Title: Scotch and Soda, part of the And Again series.
Author: Thunderhead

Bud and Ed sat in a small deserted room in the station house at the end of a long, empty hallway. The door was propped open a few inches, so they could observe the hallway. The files for the last three killings were open and spread all over the big wooden table that was taking up most of the room. Bud looked at the forensic photos of the dead men. He knew two of them. Good cops, neither of them stupid. So that was a start. There was a theory he had learned, which he thought might apply here: "If you know your victim, you know your killer." Well, that could sometimes be true. He assumed a real connection between killer and victim, if you took that the intended victim was Exley. Was Exley dangerous enough to scare like this, was he worth three good men? Obviously, somebody thought so. He thought out loud with Edmund. "These were smart cops, about ten years on the force for each of them. Okay, so if we go with that, we know that it would probably take a lot to kill them. Some advantage. What?"

Exley chimed in, looking at the papers, "The killer could be a woman."

Bud smirked back, but saw his point. "They could be surprised by a woman. Or maybe it's someone they know. It's hard to undress a dead body. It takes time. It's been done, of course, but I'm just saying they might have voluntarily…"

Ed looked at the report. "No signs of bruising, but that doesn't tell you anything. Dead bodies don't bruise," He moved the papers then looked up, "wait. Jones requested backup. Specifically me. Why? Why me? And why was he then totally naked and dead not five minutes later?" Exley paused, "I mean, that's one hell of a chain of events."

"Yeah. Goofy." They heard a set of footsteps softly clacking on the linoleum. They were silent, Bud sliding over and shutting the door just before they were discovered.

"Who was it?" Asked Exley, his eyes wide with paranoia. "Who would come down this way?"

"That shitbird O'Malley. He slammed my hand in the car door." Bud resisted the nearly overpowering urge to stick his head out the door and yell an obscenity down the hallway at him. That would have been real smart. "I think he knows we're here, though."

"Sure he does. Why else would he come down this way? I think he's a bad cop, his history is very murky, I checked his file," Ed's voice was just a little too high. He could feel the walls of the little room closing in on him.

Bud tried to save the moment. "Let's go back to the crime. Forget about that loser. He's just bored, wants to catch me fucking you on the table," Bud grinned, took a deep breath and changed course. "Let's concentrate on the case. We've got the time factor, which we didn't have on these other two. That's a major advantage. It was a big mistake letting Jones get off that call for help."

Ed was silent for several long minutes, staring at the black and white pictures of the crime scenes. Bud had a brainwave, "Do we know that was Jones? How do we know that it wasn't the killer himself? I mean, the dispatcher doesn't know our voices that well."

Ed nodded, "If we assume that the killer is a fellow officer, which I think we have to at this point, he would know the codes and procedure, so we can't assume the call was made by Jones himself. That kills the time angle. Damn." Ed dropped the pictures on the table, and began looking for a paper buried underneath all the other papers.

"No it doesn't. The body was still warm when we arrived, remember?" Bud watched Exley stop searching, get up and pace around. Exley smiled at Bud in a way that was just a little scary. Bud tried to concentrate. He was sure glad he wasn't the killer. That dumb fuck would be dead in a few hours now that they were back together on the case.

Ed spoke."Let's play. The killer lures Jones into the building, kills Jones, makes his mark. Takes off his clothes? Makes the radio call for help on Jones' own car radio, leaves. "

"Why? Why take off the clothes?" Bud asked the ceiling.

"Wait wait wait. All these men were on patrol duty at the time of death. So the clothes aren't just clothes. They're uniforms!" Ed smiled again, triumphant.

"Got it! Now we know the killer is a cop! For some reason, he had to get the uniform off those men before he could kill them."

"This guy is a lunatic. This is not a clever killing. It doesn't make sense."

"Sure it does. We just don't have the angle."

"Bud, if you can think like a lunatic, you've solved the case, but lost your sanity."

"We've got to get a break on this guy, short of me sitting naked in an empty room, I don't know how to set him up," offered Bud, getting a little frustrated with himself and Exley.

"That would set me up. Why don't we try it sometime?" Ed happened to be behind Bud at that moment, and ran his hands along Bud's strong back for just a split second. "But seriously, how do you get a man out of his uniform?"

"Well, you're holding a gun, you tell him to take it off. Simple." Bud could feel himself getting aroused, and was both disgusted and amused by that. This was the wrong time. He lost his concentration again.

"Not really. We know all these men were on patrol. Don't you think one of them was carrying a weapon somewhere else on their body?"

