CSI Sunnydale: The One Where the Reporter Solves the Crime

December 2007
25,000 words

Written for noelia_g for the AU round at Maleslashminis. Request was: "Giles is a homicide detective, and Xander is a reporter with the frustrating habit of interfering with the investigation and, even worse, ending up helping to solve the case. My undying love if other Scoobies make cameos as procedural drama types of characters, and I'd build you a shrine if anyone gets to be a CSI." No PWP or unhappy ending.

You can find my author's notes at the very end.

Bookcover by noelia_g.
Thanks to Mireille for the quick readthrough, the neverending encouragment, and the absolutely wonderful cheerleading that lasted from the first word, to the last.

* * *

Xander Harris was a pain in the arse. Rupert loved to read his articles, of course; the man had style and talent and a knack for details, definitely, but he never stopped interfering. When the phone rang for the seventh time in the past hour, Rupert glanced at the display, saw Harris' number, and ignored it. Again.
 
They were in the middle of investigating a heist in downtown Sunnydale. A jewellery store had been robbed leaving both a clerk and one of the -- suspected -- perps dead. The clerk was twenty-three years old, married, and had given birth to a little girl not three months prior. Rupert hated those casescases like this one.
 
He smiled thinly at Mrs. Holloway's husband, glancing down at the baby in the man's arms, and tried for the usual: "We're very sorry for your loss."
 
And tThe phone rang again.
 
"Aren't--aren't you going to answer that?" Mr. Holloway asked, voice almost breaking. He cradled the baby closer. Rupert could see the telltale signs of a man about to break and signalled for the CSI standing close -- the new guy, Finn -- to take the grieving widower into the waiting room.
 
"What do you want?" Rupert said into the phone.
 
"Detective!" Harris replied, much too cheerful for Rupert's tastes. "I may have a clue as to who your perps were."
 
"I thought I'd told you to stop interfering, Harris," Rupert countered. "You know it angers the CSIs when you do."
 
"And it doesn't make you angry? Ah, you flatter me," Harris said with a laugh. "Look, I know you hate it, and they hate it, but my job is to do investigative journalism, not just wait around for your science geeks to give me all the answers."
 
"I was under the impression that you knew Buffy Summers. Wouldn't she kick your arse for calling her a "geek"?"
 
"Hey, Buffy's my pal, she likes me," Harris retorted. "Besides, I never say it to her face, you know."
 
Rupert laughed. "Of course, you wouldn't. Now you were saying?"
 
"Yes, your perps." Harris' tone changed immediately to business-like. "So the one that's dead, I tracked down his family, and turns out he has two brothers that live in L.Aright here in dear old Sunnydale. One of them just did time for -- let me make sure -- yes, grand larceny."
 
"Oh, that's bloody wonderful," Rupert walked into his office and leaned against the edge of his desk.
 
"Want me to make a bet as to how long it's going to take your guys to figure that one out?"
 
Rupert looked out into the hallway. Buffy was hurrying towards the office with Finn trailing behind her, and a piece of paper in her hands. "About three seconds, I'd say."
 
"Giles!" Buffy shouted just a few seconds before she barged in. "We have a suspect. Maybe a couple of them."
 
"Dead perp's brothers, I suppose." Rupert smiled when Buffy stopped dead in surprise.
 
Then she seemed to notice the phone in his hands, and rolled her eyes. "Tell Xander to stop stealing my lines."
 
"I suppose you heard?" Rupert asked Harris, keeping his eyes on Buffy and Finn. Finn, who was staring at both of them like they were a little crazy; he was going to learn soon enough that everyone in this lab was more than a little crazy. And that made Rupert wonder if the man had met Spike yet. Probably not.
 
"Yeah, and what's the fun in that?" Harris asked, laughing. "And anyway, I've tried reaching you for the past hour, so you could have had the answer a lot earlier if you learned to answer your phone."
 
Rupert ignored him and smiled at Buffy. "He says he will try to accommodate you."
 
"'Course he will." Buffy put the papers down on Rupert's desk and sat on one of the chairs, motioning for Finn to do the same. He didn't budge from the doorway.
 
"Thanks for the tip, Harris, I suppose I'll see you at the lab later," Rupert said, before flipping the phone shut. Harris tended to turn up at odd times during a case. Especially cases where he'd found an answer or seven.
 
Rupert had once offered him a job, Finn's job in point of fact, but Harris had flat out refused and never explained why.
 
"Okay, so this guy has two brothers. One just got out of jail for grand larceny; the other," Buffy picked up the file was she spoke, "was a murder suspect two years ago in Nevada."

This picked up Finn's interest and he came to sit next to Buffy. "They both have firearm registrations, too. Both forty-fives."
 
Rupert nodded, everything falling into place in his mind: one brother with the brain to pull off the heist, another with the willingness to kill for the goal, and the last one tagging along, inexperienced, and ending up dead. "I think it's time we have a chat with Spike," Rupert said, standing up from his chair and waving at them to follow him.
 
"Spike?" he heard Finn whisper to Buffy behind him. "Who's Spike? And who's Xander?"
 
"Spike's our ballistic expert," Rupert replied before Buffy could say a word. "As for Harris -- Xander -- he's--"
 
"An investigative journalist," Buffy interrupted him. "Don't listen to what Giles says about him."
 
"He is an annoying man," Rupert said, opening the door to the ballistics' lab, and holding it for the other two to enter.
 
"What gives me the pleasure of your visit?" Spike grunted, posture indicating that he wasn't pleased at all. He kept his eyes glued to the microscope. "I'm not done with the bullets you brought me earlier."
 
"You think they come from a forty-five?" Buffy asked. "Cause we might have a couple of suspects."
 
Spike eyed her carefully, and when his eyes drifted to Finn, they turned cold. Rupert rubbed the bridge of his nose. Dear Lord, these boys had to stop with the caveman attitude. First Angel when Spike had been hired, and now Spike over Finn. Of course, Rupert wasn't stupid enough not to have noticed that Buffy had had relationships with the first two, and she'd been making eyes at the new one all morning, but-- Dear Lord, he felt like a school teacher.
 
"Spike?" Rupert asked, tersely. "Forty-five?"
 
Spike shook his head and went back to his microscope. "The victim? Yeah, definitely a forty-five. It's running through NIBIN now. The perp's? Not so much. I'm thinking nine mm; still working on it. So if you would just get the hell out of here, I could get more work done."
 
"Charming, as always," Rupert said.
 
"Okay, we'll let you work on that. Just call us the moment you got something." Buffy opened the door and pushed Finn through. "We've got a husband to talk to, and you," she turned to Rupert, "have a couple of suspects to grab."
 
"I thought he was the boss?" Finn asked, clearly confused. Oh, this one was going to be fun to have around.
 
Buffy rolled her eyes and kept pushing him out the door. "Sometimes. But I like to boss him around. Now get moving."
 
Rupert exchanged a glance and a shrug with Spike, and then followed the other two out.
 

 
"We let journalists interfere?" Rupert heard Finn ask while Buffy pulled him through the hallways of the labs.
 
Rupert had no problem letting Buffy handle that one at all. They didn't let Harris interfere, the man just did no matter what you said or did. Short of a restraining order, there was nothing that was going to keep him away. And even then, Rupert was pretty certain Harris would find a way to insinuate himself into an investigation no matter what they threw at him.
 
He deserved credit though, for the quality of the work he did. He was a fine investigator, and a damn fine journalist as well, something no one would guess when just looking at the man. Xander Harris was a gangly man of twenty-four, with shaggy hair who favoured Hawaiian shirts, mismatched kakis, and running shoes.
 
Speaking of the man...
 
"Detective!"
 
Rupert spotted Harris before Harris spotted him, but apparently hadn't managed to make himself invisible quite yet.
 
"Giles!" Harris shouted again, before giving the receptionist a flirty look. "He's expecting me."
 
Harmony rolled her eyes. She knew Harris well enough by now that this had become a habit, of that Rupert was certain. "Sure he is. Go on."
 
Rupert waved at Harris and the man followed him into his office. "What brings you here?" he asked, although he had a very good idea of what that would be. Harris always turned up at about this time when they were both working the same case.
 
"So I was looking into the Patton brothers' family history, and Henry, the dead one," Harris added, unnecessarily, "he's just the half brother. Gerry and Warren hated their father's second wife, and the younger brother."
 
"And how is that helping?" Rupert asked.
 
Harris handed him a piece of paper. "Not much, except maybe a reason for why Henry's dead."
 
Rupert glanced at the sheet and blinked. It was a summarized timeline of the brothers' lives, from Gerry's birth to their father's death just a couple of months prior. Impressive. "You think he was killed by his brothers?" Rupert frowned, thinking back to Spike's findings about the bullet. Maybe one of the other two Patton brothers owned an unregistered nine mm -- it wasn't such a farfetched idea either. "That would be an interesting thread to follow."
 
"Exactly my point; you know I love a little family drama to go with my crime stories," Harris said with a grin. "Anyway, that's not all. I got a phone call on the way here, and one of my contacts say the brothers just came into some money, like, yesterday." He waggled his eyebrows comically.
 
Rupert rolled his eyes. "We'll have to look into that too." As much as he hated the interference, Rupert did like that Xander Harris never hid anything from them. He did his work on his end, and if anything interesting or important turned up, he always contacted Rupert or another of the detectives on the case with that information.
 
It was a refreshing change from most of the other journalists Rupert had met during his career. He'd had at least five cases dismissed or ruined because of their insane habit of getting in the way, withholding information, and ending up with innocent people dead for their mistakes.
 
Rupert took off his glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose with a sigh. He needed to stop thinking about Britain. "I have to pick up the suspects."
 
Harris quirked an -- attractive, though Rupert would be hard pressed to admit he'd noticed -- eyebrow, and then stood. "I'll go back to my work table. I think my editor wants me to make this a serial."
 
"Are you sure you'll have enough material to make it quite that long?" Rupert asked, picking up his coat and badge. "I'm pretty certain you've just cracked the case," then he added, "again."
 
Harris laughed. "Hey, I provided one little lead; I don't call that 'cracking.' Besides, I'm a reporter; I can make stuff up, or just write about their family drama. The readers love drama." He said it with a flourish that made Rupert laugh and shake his head.
 
"I'm still wondering why you didn't take me up on that job offer," he said. "You'd be an asset to this lab."
 
"As much as my dear friends would kick my ass for saying this, I love doing what I do." He shrugged. "You know, I wasn't going to be a writer."
 
They started down the hall, walking next to each other with hands in their pockets. "Really?" Rupert asked out of curiosity. He'd been working -- if you could call it working -- with Harris for almost seven months exactly, and barely knew anything of the man. Besides the fact that he was friends with at least two of the people who worked for Rupert, and never quite managed to be annoying enough for Rupert to take actions to stop his involvement with cases.
 
"Yeah." Harris stopped next to Harmony's desk and leaned against it, ignoring her indignant yelp. "I used to work construction."
 
"What made you start writing?" As he talked, Rupert signalled the two officers passing them by. "Miller, Gates, we have two suspects to pick up." Rupert turned back to Harris.
 
"That is something you'll have to find out another time," Harris replied. He waved and headed out.
 
"Where are we going, Detective?" Miller asked.
 

 
The part of his job Rupert hated the most was the suspects wrangling. He wasn't getting any younger, and running after two well fit men with a mind to escape was not the kind of exercise his doctor recommended. He'd gotten his knee shot six years ago, and it hadn't been the same since. He hid a grimace as he cuffed the younger of the two Patton brothers, and packed him into the squad car. "Bring him in, Officer Gates."
 
"Graham's coming with the second one," Gates said, nodding at the corner of the street. Miller appeared leading a thrashing Gerry Patton towards the car.
 
Rupert smiled and crossed his arms, looking the eldest Patton up and down. "Do you know what we call escaping arrest?" Gerry sneered and spit at him. Rupert sidestepped and shook his head. "Oh, you missed. We call it an admission of guilt." He gave Miller a nod, and watched the officer push the suspect in the car next to his brother.
 
The squad car sped down the street, and Rupert got back into his SUV. He groaned at the pain in his leg, and paused for a moment, a hand rubbing his sore knee. "I'm getting too old for this," he muttered.
 
He was on the highway heading towards downtown when his cellphone rang. "Giles," he answered, without looking at the display.
 
"Detective, me again," the distinctive voice of Xander Harris replied.
 
Rupert groaned as he looked in his rear-view mirror and changed lanes. "What can I do for you, Harris?"
 
"Haven't I told you like, a million times, to call me Xander? I mean, we've known each other, what, seven months now?"
 
Seven months, eight days. But Rupert didn't say it out loud; Harris had a habit of jumping to -- false -- conclusions.
 
"So yeah, seven months, I think we're past the "Harris" stage by now," he continued.
 
"Does this phone call have a purpose?" Rupert asked, annoyed. Harris was Harris; Rupert wasn't going to start calling him anything else.
 
"Okay, a tad touchy there," Harris muttered just loud enough for Rupert to hear. "Yeah, there's a purpose. I dug more into the family drama, and turns out, there's a fourth Patton brother. Half-brother, whatever. Mika Ferguson; mom's last name, lives in East Sunnydale. Mom was Patton senior's mistress for like, ever, but the man never recognized his paternity until just about two weeks before he died a couple months ago. Mika's in list for the succession, and the other Pattons aren't happy about it."
 
