Roswell Fanatics

Sorry guys. I know this has been taking forever, but I've been having problems getting the cord I need to at least get the files off of my computer, on top of that the support company has informed me that there is some sort of problem with the registration on my computer and that it's not even registered to me, or my wife, or anyone else in my family. So it's just been one headache after another. Anyway looks like I'm going to have to order the cord I need from online, so that will be a few more days, plus I'm still waiting for those craptacularly helpful customer support people to figure out what the hell is going on.

So for now the only thing I can say is that it's still just a waiting game.

~Chad~

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Hey thanks for reading and waiting folks. Still no luck with my computer, but you all have waited long enough.

~Chad~
Dana Wilcox’s home smelled of freshly baked gingerbread cookies and Febreze. The smell was so strong, I had to rub my index finger underneath my nose in order to keep myself from letting out a loud, and possibly offensive sneeze. It wasn’t that I had anything against the two of those scents. By themselves they were not bad smells. I love cookies. Fresh scents? Hey, I’m all for them, but together the sweet and spicy mixture of cinnamon, clove, and meadows & rain was enough to wreck major havoc on my olfactory senses.

After getting my nose under control, I continued to follow Ms. Wilcox into what looked to be her living room. Inside this room the smell of ginger and odor eater, or disinfectant, or fabric softener, or whatever the hell Febreze is, was even more prevalent.

"Won’t the two of you have a seat?" Dana motioned to the couch that was directly across from the chair that she had stopped in front of. Liz and I both took a seat on the couch and I noticed the plate of cookies that was sitting on the table in front of us. My allspice-clogged nose told me that this had to be the source of the gingerbread smell.

"Would either of you like a cookie?" she offered in a polite tone.

Not even a little bit.

"No, thank you." I heard Liz say, and instead of voicing my rude thought I just shook my head no.

"Let’s begin." I wanted this whole thing to be over just as badly as she did. I looked over at Liz for a moment as she pulled out a small notepad and pen. It didn’t surprise me one bit. I should have known that she would be the notepad type.

"Why don’t you start by telling us what happened the night your brother was murdered, Ms. Wilcox?" Liz suggested.

Dana didn’t much look like she wanted to be as cooperative with us as Kyle had led us to believe. I couldn’t blame her. After all, she had just lost someone dear to her. I had a feeling you wouldn’t find very many people eager to go through all of the gory details of their brother’s death with every Joe Law-enforcer that came knocking on their door either.

Dana was pretty shaken up by her brother’s death. That made her a pretty reluctant witness.

"Well, I’ve already been through most of this with Officer Morrison." I watched, as in classic disinclined witness style, she picked a napkin up off of the table and started wiping away an invisible spot of dust.

Make that an extremely reluctant witness.

"We understand that, Ms. Wilcox, but it would help us in completing a more thorough investigation, if we could hear what happened from you directly," I explained. It wasn’t my intention to torture Dana, nor was I fond of pressing unwilling witnesses for information, but Dana was our only witness and I needed to milk her for all the information she could give me.

Dana sat back in her seat and started to wring the napkin in her hand nervously.

"Well, it was a Friday night. I remember that because Chuck and I have…um…we had movie nights with Charlie on Friday nights." There was a small, somewhat sad smile on Dana’s face, as she continued to speak.

"The two of us were just leaving Blockbuster when it happened. We were renting Finding Nemo. It’s Charlie’s favorite movie. He’s seen it about a hundred times. I don’t know why Chuck didn’t just buy it. He—we should have bought the movie a long time ago." There was a hitch in her voice as she spoke, but to her credit she didn’t let her emotions overwhelm her.

I knew right away what thought was playing across Dana’s mind. Had she or her brother bought the movie a long time ago, there would have been no need for them to go to the movie rental store that night. I’d seen it a hundred times, if not a thousand. Dana Wilcox was haunted by self-blame over her brother’s death.

What Dana didn’t know was that in most serial cases, time didn’t really matter. Usually the killer had an agenda. If our murderer hadn’t gotten to her brother that night, he most likely would have gotten to him on another night. As it turned out, we were pretty lucky that the killer had decided to strike on a night when Charlie had been with his sister. Charlie could just have easily had been alone. Then we would be nowhere.

I watched, as for a moment, the distressed Ms. Wilcox stared at nothing. It was evident that she was lost in the memory of the night her brother was murdered. For a moment I thought I was going to have to snap my fingers or find a cup of water or something to splash on her if I was going to draw Dana’s attention back to us, but as soon as the thought arose in my mind Dana cleared her throat, as if that would somehow help her move on, and focused her attention back on Liz and me.

