Read Part Eight.
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Jules played with the keys in her hand as they approached Sterling's car - an unmarked navy cruiser - and unlocked the car with a remote. "You're really going to make me drive you around town, aren't you?"
"Yeah." Alistair answered, opening the passenger door. In all honesty, it had been a rash decision, one that he would probably come to regret, but at the time it seemed best to give her something to do, especially if he was actually going to keep her out of his hair.
"You seem like the kind of person who wants to be in control of a situation, so why hand off the driving?" Jules asked, opening her own door.
"I'd prefer to think about the case, not the car, in front of me."
"I don't need to think?"
"You talk too much to think." Alistair laughed. "Everything gets processed out here," he waved his hands in the space between them.
Jules narrowed her eyes as she threw the car into reverse. "I'd say you can tell me to shut up whenever you want, but I have a feeling you would anyway."
"It's likely." Alistair agreed. "Just to be clear, Dr Julian, I have a method that works for me and I don't intend to change it for you, for Preston, the mayor, or the press... it's worked for years and I expect that it will continue to work for years to come."
"And how, exactly, does your method work?" Jules knew she was working with a testy man, she'd seen it before, he'd grown so accustomed to doing things in a certain way that the idea of moving an inch one way or the other made him break out in sweat. Especially if it meant being proven wrong by the men he detested.
"Use your eyes, your ears, your nose... and use your brain - empirical observation and deductive reason. That's fundamental to good police work."
Jules couldn't resist a snort of disdain at his expense. As if I don't know police procedure. "And why do you expect that I don't think?"
Alistair chuckled as Jules made a left turn. "I told you, everything happens out here - you don't think, you talk."
"And what does that mean to you?" The statement was starting to get on her nerves... rather, he was beginning to shred her already raw nerves. She knew she was more of an intuitive person, and that at times it meant that she would have to look to prove - or disprove - what she had guessed with her gut rather than to simply look at the evidence and reason from there. but that didn't mean she was incapable of doing her work.
"That you will get to the same place as me, but I will have to listen to it twice."
Jules laughed, "You're making plenty of assumptions, Detective."
"I'm using my observation skills, Dr Julian - you talk to process, I think to process. That's a concept with which you should be familiar."
Jules rolled her eyes, "I'm familiar with it, sir, but that doesn't mean I buy into it all. I'm just as committed to police procedure as you."
"I would hope so - but take this morning for instance. You went straight to a two-killer hypothesis based partly on your observations, the same observations that made me ask the same question, but you didn't stop there when no other facts presented themselves. You created a persona for the two murderers based on your gut. You are asking the same questions, you want them same results, and even if your methodology is the same as mine, you are still going to process all of the information in a different way. You don't have any solid evidence for a two-killer hypothesis, so that's all it is, a hypothesis. All I'm saying is that we do things differently."
"And that I'm going to annoy you along the way." It might serve him right if I did annoy him.
"I was hoping the driving would distract you." Alistair knew it was the wrong thing to say, knew it sounded sexist, but her expectations and attitude had became too much for him at the end of the day. He was working hard enough to keep his tongue from spewing venom all over the car.
"I'm quite capable of multitasking." Jules said, just before slamming on the brakes to avoid the car in front of her as it stopped at a red light.
"I can see that."
Jules shook her head, "So tell me why you were observing a three month old crime scene instead of the one that happened this morning?"
"What happened this morning was a classic body dump - he stopped the car, took three steps and was gone. But if he was going to get to that spot on the trail, he had plenty of ground he needed to cover to get there. How did he do it without being seen? His method of approach can speak loudly about who the murderer is, what he knows - or doesn't know."
"What does the scene from this morning tell you?" You'd think if he'd figured that out, we'd be closer to catching the guy.
"We're dealing with someone who is familiar with the city, he knows enough to know that area was mostly dead, no one would see him." That was obvious enough, a rookie on his first day could have figured that out, Alistair.
"Do we know who the girl is yet?"
"Howard called in a while ago with identification - the family verified it around 4 pm. We'll meet with them in the morning."
"You've managed to keep all of this very quiet so far - the mayor didn't even mention it at dinner."
"Dinner?" It was getting to be too much - Alistair had known that mayor had been - friendly - with Martin Julian's widow, but he had assumed it to be more of a political flirtation, one that brought a powerful if questionable voice to the front of his upcoming senate campaign. If standing in opposition to the mayor's ideas on the current case was dangerous, getting in too deep with Jules as an ally could prove to be deadly.
"Focus! He didn't say anything about today's murder at dinner."
"Probably because our office didn't inform his until after the mayor had left, almost six o'clock." Alistair smiled slightly as he saw Jules' mouth open in surprise. He'd worked very hard at getting the uniforms to keep the news as quiet as possible, he'd been working on it for a couple of months now, so that when they found another body the scanners wouldn't light up with the news of another murder and bring the media hounds onto the scene in minutes. He needed some space, a few hours to take in the area without the cameras and the questions.
"How'd you get Preston to go along with that?"
"He left at lunch, it wasn't a problem. But it'll be all over the ten o'clock news. Another reason why I wasn't out there tonight."
Jules sighed as she turned onto her street. They were going to be difficult men to work with, she could tell. One wanted her off the case for the sake of maintaining his own way, the other wanted her on the case simply to drive the other mad. And there she was in the middle. She was going to have play go-between, peacemaker, smooth things over and sweep under the rug all the ill-will, mistrust and anger if they were ever going to make any progress on the case. Or at least go down trying. "Detective, I hope you know what you are doing. I may understand your need for control and silence, but I doubt the press will, and I'm certain the mayor won't."
"The mayor doesn't understand anything." Alistair grumbled.
"He's sleeping with my mother, you don't think I already knew that?" Jules ignored Sterling's shocked face as she stopped the car in front of her mother's house, thankful that the man in question had left. It was better that she say it now than to drop the bomb on Sterling further on. "Not that anyone besides my siblings knows, so you can keep that inside of your head, too."
"Well, if the press calls - or the mayor - keep your thoughts to yourself."
"You'll do the same, I'm sure." Jules replied, getting out of the car and walking to the front door without another word.
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