Forks Nine-Nine
Charlie Swan wasn’t nervous about his son’s first official day on a big task force. He knew Harry was ready. He was much more, well not mature, but… more prepared for this position than Charlie was when he joined the force right out of high school.
It would have been nice if Charlie could tune into the basketball game that was playing from the other room, while slowly dicing the tomatoes the way Harry had taught him. He tossed these in a pan, and then he was meant to…crap. Well, whatever ingredient Harry had told him at least fifty times not to forget couldn’t be that important.
Unfortunately for Charlie’s fantasy lineup, his mind was more distracted by the dinner he was ruining and the kids that would be there soon. He smiled to himself when he thought of Harry and Bella coming home to their first Charlie-cooked meal. It wasn’t that he never cooked, in fact, some of his favorite memories were of them preparing dinner together as a family.
However horrible Harry’s first guardians had been, they did give Harry and by extension the Swan household a bunch of cooking knowledge that no matter how many times Harry tried to teach Charlie (Charlie had been so pleased when Harry was comfortable enough to shyly correct Charlie’s hand placement on a knife, and he still internally beamed when that grew into the now continuous snark peppered through the instruction), it was becoming clear that none of it stuck.
Charlie quickly tried to scrape the much too-crispy tomatoes into the trash can, trying to avoid the lecture his son would give him if he caught him maiming the dinner. Except Charlie wouldn’t get lucky that night. He heard the door open, and the clang of keys and holsters being hung at the front door. He knew Harry had clocked the smell of his dinner failure when he busted into the room with an imaginary gun pointed at Charlie.
“You have a right to remain silent. Anything you say can be used against you in the court of kitchen law.”
“Ha,” Charlie said, trying hard to not grin. “You’re real funny, son.”
Charlie felt a swell of pride fill him when he looked at his only son. Harry was grinning like a goofball and had grown to look like a fine young man in his uniform. Poor kid wasn’t the tallest, but he was a handsome-looking man.
Took after his dad, Charlie was sure.
“I try.” Harry didn’t stop grinning even while he easily shoved past Charlie to get to the fridge. Charlie would fight him, but they both knew if Charlie tried to take over too much they’d end up going out for dinner.
“How’d it go?” Charlie asked. He waited for Harry to grab fresh ingredients from the fridge before he helped himself to a beer. At Harry’s nod, Charlie pulled him one as well.
“I have to wait for Bella to get home and give me more synonyms, but amazing, awesome, excellent, oh and Deputy Commissioner Snape was there.”
Charlie raised an interested brow at that.
Snape was a fine man, Charlie didn’t have any complaints. It was just an old worry he had, the one that said if he wasn’t a good enough parent Snape would take Charlie’s son like Renee once took his daughter.
It was damn stupid, they were two different situations, but Snape had been the one to push through all the paperwork for Charlie to adopt his son. Charlie might have gotten it done in the end on his own, but that didn’t mean Snape’s assistance didn’t speed it along.
“Yeah? Any reason?” Charlie asked.
Harry shrugged while he diced tomatoes and drizzled the pan with oil (that was what Charlie had forgotten).
“I guess he was the one to recommend me for this task force,” Harry said. He kept up his casual tone, but Charlie could hear that it bothered him and it didn’t take a damn genius to guess why.
“That doesn’t mean you weren’t the best man for the job,” Charlie said firmly. “Snape’s just lucky he knew the right cops.”
Snape had gotten lucky before too, back when it was Charlie he gave an important task to. It wasn’t some flashy task force or high-profile case, but it had been the most important job of Charlie’s life.
“You have a daughter.”
Seattle Police Chief Snape looked past where Charlie had been giving him his report on the case he was working through the window to the bullpen.
Bella had been sitting in her chair reading quietly until she noticed the other kid in the room. Charlie didn’t know whose kid it was, but he and Bella had been playing together every day that Charlie made the drive to Seattle to give his report.
The kid, his name was Harry and he was the sweetest thing, didn’t want to read with Bella. Harry wanted to play tag and hide-and-seek. It made Charlie as happy as could be to see Bella running around with him, giggling and trying to find the best hiding places in the precinct.
“I do,” Charlie said proudly. “That’s my Bella. Is Harry your son?”
“Mine? No,” Snape said. He looked at Charlie suddenly and Charlie instinctively straightened up at the sharp and assessing gaze that Chief Snape had.
“I am searching for a suitable foster family for him though.”
And that had been that. Snape made the request, Charlie had been happy to comply.
Harry went home with Charlie and Bella that day and became a Swan within the year.
It hadn’t always been easy or pretty, but damn if Charlie wasn’t proud of his family.
Harry was one of the finest cops in the county, Bella was the best reporter in Seattle. Charlie might not have always done a perfect job, but they’d turned out pretty great anyway.
“Yeah, maybe,” Harry agreed half-heartedly. “Tell me about your day though, Dad. Did Mister Wilton call again?”
Charlie knew Harry was trying to change the subject, but Charlie wasn’t one to beat a topic to death. If Harry didn’t think he had been chosen on his own merits then he would soon.
There could be a room full of cops with years of experience and Harry would be Charlie’s top pick in almost any situation.
Charlie just hoped that the Seattle 99th precinct appreciated Harry because it had been one day and Charlie already missed the two of them meeting up on their lunches.
*****
Harry had a beer in hand, dinner simmering on the stove, and was in the middle of telling Dad all about the time he snuck out to go to a party in La Push when the front door opened.
“There’s no statute of limitations on being grounded, Harry!” Dad called after Harry jumped up to go greet his sister.
Harry only laughed, figuring Dad was just peeved that Harry had managed to get away with a thing or two that he hadn’t known about. It was nice, being an adult and having a chance to brag about everything he’d done as a kid.
Dad was kind of Harry’s best friend, which wasn’t lame at all. Finally, getting to tell him about passing out on the beach and having left Paul and Jared to drag his drunk ass home? It was awesome.
Bella was going to hate the second half of that story, the part where she totally lied to Dad’s face and said she felt sick too so Harry’s hungover story of the flu was more believable.
It would probably be fine, if not then Bella could misspell Harry’s name in an upcoming article about his case.
Bella grinned when she saw Harry and Harry easily returned the smile. If Dad was Harry’s best friend, it was because Bella was already Harry’s favorite sister and she didn’t need two titles.