Bud thought of the .22 he used to hide around his leg, purely for emergency. "Yeah, and while undressing, they would get to that weapon and shoot. I mean, what the hell?"

"Maybe they did, is there any record of a bullet in an opposing wall?" Bud and Exley both dove to find the documentation. "I mean, I took some notes, of course, but I never saw the official crime scene analysis."

Bud looked up at Ed,"This analysis is shit." Coming from Bud, those were strong words. Bud stood up and pushed the papers back into the files hastily. Ed did the same. There was no more need for words. They were one man again.

The abandoned red brick building stood dark in the deepening twilight, the empty windows black and terrifying in the now deserted industrial district. The men slammed the car doors as they hurried inside, Bud with a big silver flashlight in his hand. Bud clinked his metal finger cots against the side of the flashlight nervously. They were burning the last rays of daylight.

"This is creepy," said Exley, as they walked past the police tape, into the dark empty structure. "What the hell was this, a textile plant? Look at these machines. What are they?"

"Who the fuck knows?" Bud was in no mood for chit chat, no matter how creeped out Ex was. He imagined himself on a terrace in Rio, the sun shining off Exley's smiling, satisfied face. The sound of the surf, the mountains, the breeze through the palms. Stupid to think there'd be a heaven for them. This was where they belonged, neck deep in shit. Back to the task at hand. A worthy task, after all. Saving Ex from destruction, not to mention himself. But he thought he would get that money. Someday. Soon.

They both moved with catlike caution through the decayed debris of the old factory to the place where they had finally found Jones. He was gone, of course, by now, but the picture of his body was still emblazoned on Ed's mind. Ed thought maybe he should have taken up Bud's spurious post sex offer of escape. But where was this big pile of money? What did he mean? He had to file that one away for later. They searched the opposing wall, creeping slowly, feeling with the tips of their fingers on the filthy, peeling wall, aware of a million possible crazy trajectories of a desperate last bullet. Looking for any sign. Any clue.

Bud played his light around, his brows furrowed in thought. He saw it. A shard of wood, clean and pale, freshly broken from an exposed support beam, a tiny ding where the bullet hit at about seven feet up. Ed searched the surrounding area with him. No bullet, no case near the body area. They had been removed. No marking of removal point. A cover up. Of course. Ed saw Bud's back stiffen with the discovery, and he was over there in an instant.

"You got it?" asked Ed.

"Here it is," Bud poked up at it, jumping a little "The last shot of Jones." All the hairs on the back of Ed's neck stood up.

"I don't need the poetry, Bud. He was probably in on it," Ed didn't really believe that, but at this point it was all that was saving him from an all expense paid one-way trip to guiltsville. They took one last look around, then bounded out to the street, which was still a little bit lighter than the inside of the building. Bud's eyes scanned the street, aware that someone was watching.

"I think he's here," Bud said, barely moving his mouth, and slowing Ed down as they walked the few paces to the car. "I can feel him." Bud's body seemed to twitch with animal urgency.

"Get in the damn car," Ed commanded, afraid for Bud yet again, and now for himself. They sat in the car, a new level of eerie silence between them. Ed broke it after about thirty seconds of watching for any movement. "Where is he?"

"I don't know. But he's out there."

"You know, he could have come in after us."

"And gotten his brains blown out about a hundred times over. I wish to God he had. I wish he would come for me, the-" Bud slammed his hand onto the car steering wheel with violent impatience. Ed looked over at Bud, then back out the front windshield. There was nobody out there. They left, cruising the empty streets, looking, the silence hanging between them like a curtain.

***

Ed poured himself a double with uncharacteristic sloppiness and handed one of the same to Bud. They sat in Ed's living room, a big fire burning in the grate that Bud had set up. Ed felt a little safer here, with the front door bolted, the curtains drawn. Also a little bit like they were in hiding, like they were the criminals. Ed thought perhaps they were, on many levels. Perhaps he was, anyway. He gave up the idea of killing himself to save Bud. He loved him, but he, Edmund, wasn't responsible for the killings. The murderer was. Simple enough to say, but it took a lot of strength to work that out. He was not responsible. He was not the killer, this time.

At least Bud's idea about being partners had worked out like Bud thought it would. They could spend all their time together, if they so chose. And they did, for their own protection. Nobody noticed, nobody cared. It wasn't like either of them had won any popularity contests before now, anyway. Ed knew he would need Bud tonight, to keep him sane. If they couldn't crack this perplexing case, at least he knew he would be wrapped up in Bud's arms in a few hours. That was enough to get him through the night. Part of him just wanted to skip the whole investigation, stay in bed with Bud, and wait for the killer to get shot just walking through their door. "What if we just shot everybody that ever walked through that door?" Ed asked himself, "Not a bad idea," he answered back. Yeah, crazy felt good. So did Bud. They went hand in hand. Ed smiled into his glass.

