They go to Messina’s place because it’s closer. It’s tiny, smaller even than Rick’s closet of an apartment, but it’s spotless, and obsessively neat. At least it is before their cramming session starts.
Messina’s fridge is just as spotless and empty as the rest of the place, so they go down to the corner shop and stock up on pretzels and chocolate and soft drinks (Rick grabs a couple of cans of beer before he remembers and then puts them back, trying not to think).
And then they start in on Nakamura’s research notes about the Gomorrah, and its cash flow and licensing situation, and various Carlsburgh Clan thugs and foot soldiers, and the lieutenants possibly running and/or frequenting the club, and how to apply nipple clamps and simple bonds, and how to tell an actual BDSM afficionado from a thrill-seeking tourist — or undercover cop, as the case may be.
“So, I just wanted to say,” Messina ventures at some point, and when Rick looks up, the man is smiling a strangely shy little smile. “This may be an odd assignment to have as our first case together, but — I. Even so, I think it’s a good thing. I’m going to do my best not to disappoint either the superintendent or you, and… I am really glad to be working with you, Richie.”
“Don’t call me that.” It just slips out; a harsh bark that makes Messina jerk a little, almost like Rick slapped him.
What the hell kind of speech was that — it sounds for all the world like Messina is expecting this working together thing to be permanent, when Rick expects Fitz back any day now. Any fucking day.
“But — oh. I’m sorry. I just thought… Detective Fitzpatrick called you —”
“He’s my partner. You’re just a stand-in until he gets back to work.”
The smile has faded. Messina looks down at his hands, and… damn it.
Messina’s a good cop, Cooper says so and Rick has no reason to disbelieve it, and he seems like a nice guy, and he’s already had to put up with a lot of Rick’s foul mood. He hasn’t complained, has been cheerful and friendly, has tried to…
It’s not that he’d be a bad partner. Not at all. He just isn’t Rick’s partner, because Rick already has one. Fitz just needs a couple of weeks or months to get his head on straight, then he’ll get back to work all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and good as new.
Rick gets up to go to the bathroom, and gets the last bottle of Carl Cola from the fridge on his way back. They both seem to like it best — should have bought more of it.
Messina’s back to leafing through the case info, but he looks up when Rick kicks at his foot, and accepts the bottle Rick holds out with a smile.
“Look, Messina,” Rick starts, and then doesn’t know how to go on. So he drops it and just says the first thing that comes to mind. “What about your own partner? I mean, you have one. Right? In Chicago.”
“He’s dead,” Messina says.
It comes out so simply and easily that for one shocked moment, it sounds almost casual to Rick. But then Messina catches Rick’s gaze, and there’s no mistaking the look in his eyes as anything even close to casual, or simple, or easy.
His tone remains eerily light when he goes on. “There was a protection racket that nobody seemed particularly interested in except us. Not long after we started digging, Jesse was killed in a hit-and-run that nobody except me seemed particularly interested in, either. And then it was suggested to me that the climate might be healthier for me elsewhere. I guess a second accident would have been too much of a coincidence.”
Rick’s not naive; he knows cops are just as likely to be cowardly and greedy and mercenary as the next guy. But somehow he’s still always appalled and chilled — and yeah, shocked — when he’s confronted with outright corruption on this scale. It’s just wrong… it shouldn’t be possible that someone who should be protecting people and upholding laws just looks the other way, or worse.
“There was nothing to achieve by staying, so I agreed to a transfer,” Messina adds after a moment, when Rick doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t sound defensive, just matter-of-fact — almost detached, except for that look. “It’s alright. I won’t forget.”
There’s more than determination in that look; more than a glimpse of underlying steel that Rick has never before suspected Messina of having. There’s anger. No, rage — the icy, hard kind of rage Rick never really gets, because his own anger burns quick and hot and all-consuming and then dies. This rage is cold and patient and implacable, and — yeah. Rick gets why whoever murdered Messina’s partner got him transferred.
Cooper’s unit seems to pick up a lot of odd cops like that… cops that don’t fit in anywhere else. Rick’s never sure whether that means someone high up really hates the Superintendent’s guts, or thinks the world of him.
Rick also never knows what to say in moments like this.
“Fuck,” he gets out finally, roughly, because he has to say something. “I — that really sucks.”
And then he wants to kick himself because it’s totally inadequate, to the point where it sounds almost like Rick’s playing this down, when he didn’t mean it that way at all. He just doesn’t know how to respond. There are no words for this kind of thing — or if there are, Rick doesn’t know them.
But Messina nods and doesn’t say anything, and after another moment he smiles a little, and it’s crooked and looks like it hurts, but it’s real. He got it, got just what Rick meant.
If Rick has to work while Fitz’s away, then he does need someone to work with. He doesn’t like working solo, and what’s more he’s crap at it, and Cooper (and everyone else and their grandmother, and her little dog, too) knows it.
Rick needs someone to watch his back and anchor him and balance him out, to bounce ideas off of, and to give him a kick in the ass every once in a while. He could probably do worse than Messina.
“Delaney,” says Messina. “We should —”
“Rick,” Rick says, gruffly, “Rick is fine,” and goes to get a bottle of water when Messina smiles at him all surprised and bright and happy.
Rick isn’t used to cops smiling like that, but he guesses there’s no reason why he can’t get used to it.