CHAPTER FIVE.

After leaving Diego's place, Graham had made his way to the store to pick up his order. He had let Fern go online and find the things she would need for her room. Some of them were ordered to the house and others were ordered to be picked up. Graham had helped one of the workers load the boxes and bags into his car before he made his way back home. He had then brought it all up to his apartment and had planned on setting the room up for Fern until he got a call.

One of the men that he did work for had called and needed him to go ensure that some person stayed quiet. Apparently, the person had been eavesdropping in on some conversation that they were most certainly not meant to hear and got caught. And that's where Graham comes in. It's then Graham's job to find the person and "have a conversation" with them. Truthfully, there were times in which conversations really were all he had with some people. Other times, it was a lot more than a conversation.

So, now, Graham was standing in Fern's soon-to-be room with his phone out. He sent a quick text to Fern letting her know that she would need to go back to Jericho's house with him whenever Jericho finished work. He explained that if it wasn't too late, he would come back to pick her up, and if not, she would stay at Jerichos for the night. He then dialed up Jericho and put the phone to his ear.

"Hello," Jericho sang into the phone, dragging the 'o' out.

"Hey," Graham nodded despite Jericho not being able to see him, "Fern's gonna need to go home with you tonight. I got a job and I don't want her here by herself. If it's not too late when I finish, I'll come to get her. I sent her a text but I figured I'd call you and tell you seeing as you almost never answer any texts." On the other side of the phone, Graham could hear Jericho taking a bite out of an apple.

Jericho hummed, "What's the job?"

"Danny was having some conversation with some of his people and some person, uh," He pulled the phone away from his ear for a moment to look at the text Danny had sent him a while ago, "Wayne Keene eavesdropped on them. The conversation was full of sensitive information so now I gotta go pay Wayne a visit and make sure he stays quiet."

Jericho hummed once more, "Very henchman of you." He heard Fern snicker in the background. Following Fern's laugh, Jericho also let out a small chuckle. "Well, have fun and don't die, I guess."

Graham ran a hand through his hair as he joked, "Damn, dying was actually first on my to-do list."

"Ha-ha," Jericho stated, monotonously. Before Graham could say anything else, he hung up the phone. Graham laughed to himself, shoving his phone in his pocket. He made his way out of the room and to the corner of the living room that was currently inhabiting his "work tools."

He grabbed the duffel bag that was sitting against the wall and slung it over his shoulder. What was in the bag was really all he would need for this job. Hell, there might have been way more than he would need in there. He stared at the rest of the stuff in the corner for a moment, he was going to need to move those down to the basement at some point but with the heaviness of some of the boxes and the number of trips it would require, he dreaded the idea of it.

Shrugging the idea of personal labor off, he made his way out of the apartment. He locked the door and moved quickly to the steps. The quicker he gets to his car, the quicker he gets to the old warehouse he works in to find out where Wayne was. The quicker he does, the quicker they get to have a talk. And in the end, the quicker he gets to finish the job, get paid, and go back home. He didn't want to waste too much time on some lowly snooper when he could be at home doing literally anything else.

He got into the driver's seat of his car and started it. Before he could pull off, his phone began ringing again. He pulled it out to see Jericho's name on the screen.

Confused, he answered the phone, "Something wrong?"

Jericho laughed, "No. Everything's fine. Unless you get mad at me for this."

"Get mad at you for what? You get Fern killed or something? Because I wouldn't be mad about that," Graham teased, knowing that Fern was sitting close enough to Jericho to hear. He could hear her holler 'hey' angrily.

"No, no," Jericho shook his head, "I just finished up the stuff I needed to do today and we don't leave the office for another couple of hours and I was bored. And I also knew you were going to have to do some research on the Wayne guy before you could go 'talk to him,' so I did the research for you."

Graham sighed, "Jericho, I am perfectly capable of doing my job myself. It's what I get hired for."

"Look, if you don't want me to tell you what I found, that's fine. But I figured I would, at the very least, call to tell you." Graham paused for a moment, thinking.

"Fuck it, hit me," Graham leaned back in the driver's seat, "It's a stupidly simple job anyways and I would like to get it over with."

࿏

Graham sat in a chair across from Wayne Keene. Keene was tied to the chair and crying, while Graham stared bored at the man. Alongside ensuring Keene's silence, Danny also asked Graham to find out exactly why he had been eavesdropping in the first place. Wayne had completely agreed to stay quiet multiple times but still refused to tell Graham why he had been listening to confidential conversations to begin with. Which meant that Graham's work was far from over.