"As I was saying, Chuck and I were leaving the store when it happened. It was dark so I didn’t see where he came from. All I knew was that suddenly my brother was pushing me up against the car and telling me to get in and drive."

I looked over at Liz and noticed that she was jotting down things on her little notepad at an impressive rate. Dana hadn’t exactly given us the mother load of information, so I wasn’t sure what Liz could have been writing down. Judging by the way that her hand had not ceased moving since Dana had begun talking, it almost seemed as if she were writing everything the woman was saying.

I turned back to Dana, once again gave her my full attention. “You didn’t do what your brother asked?”

Dana nodded."I did get in the car like Chuck had asked me, and I locked all the doors and windows, but I didn’t drive off."

Finally, Jottie Jotterson looked up from her notepad. "You were sitting in the car when your brother was killed?"

Dana nodded her head slowly. "If I hadn’t driven off when I did…" I saw a small shudder go through Dana as if she were contemplating the horror of the fate she could have met.

"I don’t know what would have happened. He probably would have killed me too."

"He?" I interrupted, "Could you see that it was a male that attacked your brother?"

Dana shook her head no. "Not really, no. He didn’t look that big and he was wearing all black. There was a mask over his head covering his face from me and he was standing behind Chuck, so I couldn’t really see him all that well. But Chuck was a pretty big guy, and I don’t imagine that a female could have taken him down as easily as this guy did."

That wasn’t necessarily true, if Chuck was unprepared for an attack, a mouse could have taken him down. But Charlie Wilcox was a trained DEA officer. Even if he had been taken by surprise, it still wouldn’t have been easy for him to be taken down by the average homicidal maniac.

I leaned in closer so that I could bring Dana’s focus back to me."How did he do it, Dana? How did he kill your brother?"

Liz, who had at some point, began to write again, stopped and looked up at Dana, waiting for her to answer my question.

There’s a certain look that a person gets when they are asked a question that they obviously do not want to answer. I believe it was called the ‘Stop asking me all these damn questions’ face —unofficially, of course. Dana wore that face proudly. However, when she saw that neither my partner nor I were going to leave without having all of our questions answered, she decided upon a different approach. Her eyes began shifting from me to Liz, as if she was contemplating to whom she should address her answer. From the way her eyes lingered on Liz, I could tell that she was swaying more towards the ‘women untied’, ‘girls stick together’ route. I couldn’t blame her. She would definitely get more sympathy from another woman, than she would have from me.

Yeah, I felt bad about what had happened to Dana’s brother and it was not my aim to upset her, but I couldn’t baby her the way I was sure that Liz would. I needed the facts of the murder, as cold and hard as is sounded.

"Dana," I said, bringing her gaze back to me. I made sure to lock eyes with her, so that she knew that I wanted her to address me with her answer.

"How did he do it?" I repeated my question.

Dana heaved a sigh and placed on the table, the two pieces of the now ripped napkin she had been wringing.

"He came up behind Chuck while he was yelling at me to drive off. I don’t know exactly how it happened, but suddenly Chuck was grabbing at his neck. I could…I could still see his face." Finally, a tear slid down Dana’s cheek.

"He was strangled, Dana?" Liz asked.

Dana nodded her head shakily and immediately reached for another napkin to wipe at the stream of tears that were now coursing down her cheeks. The floodgates were now open.

I stood up from my seat and walked slowly over to Dana’s chair, knowing that the next part of this questioning was not going to be easy. "Dana." I waited for her to finish drying her eyes with her napkin and said her name again in order to get her to look up at me. Her eyes were red and puffy when she finally managed to do so. "I need you to think visually; remember as clearly as you can. What did the murderer do after he killed you brother?"

Dana hiccupped a sob and started to shake her head. "I don’t remember…I…I think I started screaming when Chuck fell to the ground. I wanted to get out of the car and help him, but…" Dana’s words broke off with another sob.

Liz stood up and looked at me. "Max..." she started, but I put a hand up silencing her. I just needed a little more information from Dana.

"What do you remember, Dana? Did the murderer come after you, is that why you drove away?" I offered.

Dana nodded her head. "Yes, yes, he did. He started walking towards the car"

"And then you drove off?"

She nodded again.

"Why Dana? Why did you drive off?" I saw Liz shoot a curious look my way at the strange question, but I didn’t take my eyes off of Dana. "Is there something he did that made you drive off?" Something told me that Dana wasn’t the type of person that would have just driven away if there was a chance that her brother could have still been alive.

"He…" Dana hiccupped again, "he pulled out a gun."

Just a little more. "And what did he do with the gun? Did he aim it at you?"

Dana shook her head no.

"At Chuck?" I offered.

She nodded.

Dana had now gone mute with her emotions and I knew I wasn’t going to arrive at the answer that I wanted without leading her.

