Chapter 3.1 ~ He's Bi At The Very Least

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"And you didn't see anything suspicious around the time of the robbery?"

Detective Calum Hood was interviewing employees at Babylon Banking about the robbery that occurred only a day earlier. The IT team hadn't been able to track down the culprit, so they needed to get more information and hopefully prevent this from happening again.

"No." Came the curt reply from the second teller he'd interviewed. There were only two tellers working at the time, as well as the DPO and two bankers who had been in front of the counter meeting with clients about other financial matters.

"Would you care to elaborate?"

The curly haired man shook his head.

He's a ray of sunshine, Cal thought. He tried to think of a way to get this guy to open up.

As he flipped through his notebook, he looked up and saw someone hovering in the hallway. That tall blonde bloke had passed by the room five times in the last 3 minutes, Calum noticed.

"Can I help you?" Calum called as the lanky man peered inside.

"I just...wanted to know how Ashton was doing." He shrugged, taking Calum's accusation as an invitation to come inside. He pulled a chair right up next to the dark haired boy and squeezed his hand quickly. Calum watched them closely, wondering if they were maybe a couple. There was nothing in his notes about that, and employee relationships would have been something he'd have been notified of. So unless they had something covert, he doubted it. The blonde placed his hands on the table and Calum saw a wedding band. Ashton had some rings, actually he had a lot of them, but nothing that seemed like a wedding band. Did straight men wear all that jewelry? Calum had no idea, but decided to go along with his current plan.

"And who are you?" Calum questioned him.

"I'm Luke Hemmings, DPO and temporary IT manager of the company."

Calum raised his eyebrow at how young he was. He flipped around in his book and found his info page about Luke Hemmings; he was only 26. Impressive.

"I see. Why do you have to be here, exactly? Mr Irwin can take care of himself, can he not?"

Calum knew the best way to get information from people was to see how they reacted when prompted like this. He took classes on how to properly observe people and learn what they're hiding from the things they don't say. It's what's made him a better cop, and the reason he's about to be promoted.

Calum was on track to be the youngest person in the entire state to be promoted from detective to sergeant in such a short amount of time. It was only 2 years ago he became a detective, along with his friend Michael, but his commander had noticed something special in him and set him on the fast track to become sergeant.

If Calum could catch these criminals who kept robbing from Babylon Banking, he'd be a hero. They would have absolutely no issue promoting him on the spot if he managed that. It gave him more motivation to get as much as he could from these guys.

"He certainly can, but he doesn't talk much. He prefers to stay silent if he doesn't need to speak." Calum looks at Ashton who crosses his arms and nods once. "He's a man of few words, but he doesn't need them, do you Ash?"

Luke looked over at him and ruffled Ashton's hair, which fluffed up the curls, causing him to have that just out of bed look, which was quite nice on him, Calum thought. Ashton didn't even react. He clearly had no issue with Luke speaking for him or babying him.

"Well, I'd prefer if he answered my questions, if you don't mind." Calum watched Ashton's pointer finger twitch and tap his arm and Luke scooted closer to him.

"If he wants, he's more than welcome to," Luke conceded, but smiled. "He doesn't have to answer anything though, and I'm sure you'll get more information from me anyway."

Calum smiled a sickeningly sweet smile. He actually kind of thought they were super cute together and really wanted to know who Luke was married to.

"I'm sure I would. Then you'd like to tell me what he was doing that day?"

"Ash was helping a customer at the window next to me. I was up on the line because we had a huge lunch rush and only him and Niall were working then. One of the ladies who's usually here had to go home because her daughter got called out of school; stomach virus."

"I see. And did either of you notice anything out of the ordinary?"

"No, there was a long line but that's not unusual. People always show up on the weekdays during lunch to deposit things or withdraw or whatever. We had two security officers standing in front of the counter. It was just a normal day." Luke shrugged, looking at Ashton. He glanced at Luke and tilted his head a bit. "Yeah, Ashton didn't notice anything either. He was helping some guy, I remember, but he was one of our regulars who works at a local restaurant around here and comes in every week. He likes to have Ashton help him."

"Why's that?" Calum writes a couple notes down, things he has to look into later, including the woman who was out on that day.

"He doesn't talk much either and Ashton knows all his account info so he doesn't have to tell him."

"Is that common, to know customer's info like that?"

Luke nods hesitantly.

"Tellers will have lots of peoples info memorized if they're regulars and come in often. All of them have their couple customers who's info they know."