"Look, I'll- I won't say anything about what I heard," the man cried, "I've said that a million times. Why won't you just go?"

"Because I also need to know why you were listening and you have yet to fucking tell me that," Graham explained, looking around at the apartment they were in. His eyes stopped at the pictures on the wall. He pointed to the photos and looked to Wayne, "That your family?"

Wayne's eyes widened, "You leave my fucking family alone." He fought against his restraints tirelessly. He spit at Graham, who still looked bored. Truthfully, Graham wouldn't do anything to the man's family-- they weren't part of this, there was no reason for any harm to come to them. But Wayne didn't know that. He didn't know that Graham had no actual interest and harming his family and Graham could use that to his advantage.

Graham nodded and pat his hands on his thighs, "I'm gonna fuckin' kill 'em." The statement was simple and there wasn't any malice in his voice. But the threat held strong as Wayne began, uselessly, kicking his legs out towards Graham.

"Leave my fucking family alone!"

"Tell me what I wanna fucking know then!"

"I was just listening! There was no reason, I swear!" The man pleaded, but Graham wasn't stupid. He had worked in this field long enough to know when someone was lying.

Graham leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees, "Alright, Wayne. Let me break this down for you, I'm gonna leave you tied up here and I'm gonna go hunt your family down and I'm gonna kill 'em. Then, I'm gonna come back here and I'm gonna cut your tongue out. Since you don't wanna talk to me, you might as well not talk at all, ya know? That way, it also ensures you don't ever talk about what you heard from Danny's conversation."

The man cried, "Come on, man. You don't have to do this."

Graham nodded, "It's my job, man. Yeah, I do."

Outside the apartment, footsteps approached the door. Wayne's eyes jerked to the door as he began yelling for help. Rolling his eyes, Graham stood from the chair and approached Wayne quickly. There was no hesitation as punched Wayne. The man's face fell to the side as he cried out in pain.

"Shut the fuck up, Wayne. Or I'll say fuck it and cut your tongue out right now," he pointed a menacing finger at the man who nodded slowly. Graham reached over to the table and grabbed the dirty rag that was lying on it. He shoved the rag into his mouth before making his way towards the apartment's front door. He had a feeling he already knew who was outside hence why he was in no rush to get there or to shut Wayne up. He swung the door open and his suspicion was right.

"Hey, buddy."

Graham threw his head back in annoyance, "Fuck off, Diego. I am in the middle of a fucking job! Go home, weirdo."

Diego pushed his way into the apartment, "Yeah, Jericho told me all about the job when I called him." He turned back to face Graham who had just shut the front door.

Graham shoved a finger in Diego's face, "You are not hero-ing this situation. I am in the middle of a job that I am getting paid for. You are not going to stop me and help this man."

Diego pushed Graham's finger down, "Nah, normally I would just to piss you off but if anything I'm kinda just here to tag along. Maybe do your job for you? I'll find some other way to piss you off, I'm sure."

Graham's face filled with confusion, "And why the fuck are you not going to hero the situation?" He crossed his arms over his chest, looking Diego up and down trying to figure out what could be wrong with him.

Diego shrugged, "Like I said, Jericho told me about this job and the dude. Dude sounds like a dick, don't really wanna help him."

"Yeah, well, I don't need your help either. So you can leave."

Diego shook his head, "No, I'm good." He turned away from Graham and made his way towards Wayne. Graham followed behind. For a moment, the idea of pulling one of his guns from his bag and shooting Diego in the leg didn't sound so bad. He shook the thought off as Diego pulled the rag from Wayne's mouth.

"So, Keene," Diego threw the rag to the side and rested his arms on the back of the chair so that he was face to face with the crying man, "Why were you eavesdropping on old Davey boy?"

Graham rolled his eyes and pushed Diego away from Wayne, "Danny, idiot. His name is Danny, not Dave. And once again, this is my job, not yours so fuck off." Graham turned back to Wayne, "So back to our previous conversation."

Wayne shook his head, "Leave my family alone, I won't tell you again." Diego watched, his eyebrows furrowing in confusion. He knew Graham wouldn't hurt someone who wasn't involved in the 'crimes' so he had no clue why he would threaten the guy's family. Unless they were involved? He wasn't sure but stayed quiet and watched the situation unfold.

