CHAPTER 4
SOLO

DAYS were getting harder. The streets weren't as safe. More reports filtered in about the masked vigilante roaming the allies at night, and police were now incredibly worried that they were dealing with a violent sociopath. Iris thought that was a bit of a stretch. The guy clearly just didn't want to work alongside them. Officers were a strict, tight-knit bunch, and refused to let newcomers in. She could empathize why the vigilante wanted nothing to do with them.

Or maybe he just was a violent sociopath and she was thinking all too blindly. Could be one or the other.

The chief of police had rounded up his best officers into a tiny room. It was a rainy Monday morning, so most had shown up late anyways. The old office could hardly house them, and was now mostly used for demonstrations or private meetings. It smelled like expired milk in there. Iris was lucky enough to get a seat at the long table situated in the middle of the room, squeezed between an officer who looked like he barely washed himself and the chief's secretary that was obviously fantasizing about sucking him off. She shuddered at the thought.

There were so many other ways that she could be spending her time right now. Like doing her research. Maybe even finishing that half-eaten bagel that still laid on her desk from yesterday. Literally, anything but sitting in this dumb room, hearing the static crackle in the air. Some people tried talking amongst themselves, but the room eventually grew silent again when the Chief walked in.

Mr. Angeles was a tall man with large muscles covering his entire body. His legs and calves looked like they could take down a tank. His arms were the size of adult pythons, and his hands seemed strong enough to choke someone in under two seconds. Iris hardly spoke to him, specifically for these reasons. (Not many people scared her. Mr. Angeles was a different story.) His hair was always quaffed in some sort of retro style. He was quite attractive, if you were into muscly guys that looked like they could kill you with only their bare hands. She could somewhat understand why his secretary fantasized about him.

"I'm sure you've all been watching the news lately. You know what's been going on around the city at night," the Chief began, eying each and every one of them in the room. Iris rested her cheek in her hand, narrowing her eyes in his direction. "Because of this, I thought it would be good to give you all a short briefing on what to do if you encounter a masked vigilante, much like the one seen here."

Mr. Angeles turned the projector on and flipped the lights. The room was shrouded in darkness, but eventually lit up as the projector generated a picture on the white wall from one of the blurry videos of the vigilante. Mr. Angeles swiped a red light pointer from his pocket and smacked it in the direction of the wall. Iris let her head fall into her hands.

"Step one: approach with caution –"

Steven, a low-ranking officer, raised his hand. "What if we approach too quickly, Chief?"

"Well," Mr. Angeles sighed and placed his hands on his hips. He sent Steven a concerned look before waving off his question. "Just ... just don't do that."

Steven sunk back into his seat and tried to pretend like he didn't exist. Iris snickered as quietly as she could.

"Step two –" The Chief continued. "– Advise the person to set their weapon down – hey, Grayson!"

Iris blinked, twisting her head in the direction of Mr. Angeles' scowl. Once her eyes had found his – the warm, caramel brown that could easily disguise itself in the darkness – she realized they had been directly on her the entire time. His stare penetrated her, freezing her whole body in place. She refused to move an inch until he addressed the Chief, but they were still there, holding her like a tight rope. She held her head up with her hand, allowing her fingers to shield the perplexed frown appearing on her mouth.

Finally, after what seemed like forever, he looked away, and took in the Chief's angered expression. Iris released a breath of relief that she didn't know she had been holding in.

Mr. Angeles swung his pointer towards the wall, allowing the red dot to hover over the blurry picture. "Are you paying attention? Or are you going to continue staring at the ladies?"

Dick glanced at his hands. The room was silent. Not one person wanted to release a chuckle. Dick licked the corner of his lips and replied, without viewing up, "No, Chief."

Iris couldn't look away now.

"Maybe it's time for you to start," Mr. Angeles quipped, turning back to the wall projection. His current frown flipped and the corners of his mouth formed into a quick smile. "Now, as I was saying, step two ..."

•••

Iris was one-hundo percent ready to crack down on the case. After extensive days and hours spent on research, she came up with nothing but a tiny inkling of who she thought would be hit next. She never truly realized until this case how many antique shops resided around the city. There were five: three had had already been hit, so that left two in the running.

Each shop was within a five hundred foot radius of each other, and the robbers seemed to be moving counterclockwise. They were moving in the direction of the right with each shop that they hit. If her theory was correct, the next shop on their radar was on Lonesdale street: St. Anne's Antique and Depository.

St. Anne's was probably one of the largest antique stores on the block. Iris had never stepped foot inside, though. Most people said the place smelled like dirty feet. A lot of old veterans liked to deposit their grimy and worn-out uniforms there, which left the place with a hint of death in the air. Charlie said once that she went there to thrift shop and ended up leaving because it smelled like a warzone, and she could never stand the scent of blood.