"When you say ever, you mean?"
 
"Thirty-two years and counting. Woman stuck to him even after he fucked her over about the kid," Harris said. Rupert could hear the shuffling of papers in the background, and the tapping of keys. "I have an address for the kid, if you want it."
 
"Thank you, Harris," Rupert grunted. "One day, I'd like my team to be as fast as you are."
 
"Hey, I'm a one of a kind," Harris said, cheerfully.
 
You sure are, Rupert thought to himself.
 
Buffy ended up calling in the information two point four seconds after Rupert hung up with Harris. She did not sound pleased to learn that he had stolen her thunder. Again.
 
"I'll meet you there," Rupert said, while she was still ranting.
 
She stopped just long enough to say: "sure thing, boss."
 
"Oh, and bring Finn," Rupert added. The boy needed to get his feet a little wet. Rupert had hired him over a recommendation from a friend with the Iowa State PD, and Iowa saw less crime in a year than Sunnydale in a week. Riley was smart, definitely smart enough to be on the team, but still incredibly naïve.
 
Buffy perked up at that, predictably. "Oh sure!"
 

 
Rupert knew he shouldn't have gone to meet Buffy and Riley while he had two suspects in custody to interrogate. It wasn't against regulations per se, but the CSIs were both more than enough capable of handling two witnesses. And the Chief of Police, some short, portly man named "Snyder," -- he was new, and Rupert had yet to find any redeeming qualities in the man -- hated to have things kept waiting. Especially interrogations.
 
But Rupert had learned over the years to trust his instincts over protocol. His instincts had prompted him to meet with Buffy and Riley, and so meet them he would. As he turned the Pine Street corner, he immediately noticed the three squad cars parked in front of the apartment complex. Two standard issue CSI SUVs were parked next to each other a little bit further down, and Rupert parked his own behind the one he recognized as Buffy's. The other seemed to be Gunn's, and he couldn't think of any reason for him to be here.
 
He got out, frown deepening as he flashed his badge at officer Doyle who was guarding the fence door, and found Riley and Buffy waiting for him next to the doorway. "What's going on?" he asked, eyeing the crowd of people the officers were barely able to contain.
 
"Seems like our witnesses are Angel's DBs," Buffy said, waving inside. It was a very sunny Californian afternoon, which made it almost impossible to make out anything that might be going on in there. "He's on the scene with Cordy and Gunn; fourth-floor."
 
The second half of the CSI team. Rupert had known they were working a double homicide on Pines, but the street was of a considerable length, almost enough to be considered Sunnydale's main street, and it had never occurred to him to make the connection. "I see," he muttered, pursing his lips. This definitely complicated things.
 
"Giles! What brings you to my crime scene?"
 
Rupert kept enough control not to roll his eyes, and turned to Angel, who was striding towards them quickly.
 
"Your two DBs? Our witnesses," Buffy replied with a smile. "Seems like you're stuck with us around for a bit."
 
Angel cringed. "Ouch," he said, before leading them into the building. "You think our crime scenes are connected?"
 
"Seems too much of a coincidence for it to be otherwise," Rupert answered. As the saying went: the plot was definitely thickening. "We'll know more once we pull our findings together, but I definitely wouldn't be surprised."
 
"What connects the Fergusons to the Pattons?" Angel asked as he held the elevator door for them to climb in.
 
"Papa Patton and Mrs. Ferguson were long term 'friends'," Buffy said with a wiggling of her brows. "If you know what I mean."
 
Angel shook his head. "The old lady had a couple of those in her bag, apparently, because there's a neighbour up there who claims he's been sleeping with her for over fifteen years."
 
"Patton senior was the Ferguson boy's father," Rupert added. "He recognized his paternity barely weeks before his death, and it angered the other Patton siblings."
 
The elevator door opened and they spilled into the hallway. "So we might actually have a motive," Angel said. He nodded at the officer standing next to the apartment door, and they went in.
 
Riley immediately went off in one direction and Buffy in the other, while Rupert and Angel stayed in the living room where both bodies were found. "When were they called in?"
 
"Seven this morning, neighbour called it in," Angel said, crouching down.
 
Wesley was still examining the body of the mother, and didn't look in the least surprised to see Rupert and the other two appear. "Both dead with single gun shot to the head. No other injuries so far."
 
"Bullets?" Rupert asked.
 
"Through and through, but I think your guys found them in the wall over there." Wesley waved behind him at the wall that seemed to separate the living room from the kitchen.
 
"Yeah, they did," Angel added with just a hint of pride. "They've been sent to the lab."
 
"Good. Spike will have the results ready for us soon, then." Rupert ignored the look that passed on Angel's face when he mentioned Spike. They'd been partners for a couple of years, just out of the Academy, and yet they could barely stand each other these days.
 
Wesley straightened up and nodded at the transport guys that they could move the body. "The wound's exactly the same as the one from your dead guy this morning," he said to Rupert. "And when I say exactly, I mean exactly the same. Very precise work. Whoever did this was a sharp shooter." With those last words, Wesley grabbed his kit and followed the gurney to the elevator.
 
"I'll head back to the precinct," Rupert told Angel. "I've just picked up the two elder Patton brothers. Perhaps they can shed a little bit of light on their other half brother's death."
 

 
Four hours later, and neither of the brothers were talking. They hadn't shown any sign of shock or surprise at Mika Ferguson's death either, and that was as good an admission of guilt as anything in Rupert's book. Nevertheless, he had no idea what could have happened between the siblings to lead to such a situation.
 
Gerry was clearly the minds of the operation and Warren the muscles. Henry had most probably only tagged along for the heist as a manner to prove himself worthy of the Patton name. Two of the witnesses they'd interrogated in the last hour had confirmed Henry's need for his brothers' approval, and that fit into a pattern Rupert recognized too easily.
 
He was startled from his thoughts by the loud ring of his phone, and he picked it up from the desk. "Giles."
 
"Hey, detective," Harris said on the other end. "I heard you've got the Pattons."
 
"Yes, we have. Have you heard about the Fergusons' as well?"
 
"Yeah, it's all over the airwaves; you think they're connected?"
 
Rupert rolled his eyes. "I'm not quite sure I need to answer that question."
 
"Nah, you don't," Harris replied. Rupert could almost hear him smiling. Smug bastard. "I've gone through both families' history five times this afternoon, and I've hit a dead end. I was hoping you could help me out."
 
Sighing, Rupert sat up straighter in his chair, and took off his glasses. "Harris, you know I can't give you any specific information about the case."
 
"I know, but look, I helped earlier, right?"
 
"Yes, you did," Rupert admitted with a groan.
 
"How about we talk over dinner? You sound like you could use a break, and from what I know of my dear friends who work for you, the guys in your team tend to skip meals -- I figured it's a trait derived from their supervisor."
 
Rupert laughed. "Perhaps it is."
 
"Come on, dinner, you and me, and talking, what do you say?"
 
Just as he was about to decline -- no matter how attractive the offer sounded, Rupert couldn't accept -- someone knocked on his door and Rupert looked up to find Spike there. "I have to go," he told Harris, and hung up. "What have you found?"
 
"The three nine mms bullets are definitely all from the same gun," Spike said, slumping down on one of the chairs, and throwing the reports on Rupert's desk. "The forty five's from Warren Patton's gun -- exact match. But I can't match the nine mms to any guns the Pattons have or had. And NIBIN turned up squat." Then he added. "Also, your executioner shoots like a sniper."
 
Rupert frowned, and looked more closely at the reports. "We can definitely hold Warren Patton for the murder of Jessa Holloway, but we have nothing on Gerry."
 
"Sorry, mate, can't fabricate a gun." Spike shrugged.
 
"Oh, I know. When you say 'shoots like a sniper,' you mean?"
 
"Exactly that," Spike replied. "Striations are a bit weird for a nine mm; wouldn't be surprised if it ended up being tricked for precision shooting."
 
"I'll keep that in mind." Rupert read both reports thoroughly and Spike was gone when he looked up. This case was turning up a little bit more complicated than he'd first anticipated.
 
"Oh, hey, Giles," Buffy walked in half an hour later, Finn the ever present shadow behind her. "So that money that suddenly appeared in both the Pattons' accounts early this morning is definitely from the heist. The jeweller's a bit of a control freak, and he has all his clerks put an invisible stamp on every bill bigger than a twenty. We did our magic on the bills from the deposit and voilà, instant stamp." She put a picture on his desk with a grin on her face.
 
Rupert let out a sigh of relief. There was the evidence he'd been waiting for all day; they wouldn't have to let Gerry Patton walk after all. "Good job," he told her. As long as the two brothers were in custody, everything else could be sorted out after a good night's sleep. They still had no lead on the nine mm executioner, but a refreshed body and mind would do more good than a tired one.
 
"Hey, that was Riley's idea; after the jeweller mentioned the stamping when we interrogated him again."
 
Riley shrugged and crossed his arms. "Just thought it was worth looking into."
 
Rupert remembered the brainless moron they'd hired the last time -- glowing recommendations that Rupert now suspected were more about getting rid of Parker Abrams than actually thinking he was any good -- and he had to smile and nod at Riley. "Following every lead is always a good motto to have when working here."
 
He was about to ask them if they'd had dinner already when his phone rang. Again. He looked at the display and groaned, but before he could ignore the call, Buffy shot a cheerful "say hi to Xander for me!", grabbed Riley's arms, and hauled him out of the office.
 
"Harris, please do stop calling," Rupert muttered into the phone as a greeting.
 
"Oh come on, I'm not that bad; I left you alone for a good four hours earlier."
 
True. But Rupert didn't want to give the man any credit for that, since Rupert had been in interrogation most of that time with his phone turned off. 
 
"Okay, look, I'm at the reception desk. I have take-out for two, and I just got a call from a friend with some info you might be interested in."
 
Dear God, would Harris never give up? Rupert did not fraternize with journalists. The last time he'd let one interfere, his knee had been shot; he wasn't willing to repeat the experience. But if Harris had information... "All right, I'll meet you there in a minute."
 
He sighed as he hung up. If Rupert hadn't started noticing more and more how attractive Harris was, they wouldn't have a problem at all -- well, apart from the interfering problem, but that could be handled easily enough if Rupert put his mind to it. Rupert had noticed, and it wasn't as if Harris were making it easy not to. The man flirted like it was going out of style.
 
Rupert pulled on his jacket, steeled himself for the task ahead, and went to meet Harris by the front desk.
 

 
They ended up in one of the conference rooms. Rupert put up the "occupied" sign, and closed the door, telling Harris to sit down. He'd brought Thai food, Rupert's favourite, and Rupert had to remind himself that it could only be a coincidence. "So, this information?" Rupert asked while opening what seemed to be his meal.
 
"Something didn't sit right with me, you know, with the Patton robbing a jewellery store, when Papa Patton just happened to have a fortune evaluated at about twice what Bill Gates makes in a year." Harris handed Rupert a fork while he spoke and settled in to eat his own meal. "So I did some digging into their finances, and turns out there's a little bit of a failsafe to Papa's will. None of the brothers could touch the inheritance before their dad had been dead a whole year."
 
Rupert looked up at him in surprise. "Do you have any proof of that?"
 
"No, I can't get access to the legal document, but you can," Harris told him, and smiled. "I figured you'd want to know so you can check up on it. From what my friend could dig up, the three Patton siblings are completely broke since one of Gerry's schemes went south about a month ago. They lost all their millions, and now they can't even afford the payments on their cars."
 
Rupert could probably get Cordelia on that, she was good with financial matters, and digging up account balances and transfers had always been something she seemed maybe just a little bit too cheerful about. "There might be more to Old Patton's will than simply this caveat. With the Fergusons and Henry dead, the remaining two siblings stand to inherit quite a bit of money."
 
Harris nodded at that. "I'm sure there's more to it; Patton was a funny man -- or at least, he thought he was being funny when most of the time he was just playing people."
 
"Your research turned up anything that could link the man to any criminal activity?" Rupert asked, curious.
 
"Not much -- just an old rape charge from twenty-seven years ago, but he was acquitted because of lack of evidence." Harris shrugged, and pointed at Rupert's rice which he was ignoring. "Are you going to eat that?"
 
Rupert blinked at him. "Why?"
 
"I could trade you my noodles for your rice."
 
He looked from Harris' plate to his own, considered the offer, and finally nodded. Harris reached for the plate and handed it back to him a minute later. "I suppose now you have more than enough material for a serial," Rupert said conversationally.
 
"Yeah. It'll be even better when we have the case solved. My boss has been pushing me all day for updates."
 
Rupert had to be hallucinating, because it looked like Harris might be blushing. A faint redness appeared on his cheeks, and he kept his eyes down. "Now you see how annoying you can be," Rupert said.
 
Harris shrugged. "Worth it though," he replied, looking up with a crooked smile.
 
If Rupert didn't know better, he'd think Harris wasn't only flirting, but flirting with him. Ridiculous. "Earlier, you promised me the story of how you came to be a journalist; I admit I'm rather curious about how a construction worker with a high school degree ends up writing and investigating crime stories for the Sunnydale Herald."
 
