Chapter Text
“Help me wrap my head around this, DS Lightwood. If you were nowhere near the scene of Dominic Ewans’ murder, why is there a witness of you leaving the scene at the approximate time of death?”
It had been fourty-five minutes since the interrogation-but-not-interrogation had begun, and Alec was starting to sweat. The room was stiflingly hot to begin with, and added to that was the general discomfort of being questioned, but not questioned, but definitely questioned, in regards to the sudden and suspicious death of a colleague who he’d been at blatant odds with in the hours before his premature demise. Alec had gone over where he was last night three times already. He’d expressed his condolences for Dominic Ewans’ death, and he’d informed both DI Larrimore and DCI Hartwell that he had absolutely no idea why somebody matching his description had been seen leaving the scene of the crime at the approximate time of his death.
“It must have just been somebody who looked like me.”
“Of course.” Larrimore nodded. “Yes, you did say that. So then, just to clarify, the alibi you’re giving us is that you were with Magnus Bane? The same Magnus Bane you were with the night before? Correct?”
Alec told them, again, that yes he had been with Magnus Bane last night, and the night before that. He didn’t bother to acknowledge the fact that, not two hours after he was warned of the consequences of fraternising with the enemy, he’d gone ahead and done just that, consequences be damned, only now it was coming back to bite the entire NYPD in its gigantic behind. Imagine the embarrassment if a slimey sod news reporter got hold of the information that Detective Sergeant Alec Lightwood was being questioned in connection with the death of one of NYPD’s own prosecutors. Having to explain, “No, don’t worry, he has an alibi. He was shacked up with opposing counsel, after we explicitly described to him in great detail exactly why that would be a terrible career choice.”
“Okay, well that all appears to be in order, DS Lightwood. We appreciate your time and patience this morning,” Larrimore droned on, reading from a monotonous script he’d clearly memorised decades ago. “Just best to make sure everything’s done by the book. You understand, of course.”
Alec understood. He understood perfectly. Pained smile in place, he thanked both men and stood to leave.
“Oh, and before you go, we’ve brought Terrin Foster into custody. She still maintains that she had no idea Alice was having an affair.”
“No?”
DCI Hartwell shrugged. “I’m sure she’ll crack eventually. They always do.”
“So she’s admitting to the relationship, but just denying that it was an affair?”
“She says that Alice never told her. That apparently, Alice had only ever been in one other relationship apart from her. Or so she thought.”
“Sydney?”
“No, some highschool sweetheart. They broke up so messily that it put Alice off relationships for almost a decade, according to Terrin. Though now she’s realised that she was fed a whopping pack of lies, course.” He raised an eyebrow, eyes fixed on Alec. “Well, she realised it months ago, ‘cording to you.”
Alec didn’t flinch at the implications of the DCI’s words, barely even registered them. He was too focused on the first part of that sentence.
“What name did she give? For this... highschool sweetheart?”
“She only had a first name,” the DCI replied. He didn’t rush his words, either enjoying the drawn out misery of his DS, or simply having no place else to go. “Jordan, she said. Broke Alice’s heart into so many pieces, she was scarred for life.” Plump face entirely unimpressed, Hartwell’s eye roll gave away his own pessimism towards the girl’s youthful melodramatics. “Never dared venture into the tortuous world of love and lust ever again. Statement read far too much like a teenage girl’s blog post if you ask me.”
Alec mumbled a half hearted agreement and thanked the DCI again, this time only giving a nod in Larrimore’s direction. It had been hard enough to smile at him once, and to do it again unprompted was out of the question. The second he was out of that stifling, suffocated room, Alec pulled out his phone and shot off a text before making his way down into the canteen. If anything was going to get him through the day, it was going to be caffeine.
Magnus Bane slapped a palm across his face as he read DS Alec Lightwood’s text message. Jordan Weisler had been in a relationship with Alice Sydney back in highschool. It made so much sense, it seemed almost criminal that he hadn’t pieced it together earlier. Alec had voiced his theories that Ewans had been on the take, turning a blind eye to all sorts of dirty happenings for his own profit. He was a well respected prosecutor in the eyes of the NYPD, meaning he could get away with all sorts of things, no questions asked. From witness tampering to burying evidence, Ewans was in a prime position to pick and choose who waltzed from the courthouse with a clear name, and who rotted behind bars with nothing to show for it but a clean conscience.
Terrin Foster hadn’t murdered Alice Sydney, and neither had her husband. In an unhappy marriage, Alice had been involved with multiple partners behind her husband's back. One of whom had been Terra, and another, Jordan Weisler. Her highschool beau had fallen far from the rails since the day of his last detention, but it didn’t seem that Alice had been deterred by that fact to the extent that she perhaps should have been. Terra had been telling the truth when she’d sworn her ignorance over the matter of Alice’s marriage. She truly had loved her girlfriend, and it seemed that Jordan had too.
