Out of the past

It felt to Slade that he had been stuck in that stakeout for weeks rather than the thirty-six hours it actually was. It had been difficult to resist being slowly driven mad by Morris' inane attempts at conversation, and well-meaning Nicky's thirst for knowledge. But now he was free. The men they had been watching had made their move, been arrested, booked and were now languishing in the holding cells, awaiting a date with the magistrates. Slade could now turn his attention to the one thing that had kept him sane during his enforced confinement: Holly Turner.

It was less than a month since they redefined the boundaries of their relationship – or, more simply put, had sex for the first time – and Slade felt like he was seventeen again. When it happened, it almost took him by surprise, despite the tentative plans he'd been making. He remembered their conversation the afternoon prior to the Chapman murder; he had asked Holly to dinner, but she had plans to go to the cinema instead. It was only after he'd accepted her invitation to join her that he realised that this night might give him the opportunity he needed. A trip to the cinema together – that could be construed as a date, couldn't it? He had soon concluded that Les Enfants du Paradis was not his kind of film, but that just gave him more time to think about the woman he was with. After what happened with Jessica, Slade had been adamant that he would never feel that way again – would never allow himself – but slowly, unexpectedly, Holly Turner had changed his mind. He had gone so far as to stretch his arm across the back of her cinema seat, but hadn't dared to actually put his arm around her. He knew this had to be handled delicately, and had decided that going for a drink afterwards might give him a better opportunity to gauge her feelings. Going back to hers, as she later suggested, would have been ever better, had events not conspired against him.

But two days later, when the case was closed, the machine restored and the whole, ugly Stephen Marlowe affair behind them, Slade had decided to take his chance. Kissing Holly turned out to be, he discovered, the most natural act and the most wonderful feeling in the world – exceeded only by the eagerness with which she finally returned his kiss. It quickly became clear that they would sleep together that night. Slade had been terrified of rushing Holly, of her perhaps not feeling ready, but she quickly reassured him. He had been slightly terrified, too, of how long it had been since he'd done this, but the ease and openness between them allayed all of those fears. Things had moved so quickly that night, the thrill and anticipation so great, that they nearly didn't make it any further than Holly's sofa. Thankfully, Holly had had the good sense and composure to remind him that there was a perfectly good bed waiting next door.

Not that the sofa hadn't been put to good use since then, and these were the thoughts that had sustained Slade through the grinding monotony of the stakeout. That, and the new side to Holly that he was now seeing. Although sometimes shy about expressing it, Holly left him in no doubt as to how much she wanted him – often, he discovered, very soon after they walked through the front door of her flat.

Slade hopped up the main stairs to the office, quickly making his way to Holly's room. He hoped she wouldn't mind too much that he hadn't had a proper shower or changed his clothes in more than a day. Oh well, he would soon find out.

He could see through the window that she was on the phone, standing and consulting some documents. Slade managed to open the door without disturbing Holly; he tapped her on the shoulder, and as she instinctively turned around he quickly wrapped his arms around her middle. Holly almost jumped out of her skin, dropping the documents but somehow managing to keep hold of the telephone. She fired him a stern look, but he could see she was finding it hard not to smile. She told the person on the other end that she would call back.

"So, you're back," she said, wiggling out of Slade's grasp. He could see a smile playing on her lips.

"How did it go?" she asked.

"I don't want to talk about that now," Slade told her, following her as she moved around the room. "In fact, I don't want to talk at all..."

"Oh, charming. No 'How was your day, Holly?'"

Slade made a pointed lunge towards her, but Holly dodged out of the way.

"Slade!" she said, reprovingly. "I thought we agreed – not here."

Slade's shoulders slumped, and he adopted the posture of a man severely frustrated.

"Holly!" he whined. "I've been trapped in an airless room with Morris for nearly two days. Surely you're not going to deny me one kiss?"

"Actually, I am," she replied, moving to tidy her desk. "Because I have some regard for my professional comportment."

"You sure I can't persuade you?" Slade said. He leaned across the desk, offering her what he hoped was his most seductive gaze. Holly didn't appear to be buying it.

"Come on, Holly! No-one's around. Grisham is in with the Commissioner, she won't be back for ages."

By this time, he was standing right by Holly. She looked up at him and raised an eyebrow.

"Have you even showered in the past twenty-four hours, Slade?"

"I thought you liked my natural, manly musk?"

This time, when he leaned in to kiss her, Holly did not back away. Slade felt his whole body thrum as Holly's lips locked with his. He lifted her onto the desk and the kiss deepened – this was what his brain and body had been craving for the best part of two days.

