Just the Facts Volume 2

Chapter 3-2

When their shift finished, Andy offhandedly invited Sean to his place, not really thinking his partner would accept. Sean had, though, and for a moment, Andy was left floundering.

With Lopez and O’Hara fully out and in a relationship, and with Rivers allowing them to remain partners so far, Andy had been more open about himself, not only with Sean, but others in the department. For the most part, except for a bit of ribbing, things had been okay.

Andy had heard through the grapevine that Sean was bisexual, though Sean had never confirmed it one way or another, and Andy had never dared ask. When they’d first been partnered, Sean had been dating a woman, though they’d since ended whatever relationship they’d had, and Sean didn’t appear to be currently seeing anyone.

The point was, though Andy had a major thing going on for Sean, he had yet to act on it. Well, no more than inviting Sean over anyway. Besides, there’d been zero indication that his partner had a mutual attraction for Andy. In fact, given Sean’s dating history, grapevine notwithstanding, Andy suspected the man was straight. Not that Andy really had much to go on there.

There’d been an occasional smoldering look, but well, Andy figured that was just Sean’s natural intensity and he did it without trying. Sometimes, Andy thought maybe he was being too obtuse. But he didn’t want to take any chances with mixed signals and offending his partner. It was a work relationship, after all.

Not that inviting Sean over had any deeper meaning. They were partners on the force and buddies besides. Or trying to be. But Andy had his share of fantasies, and one of those involved Captain Rivers’ reaction to two teams of detectives being involved with each other. He was pretty sure that wouldn’t go over well.

Once inside his house, Andy got Sean situated on the couch with a beer, then perused his freezer in an effort to find something to feed them for dinner. He had steaks, ground beef, and chicken, but in reality, Andy didn’t really feel like having any of that. He closed the freezer and turned to the cabinet.

As any good Italian, he did have pasta, but as a bad one, he had jarred sauce. He liked it and it was easy. And come to think of it, he had a loaf of garlic bread in his freezer, so why not?

“Spaghetti all right?”

“Sure. That’s fine,” Sean called, flipping channels on the television.

Andy put on the water to boil for the pasta, the garlic bread in the oven, then sauce in a pan, ready to be heated when the rest was closer to being ready.

He grabbed his beer and went to the living room, flouncing into a chair next to the couch, with one ear perked to hear the water boiling.

“So.” Great beginning, he thought. “I was surprised you came over.”

Sean took a long swallow of beer, then eyed Andy. “You asked.”

“Yeah. But I’ve asked before.”

“You have?” Sean shrugged. “Don’t really remember. You have a nice place here. Beats my tiny apartment.”

Andy had grown up in the house. His parents had paid it off years ago. It had been a proud moment for the Mantegnas. He recalled his parents having a party at the time. It wasn’t a big house, just three bedrooms and one bath, but they weren’t a large family, Andy having been their only child.

Five years ago, his dad had passed away from a heart attack, and just a year or so later, Andy’s mom had succumbed to a particularly bad bout of pneumonia that had put her in the hospital. It was just him now.

He liked the house. It was a simple L-shape and not very imaginative, but there was a pretty big backyard, hard to come by these days with more modern homes, and from the front, if you squinted, you could see the ocean in the distance.

“Your place is pretty small,” Andy agreed.

Once, fairly early on in their partnership, Sean had had a poker game at the apartment and Andy had been invited. Andy wasn’t much into poker, honestly, and it had showed, he guessed, because Sean had not invited him again. Still, the apartment was in one of the newer complexes with an impressive pool and hot tub, only a couple of blocks from one of the nicest areas of Haydon Cliff.

“Thinking of moving when the lease is up,” Sean said, his gaze returning to the television.

Andy rose to check on the water, and sure enough, it was boiling, so he added the spaghetti, turned on the heat under the saucepan, and waited for the pasta to be al dente.

“You want to eat there or come to the table?” he called.

“The table is fine.” Sean spoke from directly behind him.

Andy jumped a foot. “Fuck.”

Sean, the asshole, laughed. “Sorry. Came to ask if you needed help.”

“I’m pretty sure I can handle spaghetti and bread.”

Sean smiled and leaned against the fridge. “You’re pretty cute all domesticated.”

Andy felt himself flush at being called “cute” by his crush. “Shut up.” But he was grinning. He needed a colander to drain the pasta, but for some reason, he was frozen in place, watching Sean watch him.

He guessed he was crazy because he could have sworn something shifted in the atmosphere, or at least the kitchen. And that smoldering look of Sean’s he sometimes wore for no apparent reason was there, again, maybe even amplified.

But just then, the pot of boiling pasta made a hissing noise.

Sean’s glance moved to the stove behind him, breaking the weird spell, if that’s what it even had been.

“Shoot,” Andy exclaimed, taking care of it. “Probably mushy now.”

It was not, surprisingly, and though a plate of spaghetti with jarred sauce and packaged garlic bread was hardly gourmet by anyone’s standards, it tasted pretty good just the same.

“So.” Sean paused in between shoveling in forkfuls of spaghetti. “What do you think?”

Considering they hadn’t really been talking about anything, the question could have been referring to the weather, or the mayoral race currently going on in the Cliff, or maybe even whether the two of them should have s*x—which, yeah, Andy was projecting that one—but he was pretty sure Sean was actually asking about the murders.

Andy leaned back a little, contemplating his glass of Chianti. “I don’t believe much in coincidences. And it would be pretty stupid of us not to think the murders of two old ladies killed in similar fashion are not related. It’s clearly not a spree killer, because the murders are too far apart. But the answer is pretty obvious that they are related. Now, whether that means an anonymous serial killer struck?—that I don’t know. There could be a relation between them we just haven’t discovered yet.”

“Such as?”

“Maybe they both attended the same bingo game and were offed by a competitor.”

“Not funny, Andy.”

He shrugged. “Who said it has to be? Look, Tony Castro didn’t mention Maria going to bingo, but that doesn’t mean she didn’t. It just means Tony didn’t know about it, right?”

“True.” Sean stabbed at his spaghetti. “Either or both of them could have been involved in anything their families didn’t know about. They didn’t live with family, and in both cases, they were checked on only once, maybe twice, a week.”

“Rose attended bingo on Wednesdays at the Elks Lodge. Maybe we should interview some of the other players, get an idea if any of them ever remember Maria being there.”

“Pretty far-fetched.”

“Gotta start somewhere. Maybe they both had their hair done at the same blue-haired lady salon. It’s worth a shot, Sean. Even if we’re looking at a serial killer, he had to have seen Maria and Rose somewhere to focus in on them in the first place, right? And whatever we do, we have to work fast, because I sure don’t want to attend any other murder scenes of some more ladies who never harmed anyone.”