down a bit. Get anywhere with the security cameras?”

Patrick groans and sighs, looking at Frank with sympathy.

“We got about as far with the cameras as General Custer did with a damn army. We did see a homeless guy stealing newspapers though, if that’s any help.”

“Well that’s just great, so we have nothing, and there’s a little girl out there who could be in serious danger. And by the looks of it she was probably nabbed somewhere between her home and the school, so there’s no guarantee that someone else’s kid might not be in danger. Fan-fucking-tastic.”

“Well the cameras are basically only there as a decoy to make you think you’re being watched, but the quality is shit, and they’re not even pointing at good angles,” Patrick says exasperatedly, “all we have is a parking lot, but the parking lot doesn’t even show us the murder. We do have a rather sexy view of a fern though.”

Gerard is really not in any mood for joking and he glares at Patrick with daggers in his eyes, “did the fern kidnap a girl? Did the fern murder someone? No. I don’t think it did.”

Hayley speaks up for the first time looking at Gerard from above her papers, and says, “Calm the fuck down, or go away. You’re not helping anyone by being a bitch.”

“Fine,” Gerard says, raising his hands up in mock defeat, and he sits down in the chair next to Brendon, who’s thoroughly fascinated in his own locked fingers at the moment.

“So this is what it’s like working for the FBI,” Frank groans. Gerard murderers him in his head.

“Well kidnappings are particularly tiresome because they’re ongoing,” Brendon says.

“I should’ve gone for lawyer. Or maybe firefighter. At least they do stuff,” Frank murmurs.

“You know what? Your attitude isn’t exactly helping is it?” Gerard snaps, “If you’re going to just sit there and complain then get the hell out of here, and make me some coffee.”

“You know what Gerard, how about you go get your own coffee and cool down,” Hayley says.

He’s about to explode, but he just gets up and angrily walks out of the room and down the hallway to where the coffee pot is percolating. He’s aware of someone following him but he doesn’t check to see who.

“You need to take a nap man, we can handle it for a few hours,” Brendon says.

“But this is serious, I just need to muster through it.”

“Well you’re acting like a bitch, so can you just settle down before you claw Frank’s throat out?”

“Why, is that discouraged or something?” Gerard asks, pouring a large amount of coffee into the cup and accidentally spilling it over the side slightly, burning his hand.

“Fu- ow,” he hisses.

“You’re not even functioning, right now. Go home!”

“I am functioning. I’m just grouchy, okay?” He says, back and he rests against the counter to try and gather his thoughts, “Besides that Frank guy isn’t exactly mister perky.”

“Can you blame him, you’re not the most welcoming?”

“Well he’s still being a bit of an ass,” Gerard complains and sips at his drink stubbornly, like a two year old in a time out, which is essentially what’s going on in the first place.

“Yeah whatever, do you think you can go back in and play nice?” Brendon asks.

He sighs and walks out back to the room, because his pride is at stake.

Hayley doesn’t look all that excited to see him come back, but Patrick, who’s always generally polite to everyone, doesn’t react at all.

“So now what?” Frank asks.

“Oh I’m sorry is this not fun enough for you? Do you want me to go set a fire for you to put out? Or maybe I should just pull the answer out of a hat, because you seem to think we’re all just fucking perfect magicians don’t you?” Gerard shouts.

“Gerard, settle down,” Patrick says, patiently.

He scoffs but says, “Well what do you want me to do then?”

“Well you could take Frank to the crime scene, you dolt,” Brendon says looking at Gerard with anger.

“Why is that an obvious thing to do?”

“Because he’s new and he hasn’t even left the damn office yet. Just take him there. Actually don’t get behind the wheel, I’ll take him, you can sit in the backseat.”

Gerard opens his mouth but Brendon doesn’t allow him to get in a word as he walks out of the rooms quickly. Frank smirks at this and follows Brendon as he makes his way towards the elevator door.