“Hey, my human thesaurus is home,” Harry said cheerfully while he hugged his sister. He made to greet Bella’s girlfriend Rosa before remembering he valued his life and thus aborted the gesture.
Rosa did that cool chick head nod thing, which Harry tried to return. He probably didn’t look as cool as Rosa, but his hope was that soon enough he’d get some dirt on Rosa from her coworkers and her coolness would be in serious jeopardy.
Harry turned back to his sister. “Bella, help me explain to Dad, how your favorite—”
“Only,” Bella interjected.
“-brother absolutely crushed-”
“Fairly handled,” Rosa said.
“-his first day. Took that case and cracked it—”
“Like a rat.”
“Like a rat,” Harry agreed brightly.
They both erupted in laughter, the kind of silly and childish laughter that Harry only ever shared with his sister. Bella might have been Harry’s geeky and awkward little sister (by a very important 45 days, an immeasurable margin), but she was Harry’s geeky sister and he didn’t think he could live without her.
“Hey, there’s the proof we’re siblings.” Harry joked. “I was starting to worry you were adopted or something.”
As if Bella, with her brown hair and brown eyes identical to Dad, was the standout in the family. Harry used to wish that Dad would get married again, preferably to a woman with black hair and green eyes, just so Harry wasn’t always immediately identified as the adopted one.
Harry told Dad that one time, he’d been around twelve and having a hard time, and Dad pulled out his old family photo albums to show Harry pictures of Grandma Swan in her heyday. Grandma Swan had green enough eyes and dark enough hair that Harry immediately decided that if anyone questioned his parentage again, he would say he took after his grandma.
“Maybe I was adopted,” Bella said seriously. “I heard there’s a crazy man in this town who just picks kids from police stations and takes them home.”
“That’s enough.” Dad’s voice was gruff when he joined them in the mud room they hadn’t yet left and he gave Bella a one-armed hug. “You can’t make jokes with her, Harry,” Dad said, his eyes twinkling with his own humor. “You know everything you say ends up in the paper.”
“Oh I’m counting on it,” Harry said while Bella huffed about it being ‘one time’. “She’s got the inside scoop on this case. I’m ready to be famous.”
“How does Bella know what happened before me?” Charlie asked.
Harry didn’t have a death wish, welllll, he didn’t think he did, but sometimes it was fun to flirt with death just a bit. Not the full wine and dine experience, but at least flowers and a kiss on the cheek.
Harry looked Rosa directly in the eyes when he said, “Oh that’s because she was exploiting her sickeningly sweet relationship to score an exclusive front-row seat to her brother being the Superman Seattle needs.”
Rosa didn’t so much as twitch. Damn, Harry was losing his touch.
“You haven’t even caught the guy,” she reminded him.
“Or girl!” Harry said before Bella could. “Women can be serial killers too, Rosa. Jesus. It’s the twenty-first century, how dare you imply that women can’t be serial killers?”
And aside from that, as Harry had said in their briefing that morning, Harry wasn’t convinced it was a man or a solo killer at all. There just wasn’t enough of anything to build any type of profile or make any guesses at all.
It was a huge case and Harry was actually flattered to have been chosen for it. Harry didn’t understand why Snape picked him, he hoped it wasn’t favoritism, but Harry planned on pulling his weight.
For the last twelve months in Seattle, there had been six murders… It started with a woman who worked as a receptionist for the Children’s Protection Bureau. She had been killed in the office and originally it had been suspected that a bereaved or dangerous parent had killed her in revenge of some sort.
Harry wouldn’t have assumed that if he had been on that case to start with. What parent killed a receptionist as revenge then trashed the records room?
The next murder had been awful, just a teenage boy. That had been when Seattle Police thought it was the same killer, there had been similarities between the two kills.
Harry didn’t understand what a thirty-six-year-old receptionist had in common with a seventeen-year-old boy, but he couldn’t deny they had connected them with plenty of reason.
The third kill came a month later and officially marked the case as serial.
An old man, a veteran who had retired from a factory two years ago, was killed in his home. The same similarities in style and markings, there was still no link between the victims.
It had Seattle on edge, the police stumped, and Harry involved in the coolest case that he’d seen or heard of since becoming a cop.
Harry told Dad about it over dinner while Rosa added a few details here or there. Dad didn’t have any more insight into it than Harry, but it was still fun to rile up Chief Swan over a ‘big city’ case.
“I heard you have an enemy,” Bella said after Harry finished up a full recap of his day.
“Me? You mean Draco?” Harry asked, referring to the guy who was dating Jared Cameron and who seemed to hate Harry. Harry called him his enemy so that if - just if - Harry was ever bitten by a radioactive spider then he knew who to start attacking first.
“No, idiot,” Bella huffed. “Charles?”
Charles?
“The detective?” Harry asked, confused. “He’s not my enemy? He gave me a bagel today?”
It had been disgusting.
“He gave you a plain bagel,” Rosa said like that meant something significant.
“Right…?” Harry looked at Dad, checking that he didn’t miss some subtle cop code. Dad shook his head, just as confused as Harry clearly.
“Charles considers plain bagels to be like the worst food to ever exist,” Rosa said. “And he gave you one.”
“Harry.” Bella threw a chunk of tomato at Harry, which would have been disgusting if Harry didn’t move in time to smugly catch it in his mouth.
“Charles doesn’t like you,” Bella said plainly. “Rosa thinks he’s mad about Jake.”
“Damn.” Harry’s smugness deflated and he felt a prickle of annoyance in his chest. It wasn’t uncommon, cops could be the same level of douche as anyone else, it just always caught Harry by surprise when it happened.
Forks, for all its small-town glory, kept any nasty opinions behind a closed door. Harry never heard a peep out of anyone; partly thanks to the one fight Harry had been in high school, when he knocked out Mike Newton for calling him a fag. It was also partly because even if Forks was Smalltown, USA, people respected Harry’s dad.
“I didn’t clock him as a homophobe,” Harry said. “What a dick. Speaking of Jake, I need to call him. I’ll be right back.”
Harry hopped up, forgetting his phone was in his work belt on the coat rack. Bella snickered when Rosa immediately groaned and laid her head on the table.
“Isabella, is your brother always so stupid?” Rosa asked, muffled some by the table.
“Harry doesn’t do subtle,” Bella said while her dad nodded in silent agreement. “He’s plenty smart though.”
