Case by Case Love

Chapter 61: Apologies

"I'm sorry...." Jay says as he sits down at his desk once they are back at the district.

After the questioning took place with Sterling's parents, and the attempt to speak with the daughter, they made the trip back to the district to see what they look up in regards to the contacts they had been given. It was all about checking each one individually to see whether there were signs of anger, or perhaps a reason for what had happened to the six-year-old boy. 

The entire drive back was silence, with just the radio being heard between the pair. Jay did not have any words he wanted to share in relation to his thoughts on the parents, or what had transpired. Erin wanted to say something about his behavior, but bit her own tongue in not wanting to cross the lines in knowing the emotions were high right now. 

"I let my own emotions get in the way when I was speaking with Kenny," he comments quietly, taking a sip of the coffee as Erin walks over to her desk. She had simply placed a cup down, knowing he would want it and they would talk when he was ready. That was always the case with them - they shared their emotions only when they were ready to go do so. "I kept thinking about the pain he could have gone through. The bruises, the pain from those, the fact he was so innocent and would not understand why that was happening. It manifested into anger and I let it out. I directed it where I felt it was deserved." 

"You do realize what that means now moving forward?" Erin questions, earning a sympathetic nod from Jay. He would not be surprised if there was no future conversations with him and the father. He would not be surprised if there was a notice on his desk with the father filing a complaint with the mayor. Both of these worried him, more so the first piece, in knowing that may affect in how quickly they are able to solve the case as they needed to for the little boy's sake. 

"Maybe next time you should make the trip to Hank, or Adam. Then maybe you can get the okay to speak to Luna. I just...." Jay runs his hands through his hair. "The way he spoke back, the attitude, the back he put his back up immediately, and the way he kept wanting to chase me away. Was I really wrong in what I did, Erin? I don't see the issue if he is the person that caused that pain to Sterling. Sterling did not deserve to be beaten up, hurt, or killed. Is it wrong to take that anger out on Kenny?" 

"Your job is to investigate what happened, look into the details, and put the person in jail that did the crime." Jay nods his head, as he knew what he had walked into when he accepted the job. It was all about finding the bad people of the world and putting them behind bars so they could not cause anymore harm. But to do that, you had to leave your personal judgement and emotions at the door and not allow that to get in the way. 

"I did the right thing in asking him, and I don't regret that. I just should've asked in a better way..." Erin slowly nods her head as she opens the file, beginning to look through the contacts given to them from Kenny. "I just hope that they found something. I just hope the teacher said something or noticed something. Or maybe the coroner. Because if I fucked this up and we can't figure out who did this, we're screwed. What if we do not have any leads?" 

"We'll figure it ou-"

"But what if we don't? What if we don't find out what happened to Sterling? What if we can't prove what happened?" Erin takes a deep breath as she shoves the file aside, reaching over and putting her hand on top of Jay's. She caught his eyes, taking a sympathetic deep breath. She never realized just how cases like this got under his skin. It was a reminder of everything his own father was able to get away with when he was younger.

"We are the Intelligence Unit. We have the best track record of any unit in Chicago. We are called upon for the hard cases because we find the answers and do not stop at anything to do so. This is not going to be any different. We are going to find out what happened to Sterling, evidence to prove it and put the right person behind bars. If it's his father and abuse, we will figure it out. If it was something else, we will figure it out." She then takes the file she had placed on Jay's desk originally, identical the one she had on her desk, and puts it right before his eyes. "Sitting here bitching about a mistake you made is not getting us any closer to solving the crime. Sitting here complaining is just wasting time. Help me look through these names. Help me pull anybody who has priors, motive, or a connection possibly strong enough..." 

Jay takes a deep breath as he opens the file folder, beginning to look at the list of names. He types the first one in the database, watching an image come up before him with the details about him. He reads them quickly, making a couple notes, before moving onto the next.

As he shifted through the names, the conversation with the father did not leave his mind as he kept thinking about little detail Kenny had said to him, every single argument thrown back in his direction. He thought about the threats made as he spoke of the possibility of abuse. 

Why couldn't he shake the feeling he had right now?