Los Gatos 28/? part 1
Pairing: David Villa/David Silva (main), Sergio Ramos/Fernando Torres (???), others
Characters: David Silva, David Villa, Iker Casillas, Xavi Hernández, Fernando Llorente, Sergio Busquets (this part of the chapter)
Rating: R (?)
Warnings: AU
Disclaimer: I don't claim it has ever happened
Chapter 28
“Make it disappear”, Villa snatched up his clothes as soon as David was done shedding them and threw them into Piqué’s waiting arms.
The Catalan seemed a bit reluctant but did whatever Villa asked of him, probably automatically. He didn’t look like someone who fully believed their plan to succeed.
Maybe because they hadn’t strictly told him the plan.
“The cameras”, he was tilting his head towards the door at the sudden realisation, “The footage-”
“There’s no camera here”, Villa sounded as if it was a nuisance just answering his concerns.
“How can there be no cameras here?”, he was most likely asking for it but he stopped dead in his tracks.
“Because I had them taken down”, the man’s eyes promised death on no uncertain terms if he didn’t stop slacking as he angrily opened a small liquor cabinet, “There’s no security in that building. Satisfied?”
“Wait”, he knew he was frowning at judging by Villa’s face, getting frowned at was the last thing he was going to accept that night, “How…”, he got distracted for a second as the man expertly opened a scotch and began gulping it down straight from the bottle, “You kept taking me here for months!”
Villa paused in his drinking. He turned to him, slowly, eyebrows cocked up in an infuriatingly mocking way.
“Was I supposed to be afraid of you?”
David opened his mouth, then closed it, because obviously Villa was not going to treat him seriously anytime soon. At least he finally understood why Piqué had always seemed to be so pissed with his very existence back when Villa had his exec charade going.
The bottle thrust in his face made him recoil so hard he almost lost his balance.
“Uhm”, he brought his hands up to battle the onslaught of scotch, “Not a good idea. Low alcohol tolerance. You don’t want me drunk for that”, he warned loyally because well, he was still loyal.
Plus, he had a distinctive feeling that any failure on his part would land them both behind bars.
Villa scowled, made as if to stalk away and then suddenly, his whole head found itself under a golden alcoholic shower.
“What the hell!”, he cried out indignantly, trying to un-plaster his fringe from his forehead.
The other simply shrugged and reached out for another bottle.
“They’ll go to La Moraleja first”, Villa broke the silence just when David was ready to demand to know what exactly he was working there with, other than some completely unexpected crisis, “Then to Salamanca. Then here.”
“Why La Moraleja?”, he chose, wondering if they - he was guessing it meant the police - would have a search warrant on the penthouse in Salamanca. The role he was supposed to play would be most complicated if his stuff was found there.
“I live there”, Villa looked at him flatly.
“But…”, he was racking his brain searching for any mention of the place, “What about Salamanca?”
The man snorted just as a cork from a bottle of wine flew up and knocked on the ceiling.
“Did you honestly believe I’d live in a penthouse in the middle of the city?”, he leered, appraising David, “You’re such a little idiot.”
“You had a house all that time and-”
And what? Never took him there? Never even mentioned that insignificant fact?
Sure it made sense now, he was no expert but even he could figure out that a house with a garden and a high fence was much better suited to be a residence of a crime lord than a penthouse in an apartment building…
“And didn’t tell you?”, Villa finished for him with more ire in his voice David had ever heard, “All for the better, wasn’t it? Look what you’ve done with the information I did share with you.”
Not the direction this conversation should head in. Not that one and not any other, ever and certainly not in the company of liquor. Not that he’d ever seen Villa drunk, no matter how much alcohol he’d consumed, but in that situation the scotch may appear to be that perfect excuse.
David’s breath hitched when Villa took a step towards him. His own feet moved on their own accord, carrying him backwards and behind the sofa as if it could somehow save him.
“Give me your hands”, the man growled, quickly freeing a belt out of his trousers.
“What”, David wheezed out weakly, not able to take his eyes of the leather strap in Villa’s hands. What the fuck was he going to do to-
“Give me your fucking hands!”
Panicked and stuck between the sofa and the wall, David thrust his hands forwards and screw his eyes shut.
There was a heavy sigh on Villa’s part and a soft sound of leather being tightened followed by a piercing burn around his wrists.
He jerked back and his back collided with the wall.
There were angry red marks around both of his wrists, appearing to be composed of several individual marks of something coarse and thin.
“You’ve tied me up”, he brought his gaze up from the marks and onto Villa’s face.
“I picked you up in Chueca”, Villa discarded the belt onto the sofa, “You were hustling near that metro station”, he obviously waited for David to picture the place, “Then I took you to the car. The Volkswagen.”
He nodded, following when Villa jerked his head towards the bedroom.
The bedroom where he had lost his virginity. He had this ridiculous notion of balking and generally running away. Shouldn’t some things remain sacred after all?
Apparently not, because Villa grew impatient when he just slowed down, having a vivid flashback of the man lavishing him with delicate attention on the very same bed. He grabbed his elbow and dragged him inside like a particularly big sack of potatoes.
He pursed his lips, determined not to say anything - after all he doubted the man was in any shape to share his sentiments with their time running out - but Villa wasn’t letting go of his arm despite having him as close as possible.
His eyebrows began to furrow down as Villa’s hand made its way up to his cheek. The fingers, unusually cold, stroked his skin, at first fleetingly as if shy, then the hand retreated, only to come back a millisecond later to force his head to the side.
Surprised, he let himself be manhandled - like always - doing his best to keep watching Villa with the corner of his eyes.
He was fucking smirking.
“That’s a nice touch”, Villa commented and David clenched his jaws, suddenly remembering the dull pain that had been throbbing in his face throughout the whole afternoon until it had settled down into a mostly tolerable numbness.
He didn’t know what he was going to say to a man who had him fucking slapped several times in a row and now behaved as if it was a pleasant coincidence that would make his next plan go even more smoothly. So he stayed silent, in case he blurted out something too provocative and only attempted to shield his cheek with his hair.
His head jerked up when Villa began to fucking chuckle again.
“Sweetheart”, his lips formed his trademark smirk, the one that had been driving David mad from the very beginning and that made it look as if there wasn’t a single thing the man didn’t have under his control despite preparing to face the police and jail-time, “It’s so precious when your eyes just fill up with hatred like that”, Villa sounded amused, “Especially since you don’t even fucking realise that.”
“I think I do hate you right now”, he whispered, unsure it his feelings for the man had actually changed since the time they had met.
“You hate the whole world on your best day”, Villa grinned unexpectedly, “I’m sure I hate you right now, so aren’t we even?”
He shouldn’t be surprised, he really shouldn’t. After all, what else could the man think after he had betrayed him? Okay, so it was a betrayal only in Villa’s dictionary but it was all that mattered since they were clearly speaking his language there.
“Come on”, he stumbled when the man pushed him towards the door, “We need evidence. I was too pissed to get it up but that wouldn’t have done, would it?”
“You?”, David couldn’t help himself as the other manoeuvred them so that he was straddling his hips, “Too pissed to get it up?”
“Flattery will get you nowhere”, Villa was tugging at his boxers.
“I meant”, David grinned devilishly, “You never get pissed.”
...
“We could talk to the neighbours”, Busquets used his thumb to point to the nearest villa.
“It’d take too long”, Iker snapped, cursing himself for thinking that Villa would be found at home, “We still have two places to check.”
“Wouldn’t he just drop off the radar?”, Llorente opened the car door.
“No”, of that Iker was weirdly convinced, “He’ll try to pull off the innocent act again”, or as always, “A law-abiding citizen like him would be spending the night at home”, he caught Busquets’ meaningful stare, “One of them.”
