Delusional.

| Chapter 3. |

Applying a two tone knock on the glass door of the office, Jordyn popped her head in casually. At the desk, sat the most intimidating man in the world. "Mornin' Chief. Said you had an assignment for me on the phone?"

"Yes," He gestured for her to come in and shut his office door. "There's a kid in interrogation two. Said he has some information about the Christmas Homicide Report."

She tilted her head to the side, thinking. "You're talking about that unsolved case from ten years ago? The one where they only found the John Doe after two bodies were reported in the phone call?"

"That exact one."

"And you want me to find out what information he supposedly has," Jordyn nodded her head, heading for the door then turning around, a cheesy grin on her face. "Because I'm your best, huh?"

"Don't push it, Davis. You were still late this morning." Chief didn't even bother looking up at her as he grunted a response. She gave a final nod though, leaving the man to it and making her way back to her desk. Where she picked up the file and made her way to the interrogation room. Like the chief said, there was a young man in there, maybe around 19-20, with his hands drumming along the desk and his leg bouncing with nerves. He seemed to be growing an auburn beard, to match the auburn buzz cut on his head, while his green eyes roamed the room. Good cop? Bad cop?

"Hi," Jordyn walked into the room, tucking a stray hair from her messy ponytail behind her ear. "Detective Davis. How can I help you?"

At the sight of Jordyn, he began nodding very enthusiastically, showing how nervous he was. She smiled at him in reassurance, placing a hand to his pleasantly, going with good cop. "Yes. Um, I wanted to report a murder."

"Okay," She nodded her head. "Tell me more."

"Well, I don't have much more information than that," He began chewing on his bottom lip, watching Jordyn let out a breath. "Don't know if it'll be helpful or enough to reopen."

"Why don't we start by seeing what you have to tell me. Anything will be helpful, we just gotta work with each other here," She peaked at the file. "Tyler, is it?"

"Yeah, it's Tyler. And I don't know if I have anything else. I only know this guy because he comes into my job to pick up his prescription..."

He looked over at the pretty detective, who gestured for him to go on. "He just seems extremely off, ya know? And well, I know he takes olanzapine and clozapine, which makes me feel like he's suffering from something bad. Those are serious painkillers and he's prescribed them both."

"So, tell me what makes you think he committed a murder? Or better yet, this one from so long ago?" She raised an eyebrow, crossing her arms across her chest patiently.

Tyler paused. "He told me."

"He confessed to you?"

"Yes," Tyler took a second to gather his words. "I shrugged it off at the time because he clearly was crashing and I was just a kid. This was a few years ago, maybe 2 or 3. My mom is a nurse at MedStar and he was admitted for a few days. I remember him coming to me in the cafeteria, and telling me that he brought himself to the center because he set a house on fire and only one person died. Only. I used to just think nothing of it until I saw him the other day... Living like a free man. And I don't know, after seeing him, things started clicking, and then I started wondering... that for only one person to have died, the house had to have more than one person inside. And there's only been one house fire in the last ten years in this county."

"Alright, you did your research," Jordyn jotted down some notes. "You got a name for me?"

"See and that's where I come up short. I don't know."

Once again, Jordyn raised her eyebrow. "Thought you said he gets his antipsychotics from you?"

"He does. From the pharmacy I work at now. But I'm just the janitor. I can give you the address if it helps?"

Jordyn nodded, closing the file as she looked into Tyler's gemstone eyes. "That'll be wonderful, Tyler. Thank you."

-

"Did he tell you anything good?"

Jordyn looked over her shoulder in the break room, the chief standing behind her as she stirred her hot cocoa. "Eh. Couldn't give up anything more than the name of the company supplying the guy. Not much to work with."

She let silence fill the room to the point that she forgot the older man was there. She turned to face him fully, bringing the mug to her mouth and blowing slowly as she watched him scratch his gray beard.

"Well, you make it work. Because the case is yours now."

He didn't even give her time to respond, turning on his heels and back to his office as she rolled her eyes, muttering under her breath. She was good at saying things after he had already left the room. "Thanks a lot."

She shook her head, carefully walking back over to her personal little space and taking a seat. She clicked around on her computer a bit once getting settled, opening any unread emails before she shut off the monitor and focused her attention towards the Manila folder on the corner of her desk. She picked up her mug, sipping slowly as she thought about how much of a dead end this case was. It wasn't like other cases. They didn't even have a lead. The killer most likely was gone by now.

But then she saw it. A bright fluorescent pink post-it note stuck to the outside of the folder that was not there before. She reached over and grabbed it, bringing it to her face as she read the sloppy handwriting scribbled across in thick black sharpie.

[Meet at Starbucks around the corner during lunch. - your partner.]

Immediately, she balled the paper up, tossing it in the recycling bin underneath her desk. She looked at the clock. 11:39. Well. No use in getting started before lunch then.