"And then Dana, what did he do after that?"

"He shot him!" Dana said now full-blown bout of tears. "He shot him!"

"Where?" I pressed?

Dana didn’t answer; she just kept shaking her head.

Out of the corner of my eyes I could see Liz walking over to Dana’s other side so that she was flanked between the two of us. Then, she placed a comforting hand on Dana’s other shoulder.

"Dana, where did he shoot your brother?" she asked quietly.

Perhaps there was something in Liz’s voice that calmed Dana, or perhaps it was yet again that ‘girls stick together’ thing, but after Liz’s calm voice, Dana managed to get herself under more control then the streaming mass of tears she had been under my questioning. She wiped at her eyes one final time and turned her attention towards Liz.

"In the leg." She answered at long last. "He shot him in the leg."

I stood up and walked back to my seat on the couch. So Charlie Wilcox had been strangled by the murder and then shot in his right leg. After he was already dead. Just like all the other murder victims. One bullet wound delivered after death.

"And in the back," Dana added.

My gaze shot immediately over to Liz at Dana’s words. Liz was looking at me with an expression on her face that I’m sure mirrored my own.

Well, that was new.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Max, there is no record of a bullet wound on Charles Louis Wilcox’s back. No bullet wound, no exit or entrance point, nothing." It was crystal clear that Liz was becoming just as frustrated as I was, by this trail of dead ends we’d been coming on all day.

After leaving Dana Wilcox’s home, we’d spent most of the afternoon gathering all the information that we had on the murder of Charlie Wilcox. Problem was, we didn’t have much information on the murder of Charlie Wilcox.

After leaving Dana’s home, our search had brought us in to the station at Albuquerque, where we had gone through the exhausting process of checking and rechecking our diminutive amount of information. So far, all we had on our boy Charlie was a record of examination from the coroner about the state of the body. According to the report, there had been no sign of a bullet wound on any part of Charlie’s body other than his leg. After going through all of our information we’d checked in with Kyle and returned to our place.

"Dana Wilcox swore she saw her brother get shot in the back. Last I checked a bullet wound was a pretty hard thing to miss on a dead body. How can there be no record of it?"

Liz stood up from the mass of papers surrounding her on the floor. "I don’t know."

I sighed. This was one big mess of information that was leading us nowhere. "What about the other bodies?"

Liz shook her head. "All the other bodies have records of one bullet wound just like Charlie. Kelly Porter in the right shoulder, Paul White in his left leg, Kevin Reno in his left shoulder, Janet Houseman in her hip, Thomas Ray Anderson in the head."

"And Charlie Wilcox in his right leg," I finished, throwing Charlie’s file on the floor with the rest of the information.

Liz walked over the couch and sat down beside me. For a moment the two of us sat there looking down at the pile of nothing we had on the floor in front of us. I’d thought this trip would shed a little light on this investigation, and I’m pretty sure Liz had been of the same mind. If anything, it had done nothing but throw a web into the mists of a maze.

"Now what?" Liz asked looking at me.

I sighed and leaned back on the couch. Five straight hours of this and we were right back where we had started. The only thing I could do was console myself. It would have been a lucky break if I could have gotten this wrapped up after only just starting. A lucky and unrealistic break.

"Start over," I answered.

Liz leaned back on the couch so that she was lying beside me. "Start over?" she didn’t sound too happy about that. "After all this work?"

"All this work is nothing," I said. "Our link may very well be a coincidence and there may even be more bodies to this murder that have been overlooked. We go back to the beginning, recheck the police murder records regardless of whether or not they were gunned down on duty or off, or whether or not there was a gun involved at all."

"That broad? What about the strangling? You can’t tell me that’s a coincidence," she insisted.

"No, I can’t, but our facts don’t add up, we recheck it all." I felt the couch move as Liz sat up and the weight lessen as she stood up all together. "What if Dana was mistaken? What if she only thought Charlie was shot in the back?"

I raised an eyebrow at Liz. "When was the last time you mistook someone getting shot for something else? And anyway, what could she have possibly mistaken it for? A car backfiring at the exact moment that the murderer pointed a gun at her brother’s back, started to squeeze the trigger and then changed his mind?"

Liz rolled her eyes at me. "Alright, so if Charlie was definitely shot then who’s to say the other victims don’t have multiple bullet wounds too?"

I shook my head. "So you’re saying that all our information is wrong?"

"If we know that Charlie Wilcox was shot in the back as well as in his right leg, and this report says that he sustained no such injury then who’s to say that the rest of this information isn’t wrong too?"

"Why would this information be wrong? Who would want to hide bullet wounds?" I sat up on the couch and scooted to the edge so that I could look up at Liz better. She had begun to pace the length of the room, obviously trying to work this all out.