“We don’t have a search warrant”, Llorente reminded for the seventh time. He’d been counting.
“We’re not searching his flats, there’s nothing there anyway”, they’d already been down that road several times, “We’re bringing him, personally, for questioning.”
“You’re the only one who saw him, Inspector”, the Bask cut in and then paled, realising how it sounded, “Shit, I don’t mean you’re making that up, I’m sure he was there, it’s just that it was dark, and then when we were supposed to get a clear look at him this car threw us back-”
“That was the point”, he barked, irritated. He wondered if the Church wasn’t wrong and God was helping the evil ones; it would explain so much in history, “That’s why”, he took a deep breath, “We’re taking him in for questioning, not arresting for taking part in a drug deal. Yet. Things are going to get complicated once he doesn’t have a believable alibi.”
“He’ll get someone to testify”, Busquets commented in an almost bored tone.
“He can’t exactly risk using a known associate”, Llorente replied, “Not after all those times. Even the most corruptible judge won’t be able to turn a blind eye after so many similar cases”, his gaze skittered to the steering wheel as Iker took a turn right.
“We’re fools”, Iker grinded his teeth, trying to force his way into the traffic; it was late but it in no way meant the streets were empty, “He went to Malasaña, of course it’s the closest place to Móstoles.”
...
“A male streetwalker wouldn’t ask for more than fifty for everything”, Villa was appraising the bedroom with calculating eyes and David left him to that. No one had doubts who was the more experienced there.
“Well…”, he drawled, yanking the top drawer of the nightstand open, “You’re clearly loaded, flashing those earrings and all, I’d have charged more just because of that.”
Villa moved into the sitting room.
“Greedy”, he muttered, “I’d have laughed in your face.”
“You didn’t use condoms even though you have them in your bedroom”, David rolled off the bed, waving a pack at him, “I’d have definitely wanted at least hundred fifty for that.”
“You’ve only blown me, remember?”, Villa snatched the pack and threw it back into the drawer, “You asked for a hundred.”
“And you agreed on seventy-five”, he finished, “Paid up front.”
“A fifty up front”, the man stuck a bill into his discarded jeans.
“That’s not how prostitutes work”, David crossed his arms, smiling all of the sudden.
“That’s the way they work for me”, Villa smirked and pulled him to his side.
...
He ran up the stairs, the adrenaline pumping too much to wait for a lift, Busquets and Llorente hot on his heels.
Villa’s flat was situated on the last floor and given the buildings shape, it was the only one there. Rather convenient.
He glanced around, finding exactly no person other than them on the floor. If Villa was there, he would have sent his goons away long before they arrived.
Exchanging the last opinions with the sergeants as clearly as he could non-verbally, he marched up to the door and knocked.
Nothing.
He resumed the process, wondering briefly if the lack of a door bell was yet another ‘fuck you’ on Villa’s part.
Finally, there was a loud “Open the door!” from the inside. Iker frowned. Who the hell was there?
Llorente lent him a hand and banged on the door, prompting an even louder “Open the damn door”.
They glanced at each other and Iker squared his shoulders expecting to be met by a frightened cleaning lady, preparing himself for an immediate interrogation. It was important to throw unexperienced people off the track just at the beginning.
“Police”, he held the badge up as soon as the door was opened at last.
He gaped when one very familiar David Silva tilted his neck to blink at him from behind the badge.
A ‘what the hell’ was simply pushing itself onto his tongue so he had to bite down the impulse. Instead, he pocketed the badge in a professional manner.
“We’re looking for David Villa Sánchez”, he didn’t like feeling as if he was explaining himself to the boy, “He’s home?”
At that, Silva visibly reddened, taking a hesitant step back, like he was inviting him into the flat.
“Uhm…”, the Canarian looked like someone who’d take a too big bite of something steaming. To be honest, only then did Iker took in his appearance: the lack of shirt, half-undone jeans looking suspiciously as if there was nothing underneath, dishevelled hair and the distinctive stench of alcohol, “I guess? I mean-”, he trailed off miserably and screwed his eyes shut like someone in sudden pain when there was a shuffling behind him.
“I don’t recall paying you for entertaining my guests-”
Iker’s eyes widened when Villa joined them in the hall, disturbingly resembling Silva in his choice of clothing. Or lack of thereof.
“Inspector”, the Asturian slurred slightly, taxing him and the guys crowding at the door, “Wait, it’s Detective Inspector now isn’t it?”, the man’s lips turned upwards for a second, “How can I help you?”
“You can start with putting your clothes on Mr Villa”, he replied dryly, wondering if Villa was indeed intoxicated or just pretending; nothing a test wouldn’t determine, “We’ll take it from here.”
“What do you want, Casillas?”, Villa frowned making a sound that was a half-snort, “It’s probably some sort of an obligation for you to show a warrant if you’re barging into my flat.”
“I’m not barging”, Iker shrugged, observing how Silva was fighting a losing battle with his zipper, trying to make himself presentable without attracting anyone’s attention, “Your”, he glanced at the rapidly paling boy again, “Companion let me in.”
“You told me to”, Silva whispered desperately as Villa glared at him.
“I would appreciate it if you accompanied us to the Bureau to give your statement”, Iker informed dully, knowing that both of them realised that it was a formality. About Silva, he was unsure, “Otherwise I’m afraid a warrant would become an issue.”
Villa scoffed but zipped himself up, frowning at the hall floor as if he expected to find his shirt there. In the end, he sauntered back into the room he had come from and Iker motioned Llorente to follow. He didn’t exactly believe Villa would do anything unreasonable now, after all he did allow them to find him there…
He shook his head, not liking this trace of thought.
His eyes flickered to Silva. The boy quickly turned his head but not before he noticed he must have been watching him.
Actually, this new unexpected development was making him more than a bit uncomfortable.
“Do you think I could…”, the boy vaguely gestured to his naked torso, causing Iker to unwillingly take note of various bruises and other marks mapping out his skin, “Put something on as well?”, he was giving him skittish glances from underneath a too long fringe.
He nodded blankly and the boy scurried away in obvious relief. Well, he would be having mixed feelings too meeting a policeman who had arrested him in a disreputable club in a flat of an alleged criminal. Okay, that was stretching it. Silva didn’t necessarily had to know who Villa was.
Fuck. Villa had managed to make it complicated for them after all. He couldn’t guess where he had got the kid from but unless there was a very long story there, the questioning was already bound to end in a lot of frustration. Had he paid the kid to lie? Had they just taken him from some corner after the Móstoles fiasco?
His gloomy thoughts were interrupted by a swift return of Silva who stopped across the hall with an expression that would put a deer in the headlights to shame seeing that it was only Iker and Busquets waiting there still. Try as he might, Iker wasn’t able to catch his eyes that seemed to be chasing inexistent dust on the floor and soon the boy was spared the silent inspection by the arrival of Villa flanked by Llorente.
The Asturian had donned on his usual attire, a light-coloured shirt and a jacket, although Iker had to admit that they weren’t normally half that wrinkled. He appeared to have missed one button too.
All in all, Iker yearned to punch him. Just wait for the sobriety check-up. Or rather, just give him a reason for one.
“What exactly are you ‘taking me in for questioning’ for, Casillas?”, Villa drawled, trying to move suavely in front of him but failing to control his body as well as he wished.
“We’d like to know your whereabouts between 9 and 12 p.m. tonight”, he replied, tight-lipped, waiting for the other shoe to drop.
“So ask”, Villa opened his arms wide, “You don’t need to drag me to the station for that.”