"What's funny?" asked an observant Bud.

"I was just thinking, what if we…oh, forget it. It was crazy." Ed laughed to himself, and raised his glass, once more on the job. "To the solving of crimes that require absolute justice."

"Absolute justice." Bud chimed in. "I think I know who the killer is."

"Shoot."

"It's the chief of police. Anyway, he's at the top of it. He's the one."

"What evidence?"

"None. I have no case yet. I was just thinking that whoever is covering this up and quieting down the investigation has to be very high up. Like the highest up. Otherwise, I think there'd be a protest." Bud took a drink, "With three officers dead, if it wasn't the Chief, he'd be in full combat mode, and he's not. So it's him."

"Don't overestimate my popularity. I think most people think it's me."

"Then why aren't you dead yet?"

"Because I didn't do it. As much as most of the men hate me," and here Exley paused,"still they probably believe that a man doesn't kill his partner, not three times and not without a woman involved. It's a moral code so strong that they can't believe anyone would do it. Even me."

"So while they think it's you on the one hand, they can't accept it on the other. So there's a deadlock there." Bud rolled his empty glass between his two hands, feeling the glass clink against his cast, as if it were a piece of jewelry. He stood up to fill it and Exley's again.

"Yes, exactly. But now I finally have an alibi. If they choose to believe you," Ed looked up to Bud as he poured him a drink from a half empty bottle. "Thanks."

"Why wouldn't they believe me?" Bud left the bottle sitting precariously on the carpet next to him as he sat down. Ed started to get up to put a log on the fire, but Bud stopped him with a hand motion and did it himself. Ed considered his response to this question carefully.

"If they found out we were more than just partners, that would damage your credibility seriously" Exley smiled nervously at Bud, who had come back to sit on the floor next to Ed's chair, resting his back on the upholstered arm. Exley placed one hand on a thick shoulder.

"Nobody's going to find out, Ex. Don't worry. Nobody'd dare talk. Especially about me." A note of menace creeped into Bud's voice that almost convinced Ed.

"Oh, I'm not worried," Exley lied. His eyes darkened over for a moment, then returned to focus. "I'm just worried about keeping you alive long enough to get sick of me."

"Never. Nobody could live that long."

"You sweet talker." He resisted the urge to ask, "did you talk that way to Lynn?" That would have been a huge mistake. But what did it hurt to be brutally honest now, when the time between them could be so short? Ed took a big swallow.

Bud took up the thread after a moment of silence."Okay, so I think it's the Chief of Police, but I have no evidence. How would I go about collecting it?"

"That's exactly the opposite of a good detection scheme."

"Yeah, I know. So what? I know I'm right."

"Well, let's get his calendar and find out if he had the opportunity or could have made the opportunity to be in those places at those times. That would be my first thought."

"He could have someone working for him."

"Another cop killer? I don't think so."

"A criminal of the lowest regard might do that for him." Bud thought of Jack Cooper, and how useful ties were outside the realm of the law.

"But that shoots down the uniform theory. So, let's make a chart of possibilities," Ed got up to get some paper and pencils. Bud shook his head, smiled and stared into the crackling fire for a minute until he heard Ex's returning footsteps. The scotch was warming him up inside, and he was beginning to get sleepy. Charts would put him right over the edge into Dreamland. How to make this fun?

Exley put the paper down on the low coffee table, just perfect for Bud to see over, since he was still sitting on the floor like a child. Ed began to draw circles with little words in them, first for his dead partners, "Mahon," "O'Rourke," "Jones," then "O'Malley," then "Chief" and drew circles for the crime scenes. He hesitated around putting down "Cooper," deciding not to do it in front of Bud, and not sure if it connected anyway.

Bud took a red pencil from the collection on the table, and began to move the cold pencil lead across Ed's left hand teasingly. Ed felt the tickle on his skin, and stopped his writing. Writing on skin. He had to stop himself from thinking about the dead men. He was alive, and Bud was alive.

"Don't you want to solve this case?" Ed asked, looking at Bud.

"I already have."

"But you have to prove it, Bud. You can't just go kill him tomorrow morning."

"Well, it's going to be me or him. I'd rather it's him. Catch him unaware. Unguarded." Bud slid the pencil under Ed's shirtcuff and moved it back and forth. It was a simple gesture, made sexy by the association it set up in Ed's body as he remembered. He wanted Bud right now. Right here.

