by Aiden Bates
Oliver did, but only on the fourth ring. "Hi." Oliver's voice usually had hope. Now it only had wariness. The change was like a knife to the gut.
"Hi, Oliver. It's Sam. Sam Nenci."
"I know. Caller ID." Oliver paused. "Not to be rude here, but I'm not sure that we've got a lot to say to one another at this point. What can I help you with?"
Oh God. He really had shot himself in the foot. Who knew that one little sentence could unravel a life so badly? Sam had wanted to avoid letting Oliver know how much he wanted him, but not like this. He hadn't wanted to give Oliver a bad impression of him, for crying out loud. "Listen. Jake took off from here a little while ago. We had an argument, we were both pretty heated. He hinted that he was heading in your direction. I don't suppose that you've seen him?"
Oliver paused again. "He's here. He's safe."
"Oh thank God." Nenci fell into the chair, his whole body limp with relief. "That building—is it safe?"
Oliver snorted. "It's safe. I've lived here for three years. There's not a lot of turnover. Each apartment has a panic button. There's security, and there are omegas-only facilities for residents to use. They're keyed to the resident’s key, so no one can go sneaking in."
"Really?" Nenci sat up. "You don't think it can be broken?"
"Any security system can be broken, by a determined enough criminal. But it's a pretty good system." Oliver hesitated. "You're welcome to try to break in, I guess, but I'm not explaining it to the cops when they show up."
Sam snickered in spite of himself. "I'll pass, thanks. I'm sure I don't need that on my record this close to retirement. I want my pension, thank you." Oliver didn't laugh, and Sam remembered how badly he'd embarrassed himself in front of the man on the other end of the phone. "Anyway, if he's safe, then I guess I won't bother you anymore."
"Have a good weekend, Detective." Oliver's voice was cold when he hung up.
Sam leaned back into the couch cushions and looked out over the lake. He could just see it from where he sat, even more beautiful at sunset than it was the rest of the day. Chris had loved the view.
God, what must Chris think of him? Chris would have made him sleep on the couch after that fight with Jake. Of course, if Chris were alive, that fight with Jake wouldn't have happened. Hell, Jake would probably have an alpha of his own, and Oliver wouldn't be mooning around over Jake's best friend like some kind of creep.
Furthermore, if Chris were still alive Sam wouldn't have carved out Oliver's heart today. And Oliver wouldn't have turned around and carved Sam right back. He'd forced Sam to look at his work, and he'd done it in front of other people because he'd come in with the assumption that Sam wouldn't listen.
Sam had to take a good, long look at himself. It didn't show anything he liked to see.
He didn't have a problem with evidence processed by omegas. He didn't. He could see why he came across that way. He hadn't even lost his temper about Oliver acting on his own initiative until he'd been fighting with Jake, looking to defend his own behavior. Sure, he did feel that way, but only a little bit. It hadn't been at the forefront of his mind until anger churned it up.
So what was his real problem? He had some very old-fashioned views about omegas, sure, but not as bad as what his son attributed to him. That was something else that he needed to address, and sooner rather than later. His bigger problem, though, was that he'd gotten too used to responding to everything with sarcasm and nastiness. He'd gotten too used to lashing out at people. Initially it had been his grief and his pain that had allowed him to behave that way, and people had let him get away with it. Then it had become habit.
He needed to get better. He needed to change his behavior. He had no idea how.
He turned his head to look at the portrait of Chris. It had been taken just before their claiming, when Chris was probably about twenty. He'd been dark skinned and devilishly handsome, the kind of guy that you wished someone had warned you about. He smelled like roses, and Sam guessed that was about right. Roses were gone in an instant too.
What would Chris want him to do here? Well, Chris would tell him to stop being a dick. But what would Chris want him to do about Oliver?
That was harder to figure out.
Chapter Three
Oliver sent up a quick prayer of gratitude to any deity that might happen to be listening for granting him the foresight to buy a pullout sofa when he moved into this place.
His apartment was a one bedroom. That was fine for him. He was a single guy, and it wasn't like he spent a lot of time at home anyway. When Jake showed up on his doorstep, Oliver couldn't offer him a separate room or anything like that. Jake signed a lease for a one bedroom of his own, but he couldn't move in for another three weeks.
Fortunately, three weeks wasn't forever and Oliver had the pullout couch. They could work out a schedule for the bathroom. Jake agreed to keep any hookups to outside locations, just because of the lack of privacy, and that was that. They would be fine.
Jake sat in the kitchen while Oliver scrounged together what food he could to fix a quick dinner. He needed to go grocery shopping; maybe he'd do that tomorrow. He hadn't shopped for more than one before. "I probably overreacted," Jake sighed, after Nenci's cryptic phone call. "I mean, I meant it, I don't necessarily regret anything I said or did, but I probably flew off the handle. I definitely could have phrased things better, you know? I was just so pissed off."