“Yeah, apparently the two of you have been using your brains against me for years,” Dad said, leveling Bella with a look that shouldn’t scare her. Bella was twenty-three years old, she was a grown woman with a job, rent bill, and girlfriend.
“It was all Harry,” she said quickly. “Whatever he told you, it was his idea.”
Because Harry was smart… but even Harry could be outwitted and Bella knew every weakness he had…
*****
The day started with the probable killer, possibly killers, leaving another body in a back alley of a pub ironically named Tavern Law. It was a nice bar, Harry had gotten trashed there with his dad and Bella after passing the entrance exam for the force. It sucked majorly that the murder was going to be the thing Harry remembered the most about the bar in the future. It sucked even more if Harry thought too much about the fact that while he and his dad lounged around drinking beers and watching the Supersonics the night before, a man was being killed.
What made the whole situation suck much less was Peralta. Detective Peralta, a fellow man with a good career and superior taste in sneakers, was the man whom Harry had deemed his spirit’s doppelgänger. Peralta was as sharp, snarky, and good-looking as Harry was (sure, it was a slightly different flavor of hot. While they were both hella white, that was really the only physical trait they shared. Once Harry thought about it, Harry more closely resembled Charlie - though a younger and sexier version of course).
Peralta seemed to sense like Harry’s boyfriend Jake did when Harry started spiraling and gave him a quick squeeze on the shoulder to draw him back to the present. The shoulder check Boyle gave him as they passed him also firmly roused him from his darker thoughts. Harry turned and gave Boyle a grateful smile. Fighting fire with fake-niceness and all that.
Captain Holt then arrived with Deputy Commissioner Snape and Harry watched his new friend straighten his tie before tossing his arm loosely around Harry’s shoulder to walk with him as they gathered to hear their superiors' orders.
If Harry was being honest, he was slightly relieved Snape had arrived, Harry knew Snape valued his reputation too much to allow Harry to fuck up too badly. When Harry slowed to stand behind two larger detectives, Skull and Cock (maybe? No way though, right?), or the guys Snape had described as ‘human pylons’, Peralta moved his hand to Harry’s lower back and subtly pushed him around them until they were both front and center.
As they approached Harry could have sworn he caught Holt giving Snape a quick wink - which Harry was surprised Snape returned with his signature, but rare, half smirk. Harry made a mental note to get more intel on Captain Holt - if the man was making moves on his mentor then Harry wanted to make sure he was worthy. Before he could make any concrete reconnaissance plans, he felt a sudden and sharp pain in his foot.
“I’m so sorry!” Boyle exclaimed as he quickly dropped to one knee, picked up Harry’s foot, and started polishing his boot where he had literally just stomped on it. “I’m just so clumsy in the mornings.”
Harry was momentarily knocked off balance - luckily his new partner had lightning reflexes and stepped around Boyle to catch Harry before he fell.
“My hero,” Harry joked.
“Damn right, I am,” Peralta grinned as he helped Harry regain his balance.
“Officers,” Holt started, ignoring their momentary scuffle, “We’re going to start canvassing the area. A witness reported seeing a Caucasian male flee into a nearby apartment complex. Get in pairs and—”
“Dibs on Jake!” Boyle interrupted, again forcefully inserting himself between Harry and Peralta.
Harry couldn't blame him if Boyle was territorial. If Harry’s dad was also included in the super cool task force he would have called his dibs on being partners before stepping on the scene.
“Officer Swan-Potter, you're with Detective Peralta,” Holt said.
“I can't believe upper management doesn't respect the rules of dibs,” Boyle sighed.
Snape gave Boyle a withering glare. “And Detective Boyle.”
“Sir?”
Boyle seemed to snap back to his senses or he realized, like Harry did at a young age, that it was safer to not question Severus Snape.
“You have something to add?” Snape asked, glaring at Boyle down his nose.
“Sir, I was just responding to you. When you said my name?” Boyle looked like he was sweating under Snape’s glare. “Um… sir,” he added.
“I did not say your name.” Snape paused. “I was merely finishing the order.”
Boyle still looked like a deer in headlights. Harry felt a bit bad for the guy. The whole squad was laser-focused on him.
“Perhaps I should start over since I now have your undivided, uninterrupted attention.” Snape then waited, eyes boring into Boyle while Boyle was having not just his life but all his past lives flash before his eyes in this state of panic. Harry decided to end what was becoming uncomfortable for everyone.
“Deputy Commissioner Snape, I apologize please proceed. I have rectified my behavior.” Harry tried to whisper the right words from the side of his mouth. He knew it wasn't subtle, but he doubted in Boyle’s state he could process anything less direct. Maybe it was Harry’s prompt, or the fact that Snape's ire was now split between himself and Boyle, that Boyle was able to spit out some form of those words.
“Proceed, please. Sir,” he said quickly. “You have my undivided and unintelligent attention er wait undivided and… and… uninterrupted attention, um… Deputy Commissioner Snap.”
Well. Boyle was fucked.
Luckily Harry was with Peralta and didn't have to deal with the fallout from it.
“I will start from the beginning,” Snape said coolly. “Officer Potter-Swan, you will be with Detective Peralta.” Snape paused and Harry swore Snape gave him his version of a shit-eating grin. “And Detective Boyle. I will repeat myself for the,” Snape shifted his gaze back to Boyle, “drastically unintelligent. Officer Potter-Swan you will be canvasing with both Detectives Peralta and Boyle.”
Snape looked at Harry and arched his brow.
“I thought they would be a competent introduction on how to canvas in Seattle, yet it is clear that Boyle will act as a human shield should you need him, as a single order is enough to render him catatonic. Everyone is dismissed.”
Great, that comment was so not going to win Harry goodwill with his new officer buddies.
Of course, the apartment building that Harry, Peralta, and Boyle were assigned to had the elevator broken. So for thirteen flights of stairs, Bolye gave the first eight flights of stairs, Harry was treated to a running commentary of ‘Velvet Thunder and White Lightnings’ greatest hits - which if Harry was being honest sounded like White Lightning covering for Velvet Thunder’s many fuck-ups.
“If White Lightning wasn’t the perfect nickname for Jake, you could be Lightning Scarhead,” Boyle casually threw over his shoulder when they reached the next floor.
“I’ll have you know this is a scar of honor,” Harry informed him with a good-natured grin. Some razzing was fine, Harry got it and gave it all the time with Jake’s buddies at the reservation.