Harris laughed -- a short, delightful laugh -- and took another bite of food before declaring himself stuffed and pushing it out of the way. "I got to work one morning," he said, without preamble, "and the place was crawling with cops. That was just before the CSI team was formed, maybe a couple of months?"
 
Rupert nodded and kept eating as Harris talked.
 
"One of the guys on the night crew, Grantham, had fallen down from a railing about seven floors high and broken his neck. Cops ruled it an accident, and just like that things went back to same old same old on the site. There was just something about it that didn't sit right with me though, so I started writing down everything I knew off the top of my head, about Grantham, his wife, his three kids, his parents at the nursing home." Harris paused just long enough to get a drink of water, and then continued: "I spent two weeks asking the other crew guys what they knew and putting it together. Turns out Grantham's wife was having an affair with the supervisor; Grantham had found out at least two of the kids weren't his, fought with his wife about it several times a day on the phone, and had ended up moving in with his parents at the nursing home a couple of streets down from the site."
 
Rupert raised an eyebrow and stopped eating. "The wife did it?"
 
Harris shook his head. "That's what I thought too, but she'd have to climb up there, and she had a severe case of height phobia so I kept digging. The supervisor was rumoured to be kid number three's father, and his wife found out about the affair too from Grantham. She'd just filled for divorce five hours before Grantham died. Supervisor had gotten completely shit faced that night, and a couple of witnesses said they'd seen him at the site. So I just put two and two together."
 
"What did you do with the information?" Rupert asked.
 
"Sunnydale PD didn't want it because reopening the case would be a lot more trouble than it was worth, according to them. But Buffy and Willow kept pestering me about it, so I wrote it down and sent it to the Herald asking if they could put it in their letters from the readers section, and next thing I know, my text's making front page news." Harris held out his hands and shrugged. "PD gave in to pressure, reopened the case, and the supervisor went to prison for it. Then the fan mail started, and the Herald wouldn't leave me alone; they offered me a job that paid about twice what I was making. It was a no-brainer."
 
Rupert could see from the way Harris was telling the story that he was proud of what he'd accomplished, and there was a definite difference between Harris and any of the other investigative journalists he'd met before. Harris enjoyed and took pride in what he did, and he did it well.
 
He nodded at Harris. "I can see how it would be an easy decision to make." He also thought Harris did a great job too. He'd managed to become one of the most praised young journalists in a very short period of time. That alone was quite impressive.
 
"Yeah, and I liked the job," he repeated. "Made a few mistakes when I started though." He gave Rupert a smile, and tipped his head back to drink his soda.
 
Rupert purposefully avoided looking at him. "And how is that?" he asked, clearing his throat.
 
"They had me investigate a couple of crooked town officials my first month on the job. My mentor was some guy named Stan who looked like he hadn't showered in about three months," Xander said, wrinkling his nose. "I got there on my first day with a suit and a pair of really good shoes. I thought I'd make a good impression."
 
Rupert chuckled. "I suppose not."
 
"Hey, I was nineteen and trying way too hard. After that fiasco, I lost the suit and the shoes, and downgraded."
 
"The colourful look working better for you, then?" Rupert had to admit there was a good reasoning there. Xander -- Harris did look a lot less, Rupert wouldn't say threatening, but perhaps that was close enough.
 
"Yes, definitely," Xander agreed, nodding emphatically. "People tend to take me more seriously when I don't look serious. I still haven't figured out what the logic of that was."
 
That was twice now Rupert had thought of this annoying man as "Xander". He definitely needed to put an end to this da--meeting.
 
"I should head back to work," Rupert said, half-heartedly. "I still have to look up on those finances and finalize Gerry Patton's arrest warrant." He'd already finalized Warren's official arrest papers that afternoon after Spike had shown up in his office -- a rarity unto itself -- and only had to sign on Gerry's before he would be formally charged and taken into custody.
 
"Yeah, I guess I've been hogging enough of your time," Harris agreed, standing up and grabbing the empty containers of food and drink. "It's been fun though; we should do this again."
 
Before he could even process what he was saying, Rupert found himself agreeing. "Yes, perhaps tomorrow I shall repay the favour," he said with a smile, before the absurdity of it hit him. What in the bloody hell was he doing? Xander Harris was nothing but trouble and here Rupert was, enjoying himself at dinner with the man, thinking of him by his first name, and making plans to do it all over again. He needed to leave. Without giving Harris enough time to answer, Rupert opened the door, and hurried back to his office.
 

 
Before going home after dinner, Rupert had forwarded an official request for a copy of George Henry Patton's will, and it was waiting for him on his desk when he arrived at work in the morning. He shucked off his coat, hanging it on the coat hanger in the corner, and put down his briefcase before picking up the court approved envelop.
 
"Hey, boss," a voice in the doorway said.
 
He looked up to find Cordelia there, looking more refreshed and energetic than Rupert ever remembered being. This was the curse of working with a crew all several years younger than he was. "Hello, Cordelia," he said with a smile. "How may I help you this morning?" He sat down on his chair and pulled the will out of the envelope.
 
"It's more like, what I can do for you," Cordelia replied, passing him a note.
 
It was his handwriting, of course. He'd left her a note before he'd left yesterday. "Oh, yes, I'm in need of your expertise in finance."
 
"Point me at the bank account, and I'll get you all the info you need," she said with a gleeful smile. It was almost frightening, really, how digging up finance statements made her so happy.
 
"I need everything you can dig up on all three Patton siblings. Four, even, counting Mika Ferguson," Rupert explained. "We're looking for any hint of financial difficulties."
 
"I thought we had Gerry on the heist, what with the bill stamping," Cordelia said, frowning.
 
"We do, but motive would be a good thing to have."
 
"Right," Cordelia agreed. "More evidence is better than less."
 
"Quite." Rupert gave her a smile, and picked up the will again.
 
"I'm on it," she called out as she left.
 
He knew he'd have the information he needed within an hour, at most. Unless the Patton were good at hiding their bank statements, but even then, Cordelia was better.

Within an hour of being constantly interrupted by every CSI coming in for the day shift, and the night shift leaving, Rupert had barely read one paragraph of the will. Everyone else was back on track: Riley and Buffy working on the heist, analyzing every bit of evidence that had been collected the day before, while Gunn and Angel were working the Fergusons' murders for same.
 
Wills were tricky things to read, and absolutely boring if they didn't concern you. Rupert skipped the first page of definitions and precisions, and moved to the second part, which turned out to be the interesting one.
 
"Hey boss, found anything?"
 
Rupert groaned, and took off his glasses. "First of all, Harris, I'm not your employer, and second, how in the hell did you get past Harmony?"
 
"Oh, Buffy was there, she let me in," Harris walked in and sat down on Rupert's extra chair. "She's awesome like that."
 
Rupert rolled his eyes, making a mental note to have a talk with his lead CSI about letting journalists inside the offices without approval, and straightened up. "I imagine there's a purpose to this visit?"
 
"There's always a purpose," Harris quipped. "Actually, not much. I'm getting diddly about anything this morning. But I've already got the first part of the serial written and off to my editor and he wants it approved by you before he runs it." He put a manila folder on the desk and
 
Standard procedure when Harris was working one of his cases, something Rupert had made sure of during their first joint case. "I'll read it as soon as I'm done with this."
 
That seemed to grab Harris' attention. "Hey, is that Papa Patton's will?"
 
"Yes, and please don't peek," Rupert said, putting the envelope on top of the papers he'd been reading.
 
"Okay, no peeking," Harris replied, sitting back. "But nothing says you can't tell me..."
 
"I've found something interesting," Rupert sighed. Harris would figure it out sooner or later, and it was all for the sake of information. "Patton senior had a rather wry sense of humour, and the last game he played on his children was to include a clause that states that any child fathered by him had a right to his or her fair share of the family money. The houses, cars, and boats were divided between his three legitimate children, but the money itself was to be divided equally for any child he'd contributed half the DNA of."
 
"Whoa," Harris exclaimed, impressed. "I bet the brothers weren't all that happy about that. Turns out -- and that's about the only information I got since last night, and I didn't think it was that relevant, except wow, it actually is. Anyway, turns out Papa Patton was a ladies' man, hard core." He opened his backpack and took out a manila envelope in surprisingly good shape, considering where it had spent the last little while. "My contact dug up a list of about fifty or so regular mistresses, and that's just within the past ten years. Morgane Ferguson was just the one he stuck with the longest."
 
"If Gerry and Warren knew about their father's woman habit, I suppose they could have concluded there were a lot more than just the four of them out there," Rupert added. "The killer we're looking for might have been hired to kill more than only Henry and the Fergusons."
 
Harris nodded. "Yeah, but it's just conjecture, because as long as you don't have a suspect..." He shrugged.
 
"Yes, Harris, I do know how this works," Rupert snapped. "Perhaps it would be best if you left."
 
"Keep the list, I got a copy," Harris said, before he stood and made his exit--
 
--bumping right into Snyder on the way out.
 
"Mr. Harris." Snyder's eyes narrowed and he pursed his nose. "Maybe you've forgotten, but your kind isn't allowed in this part of the precinct."
 
As annoyed as Rupert might by Harris, he hated Snyder's attitude even more. A lot more. "Mr. Harris is here on my invitation," Rupert told the snivelly little man. "His first article on the Patton case is up and I must review it before it is published."
 
Snyder turned to him and they stared each other down. "You review the articles?"
 
"Procedures," Rupert answered. "We've implemented them when the Sunnydale Herald hired Mr. Harris as a crime scene investigative journalist." Rupert hoped the message was clear. He was certain it was, but Snyder was sneaky and calculating. Not even a week on the job, and Rupert hated him already.
 
"All right, but take this business outside of the personnel offices. We have meeting rooms for a reason." Snyder turned around on his heels and left the way he'd come hopefully forgetting all about why he'd been walking this way in the first place.
 
Harris looked Giles up and down, eyes blinking in awe and a suspicious flush on his cheeks. "Hey, thanks," he said. Then he was gone.
 
Rupert had to stop himself from sending Snyder a memo later that morning, reminding him that the meeting rooms out front were for interrogating families of victims and witnesses, not meetings that pertained to business. Instead, he went back to reading the will.
 

Cordelia brought the bank reports just before lunch time, and Rupert spent the next couple of hours pouring over them. The information confirmed that all three Pattons had been considerably in debts at the time of the heist. What made no sense yet to Rupert was that Mika Ferguson was also bankrupted, and so was his mother. They might have been coaxed into participating in Gerry's "scheme," whatever that might be, but Rupert had a hard time figuring out why.
 
When his cellphone rang, he half-expected it to be Harris, calling for a lead, or with information, and he caught himself just in time from answering with an annoyed "what do you want?" and instead said: "Giles speaking."
 
Officer Doyle's voice answered him on the other end of the line, and Rupert was on his feet and out of his office before either of them had hung up. He called Buffy from his car. "Drop what you're doing, and meet me at 562 Franklin. We have another DB."
 
Officer Doyle was waiting for him when Rupert turned into the driveway. The small house was set comfortably in between two much bigger houses. Franklin Street was in the quietest neighbourhood of Sunnydale, and Rupert had a hard time reconciliating this decor with what he saw when he walked in.
 
"I called you as soon as I saw the body, detective," Doyle said in his distinctive Irish brogue. "Told everyone to step out and wait for your guys."
 
"Good thinking," Rupert agreed, crouching down next to the body. A young woman this time, perhaps twenty-five years old, long brown hair, chubby cheeks, and a pair of dark brown eyes staring straight ahead. "Have you contacted the ME?"
 
"Dr. Wyndam-Pryce is on his way."
 
Rupert gave a nod, and pulled on a latex glove to move the woman's head until he could see her forehead clearly; this was definitely a familiar looking bullet wound. "Who called it in?" he asked, looking up at the officer.
 
"Neighbour," Doyle replied, waving at a woman standing just outside the door with her arms crossed over her chest. "She saw the car still in the driveway this morning, and tried to call, but got no answer. Two of them seem pretty close."
 
"Mm mmm," Rupert acquiesced. He stood up and took off the glove. "Her name?"
 
"Hilary Lambert, twenty-seven years old," Doyle answered quickly. "Lives alone with no pet."
 
"Thank you." Rupert would have to wait for Wesley and Spike's analysis, but preliminary findings definitely seemed to conclude that this woman was a fifth body for their case. He brought Buffy and Riley up to speed when they came in, and then said: "I'll need the bullet sent straight to Spike the moment you find it. And have Wesley send a sample of her DNA to Willow for testing."
 
Then he turned to the officer. "Anyone seen anything out of the ordinary?"
 
"Nothing, s'far as I can tell, but you might wanna talk to the neighbour."
 
"I'll do that."
 
Rupert walked out of the house, taking a deep breath. He couldn't tell if the woman had been a Patton, but he supposed it was possible. Before he went to talk to the neighbour, he flipped open his phone.
 
"Hey, Giles!" Harris answered cheerfully after barely half a ring.
 
Rupert groaned. He'd brought this on himself. "In that list you have of all of Patton's mistresses, is there any named "Lambert"?"
 
"Let me check--" Rupert heard Harris shuffling through paper, and then finally: "No, no Lambert. But this list only goes back ten years, so if your new DB is a Patton, it's possible her mom didn't last that long."
 