"What about your friend Jaxk?" she stopped pacing and looked at me excitedly.

"What about him?" I wasn’t quite sure where this conversation had turned.

"Jaxk deals with any dead body that passes through this state. If you’re a cadaver, chances are you’re going to end up at Jumping-Jaxk’s House O dead guys!" she said the words as if she were reciting them from memory rather than voicing a thought.

"Well I wouldn’t have put it so articulately, but yeah sure." I wasn’t sure how she knew about Jaxk, but she seemed to be on to something, so I wasn’t going to question her.

"So, there should be some sort of record or something that can tell us if there are any other non-documented bullet wounds on any of the other bodies, right?"

"Yeah, there are. They’re right there on the floor," I said pointing to our paper mess.

Liz stopped pacing and climbed back on the couch and sat on her knees in front of me. For a brief moment, she looked as if she was going to start crawling towards me and I have to say, I wouldn’t have minded if she did, but she stayed hunched on her knees and the look on her face told me that my thoughts and her thoughts were nowhere near in the same ballpark."Operating under the theory that the records we have are inaccurate, would it be possible that Jaxk could have some sort of records stating if there were any other bullet wounds on any of the other bodies?"

"If the bodies have been through one of Jaxk’s places, then yes, it is possible that if the information we have is wrong he could have the right one. That’s if the information is wrong, and if any of the bodies went through Jaxk."

An excited smile started to take shape on Liz’s lips. "And what are the chances that at least one or more of the other bodies went through Jaxk’s place?"

I shrugged, "It’s more than likely."

"Well then!" she said, as if that said it all.

"And, there’s also the chance that Jaxk’s records say the same thing that ours say. That the bullet wounds are not a factor in this case."

"How can the bullet wounds not be a factor? We already determined that they were given after the victims were already dead. Doesn’t that scream factor?"

She was right. It was unusual for the victims to all have been shot after they had already been strangled, but the way that the murderer chose to kill his victims was not all that big of a deal in this case. What I was looking for was a connector. What was it about these people that connected them to one another and the murderer?

We needed to find a solid connector in this case. We had thought it had been the bullet wounds, but it was not. We needed to find every possible piece of information that we could about these peoples' murders. So far the only connection we had was that they were all police officers, and the killer had strangled them all. But if one of our bodies didn’t match up with the others then we had to rule out one of our connectors. That being the bullet wounds. Liz was right. It was strange for a bullet wound not to be listed on a dead body, but that didn’t necessarily mean all the information that we had leading up to this point was inaccurate. There was also the possibility that Charlie Wilcox hadn’t been shot in the back. However, at the moment I had no reason not to trust Dana Wilcox’s word, nor did I see any reason for her to lie about what she saw.

"We’ll check with Jaxk to see if there are any other undocumented bullet wounds on any of the other bodies, but if there aren’t— "

"We rule out the bullet wounds and do it your way," Liz finished. I nodded my head in agreement.

Well wild goose chase, here we come.

chanks_girl wrote:Are you going to update soon?
BUMP!!!

PS: I sooooooooo love your avatar....freaking hilarious

Yes I'm going to update soon. I'm just now getting my computer stuff sorted out. Turns out I will be able to get my crap off of my computer. Too bad I already brought a new one. Oh well. But right now I'm just putting all of my old crap on my new computer. It's taking a while because I have a lot of crap. Plus I'm going to Ohio at the beginning of next month and I have a lot of other stuff I need to do with my computer that kind of takes priority right now. But I should have the next chapter ready to go soon. Don't worry, it's already written. I just need to get it on my new computer and send it to my beta. Thanks for hanging in there everyone. Just hang on a little bit longer.

PS: Why thank you. I tickles the hell out of me too.

~Chad~

Over there

Hey guys.

Here's a little word just to let you all know that I have not forgotten about you.

I sent my beta Chapter 11 a while ago, but I still have not gotten word back from her yet. So basically I'm just waiting for the go ahead. I emailed her again today, so hopefully it won't be long. Thanks to all of you for being so patient. I know you're getting sick of my lame excuses, but all I can say is hang in there. I'll do my best to make it worth your wait.

~Chad~

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Thanks for reading everyone. You guys have waited long enough so I think I'll put you out of your misery, But be forewarned, this chapter is raw and has not been beta read so there may be some mistakes, but nothing fubar I hope. Anyway, I hope you all enjoy. Sorry for the wait.

~Chad~


God, she was hot.

Hot, wet, steamy.

So damn hot and wet that her skin glistened.

Glowed, shined, gleamed.

My hands ached with wanting to touch the soft forbidden fruit of her creamy skin. My senses tingled with the desire to explore her body with them.

