Denton CID

Part 2

Author's note: Sorry, I was planning to have this up on thursday but family celebrations got in the way.

Warning: This chapter deals with child death.

Sleet splattered against the windscreen as they drove. Louis had the wipers working furiously, his hands clenched around the steering wheel as he attempted to navigate the dark country road. It was a sod of a night; a perfect compliment to the events unfolding. In the far distance he could see the faint flashing red and blue lights of the attending services dancing across the valley. It wouldn't be long until they reached the scene - probably only another five minutes.

He tried to keep his emotions in check by going through the crime scene procedure in his head. He had always found it difficult to detach himself when it came to crimes with corpses – especially when a child was involved. There was something inexplicably harrowing about seeing a life heinously cut short and knowing something worse was still to come; informing the family. He could remember the expression on every single face of every single person he'd had to deliver the bad news to. They were etched into his brain; popping up like some grotesque Jack-in-the-box whenever his guard was down and haunting his sleep whenever his mind dared to dream. But as hard as the repercussions were to deal with at times, he hoped he never stopped caring. For a man desensitised to loss and devastation was a man who had lost part of his soul – or at least that's what his grandfather had told him before he died.

Louis had seen all too well what happened to police officers who became desensitised to the job and it quite honestly terrified him that one day it might happen to him too. It was a conversation he'd undertaken so many times on boozy maudlin nights with Bill Wells and Arthur Hanlon; what were the signs that you'd reached your limit? Arthur felt that as soon as you stopped wanting to solve crime and merely went through the motions for the sake of a pay slip it was time to leave. Bill, on the other hand, felt it was the moment you stopped feeling guilty when a case went cold.

Louis wondered what Harry's opinion would be. So far the ex-Met DI had been a bit of surprise; there was a reason why detectives were stereotyped as tough, cynical, middle-aged soaks who trudged their way to the answers with dogged persistence rather than astounding leaps of logic.

Despite showing he could throw back the banter and sarcasm as good as he got, over the last seven hours Harry had demonstrated he was a pretty gentle soul on the whole. That didn't mean he wasn't smart; his cognitive reasoning and memory appeared razor sharp, but most detectives were the same. It was his incredibly warm and gracious manner that was so striking and set him apart from Louis's traditional partners. The guy literally radiated positivity and was so charming that within two hours he had Johnnie bringing him a mug of tea without being nagged to death. Louis never got tea unless there was some kind of Tunnock's Teacake bribe involved. How Harry managed to get not only a cuppa but also two Jammy Dodgers out of the stingy bastard, Louis hadn't a clue. He even managed to entice the cranky Ernie Trigg out of his dusty cave. Then again, Ernie's show of socialness might have less to do with Harry as a person and more to do with the returning of a stack of files he'd probably been looking for... for months *cough*.

But what really set the Lexington DI apart from any of Louis's previous colleagues were his jokes. Harry had the corniest sense of humour Louis had ever encountered in his life.

Harry building the filing cabinets: What did one cowboy filing cabinet say to the other? Drawer!

Harry hitting the keyboard: I love pressing F5. It's so refreshing.

Harry rifling through the stationery drawer: What did the magnet say to the paperclip? I find you attractive.

Harry retelling amusing cases: I once asked a suspect where he was between 3 and 4 and he said 'Preschool."