Everything and anything RDJ

Paul Avery x Reader

Prompt - "What happened to you?"

Second person POV

"And that's when I said to him, hey buddy maybe you shouldn't be hanging around here if you can't tell what sort of area this is." You joked with your work colleagues at the San Francisco Chronicle, explained to them the antics of your previous night down at the bar. Suddenly there was an ear piercing scream, chilling you to the core. Everyone looked around the office in confusion before you heard a door slam. That was when you saw the editor walking through the office with Paul Avery hot on his tail. "Hear me out boss, what if-" he began before the editor turned around and looked him dead in the eyes. "Just shut it for two minutes Avery. Everyone, meeting room in five, understood?" He shouted, people mumbling a few questions and remarks as Paul strode over to Robert Graysmith's desk.

"Typical Paul, pressing buttons at the wrong moment." One of the male workers commented as he walked off towards the meeting room, with a few others trailing behind him nodding their heads in agreement. You shook your head and grabbed your notepad and walked towards the room with the others, glancing over at Paul and Robert as they stopped their conversation and looked up at you. Paul's glance caught your eye for a second before his gaze shifted towards someone else, two men came walking through the office, enquiring about the meeting room as you saw the secretary ushering everyone inside, they looked like feds. Paul and Robert quickly huddled into the room and sat down rolling his eyes.

You quickly hurried into the room and took a seat just to the left of where the editor was sat, notepad at the ready in case there were special notes to be taken. "Paul, read this for me." the editor sighed, rubbing his temple as he tossed the letter towards Paul who sat at the other end of the table, he looked mortified and if that look was anything to go by it was obvious why he had such a look of horror. He picked up the letter and opened it, looking around the room before he looked back down at the letter. "This is the Zodiac speaking..." Paul began, taking a deep breath as he knew exactly where this was going.

"I am the murderer of the taxi driver over by Washington Street and Maple Street last night. To prove this, here is a blood stained piece of his shirt. I am the same man who did in the people in the North Bay Area. The S.F. Police could have caught me last night if they had searched the park properly instead of holding road races." He stopped, sighing deeply as the door flew open and the two men from earlier walked in. "Dave." Paul said rather coldly, they must have met before. "Paul. Where's the shirt?" Dave asked as you looked over at Paul who just pointed to the bloodstained rag. "Right there boss."

To say you were mortified was an understatement, a severe understatement. Not only had this man, or at least they thought it was a he, shot and killed people in cold blood but he was growing more and more adventurous and cocky. And to make it worse people were starting to become scared to leave the house, making walking around in the evening harder for some individuals as everyone was paranoid about each other being the killer, the town was now considering a curfew. You looked to Paul as he smoked his cigar, looking at the two detectives as they put gloves on and proceeded to bag the rag in an evidence bag.

"There's your rag from the kids." Armstrong noted, sealing the bag. Dave looked at him and raised his brow. "So he sits in the front seat to rip off a piece of the shirt." Now that he had seen it, it started to make sense.  Paul swung back around in his chair. "Is this on the record?" he asked with his pen at the ready. Dave looked at Paul before sighing heavily " What do you think, Paul?". "He takes credit for Vallejo and Napa." Armstrong tutted before Robert spoke up. "It's worse than that." The entire room turned to look at him, surprised that he spoke at all, he never spoke in the meetings. After a small silence, someone spoke up. "You get your cartoon in yet, Robert?" When he spoke Robert turned with a frown upon his face and walked towards the door pausing briefly to look at Paul who just looked away. He heads for the door, pushing it open in frustration and walking through the office back to his desk. When he's gone, Dave looks at him as he leaves before looking back at Bill and then turns back to Theiriot, the editor.