Touch it, smell it, taste it.

My body ached. I wanted her so badly I was ready to die from it

Ooh, so ready to die.

And she knew it. She could see it written all over my face. And I knew she was teasing me—flaunting her sexuality like... I was the dog. She was the master, dangling the bone right in front of my face. She may as well have been shouting “Come and get it, boy”’ She was daring me to reach out and take her—wanting me to reach out and take her. I closed my eyes, breathed in once, out slowly, in again, out again.

She was the master.

I was the dog.

She was the treat.

I was the dog…

The clock struck nine AM just as I opened my eyes. At the same time, that annoying noise that could only be the blaring drum of city morning street work pounded in my ears. In the disorientation of semi wakefulness, I stared at the clock in front of me, wondering if my body was somehow in sync with it. It was as if time itself were saying to me: "Alright Evans, you’ve had enough erotic dreams for one night."

And how pathetic was that?

Even in my own dreams—my freaking subconscious mind—my chances with Liz were in line with a snowball’s chance in hell. And all I had to show for it was a stiff neck and a stiff…well let’s just say I was waking up in a less than comfortable state.

How could one woman wreck so much havoc on me?

Honestly, I'd like to know!

It was bad enough I spent my waking hours doing my damndest to completely ignore how attracted I was to her. Now I was spending my dreams fending her off. And believe me, dream fending wasn’t quite as easy. No doubt she’d get a kick out of that tiny bit of torture. But regardless of how sexually frustrated I was, it was probably better for me that the dream had ended when it had. Liz tormented me enough when I was awake. Having her costar with me in the X rated fantasies of my subconscious mind was the last thing I needed if I was going to keep our relationship strictly professional.

Switching my mind over to other things, I rolled off the side of the couch and fell gracelessly to the floor. I attempted, but failed to ignore the sting of discomfort that shot through my body as I collided with the floor. It took me a moment to get out of my sleepy fog. Not so long for me to come to the realization that my entire body felt like I’d been lying on a huge slab or rock instead of the living room couch.

Who the hell had picked out this couch anyway? Not only was my entire body stiff as a board, but I had been lying in an awkward position, and I’m sure it didn’t help that my feet had been dangling off the side. I was almost positive the blood had officially given up circulating to the lower portion of my body...well, almost given up.

Walking to the bathroom would be a killer.

Slowly, I lifted my head up from off the floor and attempted to get my bearings. This was not particularly the most refreshing morning wake up I’d ever had. It was like laying face down on the floor on top of a pogo stick…not pleasant. Getting to a sitting position—not an easy task thanks to the pogo stick, I yawned tiredly and rubbed my hand across my face. Yesterday had been a long day, and the minimal amount of sleep I’d gotten had done nothing for slaking my fatigue. There was no doubt that I was going to need more sleep if I wanted to be at my best. Sleep, that didn’t involve erotic dreams, if I could help it.

I’ll admit they were exciting and sexy as hell, but they weren’t exactly the type of dreams that inspired rest and relaxation. On the contrary, eroticism made rest and relaxation the last thing on my overworked and undersexed brain. Things more like exertion and stimulation came to mind.

And speaking of stimulation…

I looked up at the couch at the body that was curled up on the other end. A bitter frown tugged at my mouth as I watched Liz sleeping as deeply as I wished I could have been. Somewhere along the long and tiresome road of going through the large pile of nowhere-leading-crap we’d accumulated for this case, the two of us had fallen asleep. Surprisingly enough, my ungainly fall onto the floor had done nothing to stir her.

Disregarding the fact that the two of us had shared a hard slab of a couch when we could have been sharing a bed, there was no doubt that the close proximity of her bodies had been the stimulus of my erotic dream. And while visions of sugarplums had danced in my head, I’m sure her sleep had been filled with processing case information and catching bad guys.

Not exactly as risqué.

She was lying in almost the exact same position I had been lying in. Only, she had drawn her knees up so that her feet wouldn’t dangle off the side like mine had—smart girl. But hell, she was so damn small she hadn't exactly had the same disadvantage of long limbs that I'd had. And speaking of long limbs, I'm sure laying on the couch was a lot easier without that disadvantage as well. Her hair had either come down, or she had taken it down, and it was now strewn on top of her head in disarray. One of her hands was next to her face, gripping one of the throw pillows, while the other was wrapped snugly around her waist, clutching another pillow to her body. My mind could have easily replaced that pillow with a stuffed animal. Watching her sleeping this way, I couldn’t stop a smile from replacing the frown on my face.

Liz Parker, for all her womanliness and professional air, slept like a child.

That was rich.