Of course they didn’t. But they wanted to ruffle his feathers a bit and the sole fact he wasn’t protesting too hotly indicated Villa was well aware that this time he could have landed himself in deep shit.
“Well”, it was Iker’s turn to drawl sarcastically, “Add prostitution to that”, he glanced pointedly to where Silva was doing his best to disappear into thin air.
Villa scoffed but the boy blanched even more.
“You’re coming with us, Silva”, he informed just in case someone decided to pretend it wasn’t clear.
He didn’t even manage to make another step towards the door before Silva was at him, waving his hands in indignation.
“Why the fuck would I be coming with you?”, the boy snapped but it came out more pleading than aggressive, “I didn’t do anything! You want to question him, fine, I’ll be off on my merry way-”, he gestured uncoordinatedly towards the staircase, eyes wide and frantic.
“We want to question you too”, Iker refused to address him as ‘Mr Silva’, “Consider it a career perk.”
Okay, he was officially a bastard. But if it wasn’t at least slightly suspicious that a prostitute would be covering for a crime lord, he was Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer. And don’t ask where this comparison came from.
As soon as the last bit was out, Silva recoiled, jaw slack with shock or wounded dignity, arms automatically crossing themselves over his now t-shirt-clad chest.
“You didn’t catch me soliciting”, the boy pointed out bitingly, “In the street. That’s what you’re now fining for, isn’t it? You can’t prove anything, I’ll just say we’ve been fucking…”
Iker could only stare at him because the fuck, did the kid honestly think that was the main problem there?
Villa must share his thoughts because he suddenly whirled to the Canarian, glaring daggers.
“Shut up”, he hissed, causing the boy to pause in his tirade but only for a second.
“I’m not shutting up you bastard!”, Silva was giving Villa a look that made Iker wonder about his survival instinct, “Getting mixed up with the cops wasn’t in our fucking agreement!”, he had his finger up and seemed ready to jab it into Villa’s chest.
It was amusing as hell because clearly Villa was so stunned someone was mouthing off to him that he just stared dumbly at the boy. It was either a perfect mascarade or Villa had truly run out of luck and picked up the only prostitute in Madrid that didn't know who he was.
He almost regretted advising them to keep their quarrel down and herding them to the car, with Silva protesting loudly all the time, especially whenever anyone tried to touch him, and with Villa scowling silently at everyone and everything.
He couldn’t quite shake the off-feeling during the whole ride to the Bureau.
...
Because he didn’t fully know how to proceed, he left Silva in a holding cell for all the ruckus he had caused and all the highly uncomplimentary names he had called them when Busquets had attempted to threaten him with accusing him of soliciting.
Iker wasn’t happy with his sergeant. He might have not liked the kid the first two times they had met, but comments like that only because he had somehow winded up working as a prostitute were far below the line for him.
Anyway, he had let it go because they had a far bigger fish to fry. And, as noted, absolutely no idea how to start with the Canarian.
He had Villa escorted to one of the offices - not the interrogation room because it wasn’t strictly an interrogation and the last thing they needed was for Bento to be called: the man had accused a passenger that had fallen out of the car through a fucking windscreen of running away from a crime scene once and not only had got away with that but also won the case.
So, they needed to thread carefully as long as Villa was either too confident or too plastered to remember about the Portuguese. They couldn’t force him to get a check-up done for the alcohol, as he hadn’t been caught driving or anything. He hadn't even insulted them but even if he had tried Silva would have shouted him down anyway.
“Can I”, Xavi walked up to him as he was calming himself down before confronting the man. If he fucked that up…
“How’s Andrés?”, he momentary felt like a swine for not inquiring before when he was passing the Catalans on his way up there.
“Well, actually, considering everything”, Xavi smiled fondly for a second, before his normal impassive expression was back, “Some minor burns, nothing remotely serious. It was mostly shock, not the wounds that caused him to faint, he was at a relatively safe distance when the SUV exploded”, he had to take a short pause just recalling that, “They could’ve kept him at the hospital for the night but both Andrés and I decided it’d be better if he just went home. The hospitals aren’t the best place for him to be right now”, he finished awkwardly, most likely not sure if bringing them up with Iker wasn’t just as bad.
It was. He was simply not thinking about it. Not right now.
“And is it alright to...”, he desperately searched for a good way to phrase it.
“They’ve given him a sedative”, fortunately, the Catalan didn’t need words to understand, “It knocked him out pretty hard, he won’t be waking up for the next few hours… And I thought that maybe I could go back to him after the questioning’s over?”
They had far too few people for that but how could he ever say no, considering everything the Manchego had been through recently?
“Sure”, he nodded, having a feeling that Andrés was going to insist on coming back to the Bureau as soon as he was up anyway, “So, I guess I better get started”, he made to sidestep the Catalan when the technician coughed.
“That’s not all I’ve wanted to talk about”, he announced, face turning even more grave, “We have the explosive: it was simple semtex”, he sounded repelled by the idea, “Someone must have stuck it to the car… Before or after we got there”, the Catalan met his eyes squarely.
“Shit”, he briefly closed his eyes, “It means-”
“That unless one of Villa’s men miraculously circled ours under the rain of bullets it was either me, Andrés or Leo who did it.”
“But it’s ridiculous”, Iker shook his head, “You’re also the only ones who could have got hurt by the explosion. The SUV was too far away for anyone else to be in direct danger.”
“Well, we have a theory”, Xavi carried on, now staring somewhere at the wall over Iker’s shoulder, “Or rather, Víctor has. The guy who did it panicked. He wasn’t acting according to any plan, okay, an emergency plan maybe, or he just acted. The situation got out of control, the explosion may not have been even thought to be a way to hurt anyone, just to distract everyone.”
Iker remembered the sudden flare and thud and heat and yeah, it had been a hell of a distraction. Still…
“But he had the explosive on him”, he narrowed his eyes, unwittingly glancing at the door behind which Villa was seated.
“Precaution?”, Xavi hazarded a guess, “An emergency plan? We’re not overly sure about that. Anyway, he could’ve been walking around with it all the time, we don’t check people for explosive materials”, the last part was said in an especially exaggerated tone.
Yes, an emergency plan sounded most likely. Something along the lines: whenever you don’t manage to tip me off about the raid, make sure to go on it and blow something up.
Only no one had strictly wanted to go on the raid, none of the technicians.
Okay, Xavi hadn’t been protesting too much, but then if it was Xavi then why would he so readily share everything with him? There was Víctor. The coroner had been said to be the one who had put everything together so Xavi couldn’t openly hide anything from him, but there was hiding and running to tell about the discoveries…
It was too fucking much to deal with. Too much and he still had Villa waiting to be tricked into giving something away.
“We’ll think about it once I’m done here”, he gestured to the door.
Xavi didn’t even breathe.
“Okay”, he was beginning to dread the sole presence of the Catalan, “What else is there?”
Xavi sighed, took a breath and pursed his lips. In one minute. It was probably a new record of mimics for him.
“Messi.”
“Messi”, Iker repeated, envisioning where it was all going. Yes, he shouldn’t have made a guy freshly out of a shooting exam go on a raid. Yes, he should have at least asked about him and yes, he should be punched for treating the intern as one of the field agents while he still hadn’t even graduated a university, much less a police academy, “How’s he?”, he risked it with a brave face.
More or less brave. With that thing Xavi had going on with his eyebrows everyone would put their tail between their legs.
“I wouldn’t call it well but stable”, the Catalan made a weird gesture, “Or not really. He may still be in shock. That’s not the point”, that Xavi wasn’t preoccupied with Messi’s apparently shaken state didn’t bode well, “There’s a thing. Or several.”
“Just spill it.”