“Now wait just a minute!” Gerard shouts as he runs to catch up with them. The door slides open with a ding and Frank follow behind Brendon. Gerard crams in almost missing it entirely, had Brendon not put his foot out to stop the door.

“I am not sitting in the backseat,” Gerard says.

“You’re being a child, so you will sit where a child sits,” Brendon answers patronizingly, and the glimmer in Frank’s eye is of pure glee, at seeing Gerard being called out.

“Brendon, do I need to remind you who your boss is?”

“Do I need to remind you that when you’re incapable of working that makes me effective team leader?” Brendon sasses back.

“But I’m not indisposed, nor am I incompetent at doing my job,” Gerard complains as the elevator slowly descends floor after floor.

“Gerard, you couldn’t pass a DUI test right now, and you’re not even intoxicated!”

“Yeah? Well...” he tries to come up with an answer when the doors open up and the two walk out in front of him, off towards the parking lot.

A lot of people in New York don’t own cars, but that’s one of the perks of being a cop, you get a licensed car, but when you’re a cop you get an unmarked car, depending upon your level of security. This means that only Brendon and Gerard have cars. Gerard’s is a jet-black car, but they head towards Brendon’s instead which is a dark grey and it’s a newer model. Brendon keeps better care of his though so it’s shiny rather than grimy.

“I’m not sitting in the back,” Gerard says as they approach the car.

“But Frankie is sitting in the front,” Brendon chides.

“Don’t you ever call me Frankie,” he says, severely, and Gerard smiles because he now knows something that annoys Frank.

Brendon shrugs and opens his door, while Frank opens the passenger’s side door leaving Gerard standing blankly in the parking garage.

“Get in!” Brendon says, after rolling down his window to look at Gerard whose closer to Brendon’s side then Frank’s.

“Jesus fucking Christ Brendon!” He says and angrily gets into the backseat looking like he’s ready to rip his hair out, “when we’re done with this case, I am going to give you hell with the paperwork.”

“I figured,” he sighs, and the car pulls out of the parking space, “but right now it’s more important that this little girl is alright.”

Gerard sighs but doesn’t argue, so he lets his head fall back against his seat and he crosses his arms to really solidify the angry toddler image.

He closes his eyes out of instinct and when he opens them, Frank is looking at Gerard through the rear view mirror.

“If you want to wake up with your head above water I suggest you keep your eyes to yourself,” Gerard threatens him, and Frank actually turns his view immediately.

Gerard might have actually fallen asleep because the next thing he knows is that they’re coming to a halt in the parking lot of the school where the teacher was found dead. It’s also most likely where the little girl was taken.

“Aw nothing like a good old fashioned crime scene to cheer you up,” Brendon says, and Gerard rolls his eyes. Gerard does usually think better at crime scenes though for some reason. Feeling what the victim felt, or seeing what the victim saw makes Gerard function more accurately.

“Hey isn’t that the girls’ mother, over there?” Gerard says after he slams the door to see the woman they’d interviewed earlier standing with the school’s principal. Mrs. Rosessen with her life affirming self, looks pissed as hell.

“Yeah it is, let’s see if she’s got more information for us,” Brendon says and he makes his way over to them.

“Excuse me, Mrs. Rosessen?” Brendon says as he approaches them. When the principal sees them he looks relieved and steps back from Mrs. Rosessen so they can talk with her. Neither Brendon nor Gerard would blame anyone for wanting to get away from this lady. She’s mean, and snappy.

“Um, you can leave sir, we have a few questions to ask Mrs. Rosessen here, that don’t concern you.”

She looks unhappy and asks, “am I being interrogated?’

“No we’re just trying to find your daughter and solve a murder,” Gerard assures her. “But if you don’t cooperate we can talk further at the station.”

He’s much more focused on reading her this time and barely notices Frank standing next to him until she asks who he is.

“This is Frank, I mean...” Gerard grits his teeth and says, “Special Agent Iero, he’s new to my team, and he’s looking in on procedure.”