“You totally saved an old lady crossing the street and got hit with a stoplight for your heroic efforts, right?” Peralta asked him, adding an overtly obvious wink.
“That does sound better than climbing out of my crib and hitting the floor the night my biological parents were murdered,” Harry said, seriously considering making that his new story for the little scar he had his whole life.
“Boyle! You can’t just ask people about their scars!” Peralta cried, pulling a dramatic face and smacking Boyle in the back of the head. “Tact, man! His parents were brutally slayed by a monster!”
Boyle didn’t apologize and Harry wasn’t offended. Harry didn’t remember his parents and never felt the need to dig too far in their deaths. Snape had been the responding officer and he told Harry all he needed to know - it happened on Halloween, Harry’s parents loved him, it was a tragedy.
The three of them canvassed most of the floors quickly and were approaching the top floor when Peralta stopped and suddenly snapped his fingers.
“I’ve got it!” Peralta cried, impressing Harry deeply. How had he solved the case so quickly?
“Have you ever seen Die Hard?” Peralta asked Harry.
“Don’t be stupid, I’ve got the tattoo,” Harry scoffed. Die Hard was the greatest movie of all time, it was just as perfect as Harry’s ‘Yipee Ki-Yay’ tattoo that Paul Lahote dared him to get on his eighteenth birthday.
“First off,” Peralta shook himself dramatically, “that’s the hottest thing anyone has ever said before. Secondly, tell me that Deputy Commissioner Snape doesn’t look just like Hans Gruber.”
Harry pictured Hans Gruber, the best movie bad guy ever. The Harry pictured Snape, hardass who had been like family to Harry for most of his life.
“Not at all,” Harry said, shaking his head. He patted Jake’s shoulder and passed him on the stairs, bypassing where Boyle looked like he had been selfishly eating sour candy without sharing.
“I guess nobody’s perfect,” Harry told Jake with faux-disappointment.
“Title of my sex tape!” Jake countered quickly. “No, shit. Wait! I meant title of your sex tape!”
Harry’s sex tape was absolutely not named ‘Nobody’s Perfect’, that was a hit song performed by Hannah Montana that was on Harry’s gym playlist… as a joke…
They reached the top of the building with only a few more bad sex tape jokes from Peralta and stepped into another long, dingy, poorly-lit hallway. Harry really hoped no one lived on the floor that could have been the set of The Shining. Harry thought it was sweet that Boyle took the lead, he really took human shield duty seriously.
Thankfully, their luck held as they went seven for seven on unanswered doors. However, when they arrived at the lone door at the end of the hallway - Boyle aggressively stepped in front of Harry and rapped on the door in an uncharacteristically confident manner.
Harry felt a smidge of pride that maybe Boyle was gaining confidence in their partnership. More accurately - Harry was beginning to think that before Boyle turned and booked it back towards the stairwell, shouting—
“Last one to touch the Captain has to share a ride with Hitchcock and Scully after lunch.”
Fuck.
Harry would never let Snape know that he hesitated for half a second, contemplating the gassy afternoon he was dooming himself to. Which would be worse? Noxious fumes or ditching a possible lead?
At least Peralta seemed to have the same thought process, before also coming to the same conclusion that if there was a person in this apartment that they ding dong ditched, whatever Snape and Holt doled out would be ten times worse.
After making that decision, Harry thought he might as well knock again and perhaps will a person to make the punishment he was going to face worth it. Since he was so invested, he thought he imagined the faint sound of a struggle behind the door - but a quick look at Peralta confirmed that wasn’t the case.
Harry pulled out his gun and leveraged a badass kick at the handle which crumpled the poor excuse for a door to the ground. Quickly, Harry and Peralta cleared all but two closets in the master bedroom - where someone was either being kept captive or having sex that involved gags. Harry, having experience uncovering both, prepared to avert his eyes when he opened the door. Luckily it was three fully dressed people bound, but largely unharmed in the closet.
They didn’t have any information for them, they only said that they were taken by a Caucasian man (so Harry’s theory on a team of badass female killers was out) and told that ‘if the police were as smart as they thought they were, they would be saved’.
It pissed Harry off to be directly challenged by a killer, especially when he was freaking losing. Peralta didn’t seem any happier, he promised the victims that they should stay with friends or family outside the city until the killer was caught - and they would catch the guy. Harry’s ass was on the line with Snape’s reputation, he didn’t want to let down every person who approved him to join the task force.
When Harry unbound the young woman who appeared to be about Harry’s age with long blonde hair, she flung herself at him while mentioning something about his comforting aura. Harry missed most of what she was saying because Peralta, who was finishing the canvas, gave an unholy shriek of disgust.
“EWWW, dead body! Dead Body! Get him off me! Get him off me!!” Peralta shrieked as he promptly chucked the rotting corpse off of him. It landed with a squelchy thud, and a handful of rats quickly vacated the scene of the crime.
Harry noticed the wallet tucked into the back pocket of the dead guy’s jeans. It was too easy. Except he had no desire to put his hands near decomposing ass.
“No way, you see it, you free it,” Peralta said as he gestured to the wallet. He apparently had recovered enough to boss Harry around. Harry sighed as he took one for the team, his Jake wouldn’t have let him suffer like this.
Harry held his breath to snag the wallet then scooted away near the hostages to open it up. There was no cash, but strangely enough a couple of Chuck-E-Cheese coupons, and a foreign driver's license.
Peter Pettigrew.
Harry didn’t know why that name itched the back of his head for the rest of the evening - and it didn’t look like he’d find out. After he had given this report to Commissioner Snape, who had just run into Boyle and was anxious to hear why his pick for special forces was lollygagging. Harry was immediately told he was in charge of driving the hostages to their respective homes located at different ends of the city.
Finally, Harry arrived at the last hostage, the blonde's house located as close to the woods while still being within Seattle’s city limits. He started to daydream about the warm meal his soon-to-be fiancé was probably preparing for right now.
“It's sad about Peter,” Luna commented as Harry parked in their driveway. Harry learned her name during the interviews, when she described being taken by a man and tied up and tossed in a closet with others.
Harry probably would have died, surely she could smell dead body the whole time. There was being a kidnap victim slash possible hostage, then there was being tortured by scent.