Justin Hargreaves had been wrongfully charged with Jordan Weisler’s murder. The boy had never been a killer. Magnus had spotted that from a mile away, it was the reason he’d taken on the case pro bono in the first place. The fact that he’d even been arrested was somewhat laughable, in Magnus’ humble opinion. Jordan had run with a bad crowd. Drugs, guns, trafficking. Perhaps he’d seen something he shouldn’t have. Perhaps he’d gotten too comfortable with Alice, trusted her with information that should never have left his lips. Or perhaps he’d even tried to quit, get out of the game that never let you go. Whatever the reason, he hadn’t been killed in a lowly drug deal gone wrong, he’d been targeted. Alice too.
It was the only explanation as to why they’d been murdered in the exact same way within hours of one another. Magnus would bet his last penny on it even being the same murder weapon. It would be different for Ewans, though. Jordan was silenced, and Alice was collateral damage. Dump the first body in the wrong part of town, then follow Alice home, splatter her blood all over the cold, marble tiles of her ensuite bathroom, and leave the body for her husband to find. She was having an affair, so it was plausible that Thomas had been the one who’d battered her to death. In the mind of the person who was actually responsible, at least.
Both crimes had been neatly covered up, possibly with the help of Ewans, though it was too late to prove much in that regard. But this time was different. When a respected prosecutor dies, nobody assumes anything. The case would be taken more seriously than Jordan and Alice’s combined. Whichever one of Keller’s lackey’s had been delegated body number three, might even have been tasked with the job of a more comprehensive cover up. Something to really throw the sniffer dogs off the scent, and who was a more plausible suspect in the death of Bulldog Ewans than the man who’d just taken a metaphorical swing at him in open court?
None other than Detective Sergeant Alec Lightwood.
Alec could feel the beginnings of a headache needling its way into his brain. He’d requested for all files to be sent over pertaining to Jordan Weisler’s murder, pulling in a favour or two since it wasn’t Larrimore’s case. DS Maia Roberts was now expecting multiple rounds on Alec the next time they found themselves out on an after-work-sorrow-drowning mission. The files alone likely wouldn’t have been worth the tab he knew he was going to rack up, but Maia had gone above and beyond when he’d told her about his interrogation that morning. Mere hours later, she’d waltzed up to him with a stack of papers and a smug grin, slid them over the table to Alec and swaggered away. It turned out that Alice and Jordan had frequented the same Hilton hotel twice a week, every week for the last five months. They hadn’t even bothered to switch it up from a Tuesday and a Friday.
Quite honestly, Alec couldn’t wrap his head around how on earth she’d had the time for it. Or the energy. Which was a thought that he’d expressed to Magnus promptly after inviting himself over to the man’s apartment for their third rendezvous of the week. Once he’d secured the files from Maia and put in a reasonable day's work, heading over to the much more luxurious apartment of Magnus Bane had seemed like the only logical thing to do. Magnus hadn’t seemed to mind much, ushering Alec inside and telling him that he hadn’t made a single bit of sense in his ramblings over the intercom, and that he was going to have to start from the beginning.
“Alice was seeing them both on the side,” Alec explained. “Jordan and Terra.”
“Well, I’d put that together from your text, if I’m being honest,” Magus drawled. “The pair of them ending up dead on the same day, I can pretty much piece that puzzle together. But it’s Ewans ending up dead that I just can’t wrap my head around.”
Alec looked at him. “I’ve got mountains of evidence that Jordan and Alice were seeing each other before they died, now we just need to prove that Ewans was on the take.” He picked roughly at the skin around his thumb, ignoring the beads of red that began seeping to the surface. “Without that, this is all just guesswork.”
Magnus sighed, in agreement with Alec but not at all enthusiastic about the monotonous task that lay ahead of them. “Right then,” he chirped, tone far too upbeat to be anything less than sarcasm. “Let’s find the needle in this haystack.”
The task lacked any logical starting point, with the only objective being to read through each case file that had Ewan’s name attached to it, looking for anything that didn’t quite make sense. If Ewans had dotted his I’s and crossed his T’s, they’d be embarking on a wild goose chase, but Alec had a feeling that as soon as he found the right thread to pull on, the rest of the haystack would come tumbling down around them.
Magnus made it through two whole pages before flouncing away from the table over to his drinks cart. He offered one to Alec, who refused, as usual. It wasn’t until halfway through his tenth file, or maybe his eleventh, that Alec glanced at the clock. “Ten already? You’ve got to be joking me?” He dumped the papers onto the table with a disgusted look on his face. “This is getting us nowhere.” Alec sighed and dropped his head into his hands with a heavy thunk.
Magnus had the strange urge to curl a hand through his thick, black hair, and tug. Thankfully, before he had time to question the odd desire, Alec was speaking.
“Did you have one?”
“One what?”
Alec motioned at the picture in front of him, Jordan Weisler. “You know…”
“Oh.” Magnus pulled an unhappy face. “I did. We were madly in love, going to get married and grow old together,” he recalled. “You know, like everybody else in high school. Funny how it never ends up happening.”
“It did for my brother,” Alec told him. “Met when they were seventeen, fell completely head over heels for each other. I figured it was just one of those things, would pass it as quickly as it had come, but no. They got married last year, still just as infatuated as they were the day they met.”
“Wow.” Magnus gave a slight nod of his head. “So he had a real life love story? You don’t hear many of those anymore.”