"Can you leave early?" Slade murmured.

"Slade, it's barely eleven o'clock!" Holly giggled.

"Better make the most of it, then," Slade replied, leaning in and kissing her again.

At that moment, the door to Holly's office opened. Slade and Holly sprung apart, but judging by the look on Grisham's face, it was clearly too late. Slade wasn't sure which one of them was more shocked. Holly, he could see, was deeply mortified.

"Chief!" Slade said, the first to recover the power of speech. "I...I thought you were with the Commissioner."

"Evidently you did," Grisham replied, her expression one of barely suppressed amusement. Hovering just behind her, Morris wore an unabashed smirk, while Nicky's own smile was accompanied by a slight blush.

"Interesting to find out what goes on around here when my back is turned," Grisham continued. "And here was me thinking, Slade, that you were rushing back to the station to get started on your report."

"Well, there was that, too," Slade replied weakly. He offered Holly an apologetic look, but it didn't alter the embarrassment in her eyes.

Grisham's gaze flicked between the two of them.

"You'd better take a minute to...gather your thoughts, and then I think I'd better see both of you in my office."

With Grisham out of the room, Slade turned to Holly to see how much damage-control he could put in place. But Holly was too quick for him.

"Slade!" she exclaimed, shoving him squarely in the shoulder.

"You think she saw us?" he replied, trying not to smile.

"Not only did she see us, but Morris and Nicky did, too. How long do you think before it gets around the whole division?"

Slade moved to touch Holly's arm, but she shrugged him off.

"It's not that bad, Holly," he told her. After all, they were going to have to go public at some point, weren't they?

"That's easy for you to say; no-one's going to think any less of you. In fact, probably quite the opposite."

Slade frowned.

"What do you mean?"

Holly narrowed her eyes at him, which was usually a sign of her exasperation. Once again, there was a point and he'd missed it.

"How many women work around here, Slade? It's hard enough to get taken seriously when you're just trying to do your job, but once people find out I was..."

"Kissing me in your office?" Slade offered, when the words seemed to be failing her.

"What are they going to think?"

She threw up her arms in resignation.

"Do you honestly care what people around here think, Holly?" Slade asked.

"Like I said, I have some regard for my professional reputation."

As they walked the short distance from Holly's office to Grisham's, they were treated to sporadic whoops, whistles and bursts of applause from their delighted colleagues. Slade glared in their general direction, aware that Holly couldn't even bear to look at them, and aimed some daggered looks towards Morris in particular. Grisham gestured for Slade to close the door, and she sat perched on the front of her desk

"Well," Grisham said. "It seems we have a bit of a situation here, doesn't it?"

Holly took a step forward and spoke before Slade had a chance to compose his thoughts into tactful words.

"Chief, I can't begin to tell you how sorry I am," Holly said, her words tumbling out. "It was thoughtless, it was unprofessional, and I can assure you it won't happen again."

Despite the situation he was now in, when Slade heard those words he couldn't help but feel slightly crestfallen. His boss, he could see, was doing her best to keep a straight face, but couldn't prevent the corners of her mouth from turning up ever so slightly.

"I have to say, Turner, I'm a little surprised at you," Grisham said. "I can guess which one of you was the instigator here."

Again, before Slade could speak, Holly continued talking.

"It wasn't just Slade, Chief. What I mean is, we...what you saw...neither of us was thinking."

"From where I was standing, it was obvious what you were both thinking," Grisham said.

"Chief," Slade said finally. "If you want to punish me, that's fine, but please leave Holly out of it. I'd just got back from the stakeout, and I got a bit...carried away."

He saw Grisham's eyes flick between them thoughtfully.

"You know, I've had my suspicions about you two for a long time, but I trusted that you knew the rules. The Police Handbook clearly states that personal relationships between officers must be disclosed to the senior supervising officer. I have to make a decision about whether it's appropriate for you two to still carry out police work together."

"But Chief -" Slade protested.

"Slade, according to the Handbook," Grisham continued, with a warning tone. "I could even have one of you transferred to a different division. Now, is that what you want?"

"Of course not, Chief!"

"Then the best thing you can do is go home, get some sleep, and then get back here – on time - tomorrow morning. And for heaven's sake, Slade, have a shower!"

Slade felt his heart sink, but nodded his compliance. He wanted to at least make eye contact with Holly before he left, but she deliberately avoiding his gaze.

"Go!" Grisham told him with an exasperated tone. "Turner, I'd like you to stay a moment."