Luke really hoped he didn't just dig them a hole they can't get out of. That shouldn't be anything important that's going to link it back to them. But he really should stop talking so much. He just wanted to take the attention off Ashton, who he could tell was getting uncomfortable with Calum's questioning. He was just glad the cop didn't make fun of him for not talking. Some people did and it infuriated Luke. Every person is different, not everyone likes talking. It isn't something to stare about or make a fuss over. Luke knew he was overly protective of his friend, but Ashton didn't seem to mind, or he'd never told Luke otherwise, so he continued. Some times his wife would tease him about being in love with Ashton more than her, but Luke would just brush her comments away. It wasn't that he hadn't thought about it, Ashton was attractive, that was certain, but Luke was like 95% straight. He had no idea what Ashton's preferences were, but Luke wouldn't be too mad about it. But he was already married, and that wasn't what they were talking about.

"Luke?"

"What?" Luke had stopped paying attention which wasn't good when he was the center focus of the conversation.

"I asked if there was anything else you wanted to tell me about yours--and Ashton's--day yesterday."

"Oh." He bit his lip as he thought. Maybe I should bring my lip ring back, he thought as he absentmindedly chewed it. His wife loved the lip ring, and he had to admit it made him look hot. Focus, Luke, what happened yesterday? "Nah, there really was nothing out of the ordinary. We were just here, business as usual."

"Now, you work for the entire company, not just at this one branch?" Calum asked, checking his notepad again. He thought he'd lost Luke for a minute, but thankfully he came back. Calum would give up his sergeant position to know what thoughts passed through Luke's mind in those couple silent minutes.

"That's correct, I'm not a teller who generally stays at the same branch, I go around to all locations and make sure everyone's security passes are up to date, check scheduling, and since I went to school for IT as well, I make sure there's nothing wrong with any of the tech."

Luke's father had made him go to school for IT as well as enroll in a program to teach him about data protection regulation, that way he "would be more marketable" when searching for a job. Luke didn't hate the work he did, and he knew it was important for the company, but all he really wanted to do was make music.

That was his passion. Luke had found a guitar in the trash once when he was walking home from school. It had a broken string, but after going to a local music shop and repairing it, the guitar was in decent shape. He watched videos from the internet and began writing songs.

He did all of this in secret for 5 years, he even became brave enough to post some of his songs online--and he'd been decently popular, over 800 subscribers and counting--when his father found out and took the guitar away and forced him to delete his channel. That was around the time Luke started to hate the man and rebel. He would find any excuse not to be at his house and hung around Ashton a lot more. They were hanging out downtown like they usually did when they met Louis and Harry, at the time they weren't married, and Harry actually hated Louis. But they were invited to join the gang. Ashton shrugged, he didn't care either way, and Luke knew it would piss his father off, so he was in.

Luke set out to do anything and everything that his father would hate. He often asked himself the question: Would my father like this? And if the answer was no, he'd do it.

"How often are you at this branch in particular?"

"This is our main branch, so I'm here usually more than half the week and then I split my time between other branches as needed. The smaller ones don't often need as much oversight."

Calum nodded.

"Right. So the bank has been robbed...four times?" He scanned his page again. He should have looked at everything before he got to this interview, but had been running late this morning and didn't get the chance. "Four times in the last three years." he confirmed.

Luke sighed.

"Yes, it started about 3 years ago, that's correct."

"And aside from the first time, it was always this branch that was being robbed." Calum raised an eyebrow. "And you were here every time a robbery occurred."

Luke frowned, narrowing his eyes at Calum.

"Is that an accusation, officer?"

Calum feigned shock.

"No, nothing of the sort, Mr Hemmings. Just stating some facts that are here on my sheet, 's all." He smiled kindly. "Is there something you think I should know?"

"I don't know what you're implying, sir, but--"

"What's with all the yelling?"

Michael Clifford, detective and Calum's partner was drawn into the break room when he heard someone shouting. He knew Calum was interviewing one of the tellers while Michael talked to security, but when he heard shouting he decided to see what was wrong.

"Your partner is accusing me of shit that I didn't do!" Luke huffed, flopping back into his seat and crossing his arms.

Michael knew this guy from somewhere. The second he saw that fluffy, dirty blonde hair, he knew he recognized him. He couldn't figure out from where though.

Michael walked inside and stood behind Calum, who looked up at his best friend.

"I didn't accuse him, Mikey, I was just laying out the facts and he got real defensive," Calum looked back and smiled at Luke who rolled his eyes. Ashton hadn't moved in the last couple minutes and seemed unphased by all the commotion.

"Well what did you ask?" Michael leaned down and looked at the sheet, skimming over the information.

"He's telling me I'm the one who did this because I was at the location every time it happened." Luke scoffed. "But I work here 4 days a week out of 6. It's just likely that I'd be here whenever these assholes strike."

"Makes sense to me," Michael leaned against the table, brushing his bright green hair out of his face. "I'm sure my partner didn't mean to accuse you, Mr Hemmings. It was probably a misunderstanding. I'm sorry you felt that way."

Luke rolled his eyes.