I really wanted to laugh, but I didn’t want to wake her. This had to be what they meant by a “Kodak moment”. What I wouldn’t give to have had access to a camera. It would have been nice to pay her back for the little shower stunt she’d pulled yesterday. Although, I had to admit, other than being hilariously funny, it was also very sweet seeing this side of her. It was a relief to know that there was a moment in Liz’s life when she wasn’t so guarded and worried about what I, or any other person thought of her. Albeit, it was a moment when she was unconscious, but it was still a relief to see.

I smiled one more time, then stood up on my still slightly bloodless feet, and hobbled to the bathroom.

~~~~~~~~~~~~
Max tasted like sweet candy.

Chocolate, maybe…caramel?

Definitely caramel.

The taste was sinfully luscious and dangerously addicting. As his tongue melded with mine, I could literally taste his breath in my mouth. The taste was good, better than the richest, thickest, sweetest caramel I had ever tasted in my life.

I heard myself whimper as his lips parted from mine, then I felt him begin to move down my body. He melted that hot caramel kiss along my neck, down the flat part of my chest, and stopped just as he reached the swell of my breasts. He bypassed them, instead moving down to my stomach and placing a hot kiss right beneath my bellybutton.

I squirmed a little in annoyance at the deliberately teasing love play he was tormenting me with, and smoothed one of my hands along his jaw, drawing his head further down to the spot I wanted it most. His face hovered above me for a split second and he lifted his head to meet my gaze. There was a sparkling glint of mischief in his eyes as he looked at me, and I could have strangled him for it.

If he didn’t touch me soon, I was going to strangle him.

He raised his pinky, folded it slowly, and ran a soft caress right along the inside of my upper thigh. The digit slipped between my folds and right into my…

"Hey come on, sleeping beauty. It’s time to wake up."

It was the worst wakeup call of my life. One moment I was basking in the wonders of sexual fulfillment, the next I staring at the upside-down face of the bringer of my sexual fulfillment as I was doused in the face with the fact that I had definitely been dreaming.

"Max?" I was still a little groggy from my dream, and more than a little pissed.

"Unless you’ve been hiding another guy here, then yeah, it’s me. Get up, we gotta go"

Max’s upside-down head disappeared from my view and I heard the sound of rustling paper as he started to gather up all of the files we’d left on the coffee table. I buried my face in the arm of the couch and let out an agonized groan. Why did it have to be Max? Why not Alex, or that guy that lived in my building that always called me ‘Miss Liz’, or the cute guy that worked at the coffee shop? Why did it have to be Max flipping Evans!?

Yeah, I knew that I was attracted to Max. But it was much easier to deny when he was being mean and rude, and pissing me off every time he dared to open his mouth. But I couldn’t deny it when I was having dreams about him doing…things to me. Well…almost doing things to me.

And wasn’t that just fair?

Even in my dreams, Max Evans drove me up the wall with sexual frustration. It was enough to make a girl want to scream…and not in the good sexually fulfilled way. Even the couch that I had my face so apathetically buried in, smelled like Max! And I—pathetic wretch that I was, took a moment to inhale the very masculine, very brute, very Max scent.

Ahh! I seriously needed to get laid.

"Come on dear, you’re late for school," Max teased, in what I guess was his best June Cleaver. I lifted my head from the couch and glared at him.

He was the devil.

He laughed as he sat down on the farthest end of the couch from me. "What, you still sleepy? Imagine how I feel. You snore like a lion."

I do not!

"I do not!" I stretched out my foot and kicked him on the side of his thigh…his hard, muscular, strong thigh. Quickly, I snatched my leg away before it could get me into some real trouble.

Max stood up and faced away from me towards the door. "We were supposed to be at the station almost an hour ago. And we need to check in with Kyle. I’m going to go get the car. Be up by the time I get back."

Who did he think he was? “Be up by the time I get back.” What if I wasn’t up? What was he going to do about it?

I watched Max...actually...Max’s butt, as he left the room. How could I have possibly been attracted to that broody, testosterone filled, control-freak of an ass?

Pun intended.

He did have a nice butt though…

And his body, well, it was pretty nicely muscularly toned…

He had gorgeous hair, and his eyes that I could have just drowned in.

But he was still an ass.

~~~~~~~~~~~~
I’d never thought of myself as the type of person that would take advantage of a woman. Of course, I’d also never been one to pass up a once in a lifetime opportunity. Having Liz Parker beneath me all sleepy and sexy and begging me to kiss her would definitely constitute as a once in a lifetime opportunity.

And I’d passed it up.

When I’d left the bathroom I’d found my previously juvenile sleeping partner tossing and turning on the couch. Apparently, her dreams had been a little less case related than I’d thought. My initial thought had been that she was having a bad dream or something. So I—being the thoughtful person that I am, walked over to her side and attempted to wake her up.

