Crash! Boom! Bang!

End

Alec pulled his hair out and groaned loudly. This case had become his worst nightmare. He could hardly sleep anymore, and since the car bomb, all he wanted was to catch the son of a bitch who did it. He wasn't interested in the goons. He wanted the kingpin. He wanted Valentine. On his first day back, the Captain had called him into his office and made a not-so-subtle implication that he wanted to take him off the case. He said he was worried that this case was too close to him. Alec had stared the Captain in the eyes and ensured him that it wasn't and that he could handle it. That wasn't completely true though. This wasn't just professional any longer to Alec. It was very personal.

Due to everything that had happened since he had left Magnus' loft that fatal night, it had taken him a few days to notice that Magnus in fact had texted Alec on the night of the car bomb. A five-word text;

Valentine, Asmodeus, Lilith - Old Liaisons

As always, Magnus' leads were cryptic and Alec knew he wouldn't get any more. He needed to find the connections on his own because then they couldn't be traced back to Magnus. Since Magnus had hinted that Asmodeus, Lilith, and Valentine knew each other before, Alec started his digging by going through the city archives. It had been frustrating, but endless hours of work had finally paid off. As he was scrolling through some old newspapers, he had found a photo of all three of them at a construction site. That had led to more digging and Alec found out that Valentine and Asmodeus had a long history of working together. Asmodeus had stood behind Valentine ever since he started his political career over 20 years ago.

The picture had revealed Lilith Baker, but as it turned out Lilith Baker seemed to be a ghost. The only thing he could find out about her was that she, at the age of 18, had a child that was named Jonathan. The father was listed as unknown. Since then, there was no other record of either of them. Magnus' lead had turned from hot to cold - another dead end.

Then there was this other metaphorical punch to Alec's face. He didn't have his partner anymore. Jace had pulled through the surgeries with the best outcome possible, and he was expected to fully recover with physiotherapy. Hence, he was still on medical leave and not expected back to active duty for a couple of months. The Captain had assigned Alec a new partner, and Alec absolutely couldn't stand her. Not only because she, in Alec's opinion, was doing everything wrong, but also simply because she wasn't Jace. Officer Fray had a tendency to drive Alec insane.

It had only been a few days, but Alec had concluded two things about her. First was that she talked too much. Second was that even though she wasn't even a detective, she never listened to orders. He was certain she was going to get herself killed. Besides, if she would have come into his life three months ago, he probably would have hated her simply by the way Jace was looking at her. They had stopped by the hospital for a visit, and as soon as he had seen the redhead, he was speechless. Now, Alec was simply amused and filed that information away for later.

There was this other thing he had a problem with too. This one, though, wasn't really something he could hold Fray responsible for. No matter which new partner he would have gotten, he would have been forced to do the exact same thing. But he still had to go over the case, over and over again, explaining everything to her. She didn't know the case and at the moment she was trying to keep up with all the information. Alec had given her the assignment to go through the employee files from Asmo Corp. When he had found out about the partnership of the two men and Lilith, Alec suspected that there might be someone at Asmo Corp that still was connected to Valentine. He had therefore asked Magnus for the employee files.

Alec studied his new partner as she meticulously studied those files from Asmo Corp. Secretly, Alec did kind of admire her fierceness and devotion, but he would never tell her that. He was just going to put up with her until Jace was back from his medical leave. Then everything would go back to normal - whatever normal was these days.