Graham smacked the man, "I'm gonna kill them, Wayne. And the more I think about it, the more I wanna cut your tongue out first. Leave you here to bleed out while I go kill your family." Graham held a straight face as he looked into Wayne's eyes. Off to the side, Diego's face was now full of surprise. Those were some strong threats and out of all the things he had Graham tell people before, those were probably more on the extreme side. He knew Graham could get like this when doing jobs-- it makes sense to get like that, or worse, when doing work like this. But he knew that Graham tried to stay more on the tame side of threats. Threatening the guy's family and threatening to cut the guy's tongue out and leave him for dead didn't seem all that tame to Diego, however.

"I already told yo--"

Graham smacked the man again, "You didn't tell me anything. You lied to me. There's a difference. I'm getting impatient, Wayne." Wayne didn't respond, only let out a strained sob. Graham stared at Wayne for a moment before turning back towards his bag. He bent down and opened the bag, planning to grab his gun to threaten Wayne with it. He shot back up before doing as Wayne began yelling erratically. He turned to see a knife floating in the air at Wayne's throat.

He turned his head to look at Diego, throwing his arms in the air like a child, "Seriously, Diego? Can you let me do my job?"

Diego looked to Graham with a grin, "Does it piss you off when I do your job for you?" Graham didn't respond, only flicked Diego off. Diego moved to stand in front of Wayne, keeping the knife at his throat. He placed a hand on the arm of the chair and leaned down to Wayne's face once again, "Tell him what he wants to know."

Wayne shook his head, "I did!" Diego reached behind him and pulled another one of his knives out. He let go of the knife, throwing it to the side and all three watched as it moved through the air back so that it was pressed against the other side of Wayne's neck.

"You gotta kitchen full of knives, Keene. I can do this all night long," Diego explained. Graham shook his head but said nothing. Maybe what Diego was doing would work and Wayne would finally just tell him what he needed to know so that he could leave. But Wayne said nothing, also. Diego sighed, pushing himself up, "Alright, fine. Let me go find the knives in your kitchen and we'll keep this going." Diego made his way towards the man's kitchen and stood by the wooden stand holding knives on the counter.

Wayne's head shot towards Graham, "You're not seriously gonna let him do this to me are you?"

Graham shrugged, "Why wouldn't I? You got information that I need and you're not giving it."

"If I die, you'll never figure it out!" Wayne pleaded. His head turned to look at Diego, who had pulled a knife out and was waving it around. He looked back to Graham, "Come on!"

"Tell me what I need to know and I'll tell him to stop," Graham explained, "And if we're completely honest, even if I don't find out what I need to know, I'm sure Danny will still be pleased to find out you died."

Diego threw the knife he was holding and it stopped directly in front of the man's eye, "Would you rather tell the truth and live? Or keep lying and die? It's up to you, Keene." He grabbed another knife, swinging it around just like he had the other.

"Fine! Fine," the man cried. He leaned his head back, trying to get away from the knife at his eye, "I'll tell you but you gotta get these knives off me first, please." He begged, staring at Graham. Graham crossed his arms over his chest and glanced to Diego, nodding his head. Diego dropped the knives. The knives clang on the ground as Diego sat the kitchen knife he was holding down. He made his way back into the room and picked up the dropped knives. He put his personal knives back where they went in the holsters on his back and tossed the other kitchen knife onto the table in the room.

Graham sat down in the chair across from Wayne, "Go on, then."

Wayne sighed, "Lance Connors offered me a job." Graham rolled his eyes and made a hand motion, telling Wayne to continue. Wayne nodded, "He wanted to know what Danny's plans were and he was offering good pay to do so."

"So you work for Danny for six years and someone comes along and offers you some money to betray him and you do?" Graham questioned, leaning back in his chair.

"It was good pay, come on. You gotta understand that," Wayne defended.

Graham shook his head, "I understand loyalty. Just because someone offers higher pay doesn't mean you take it. Danny pays you well. Hell, Lance has offered me jobs before to go behind Danny's back. Offered me triple what Danny pays me sometimes, but I didn't take it. 'Cause even though I'm not an official worker for Danny, I still got loyalty."