“Right”, Xavi sighed again, “Look, soon after you three left, we found him.”
“Found him?”, that came out weak.
“Not found him as in dead found him”, Xavi realised how his phrasing had made it sound, “Found him as in found him hiding in an alley next to the SUV.”
Okay. Nothing to be brag about in a next e-mail to his parents but then nothing too shocking either.
“Focus, Iker”, Xavi snapped, waving a hand in front of him, “The same alley I assume you had come through before”, he made a displeased noise, “The main problem with our guest here”, he lowered his voice but not-too-subtly jabbed his finger towards the door, “Is that the way their cars were parked, it was literally impossible for us to see him. They’d known that all along, they’d planned it that way, in case anything went wrong… With the topography of the place, the buildings, they’d realised we could only come from that side, so they’d parked the cars so that he, on exiting, would be perfectly shielded by the SUV and so in the shadows we wouldn’t have a clear view of him”, the Catalan summed up what he very well known, thank you, “However, they hadn’t thought of someone following the alley you had, because it’s unreachable by car. So you were the only one who actually saw him”, Xavi looked at him expectantly, eyebrows going even higher.
“Fuck”, Iker’s shoulders slumped, “Messi must’ve seen him too!”, for once he was so fucking grateful they had hired the intern.
“Yeah”, somehow, Xavi wasn’t as ecstatic, “The problem is he says he didn’t.”
“What? How the hell could he have-”
“Actually, it’s quite possible”, the technician seemed sorry to interrupt his righteous fit, “I took a good look back at the square. I gather you went left after leaving the alley?”, when Iker nodded, he continued, “If he hadn’t hidden right after we’d arrived and if Villa’s SUV was parked exactly the way I remember, by hiding behind the door Villa would hide himself from Messi’s eyes. Sorry.”
Why the hell was he even bringing it up then? To make him want to go and throttle Messi even more than usually?
“Then why are you even suggesting he might have seen him”, he gritted out, glaring at the controlled Catalan.
“Because I’m trying to paint a picture here”, Xavi snapped, frustrated, “Llorente says Ramos was there, right?”
“Yes”, his eyes flickered to his aching wrist.
“Ramos wasn’t shielded the way Villa was, hell, he was a shield”, the technician was articulating every word very carefully, “He was another distraction. He wasn’t there until the situation went shit, was he? He must have been lurking somewhere in the shadows and only stepped out because I guess you came close to getting Villa?”
“I was going to shoot the tires”, he blinked, “How the hell do you know all of that?”
Xavi brought his hands up placatingly.
“Remember, while you three were chasing Villa around the city, Víctor and I went straight there. Okay, we went to the hospital but when it became clear Andrés’ going to be alright we tried to interpret what had happened. The other guys helped me to fill Víctor in.”
“Okay”, paranoid much but it had been Xavi who had pinpointed the mole as one of the technicians from the SUV, “Ramos? Did Messi see him?”
“That’s where it’s getting weird”, Xavi sounded almost satisfied, “Or weirder. First, when we asked about that he did admit he’d seen both you and Ramos from the distance and that he tried to shoot him.”
Iker tilted his head to the side. He had been pretty busy back there but couldn’t recall any strange bullets flying over his head.
“But then we got his gun”, the Catalan grew gloomier, “He just got his license, he just got his gun. I mean, it was a new one”, he spelled it out for Iker as if he hadn’t known, “Never used”, he paused, “Turns out it’s never been used.”
“He didn’t try shooting”, so much for thinking he owed the Argentinian. Or that he wasn’t a lost cause.
“Yet his magazine was empty”, Xavi once again was arching the eyebrow.
“What?”
“Okay, I misspoke again”, the technician rushed to explain, “It’s missing. He said he’d realised it’d been empty and thrown it away. But as he hadn’t had a spare one he’d just ended up with an unloaded gun.”
“But first he claimed he tried to save me.”
So, well, it happened. People did say one thing and then the other, the first being a lie and the second the truth and it didn’t necessarily mean they had nefarious intentions. The fact Messi was a mole candidate changed the perspective.
“He could’ve had another gun”, Iker made a so-so expression, “He ran out of bullets and replaced the magazine with the one he ‘lost’.”
“Why not using this gun then?”, Xavi immediately picked it up, “I mean, it’s been always far more likely we’d be investigating it once it became clear he wasn’t shooting than if he was shooting the wrong men. That is, we might have never found out in that case.”
It was probably true. Unless Messi, who was hypothetically the mole, had killed one of the officers they wouldn’t be identifying any bullets.
“Your theory then”, Iker really needed to go to Villa. The more time the man got, the more perfect excuse he was going to prepare. But he needed to listen to this too.
“I’ve got two”, at least Xavi wasn’t a person who was disappointed unless he had constructed at least five, unlike some other people at the Bureau…, “First one is as you said. He used the magazine to replace another in a different gun, a gun we most likely will never find. The second…”, he coughed uncomfortably, “The second one sounds awfully feeble if we assume Messi is the mole. But as long as we don’t, and only keep in mind that he’s a 22-year-old intern with almost none shooting expertise and exactly none field experience, it makes sense in an illogical way. Think of that: he simply took a wrong magazine from here. An empty one”, spotting Iker’s doubtful face, he hurried to explain, “I know that it’s impossible to mistake an empty one with a full one, but he was stressed, damn, he was petrified and probably didn’t follow too well what he was doing.”
“Why the lie then? Why saying he was shooting after all?”
“Iker, really, isn’t it obvious?”, Xavi’s face may one day get stuck like that, “Pride! Who working for the police would ever admit they have mistaken magazines and gone on a raid with an empty gun? He didn’t suspect we’re going to actually check the gun for being fired, so he suddenly had to tell the truth, only a truth like that doesn’t sound believable”, he finished, looking at him expectantly.
“You’re right”, he shrugged, readjusting his shirt, “It doesn’t. By the way, find me everything you can on one David Silva. There must be a file with his name somewhere here.”
...
As soon as he walked in, Villa drawled at him smugly that he had been under impression that during a questioning a questionee was treated to a coffee so he went to get it because the other validate option was staying and getting the man’s face acquainted with a desk.
And because he was such a lucky person, his phone rang just when he was putting the money into a coffee machine. He was half-tempted to ignore it, it was probably Alba after all, but then he told himself to stop being an arse and took the phone out.
“Suárez?”, he pressed the ‘black coffee’ button.
“There's either something with my eyes”, the man’s voice didn’t sound confused, though, “Or I think I need men. Ramos has just walked into the apartment building and he didn’t seem like someone on a quest to get rid of a police psychologist.”
His eyes fluttered closed briefly as his finger jabbed strongly into the button.
“Stay there.”
“I shouldn’t be going anywhere I guess”, Suárez snorted, “How long until you arrive?”
“I’m sending Llorente and his men right now”, discarding the coffee - Villa wouldn’t touch that coffee-like liquid anyway - he jogged down the corridor to where the Bask sergeant should be, “Wait.”
“Sure”, Suárez didn’t strike him as a guy who would needlessly endanger himself so he wasn’t worried about the unconcerned tone.
“No, I mean wait”, he took a breath, motioning for Llorente to start getting ready, “Until he comes out.”
“Huh, what?”, there it was, some energy at last.
“You’re where I told you to be?”, after a short confirmation, he continued, “Good, so we have your testimony and the camera footage, the building has a tight surveillance system. Arrest Ramos”, he ordered as much to Suárez as to Llorente, “And make sure Torres doesn’t find out. I still want him here tomorrow”, he had an experiment to condone.
He glanced at Llorente to see if everything was clear and the man nodded once, disappearing to gather his men.
Turning back to finally get care of Villa, he localised Busquets.