Oliver focused on browning some chicken in a skillet. "These things happen. Parents bring them out in us, you know?" He hadn't seen his own mother in years, not since his sophomore year of college, but he still remembered how tied up in knots he used to get around her.
Jake chuckled. "Oh, don't I know it. I mean he's a good dad, you know? Don't get me wrong. He took great care of us after our father got killed. He's just… you know. He's old fashioned, and he's super paranoid about a lot of things because of what happened to Papa." He picked his head up. "Oh, crap. I should call Joey and tell him where I am. Er, are you going to have an issue with an alpha you don't know showing up?"
Oliver blushed and shrugged. "Joey's your brother, right? No. I shouldn't have a problem with that. Do what you need to do, Jake. This is your home, until your place comes through."
They spent the night just hanging out and drinking a little wine. Oliver tried to hide his shock and disappointment in Nenci. He knew that he shouldn't take it too seriously; he was only getting half of the story. Instead, he supported his friend and drank wine with him, and went to bed.
The next morning, he washed their wine glasses and put together a shopping list. Jake was still asleep, so Oliver left him a note on the bathroom mirror. By the time he got home, Jake was up and able to help with the groceries. That counted for a lot. Jake had also made coffee, which officially made him the Best Roommate Ever. Oliver wondered if he could get him a trophy or something.
They got the groceries put away and made a schedule for dinner prep, and then Jake warned him that Joey would be stopping by in the afternoon. "It's cool," Oliver told him. "I'll just head out on a bike ride or something."
"It's okay, man. Joey actually wants to meet you. He wants to know who I'm staying with, in case there's an emergency or something." He shrugged and blushed. "He's not into all of the alpha posturing or that stuff, but he can be kind of a stereotype about some of it. At least it's the good parts, right?"
Oliver laughed and made sure that they had cheese and crackers ready.
Joey showed up at around two. He brought beer. He would have been Jake's identical twin, if it weren't for the scents. He smelled strong, like sage, and looked around himself and nodded before shaking Oliver's hand. "Hi. I'm Joe Nenci. You must be Oliver."
Oliver blushed. He couldn't help it. "That's me. Oliver Wesson. Can I get you anything? A drink? We've got some cheese and crackers over here." He led the way into the living room, where the sofa had been folded back up and the bedding discreetly stashed.
"Thanks. If you guys are having a lit
tle wine, I'll have some too." He smiled, just a little, and sat down on the edge of the couch. "So Jake, come on, man, what happened? I thought you'd never move, I thought Dad needed you to stay too badly."
Well, that was interesting.
"He pushed too far this time. He might be able to keep me from doing what I want to do, but he can't keep me from living the rest of my life the way I want." Jake rolled his shoulders and plastered a huge grin onto his face. "That's not the important thing right now, Joey. Did you see much of the building? Did you like it?"
"It seems nice enough. Are you really keen on living alone, though?" Joe tilted his head and stared at his brother. "I mean good for you, if you are, but it's not something you're used to."
"Well, it's not like I'm going to be in some cabin on the edge of a mountainside, dude. There are a lot of social spaces, to include social spaces set aside for omegas only. It's a safe building, and it's close to work. Plus, I've got Oliver here. We don't see nearly enough of one another at work, you know." Jake batted his eyelashes at Oliver.
Oliver laughed and brought the wine over. "It's true. We don't. That cubicle wall is insurmountable." He passed out the glasses and sat down. "So what is it that you do, Joe?"
Joe tugged at his collar. "Actually I'm a firefighter."
"That's right. My brother's one of the best, too. And Oliver here did his master's thesis in arson investigation." Jake grinned. "Isn't that a coincidence?"
"Not really." Joe smirked and shook his head. "Our family tends to attract fire in one way or another. It's dad's charming personality. It tends to have people reaching for the accelerant."
The twins laughed, and Oliver grinned along with them even though his heart wasn't truly in it. He was still disappointed in Nenci, but he couldn't quite shake his affection for the older man.
Joe stayed for dinner, something Oliver didn't object to. Later the twins went out to a club while Oliver stayed back; clubs weren't his scene. He spent his Sunday with a pleasant bike ride and took care of some housework, and just like that the weekend was over.
He and Jake carpooled on Monday, because Oliver wasn't a big fan of biking in the rain. They walked up to their workstations more or less in sync, which made Nina shudder. "That's all I need, the two of you mind melding or whatever. What's up with the two of you? You're not usually in at the same time."
Oliver just took his seat. It was Jake's story to tell. It wasn't Oliver's place to share it.
"I just signed a lease on a place in Oliver's building. Since it won't open up until July first, he's letting me crash with him until it does." Jake flashed one of his huge, charismatic grins at their boss. "So far, it's been great. Although I've got to say, he's got a lot of clean and healthy habits that are just a bad example for everyone."
Nina pursed her lips. "I'm not sure that it's a great idea to let you two spend more time around each other than you already do. I mean really, you're already starting to morph into one unit. What happens when your bodies merge and you become one mega-technician?"
