PARTNERS IN CRIME - JAKE PERALTA

An Old Friend

3rd Person POV

"Dammit." Valerie slammed her hand down on her desk, "Where the fuck did he go?"

Slumping back in her desk chair, she rubbed her eyes, thinking back to last week's excursion.

Valerie ensured that her gun was secured in her holster as she approached the apartment.

As she read through his files, she quickly understood why her mother had kicked him out. What surprised her was how he didn't put up much of a fight - maybe he really didn't care about them at all. Either way they were better off without him.

Ellis Levin was once a well-known businessman, with a reputation built entirely on lies and manipulation.

He, alongside his business partner, Rhys, founded a successful company named Levin and Tyrell. They were thriving with a generous income until they were caught out completely. Things started to go downhill for the two, leading to a large falling out. The collapse of the partnership lead to the company going completely bankrupt. That's when everything changed

He was only charged for a couple of things, but then he disappeared completely. He was a suspect in a few cases, one involving the murder of a young man, but there was no solid proof. Only circumstantial. And then he disappeared all together.

Valerie didn't want to reconcile with her father, she just thought he ought to know that the woman he abandoned was dead.

Maybe there was a small part of her that wanted her father in her life. Valerie was fragile, and grasping at straws. There was a hole in her life, left by her mother, that was in desperate need of filling. But the detective had promised herself that she wouldn't give in. He's a lowlife, not worth her time.

The apartment complex was in bad shape to say the least, making Valerie wonder how anyone could live here.

Apartment 104. The number she had been both dreading and anticipating.

The first thing that Valerie had noticed was the dents in the door. She removed her hand from her jacket pocket, reaching out, her fingers running along the indentations, a concentrated frown on her face.

A crowbar maybe?

There were scratches all along the door, but what caught her eye was the familiar logo carved into the metal.

The symbol belonged to a gang that her and Amy had been working a case on a couple of years ago, that was until the FBI took over the case.

Relligent was the name, and Valerie could never forget it. Despite them taking the case off of her hands, the FBI were never able to find the man in charge of the gang.

But what was it doing on her father's apartment door?

Valerie didn't hesitate, firmly knocking on the metal, only to find that the door was already open.

Removing her gun from her holster, firmly gripping the weapon in her hands, she entered the apartment.

The room was almost entirely empty. No furniture, nothing of the sort. The late morning sunlight filtered through the damp-looking shutters, illuminating the room with an unsettling pale yellow glow.

The only thing in the room was a chair, a knife and a piece of paper.

The items seemed random, but the placement of them was unnerving to say the least.