“Sorry, what was that?” Harry asked. He could already hear Snape’s lecture about the dangers of daydreaming while a civilian was in the back seat. It would be a boring lecture, given in Snape’s drawling tone and filled with a few meaningless insults. They’d get a beer afterward, Harry wouldn’t be allowed to drive.
Luna hadn’t heard Harry’s question as her parting words to him were - “At least the rats had a nice meal.”
That was it, forget enjoying the meal Jacob had prepared for date night, Harry was sure he wouldn’t eat for the rest of the week.
Date night went as well as it could. Harry was distracted some by his case, Jake was annoyed with a truck that had been brought into his shop for an oil change.
“An oil change, babe,” Jake scoffed for the tenth time, his tan skin wrinkling up on his forehead adorably. “Does ‘Black’s Body Shop’ sound like I do fucking oil changes?”
“Yeah, but not on a car,” Harry said, adding a leer just to make Jake smile. Jake’s smile was… it was the reason Harry smiled, maybe the reason the sun rose every morning.
Oh! That was sappy!
Harry needed to remember that to add to the half-assed speech he kept carrying around and working on in his rare spare time. It seemed like he’d have time that evening, Jake got a call about a wreck on 65 and kissed Harry with a promise to make it up to him before taking off to the shop he owned and ran with a couple of his buddies.
Harry ended up having a productive evening alone. He thought this was how Bella must feel all the time as his pen raced on his overly folded and creased paper, his brain putting all his sappy thoughts in one speech. Cliché as it might be, and it was, cases like the one he was assigned to made him think of what's important, what he wanted to spend his life — no, more precisely who he wanted to spend the rest of his life with. So, Harry was spending this evening after a day from hell writing his vows when a chirp from his phone interrupted his thoughts.
It wasn’t Jake, or Dad. Not even Bella, Rosa, or Peralta. Which were really the only people Harry would accept an interruption from when he was in the zone.
The Proposal Zone.
Could Harry fit that in his speech?
Boyle: What are you doing right now?
Harry reluctantly grinned down at the phone. Boyle was awfully forgiving. Harry thought that after Snape reamed him, only Peralta would be Harry’s remaining friend on the task force. Harry went ahead and paused his epic speech writing to respond.
Harry: Writing my proposal for Jake, wbu?
Harry watched as the three ellipses by Boyle's name started and stopped repeatedly over the next 5 minutes.
Boyle: Wow you move fast lolz. Want to hang out right now instead?
‘Lolz’. How old was Boyle?
He might have just been nervous to ask Harry to hang out though, maybe he was shy? Or an introvert, like Bella. Harry had plenty of experience in pulling her from her shell. Since Boyle was putting himself out there, Harry decided to pause his proposal planning. Perhaps getting a little tipsy would even help finish the speech Boyle also seemed like the romantic sort, maybe he'd have some pointers for the actual setup. Harry quickly texted back.
Harry: Sounds great! Meet you at The Black Dog on 69th in 30
Harry slipped his draft into his pocket, excited for a night of getting to know more about Peralta’s partner and ‘brother from another mother’.
It wasn’t far for Harry to travel to the Black Dog. Usually, Harry would go somewhere a little closer to Forks, but the Black Dog was the one where Rosa liked to drink, since it was closest to the Seattle Department most of Harry’s new task force buddies worked out of.
Harry parked down the block, making damn sure he wasn’t in a meter zone, and stuck his hands in his pocket while he walked toward the — backup.
Harry backed up a few steps to peer in the alley he just passed and, yeah, there was Boyle. Boyle was hidden just in the mouth of the alley, having what looked like a tense conversation with a dude so pale and bald he could probably glow in the dark.
“Hey, Boyle, who's your friend?” Harry called, a bit miffed that he'd have to share his bonding time with a waxy-looking Mr. Clean.
At second thought, Harry didn’t think they were friends. For one, Ghostly and Anorexic Homer Simpson probably didn’t have friends. For another, Boyle actually seemed tense, unsteady. There was a waver in his stance, a tightness in his expression.
Boyle jolted at Harry’s call - yeah, ‘Velvet Thunder’ was super suave - and before he could respond, sickly-looking Prince William decided to speak up
“I am so pleased that Charles here led you straight to me, Harry Potter,” the man said, his voice accented and hissing in a way that made Harry think of snakes… deadly, albino, name-knowing snakes. “It truly is a full-circle moment,” the man added. He pulled a gun, quicker than Harry could pull his, and had it against Boyle’s head in a flash.
“It's a shame I had to create so many clues.” He laughed a huffy and horrifying sound. “I had hoped you would be brighter, more skilled.”
Who the fuck?!
Harry pulled his gun, heard some random civilian scream down the road, and let the racing of his heart steady him. It wasn’t time to panic, it was time to let the man explain who he was and why he knew Harry.
“You killed innocent people,” Boyle said, clearly only smart enough to pick up the hint that the Snake-Face (because, damn, Harry had never seen a nose so flat it looked like slits before) might just be connected to the murders.
And why the hell couldn't Snape give Harry a partner he personally trained? From a young age, Harry was told to never interrupt a serial killer while he was monologuing.
“And why is that Harry?” Snape asked, smiling too fondly as Harry shoveled cake in his face. Harry was starving, he had been at track practice when Snape picked him up for one of their monthly ‘check-ins’. It stopped being about Snape asking if Charlie and Bella were nice to him a year ago and started being more like… Harry and his favorite uncle, grabbing food and talking. Harry liked it.
“Because if they’re busy running their mouths, they aren’t busy shooting your head off,” Harry replied, grinning proudly.
“Usually,” Snape stressed. “They will usually be too busy. Braggy killers are a gift, Harry. They want you to know how brilliant they are and will usually become careless for a split-second.”
“Yeah, usually.” Harry rolled his eyes “But if they’re talking a lot and trying to shoot, then their aim is gonna be shit.”
“I think you’ve been picking up your dad’s vocabulary,” Snape had said with a genuine smile. It made Harry smile too, knowing that everyone he cared about got along.
Harry snapped out of his panicked flashback when he heard Boyle say, “And at least Harry doesn't look like an elderly naked mole rat!”
Fuck. The one time Boyle had something nice to say about Harry would be when a megalomaniac had a gun pointed at him.
Elderly naked mole rat was a mouthful though, if Bald-and-Ball-Python McGee didn’t end up being the serial killer and Harry had more time on the task force, he would teach Boyle some more pithy quips.
