⋆° დ ༄ RISKY BUSINESS
chapter twenty one. an honest woman.
Maxine walks into THE CHICAGO SKY night club, looking around at how more crowded it is tonight then when she was here the week before.
She heads to the bar and waits for the bartender when she hears, "hey, you made it back"
Maxine turns around a small smirk playing at the corner of her mouth when she sees the beautiful blue eyed man and she shrugs, "yeah, thought I'd give this place another chance" making him chuckle.
"What can I get for you, miss?" The bartender asked.
"Anything she wants, on the house tonight" Maverick says. The bartender nods his head, "sure thing boss"
"Two shots of tequila please"
Maverick smirked, "you look breathtaking tonight, by the way"
"Thank you" Maxine smiles, looking down as the bartender sets two shots of tequila in front of the brunette, "here, take one with me" she says, handing one of the shots to the taller man.
"Okay" he said, his blue eyes never leaving her brown ones. They both take the shot, setting the glasses back down on the bar.
ALL HANDS ON DECK by Tinashe started playing and an immediate smile appeared on Maxine's face. She grabs the taller man's hand, "come dance with me"
"I don't dance, Maxine"
Maxine shrugs, "okay" then she walks away, grabbing some random guys hand and starts dancing with him, his hands on her hips and she sways them. She didn't know why she was acting like this, she would have blamed it on the alcohol but she had one shot of tequila, so maybe it was this man who she met once last week that was making her crazy. She didn't know why, but she didn't care. She needed the distraction.
Maxine looked over at Maverick who was staring at her from the bar. His eyes squinted in anger, his jaw tightened. She could tell he was pissed but it was his fault, he didn't want to dance. Then she watched him walk away and she smiled, going to turn around and finish dancing to the song.
Later that night and shot after shot after shot, Maxine leaned against the dark brick wall, taking a breather. She hasn't seen Maverick all night. She was sort of disappointed.
She took a deep breath when she hears, "are you Maxine?"
Max looked over at the red head male that was walking over to her. "Yeah?"
"Mr Conners wants to see you in his office" he said then starts to walk away. Maxine looks around and quickly follows after the redhead, who shows her where Mavericks office is.
"Thank you" she said, walking into the red and black colored room as the red head closed the door behind him. "You wanted to see me?" Maxine says, looking around the dark room.
"I did" he said, looking through the papers on his lap, sitting on his black leather couch.
"About what?" She asked innocently, sliding her heels off so her feet could see the warm carpet underneath her.
"You like dancing with men you don't know?" He asked, looking up at her. His baby blues were replaced with lustfilled black ones. Maxine shrugs, "it's a nightclub right? And you said you don't dance, remember?" placing her hands on her red velvet covered hips.
He chuckles to himself, throwing his paperwork onto the coffee table, "you have a smart mouth"
"So I've been told"
Maverick stands up, walking over to the 5 foot nothing girl, barely putting any space between them. Maxine swallows the lump in her throat, the smell of his cologne filling her nose. A sent she'll never forget. Cherries.
Maverick lifts her chin up so she would look at him, "do I need to take care of that smart mouth?"
"No, it can take care of itself"
"Mhmm" he hums, circling around her. He brushes her hair to the side, his lips ghosting over her neck and she let out an involuntary moan, which made him smile. "I'm not even touching you yet, pretty girl"
Maxine bites her lip and turns around, looking up at his baby blues, "and why is that?"
"Just waiting for the right moment"
Maxine raises an eyebrow, "and when will that be?"
"Not sure yet" he said, tucking some of her hair behind her ear and she gave him her best puppy dog eyes, "Hmm, that's cute. That usually work for you?"
Maxine sighs, raising an eyebrow, "yes"
"And I'm guessing you usually get what you want?"
"Usually"
"I can see why"
"I guess I'll just leave then. Hopefully you'll see me soon" Maxine said, backing away, pulling her dress up a bit so when she went to bend over to pick up her heels, her ass would be showing.
"Maxine" he said, watching as she bent over to pick up her heels and her black laced panties appeared in his eyesight.
"Whoops. It's hard to keep this dress down" she said, smiling at him. Maverick couldn't believe how she could have him wrapped around her finger already. There was just something about her he couldn't brush off. Not that he wanted to anyways.
Maverick walks over to Maxine, cupping her cheeks, caressing them with his thumbs. "Are you gonna kiss me or what?" She asked.
Maverick leaned down, ghosting his lips over hers as her breath hitches. He smiles then leans in to taste her soft lips. Maxine places her hands on his belt buckle to undo it then unbuttons his pants.
A moan slips from mavericks lips, helping Maxine take her dress off when he notices the scar on her abdomen. "How'd you get that?" He asked.