“Go through all the stuff in Torres’ office.”
...
Characters: David Silva, David Villa, Iker Casillas, Xavi Hernández, Fernando Llorente, Sergio Busquets (this part of the chapter)
Rating: R (?)
Warnings: AU
Disclaimer: I don't claim it has ever happened
Chapter 28
“Make it disappear”, Villa snatched up his clothes as soon as David was done shedding them and threw them into Piqué’s waiting arms.
The Catalan seemed a bit reluctant but did whatever Villa asked of him, probably automatically. He didn’t look like someone who fully believed their plan to succeed.
Maybe because they hadn’t strictly told him the plan.
“The cameras”, he was tilting his head towards the door at the sudden realisation, “The footage-”
“There’s no camera here”, Villa sounded as if it was a nuisance just answering his concerns.
“How can there be no cameras here?”, he was most likely asking for it but he stopped dead in his tracks.
“Because I had them taken down”, the man’s eyes promised death on no uncertain terms if he didn’t stop slacking as he angrily opened a small liquor cabinet, “There’s no security in that building. Satisfied?”
“Wait”, he knew he was frowning at judging by Villa’s face, getting frowned at was the last thing he was going to accept that night, “How…”, he got distracted for a second as the man expertly opened a scotch and began gulping it down straight from the bottle, “You kept taking me here for months!”
Villa paused in his drinking. He turned to him, slowly, eyebrows cocked up in an infuriatingly mocking way.
“Was I supposed to be afraid of you?”
David opened his mouth, then closed it, because obviously Villa was not going to treat him seriously anytime soon. At least he finally understood why Piqué had always seemed to be so pissed with his very existence back when Villa had his exec charade going.
The bottle thrust in his face made him recoil so hard he almost lost his balance.
“Uhm”, he brought his hands up to battle the onslaught of scotch, “Not a good idea. Low alcohol tolerance. You don’t want me drunk for that”, he warned loyally because well, he was still loyal.
Plus, he had a distinctive feeling that any failure on his part would land them both behind bars.
Villa scowled, made as if to stalk away and then suddenly, his whole head found itself under a golden alcoholic shower.
“What the hell!”, he cried out indignantly, trying to un-plaster his fringe from his forehead.
The other simply shrugged and reached out for another bottle.
“They’ll go to La Moraleja first”, Villa broke the silence just when David was ready to demand to know what exactly he was working there with, other than some completely unexpected crisis, “Then to Salamanca. Then here.”
“Why La Moraleja?”, he chose, wondering if they - he was guessing it meant the police - would have a search warrant on the penthouse in Salamanca. The role he was supposed to play would be most complicated if his stuff was found there.
“I live there”, Villa looked at him flatly.
“But…”, he was racking his brain searching for any mention of the place, “What about Salamanca?”
The man snorted just as a cork from a bottle of wine flew up and knocked on the ceiling.
“Did you honestly believe I’d live in a penthouse in the middle of the city?”, he leered, appraising David, “You’re such a little idiot.”
“You had a house all that time and-”
And what? Never took him there? Never even mentioned that insignificant fact?
Sure it made sense now, he was no expert but even he could figure out that a house with a garden and a high fence was much better suited to be a residence of a crime lord than a penthouse in an apartment building…
“And didn’t tell you?”, Villa finished for him with more ire in his voice David had ever heard, “All for the better, wasn’t it? Look what you’ve done with the information I did share with you.”
Not the direction this conversation should head in. Not that one and not any other, ever and certainly not in the company of liquor. Not that he’d ever seen Villa drunk, no matter how much alcohol he’d consumed, but in that situation the scotch may appear to be that perfect excuse.
David’s breath hitched when Villa took a step towards him. His own feet moved on their own accord, carrying him backwards and behind the sofa as if it could somehow save him.
“Give me your hands”, the man growled, quickly freeing a belt out of his trousers.
“What”, David wheezed out weakly, not able to take his eyes of the leather strap in Villa’s hands. What the fuck was he going to do to-
“Give me your fucking hands!”
Panicked and stuck between the sofa and the wall, David thrust his hands forwards and screw his eyes shut.
There was a heavy sigh on Villa’s part and a soft sound of leather being tightened followed by a piercing burn around his wrists.
He jerked back and his back collided with the wall.
There were angry red marks around both of his wrists, appearing to be composed of several individual marks of something coarse and thin.
“You’ve tied me up”, he brought his gaze up from the marks and onto Villa’s face.
“I picked you up in Chueca”, Villa discarded the belt onto the sofa, “You were hustling near that metro station”, he obviously waited for David to picture the place, “Then I took you to the car. The Volkswagen.”
He nodded, following when Villa jerked his head towards the bedroom.
The bedroom where he had lost his virginity. He had this ridiculous notion of balking and generally running away. Shouldn’t some things remain sacred after all?
Apparently not, because Villa grew impatient when he just slowed down, having a vivid flashback of the man lavishing him with delicate attention on the very same bed. He grabbed his elbow and dragged him inside like a particularly big sack of potatoes.
He pursed his lips, determined not to say anything - after all he doubted the man was in any shape to share his sentiments with their time running out - but Villa wasn’t letting go of his arm despite having him as close as possible.
His eyebrows began to furrow down as Villa’s hand made its way up to his cheek. The fingers, unusually cold, stroked his skin, at first fleetingly as if shy, then the hand retreated, only to come back a millisecond later to force his head to the side.
Surprised, he let himself be manhandled - like always - doing his best to keep watching Villa with the corner of his eyes.
He was fucking smirking.
“That’s a nice touch”, Villa commented and David clenched his jaws, suddenly remembering the dull pain that had been throbbing in his face throughout the whole afternoon until it had settled down into a mostly tolerable numbness.
He didn’t know what he was going to say to a man who had him fucking slapped several times in a row and now behaved as if it was a pleasant coincidence that would make his next plan go even more smoothly. So he stayed silent, in case he blurted out something too provocative and only attempted to shield his cheek with his hair.
His head jerked up when Villa began to fucking chuckle again.
“Sweetheart”, his lips formed his trademark smirk, the one that had been driving David mad from the very beginning and that made it look as if there wasn’t a single thing the man didn’t have under his control despite preparing to face the police and jail-time, “It’s so precious when your eyes just fill up with hatred like that”, Villa sounded amused, “Especially since you don’t even fucking realise that.”
“I think I do hate you right now”, he whispered, unsure it his feelings for the man had actually changed since the time they had met.
“You hate the whole world on your best day”, Villa grinned unexpectedly, “I’m sure I hate you right now, so aren’t we even?”
He shouldn’t be surprised, he really shouldn’t. After all, what else could the man think after he had betrayed him? Okay, so it was a betrayal only in Villa’s dictionary but it was all that mattered since they were clearly speaking his language there.
“Come on”, he stumbled when the man pushed him towards the door, “We need evidence. I was too pissed to get it up but that wouldn’t have done, would it?”
“You?”, David couldn’t help himself as the other manoeuvred them so that he was straddling his hips, “Too pissed to get it up?”
“Flattery will get you nowhere”, Villa was tugging at his boxers.
“I meant”, David grinned devilishly, “You never get pissed.”
...
“We could talk to the neighbours”, Busquets used his thumb to point to the nearest villa.
“It’d take too long”, Iker snapped, cursing himself for thinking that Villa would be found at home, “We still have two places to check.”
“Wouldn’t he just drop off the radar?”, Llorente opened the car door.
“No”, of that Iker was weirdly convinced, “He’ll try to pull off the innocent act again”, or as always, “A law-abiding citizen like him would be spending the night at home”, he caught Busquets’ meaningful stare, “One of them.”