There was no way Ed could concentrate with that going on, but he felt unable to say stop because it felt so good. "I don't want you…" his eyes rolled back in his head with the feeling of desire that the light, gentle teasing with the pencil was causing, "to go to jail." Bud stood up to move between the spread legs of the seated Exley. He bent over him, dropping his face near Exley's neck, tracing light lines over his skin. Ed was getting hard just from that touch, and the feeling of Bud's hot breath on his skin.

"No one would know it was me. No one but you. And then, we'd be gone." Bud kissed Ed full on the lips, feeling Ed put pressure on his back to pull him down on his knees. Bud came to rest there, between Ed's legs. He could feel the heat emanating from them both.

"Where do you want to take me?" Asked Ed, breathlessly, his head falling back on the chair as Bud kissed his neck. He had a fleeting question about this pile of money and Bud's escape plan. Some kind of a question he was supposed to ask.

"I want to take you right here," answered Bud, his voice deep and low, knowing full well what Exley was really asking.

"Oh, God, do it," said Exley, getting out of the chair and sliding down on the floor rug, quickly undoing his belt and pants in the small space between chair and table. Bud pushed the little coffee table out of the way too roughly, accidentally sending it teetering over on its side, spilling paper and crashing their empty glasses to the floor. Ed was already halfway gone, but that sent him over the edge into blind lust. Bud ripped Ed's pants down to his ankles in a fast, brutal motion, crawling over him as if to possess, kissing him with violent passion. Bud needed to fuck, now. He looked at the logistics of the situation.

"Over." Ed turned over on all fours, staring into the fire, feeling the heat radiating on his face, feeling himself relax again like he so desperately needed to even as he became hard. His pants were pooled shamefully around his ankles, his shirt was hiked up to his shoulders. Bud hadn't bothered to undress at all. He was getting addicted to this man, the feeling of being taken by him so delicious, he barely needed anything else.

Ed's voice came light and disembodied, as if from another person. "Fuck me you big strong cop. Do it. Now."

Bud did as he was told, fighting for control over the moment. Ed wasn't ready, wasn't ready, this was too fast, he would hurt him, he didn't want to hurt him. "This is too fast," Bud breathed tightly. "I'm going to hurt you." He looked around the room. Bud grabbed the bottle, licking the narrow opening for the sheer pleasure of it, and taking a big, deep sensual swallow that hit his stomach and exploded in his head like Exley's voice.

"Yes. I want you to. Now do it."Ed felt time stop around them. A wave of cold liquid broke over his back as he smelled the scotch being poured over him, the alcohol starting to warm his skin as Bud rubbed it in. Then, suddenly, Ed felt the pain of entry shoot through him from his toes to the tips of hair. He tried to relax. He couldn't breathe. It didn't matter. The pain was exquisite, beautiful and clear. He disappeared into the feeling. Exley the detective was no more, he was just something to fuck, fuck hard and often. Somewhere in his mind, he and the fire merged into one. He rocked back and forth with the motion, barely making a sound.

Bud grabbed the now empty bottle next to Ed by the neck, and threw it into the fire, where it shattered into a million pieces and exploded into a cloud of flame. At the same time, Ed ducked his head down between his arms, shaking, knowing he had partnered with a lunatic, but knowing that he was one, too. Bud's hand came around his slender waist and gave him three quick pumps in a nearly heroic effort to share before he came inside Exley in a thundering wave that released all the tension in his body.

Ed slid down to lay flat on the floor as Bud rolled off of his small frame, stretching out towards the fire. Bud was breathing hard, trying to catch up. God, he loved Ex. No boring, lengthy foreplay, just flat out fucking. Perfect.

"Nobody fucks like you," said Bud when he could speak.

"You're a real one of a kind, yourself," said Ed, smiling. He got up slowly, still hurting, feeling the drops of liquid roll down his skin, making him cold and alive in a way he couldn't remember ever being before, not even when he was killing someone. He looked over at Bud, who was wincing in sympathy.

"Come on, Bud, this is how you like it. Live up to it."

"Let me help you. And don't pretend you didn't love it too," he began in a teasing imitation, "You big, strong cop-"

"Yeah, you loved it," Ed smiled and tilted his head, sure of himself. "That drove you crazy. I know just what to say to drive you right over the edge." He moved with infinite carefulness through the living room, aware of the broken glass. The bathroom door shut and the shower came on as Bud stared into the fire. He fastened his pants back up, smiling to himself.

The doorbell rang, breaking into the privacy of the house with an almost surreal chime.

****

Continue to part 6

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