"You've heard, then?"
 
"All over the waves, boss, all over the waves," Harris replied, voice annoyingly chipper. "Besides, I got my informers too, so even if I wasn't connected to police radio, I'd still get the news fast enough."
 
"I suppose so."
 
"Look, I can dig more into this if you want? You said Lambert, right? I could see if anything turns up about her mom." Then he added: "And I promise I'm not going to divulge her name to the press. I like having my editorials exclusive."
 
Rupert rolled his eyes, but kept himself from making any sort of derogatory comment. "All right, please dig. Call me if you find something."
 
"Will do, Boss!"
 
Groaning, Rupert flipped his phone shut again, and turned to their (so far) only witness.

The witness, Mrs. Strumer, had one piece of interesting information: a man, somewhere between twenty and thirty years old -- she couldn't tell because of the hat he'd been wearing -- had been by the night before Ms. Lambert's death. Mrs. Strumer had been sitting on her balcony waiting for her daughter to come home, and she'd seen him arrive. He'd knocked and rung the doorbell twice, before doubling back. She'd never seen the man before, and Ms. Lambert was a quiet sort, or so Mrs. Strumer said, and barely ever had anyone but her mother in for a visit.

Rupert had asked her to go to the station to give a deposition, and meet with their sketch artist. It was now two hours later, and he was staring at the sketch intently. The man's face looked familiar, in a distant sort of way, and he couldn't quite place him. He'd have to show the others and see if anyone recognized him.

He was putting down the drawing when his phone rang. "Giles."

"I get that you've been busy," Harris said, again without preamble. The man was irritatingly impolite. "But, it's almost dinner time, and you owe me food."

Rupert refrained from adding the obvious comment about Harris' intention, fearing they wouldn't be taken into the right context. "I need an hour to wrap things up here and see if my CSIs have everything under control. Meet me at the front desk then?"

"I am at the front desk," Harris replied. "Harmony doesn't look real happy to see me, and I'm kinda scared she's picking up the phone to call that Snyder guy right now. He gives me the creeps."

"Yes, I can see why," Rupert said, sighing. "Very well, I'll be as quick as I can. Given the circumstances, perhaps you'd rather wait in my office?" Not that he wanted the man anywhere near him right now, especially when he'd have to endure at least an hour of his company soon enough, but Rupert had a strange moment of solidarity for him. Snyder was not the kind of man you wanted to face on an empty stomach. Or ever, actually.

Dear Lord, but he loathed the new Chief.

"Yeah, and I promise not to snoop or peek at anything." Rupert could almost see Harris holding up his hands in that much too endearing way of his.

"Right then." Rupert hung up. Less than a minute later, Harris was at his doorway. "Come in, and sit down," Rupert said, holding the sketch in one hand while he waved Xander in. "I'll be as quick as possible." Then he added, "There is a lock on the door if you see Snyder come this way."

Xander shot him a grateful look, and Rupert walked out, ignoring the way his chest tightened at the sight of Xander's smile.

Harris, Rupert reminded himself sternly. There was really no need for first names in their strictly job-related relationship.

"Buffy," he called, walking into the evidence room a few doors down. She was sitting on a stool, Riley just a few feet down the table, examining pieces of evidence from that afternoon's shooting. "I've a sketch of a potential suspect. Perhaps you could circulate it before going home tonight?"

Buffy gave him a distracted nod and picked up the paper. "You know that shoe print we found at the first and second crime scenes?"

"Yes, I remember." It was a puzzle to say the least. The Fergusons had been murdered before the heist took place, and yet the print at the jewellery store was older than the one at the Pine Street flat, as evidenced by the fact that the second print had dirt from the first one.

Riley took over. "We think we found a similar one in Ms. Lambert's flower bed, but it's not the same shoe."

"Same size, though, and roughly the same width too," Buffy added. "Maybe he got a new pair?"

Rupert considered that. "Perhaps our perp simply owns more than one pair of shoes. Has Willow gotten the results of the DNA test yet?"

Buffy shook her head, and kept her eyes on the sketch in her hands. "Not as far as I know, and Spike's still doesn't have his bullet. It was stuck in the woman's head, and Wesley isn't done getting it out."

Yes, of course, it'd only been a few hours after all. "All right, no one pulls a double shift tonight, I want you refreshed and alert in the morning; this case is at a standstill as it is. Though if anything turns up before you leave, please call me."

Buffy waved him off distractedly, while Riley shot him a "Sure thing, boss."

Rupert stopped to tell Angel he was leaving and also told him to take a look at the sketch Buffy had as soon as he could, and then met with Harris in his office again.

"Ready?" Xander asked, eagerly getting to his feet. Much too eagerly.

"Yes, shall we?"

"We shall," Xander replied, with a flourish. "Oh," he said, turning around to pick up a manila folder from the desk. "Alibi."

"Alibi?" Rupert asked, frowning. He recognized the folder as being the one holding Xander's article, which he hadn't had time to read yet.

"For in case we get caught on the way out and Snyder asks too many questions."

Oh. "I see," Rupert said. "Good thinking."

"Thanks," Xander beamed. "I try."

Harris--Oh, bloody hell, Rupert sighed. He might as well give in. Xander it was.

Xander's plan ended up being really helpful when they passed by Harmony's desk and heard "Detective Giles!" bellowed in Snyder's easily recognizable tone. "What do you think you're doing? Your shift ends in an hour."

Rupert slowly turned to him and quirked an eyebrow. "Yes, and I am, in fact, still working."

Snyder sneered at him. "How is that? You're on your way out, and you've just told your staff you were leaving for the day."

Rupert took a deep breath. "Mr. Harris and I are meeting to discuss his article. Since we need to be uninterrupted while we do so, we figured it'd be best if we did it outside of the precinct. Perhaps you'd like to join us?" He said it in the most innocent tone, and could see Xander repressing a laugh from the corner of his eye.

Snyder spluttered incoherently.

"Of course, it'll be quite boring, as we'll be going over every paragraph, and it might take several hours," Rupert added.

The man harrumphed and glared at him. "I'm watching you, detective." Then he turned around, and walked decisively back towards his office.

"Man, that was glorious," Xander said, laughing, when they emerged from the building. "I thought he was going to have a heart attack right there."

Rupert found himself smiling and laughing as well. "His face did turn a rather deep shade of red, didn't it?"

"Oh yeah. I was scared for a minute that he was going to actually, you know, come with us, but that was still awesome." He stopped at the street corner and looked in every direction, before settling his eyes on Rupert. "Where we going?"

Rupert hadn't thought much about it, but he figured if he was going to have to suffer through a dinner with Harris again, he should at least do it somewhere comfortable. "There's a lovely restaurant down the street, just a few blocks away, Rosemary's, have you heard of it?"

"Yeah," Xander said, his smile widening. "Never been though; the food's supposed to be pretty good."

"It truly is," Rupert replied. It had opened just a few months earlier, and Rupert had fallen for the quiet, café-like atmosphere the first time he'd walked in. "I'm surprised you haven't tried it yet," he added as they walked.

Xander gave a shrug. "I'm more of a diner kinda guy, usually. I mean, I make good-enough money, but some restaurants are still out of my league."

Rupert filed that information away. He knew journalists in Xander's field didn't make that good of a salary, but Rosemary's was certainly not an expensive restaurant by anyone's standards. He didn't ask though, as it was none of his business. Perhaps Xander had plans that involved putting money aside, and thus meals out, unless strictly necessary, were out of the question.

Knowing it wasn't any concern of his didn't make Rupert any less curious.

They were seated in the back of the room, at Rupert's request -- they would be discussing sensitive information, and a view on the street was definitely not ideal for this -- and the waiter immediately brought them menus and glasses of water.

"So," Xander asked, a few minutes later. He put down his menu, folding it back properly, and grinned in a somewhat comical way. "What made you leave your home country?"

"Isn't that quite personal? And never mind the fact that I'm certain you've read what public record there is on me out there." Rupert picked his meal and put his menu down on top of Xander's.

"What can I say, you asked me why I'm doing what I'm doing, and I figured now it's my turn," Xander said, leaning forward. "Anyway, you don't really want to talk about work, do you? My article won't be published until this case is cleared, so there's no rush."

"There are still a few points we need to discuss," Rupert said firmly. He had no desire to speak of anything but work.

Or perhaps it was the opposite. He had an intense desire for this to be something it obviously was not, and could not let himself fall into this trap. Not again.

"All right, a deal," Xander said, putting down his glass of water. "We talk business until the food gets here, and I mean the main course, appetizers don't count. But the moment we get our plates? No more business and you answer that question."

It was a recipe for disaster, though Rupert still nodded in agreement. He should have brought the sketch with him to show Xander. Although that was not allowed, Xander did have a knack for remembering faces, if not names. "This sounds reasonable."

"Good."

Just then, their waiter came back to take their order, and promptly went away. "We had a witness on the Lambert case," Rupert said, when the man was out of earshot. "The neighbour saw a man come by the house in the evening, when Ms. Lambert was out."

"Did you get a sketch?" Xander asked.

"Yes, not a very good one, but I suppose it's better than nothing."

"Too general?"

Rupert pursed his lips. "Somewhat. The witness only had partial details, as the man was wearing a baseball cap, but the face is familiar, and I've the feeling we're missing something." It felt like there was one rather large piece of the puzzle missing, the kind that was right in front of them, but no one could see until their faces were shoved in it. He hated cases like this.

"See, I have this feeling I can't shake off," Xander said, leaning forward with his elbows on the table. "There's something that's rubbing me the wrong way about the Holloways."

"Oh? And why is that?" Rupert frowned, taking off his glasses. He had never even reconsidered the Holloways. Jessa Holloway was dead, and her husband a properly grieving widow left alone with a child too young to have lost her mother. Perhaps, Rupert thought as he remembered Mr. Holloway's face when they'd met, perhaps the man was grieving too properly. There was nothing out of place about him, and that seemed odd to Rupert all of a sudden.

"I don't know," Xander admitted. "It's too clear cut or something. See, the brothers didn't set up to kill anyone in that robbery, all they wanted was the money. And Warren's been saying left and right that yeah, it was his gun, but no, he didn't kill the woman."

"Yes, I know," Rupert said. "He's made it quite clear he believes Henry pulled the trigger despite all evidence of the contrary."

"It doesn't matter who did it, but that they didn't want it to happen. Something must have set them off."

"Perhaps she'd said something--"

"Did the jewellery store have any video surveillance?" Xander asked, suddenly.

Rupert groaned quietly. He really disliked being interrupted. "Yes," he sighed. "But we can barely see or hear anything from the angle of the cameras." Andrew Wells, their video tech expert, had been working on it almost non-stop, to try to enhance the sound and/or image, and had yet to come see Rupert with any sort of result. He'd have to check up on Wells' progress in the morning. Even just a passable audio feed would be better than nothing. Of course, that meant subjecting himself to Andrew's unique way of communicating -- Rupert needed a "Pop Culture References to English" translator almost every time -- but it needed to be done. Or perhaps he'd send Finn. See how the new guy handled yet another one of the crazy people this lab held.

As if reading Rupert's mind, Xander said, "I'm sure Andrew'll figure something out; he's a tech whiz."

If Xander hadn't already been a good friend of most of his staff before any of them had ever been hired -- and when Xander had yet to find his calling as a journalist -- Rupert would think he was befriending them for inside information. "I'm afraid of how Snyder will take your being friends with possibly all of the technicians and CSIs on the payroll," he admitted.

Xander smiled. "Buffy'll kick his ass the moment he tries to say something stupid about it." He shrugged and pulled back when the waiter arrived with their appetizers. "Then they'll quit en masse and Snyder'll be in so much trouble, he'll hire them back. It's not like Sunnydale's a big city, you know. Crime rate's high, but there aren't all that many science experts living here, and not a lot of people want to move here for work either."

Rupert, though, no matter what Snyder might think, trusted everyone he worked with, and while Xander tended to be the annoying sort, he was also too honest and loyal to do anything to jeopardize work or friendship.

"And it's not my fault all my friends are geeks," he added with a smile, before digging into his soup.

"Perhaps not, but it does say a great deal about you," Rupert said, picking up his own spoon. It was carrot soup tonight, one of his favourites.

In between two spoonsful of soup, Xander said, "I think I'm gonna see if I can dig up anything on the rape charges against Patton the patriarch from twenty-seven years ago."

"That sounds like a good plan," Rupert agreed. That would possibly mean Xander would be out of his hair for part of the day on what Rupert imagined would be a fool's errand. Although, at the same time, Rupert liked to have as much information about the concerned parties of each cases he worked, no matter how trivial, and knowing why those rape charges had been either dropped or dismissed would feed his curiosity.

And now that he was focused on it, Holloway did seem dodgy to him as well.

"How old is Holloway?" Xander asked, putting down his spoon, and pushing away his empty bowl.

Rupert held his gaze, jaw set and mouth firmly closed but for letting soup in.

"Oh, come on, Giles, it's not like this is something that'd be hard for me to find out." Xander turned to dig into his messenger bag on the seat next to him, pulling out his cellphone. "One call and I'll get that information out of someone."