Holly had never felt so mortified in all of her life, professional or otherwise. What she'd had going for was that she was respected professionally; people knew she was good at her job, and more importantly, she had the respect of her boss - her female boss. Now she couldn't help but feel that any respect had probably evaporated. She couldn't blame Slade, either; only her weakness for him.

"Turner," Grisham said, once Slade had shut the door behind him.

"Chief?"

"I hope you'll believe me when I tell you that I don't want to make this any more awkward than it already is."

"Chief, I can assure you that it has never happened before, and it won't again."

"Do you mean it's never happened before...or it's never happened before here?"

Holly couldn't decide where Grisham was heading with this line of enquiry.

"It's never happened before at work," she replied.

Grisham nodded.

"But you two...that's been going on...?"

"A few weeks," Holly said, feeling her cheeks flush.

"Is that all?"

"Chief?"

Holly wasn't sure how to take this.

"I must say I thought it was longer, a lot longer," Grisham said, and gave a short laugh. "You do know that that man is going to turn your life upside down?"

Holly nodded feebly; her boss only knew the half of it.

"To be honest, Turner, I was content to turn a blind eye because, well, you seemed to be having a positive influence over Slade."

Holly knew she was blushing again.

"Since he's been working more closely with you," Grisham explained. "He seems to have had a new lease of life, a better focus. His clear-up rate has gone through the roof and, God forbid, he even manages to get himself here on time occasionally. He actually seems to care about his work."

Holly felt herself floundering for words. She couldn't, she knew, take direct credit for all of that.

"I've known Slade for years; when I came here he was still in uniform," Grisham continued. "Back then, he was considered a great hope in the division, a rising star – determined, focused, good instincts. But then when his wife died...well, it was understandable..."

"His wife..." Holly repeated the words without thinking, forcing herself to maintain a neutral expression. "Of course..."

"Turner?"

Holly realised she was staring at nothing in particular, and when she snapped out of it, her boss was looking at her quizzically.

"Nothing," Holly replied. "It's nothing."

"Okay. Well, I'll speak to you both later," Grisham said, as Holly turned to leave. "And don't worry, Turner, in my twenty-five years on the force, I've seen much worse."

Holly left her boss' office in somewhat of a daze, the revelation still playing on repeat. The truth was, she wasn't sure how she should be feeling, but anger and disappointment towards Slade was actually eclipsed by her own embarrassment; Grisham knew that Slade had been married, which meant that probably a lot of other people did, too. Holly's mind tracked back to the framed photo Slade kept at his flat, the one she'd noticed the first time she'd been there. She felt stupid – of course that was his wife, it had to be. Slade had made it clear at the time that he didn't want to talk about the woman, and Holly had to admit that she had more or less forgotten about it - preoccupied, she knew, by the distractions of their burgeoning relationship. It all seemed blindingly obvious now, but this didn't change the fact that Slade had never come out and told her. Did that mean he didn't see whatever they now had as long-term? Although the romantic side of their relationship was less than a month old, Holly was embarrassed to admit that she'd already started to wonder what their children might look like. The 'l' word hadn't been spoken aloud, but it was on Holly's mind constantly, and she felt the truth of it implicitly whenever she and Slade were together.

Holly made it back to her office with relatively little harassment, and was thankful for the pile of work on her desk, as throwing herself headlong into it helped to steady her mind. By the time she left the office she had regained her composure, but for how long, she had no idea. She had only been back in her flat for ten minutes when the doorbell rang. She knew the silhouette immediately, but felt strangely divided; part of her just wanted to forget everything, to spend another night with Slade, but the more rational, cautious side threw up too many objections.

"Can I come in?" Slade asked once she'd opened the door. "I feel bad about what happened, and I wanted to check that you're okay. I've also taken a shower, if that helps..."

Holly stood back to let him in. Already, he seemed like part of the house, like he belonged.

"I'm sorry about before," he continued. "You were right, as usual. I'll go and see Grisham again tomorrow, try and smooth things over. I don't want you to worry about it, Holly, I'll sort it out."

"Why didn't you tell me you were married?"

Holly was surprised to hear herself blurt the words out like that and, for a moment, Slade looked like the proverbial rabbit in the headlamps. He usually had an answer – an excuse – for everything, but Holly could see that he was struggling.

"Holly..."

"That's right, isn't it? I mean, you've been married before."

Slade nodded.

"Yes. I was married. It was a long time ago."

"So that makes it okay not to tell me? Unless you think it's not important enough for me to know...?"

"Of course I don't think that!"

Holly felt her eyes start to sting; Slade was the only person she knew capable of making her cry, and she knew it was down to the strength of her feelings for him.