Looks like it was time for Iris to finally pay a visit. Lucky her.

She let Mr. Angeles know that she was leaving early that day. Telling him a lie was the only way to get him to not question it. She said that she was going to interview a potential witness about the masked vigilante case, but that couldn't be farther from the truth. Iris headed for the four-thirty train that evening, but instead of getting off eight stops for home, she stepped off at stop three, right near the tail end of Lonesdale street. The cold air whipped against her face, almost blowing the scarf right off her shoulders. She began to walk quickly towards the location of St. Anne's, if the GPS app on her phone was correct.

Turns out, it wasn't. What looked like a short three-minute walk from the train station turned into a fifteen-minute walk, which – for your information – felt even longer in cold weather. Finally, after what seemed like forever, she spotted the blinking sign for St. Anne's Antique and Depository. The sign was rotting and made out of all old lightbulbs – some flickering in and out, some not. Iris smiled to herself, but the expression soon faded when she noticed a particular car sitting in front of the building.

A silver Porsche 911. One that she saw in the parking lot at the station far too often.

Iris' teeth clenched. She began to stomp towards the antique shop, releasing incoherent grumbles under her breath. Iris approached the car with a scowl, peering inside the passenger side door the most she could. The windows were blacked out. But she managed to squint enough to recognize a cold Jillian's Coffee in the cupholder. Iris shot back up, murmuring under her breath, "Grayson."

Spinning on the tip of her ankle boot, she continued her stomps right into St. Anne's, practically ripping the front door off its hinges. She found him there, leaning against the cashier counter, sending the owner his best charismatic grin. (It looked far creepier to Iris. He really didn't know how to talk to strangers.) The bell over the door rang at her arrival, causing both Dick and the owner to turn her way.

Iris was already in front of him, though, yanking on the collar of his dress shirt and muttering, "Fucking Dick."

"Huh," he chuckled, wiggling out of her grip, "haven't heard that one before."

She swallowed hard, realizing that she was making a scene in front of the owner. The store was quiet and empty, except for the three of them. Iris sent the older woman a quick smile. "Will you excuse us for a minute, um –" She looked down at the woman's name tag written in red sharpie. "– Melissa?"

"It's Meleesa," the elderly woman corrected in a grouchy tone, shooing them off with a wave of her veiny hand.

Iris rolled her eyes and dragged Dick out by his collar, refusing to let go. He tried shaking her off, but her grip was strong and resilient, and he knew her anger wasn't going to fade so quickly. Once outside, Iris released her hold, causing him to stumble back a few steps. "God," he said, tugging on his now-wrinkled collar, "did anyone tell you that you got a good grip?"

"Don't change the subject, Grayson." She shoved a finger in his face. His eyes focused in on her chipped brown fingernail polish. "You've been looking at my shit again. This is my investigation. My interview. Not yours! I told you –"

"Office lingo 1-0-1. Yeah, I know." He stuck his hands into his front pockets. "I wasn't trying to take the case from you."

One of her eyes twitched. He was really testing her patience. "Then what do you call you showing up to this interview before me and talking with the St. Anne's owner yourself? Friendly partnership?"

He looked at her as if it were obvious. "Well, yeah, kind of."

"Are you that dense?" She tangled her hands into her hair, forming knots into the already-matted strands. "You're a detective, for Christ's sake!"

"Can you just listen to another person for one goddamn second?" He exclaimed, stepping closer, invading her space.

Iris felt his breath on her face. She licked her lips, allowing her cheeks to flush for a second – and only a second. His nostrils flared; his brows went narrow. She silently wondered if he got this close to his other coworkers.

"I came here because I want to help. That's it." He replied, his tone venomous and seething. "Whether you like it or not, you have to realize one day that we are partners, and the Chief wants us to work together. He's not sitting around and letting you walk all over him anymore. Neither am I."

She tilted her head to the side. "Really? Because my boots could sure do a number on all your faces."

Dick sighed, lifting his stare to the darkened sky. "Can you please just work with me here? I'm not asking for much."

"No, you're asking me to change and I don't want to do that."

Those caramel irises scrutinized her, and she questioned if he actually had to power to hear her continuous internal screaming because they were still so fucking close to each other: chest to chest, toe to toe. "You don't like change?"

Iris shook her head, finally moving away from him and rounding his side. "I don't have time for this."

Dick turned and watched her head towards the entrance to St. Anne's once again. "Then what do you have time for?"

"Working on this case," she said with a salacious smirk, "solo."

•••

A/N: short chapter but!!!! I hope you liked it!