“We don’t have a search warrant”, Llorente reminded for the seventh time. He’d been counting.
“We’re not searching his flats, there’s nothing there anyway”, they’d already been down that road several times, “We’re bringing him, personally, for questioning.”
“You’re the only one who saw him, Inspector”, the Bask cut in and then paled, realising how it sounded, “Shit, I don’t mean you’re making that up, I’m sure he was there, it’s just that it was dark, and then when we were supposed to get a clear look at him this car threw us back-”
“That was the point”, he barked, irritated. He wondered if the Church wasn’t wrong and God was helping the evil ones; it would explain so much in history, “That’s why”, he took a deep breath, “We’re taking him in for questioning, not arresting for taking part in a drug deal. Yet. Things are going to get complicated once he doesn’t have a believable alibi.”
“He’ll get someone to testify”, Busquets commented in an almost bored tone.
“He can’t exactly risk using a known associate”, Llorente replied, “Not after all those times. Even the most corruptible judge won’t be able to turn a blind eye after so many similar cases”, his gaze skittered to the steering wheel as Iker took a turn right.
“We’re fools”, Iker grinded his teeth, trying to force his way into the traffic; it was late but it in no way meant the streets were empty, “He went to Malasaña, of course it’s the closest place to Móstoles.”
...
“A male streetwalker wouldn’t ask for more than fifty for everything”, Villa was appraising the bedroom with calculating eyes and David left him to that. No one had doubts who was the more experienced there.
“Well…”, he drawled, yanking the top drawer of the nightstand open, “You’re clearly loaded, flashing those earrings and all, I’d have charged more just because of that.”
Villa moved into the sitting room.
“Greedy”, he muttered, “I’d have laughed in your face.”
“You didn’t use condoms even though you have them in your bedroom”, David rolled off the bed, waving a pack at him, “I’d have definitely wanted at least hundred fifty for that.”
“You’ve only blown me, remember?”, Villa snatched the pack and threw it back into the drawer, “You asked for a hundred.”
“And you agreed on seventy-five”, he finished, “Paid up front.”
“A fifty up front”, the man stuck a bill into his discarded jeans.
“That’s not how prostitutes work”, David crossed his arms, smiling all of the sudden.
“That’s the way they work for me”, Villa smirked and pulled him to his side.
...
He ran up the stairs, the adrenaline pumping too much to wait for a lift, Busquets and Llorente hot on his heels.
Villa’s flat was situated on the last floor and given the buildings shape, it was the only one there. Rather convenient.
He glanced around, finding exactly no person other than them on the floor. If Villa was there, he would have sent his goons away long before they arrived.
Exchanging the last opinions with the sergeants as clearly as he could non-verbally, he marched up to the door and knocked.
Nothing.
He resumed the process, wondering briefly if the lack of a door bell was yet another ‘fuck you’ on Villa’s part.
Finally, there was a loud “Open the door!” from the inside. Iker frowned. Who the hell was there?
Llorente lent him a hand and banged on the door, prompting an even louder “Open the damn door”.
They glanced at each other and Iker squared his shoulders expecting to be met by a frightened cleaning lady, preparing himself for an immediate interrogation. It was important to throw unexperienced people off the track just at the beginning.
“Police”, he held the badge up as soon as the door was opened at last.
He gaped when one very familiar David Silva tilted his neck to blink at him from behind the badge.
A ‘what the hell’ was simply pushing itself onto his tongue so he had to bite down the impulse. Instead, he pocketed the badge in a professional manner.
“We’re looking for David Villa Sánchez”, he didn’t like feeling as if he was explaining himself to the boy, “He’s home?”
At that, Silva visibly reddened, taking a hesitant step back, like he was inviting him into the flat.
“Uhm…”, the Canarian looked like someone who’d take a too big bite of something steaming. To be honest, only then did Iker took in his appearance: the lack of shirt, half-undone jeans looking suspiciously as if there was nothing underneath, dishevelled hair and the distinctive stench of alcohol, “I guess? I mean-”, he trailed off miserably and screwed his eyes shut like someone in sudden pain when there was a shuffling behind him.
“I don’t recall paying you for entertaining my guests-”
Iker’s eyes widened when Villa joined them in the hall, disturbingly resembling Silva in his choice of clothing. Or lack of thereof.
“Inspector”, the Asturian slurred slightly, taxing him and the guys crowding at the door, “Wait, it’s Detective Inspector now isn’t it?”, the man’s lips turned upwards for a second, “How can I help you?”
“You can start with putting your clothes on Mr Villa”, he replied dryly, wondering if Villa was indeed intoxicated or just pretending; nothing a test wouldn’t determine, “We’ll take it from here.”
“What do you want, Casillas?”, Villa frowned making a sound that was a half-snort, “It’s probably some sort of an obligation for you to show a warrant if you’re barging into my flat.”
“I’m not barging”, Iker shrugged, observing how Silva was fighting a losing battle with his zipper, trying to make himself presentable without attracting anyone’s attention, “Your”, he glanced at the rapidly paling boy again, “Companion let me in.”
“You told me to”, Silva whispered desperately as Villa glared at him.
“I would appreciate it if you accompanied us to the Bureau to give your statement”, Iker informed dully, knowing that both of them realised that it was a formality. About Silva, he was unsure, “Otherwise I’m afraid a warrant would become an issue.”
Villa scoffed but zipped himself up, frowning at the hall floor as if he expected to find his shirt there. In the end, he sauntered back into the room he had come from and Iker motioned Llorente to follow. He didn’t exactly believe Villa would do anything unreasonable now, after all he did allow them to find him there…
He shook his head, not liking this trace of thought.
His eyes flickered to Silva. The boy quickly turned his head but not before he noticed he must have been watching him.
Actually, this new unexpected development was making him more than a bit uncomfortable.
“Do you think I could…”, the boy vaguely gestured to his naked torso, causing Iker to unwillingly take note of various bruises and other marks mapping out his skin, “Put something on as well?”, he was giving him skittish glances from underneath a too long fringe.
He nodded blankly and the boy scurried away in obvious relief. Well, he would be having mixed feelings too meeting a policeman who had arrested him in a disreputable club in a flat of an alleged criminal. Okay, that was stretching it. Silva didn’t necessarily had to know who Villa was.
Fuck. Villa had managed to make it complicated for them after all. He couldn’t guess where he had got the kid from but unless there was a very long story there, the questioning was already bound to end in a lot of frustration. Had he paid the kid to lie? Had they just taken him from some corner after the Móstoles fiasco?
His gloomy thoughts were interrupted by a swift return of Silva who stopped across the hall with an expression that would put a deer in the headlights to shame seeing that it was only Iker and Busquets waiting there still. Try as he might, Iker wasn’t able to catch his eyes that seemed to be chasing inexistent dust on the floor and soon the boy was spared the silent inspection by the arrival of Villa flanked by Llorente.
The Asturian had donned on his usual attire, a light-coloured shirt and a jacket, although Iker had to admit that they weren’t normally half that wrinkled. He appeared to have missed one button too.
All in all, Iker yearned to punch him. Just wait for the sobriety check-up. Or rather, just give him a reason for one.
“What exactly are you ‘taking me in for questioning’ for, Casillas?”, Villa drawled, trying to move suavely in front of him but failing to control his body as well as he wished.
“We’d like to know your whereabouts between 9 and 12 p.m. tonight”, he replied, tight-lipped, waiting for the other shoe to drop.
“So ask”, Villa opened his arms wide, “You don’t need to drag me to the station for that.”
Of course they didn’t. But they wanted to ruffle his feathers a bit and the sole fact he wasn’t protesting too hotly indicated Villa was well aware that this time he could have landed himself in deep shit.