“You dare insult me?!” Terror Tot demanded, jamming the gun harder against Boyle’s skull. “The great killer of the night? The undefeated Voldemort?!”
Harry was not happy that they had a lunatic with a nickname, but he was happy the insane ramble gave him a chance to slowly hedge toward Boyle. That way if Voldesomething (Killer of the Night was too Zodiac Killer, Voldewhatever was original, but laaaame) fired his gun, Harry would be close enough to knock Boyle to the ground.
“That man’s a cop,” Harry said calmly, trying to de-escalate the situation. “You don’t want to do this, Voldie. You lower your gun and we can talk about this, alright? You like piña coladas? I’ll buy you one.”
“The Boy Who Lived…” Noseless-and-Nasty (okay, Harry was running out of nicknames) narrowed his eyes and abruptly shoved Boyle away so that he could point his gun at Harry. “You truly do resemble your father.”
There was the click of a finger pulling on a trigger —
Harry had two very distinct thoughts in that moment, neither that were especially helpful.
The first was that it was kind of nice, being told he looked like Dad. Sure, it was by a psycho with a pistol, but it was still nice to hear.
The second thought Harry had, the one that popped up when a bullet whizzed toward him and time seemed to slow, was that Boyle was the worst fucking human shield ever. Boyle lunged, he did and Harry would never take that small act of bravery away from him, but it would have been cool if he took the bullet for Harry instead of trying to knock Harry to the ground with his much smaller size.
And when the bullet tore through Harry’s body, filling the alley with a scream Harry didn’t mean to release, Boyle was the one who got to be credited with taking down the serial killer that Seattle had been hunting.
*****
“It may have been hubris on my part to not confirm the boy’s death, yet it led me to orchestrate a masterpiece of murders. I do not believe in happenstance, fate is in the hands of the man. No, of the God.”
It was what Hell must be like, Snape thought when he sat in the interrogation room listening to Tom Riddle - Snape held no care that the egotistical killer legally changed his name to Vold E. Mort - he was certainly not going to be caught on the record indulging that nonsense on top of everything else.
Severus did not interrupt a single word of the story that Riddle fed him, he was a visibly receptive audience to the boastfully shared story. All killers were the same in the end, they had a story built around achievements through death and needed an audience to share it, to appreciate it.
Riddle had a surprisingly meticulously planned spree that he shared. It was Severus’s penance for putting Potter with the most incompetent detective - though perhaps not the most, as there were an abundance of incompetent detectives in the ninety-ninth precinct - to sit and listen to each murder be detailed.
Riddle had been an active killer two decades ago, Severus would never forget those that were murdered before Riddle went inactive, he took a trip to the UK and would face charges there once he was sentenced in the U.S. Upon his return home, Riddle saw that the boy of his final two victims from his first spree had grown to become a man - become a police officer being lauded in the Seattle Times.
He regret allowing the boy to live and began hunting. It started with a trip to the Children’s Bureau where he killed the receptionist to get to the records. The records led him to the first foster home where the boy had lived and he killed the adopted child of the couple - the wrong child. He then went to the house of the relatives of the boy, only to find that they no longer lived in the house and had sold it many years ago to settle in another state.
It was all about the boy, always.
“I could never allow the boy to undercut my legacy by letting him live. I gave him mercy once and he grew to become everything I despised. I would not allow Harry Potter to make me a merciful God.”
All the ramblings of Riddle washed over Severus’s head, after he decided that these records would never be available to Harry to review. It was a strange story, one of a man who found himself obsessed with the infant he chose to not kill over twenty years ago. If Severus did not need to record the man admitting that it was he who killed James and Lily Potter all those years ago, Severus would have allowed another to conduct the interview.
Severus mostly found himself picturing the beach vacation he could take after what felt to be a quite long twenty-two years. In a way, Harry getting shot in the ass was perfect, Harry’s paid leave would allow him to enjoy a version of Severus that no longer had to worry about the man that took James and Lily going after the only surviving victim.
Severus was fond of Harry, accidentally so. Harry was meant to mean nothing to him, just the son of a fellow cop and his wife - admittedly the wife was the one who Severus had been closest to when he was fresh out of the academy with James Potter.
No other officer had questioned if Harry surviving that Halloween murder was a sign or not. Most thought that either Harry had been quiet enough to go unnoticed or the killer refused to harm a boy of just one.
Even when the case went cold, Severus continued to work it. James Potter may have been an arrogant fool, yet no man deserved to die without justice. After two decades of working the case in every spare moment, obsessing over it, Severus was finally across an interview table from the killer.
Severus worked the case so much that he did not believe anything could come out of Riddle’s mouth that would surprise him - but it appeared that he was wrong twice.
A record he hoped to never repeat.
“And that was when the fortune teller set me on the path to greatness. She said…” Riddle looked in the distance, a dramatic one to be sure.
“‘The one who will vanquish the Dark Killer is approaching, born to those who defied him thrice, as the seventh month ends. The Dark Killer will see him as his equal, yet he possesses a power the Dark Killer knows not—a strength in turning the other cheek. One must perish by the other’s hand, for neither can survi—”
A fortune teller.
A man and his wife were killed, their son orphaned then later abused, over a fortune teller?!
Severus immediately stood and left a stunned Riddle locked behind the interrogation door. Severus looked for Holt, a captain who also had a protege he favored, and yelled when he was not immediately found.
“Holt!” Severus was fuming, absolutely furious at the idiocy and obsessive tendency of killers. “I need you to take over or I am going to start shouting profanities at this dime-store boogeyman!”
Severus would accept many excuses for the murder of James Potter, a fortune teller filled with nonsense was not one of them. Also, Severus had already won his private bet with Holt on which of their protégés would solve the case. Harry was shot by the killer, Peralta had been at home sleeping.
It was Severus who won and Severus who was quite ready for a vacation.
*****
The blinding and unflattering fluorescent lights and the steady beeping of a monitor were Harry’s first clues. The itch in his left arm and the dull pain in his ass were Harry’s third and fourth clues.
Harry was going to survive, as much as he wished he wouldn’t. It wasn’t that Harry was suicidal, nobody had more to live for than Harry, it was that if Harry got shot in the ass he was never going to live it down so why bother trying?