Until I heard her say my name.

Not to brag, but I wasn’t exactly a stranger to the sound of a woman calling out my name. One thing was for sure, the call coming from Liz’s mouth was definitely not a "Come and save me from my nightmares, Max!" This “Max” was strictly, "Oh come and do it to me right!" Believe me, I knew the difference. And just in case I had a hard time seeing that difference, the "kiss me now!" that followed did a pretty good job clearing it up for me.

Contrary to my initial thoughts, Liz had not been in the middle of a nightmare. More like she was in the midst of an erotic dream starring yours truly.

But it got better!

Somewhere along the line of my sitting down to wake her up, and her simulating request, her dream had mixed with reality, and I’d soon found myself situated on top of my sleeping partner with her body moving sinfully beneath mine while she babbled something about caramel and did some pretty provocative things with her hands.

It had taken all my strength, and every ounce of will power I had—plus some I had to borrow, to keep me from taking her on that couch right then and there. But somehow, I’d managed to pull myself away from her. After all, I’d taken an oath to serve and protect. That included protecting her from me. And she would need it too, because there was no way she was aware of what type of danger she'd just put herself in.

I was horny, overworked, undersexed, and so damn attracted to her, I felt as if I could have spontaneously combusted into a trillion and one pieces. Climbing off of her body had been the hardest thing I had ever done in my life. Pretending like nothing had happened was a close second.

I’d tried joking with her as a means to clear the air between us. She’d woken up and showed no sign of being aware of what she had just done. She’d just stared up at me so innocently unaware. Her lips were parted and her eyes were still heavy with sleep. Meanwhile, all my over stimulated mind could think of was that this must have been how she looked after sex.

I had to get the hell out of there. And when her foot had touched my thigh…I’d known I had to get the hell out of there.

So here I was, standing in front of the house, part of me cursing myself for being a hedonistic hack, and the other part wanting to march back in that room and take control of the vigorous ache in my pants that knew just how to be soothed.

“Go get the car, Evans” I whispered under my breath, silently reminding myself that there were a million and one reasons why hooking up with Liz was still a really bad idea.