“Well”, it was Iker’s turn to drawl sarcastically, “Add prostitution to that”, he glanced pointedly to where Silva was doing his best to disappear into thin air.
Villa scoffed but the boy blanched even more.
“You’re coming with us, Silva”, he informed just in case someone decided to pretend it wasn’t clear.
He didn’t even manage to make another step towards the door before Silva was at him, waving his hands in indignation.
“Why the fuck would I be coming with you?”, the boy snapped but it came out more pleading than aggressive, “I didn’t do anything! You want to question him, fine, I’ll be off on my merry way-”, he gestured uncoordinatedly towards the staircase, eyes wide and frantic.
“We want to question you too”, Iker refused to address him as ‘Mr Silva’, “Consider it a career perk.”
Okay, he was officially a bastard. But if it wasn’t at least slightly suspicious that a prostitute would be covering for a crime lord, he was Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer. And don’t ask where this comparison came from.
As soon as the last bit was out, Silva recoiled, jaw slack with shock or wounded dignity, arms automatically crossing themselves over his now t-shirt-clad chest.
“You didn’t catch me soliciting”, the boy pointed out bitingly, “In the street. That’s what you’re now fining for, isn’t it? You can’t prove anything, I’ll just say we’ve been fucking…”
Iker could only stare at him because the fuck, did the kid honestly think that was the main problem there?
Villa must share his thoughts because he suddenly whirled to the Canarian, glaring daggers.
“Shut up”, he hissed, causing the boy to pause in his tirade but only for a second.
“I’m not shutting up you bastard!”, Silva was giving Villa a look that made Iker wonder about his survival instinct, “Getting mixed up with the cops wasn’t in our fucking agreement!”, he had his finger up and seemed ready to jab it into Villa’s chest.
It was amusing as hell because clearly Villa was so stunned someone was mouthing off to him that he just stared dumbly at the boy. It was either a perfect mascarade or Villa had truly run out of luck and picked up the only prostitute in Madrid that didn't know who he was.
He almost regretted advising them to keep their quarrel down and herding them to the car, with Silva protesting loudly all the time, especially whenever anyone tried to touch him, and with Villa scowling silently at everyone and everything.
He couldn’t quite shake the off-feeling during the whole ride to the Bureau.
...
Because he didn’t fully know how to proceed, he left Silva in a holding cell for all the ruckus he had caused and all the highly uncomplimentary names he had called them when Busquets had attempted to threaten him with accusing him of soliciting.
Iker wasn’t happy with his sergeant. He might have not liked the kid the first two times they had met, but comments like that only because he had somehow winded up working as a prostitute were far below the line for him.
Anyway, he had let it go because they had a far bigger fish to fry. And, as noted, absolutely no idea how to start with the Canarian.
He had Villa escorted to one of the offices - not the interrogation room because it wasn’t strictly an interrogation and the last thing they needed was for Bento to be called: the man had accused a passenger that had fallen out of the car through a fucking windscreen of running away from a crime scene once and not only had got away with that but also won the case.
So, they needed to thread carefully as long as Villa was either too confident or too plastered to remember about the Portuguese. They couldn’t force him to get a check-up done for the alcohol, as he hadn’t been caught driving or anything. He hadn't even insulted them but even if he had tried Silva would have shouted him down anyway.
“Can I”, Xavi walked up to him as he was calming himself down before confronting the man. If he fucked that up…
“How’s Andrés?”, he momentary felt like a swine for not inquiring before when he was passing the Catalans on his way up there.
“Well, actually, considering everything”, Xavi smiled fondly for a second, before his normal impassive expression was back, “Some minor burns, nothing remotely serious. It was mostly shock, not the wounds that caused him to faint, he was at a relatively safe distance when the SUV exploded”, he had to take a short pause just recalling that, “They could’ve kept him at the hospital for the night but both Andrés and I decided it’d be better if he just went home. The hospitals aren’t the best place for him to be right now”, he finished awkwardly, most likely not sure if bringing them up with Iker wasn’t just as bad.
It was. He was simply not thinking about it. Not right now.
“And is it alright to...”, he desperately searched for a good way to phrase it.
“They’ve given him a sedative”, fortunately, the Catalan didn’t need words to understand, “It knocked him out pretty hard, he won’t be waking up for the next few hours… And I thought that maybe I could go back to him after the questioning’s over?”
They had far too few people for that but how could he ever say no, considering everything the Manchego had been through recently?
“Sure”, he nodded, having a feeling that Andrés was going to insist on coming back to the Bureau as soon as he was up anyway, “So, I guess I better get started”, he made to sidestep the Catalan when the technician coughed.
“That’s not all I’ve wanted to talk about”, he announced, face turning even more grave, “We have the explosive: it was simple semtex”, he sounded repelled by the idea, “Someone must have stuck it to the car… Before or after we got there”, the Catalan met his eyes squarely.
“Shit”, he briefly closed his eyes, “It means-”
“That unless one of Villa’s men miraculously circled ours under the rain of bullets it was either me, Andrés or Leo who did it.”
“But it’s ridiculous”, Iker shook his head, “You’re also the only ones who could have got hurt by the explosion. The SUV was too far away for anyone else to be in direct danger.”
“Well, we have a theory”, Xavi carried on, now staring somewhere at the wall over Iker’s shoulder, “Or rather, Víctor has. The guy who did it panicked. He wasn’t acting according to any plan, okay, an emergency plan maybe, or he just acted. The situation got out of control, the explosion may not have been even thought to be a way to hurt anyone, just to distract everyone.”
Iker remembered the sudden flare and thud and heat and yeah, it had been a hell of a distraction. Still…
“But he had the explosive on him”, he narrowed his eyes, unwittingly glancing at the door behind which Villa was seated.
“Precaution?”, Xavi hazarded a guess, “An emergency plan? We’re not overly sure about that. Anyway, he could’ve been walking around with it all the time, we don’t check people for explosive materials”, the last part was said in an especially exaggerated tone.
Yes, an emergency plan sounded most likely. Something along the lines: whenever you don’t manage to tip me off about the raid, make sure to go on it and blow something up.
Only no one had strictly wanted to go on the raid, none of the technicians.
Okay, Xavi hadn’t been protesting too much, but then if it was Xavi then why would he so readily share everything with him? There was Víctor. The coroner had been said to be the one who had put everything together so Xavi couldn’t openly hide anything from him, but there was hiding and running to tell about the discoveries…
It was too fucking much to deal with. Too much and he still had Villa waiting to be tricked into giving something away.
“We’ll think about it once I’m done here”, he gestured to the door.
Xavi didn’t even breathe.
“Okay”, he was beginning to dread the sole presence of the Catalan, “What else is there?”
Xavi sighed, took a breath and pursed his lips. In one minute. It was probably a new record of mimics for him.
“Messi.”
“Messi”, Iker repeated, envisioning where it was all going. Yes, he shouldn’t have made a guy freshly out of a shooting exam go on a raid. Yes, he should have at least asked about him and yes, he should be punched for treating the intern as one of the field agents while he still hadn’t even graduated a university, much less a police academy, “How’s he?”, he risked it with a brave face.
More or less brave. With that thing Xavi had going on with his eyebrows everyone would put their tail between their legs.
“I wouldn’t call it well but stable”, the Catalan made a weird gesture, “Or not really. He may still be in shock. That’s not the point”, that Xavi wasn’t preoccupied with Messi’s apparently shaken state didn’t bode well, “There’s a thing. Or several.”
“Just spill it.”
“Right”, Xavi sighed again, “Look, soon after you three left, we found him.”
“Found him?”, that came out weak.