It was probably time for Harry to open his eyes, not that he wanted to. Harry just knew, knew in his morphine-soaked heart, that he was going to open his eyes and have to look Snape in the face, triggering a lecture.
Why would you be so careless, Harry? Do you have no brain cells inside of your head, Harry? How can one cop be so handsome and so stupid, Harry?
The last one might be a morphine-induced idea, but it could happen.
It was a small struggle of Harry versus the joys of medical-induced comatude to open his eyes and he was mildly surprised, and disappointed, to see that the man who mentored him his entire life wasn’t present.
Harry’s dad was there, slumped in a chair directly beside Harry’s bed, his hand being the weight that kept Harry’s right hand from itching at the IV. Dad looked tired and Harry probably deserved a lecture from Snape for being the reason for the bags under Dad’s eyes.
“Morning,” Dad said, a sleepy croak in his voice. He smiled, but his eyes didn’t crinkle like they did when he was stress-free and laughing on the fishing boat with Harry.
“Hey,” Harry said. “You oughta get a bed, old man. That chair can’t be good for your back.”
“You’re awake for ten seconds this time and the first thing you did was insult our father.” There was Bella, breaking free from the small crowd in Harry’s room to wrap Harry up in a hug.
Harry wasn’t ashamed to admit that sometimes a guy just needed a hug from his sister - especially if he had recently been shot in the ass and knew that hug was going to be followed by a lot of jokes at his expense soon.
“This time?” Harry asked, working to not be choked by Bella’s freaking mess of a hairdo. The second Bella said something about Harry’s newest scar, he was going to direct her to a hairbrush.
“You woke up last night, cried like a bitch, then passed out again.” Rosa leaned against the wall at the end of Harry’s bed, standing beside Peralta, and smirking smugly at him.
Harry tried to not show his disappointment at seeing Peralta there. It wasn’t that it wasn’t cool of him to show up, it was that he wasn’t the Jake that Harry wanted to see at the moment.
“Bells, why don’t you go ask if your brother can have something to eat now that he’s awake,” Dad suggested, his own love language really. For a man who couldn’t cook, Dad always tried to feed Harry when he thought Harry needed comforting.
“I’m fine,” Harry promised him. “All good.”
It sucked if Dad had sat there worrying about him. Harry and Bella had never had to sit bedside for their dad, but Harry imagined it was every person who loved a cop’s worst fear.
Not like Harry’s current worst fear, which was that his ass was going to be too scarred to get pounded ever again.
Bella ignored Harry’s refusal and started toward the door to track down a nurse. She reached for the handle and it was abruptly thrown open, knocking Bella right on her ass and pissing Harry off.
Nobody hurt Harry’s sister except Harry, and he rarely ever hurt Bella. Maybe once, when she snapped his favorite fishing pole just because Harry said she spent more time checking out her creepy ex-boyfriend’s sister than she did the boyfriend.
So sorry that Bella didn’t know she was bisexual, it seemed obvious.
If it had been Jake who threw the door open and knocked Bella on what was going to be one hell of a bruised tailbone, Harry could forgive it. It wasn’t. It was Boyle… who Harry wasn’t exactly pumped to see.
Boyle was sooooort of the reason Harry got shot, if his fuzzy memory was right. Boyle had been chatting up the killer in the alley and then - totally on purpose, probably - made himself seem like the lesser threat of the two, leaving Harry to be the target of the killer’s pistol.
There seemed like there was something Harry was forgetting, he was sure it wasn’t important. If it was, he’d get a memo with the final case report.
If Boyle had looked more like Rosa’s staff sergeant that Harry met briefly at the start of the task force, the hulking and impressive Sergeant Terry Jeffords, then Harry could have been the lesser threat and Boyle could be the one with the bullet in his ass.
Damn Harry and his good looks, lean and athletic body, and general aura of heroic awesomeness.
Boyle rushed past where Rosa was helping Bella up and literally threw himself at Harry for a painful hug.
“Thank God, I’m not too late,” Boyle gushed. Harry would have asked what he thought he was late to, but considering the hella fancy suit Boyle wore, complete with fluttering coattails, Harry assumed Boyle thought he was showing up to a funeral.
And if it was Harry’s… then he was early. By several years, hopefully.
“Don’t you worry, buddy.” Boyle squeezed both of Harry’s shoulders and gave him a quivering smile. “I approve,” he said grandly. “And I’m here to help you cross the finish line. AHEM!”
Everyone in the room, basically Harry’s family and Peralta, had already been watching Boyle with clear confusion, which made the dramatic arm flapping and throat clearing super unnecessary. Not that Harry minded just yet, he was still high enough to picture Boyle as a little chirping penguin.
“I hope you don’t mind,” Boyle whipped a familiar and crinkled paper from his inner jacket, “I memorized the whole thing. I added some emotions though, you really need to know your target audience. There’s a few creative changes, you’ll love it.”
Harry looked at Dad, but Dad stared at Boyle with one eyebrow cocked, clearly unimpressed with Seattles finest…
Seattle’s finest penguin… Harry giggled, which was embarrassing, but only his dad heard him since Boyle chose then to start… whatever it was he was doing.
“Jake.” Boyle placed a hand on Harry’s shoulder while he stared at Peralta with big puppy eyes and a gay smile. And not gay like happy, but gay like how Harry was gay.
“I, and by I, I mean Harry. In fact, just pretend every time I say ‘I’ I mean Harry, okay?”
Peralta didn’t even nod in understanding, if he understood because Harry didn’t, before Boyle was off again.
“My Jacob — wait, pause, hold on.” Boyle looked down at Harry and shook his head. “I’m not saying this as your sworn enemy any longer, but as your friend who wholeheartedly approves of the love you and Jake share. His name is Jacobi, not Jacob. It’s a common mistake, I’ll give you a copy of my book on all things Jake before the big day, okay?”
Harry wondered if penguins could fly, then he wondered if his morphine was on a time-released drip.
It probably was.
“Jacob,” Boyle said again. “You are my best friend, the person who I want to have adventures with forever. I might not have the fanciest vocabulary or the big dreams to ask you to share, but I don’t think you need those things. Ever since we met, back when you were chubby — Harry,” Boyle sighed right in the middle of his super sweet speech to Peralta. “Jake was never chubby. He was probably just bloated, he gets gassy.”
“Hey! I do not!” Peralta cried indignantly.