"Whatever. Do you have any more questions, or are we free to go?" He said, scrunching up his nose.

"I think I have a couple more things to ask," Michael said. "We don't have to stay here though, is there some other place you'd feel more comfortable?"

"This is fine," Luke agreed hesitantly. He wasn't actually upset, but he figured he would give mixed signals and potentially confuse the officers. If he played too innocent, they'd know something was up. If he acted out too much, they'd be suspicious. He had to walk the line between insanity and innocence and he thought he was doing okay. Calum was flustered now and Michael was trying to play good cop since Cal had been identified as bad cop.

Michael just wanted them to stay here until he could figure out why he recognized them. They'd never been to the station before, and he didn't use this bank. It was a smaller, private bank; he'd rather use a national bank chain so that whenever he travelled he had access to his money.

Maybe they just lived in the same town and he saw them around sometimes. It's possible, as they lived in a relatively small place.

"Sorry if you've already gone over this, but who are you?" Michael asked, looking at Ashton. He'd been staring at the rings on his hands since before Michael walked in and slowly looked up when being addressed.

"That handsome lad is Ashton, he's one of the tellers," Calum winked at the boy who didn't even blink. "He doesn't talk much, but he doesn't need to. His actions speak louder than words."

Michael looked at him questioningly, but continued.

"And I'm Luke Hemmings, DPO." Luke replied, scoffing when Calum didn't introduce him.

"I see. And you both were here when the attack occurred?"

"Yes," Luke answered for them. "We already went over this. Are there any new questions you have, or can we get back to work? It's almost lunch time, so we have to get ready for the influx of customers."

"Of course, we're sorry to have dragged you away from your work for so long." Michael nodded. "Can we get your numbers so we can call you if we have any more questions?"

Calum held out a pad and Luke snatched it from the man, writing his and Ashton's numbers down.

They stood up, bidding the detectives goodbye, or Luke did, Ashton just followed him like an angry puppy, and that's when Michael made the connection.

These were the guys who were always hanging around downtown with the Young Guns. He didn't think they were part of the gang, but they were up to something, he knew it.

He'd had it out for the Young Guns since they burnt down his fathers restaurant a couple years ago during some war they waged against another gang. It wasn't on purpose, but that didn't stop his father from getting hurt and having to give up his restaurant. Part of Michael's job was to be impartial, but he could tell these two were hiding something and he was determined to figure it out.

"Oh, I'll definitely be calling you guys, especially you, Ashton." Calum stood up and waved as they left. Ashton turned back and gave him a weird look before leaving and Luke stormed away.

"What was that about?" Michael asked. He was honestly just confused.

Calum shrugged, picking at something underneath his nails.

"He's cute, it's not my fault."

"You need to calm yourself, that is not sergeant material. If anyone above you found out about your flirting attempts, they'd have your name out of the running faster than you could get your bisexual ass in that door and plead for mercy."

"Yeah, I know, it's not professional. I just thought it would be a good tactic and maybe loosen him up."

"You don't even know his preferences,"

"Please, that boy was wearing more rings than Kay Jewelers has in their entire store," Calum rolled his eyes. "He's bi at the very least."

Michael sighed.

"Just be careful, please? You don't want to ruin your entire life,"

"Yeah, yeah, I know." He paused, closing his notebook. "Mom."

Michael scoffed.

"Whatever. You ready to go?"

"Sure,"

They walked out together, letting Luke know they'd be leaving and if they had anything else to ask, they'd be back or they'd call. He was back to his friendly self in front of the customers and smiled and waved as they walked away.

Once they were back in the squad car, Michael told Calum about the connection he made.

"Wait, they're the guys you're always chasing downtown?"

Michael nods.

"The very same. I hate those bastards."

"Huh, I wouldn't have pinned them as the type to hang around with the Young Guns."

"Me neither, but I guess you can't judge a book by it's cover."

"Ew, shut up with the cliches," Calum punched Michael in the arm and he laughed.

"Fine, but coffee's on you then."

Calum whined as Michael drove away from the bank.

"What? Why? I always pay,"

"Because you keep abusing me. It's your punishment."

"Oh, kinky." Calum smirked.

Michael groaned.

"Shut up, ya nasty little bugger!"

They stopped at a red light and Calum met his eyes before they both burst into laughter.

"I want a donut though."

"You can get a donut, Cali," Michael agreed. He might now have a name and a face to his number one enemy, but that was something he could worry about later. He had time to catch them in some sort of act and take them away. The robberies occurred within months of each other, so they had time to figure this out. But for now, they needed coffee and donuts with his best friend.

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I should probably stop updating so much, but I love this story, so here's the next installment! 

What did you think of Malum? Calum flirting with Ashton? I'd love to know what you think so far <3 

~ashtonfortherwin