“Not found him as in dead found him”, Xavi realised how his phrasing had made it sound, “Found him as in found him hiding in an alley next to the SUV.”
Okay. Nothing to be brag about in a next e-mail to his parents but then nothing too shocking either.
“Focus, Iker”, Xavi snapped, waving a hand in front of him, “The same alley I assume you had come through before”, he made a displeased noise, “The main problem with our guest here”, he lowered his voice but not-too-subtly jabbed his finger towards the door, “Is that the way their cars were parked, it was literally impossible for us to see him. They’d known that all along, they’d planned it that way, in case anything went wrong… With the topography of the place, the buildings, they’d realised we could only come from that side, so they’d parked the cars so that he, on exiting, would be perfectly shielded by the SUV and so in the shadows we wouldn’t have a clear view of him”, the Catalan summed up what he very well known, thank you, “However, they hadn’t thought of someone following the alley you had, because it’s unreachable by car. So you were the only one who actually saw him”, Xavi looked at him expectantly, eyebrows going even higher.
“Fuck”, Iker’s shoulders slumped, “Messi must’ve seen him too!”, for once he was so fucking grateful they had hired the intern.
“Yeah”, somehow, Xavi wasn’t as ecstatic, “The problem is he says he didn’t.”
“What? How the hell could he have-”
“Actually, it’s quite possible”, the technician seemed sorry to interrupt his righteous fit, “I took a good look back at the square. I gather you went left after leaving the alley?”, when Iker nodded, he continued, “If he hadn’t hidden right after we’d arrived and if Villa’s SUV was parked exactly the way I remember, by hiding behind the door Villa would hide himself from Messi’s eyes. Sorry.”
Why the hell was he even bringing it up then? To make him want to go and throttle Messi even more than usually?
“Then why are you even suggesting he might have seen him”, he gritted out, glaring at the controlled Catalan.
“Because I’m trying to paint a picture here”, Xavi snapped, frustrated, “Llorente says Ramos was there, right?”
“Yes”, his eyes flickered to his aching wrist.
“Ramos wasn’t shielded the way Villa was, hell, he was a shield”, the technician was articulating every word very carefully, “He was another distraction. He wasn’t there until the situation went shit, was he? He must have been lurking somewhere in the shadows and only stepped out because I guess you came close to getting Villa?”
“I was going to shoot the tires”, he blinked, “How the hell do you know all of that?”
Xavi brought his hands up placatingly.
“Remember, while you three were chasing Villa around the city, Víctor and I went straight there. Okay, we went to the hospital but when it became clear Andrés’ going to be alright we tried to interpret what had happened. The other guys helped me to fill Víctor in.”
“Okay”, paranoid much but it had been Xavi who had pinpointed the mole as one of the technicians from the SUV, “Ramos? Did Messi see him?”
“That’s where it’s getting weird”, Xavi sounded almost satisfied, “Or weirder. First, when we asked about that he did admit he’d seen both you and Ramos from the distance and that he tried to shoot him.”
Iker tilted his head to the side. He had been pretty busy back there but couldn’t recall any strange bullets flying over his head.
“But then we got his gun”, the Catalan grew gloomier, “He just got his license, he just got his gun. I mean, it was a new one”, he spelled it out for Iker as if he hadn’t known, “Never used”, he paused, “Turns out it’s never been used.”
“He didn’t try shooting”, so much for thinking he owed the Argentinian. Or that he wasn’t a lost cause.
“Yet his magazine was empty”, Xavi once again was arching the eyebrow.
“What?”
“Okay, I misspoke again”, the technician rushed to explain, “It’s missing. He said he’d realised it’d been empty and thrown it away. But as he hadn’t had a spare one he’d just ended up with an unloaded gun.”
“But first he claimed he tried to save me.”
So, well, it happened. People did say one thing and then the other, the first being a lie and the second the truth and it didn’t necessarily mean they had nefarious intentions. The fact Messi was a mole candidate changed the perspective.
“He could’ve had another gun”, Iker made a so-so expression, “He ran out of bullets and replaced the magazine with the one he ‘lost’.”
“Why not using this gun then?”, Xavi immediately picked it up, “I mean, it’s been always far more likely we’d be investigating it once it became clear he wasn’t shooting than if he was shooting the wrong men. That is, we might have never found out in that case.”
It was probably true. Unless Messi, who was hypothetically the mole, had killed one of the officers they wouldn’t be identifying any bullets.
“Your theory then”, Iker really needed to go to Villa. The more time the man got, the more perfect excuse he was going to prepare. But he needed to listen to this too.
“I’ve got two”, at least Xavi wasn’t a person who was disappointed unless he had constructed at least five, unlike some other people at the Bureau…, “First one is as you said. He used the magazine to replace another in a different gun, a gun we most likely will never find. The second…”, he coughed uncomfortably, “The second one sounds awfully feeble if we assume Messi is the mole. But as long as we don’t, and only keep in mind that he’s a 22-year-old intern with almost none shooting expertise and exactly none field experience, it makes sense in an illogical way. Think of that: he simply took a wrong magazine from here. An empty one”, spotting Iker’s doubtful face, he hurried to explain, “I know that it’s impossible to mistake an empty one with a full one, but he was stressed, damn, he was petrified and probably didn’t follow too well what he was doing.”
“Why the lie then? Why saying he was shooting after all?”
“Iker, really, isn’t it obvious?”, Xavi’s face may one day get stuck like that, “Pride! Who working for the police would ever admit they have mistaken magazines and gone on a raid with an empty gun? He didn’t suspect we’re going to actually check the gun for being fired, so he suddenly had to tell the truth, only a truth like that doesn’t sound believable”, he finished, looking at him expectantly.
“You’re right”, he shrugged, readjusting his shirt, “It doesn’t. By the way, find me everything you can on one David Silva. There must be a file with his name somewhere here.”
...
As soon as he walked in, Villa drawled at him smugly that he had been under impression that during a questioning a questionee was treated to a coffee so he went to get it because the other validate option was staying and getting the man’s face acquainted with a desk.
And because he was such a lucky person, his phone rang just when he was putting the money into a coffee machine. He was half-tempted to ignore it, it was probably Alba after all, but then he told himself to stop being an arse and took the phone out.
“Suárez?”, he pressed the ‘black coffee’ button.
“There's either something with my eyes”, the man’s voice didn’t sound confused, though, “Or I think I need men. Ramos has just walked into the apartment building and he didn’t seem like someone on a quest to get rid of a police psychologist.”
His eyes fluttered closed briefly as his finger jabbed strongly into the button.
“Stay there.”
“I shouldn’t be going anywhere I guess”, Suárez snorted, “How long until you arrive?”
“I’m sending Llorente and his men right now”, discarding the coffee - Villa wouldn’t touch that coffee-like liquid anyway - he jogged down the corridor to where the Bask sergeant should be, “Wait.”
“Sure”, Suárez didn’t strike him as a guy who would needlessly endanger himself so he wasn’t worried about the unconcerned tone.
“No, I mean wait”, he took a breath, motioning for Llorente to start getting ready, “Until he comes out.”
“Huh, what?”, there it was, some energy at last.
“You’re where I told you to be?”, after a short confirmation, he continued, “Good, so we have your testimony and the camera footage, the building has a tight surveillance system. Arrest Ramos”, he ordered as much to Suárez as to Llorente, “And make sure Torres doesn’t find out. I still want him here tomorrow”, he had an experiment to condone.
He glanced at Llorente to see if everything was clear and the man nodded once, disappearing to gather his men.
Turning back to finally get care of Villa, he localised Busquets.
“Go through all the stuff in Torres’ office.”
...