Rupert sighed. "All right, true enough. He's twenty-six or so, I believe. Not that I've paid that much attention to him, since he was the husband of our first victim, and not a suspect."

"Yeah, figures," Xander said. "But that would fit."

"Fit what?" Rupert brought the last spoonful of soup to his lips.

Xander gave him a half shrug and a smile. "It's just some weird theory that's taking shape in my brain. If I'm right, I'll tell you all about it tomorrow, promise. I know you value evidence over theory, so you'll have to wait."

Their waiter returned, clearing out their empty plates, and replacing them with their main course. "Is everything all right here?" the man asked, smiling in that constipated way some restaurant workers had when they were clearly not happy to be working at that moment.

"Everything's fine," Rupert answered. "Thank you."

There was a moment of comfortable silence while they took the first few bites of their meal -- delicious shepherd's pie for Rupert, and steak and potatoes for Xander. When his phone rang, Rupert put down his fork and reached for it. "Rupert Giles."

"Hey, Giles!" Buffy said, jovially. "Sorry to interrupt your date--"

Rupert groaned. "It is not--"

"--but I've got some news," Buffy continued without acknowledging him. "Spike got his bullet and he confirms it's the same as the other three. So fourth body for our sharp shooter. And I went around the lab with that sketch and everyone's saying the guy looks familiar, but they can't put their finger on who it is."

"I was afraid of that." It was exactly what he'd thought. The sketch was their first lead for their serial killer, but it was too vague to do them any good yet. "Thanks anyway for the update, and Buffy--"

"Tell Xander I said hi," she interrupted him, again, too chipper for Rupert's good. "Have a good time!" And then she hung up.

Rupert pinched the bridge of his nose, and when he looked up, Xander was smiling at him broadly, his smile reaching the corner of his eyes. Rupert almost did a double take. Bloody hell -- "Buffy says hi," he managed to said despite the knot in his throat -- this was a date.

He looked at his plate, and then up at Xander again. He should leave. Run. Never look back. This was definitely a recipe for disaster; he'd almost gone down this road once before and had promised never let temptation win. Yet he felt compelled to stay.

Rupert hid his sudden realization by stuffing another forkful of pie in his mouth.

"Did she have anything interesting to say?" Xander asked.

Shaking his head, Rupert reached for his napkin and lay it down on his lap. "Not so much; just confirmation that the bullet does point to the same killer and the sketch hasn't turned up anything so far."

"So things we already suspected," Xander concluded. "Anyway, main course is here, so you owe me an answer."

Oh dear Lord. Rupert groaned, and went to take off his glasses, only to find them gone already. He picked them up from the table and put them back on instead. "I'm not sure we should--"

Xander nodded and looked down at his plate, pursing his lips. "Yeah, okay, never mind."

Rupert should not, in any way, be feeling guilty right then. Xander had tricked him into asking him out, and now he wanted to dig into Rupert's past. Rupert wouldn't be another cover story. He'd spent the past five years learning to deal with what had happened, and not just so it could be splattered all over the headlines again.

But he did feel guilty at the look on Xander's face, and at the way he held his head down. Perhaps, this being a date -- despite Rupert being thoroughly unaware of it until now -- perhaps Xander's motives weren't moved by a desire for information, but by a desire to get to know Rupert. That happened to be something Rupert truly wasn't used to. Even with Olivia, despite their lifelong friendship, things between them had always, somehow, related to business.

He sighed, and swallowed his mouthful before speaking. "The last case I worked in England did not go so well."

Xander perked up and gave a swift nod. "I read about that, from the newspaper articles."

"Yes, there was quite a scandal over the whole thing." And Olivia, whom Rupert had known for more than half their lives, had ended up dead.

"That journalist, you really were, you know, an item?" Xander asked, suspiciously nervous.

Rupert couldn't make heads or tails of Xander's tone of voice, but he still answered, "No, we weren't. She was an old friend." And he was surprised that talking about her wasn't as painful as it used to be. She'd pursued him relentlessly for years, until finally giving up. The tabloids, however, had immediately seized on their close relationship and made a mess of things, after Olivia's death. Rupert hadn't lost his job, but it had been a close call, and it was made clear that he should start looking for some other precinct to work at, while he was still in recovery.

"Sorry," Xander whispered. "It said you got shot..."

"My knee, yes," Rupert replied. He absently rubbed at his knee before catching himself, and putting his hand firmly on the table.

"Okay, so let me see if I can put the puzzle together." Xander stared into space for a moment, lips pursed and food forgotten. Rupert took another few bites while he waited. "So, you were one of the best detectives Bath PD ever had -- and I know that because you're the best one Sunnydale PD's ever had, and I figure you didn't just suddenly become cool when you moved here -- and you were working with a journalist who had a huge crush on you."

Rupert tried not to draw too many parallels with his current life, but the description was accurate enough.

Xander went on. "You were investigating a serial killer with a taste for middle aged black women, and your journalist friend wouldn't wait for you to catch up with her, and decided to act as bait."

He hung his head down, and listened. Xander really did have a talent for this. Olivia had left a message on Rupert's answering machine that night; short and to the point, just like she always was. By the time he'd gotten the message, it had already been too late.

"When you rushed to find and save her, you found her already dead, and you got shot, and the killer decided it'd be a much better idea to kill himself than to go to prison."

Of course most of those details were in the published articles and the police report, but that didn't make Xander's tale any less true. He'd taken out the trashy tales of a behind the scenes romance, and of an imagined fight that had to have occurred between them and meant Rupert had ignored Olivia, and thus led to her death; fight which painted Rupert as a very nasty human being indeed. The truth was, Rupert had been in a meeting with several colleagues while they put together evidence, and Olivia had known that. She'd chosen that time to act, because she knew Rupert wouldn't be there to stop her, or do anything that would jeopardize her quest for information. She'd wanted to be in the skin of a victim, to make her article that much more appealing to readers.

That didn't lessen Rupert's guilt at all. It only heightened it. He'd known her inside and out, and she'd told him what she'd do if he wasn't looking over her shoulder every step of the way. He should have seen the signs. She'd never understood the risks.

"What I don't get," Xander added, "is why you came here. I mean, you had a career over there, you solved more crimes than any one of your colleagues, and you still decided to move all your stuff to sunny Cal."

Rupert looked straight at him. "During my recovery, I received a call from an ME friend who'd been contacted about a new CSI lab opening here. You might know him." He quirked an eyebrow at Xander and bit into his piece of bread.

"Wesley? You mean you knew Wyndham-Pryce before moving here?" Xander seemed genuinely surprised by this; it was almost heart-warming for Rupert to think that some things could stay secret in this world.

"Yes, we were at Oxford -- well, not quite together, as he's a few years younger and was in a completely different field, but we knew the same people." Rupert took a sip of his water, and another bite of food. "I was in need of being far away from what had happened, and he was asking for permission to leave my name with the Sunnydale Chief of Police. I agreed. I wasn't expecting any job offers, but Chief Flutie quite shockingly offered me the lead of the department, and I was on a flight as soon as my orthopaedist cleared me for travel." Oh, how he missed the man now. Flutie had died on duty just over four months ago, and it had taken quite a long time before they'd found a suitable replacement; and saying Snyder was "suitable" took quite a stretch of the imagination. Sure, he got the work done, but he acted more like a school principal would with wayward teenagers, than a Chief of Police with trained officers and scientists under his command.

"Wow, I never would have figured that part out," Xander said.

The rest of their meal passed in agreeable conversation while Rupert recounted the first days of the CSI lab, with Xander adding bits and pieces of information along the way, from the time Buffy and Willow, both his best friends from high school, had been hired.

The first crew of CSIs that Rupert had worked with in Sunnydale had been from all over California and the lower surrounding states, and they'd been there on a "loan" from the other PDs until the precinct had their own scientists and officers working the labs. The only one left from that time apart from Rupert and Wesley, was Winifred Burkle in Trace, who'd finally decided not to head home to Texas after her contract had been over. Rupert had immediately offered her a permanent job as while she was a little eccentric, and possibly more than a little insane, she definitely was the best. Everyone else had been personally handpicked by Rupert, and most of them were born and bred in Sunnydale. And all of them were fairly close to or less than thirty years old. They had the youngest overall mean age of any CSI lab in the States, which sometimes gave Rupert nightmares, but also made him quite proud of everyone's efficiency.

When the waiter came back with dessert, Rupert asked for one bill, and Xander shot him a look of surprise. The lad hadn't thought Rupert had been onto the "date" yet, or perhaps he'd been expecting to be the one paying. Rupert smiled at him, and handed his credit card to the waiter.

They walked out into the cool night air and down the street in silence, and finally stopped next to Xander's car in the precinct parking lot. Rupert's car was in the underground garage.

"Look, I -- thank you. For paying, I mean," Xander mumbled and stuttered.

Rupert nodded nervously. "My pleasure, really. After all, you paid for yesterday's meal." And oh, dear lord, had he truly been that blind? Harris had been pursuing him for weeks, now, and Rupert had only figured this out tonight. The urge to run away reared its ugly head again, and this time he could, if he truly wanted, just turn around and leave.

Except not, because Xander was grabbing his arms, and pushing him up against the side of his car. "Okay, this is probably a really bad place to do this, but I really wanna kiss you right now."

Rupert glanced at the front door of the precinct, more than just a few feet away; it was empty, the light from the hallway inside streaming in through the window into the dark night. The parking lot was also empty of onlookers. There were many reasons Rupert shouldn't allow this to happen, but none of them was that they could get caught right now, and so he leaned in and pressed his lips against Xander's warm mouth. A shrill ran through him at the touch, and he gripped Xander's forearms tightly.

When they pulled back, Xander looked flushed and slightly out of breath. "I know you're going to say this is a mistake, or at least you're thinking it right now, but I'm going to tell you this, and then I'm never going to mention it again," he said, and Rupert could feel him trembling slightly against his palms. "I'm not your reporter friend from England. I know I'm basically doing the same job she did, and you're probably scared to let yourself get close to me because of that, because you don't want anything to happen to me that could, in some really remote and stupid way, be your fault; and fuck if I don't get that. It took me forever before I worked up the nerves to sit behind the wheels of a car after my high school boyfriend got himself killed in a car accident on graduation day, and seriously--" he coughed, out of breath, before finishing with: "I know how it feels okay?"

Blinking in what he assumed must look quite idiotic Rupert nodded and ran his hands up Xander's arms to curve around his shoulders and pull him closer.

"Anyway, I'm not her, and I'm not going to be stupid and put myself in danger just because I can. I really like being alive. Like, a lot, and my readers aren't worth getting myself killed for any kind of reason whatsoever. And I like you more than a lot, and--"

"Xander," Rupert interrupted him, kissing Xander's lips again briefly. He could hear Xander's words and he knew their meaning, but all he could think about was that they were in the Police Department parking lot, and they really needed to be somewhere else to have this conversation. "You know where I live, correct?"

Xander nodded emphatically, licking his lips as if looking for a lingering taste of Rupert on them. "Yes, yeah, I know."

"I'll fetch my car and see you there, all right? Flat twenty-two, on the second floor," he added, unsure whether Xanderknew, or simply had a vague idea of which building Rupert lived in.

"I know; one six three Holland Drive, right off Main Street," Xander said quickly, nervously.

Rupert was starting to have doubts about Xander driving at all. He looked stunned, and more than a bit shaky. "Are you certain you're fit to drive?"

Xander gave a decisive nod, and let go of Rupert, smoothing down the edge of his shirt. "I'll be fine," he said steadily. "Don't worry. I just had -- a moment."

That explained nothing, really, but Rupert didn't ask again. He straightened up from the car, and watched Xander get to the driver's side door. "I'll see you in twenty minutes," he said, cursing the nervousness in his voice.

Xander smiled at him, and climbed in.

Rupert made a quick stop by his office to put down Xander's article, and see if there were any messages. He waved at Oz and Faith, the only two CSIs on the night shift -- as, contrary to most other cities, there were a lot less crime in Sunnydale at night than during the day, or at least the crimes were quieter and they tended to find the scenes in the morning and not at night -- on the way, and unlocked his door quickly. The sketch had been put back carefully on top of one pile of paperwork, and there were no written messages on the seat of his chair where they usually were. There was, however, a message on the answering machine.

"Hey, Giles, it's Willow. Um, so I don't have your DNA results because the machine kind of went poof and lost all my data, and I'll have to rerun the test tomorrow morning, but Snyder wants me to redo all the tests from the last week, because he thinks the malfunction may have cause 'skewed readings' or something -- as if I wouldn't have noticed or whatever; it's not like I don't know how to do my job. But I'll have to redo them and everything. I'm going to start tonight," she said, "but Buffy said that you said no double shifts, so I need to leave in like, ten minutes, and I won't have time to rerun the Lambert samples until tomorrow and I hope you can forgive me for this. I promise it's not my fault. I'm actually pretty sure it was Cordelia's fault, because she used it yesterday to run the Ferguson DNA behind my back and it was working fine before that, and she probably touched something she shouldn't have. Anyway..."

