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CHAPTER THIRY-FIVE NED

The moment the badger family disappeared from view, both of the TV announcers started talking at once, tripping over each other in their haste to explain what had just happened. Ned's focus had already left the television though, turning instead to his two companions.

"I'm actually proud of our city today" Diego said, but he did not smile. "But that dude is...crazy."

Scarlett looked up from where she'd been scribbling on a notepad - taking notes of Johnson's wording, not a bad idea actually. "Crazy enough to murder?"

"That, or to pay someone else to do it for him" the handsome wolfdog growled. "Either way. If he doesn't shut up someone else is going to off him whether he's guilty or not."

"Either of you know who that congressman is, the one he mentioned?" Ned asked. He had a pretty good guess of who the man was already.

Neither of them did, but he asked Lennox about it when they had returned to the station, and she did. "Representative Van Holling." The tall wolf looked up from where she was watering the plants in her office. This reminded Ned of Olympia. What was it with female wolves and plants?

His ears pricked at the mention of the congressman. "That gay Alsatian?"

"Yes, Friedrich Van Holling. From what I've heard, he'll be giving some kind of event at the Bay State University, dealing with our Amendment 28, the case, and hate crimes in general."

A rap sounded on the door.

"Thank you, Parker" Lennox said, as Arkady entered. The fox was frowning and held up a flashy tabloid which was all too familiar. FABULOUS.

Lennox had seen the magazine too. "Don't tell me Miss Vaughn wrote another...."

"She did." Ned paused as Arkady held out the magazine, since Lennox had not necessarily dismissed him. "This one's mostly just slander."

The wolf stared at the article briefly before tossing it into a wastebasket. "I don't need to read this trash. What did she say?"

"She still claims an officer here is giving her information about the case, has him or her quoted as saying that our division is unfocused, divided between fighting organised crime and catching the Prophet. And-" he held up a finger. "This is interesting - the article also claims that we have evidence incriminating Senator Johnson, but we have not made use of it."

Lennox walked around the desk, snorting. "I wish we had evidence of that variety." She passed Ned and Arkady, opening the door of her office. "Is Montoya about?"

"Just back from the lab" the jaguar answered, holding up some papers. "Carmen says the bullets used to kill Bergman and Moyle were from a different make of handgun than Fincher's gun. Just to rule that out."

Ned followed the two senior officers out of the lieutenant's office. "Did you find any interesting history on Holly Vaughn?" Lennox was asking, looking at Montoya. "Any criminal record?"

The jaguar shook his head. "Just some speeding tickets. Holly's Phoenix born and raised, and still officially a resident of that city, although she spends most of her time in LA. She got her Masters in Journalism at the University of Phoenix in 2009 and has been working for FABULOUS ever since."

This information was not very useful, but the next piece was. "What's interesting, from our standpoint" Montoya explained to the group now gathered near the evidence board, "is that she does have connections with four of our victims. She's written stuff on Claudia Wittmore, Conrad Fincher, and Carlos Sanchez, and - get this - she even did a little piece on gay athletes a couple months ago. Which, as it happens, included our recently-deceased friend Hugo Sota."

Now that was interesting. A connection with four of seven victims was enough to make Holly Vaughn at least someone to consider as a suspect. The way to solve cases like this was to find a connection between the all the victims and some other person, and this was a start. Anyway, of the three not found to have a link with Holly Vaughn, two of them, Marvin Feeley and Eliza Harding, were not even gay anyway, so not likely to have been mentioned in a LGBT -focused tabloid.

"That's more than we have between anyone else" Arkady mused, looking towards Holly's photo on the board. "Maybe if she has an accomplice who helps her with the larger victims..."

"No association with Miss Vaughn and a white Prius" Nolan pointed out. The wolf must have just come in. "I finally got a statement from one of the Harding witnesses."

"Witnesses?" Diego arched an eyebrow. "Didn't realise we had any of those?"

"Oh, this happened while you were up in Sacramento" Arkady explained. "Apparently Ken Harding had taken his sister out to dinner-" he glanced at Nolan.

"A Mexican place, La Casa Rubia. Last place they were seen alive, and it's where Ken's jeep was found" the wolf finished. "All the restaurant staff said they'd seen nothing out of the ordinary when the wolves left, but I thought to ask if they remembered the vehicles in the lot at the time. One waitress thought she'd seen a white Prius parked out front."

"So we know the Prophet has poor taste in motorcars" Scarlett shrugged. "We already knew that." Ned suspected the coyote would not have been so sassy if not for the fact that Nolan was her boyfriend.

The wolf smiled thinly. "Except that's not the only thing I turned up. Guess who else drives a white Prius?"

Ned held his breath. Was it...

"Senator Johnson" Nolan growled. He held up a sheet of paper, and handed it to Arkady. "This is the rental agreement from Hertz. Rented in Sacramento, when he arrived three days ago."

Ned was still thinking about Nolan's revelation when Olympia Rogan arrived.

Technically they still did not have definite evidence to arrest Senator Johnson, but the indication against the badger was piling up, enough that - wait. Johnson could not be guilty of all the murders, but what if "the Prophet" was not one person, but several? Senator Johnson might be the leader, possibly allied with Holly Vaughn and maybe others. It seemed incredible, but...

