When Emory entered the TBI office the next morning, he was wearing his usual suit and tie under his field jacket with his satchel strapped over his shoulder. He was also sporting the shiner from Victor’s punch the night before.
As he walked past the rows of desks in the large room, he could sense tension in the air. The other special agents who noticed him either gave him an apprehensive stare or couldn’t look away fast enough – as if they all knew a secret to which he was not yet privy.
He glanced at Eve Bachman’s office at the back of the room when he saw Wayne leaving it. He could tell that Wayne saw him, but he still refused to look at him as he made his way to his desk. Emory wondered how his partner would treat him today. No matter what, he was determined that they would talk about Wayne’s apparent uneasiness concerning his long-held secret and that this day would see some sort of resolution to the matter. Either Wayne would need to get a grip, or Emory would be forced to request a new partner.
He was about to place his satchel on his chair when he saw Fran Havel working at her desk with a worried look on her face.
Curious, Emory walked up to her. “Good morning, Fran. Is everything okay?”
“Emory…” Fran began before stopping herself. “Bachman wants to see you.”
“Okay. Is something wrong?”
“She really wants to see you.”
Wayne told Bachman about the kiss! Apprehensive about her reaction to the news, Emory tapped two tepid knocks on the nearby door to his boss’ office and creaked it open when she invited him in. The first thing he noticed when he entered wasn’t Bachman’s shrieking red hair. It was something hanging from the wall behind her that he had always tried to ignore before. It was the stone-painted wood in the shape of two Bronze-Age tablets with the Ten Commandments etched in the charred handwriting of god.
“Sit down,” Bachman ordered, and he complied. Her eyes darted up to him and then back down to a small stack of papers on her desk. “I’ve reviewed the injury report you submitted regarding your ‘accidental’ drugging with an ecstasy-like substance.”
“Yes?” Emory asked, wondering about her curious enunciation of the adjective.
“Your statement suggests that the drug was inside a bottle of water you were given by a private investigator named Jeff Woodard.”
“It doesn’t suggest,” Emory told her. “It clearly states that’s what happened. He picked it up from Scot Trousdale’s desk—”
“Enough.” Bachman looked at him with the eyes of an executioner, separating herself from the thing she was obligated to destroy. “And this is the same man you were seen kissing at the scene of one of the crimes?”
Emory froze for a moment as he tried to think of how to respond. “He was hired by the father of the victim to help with the case.”
“I know from experience, as do you, that the clientele for these types of drugs are very often…people like yourself.”
“People like me?” asked Emory.
“You were at the factory where the drug was being infused into bottled water.”
“Yes.” Where is she going with this?
“Of all the times you could’ve come into contact with the drugged water, how do you expect me to believe that it just happened to occur on a Friday night in Knoxville – nearly sixty miles from the factory – when you were in the company of a man who you were obviously…well, doing what you do?”
Emory popped up to his feet. “I did not take that drug by choice!”
Bachman didn’t flinch. “I need your badge and your gun.”
Emory hesitated before muttering, “Wha—”
“Your badge and your gun!”
Emory plopped both onto her desk. She transferred the items to one of her desk drawers and turned her attention to her computer. “I need you to take your personal belongings and leave. Do not sign into your computer. Do not talk to anyone on your way out.”
“You know damn well I didn’t do this. You’re just looking for an excuse to get rid of me.”
Bachman glanced at him once more. “You know, I’ve had a feeling about you from the beginning. Leviticus 18:22. Do yourself a favor, and read it.”
“You can’t fire me for this.”
Bachman let out a stilted laugh. “The Bureau puts away deviants. We don’t employ them.”
In desperation, Emory told her, “I’ll sue to keep my job.”
“State law doesn’t afford you any special privileges. You’d be wasting your time.”
There was no use arguing with her. Emory left her office to find two special agents waiting for him. He could hear Fran crying as he walked with his escorts to his desk, where he found an empty box waiting for him. Wayne was now missing from his desk. Convenient.
No one said a word as he collected his belongings and left the building for the last time.
Emory’s escorts abandoned him to trek to his car alone, in a state of shock. He opened the driver-side door and slipped behind the wheel with the box on his lap. He stared at the building through his windshield but didn’t see it. When at last he moved, he put the box on the passenger seat and grabbed the wheel. Tears began dripping down his face.