She doesn’t say anything to this but Brendon starts asking her questions, “Have you received any sort of ransom yet?”

She flinches before answering and says, “No, not at all.”

Gerard groans. She’s lying, he’s sure of that. She hadn’t been earlier when they’d asked the question but she is now. It must have come in sometime in the last hour.

“Look Mrs. Rosessen,” he starts and his voice sounds stern, “Whatever they told you, it’s not going to help if you keep us out of the loop. You have every right to refuse our help in the kidnapping, but it’s in your best interests to let us help. And I know they probably told you that you can’t work with the police, but that’s bullshit. We just want to help.”

“Excuse me?” She says looking at Gerard like he just spit in her face.

“What he’s trying to say is that it’s in your best interest to tell us if you’ve been contacted. This is our job,” Brendon states.

“There’s no ‘if’ to it, she was lying,” Gerard says. He’s really a prick today.

“Are you suggesting that I lied?” Mrs. Rosessen asks.

“No I was saying it outright. No hinting or suggesting,” Gerard says.

“He doesn’t mean to sound rude, he’s just-” Brendon starts.

“No I meant it.”

Frank just snorts at the two.

“Ma’am if you’ve been contacted, it’s important you tell us,” Brendon says, looking ready to hit Gerard.

“Well I haven’t! She answers loudly, “and I have places to be so I’ll be on my way!”

They don’t stop her, but watch her as she storms away and gets in her car.

“That was a complete bust. Thanks Gerard!” Brendon says, and he walks over to the parking space surrounded by crime scene tape. There’s a very small amount of dried blood, but only a little bit because the victim was strangled.

“So a person died here,” Frank says in awe looking at the tape.

“No, they uncovered a fucking dinosaur fossil,” Gerard answers tetchily.

“There was something off about that woman,” Frank says, but he doesn’t expand so Gerard ignores him.

“Why do they always pretend they haven’t been called,” Gerard complains as Brendon explains something to Frank, “Always with the lying, they do realize it’s our job, right?”

“It’s because they have angry cops like you making them feel like idiots,” Brendon scolds.

“Well they are idiots!”

“You’re an idiot,” Frank mumbles.

“Fuck you, Iero,” Gerard says. That makes three times.

Brendon summarizes the crime to Frank, “So what happened here was that the teacher was murdered around seven at night, according to the coroner’s report, and then she was dragged under her own car. She was found the next day by another teacher who saw her foot sticking out from under the car.”

“Do you have a motive, is there anyone who would want to kill her?”

“There’s the thing,” Brendon says looking stumped, “No one had it out for her. She was one of the favorite teachers at this school, and her marriage was fine according to her husband.”

“I don’t buy that,” Gerard butts in, “something was up between her and the husband. Lizzy Carmycle was not just killed willy-nilly. Someone wanted her dead. The rope marks around her neck suggest that the killer wasn’t very strong, but determined.”
“How do you know that?” Frank asks.

“Well it’s the way that they’re printed into the skin,“ Gerard says, and he forgets to be angry for a second while he enlightens the kid, “the death wasn’t instant, meaning someone had to hold on for a long time, and that suggests determination. If they wanted to just get her out of the way to knock her out, then they wouldn’t have been so forceful about it. A stronger person would’ve been able to finish the job in half the time that it took, so it had to have been a weaker person.”

“Exactly,” Brendon says, “now, we have a few fibers from the body that suggest the killer was wearing gloves and what we really need to do is find the gloves, to match the samples.”

“Right,” Frank says nodding, “and they wouldn’t have just thrown them in the garbage can across the street, right? Because they would have known that we’d look.”

“Dead on kid, you’re pretty smart,” Brendon says.

“For a twerp,” Gerard says.

“What’s your problem man?” Frank asks, looking livid.

Gerard ignores him and walks back to Brendon’s car to wait for them to leave.

Notes

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