She took a deep breath and went on, "I hope you had a good time with Xander last night, or tonight, whatever time it is; I don't know when you're gonna get the message. I know you don't like to discuss your personal life with us and I promise I won't mention it again unless you do first, but just--" She paused and for a moment Rupert thought she'd been disconnected. "Just don't hurt him, okay?" She was silent again, and Rupert, thinking she was done again, went to delete the message, but then he heard her whisper, "he hasn't had a lot of luck with boyfriends, you know. The first one he had died from a blood disease when we were fifteen, and they'd been best friends forever, and then there was Larry, and he got killed in a car accident on Graduation day, and I don't know why I'm telling you all this, just that I think it's stuff you should know." He heard her breathe deeply again, and then: "I'll see you tomorrow."

He heard the click of the phone being disconnected this time, and his finger hovered over the delete button.

"Hey," Oz said behind him. Dear lord, how long had the lad been there? Rupert cursed Oz's silent nature under his breath. "Want us to look at the Patton case? Place's dead."

Rupert shook his head, and pushed his finger until the red display light blinked from "1" to "0". "Perhaps you should look over what evidence we have. We might have missed something."

"Case's kind of a mess, isn't it?" Oz asked.

"Yes, that would be an accurate description." Rupert picked up the sketch and handed it to Oz. "See if you can match this to anyone who might be connected to the case. And check to see if Andrew did anything with the surveillance tapes before he left." If Wells had managed anything, Rupert knew he'd have left whatever it was he'd found or done in the evidence room. Then he looked sternly at Faith, who was leaning against the doorway behind Oz with a smirk on her face. "Oh, and please, no heroics. This case is complicated enough, we can continue working on it in the morning. I'm only asking you two to do this to have a new set of eyes looking at it."

"Ah, boss," Faith crooned, "you know I like solving the cases I work on."

That would be why he'd hired her, actually. It was certainly not for her charming personality. Truth was, the woman scared him. "Yes, I do know," he said sternly, eyeing them both in turn. "But I do not want either of you to rush into anything. If you need to follow up a lead that cannot wait until the morning, please clear it with me first."

"No prob," Oz said.

"Sure, whatever, just let me play with the big kids now." Faith grinned, angling her body in that distinctive curl of hers; the one that meant trouble.

Rupert rolled his eyes at her. "I mean it, Faith."

Her expression changed to one of utter seriousness. "I know, Giles, trust me. I'm not gonna do anything."

"All right, and if you do find something we've missed, I'll even let you work a double shift so you can help us during the day." He smirked. Faith would never go for it.

Oz gave a shrug and said "sure," while Faith blinked. "Oh yeah, like I'm gonna miss on my beauty sleep because the day shift's dumb. Nuh uh."

Rupert sighed fondly and grabbed his keys from his pockets. He had to leave now, or Xander would start wondering if Rupert had stood him up.

Bloody hell, just what did he think he was doing? Dating a reporter? Snogging him in the parking lot? Meeting him for what was obviously meant to lead to sex?

He cleared his throat. "Right then, I'll be going. I'll see you both in the morning."

He called Xander to let him know he was running late, and then had to park the car two blocks from his apartment building just to breathe.

Rupert was a grown man, for heaven's sake, and he should not be having a breakdown because he was about to have sex with a ridiculously attractive young reporter. And the fact that he'd noticed how attractive Xander was should, really, have been a clue of what was happening between them, but Rupert really had been blind to all this.

His team, however, clearly hadn't been. Though he supposed Xander could have told Willow and Buffy about this evening himself. And this, of course, only made it clearer just how much of a bad idea this was.

But Rupert still found himself calming down when he remembered how much he'd actually enjoyed himself at dinner, something that so rarely happened. Even talking about work seemed easy with Xander. Everything had always been about information with Olivia, anything that could fit her article, or that she could get exclusive rights on; and she never listened when he asked that she not publish a certain detail or other. It had gotten to the point where Rupert had started avoiding her, for fear that she'd use their friendship to dig for information.

And the avoidance had ended up with her dead.

Xander was the complete opposite. He didn't rush any case, and never published any of what Rupert asked him to keep quiet. It was the boy's professionalism -- so unusual in someone with Xander's distinctive style of dress or well, everything -- which had attracted Rupert to him in the first place, he realized suddenly.

And he was attracted. More than, actually. Rupert shifted in his seat, and started up the car again.

He spared half a thought to the idea of calling Xander again and telling him that something had come up, but he shook his head; Xander would know it was a lie the moment the words would be out of Rupert's mouth. Perhaps he was a fool, to think this could be more to Xander than a fling, a one night stand, or whatever Yankees called it, but he'd be more of a fool to let this opportunity pass him by.

Xander was waiting for him on the steps outside of his building, and Rupert parked a few feet away.

"I was starting to think you'd stood me up, except for the part where it'd be really stupid to stand me up when I'm right where you live, but you know." Xander shrugged.

"I apologize," Rupert replied, coming up next to Xander and unable to suppress the smile that widened on his lips. "I was ambushed by the night shift on the way to the garage."

"Oz giving you trouble?" Xander asked as Rupert let them into the building, and led him to the stairs. "You know I can just not show up to his next gig in a show of solidarity. Or something."

"Gig?" Rupert said.

"You really don't know what your geeks do when they're not working, do you?" Xander arched his eyebrows at him in a way that should definitely not be in any way arousing.

Rupert shook that thought away, and walked decisively up the stairs, ignoring the pleasant throbbing in his groin, and the sudden pain in his knee. "I make it a point not to ask."

"Then I'll bet really good money you don't know Willow and her girlfriend are getting married in May," Xander said.

Rupert stood midway through the second set of stairs and blinked. "I wasn't even aware she was in any relationship at the moment." Let alone with another woman. The last he remembered of Willow's dating habits, she'd been recovering from a difficult break-up with Oz and had spent almost an entire week crying in the break room, which had led to a rather impressive backlog of cases to process, and Rupert had had to put his foot down. Gently. But it had been Oz, who was definitely a man; unless that was something else Rupert wasn't aware of.

He needed to get to know his staff a little better. "Where will the ceremony take place?" he asked. He resumed climbing up the stairs with a curse when his knee made its disagreement known.

Xander answered him from the top of the landing, "I don't know yet."

Rupert nodded and suppressed a grimace when he came to stand next to Xander. "This way," he nodded to the left. He took his keys out when they stopped in front of his door. "Don't let the cat out; the last time she escaped, she destroyed Mrs. Drumstrang's carpet on the fourth floor."

"You have a cat?" Xander asked, eyes widening. "Wow, I never took you for the cat type."

"It was a suggestion from my therapist after--" he shrugged. At first, Rupert hadn't even wanted to consider it, but the department was putting enormous pressure on him to complete his recovery as soon as possible, and Rupert hadn't wanted to jeopardize his career because one suggestion seemed utterly pointless to him.

Then he'd had to admit his therapist had been right, and when he'd moved to California, he'd been unable to part with the cat.

"Yeah, okay, that makes sense," Xander said. Rupert unlocked the door, and they quickly walked in. Fortunately, Penny wasn't hovering around the doorway when they did, and she only came running at them a few seconds after the door was shut. "Hey, kitty," Xander crooned as he bent down and scratched behind Penny's ear.

Rupert had to refrain from thinking the word "adorable." This was a sure way to win Penny's affection, and within seconds she went from being hesitant to rubbing herself all over Xander's hand. "She likes you," Rupert said, grinning.

"Yeah, she's a good kitty, isn't she?" He made cooing sounds at her, before finally straightening up. Rupert noted that Xander's cheeks were flushed. It looked good on him. "Um yeah, I like cats."

Rupert chuckled as he hung up his coat and took off his shoes. "Penny will not leave you alone now." As a matter of fact, she was already meowing and rubbing her side against Xander's legs.

"I can see that, but she'll have to, because I have plans tonight," Xander replied.

"Plans?" Rupert repeated. He came closer to Xander, and smiled. "What kind of plans?" He was starting to find it difficult to remember why, exactly, this was a bad idea.

"Mostly," Xander said, cupping Rupert's cheek, "they involve very little clothing."



Xander's lips tasted faintly of the chocolate cake he'd had for dessert. Rupert coaxed his lips apart and dipped inside, following the taste with his tongue. It had been too long, far too long, since he'd let himself feel this.

"Anyway," Xander whispered when they pulled apart, "like I said, I'm not going to get myself killed, okay? And I'm not going to use this to grill you for information."

"I know," Rupert replied softly. Xander had the annoying habit of insinuating himself into Rupert's investigations anyway; whether they were sleeping together or not, that wouldn't change.

"Now that that's out of the way," Xander said, curling a hand over the back of Rupert's neck. He pulled Rupert closer and nuzzled his neck.

Rupert shivered, his own hands coming up to touch Xander's shoulders, down his back. "My bedroom's at the end of the hallway," he whispered against Xander's lips. "We will be more comfortable there."

"Why, detective," Xander teased, "I think you may be propositioning me."

Rupert laughed and gave Xander's ass a sharp smack. "If I remember correctly, I didn't push you against your car earlier."

"Mmm, no," Xander admitted, lips grazing Rupert's jaw. "I did that to you. And you were really hot like that, too."

Rupert moaned softly when Xander's mouth found a sensitive spot next to his ear. He clutched at Xander's hips, pulling him forcefully against his groin. "Take off your shirt," he murmured, hoarsely. "Now."

"Oh God," Xander whimpered. Rupert didn't let him pull far, just enough that he could pull off the offending item and throw it against the door, which reminded Rupert that they were still in the hallway. He looked down at Xander's torso and didn't care. "Oh God, Rupert," Xander moaned, when Rupert bent down to suck at the skin on his shoulder.

He moved one hand slowly over Xander's torso, mapping the muscles, the hair, nipples. He bent down further and took one into his mouth and bit, softly, chuckling around it when it made Xander arch against him. Then he pulled back. "My bedroom. I'll be with you in a second."

He needed supplies, and the condoms were stocked in his bathroom. He hadn't had a nightly visitor in years. Xander didn't say a word when Rupert let him go; he went down the hall, his walk hindered by the erection tenting his khakis. Dear Lord, Rupert wanted to slip his hands into Xander's trousers, feel that heat against his palm.

In the harsh light of the bathroom, Rupert took a look at himself in the mirror, greying hair and creased face. God, he looked old and-- What in the bloody hell did he think he was doing? Harris was a reporter, almost a colleague, and he was less than half Rupert's age; that alone should be a good enough reason to stop. But Rupert didn't want to stop.

The feel of Xander's mouth on his lips and his neck, Xander's hands on him -- he wanted this, not the overwhelming solitude of his life.

His work didn't allow him to pursue a romantic relationship; they always ended in disaster when Rupert spent more time investigating murders than being at home. It was why he had a cat and not a dog, after all. But Xander--

Not that whatever they had between them was going to become anything serious, but if it did, if there was the slightest chance that tonight turned into more, Xander would know what the job was like; he was knee-deep in it as well.

With a deep breath, Rupert resolutely pulled a handful of condoms from the box, and closed the drawer. He turned off the light on the way out.

Xander was sitting on the bed, looking around in curiosity when Rupert walked in; his expression turned to worry. "Did you--"

Rupert silenced him by cupping his cheek and kissing him, slowly, savouring the taste of him as he dipped his tongue inside Xander's mouth again. "I am fine," he whispered when their lips parted. He put the condoms down on the nightstand and ran his fingertips down the length of Xander's torso. "Would you like me to undress?"

Xander bit his lower lip, and Rupert would have had to be a much stronger man not to bend down and kiss it, dragging his tongue over the quickly fading teeth marks. "Yeah," Xander murmured, out of breath. "Yes, please."

There was something intensely arousing about making Xander Harris virtually speechless. He was eyeing Rupert, mouth partially open but not saying a word, as Rupert stepped back and unbuttoned his shirt. He slid it off his shoulders and turned to hang it on the closet door handle before he pulled his undershirt over his head. He had a second of self-consciousness when he remembered the greying hair of his chest, but one look at the look of raw, open arousal on Xander's face pushed the thought away.

He unbuckled his belt and undid the first button of his trousers. "Take off your pants," he said to Xander when it was clear the boy wouldn't do anything but stare unless Rupert told him what to do. "And your socks."

Xander's fingers scrambled for the button of his khakis, and he lowered the zipper quickly, immediately pulling pants and socks off.

Rupert let his hand drift to his crotch, and he moaned softly as he cupped his erection through his pants. He pulled his trousers down and draped them over the back of the chair in the corner; socks went into the dirty laundry basket underneath it. He came back to face Xander with a grin and curled his hand around Xander's neck. "Stand," he said firmly.

Xander immediately did as he was asked. "Fuck, you're so hot," he murmured, pressing his own hands flat against Rupert's torso.

"I tend to be--" he searched for the word and settled on, "demanding, in the bedroom."

"That's okay with me. God." Xander groaned when Rupert's fingers drifted down his back to rest above the curve of Xander's ass.

"Shall I fuck you, then?"

"Oh fuck." Xander shivered and moaned. "You know when I planned on seducing you tonight? I didn't think you'd be this hot. And I thought I'd have to do a lot more coaxing."

"It all backfired on you, then?" Rupert asked, lips grazing Xander's neck.

"Totally in my favour," Xander replied. He whimpered when Rupert's teeth worked at the skin under his lips. "God, fuck, totally."