Maxine cleared her throat, "I um, it's uh—maybe I should get going" then she grabs her dress from the ground and goes to put it back on.
"Maxine—"
"I'm sorry" she says, putting her shoes back on and leaves the room.
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Maxine leans her head on the head rest, not wanting to be at work because of her massive hangover. She pops a couple aspirin and takes a sip of her water then turns her car off and gets out as she sees Adam and Kim walking into the district together.
She sighs walking into the district and over to Platts desk, who just stares at her. "Long night?"
"Just a tad"
Platt slides a package of twizzlers over to the detective and said, "maybe these will help"
Maxine smiled, grabbing the package, "thanks Sarg." Then she walks away, up the stairs to the unit.
Maxine walks onto the unit when she hears Nadia say, "Hey, some guy from HQ called? Voight skipped a Compstat meeting? I tried but it went straight to voicemail"
"Weird. I'll try him" Erin says, taking out her phone to call her sergeant. Maxine walks over to her desk, making awkward contact with Adam.
"See?" Nadia says, once Lindsay couldn't get a hold of him.
"I believed you"
"Maybe he's sick?"
"He's never sick and he's never late" Erin says, then looks around the unit, "Max" then she nods her head for the brunette to follow her.
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"Maybe he is sick" Maxine said, as she and Erin get out of the car to head over to Hank's house.
"When have you ever seen him sick?"
"Since I've known him? Once but now that I think about it, that might have been Al"
Erin chuckles then knocks on the front door and goes to unlock it. "Huh" Maxine said.
"Because I'm special that's why" Erin said, as they walked into the house, "Hank?"
As the two detectives walk further into the house they see a chair knocked over and when they walk into the kitchen they see a smashed phone and blood.
"Back door" Max says as they draw their guns. Erin walks down the basement stairs to see more blood and the safe missing from the wall.
Maxine follows behind Erin to see fear written across her face then takes out her phone, "Antonio. Take me off speaker"
~~~
"Smashed his phone so we couldn't track him" Dawson says as he, Max, Jay, Erin and Mickey walk into the kitchen.
"So, you figure two guys?" Jay asks.
"At least" Erin says, "somebody was here. Coffees Voight but the tea..."
"Voights not the only one who got snatched" Mickey says.
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"Voight had cameras at the front and back doors. Front door, seven this morning. This girl arrives" Dawson says, taping a picture onto the board, as the team gathers around to discuss their newest case, missing person hank voight, "seven-thirty, two unknown offenders enter the back" Antonio continues on, taping another picture onto the board right under the first, "Now we can't see if Voight or the girl let's him in. Five minutes later, this girl is seen leaving. Then one of the male subjects escorts her back inside"
"Ten minutes after that, they exit the back with the girl. They're carrying Voight out. He appears to be unconscious" Atwater adds.
"We gotta put out an all call message and get a wide search going" Jay says.
"No. Cause we don't know what Voight was into" Al says and Max raises an eyebrow at the older man, "We're gonna bring him home safe, we do it ourselves. We keep this in house. Just like we did with Max. Now the girl is Olive Morgan. A girl Justin dated when he was in town"
"Yeah, I remember her from back in the day. I wouldn't figure her for this" Erin says, her arms folded over each other.
"We gotta run it through every database we got. See if her phone is active. Get her family. Credit cards. She could be connected to these two, whoever they are" Antonio says.
"Connected?" Max says, standing up from her desk to go stand next to Jay, "She could've set it up"
"What it's worth, Ruzek doesn't think they're local. So, he's trying something else" Kevin says.
~~~
"Alright, the little guy, Ian Marks." Adam says, walking into the bullpen and tapes up a picture, "LKA came back Denver"
"I ran his name through face of the nation database. His whole family is nothing but crooks. No match on the partner" Jay says.
"The head of this unit has been missing four hours already. We need more" Antonio says.
"Detective" Nadia says, handing Dawson a piece of paper. Antonio reads it over and says, "cell phone towers?"
"That was fast" Ruzek says.
"I flirted with the girl at US cellular"
"Over the phone?" Erin asks.
"Yeah"
"Idiot pinged a local tower" Antonio says, "Looks like Marks called his family back in Denver"
"Can't be that stupid" Mickey comments.
"You choose Voight as a target, you can't be that smart" Maxine says, standing up from her desk.
"Ruzek, triangulate those pings and get us a location. I'll get an arrest warrant. Let's go" Al says, as the team heads out to find Hank.
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Kevin kicks in the door. Antonio, Jay, Al and Erin come running in with their guns drawn.
"The girl! Get the girl!" Voight yells. Antonio runs over to the girl and tears open the plastic bag, while Erin goes to make sure Hank is okay.
