Chapter Text
It was a melancholy kind of summer. A fella such as myself don’t really throw around words such as melancholy all that often but trust me the occasion called for it. When it wasn’t raining it was still so foggy it made everything look kinda greyscale like you were looking at life through a picture screen.
Even in all that dark and gloomy, there was still the heat. Not a pleasant dry heat, mind you, but the kind of hot and wet that sits on you and don’t get up. The whole city was claustrophobic with it and when people feel closed in like that it messes with their heads and makes them act up in all kinds of ways.
I reckon that’s what I could blame my behavior on but I know full well the story I’m about to tell could have happened anyways because the kind of heat and pressure I was under had nothing to do with the weather.
But let me not get too ahead of myself.
So, I’ve set the scene: hot, dark, and depressing as all hell. I dragged myself to work that day down at the precinct and sat my sorry behind at my desk, sweating over the notes from a case that I couldn’t really give less of a shit about when I was interrupted by a knock at my office door.
The knock sounded real small and timid so imagine my surprise when the door swung open and I saw a man whose shoulders almost filled up the whole doorway. He was hunched in on himself like he was embarrassed to be taking up so much space but he couldn't hide the power in his body or the piercing intensity behind those big dark eyes.
He introduced himself with a husky voice, better suited for whispers under the sheets than a conversation with a desk between us. Said his name was Din Djarin. I repeated it back to him before giving him my name just to taste it a little and roll around the consonants and vowels behind my teeth. Even then I think I was desperate for a taste of him, just wondering if he’d be as sweet as his pretty little name.
He sat down, doing his best to keep from fidgeting, and told me he needed my help because his husband was no good.
I told him he didn’t need a detective for that, he could have gone to any of the beat cops in the bullpen if he needed someone to slap around his old man. When I saw the look on his face, I got a feeling in my gut that more trouble had found me than I bargained for.
Turns out I was right because Din Djarin told me his husband’s name was Gor Koresh.
The Gor Koresh. Not just a gangster but the gangster with his big meaty fists in every elicit dealing the city. Weapons, drugs, fights, imported goods, You name it this guy bought, sold, or fenced it. All of his connections meant that he had a pack of the nastiest lowlifes in the city that followed him around like a pack of piss-poor attack dogs.
I’d only met the man once, back when I was a little fish cop, fresh off the beat. He was a big ugly balding bastard with an eye patch from a shootout gone wrong. His clothes were expensive and so was the giant cigar he’d munched on while evading any and all questions about the investigation.
Gor Koresh had allegedly lied, cheated, backstabbed, and stolen from every sap he’d ever met. But by far the worst crime he ever committed was marrying the gorgeous creature seated across from me at my desk and putting the sadness and fear I saw behind those big brown eyes.
Din was lucky that he came into my office instead of one of the others but then again I suspect luck had little to do with it. He was smart and he had to have known I just made detective and wasn’t yet on his husband’s payroll or his shitlist.
Koresh apparently didn’t keep his trap shut when he was around Djarin, most times just forgetting he was anything other than decoration. Din had fresh dirt for days on the man. He didn’t tell me the reason why he decided to come forward with it but I suspect I knew.
I know somebody who’s been beaten down one too many times when I see them. So I told him I’d take the case quietly and do some digging around before bringing it to my superiors.
They always said I had a weakness for a pretty face.
Din thanked me in that quiet rasp of his and then was slipping back out the door the way he came.
I got to work, tracking down any and all records I could find at the station about Koresh’s dealings. Most were buried deep, missing pages, or misplaced but I was able to piece together enough.
Koresh had two main businesses that he used to hide his illegal earnings. One was the fights and the other was his nightclub. I’d never been to either myself but I knew some of the other fellas on the force had. By the time I chased down every paper trail in the precinct, it was getting pretty late. I wasn’t ready to go home yet so I decided to show my face at the nightclub and see if Koresh was showing his. I figured either he wouldn’t recognize me or he would figure that I was interested in getting in on the action. Either way, I could sniff around a little and see what I found out.