Attempted Murder Is Still Illegal

Chapter Three

Alfie was stuck again.

It had barely been a day since he'd gone to the morgue and yet, here he was again, sitting on his sofa, staring into space as though the answers would drop from the air in front of him and everything would start making a little bit more sense. Absentmindedly, he took a sip of the lukewarm coffee in his hand.

He had hoped Emily's body would be able to give him some answers or, at least, somewhere to start but it had been a bit of a dead end. Though if he'd actually examined it instead of making heart eyes at the irritatingly attractive man that had been standing over it, he might've found something useful, Alfie thought bitterly.

He shook his head, huffing out a frustrated sigh. He couldn't go back – going there once had taken days of psyching himself up and he'd bailed almost immediately once his distraction had left. No, what he needed now was to treat this like any other case. He dropped his head into his hands, massaging his forehead.

If this were any normal case, how would he start it? Generally, the first thing he would do in a new case was try and question the victim – or those closest to them, should the victim be unable to answer themselves – but, given he, himself, was the victim, it didn't exactly help him.

Really, he needed to just start over and go back to the beginning, he thought, then he stilled. He could do that. He could go back and investigate the scene of the crime, as an outsider, this time, rather than the target.

Jumping to his feet, a renewed vigour in his movements, he grabbed his jacket and raced out the door.

***

Alfie hadn't thought about the technicalities of returning to his former home when he'd ran out the apartment that morning; like, for example, how he couldn't exactly explain that, yes, the manor was legally his but, no, it would not come up under the name of Alfie Sawyer because Alfie Sawyer hadn't technically existed until a few months ago.

God, this double-identity thing was super inconvenient sometimes.

Slumping down in the seat of his car, Alfie considered his options: he could either march straight into a crime scene, declare he was there to investigate it and possibly get himself banned from what had once been his home or he could try and sneak in unnoticed. He laughed humourlessly at that; here he was, planning how to break into his own house – the irony was not lost on him.

Something moved in the corner of his vision, drawing his attention to it. It was Wilson, Alfie realised with a jolt. Hastily, he tried to smooth the creases out of his wrinkled jacket – trying to make himself look official, he told himself, not to impress Wilson.

He stepped out of the car as Wilson neared, phone in hand. He looked up as Wilson walked past, feigning surprise at his presence.

"Mr Wilson," Alfie said, shoving his phone in his back pocket, "what a coincidence seeing you here."

"Oh, is that what you call it?" Wilson said, smirking, "I didn't realise watching someone from a parked vehicle classified as a coincidence." Alfie blushed, cringing at Wilson's words.

"You saw that, huh?" Wilson reached over, patting Alfie's shoulder in what was probably intended to be comforting but really just ended up coming across as more condescending.

"It's okay," he said, his tone was almost patronising, "I'm used to my fans doing anything under the sun to garner my attention."

"What- no, I wasn't-"

"You don't need to pretend otherwise, I'm not going to judge," Wilson said, giving Alfie's shoulder a gentle squeeze.

"No," Alfie insisted, stepping out of Wilson's reach and letting his arm drop back to his side. "I'm here on a case." He could've sworn he saw Wilson's eyes roll. His arms folded and, all of a sudden, Alfie was reminded that this was the Jacob Wilson.