Enter the Storm

Chapter 2: Hidden

Rixton walks up to the bullpen at that moment, "Dan Llewellyn stood up for a few gay teens a week and a half ago...punched a grown bully who was threatening them. Harlan Betts. Betts left, but pissed."

Voight looks to Jay, "You and Erin."

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Gloria knocks on the door to the interrogation room where Erin and Jay are questioning Betts, "You two are gonna wanna see this."

They follow her out to the bullpen where Voight says, "Hit it."

"Dan Llewellyn, tenant from 3507 Wallace," Dan greets with his girlfriend on his arm.

"He's alive. He's okay."

Erin asks what they are all thinking, "Then...who the hell died in that fire?"

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Gloria sips her coffee, "Kimmy, you can stop watching me," She says without looking up from her paperwork.

Kim startles, "Oh, right, uh, sorry."

"What's going on? You have been watching me for weeks now," Gloria questions her sister.

"I just-it's weird seeing you everyday now. I mean, we used to not even talk for years. Now we work together and it's weird, but in a good way, but still...weird."

Chuckling, Gloria gets up for another cup of coffee, "ME is ready for you and Al."

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Gloria finishes updating the board, "Curt Framingham worked for Metro Gold Central for five years. No employment before here and no Curt Framingham in Chicago before that."

"There's no Curt or Curtis Framingham countrywide," Al adds, "Not in Lexus Nexus, Face of the Nation, social media."

"However," Gloria adds, "We ran a multistate DMV facial recognition and popped a match for Curt Forrester," She puts up the photo for Forrester, matching that of Curt Framingham, "So, Curt Forrester, aka Curt Framingham, was arrested in Indianapolis in 2010 for running a Ponzi scheme. He funneled client savings to these money-losing businesses to line his own pockets with finders fees. The SEC lost the case when a key witness died during trial. It was a boating accident and from what Al and I could tell, it looks like an actual accident."

"Call HIDTA. Run a deconfliction report on Curt Framingham and on Metro Gold Capital. Let's see if the Feds are into this guy," Erin tells her, Gloria nodding and picking up her phone.

Rixton tells Erin, "I got a guy at the Fed who gets me whatever I want to know. You want me to call him?"

Jay simply says, "We're good."

Gloria is on hold, so she sits and listens to the conversation in front of her as Rixton faces Jay, "Someone want to fill me in on the office gossip?"

Al tells him, "Um...your gang unit pulled indictments for everyone but you...um, why don't you tell us how you worked that out?"

"Well, maybe there was nothing to indict."

"Seven guys taken in, and one in the clear? That happens," Jay comments.

"You wanna say something? Say it," Rixton challenges.

Jay doesn't flinch, "I just did."

Atwater throws his opinion in, "I mean, there's only a couple options, right? I mean, either you're dirty and you got away with it, or you worked a deal. I think we just want to know-"

"You wrote parking tickets for two years to get up here, and you're gonna lecture me? Come talk to me after you work seven years on the front lines."

Gloria shakes her head, "And you can talk when you've actually been the one struggling on the front lines. Don't talk down to Atwater just cause he did this the right way."

"Is there a problem?" Voight asks the team.

"No, Sergeant."

"Well, that's good, cause if I hear one more person talk about anything other than this case and the two people who were killed, I'll put you on the next transfer order. Try me," He turns back to his office.

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Gloria hangs up her phone and moves over to Erin's desk, "Hey, there's a Jane Framingham downstairs. She asked to see you."

Erin sighs before getting up.

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Jay looks over Gloria's shoulder, "Hey, we got a hit on Framingham at a car rental place on Lake Park Avenue. It's rented to a Curt Forrester."

"The same credit card was used at a gas station on 94, going north."

"Is he going to Canada?" Erin asks.

Gloria clicks to the next statement, "And at a motel off 94, half an hour ago. He's probably bunking down for the night."

Voight nods, gathering the unit, "All right. Let's roll. We're gonna get this bastard before he skips town completely."

Jay squeezes Gloria's shoulder in appreciation as he gets ready for the bust.

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Gloria moves around, setting cups of coffee at the officers and detectives desk as they had a lot of paperwork to do before Jay raises his hand, "Hey, um, I'd-I'd like to publicly apologize. There were some whispers and some gossip. I ran with it, and I shouldn't have, okay? You know, this-this whole nonsense-I was leading the charge on this. I'm sorry, man. I had a bad experience with a guy in my unit when I was overseas who was not who he claimed to be. And that's my problem. That's not yours. You're a solid dude, and a good cop, so whatever happened in the gang unit doesn't matter, all right? Man to man, and to the whole team, um, I'm sorry."

"Yeah, you can count me in on that, too," Kevin speaks up, "My bad, dog."

"The sister of one of the gang unit cops was beat up after she turned in a banger for robbing her place. ASA didn't have enough to convict the guy who did it, so Rixton's unit went after him. But Kenny wasn't with them. Two cars belonging to other members of the unit were spotted by plate readers one block from where the payback beating went down at the same time it happened. Oh, and one of those cars-one of those cars was approached by a patrolman who was told they were on a narcotics sting, but they'd already clocked out. So it had to be a lie. That's how they got caught. Not by anything Kenny did," Voight tells the team.

Rixton adds in, "I was approached by IAD, but turned down a deal, and I never said a word. Not that my unit believed me."

Kevin asks him, "Why didn't you just say that in the first place?"

Voight says, "Because I told him not to. We were working a case. Plus, his last unit iced him out over a rumor. I wanted to see if you guys were any better."

Erin scoffs, "How did we do?"

"I'll see you at Molly's."

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AN: I stayed up a couple nights ago to watch Tokyo N4 on a livestream and that lasted until 6 am my time. I had woken up at 6 am the day before so my brain is not working as well as it needs to.

Chicago PD for me is one of those shows that have moments that I really, really love but most of the time it takes me a little bit to get super into it.

QoC: Who do you want Gloria to be close to?

Thank you for all of the votes and reads and comments!!