While the rest of the team clears out the house and looks for the suspects. Antonio takes off the duct tape from Olive's mouth and taps lightly on her cheeks to wake her up.
Olive suddenly gains consciousness and says, "The baby..they said they'd kill the baby"
Outside, Adam and Maxine walk down the alleyway with their guns drawn to find the suspects but with no luck, Max takes out her phone and says, "B5021. This is detective bishop with intelligence. Please be advised, we're looking for two white males last seen fleeing on foot from Wentworth and 31st. Hold under the authority of Intelligence...regarding? A confidential matter"
Maxine turned around toward her best friend and says, "so you and Kim a thing now?"
Adam raises an eyebrow, "what?"
"I saw you guys walking into the district together"
"Taking it slow. Why do you care?"
"Because I'm your best friend" Maxine said, her hands placed in her hips.
"You are? I didn't know best friends yelled at each other for taking care of them"
Maxine sighed, "I'm trying, A. It's been a long three weeks"
"I know that and I'm trying to help but it's hard when I get yelled at for it"
Maxine looked at the pavement, "I'm sorry" then walks away.
Back inside the house, Erin stands with Voight who tries to clean off his face. "You need a hospital?" Erin asks her sergeant.
Hank sighs and says, "maybe later"
"Shes pregnant. She needs a hospital"
"She said she's fine. District didn't send anyone else?"
"We kept it internal. If we're gonna catch these guys, we need to know why they came after you"
"Why do people rob people"
"That's helpful, Hank. Thank you. Now they know we're gunning for them. They're gonna be extra careful. We can have a thousand units on the streets like that"
"No. We keep this in house."
"You still got IAD looking at you. You can't muscle your way through his"
Hank walks past Erin into the next room where Olive and Antonio were to get her side of the story.
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"Ian Marks' got five known aliases. Warrants out for home invasion in Indiana and Michigan" Maxine says standing at the whiteboard and reading from a file.
"Two days ago, he used an alias to rent a van down state. I put plates into NVLS, so hopefully, we get a hit" Adam adds.
"I called in a search but..."
"But what?" Dawson asks.
"All we can say about our investigation is confidential matter"
"That's what it is"
"Yeah well, district south can't authorize a search based on that"
"Still no ID on Ian Marks' partner?" Antonio asks Kevin.
"Nah. I talked to some CI's, some guys who run with robbery crews. But no dice. Still working on it" Kevin answers.
"What the hell does that mean? If you got nothing. say you got nothing"
"Nothing"
"I got a hit on the van" Jay says walking onto the bullpen, holding up his phone, "dummies drove through a toll booth. Red light camera caught it going west, just south of 290. We gotta go right now"
"I'll dispatch state police" Ruzek says, about to go over to his desk phone when Dawson stops him. "No. Voight said we do this ourselves. We'll do a grid search, they gotta be there someplace. Where's olinsky?"
"They went to go look for olives friend Josie" Erin states.
"Atwater, Ruzek with me. Get me an ID on the big guy" Antonio says, before leaving the unit.
"Yeah"
~~~
The team wait at their desks on the unit, waiting on news from Al and Hank, as they walk up onto the unit.
"You find the friend?" Erin questions.
"Well, we got both these jagoffs names now" Al answers.
"Great, lets run the big guys name" Jay suggests and Hank just walks into his office, ignoring everybody.
"Right" Jay says then gets up from his chair, grabbing his jacket. Maxine grabs her coat and heads out, following after her partner and says, "hey Jay?"
"Yeah?" He says, opening the caged door for them.
"I just wanted to say that I'm sorry for how I've been acting lately. You were just trying to help"
"You've been through a lot, Max. I get it"
"Yeah but it doesn't give me the right to act out and take my anger out on you"
Jay places a hand on her shoulder for reassurance, "we're good, Max. Promise. Besides you're the best partner I've ever had" then he continues down the stairs and out of the district.
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Maxine was taking her Chinese food out from the plastic bag when there was a knock at the door. She raises an eyebrow in confusion and walks over to the plain white door and looks through the peephole.
She smiled to herself and opened the door, "hi"
"Hello Maxine"
"How'd you find out where I live?"
Maverick raised an eyebrow, holding up the girls purse, "you left your bag and your address was inside. So either you did it on purpose so I'd find you or you forget your address a lot"
Maxine stands to the side to let the tall man in and says, "I guess we'll never know" then she closes the door behind them.
Maverick hands the brunette girl her purse and says, "why'd you run out on me last night? Did I say something?"
maxine sets her purse on the hallway table and walks into the kitchen, "No, it wasn't you"
"Did I make you uncomfortable?"
Maxine looks up at the taller man who she noticed, looked more tired than she had noticed before, "what, no. do you think that?"