"Loo-"

"No," Graham cut Wayne off as he stood up, "You don't get to explain anything else. You've told me what I need to know, now I'm leaving and reporting it to Danny who will then pay me and he'll then decide what happens to you next. Either way, anything from this point on does not concern me." He grabbed the knife that Diego had laid down and tossed it into the chair that he had been sitting in. He pointed to it and looked at Wayne, "You can figure out how to get yourself untied too. Have a good day, Wayne Keene." He saluted at the man before making his way towards the door, Diego following behind quietly.

"Hey, you guys can't just leave me here like this!"

"Watch us," Diego called over his shoulder, shutting the door behind them. He moved to walk next to Graham, "That was fun. So who are these people anyway? Danny, Lance Connors?"

Graham exhaled, "Danny Mathers. He works shipping yards and stuff. I think you can take a wild guess at what his side job is. Lance Connors is like his rival, I guess? They've been fighting for years. Lance tried to buy Danny's shipping yard out because he wanted to use it for his side job. But it didn't work. Hence why they're enemies. Danny hires me as muscle basically. Anytime he needs a person shut up or if any of Lance's men need to be handled. Stuff like that."

Diego laughed, "Handled? Like--" He brought a hand up to his throat, mimicking a throat cut.

"No, no. Just beating. I don't kill people, Diego," Graham scoffed at the accusation.

"I didn't think you did but usually when someone says people are being handled.." Diego drifted off. Graham nodded, understanding what Diego meant and that he could have worded it better himself. Diego bumped his shoulder into Graham's, "You know you always sound so monotonous when you work. Like you sound like you would rather be literally anywhere else."

Graham raised an eyebrow and laughed, "That's because I would like to be literally anywhere else. Might be my job but that doesn't mean it's a fun job."

"Guess that makes sense," Diego agreed. The two made their way out of the apartment complex. They kept their heads down as they passed by people. Though, it wasn't like the people were paying them any attention to begin with.

Graham made his way to his car, "Where's your car?"

"Oh, I took a taxi. Figured I'd force you to drive me home," Diego laughed.

"And if I say no?"

"You wouldn't leave a friend abandoned here, Graham."

"You always seem to forget that we're not friends, Diego. I don't know how many times we have to have this conversation," Graham shook his head as he unlocked the car. The two climbed into the car. Graham smacked Diego's shoulder, "Buckle up, dickhead. And learn to drive your own car. I'm not a fucking taxi."

Diego laughed and was going to say something but stopped when his phone chimed. He pulled the phone out, reading the message. Graham started the car and pulled off into traffic.

Diego looked up from his phone, "Hey, you wanna go to a crime scene with me?"

Graham looked at the clock, "I guess I could spare some time to do so. That way I can just leave Fern at Jericho's tonight which will give me the opportunity to set her room up for her like I was planning to before I got that job." He nodded towards Diego's phone, "What happened at the scene?"

Diego locked the phone, putting it in his pocket, "Shooting of some sort it says."

࿏

The two had arrived at the department store that the shooting had occurred at. The two had snuck in through the back seeing as they weren't meant to be there to begin with. Graham was currently standing behind Diego, who was crouched on the ground looking at a bullet casing.

Graham jumped when a woman's voice came out of nowhere, "Do you seriously still not understand the chain of custody?" Graham turned to see Eudora standing next to him.

Diego looked over his shoulder to Eudora then back to Graham, "Nice lookout, dipshit." Graham simply shrugged as Diego looked back to the bullet casing in his hand.

Eudora continued, "If you touch it, I can't use it." Eudora spared a glance at Graham, giving him a nod before focusing on Diego. Truth be told, Eudora wasn't a fan of Graham. She knew the basis of the jobs that he did and as a cop, she wasn't a fan. She had worked a case to shut Danny down at one point and had tried to get Graham to turn on him but Graham refused. That was the starting point for her dislike of Graham. She had tried to collar Graham many times but never could get solid evidence to do so. She knew that her inability to collar him was a combination of Graham's own doing and Jericho Wakefield's doing.

Diego held his empty hand up to her, "Let me save you some time running ballistics." He stood from the ground, still speaking, "These nine-millimeters haven't been manufactured since 19--"

"1936. Odd, I know," Eudora interrupted. She grabbed the casing from Diego, "Matching casings were found at a murder scene last night." The two turned and began walking, "Ishmael's Towing." Graham followed behind the two, not speaking. Really, he didn't have anything to say. Crime scenes weren't really his thing. But again, it passed the time.

"The driver?" Diego asked.

"Found him hanging from the ceiling," Eudora described, "Looks like he must have known something after all."