But as I slowly made my way to the car, I couldn’t think of a single one.

~~~~~~~~~~~~
The car ride to the station was…odd.

Very odd.

I found myself casting glances at Max as he drove, and yet his eyes remained completely fixed on the road ahead of him, as if it would magically disappear if he dared to look away from it. And he was completely silent. In the short time that I’d known him this was the quietest he had ever been. That alone was frightening.

I wasn’t quite sure what it was, but something about him was really off. He seemed, shaken. And that was a completely new experience for Max.

I couldn’t say that Max’s lack of the desire to converse wasn’t a blessing. I myself, had barely been able to look at him without blushing like a Catholic School girl. I couldn’t stop thinking about that dream. Which was really starting to piss me off. Everything seemed to remind me of it. From the dumpy roadside restaurant that was advertising it’s caramel topping super sundae, to the slow moving Ford truck that coasted in front of us with its license plate that read, HRD BOD.

The sooner I got out of this car and far away from Max Evans, the better off I would be.
When we finally arrived at the Albuquerque station, I couldn’t help but notice all the strange looks Max and I were attracting. It felt as if everyone in the room had their eyes on me. Everyone except Max, of course. He hadn’t looked at me once since we’d left this morning. I couldn’t tell if he was giving me the cold shoulder or if my existence was really that minute to him. Whatever it was, the whole silent treatment thing was really starting to get on my nerves.

When Max and I entered the small office the two of us had been assigned to, he immediately walked over to the desk and started dialing a number on the phone.

The phone rang three times before a familiar voice came across on the speaker. "What have you two got for me?” Kyle asked.

I looked at Max, waiting for him to speak. I was sure he was going to jump right in and tell Kyle every little detail without giving me room to take a breath, let alone get a word in. But I didn’t much feel like talking over him to have my say, so I just decide to let him have it.

However, to my utter surprise, Max didn’t say a word. He barely looked as if he had registered that Kyle had spoken. I was beginning to think that something really strange was going on.

"Um, we were able to talk to Dana Wilcox," I began, eying Max strangely. "However, we discovered that some of the facts of her story were inconsistent with our previous knowledge involving her brother’s murder." I leaned forward and peered at Max from the other side of our work table.

"What facts are those?" Kyle’s voice asked.

"The records that we have state that Charles Louis Wilcox was shot in the right leg after being strangled to death by our murderer. This is consistent to the information we have regarding all the other victims. That he was strangled to death, then shot in a particular area of his body." I paused for a moment, then looked over at Max to see if he was going to chime in, but he remained silent.

"And," Kyle asked impatiently. "What else?"

"Right," I cleared my throat. "What doesn’t fit the bill about Dana’s statement is that according to her, after her brother was shot in the leg, he was then shot again in the back. However, there is no record that such a bullet wound exists on Charles’s body."

"Really?" Kyle said. He paused for a moment, apparently taking the time to mull hat information over in his head. " And what do you plan to do about this bit of conflicting information?" he asked calmly.

It took me another moment before I could answer. I was still kind of thrown by Max’s lack of response. Kyle was rather strangely quiet as well. I may as well have been talking to myself for all the feedback either of the two of them were giving me. Like they were basking in the warmth of some inside joke I wasn’t in on. "Max and I are going to check with another source that may have handled Charles’s body. If we come up with anything new, we’ll go from there."

"And if you don’t come up with anything?" Kyle asked.

Again, I looked over at Max, waiting to see if he would speak. He didn’t.

"If nothing comes up, we’ll start over. Broaden our possible victims, possible suspects, possible connectors. But I think there’s a strong possibility that something was withheld, or maybe even tampered with."

Kyle’s voice was silent again. "Fine, the two of you seem to have everything under control for now. Give me a heads up on any new information you uncover."

“Yes sir,” I said, nodding my head even though I knew Kyle couldn’t see me. Max may have grunted his acknowledgment, but I wasn’t sure. I clicked the phone off, disconnecting with Kyle.

Once I was sure the phone was off, I balled up a blank sheet of paper off the desk and tossed it at Max’s head. When the paper bounced off and ricocheted back onto the desk Max finally looked over at me. "What the hell is going on with you?” I asked.

"What do you mean?" His tone sounded phony, like he knew exactly what I was talking about and was doing a horrible job of pretending he didn’t.

"Oh, so it does speak?" I said, rolling my eyes.

"Liz, I don’t know what you’re talking about."

I didn’t buy that for a second. "What was with the whole silent treatment in the car? And with Kyle just now, you hardly said a word. What’s the matter with you?" I folded my arms across my chest and waited to see what Max’s explanation for his odd behavior would be.

"Liz, there’s was no silent treatment in the car, or with Kyle. You were there too, you know the plan. I figured you could handle the details. And as far as Kyle goes, he’s been doing this a really long time. He’s seen about every scenario there is. What was he supposed to do, let out a heap of ohs and ahs of wonder?"

I still wasn’t buying it. Max letting me handle the details? There was something strange going on with him. But before I could question him any further he stopped me with a glare. "Is the interrogation over yet, Detective? We have a lot of work to do. I’ve got to make some phone calls, and I need to check something out,” he said.

“Check what out?” I asked curiously.

“You don’t need to worry about that, doll,” he said, smiling down at me as he stood up. “I’ll be back soon.”

I stood up too, ignoring the ‘doll’ remark and the urge to smack him. "You can’t leave without me.”

Max’s eyes quirked up and I saw the first hint of that wily look he hadn’t shown me all morning. "Is that an invitation?" he asked.

"You wish,” I answered. I didn’t know what was more shocking, that I was actually starting to get used to Max’s inappropriate teasing, or that I had actually missed it.

He shrugged, "Your loss."

I sighed. “We’re partners remember? A team,” I stressed. “Wherever you go, I go.” I sure as hell wasn’t about to let Max blot me out on this.

Max walked over to the door. “What happened to following my lead?” he asked.

I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, I think we threw that idea out the window a long time ago.”

He laughed. “You’re probably right, but just do me a favor and stay here for now. Make the calls to Jaxk’s. I’ll be back before you know it.”

“I don’t understand why you can’t just tell me where you’re going?” I asked.

Max smiled a slightly lopsided grin at me. “Trust me,” he said.

“Trust you?” I repeated.

“Yeah,” he said. “Just trust me.”

Three simple words, those words. But trusting Max wasn’t something I was one hundred percent sure I could do just yet.

“Fine,” I surrendered. “Go do whatever. I’ll make the calls. But if something pans out…”

“You’ll be the first to know,” he winked, right before he left the room.

For an entire sixty seconds, I sat at my side of the desk doing absolutely nothing, but when the clock above my head on the wall in front of me indicated that a minute had gone by, I stood up from my chair and headed for the door.

Trust you, Max Evans?

Not a chance in hell.

Hey everyone. Just a friendly little AN.

Thanks for all the bumps. I have not forgotten about this or any of my other stories. Life's been...well pretty damn fun actually, but I'll still be coming back to this. I won't say exactly when I'll have the next chapter up, but I'm working on getting it to you ASAP.

Thanks for hanging in there with me.

~Chad~