Alec smiled, more wistful than anything. “No, you certainly don’t.”
Silence fell once again, each of them half-heartedly shuffling papers around the table, reading the same lines again and again with nothing really making an impact. “What’s his secret?” Magnus asked.
“I don’t think there is one. If there was, Jace certainly wouldn’t have figured it out. He’s next to useless,” Alec said with a smirk. Then a shrug. “I think it’s just, if it’s not the right person, it won’t last.”
“So he was just lucky? Meeting the right person early on?”
“I guess so. If that’s what you’d want.”
“You wouldn’t?”
“Well, not that I wouldn’t want to, or that it hasn’t worked for Jace and Clary. Just that, if I’d have met someone in high school and stayed with them, there’s so many things I could have missed out on,” he explained, waving his hands around to convey his jumbled up thoughts. “Would I ever have joined the force if I had someone waiting for me at home? It’s long hours, miserable work sometimes. Would it still have been what I wanted?” He looked at Magnus then, as though he really wanted an answer from the other man. “I might never have moved to the city, just stayed in that little town I grew up in. There wouldn’t have been anything wrong with that, I guess, but I like my life how it is. Mostly.”
Magnus was nodding slowly at Alec’s words, all pretence of flicking through the files in font of him abandoned. “You’re right. I do love my life, most of the time, and I’m proud of everything I’ve accomplished.” He paused then, glancing between Alec and the wall behind him. “I just can’t help being a bit of a romantic at times.”
“You want the fairytale ending?”
“Don’t you?”
Alec opened his mouth, then cursed as the ringtone of his phone began to blast through Magnus’ loft. “Shit, sorry,” he scrambled up from the couch, dislodging a few papers on the way to where he’d dumped his jacket. “One sec, sorry.”
The missed call was from Maia, her voicemail telling him to call her as soon as he got the message. Images of a suspension, a front page feature in an article titled, ‘NYPD Detective Charged With Murder?’, and another body lying under a SOC tent somewhere in the dark, drizzle-filled night had Alec tapping furiously at his keypad, offering Magnus an apologetic glance as the other man continued to trawl through the remaining files on the table.
Maia didn’t bother with a hello, which didn’t surprise him. It was one of the things he appreciated most about her, the to-the-point attitude that always got the job done. “The plates you gave me, I ran them. Turns out your boys didn’t use fakes,” she explained, voice distorted over the phone’s abysmal speakers. “Cocky bastards. Known associates of Keller, as expected. Then in a stroke of pure genius, if I don’t say so myself, I matched the phone number registered to one of them with the number that called in the tip about a person matching your description leaving the scene.”
She went on to explain that the weapons used in both Alice and Jordan’s murders had been tentatively matched by the doc who’d done the post-mortem, and was due to be formally identified as quickly as was humanly possible. Alec relayed the information to Magnus, smiling at the man’s delighted grin. That got Justin Hargreaves off the hook, the teen who’d been wrongfully charged, and who would now be rightfully acquitted. With a formal statement of apology from the NYPD, if Magnus Bane had anything to say about it.
While it might not be enough to get a conviction for Ewans’ murder, it was a good start, and it was enough for them to put a pin in it, at least for tonight. Alec thanked Maia, promised her an even heavier night out when this was all over, and hung up the phone. “Looks like we can stop with all this, then.”
“You’re calling it a night?”
“Might as well. Maia’s on it, there’s not much more we can do here. There’s no way Justin won’t be released when we get a positive match on the murder weapon, and hopefully the fact that Larrimore’s anonymous tip came from one of Keller’s goons will be enough to keep the chief off my back.” He stepped over piles of papers that had started out as organised, but now looked more like an avalanche than a tower, and perched on the edge of the couch. “I really appreciate all of your help with this, Magnus. I know it wasn’t exactly conventional.”
“Being a bit generous with your words there, aren’t you?” Magnus snorted, then added, “Don’t thank me, Alexander. You helped me too, remember?”
It was time to leave now. There wasn’t any reason to stay, not now they were finished for the night. Really, since they weren’t going to be working together anymore, there wasn’t any reason for Alec to come back here.
“Now that you’re technically off the job… are you sure I can’t tempt you with the offer of a drink?”
Alec glanced up at Magnus, at the shy smile in place as he made to stand from the couch. “Yeah, sure, why not? One can’t hurt,” he agreed.
It was true that one couldn’t hurt, but both men had just struggled through a handful of exceptionally difficult days, and to think that they were actually going to stick to one drink, was certainly one of the more naive things that they’d told themselves that week. One led to two, then three, the usual cliché.
Alec wouldn’t go as far as to say that he was head over heels in love with Magnus Bane, but he wasn’t ashamed to admit that he’d never felt such excitement at someone’s knee brushing lightly against his own before. He told himself that night, that it wasn’t as perfect as it all seemed to be. It was just the alcohol easing things along. But when he checked his phone the next morning to find a text from Magnus, just a simple good morning, he knew that all the vodka oranges in the world couldn’t have him as elated as those two small words from Magnus Bane. Maybe it wasn’t love, but it certainly was something.