“Anyway!” Boyle ignored Jake and continued his dramatic speech. “Ever since we met, I’ve known that we were going to be awesome together. I’m not good with words, I wish I could write a whole lame novel to tell you what you meant to me. All you need to know is that I love you more than anything, and I always will. And all I need to know,” Boyle dropped to one knee and pulled out a ring that he held up to Peralta, “is if you’ll marry me?”
Boyle was crying, which was cool because high-Harry felt a little teary-eyed too. Ass pain, probably. It definitely wasn’t because Harry just got to hear the most badass, honest, perfect…
Wait.
Harry shifted in his bed, struggling to sit up, and he quickly snatched a pillow from behind his head and launched it at Boyle’s back.
“That’s my badass, honest, perfect speech!” Harry said, yelling to the best of his drugged abilities. “What the fuck?”
Boyle stole Harry’s speech - Rosa snatched the ring out of Boyle’s hand and Harry could see the familiar box - and Harry’s ring! Boyle had stolen Harry’s proposal that Harry was going to give Jake at the end of a romantic motorcycle race on their upcoming anniversary! Boyle got Harry shot then stole his speech and ring and used all of Harry’s charm to try and marry the less-handsome, less-rugged, less-Harry’s-soulmate Jake!
When Harry looked for his sister to see if she was understanding the level of bullshit happening, he saw his Jake leaning in the doorway of the room. Jake had his arms crossed over his chest and his eyes glued to Harry.
Boyle was apologizing while Harry swallowed his tongue, very sure that Jake knew who wrote that speech and for what purpose.
“I know, I didn’t do it justice,” Boyle apologized with a heavy sigh. “I just thought since you couldn’t kneel, I would propose to Jake on your behalf. So, what do you say Jake, will you marry Harry?”
Harry hadn’t looked away from Jake - his Jake, the only Jake that Harry wanted to build their perfect small-town life with, the simple dreams they shared - and he really hoped it wasn’t the morphine that made him imagine Jake nodding.
“Damn, babe you’re high.” Everyone who had been distracted by Boyle and Peralta turned to see Jacob Black stride in the room, a freaking God of a man.
Jacob reached Harry’s bedside and politely nodded at Harry’s dad before bending down and pressing a chaste and totally parent-approved kiss to Harry’s lips.
“I’m saying yes now and I’ll say it again later when you’re not stoned,” Jake told him quietly, the Harry-specific warm smile firmly in place. “I’m gonna guess that celebration sex is off the table for a while.”
Harry whined, probably. That wasn’t fair.
How come heroes didn’t immediately get laid? Ass-bullet, mass-mullet. Harry wanted sex.
Harry really hoped he wasn’t imagining Jake’s response though, not like he did the penguin that beat up his sister…? Or…? Had that happened?
“Are you kidding me?!” Boyle took Harry’s fleeting attention when jumped to his feet and waved both hands at Jake, pissing Harry off again. “You’ve been cheating? On Jake? What? Just because this man is 6’5” with probably rock-hard abs and - God, your skin is amazing, what do you use? No! Wait! I’d never use the moisturizer of a homewrecker!”
“Daaaaaad,” Harry turned away from his fiancé (were they engaged? That happened, right?) to pout at his best friend. “Will you just give me the highlights reel? What the fuck is going on?”
“Son, I’ve got no damn clue,” Dad said. And if Dad didn’t know, then it had to be bullshit times ten.
Rosa suddenly stepped out from behind Bella and pointed at Boyle then Harry. “How did these two morons catch a freaking serial killer?” she asked Bella. And… rude.
At least Harry was getting credit for the takedown, that was cool.
“Listen up, idiots,” Rosa said. She pointed at Jake - Harry’s Jake. Not Boyle’s Jake. Harry nuzzled into Jake’s side… his.
“That is Harry’s boyfriend, fiancé, whatever. Jacob Black. Shockingly, he gets called Jake. That,” Rosa pointed at the other Jake, the spiritual twin rather than the romantic soulmate, “is Jake Peralta. Who is not now, or ever, in a relationship with Harry. Which, by the way, is what Boyle assumed when he went ahead and ruined Harry’s proposal to Black by giving it to Peralta.”
“Not ruined,” Jake told Harry with a dopey grin that Harry returned with a doped-grin.
Rosa made a lot of sense, everyone needed a Rosa in their life. Rosas were like Bellas but they used simpler words for their explanations.
“I like her,” Harry told his sister. “Let’s keep that one. Oh! Bella! Propose! Then Rosa and Jake can wear their ‘I’m so sexy and cool’ leather jackets and we can get married on a boat together!”
“That’s enough out of you,” Dad said, kindly covering Harry’s mouth with his hand. “You can talk when you’re not high and trying to push your sister to a damn altar.”
“And you have got to get over your jealousy issues, man,” Rosa scolded Boyle, getting a muffled cheer from Harry. “You were an ass to Bella and your stupid plan to frame Harry with heroin got him shot.”
“‘F neber done hewoin,” Harry swore to his dad quickly. It was muffled, but Dad had to know that Harry did hugs, not drugs.
“Oooh.” Peralta kicked off the wall and nodded eagerly. “I get it now, Boyle was going half-Boyle on Harry because he thought I was dating Harry, like he did to Bella when Rosa started dating her.”
Was that what happened? That was news to Harry.
“Oh God.” Bella groaned and looked around the room slowly, looking kind of like she did when Harry told her that Santa Claus wasn’t real (sue him, Harry didn’t like Bella thanking some imaginary fat man while Dad was the one to give Harry his first real Christmas).
“How were any of you chosen for a task force?” Bella asked.
“I’m an excellent assistant,” Boyle said.
“Undefeated record of closed cases,” Peralta said.
It took Harry a minute to think of the word he wanted, but he knew it when it popped up in his mind.
“Nepotism.”
“Dude.” Rosa laughed harder than anyone, which was awesome because Rosa never laughed at Harry’s jokes usually. “You’re not supposed to admit that.”
“I’m high,” Harry said. He whined and shifted uncomfortably. “And my ass hurts.”
“Title of Harry’s honeymoon sex tape!” Peralta leaned out for a high-five and Harry enthusiastically gave him one.
Dad didn’t look really excited about the sex tape jokes, but - hey. He had no one to blame but himself. Nobody made him take Harry home with him all those years ago.
Dad probably didn’t regret it, Harry knew that he certainly had no regrets.