"Gruesome," Graham commented quietly. Eudora and Diego both looked back to Graham, who just shrugged.

"Yeah, that's gruesome," Diego joked, in reference to the threats that Graham had made against Wayne's family--and his tongue.

Diego looked back to Eudora, leaning into her, "It's a shame nobody told you to go talk to him." Graham could tell Diego was being sarcastic which meant that Diego had probably told her at some point to do so and she didn't listen. Diego stepped away from Eudora as another officer approached her. He pretended to be looking at one of the clothing piles.

Eudora walked back over, "In the span of twenty-four hours, I've had attacks in three different places across town. Whatever this is, whoever this is, they're not slowing down. So if you really give a shit and you've got any fresh ideas, I'm all ears."

Diego turned to face Eudora, "The guy's kid, in the doughnut shop?" Graham looked aimlessly around the store, barely following along with Diego and Eudora's conversation.

"I've got units tracking the extended family in case anyone goes after him."

"Gotta be real fucked up to wanna go kill a kid, though," Graham commented, his eyes still looking around at the store. Diego pulled a face, agreeing silently.

"Well, this place must have surveillance footage," Diego sighed.

"No, it doesn't exist,'' Eudora responded immediately, "The first unit on the scene clocked two shooters fleeing the premises, wearing, get this, creepy kids' masks."

Diego nodded, "The city is really going to shit, huh?"

"Been shit," Graham chimed in.

"Coming from the guy dressed in spandex?" She commented. Graham snickered.

He nodded at Eudora, "I know you don't like me, but that comment made me like you a hundred times more." Eudora, surprisingly, laughed back at Graham.

Diego looked offended as he spoke, looking between the two, "It's not spandex, it's leather. And you used to like it. A lot, if I recall."

Graham's face scrunched, "T-M-I."

Eudora leaned her head to the side, "God, please un-remember that."

"I know that was directed to Diego, but I really hope that someday I can un-remember that, personally," Graham's face was still scrunched up in disgust.

"Etched in the data bank, Eudora," Diego declared.

"And we're done," Eudora finished.

"I know you're a cop and all, but if you ever wanna kill him, I am so down to help," Graham nodded, patting Eudora's shoulder.

She looked over to Graham, "Honestly, never thought I'd see the day I'd be on the same page as you but trust me, I will remember that offer." She pushed past Diego and began walking away.

Diego called after her, "Yeah, well, you go fill out your form while I go hunt these animals down." She didn't say anything, so Diego raised his voice, "And, Detective," she turned this time, "I do give a shit." Eudora smiled at him before turning and leaving.

"I don't," Graham muttered to himself. Diego watched as Eudora walked away. Graham felt his phone buzz in his pocket. He pulled the phone out and looked at the text on the phone. It was from Melody. She was asking Graham to call her when he got the chance.

"Everything cool?" Graham looked up to see Diego pointing to his phone.

Graham nodded, locked his phone, and shoved it back into his pocket, "Yeah, just Jericho checking in on me and shit." Graham chuckled. He clasped his hands together, "So am I taking you home now, or are we just going to like chill at a crime scene?"

"Back to my dad's place if that's cool."

"And if it's not cool? Then what?"

"Oh, fuck off," Diego rolled his eyes and started walking away from Graham. Graham laughed and followed behind. The two made their way back out of the back of the store.

word count. 4378
Hey, hey!! I decided to break episode three up into two chapters!! So chapter six will pick up at the halfway point of episode three. I also wanna say that I did change how/when Diego found out about the department store shooting for the sake of the fic but we're not gonna talk about that! I will say I am going to do my best to go ahead and write at least some of chapter six just so that I can try to go ahead and finish episode three so HOPEFULLY I can have that chapter up maybe sometime tomorrow or the day after!

Also, I've just created an instagram account for my wattpad. I wanna try to interact more with people on here and with my dms on here very rarely loading, being able to talk to people of instagram might help with that! I also wanna update you guys on stories that I'm working on, show you guys snippets of chapters, drafts, possible future ocs, and all that stuff without having to like clog my message board or anything! I also wanna use the account for polls and stuff to connect with you guys more and see what you guys wanna see out of me and anything like! There is nothing currently on the account because I've just made but I am going to work on getting everything together and starting posting here soon!! The username is hexgiris just like this account!! It would mean a lot to me if you guys checked it out and followed!! :)

posted. february 28, 2021
hexgiris