Milo tapped his shoulder. "Ned, you have a...visitor." The jackal was grinning when he said it; in a way that Ned knew meant that the visitor could not possibly be Garrett.

The white wolf was waiting for him next to one of the interview rooms, dressed again in her black jacket. "Did he send you here?" Ned growled. "Couldn't face me on his own?"

Olympia regarded him scornfully. "Garrett does not know I am here. I came on my own accord."

"Speak, then." Seeing the wolf brought back all the emotional uncertainty which dealing with Senator Johnson and Holly Vaughn had momentarily buried, and Ned was not happy to return there, especially not with Olympia Rogan, the wolf he blamed for destroying Garrett.

"Garrett loves you" Olympia spoke softly. She leaned against the wall almost motionless, never twitching an ear or flicking her tail or shifting on her feet like normal people did, eternally keeping emotions hidden away within her. "At least he feels some close affection for you. Your rejection has wounded him deeply."

It was not like Olympia to speak so freely about emotions, and Ned wondered what she was up to. "He should have thought of that before he lied to me" he murmured bitterly. "You never told me he was one of you!"

"That was not for me to tell" the wolf responded.

She was right, and that irritated Ned. "Remember what I told you yesterday morn" she continued.

"Oh yes, that you aren't evil, or are so only in my perspective." He shook his head. "Sorry, but killing for profit does not agree with my moral stance."

Olympia offered no rebuttal, merely holding out a paw, pads down, and pulling back her jacket sleeve to expose the rose on her paw and the thorns and vines connecting with it. "Do you know why I wear roses, Ned?"

He shook his head, fighting with himself. The pain of no longer being with Garrett burned ever yet, but how could he accept...this?

"I wear roses because like a rose, I am beautiful, but I am deadly too" the mafia leader remarked. She smoothed her paw over her exposed arm, tracing the thorns. "Beauty, too, can draw blood." The sleeve slid back over the thorns. "Is Garrett so different? A beautiful person is he, but he is lethal as well. Yin and Yang exist within all life, Ned."

He looked away, unable to meet the penetrating eyes.

"No life form has ever lived that contained only one of the two" she whispered. "One cannot exist without the other, in all people...including you, Ned."

"The difference is that you use your dark side for evil," he growled.

Her expression changed, to one of perhaps...pity? "No," she whispered even quieter, "the difference is that people like myself and your coyote do not fear our dark side. You fear it, and fear is the real danger. Remember that, Ned Parker."

She turned to go, and Ned uncertainly stared after her. "You do realise that with all those roses and thorns, you're very inconspicuous, right?"

Olympia didn't smile, only nodded. "Which is why, following the event with Mr Burns - you will soon be hearing a lot of reports stating that Xang Lan is a big tigress from Hong Kong. No one will suspect that I, friend of the Mayor, could be the true enemy, yes?"

Ned followed the white wolf out as she left, going down the stairs instead of the elevator, without a glance back. For a moment he stared after her, until he heard paws on the floor and turned to see Arkady regarding him curiously. "That was Miss Rogan, wasn't it?" the fox asked. "That British socialite the Mayor was getting all cosy with."

"Yes" Ned sighed. "I'm having....relationship trouble" he admitted. "Olympia is trying to act as mediator."

Arkady smiled sympathetically, like a father giving advice to a child. "I'm sorry to hear that, Ned."

The fox turned to go back to his own office, which was smaller than Lennox's and decorated with model military aircraft rather than plants. "Arkady," Ned asked, following, "you've been married for a long time....what do you do when the person you....care for, has a trait you just can't accept, something that tears you up inside, but you love them anyway, even though it is something you can't turn a blind eye to."

Arkady didn't reply right away, or even look at him. Inwardly, Ned scolded himself. Why question the fox? Sometimes he felt like Arkady was a parental figure, the way the sergeant seemed to look out for less-experienced members of the division, so that Ned was reminded of the way his father had been, even if the fox was only ten or fifteen years Ned's senior. "People speak of finding a perfect soulmate" the fox spoke at length, finally meeting Ned's eyes, "but in truth there is no such thing. You'll never find someone who's your absolute clone, no matter how you try, and even if such a person existed, would you want to be with them? It's the differences within couples which lead them to shared new experiences, new interests, new hobbies." He laid a paw on the small boombox he kept on his desk. "I could tell you how much my music tastes have broadened since I met Moira, all the new artists she introduced me to...."

"But those aren't negative traits" Ned pointed out.

"The principle does not change, though" the fox told him. He sat against the edge of the desk, picking up the photo of he kept there, holding it out for Ned to see. The photo depicted a much younger Arkady and Moira - they'd been high school sweethearts, or so the rumour went - on their wedding day. "There's always going to be traits about your lover that irk you. But Ned, when you marry someone, or commit to them...you stop becoming individuals, to a degree. Both of you shave off little bits of yourself to fit with the other, until you're a whole..." he paused again. "What it all runs down to, son, is this: which is worse - staying with your lover and learning to accept his faults....or learning to live without him?"

He gave Ned a short smile, patted the wolf on the shoulder, and sat, while Ned silently slipped out of the office and, hardly aware of what he was doing, started walking towards the elevator.

Learn to live with Garrett's faults, or learn to live without Garrett.

He knew what he would choose.