"I'll admit I haven't gotten much sleep"
"It wasn't you, I swear. Um, that person close to me, that died recently.."
Maverick looked at how sad she got. He hated seeing that. She didn't deserve that.
"We were both kidnapped. He died, shot three times. I tried saving him. I watched him take his last breath." Maxine takes a deep breath, trying not to cry, then she lifts up her shirt to show her scar, "I was stabbed. Almost lost my life in the process"
Maverick cups her cheeks, "I am so sorry, Maxine. You shouldn't have had to go through that"
"Yeah, well..." she clears her throat and walks away to finish taking out her Chinese take out, "you want some food? I think I ordered to much"
"Sure" Maverick said, going to sit on a stool at the island. Maxine goes to her fridge to grab a couple beers and slides one towards the beautiful man, "Sorry to dump that on you. We don't even know each other like that"
Maverick twists off the cap and takes a sip, "don't be sorry, Maxine. Thank you for telling me"
Maxine goes to sit next to the nightclub owner, sitting up to grab the many containers of Chinese food from across the counter. She takes her chopsticks to grab some of her sesame chicken and takes a bite, "god, this is so good"
Mavericks smiles and picks up the chopsticks, not really sure how to use them. Maxine looks over at the taller man and chuckles, "what are you laughing at?"
"You've never used chopsticks before have you?"
Mavericks shakes his head, "no"
"Here let me help" she smiled, getting up from her seat and leaned forward to help him hold the chopsticks correctly.
"Like this?" He asked. She nodded, "yup"
Maverick picks up the noodles with his chopsticks and takes a bite, "hey, I did it" he said, making them both laugh.
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"No priors on Lukasz Gregorie" Jay says leaning back in his chair, "You can't even prove this guys had a sandwich in Philly, let alone a double murder"
"We got nothing from the van. It was torched to the rims" Ruzek adds, "No prints. Nada"
"Look, this maniac is on someone's list. I mean, somewhere he jumped a turnstile. Ran a red light. Someone bailed him out. I want every phone, every camera we have on everyone he knows! I want leads! One hour" Hanks demands, before going into his office.
Maxine looks over at Adam, who rolled back over to his desk in his chair, who looked back at her and she looks away as Trudy walks onto the unit. "Someone here to see Voight"
"Now's really not a good time" Erin sighed.
"He said his names Ian Marks"
~~~
"I don't know where he's at now" Marks says in interrogation with Maxine and Jay, "Deal was, after the house, we split up and we both took half the cash"
"Your contact arranged for a way out?" Max asks.
"Josie? No. Uh, Gregories people. We meet up at three at Northerly Island. Some guy I never mets gonna take us up to Ontario"
"You better not be playing us" Jay says, "Because if you are..."
Marks cuts the brunette off, "Yeah, yeah. You work for a psycho. Guess what? We all do"
🪩🪩🪩
The Intelligence unit is now at Northerly Island, scattered about, as they watch the deal go down and finally arrest Gregorie.
Max and Jay are acting as tourists, standing in line for something, holding hands and surveying the scene. Hank, Erin, Mickey and Al are inside the main building, watching Marks, as Antonio, Ruzek and Atwater are undercover as workers.
A few minutes later, Max and Jay see Gregorie run outside with Hank and the team running after him with their guns drawn. As the male suspect grabs a woman and points his gun at her head.
"Stay back!" Gregorie demands, "I will waste this bitch!"
Bishop and Halstead , slowly walk up behind the bearded man with their guns drawn.
"No one else has to die here" Hank says.
"That's up to you. Lose the guns!" Gregorie demands, "Lose the guns right now!"
Hank holsters his weapon as Al, Ruzek, Jacobs, Atwater, Dawson and Lindsay simply just lower theirs.
Halstead moves closer and puts his gun at the back of Gregories head, and says, "Move and I will shoot...nice and easy, drop the gun. Release the girl"
"It's over, let her go" Maxine tells the suspect.
"Do it!" Jay shouts and Gregorie lets the woman go, who then runs away towards Lindsay.
Jay forces Gregorie on his knees and cuffs him, while Hank looks through the bags and drags him away.
🪩🪩🪩
Maxine leaves the district, smiling at her phone from the text from Maverick as she heads to her car. "Maxie!"
Max turns around to see Adam jogging over to her, "what?"
"I um, do you wanna go grab a beer?"
"Why?"
Adam sighs, "look, I'm sorry Maxie. Okay? I know you've been trying but so have I"
Maxine looks down at the pavement, "I know"
"I miss you"
"I miss you too, A"
Adam cups her face, "be my best friend again?"
"Okay" she whispers, "best friends"
authors note;
things are heatin' up!🔥🔥
Thoughts on maverick??