"Were you ever going to tell me?" she asked, regaining her composure.

"Yes. I was waiting for the right moment, but it just never came up," he said. He stepped closer to Holly, but she stepped back from him.

"Holly..," he said, trying, she knew, to wear down her defences.

"Slade, I can't. Not right now," she said. "I...I think I would like you to leave."

She had never seen Slade look so hurt, so confused and, critically, she knew he wasn't used to having no control over a situation.

"I just need some time," she added.

With a barely perceptible nod, Slade turned and walked out of the front door.

When Slade returned to his flat, he could barely remember having driven there. The jubilation he had felt that morning on release from the stakeout had vanished entirely, and he was questioning how he let this happen. He knew why, of course; he had been happy to coast along on a wave of optimism, revelling in the day-to-day pleasures of the first real relationship he had had in years. What good could come of bringing up the past? As he let dropped his keys and jacket on the sofa, he reminded himself that he had always intended to tell Holly about his past, and he had been telling the truth when he said that the moment never seemed right. Slade had always been able to negotiate life's little challenges using a combination of wit, charm and a bit of good luck, but how and when were you supposed to tell the woman you love about your dead wife? It wasn't as though there was much opportunity when he and Holly first got together; talking hadn't really been on the agenda that night.

Slade opened his fridge and surveyed the contents; food was sorely lacking, but he wasn't hungry anyway. He took out a beer and instead of searching for a bottle opener, expertly struck the bottle against the kitchen worktop to remove the cap, something he hadn't done in years. Collapsing onto the sofa, his eyes were drawn to the unit where he used to keep Jessica's photograph. He had never thought he would remove it, but one day he had decided to test himself and was surprised at the relief he felt. The relief was tinged with guilt, but Slade knew that until he took that step he couldn't act on his steadily growing feelings for Holly. And more and more that was all he was thinking about.

He found that he was losing his enthusiasm for the beer, and abandoned it on the coffee table. He used to be able to pass solitary evenings in his flat without any problem – he had been doing it for nearly seven years after all – but now his surroundings seemed even more vast and empty. When bought the flat, it was almost out of perversity; he was drawn to its blankness and sparseness – it was a difficult place to love, and that suited Slade at the time. But he had been seduced by the warmth and well-worn homeliness of Holly' apartment and the company that came with it, and there was no going back. That was his home now.

He went over to the unit in his living room and opened the bottom drawer, which tended to where he shoved anything that didn't otherwise have a home. Rifling through it, he eventually found the battered shoebox he was looking for. He had never had the patience or inclination to compile albums, so any important photographs found their way into this box. The photo on the top of the pile was the one he had removed from display, and Jessica's smiling, suntanned face gazed back at him.

Holly had skipped dinner in favour of working on building a new gravity simulator; she had been meaning to do it for weeks, and for once she didn't have a distraction. The distraction himself, however, was never far from her mind. Was it wrong to want to know about the life he'd had before she came along? She was tired now, and finding it hard to concentrate on the scrawled instructions in her father's old notebooks.

Just then, the doorbell rang. For a guest to have made it as far as her front door they would have to have made it past Danny – and there was only one person who could easily get past Danny...

Holly opened the front door, and Slade immediately presented her with a cardboard box.

"I brought you something," he said.

Before she'd had time to think about it, she'd accepted the box from his outstretched hand.

"What is it?" she asked, sceptically.

"Some background information," Slade replied, his expression inscrutable.

Holly made her way through to the kitchen, and Slade sat down opposite her at the table. When she removed the elastic band from the box and took off the lid, she was greeted with a neat stack of photographs. The one on the top was a square snap in black and white, of a smiling young couple with a dark-haired baby, who was dressed in a long christening gown.

Holly looked at Slade questioningly, but he was giving nothing away. She looked again.

"This isn't...?"

"Yeah, it is. But I grew up and decided white lace didn't really suit me."

Holly then recognised the man in the photo as Jack Slade – just slimmer and with more hair. But she still had no idea what Slade meant by any of this. Setting the first photo aside, she picked up a photo of a small boy dressed in a velvet suit, with his hair slicked to one side in a parting and a fierce scowl on his face.

"I was a page-boy at my aunt Angela's wedding," Slade explained.

The next photo, in colour, showed a little boy on his first day of school. As Holly started to flick through the others, she saw a Christmas scene featuring a red Chopper bicycle, a young boy dressed in a Scouts uniform, a teenage boy holding a sports trophy, and four boys of varying ages posing with a battered-looking car.