"I'm glad," Rupert whispered, letting his fingers dip under the waistband of Xander's boxers. "I'll take these off you."

"Yes, please," Xander groaned.

Rupert slid his hands further down, cupping Xander's asscheeks into his palms. "Such a beautiful arse." He caught Xander's whimper with his lips, and squeezed his hands on the warm flesh before pushing the boxers down Xander's legs.

Xander was hard, so very hard, his cock leaking at the tip, and Rupert caught the drop on his thumb and brought it to his mouth.

"Oh. Fuck," Xander groaned.

Rupert savoured the taste on his tongue and brought his hand down again, wrapping his fist around Xander's erection, feeling it warm and pulsing against his palm. He kissed Xander, lips pushing hard against Xander's, tongue dipping in and out slowly, making the boy moan and arch up into Rupert's grip. "Sit," Rupert ordered him, his breath brushing over Xander's kiss-bruised lips as he pulled back.

Eyes drifting to Rupert's crotch, Xander sat on the edge of the bed and bit his lower lip.

Rupert curled his palm around the curve of Xander's skull and forced him to look up. "Good boy," he murmured, his voice hoarse from contained arousal. He wanted Xander's mouth on his cock, Xander's hands on his hips. Rupert shuddered when Xander leaned forward and nuzzled his stomach. Rupert gave him a nod of approval, and Xander moved lower, mouthing at Rupert's erection through his boxers. "Take them off me," he groaned, fingers coursing through Xander's hair.

Fingers hooked on the waistband, and then pulled the boxers down, over Rupert's ass, and his cock, down his legs. "I want you to suck me."

Xander grinned up at him, and darted out his tongue to lap at the tip of Rupert's erection. "I want to taste you, God," he said, breathless and flushed. "Please."

Rupert would never have imagined this, not before tonight. Perhaps he was a cynic these days, or a loner, someone accustomed to not having what he desired, and so he never dreamt of what could be. But if he had thought about having Xander Harris, naked and so hard for Rupert in his bedroom, Rupert wouldn't have imagined Xander being so quietly submissive. He would have hoped for it, but he wouldn't have thought it possible at all.

Here he was, nonetheless, with Xander's mouth wrapping around his cock, and Xander's hands settling on Rupert's hips. Within minutes, Xander's head was tilted back, his eyes locked on Rupert's, and Rupert was steadily pushing his cock in and out of Xander's mouth, slowly, in and out. And then faster, deeper, careful not to go too deeply, until Rupert pulled back, shaking, panting, every nerve on edge, and said, "On the bed, on your stomach."

Xander made a wordless sound in his throat and scrambled up on the bed, taking position on all fours, his head pillowed on his forearms. "Like this?" he croaked, licking dry lips.

Rupert looked at him for a moment, just drinking the sight of him like this, spread out and eager. Who knew when it would happen again... Forcing his thoughts away, Rupert opened the nightstand drawer and pulled out the tube of lubricant. He put it on the bed, next to a condom, and climbed behind Xander. He dragged his fingertips down the expanse of Xander's warm, sweaty back, to his ass, dipping them into the crack to brush against Xander's hole.

Xander arched up immediately and whimpered. "Please," he moaned brokenly. "Please, fuck me."

Kissing between Xander's shoulder blades, Rupert bit gently on the skin there and whispered, "Yes, I will." He reached for the lube and pressed a slick finger to Xander's entrance a moment later. "Tell me you want this, Xander."

"God, yes, Rupert, please." Xander pushed back, and looked over his shoulder at Rupert. "Please, I want you to fuck me so fucking much."

"You have done this before, right?" Rupert asked, pushing a first finger in to the knuckle.

"Yes, fuck, yes, shit," Xander replied. He clenched his muscles and added, "Been a few years, but yes."

Rupert caressed Xander's asscheek with his other hand, and pushed his finger further in. He wanted to prepare Xander gently, slowly, but the combination of Xander's moans, and the throbbing of his own cock, the way Xander arched and pushed back with each thrust, meant Rupert couldn't make himself wait as much as he should. He added another finger, scissored them, felt Xander's muscles relax, and added yet another.

"I'm ready, fuck, please," Xander groaned, trying to pull Rupert's fingers in deeper. "Please, please."

There was no way Rupert could wait then. He put on a condom and lube, and then he was in, hands on Xander's hips, holding him still as he pushed his cock inside tight, so very tight, heat. "Oh," he grunted, head thrown back.

"Fuck me, yeah, yeah," Xander urged him and twined his fingers with Rupert's on his hip. "Want you in, all the way in."

Rupert pulled out until only the tip of his cock was encased, and then thrust back in, slowly; pulled out again, and in, until he had his cock as deep as it would go, Xander's muscles clenching so tight, and the boy moaning and whimpering underneath him. "So tight, so bloody tight," Rupert whispered against Xander's shoulder. "Want me to fuck you hard now?"

Xander nodded into the pillow, voice and moans muffled as he arched up and met Rupert's next thrust, and the next. Rupert's fingers tightened on Xander's hips, and he drove in harder, faster, deeper, feeling it down to his toes.

He could feel his orgasm building, slowly, steadily, each push of his cock inside Xander's ass bringing him closer to the edge, and he pulled out almost completely, and then thrust in, hard. "Touch yourself. I want to see your fist around your cock."

"Fuck yeah," Xander groaned. He uncurled one hand off the pillow and slid it between his body and the mattress.

"No." Rupert smacked his hip, and then pulled until he was sitting on his heels and Xander's back rubbed against his chest. "Like this, I want to watch you."

Xander whimpered when the next thrust sent Rupert's cock even deeper inside him. "God, yeah, fuck."

"Wrap your hands around your cock. I want to see you come." Rupert put his chin on Xander shoulder and thrust up again, pushing Xander's hips down. "Come now, lad, come for me." Xander's head came to rest on Rupert's shoulder as he moaned, baring his neck, and Rupert pressed his lips against the curve and sucked on the skin.

"Oh God, Rupert," Xander cried out, panting harshly. He sped up his strokes, pushed down harder into Rupert's cock, and moaned low in his throat as he came messily, spilling himself on his fingers and wrist.

Spent, he slumped down on the bed, face first, and Rupert followed him, forcing Xander's legs further apart. He thrust in and out faster and harder, mouth still pressed to Xander's neck and biting now. "Want me to come on or in you?" he asked, breath coming in short gasps.

"In, fuck, please, in me," Xander managed, voice half muffled by the pillow.

"Bloody hell, yes, in you," Rupert whispered, biting on Xander's earlobe. It wouldn't be long; watching Xander come had already taken him so close, so fast, and Xander was clenching his muscles again, pushing up to meet Rupert's next thrust. "You feel so bloody incredible, Xander. So tight, so--" He moaned, and gave one, two, three more thrusts, and came, cock buried balls deep into Xander's ass.

Rupert collapsed next to Xander, panting, and reached down to give Xander's ass a quick, clumsy squeeze.

"Fuck," Xander groaned next to him. "Fuck, that was good."

Rupert grinned dazedly at him and raked his fingertips up Xander's back to curl around his neck. "Couldn't say it better," he murmured and pulled Xander close, brushing their lips together in a satisfied kiss. Rupert cleaned himself up and settled on the bed lazily. He heard himself say, "Stay for the night," and he heard Xander's half muffled "yes" before he'd even finished.

Rupert turned off the light, and pulled Xander against his side, warm, just a little sweaty, and definitely half asleep already. Sex in general didn't tend to put Rupert to sleep, but the day had been a long one, and the soft snores from Xander quickly lured him into slumber.

The first thing Rupert was aware of upon waking was the arm draped over his torso. The second was the warm heat against his side, suffusing his body. The third -- and he let out a soft moan then -- was the mouth, sucking softly at the skin below his collarbone. Then it stopped.

"Morning," Xander said sleepily.

Rupert felt the grin widening on his face, and turned to look at Xander, head now pillowed on Rupert's shoulder. "Good morning."

"I think I gave you a hickey," Xander murmured, nuzzling at the skin he'd been sucking a minute before.

"You might have." Rupert wouldn't mind at all. He cupped Xander's cheek and caressed the skin there softly. "Perhaps I should give you--"

He was interrupted by the shrill ring of a phone that wasn't his, and Xander swore, pulled back from Rupert with a really disappointed look in his eyes, and fetched his phone from within his pant pockets.

Rupert sighed and sat up, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed. He left the sheet covering his midsection, and shivered at the loss of heat. He pointedly didn't listen to Xander's phone conversation. He'd expect the same courtesy of Xander in this case, so it wasn't all that difficult to clench his curiosity and focus on the room; on the clothes scattered across the floor, the condom thrown haphazardly somewhat in the direction of the bin, the tube of lubricant on the nightstand still opened.

He didn't hear Xander hang up the phone; one moment he wasn't in the room, and the next he was climbing behind Rupert and wrapping himself over Rupert's back, chin tucked against Rupert's shoulders, and hands sliding over Rupert's torso.

"I have to go," Xander whispered, sounding a little upset. "One of my contacts got a lead, and I need to get on it before it goes away."

Rupert twined the fingers of one hand with Xander's on his chest, and turned his head slightly to the side, so he could look into Xander's face. "It's quite all right," he murmured.

"No, it's not. I had this plan for this morning, to make sure you weren't going to freak out and go hide in your bathroom, and it involved my mouth on your dick and a bunch of other things."

A shot of arousal went through him, and Rupert shivered. "You can make it up to me."

"Tonight?"

There was uncertainty in Xander's voice and Rupert squeezed his hand tightly. "Tonight would be perfect."

Xander curled his hand around Rupert's neck, and tilted his head. "I'll hold you to that."

"Shouldn't that be my line?" Rupert asked, his free hand coming up to cup Xander's cheek.

There was no answer from Xander; just a much too short kiss and a smile.

Rupert had been at work less than half an hour -- and had spent all that time resolutely not thinking about Xander at all -- when Willow knocked quietly on his doorframe and walked in. "DNA matches," she said with a nervous looking smile, and handed him the results. "Mr. George Henry Patton did donate half of Ms. Hilary Lambert's DNA."

"Well, that is not surprising at all," Rupert said. He took off his glasses and pinched his nose. "We have five bodies, three of which are Patton's children, one is a mistress, and one seems to be completely unconnected." Then he added, "Thank you, Willow; that was quick work."

"Yeah, as soon as we figured out why the machine wasn't working last night, things went smooth," she explained, bowing slightly at the waist.

He eyed her carefully for a moment, and then said, "Thank you." He paused before adding, "for your message."

The smile she gave him was shy and maybe a little guilty. "I know it's none of my business and all--"

"No," Rupert interrupted her quickly, standing up and coming to lean against the desk next to her. "Xander is your friend, and that makes it your business. I'm aware of that, and while I may not be thrilled that people who work for me might know more about my personal life than even I do, it is a drawback I can learn to live with."

"Do you want to?" Willow seemed uncertain, as if she'd been expecting him to bolt. And really, she hadn't been wrong to expect it; in any other case Rupert would have let whoever it was down gently; he'd done it before, almost too many times to count.

"Yes," Rupert replied. He crossed his arms over his chest, and he looked straight at her. He didn't want her to have any doubts about this. As much as Rupert was still berating himself for falling into bed with Xander, he wasn't so sure about it being a mistake anymore. Waking up next to him, feeling warm skin against his own, and the way Xander had wrapped himself over Rupert's back after the phone call had forced them both to sit up; it had all added up to Rupert wanting this to last.

Perhaps even needing it.

He'd tried once, when he'd been a young police officer in London, before he'd become a homicide detective, to have a long term relationship. To say it had turned sour was to underestimate the amount of pain the relationship had caused both Ethan and himself. The fact that it had officially ended the day Rupert and his partner had caught up with Ethan's drug smuggling operation, and had had to put manacles on him, definitely didn't even start to lessen Rupert's guilt.

Something told him, though, that this was different. Xander not only knew about the job, he worked the job. He would never blame Rupert for spending more time at the precinct than at home. He'd never blame Rupert for his illegal dealings.

Not that Xander was caught in any sort of illegal act.

"Yes, Willow, I do," he repeated again.

She put her hand on his shoulder and squeezed. "Okay," she said. "After my shift, I need to give you the shovel speech, but until then, you're off the hook. And I better get back, because I can almost feel Snyder walking towards my lab to see what progress I've made since ten minutes ago, and I really don't want to have to talk to him."

Rupert smiled at her and wondered if he should be frightened. He watched her walk down the hallway and a second later, Snyder passed by with a resolute look on his face. Oh poor girl, Rupert thought.

He sat down at his desk again and didn't even have time to resume his thoughts when his phone started to ring. Rupert reached for it and said, "Rupert Giles."

"Hey, absolutely hottest man on Earth," Xander replied. Rupert shook his head and grinned. "I got some stuff for you that I'm faxing over right now. I'll bring you the originals in a couple of hours, but I have to meet with another informant first, and I thought you'd be interested in having those right away."

"Thank you." Rupert refrained from adding "Xander" on the off chance that Snyder was still within earshot, and calling him "Harris" now felt so-- so wrong and impersonal.

"I'll give you the gist," Xander continued. "Holloway's ex-military, army. Guess what he used to do in the field?"