"We get twice the pay and pay half the rent," Oliver told her with a straight face. "And twice the pension. It's kind of genius, if I do say so myself."
Nina threw her hands up and walked away, muttering to herself.
Oliver didn't have any current projects, since his other projects had been parceled out so he could focus on the Coucher case. Since he had the capacity, he worked on the rape kit backlog. Processing of a kit from start to the end of the report took about fifty hours, end to end. Then, another analyst had to conduct a technical review—three hours—and yet another analyst had to do an administrative review. He noticed that there was a stack of kits that had been processed and were awaiting reviews, so he grabbed a couple of those and sat down to work.
He hated the kits. They were part of the job, and he understood that they helped to put some pretty terrible people in jail. That part he liked. He hated the backlog. He hated how long some of these survivors had to wait. He hated the fact that it must feel like their trauma had been shunted off and declared not worth the time, or resources.
He hated the fact that more cases kept getting added to the backlog, like heads on a hydra.
He couldn't let that get to him, though. All that he could do was keep plugging away at it and do his job. Eventually the team would get the backlog back down to something manageable, if they continued to make it a priority, and as long as Nina was in charge it would continue to be a priority.
He got through one technical review and two administrative reviews before lunch, which he took at his desk while he continued to work. He was about to start on another technical review, just to try to move the bottleneck along, when Nicole called him and asked him to head out to supervise evidence collection in the Upton State Forest, where human remains had been discovered.
Oliver hid his squirming and complied. He didn't mind supervising, and he didn't mind collecting the evidence. He wasn't a huge fan of mud, but it was his job. He was going to have to go and do it.
He headed out with the pathologist from the ME's office in the same van, with a couple of other techs trailing behind in the crime scene unit van. The rangers that had been called to the scene had helpfully put a pop-up over the remains, and Oliver might have kissed them. That didn't change the fact that there was mud, but it kept the rain from getting down the back of his shirt, which would have to do.
It didn't take long to figure out that while a crime had almost certainly taken place, no one was likely to pay for the crime. The remains had only come to light when an old, dead tree had toppled over thanks to wind, rain, and soil loss on the side of a small hill. The tree's demise had left a small piece of bone exposed to the elements, which had excited a soggy dog walker's canine companion beyond reason. Once the woman had convinced her Golden that no, the bone really wasn't for him, she'd called the rangers.
Most of the clothes had rotted away, but the tree that had grown on top of the man had been at least a hundred years old. Most of the skeleton was still intact, and a bullet hole marred the perfect vault of his skull. Oliver took the pictures that he needed to take, and then Cissy from the ME's office carefully collected the bones.
Oliver took more pictures, and collected what evidence still existed in the grave. Then he let the detective on the scene tape it off. They would examine the bones, and the items found with the victim, but Oliver was fairly certain that the investigating detective would make a call to Boston University and their archaeology department.
He headed back into the office and got to work cataloging the evidence. There wasn't a lot. There was a pipe, rich with tooth marks. There was a tin tobacco box. There were a few rusty buttons. That was it. By four-thirty, Cissy brought him the bullet that had been in the man's head. It only cemented Oliver's assessment: the bullet could only have come from a gun from the nineteenth century.
Just as he and Cissy were discussing the Upton find, Nenci walked into Forensics. Oliver's mouth went dry. What could Nenci be doing here? Was he here for Oliver or for Jake? His skin looked paler than usual over his dark beard, and he couldn't keep his gray eyes in any one place. His unique scent—banana nut bread, as if Oliver needed any other reasons to adore him—was all over the place.
Nina walked right up to him. "Can I help you, Detective?"
Nenci cleared his throat and pressed his lips together. "Yeah. I—I'm here to apologize."
Oliver put down the evidence bag he'd been holding. He was afraid of dropping it; his hands had just gone slick with sweat.
Nina crossed her arms across her chest. "Apologize to whom?"
Nenci swallowed, hard. This couldn't be easy. Alphas didn't apologize, as a general rule. "I want to apologize to all of you, actually. The whole department, the whole lab. I was rude and out of line. But first and foremost, I need to apologize to Oliver Wesson. I was unsettled, and I lashed out because I was unsettled. I'm still iffy on treating a crime scene technician like a detective, but your work was damn good and
it was absolutely right of you to take that initiative."
Nenci tugged at his collar. "And it was wrong of me to keep what I was doing from you. I'm used to doing things a certain way, and there are probably a lot of good reasons for that which don't reflect well on me. But this case is going to be solved by teamwork. It's not only going to be solved in the lab, and it's not going to be solved without a lot of detailed lab work either." He bowed his head. "I would greatly appreciate it if you would please come back onto the job."
Oliver gripped the back of his chair. He wasn't sure if he could come back to the case. He didn't know if he could face working with Nenci again. It was the only way that the case would get solved, though, and the sixty dead deserved some kind of closure.
Jake stood up and slipped between them. Oliver blushed. He hadn't realized that he was moving toward Nenci.