"Dad bought it for us to work on," Slade said. "I probably should have told you that I'm the oldest of four brothers, but I didn't want to scare you off completely."

Holly looked up at him and saw him smiling.

"We never did get that rust-bucket working."

Holly was starting to get the idea, and in subsequent pictures she found Slade's official police photograph from the day he was accepted as a uniformed officer; he looked like he was still a teenager, but the self-confident smile was unmistakable.

"I joined up as soon as I turned eighteen," he told her. "It was all I ever wanted to do. I was a pain in the neck even then, but at least in those days there weren't any Science Officers for me to bother."

Holly couldn't help herself smiling. She understood now; this was Slade trying to answer all the questions she might have about him. There were several other photos from family get-togethers and work socials, as well as one of Slade holding a paint-roller and a glass of Champagne in what Holly assumed was probably his first flat. Eventually, she came to the picture she had guessed must be in there. She once again picked up the image of the young, blonde woman photographed on a beach, unsure what Slade expected her to do or say. When she turned it over, it was marked with a pencil notation reading 'Jessica - Cassis, 27th May 1990'.

"I took it on our honeymoon," Slade said. "It was the day we were leaving for the airport. It turned out to be the last photo that I took of her."

Holly had never heard Slade speak in this tone before, and she could see it was a struggle for him.

"What happened?" she asked, quietly.

"It was a road accident," Slade sighed. "A stupid DUI involving a solicitor who'd been drinking in his lunch hour. Jessica was a freelance photographer, and she was just on her way to a job; she was on foot because I'd borrowed her car while mine was being repaired."

"Slade -"

"We'd only known each other three months," he continued, with a reflective smile. "It had all been pretty impulsive, but we knew it was right. I'd never felt like that about anyone...and I didn't think I ever would again."

When Holly looked up, Slade's gaze was on her.

"And when I realised that I did, I was...well, I was afraid."

"Afraid?"

"That if I did something about it, something bad would happen again," he explained. "It took me a long time to get up the courage, even though I knew I was probably giving you mixed messages."

Holly absorbed his words and thought back to all those times where she had been left baffled over the nature of their friendship; he had seemed to be on the verge of making a move during the Sonja Duvall investigation, but his subsequent behaviour had been much more along the lines of a platonic friendship. It was only when Stephen Marlowe landed back in her life that Holly recognised the unambiguous jealousy in Slade's actions, and suspected that he might feel the same way she did.

Slade got up from his seat and came to crouch beside her chair.

"This, us...it's all that I think about, all that I want," he told her, his voice almost a whisper. "But I know that I should have told you before."

"Yes, you should," Holly said. "I would have understood, you know. Finding out from Grisham...it was humiliating."

Slade nodded. He hauled himself onto the chair adjacent to hers.

"I know. I'm sorry," he said. "But I promise you that there'll be no more surprises."

Holly gave a snort of laughter.

"Okay, just good ones," he qualified. "Anyway, I think Grisham probably got a bit of a surprise of her own, today."

"Not necessarily," Holly told him. "I don't think we were as discreet as we perhaps thought."

She saw a smile start to spread over Slade's face, and knew what it meant.

"That doesn't mean, Slade that you can ambush me in my office every time you feel like it."

"Well, for the record, I don't mind if you want to 'ambush' me at my desk," he replied. "Or in the lift, or the stationery cupboard, or in the evidence room..."

Holly fired him a warning look, but couldn't prevent a smile from creeping through. Slade stood up and she let him pull her to her feet and into a careful embrace. Slade obviously felt as though he was on secure ground again, because he leaned in towards Holly as to kiss her. She put a hand on his chest to stop him, and he looked at her, enquiringly.

"Am I anything like her?"

It was the question she knew she shouldn't ask – because she knew she shouldn't need to, and in case she didn't like the answer – but it was too late.

"Like who?"

"Jessica."

Slade grinned broadly.

"Holly, I can honestly say that you are absolutely nothing like her."

Holly froze for a second.

"Except in the most important way," he added.

"What's that?"

"Being able to put up with me."

Holly raised her eyebrows at him.

"Well, that does require a very particular skill-set."

Before she could say another word, Slade leaned in and kissed her, and Holly was reminded of just how right this all felt. They had nothing in common, they disagreed about almost everything, and yet she now couldn't imagine ever being with anyone else. This was a paradox she would probably never get to the bottom of.

"I can't believe you were in the Scouts," she said, when they broke apart.

"Lasted two weeks," he replied, grinning. "I looked good in the uniform, but it turns out they don't like you lighting campfires in the Scout hut. Who knew?"

THE END