Of course he did.
Zach let out a low breath, putting his hands into his pockets and letting the familiar smell of smoggy London fill his lungs. Somehow he found it comforting, it being a smell he had grown up with, and he found his nerves settling a little bit. He wasn’t in imminent danger of getting stabbed, after all.
“Not a detective. Just a cop.” Zach sub-consciously led the walk, wanting to head down to the Thames. Sure, it was a disgusting mockery of a free-flowing river, but Zach found it peaceful. “It started when I was arresting dealers and druggies – didn’t take much effort to take some of their stash. Tried using it, wasn’t a fan, figured selling it would be better for me.”
He let out a slightly nervous chuckle, figuring that the situation he was in right now might disprove that to be true.
“Busts and druggies are where I used to get all my stock, but then demand went up and I’ve started trading with some … people. I use my job to make sure that my people stay out of attention – a missing file here and there is easy enough. Then I sell to the people who get brought into the station, who recommend me to their friends, so on and so forth.” His eyes flicked back to the direction they had come from, where a body was undoubtedly still laying. “Then things got away from me … He was the first person to say that he had enough on me to go to the police, and he was getting cheap rates in return. I demanded information on what he had, and he refused, and I just …”
Zach shuddered, feeling bile rising in his throat from his memory of what he had done. It had all he had thought of to do, all he could think of, but it didn’t mean that he had enjoyed it. He was repulsed.
“I can’t go to prison.” Zach muttered out, his hands clenching inside his jacket pockets. “You have no idea – well, unless you do.”