Oh. Oh. Rupert sat up straighter in his chair and picked up his pen and paper. "Sniper?" he hazarded.

"Got it in one," Xander answered. "I'll give you a prize later tonight."

"Oh, what kind of prize?" Rupert lowered his voice, and then bit his lips, unable to believe just how unprofessional he was being. Perhaps this really was a bad idea after all; if he couldn’t act like a skilled detective when Xander was around, what would that do to his work?

"Hey, no sex talk while we're discussing business, okay?" Rupert could almost see Xander shaking his head.

"You're the one who brought it up."

"And you're the one who had to not let it go," Xander retorted with a laugh. "Anyway, I'll tell you about that later. So, Stephen Ormond Holloway served with the army for four years and was discharged just about three years ago for being just a little too trigger happy."

"Bloody hell," Rupert sighed, index rubbing the skin under his eyebrow. "I can see where you're going with this, but how in hell did you get your hands on this information?"

"A good reporter doesn't give away his secrets," Xander said, sounding just a little too smug. "Besides, I'm just putting you on the right track; you should have the papers now."

"Thank you." Rupert hung up the phone before he could give in to the ridiculous urge he had to make small talk; though the fact that he'd managed to hang up at all was a point in the "I might still be able to work properly" column. The papers were indeed being printed by the fax machine when Rupert crossed the corridor into the room where it was stored. Rupert waited until they were all there, and went back, leaving his door opened into the hallway.

"I don't know how I missed that," Spike muttered, walking into Rupert's office unannounced just a few minutes later.
 
Rupert looked up from the document he'd just picked up and asked, "Missed what?"
 
"I looked at the bullets again when I got in; something just rubbed me the wrong way, you know. And look at all this." Spike put down the pictures he'd been holding on Rupert's desk.

There were four images; four different bullets all with the same striation marks. Rupert looked closer and frowned. "Is that a military issue?"

"Yeah! Beretta!" Spike exclaimed. He brought a finger down and pointed at lines on all four pictures. "Those marks come from the barrel of an M9. I shot my own gun to get a confirmation; not exact match, but close enough."

"You have got to be kidding me," Rupert muttered under his breath. He pushed his glasses up on his nose, and looked more closely at one of the pictures. "But what about the other striations?"

"I'm thinking it was tricked out," Spike answer, slumping down on a chair.

"Tricked out?" Rupert repeated, curious. Spike looked almost awed, and that so rarely happened this pistol must certainly be a completely new challenge for him.

"Yeah, into some kind of sniper riffle. Just, without the rifle part."

Rupert looked up from the pictures and gave Spike a dubious look. "Is that even possible?"

"I have no bloody idea," Spike said earnestly with a hint of awe in his voice. "I guess with the right kinda tool, and if you knew your gun in and out, it could be, yeah. I really want to get my hands on that gun. It must be something."

Rupert had absolutely no doubt about that. Spike's love affair with guns was almost as frightening as Cordelia's with bank accounts. "Once we find it, I promise you'll be the first one who gets to dismantle it."

"Thanks, mate." Spike grunted his approval and gave him a salute on his way out. He was halfway to his lab when he yelled back at Rupert, "Hey, do I get to shoot it?"

Rupert shook his head; of course Spike would want to shoot it, and it was a good thing that they'd need a reference bullet to compare these to, otherwise they might have to forcefully pry Spike away from the gun whenever they had their hands on it. Although they might still have to do that.

It was definitely starting to look more than possible that Holloway was the killer. But how and why-- If the Fergusons had been executed first, before the heist, Holloway didn't have a motive for their murder. Henry Patton, yes, if Holloway had been in the vicinity of the heist and had seen him pull the trigger on Jessa -- that was assuming Warren was saying the truth -- but none of the others.

Perhaps it was time to brief the whole team on these new findings.

Rupert grabbed all the files on his desk that pertained to the case, and walked out. "In the evidence room, now," he told everyone as he passed by their labs, and the break room. He found Gunn and Riley hunched over the evidence already, and then everyone piled in.

"What have you got for us, boss?" Cordelia asked, taking a stool and sitting down.

"A theory that we need to find evidence for," Rupert answered.

"Mmm, boss?" Andrew asked shyly from the side. "I thought it worked the other way around?"

"Usually, yes," Rupert said. "Usually we have evidence and we build the case from there, but here, this particular serial is rather complicated. That is why I want all of you here, and not only the CSIs."

He set down his papers and pulled out the sketch first, pinning it to the wall behind him. "This is the only face we have for our suspect; I know each and every one of you have looked at it already, and I know that all of you, just like myself, have had the same reaction: this man is familiar, and yet not."

Everyone nodded. Rupert picked up another folder and opened it to reveal the picture in it. It was definitely not the best quality, as faxes never were, but he still pinned it next to the sketch. Dear Lord, he hadn't seen the resemblance before now. It was rather uncanny in a very vague way.

"Oh, man, that's him," Gunn exclaimed. "Same lines on the face and that ear, right there." He point at a scar on Holloway's ear that Mrs. Strumer had been very precise about to the sketch artist.

"Who's the bloke?" Spike asked.

"Stephen Ormond Holloway," Rupert answered, gaze sweeping over his crew.

"Giles? Not to be a mood killer or anything, but he's the DB's husband," Buffy said, clearly confused, from where she stood just a few feet next to Rupert.

"I'm more than well aware of this, and I'm going over all this information with you all so as to make sure I'm not simply jumping to conclusions that have no evidence except for a vague sketch." And a rather prominent scar.

"Okay, so what else have you got?" Cordelia asked.

Rupert told them all that Xander had reported to him, and then added the information from Spike's findings. "We're looking for someone with military or police training, who has an uncanny ability with guns, and who wouldn't be scared to kill."

"So some kind of PTSD?" Riley said. "War can make you kinda crazy."

"Perhaps," Giles pointed out, "he might have simply been looking for a way to make extra income when he came home."

"So he'd be some kind of mercenary. Killer for hire." Riley stood up and grabbed Holloway's military file. "I can check see if any unsolved cases match the MO."

"Already ran the bullets through NIBIN," Spike said, shaking his head and glaring quite unprofessionally at Riley. Rupert made a mental note to have a chat with him after the case was closed. "Turned up squat. If there were unsolved with the same bullets, they'd be in there."

"Not unless they didn't find the bullets on site," Riley retorted back. "And if the guy's mercenary, he'd know to clean up the mess before he left. I'm on it."

"Thank you, Riley," Rupert said, nodding at him. "Buffy, I want you to go with him. Dig up the addresses where Holloway lived and traveled in the past three years and try to look these areas for unsolved murders."

"Sure thing, boss," she said, following Riley out of the room.

"Andrew, anything with that videotape?"

"I have a partial audio feed, but I think I can still enhance it; there's some words I can't make out, and I looked on the net last night and they had this really cool article on a new technique I want to try--"

"All right," Rupert interrupted him sternly. Andrew was good, he was actually the best in his field that Rupert had had to work with, but he did have a habit of talking too much. "You have an hour, and then I want to listen to what you have ready." He turned to the others when Andrew left, settling his gaze on Willow. "Do we have a DNA sample from Holloway?" Rupert knew there was little hope of that, even though it usually was standard procedure to get a DNA sample from everyone related to any case they worked. It wasn't always a procedure they applied to families of victims unless they volunteered it.

"No, we don't," she answered with a shake of her head.

"All right, we'll get one when we bring him in for questioning." Rupert turned to Gunn. "Did Jessa Holloway have a--"

Cellphone, he was going to say cellphone, then his own rang. "Rupert Giles speaking."

"Detective, we have another dead body. Offices of Gunther, Thurman & Associates, downtown. Third floor," Officer Doyle said, sounding a little agitated.

"All right, I'll send someone in," Rupert replied with a sigh. He didn't need yet another crime scene.

"It's your killer again."

"Oh, Bloody--" Rupert rubbed the bridge of his nose and hung up. "Cordelia, you and Angel head downtown," he said, repeating the address. "Another body killed with the same MO."

"This guy needs to be stopped," he heard Angel mutter on the way out, and Rupert couldn't agree more.

"All right, Gunn, did Jessa Holloway have a cellphone?"

"Yeah, she did," Gunn said, digging through the contents of their victim's purse. "Want me to dig up phone records?"

"Yes, and we'll be concentrating on any exchange she had with her husband within an hour of the heist." It felt good to be on a track; whether it was the right track remained to be seen, but it was a track. "Everyone else, back to work, I'll call you if there's anything."

Rupert was halfway to his office when his phone rang again.

"Hey, very lickable detective Giles," Xander said before Rupert could even greet him.

"You should be more careful."

"Why, you planning on letting anyone else answer your phone?"

"Mmm, not as such, no." Rupert grinned, closing the door behind him. "What have you got for me now?"

"The Patton rape charges, from twenty-seven years ago. That's what I was looking up on this morning before I got the phone call about Holloway's military past," Xander said quickly. "Anyway, so the victim? Catherine Ormond. Making the connection yet?"

"Are you quite certain you don't want a job here?" That was what efficacy was. Rupert was floored.

"Nope, it's iffy to date one's boss anyway. Not that I wouldn't do it; we can even play sometimes if you want, but iffy."

"Oh, now I see why you didn't take me up on my offer last time," Rupert teased him. It did make perfect sense to him after the last night.

"Exactly," Xander replied cheerfully. "So the info I got told me a lot. Catherine, now Mrs. Zachary Holloway, was eighteen when she was allegedly raped," he continued, "and about an hour after she dropped the charges, hers and her parents' bank accounts received a substantial -- and when I say this, I mean a lot -- amount of money. The prosecutor managed to get the court to rule that it was dodgy, and the evidence wasn't destroyed despite the charges being dropped. It should still be in your vault."

"Wonderful," Rupert said, leaning against the wall. "Thank you, very much, I think you may have solved our case."

"Gave you a motive, didn't I?" Xander asked, smugly.

"You just might have."

"Yeah, I figured. If the Patton patriarch raped his mom, Holloway could be on a revenge kick."

"Or," Rupert added, "he could be the result of that alleged rape, and have had wind of the will. In which case, murdering the siblings could be both revenge, and a sure way to get access to all of the Patton money."

"Or he was hired by someone to kill the Patton siblings without knowing he was a Patton himself."

"I suppose we will see." Rupert saw Snyder heading this way through the glass window wall and he cringed. "I'll make sure to have someone check on the evidence from that case. I have to go."

"Okay, I'll see you soon."

Thankfully, Snyder had only asked Rupert for the latest developments on the case, and hadn't tried to insinuate himself into their investigation any further. As soon as the man was out of sight, Rupert put back his glasses on his nose and went out.

"Fred," he said, walking into the Trace lab. "Do you have a minute?"

"Oh, yes, sure, boss, it's not like you need me much on this case or anything. Not that I'm complaining, I'm just feeling kind of -- useless?" She was sitting on her stool, hands with fingers crossed over her knees, and her glasses perched on the very tip of her nose.

"I may have something for you," Rupert told her, indulgently. "I'd like you to dig up an old box of evidence from the vault."

"Oh, yeah, I can do that!" She perked up visibly and scrambled to her feet excitedly. "Do you have the case number? I can probably dig it up if you don't."

Rupert nodded at her. "You will have to, as I don't have it. The name is Catherine Ormond, and the case file would date from nineteen eighty."

Fred noted the information down and smiled at him. "I'm on it. Thanks. I'll tell you as soon as I got it."

That left Rupert with not much else to do but wait for everyone else to bring their findings to him, and he ended up in the evidence room, looking over everything. They'd need a print of Holloway's shoe, and as soon as they had their hands on a warrant, they would need to search the man's home for his gun. Perhaps another pair of shoes.

Gunn found him there a short while later. "Hey, Giles, got the info you wanted. No phone calls between them for at least twenty-four hours prior to the robbery, but this you might be interested in." He put the cellphone activity report down and pointed at the lowest entry.

"A text message?" Rupert frowned. Nineteen thirty two. That was at least five minutes into the heist, possibly more; Andrew would be able to confirm that with the tapes.

"Yeah, right to husband dearest's phone."

"I'll have Andrew right on it," Rupert said. With this evidence, they had enough for a warrant. Nothing they'd had beforehand had been enough on its own, but everything combined now meant the judge would have no other choice. And a chance to walk into Holloway's home meant possibly finding the murder weapon that would lead to an arrest.

Angel called to confirm the new victim -- a man in his mid-twenties by the name of Patrick Russell -- had indeed been killed in exactly the same way as the others, while Rupert and Gunn were on their way to Holloway's house. The bullet wasn't recovered from the scene, and it seemed that the man had been killed several hours before that, at the beginning of the evening.

"Anything else of note?" Rupert asked, pulling into an empty parking spot next to Holloway's home. Officers Forrest and Miller had beaten them to the address, and they came to meet Rupert and Gunn when they got out of the SUV.

"Not so much," Angel replied. "The place's a bit ransacked, and Cordelia's still looking around the guy's office; no one here's seen anything."

"All right, thank you for the update."

As soon as Rupert's phone was flipped off, Gunn said, "Anne should be there any second."

Oh, Lord, Rupert had completely forgotten about the child. It was a wonderful advantage to their team that Gunn never did forget the children of any case they ever worked on. And he never forgot to call S