CHAPTER 1: CONFESSION
Author's Note: This is a sequel to Walk and Don't Look Back, but you don't have to read that story to understand this one.
Monday, October 16
12:30 am
"I did cheat on you."
The words hung in the air.
Deborah stared at Rey for a minute. "Are you - is this a joke?"
"I wish it was."
She cast about for something, anything to say. To pin this down. To make this either go away or become real.
They had been dancing together, chatting casually. She had brought up one of her recent in-service training sessions for the church counselors, in which their priest had directed them to tell one-time adulterers not to confess to their spouses, much to her disgust. She had jokingly made Rey promise that if he ever cheated on her, he'd at least respect her enough to tell her.
That's all it was. A conversation about a situation at church that had made her angry. That's all it was. That's all it could be. How did it go from a conversation about a patronizing priest and theoretical adulterers to... this?
I did cheat on you, he had said.
"When?"
"The day Mickey Scott was executed."
Suddenly it was real.
She slowly withdrew her hands from his, staring at him, his eyes still meeting hers, but noting her withdrawal with a press of his lips. "You... you slept with another woman?"
"Yes."
"What happened?"
"I told you I went to see McCoy instead of taking you to the church bazaar. I didn't. I left the precinct and went to Central Park, and read the paper. I was going to leave but this girl came up and asked to borrow my paper, and then we started talking and she invited me to lunch."
"You didn't go see McCoy?" Deborah tried to remember that day - it was so long ago. She remembered the church bazaar, remembered the execution, and Lennie's accident. And Claire Kincaid's death. But not the details of what happened when.
He nodded. "I called you from the restaurant and I told you I wasn't feeling too good and you said I should just take some time to myself-" he swallowed hard and closed his eyes, pausing for a moment. "I thought - I thought I'd just go to lunch and then go see Father Morelli." He met her gaze again and she was struck by the sorrow in his eyes. "I swear, I wasn't... I wasn't thinking of-" he shook his head. Then he took a deep breath and continued.
"After lunch she invited me to a sidewalk sale - CDs. I helped her pick out a couple of CDs and she said she had bought a new stereo, and it was one I was thinking of buying for you, and she asked if I wanted to hear the sound quality, so I went to her place... and..." he trailed off, then looked away.
"What was her name?"
"JC."
"And you just met her that day?"
He nodded slowly.
"You... you slept with a woman you'd just met that day, you... you threw our marriage aside just like that?" she asked, her voice impassive.
He started to shake his head, then stopped, biting his lip. Nodded slowly.
"Why?" He shook his head helplessly. "You told me you went to see Jack McCoy that day. You told me you were working with him."
He shook his head again.
"That was in early summer."
"May 30th"
Trust Rey to know the exact date, Deborah thought numbly. It was normally an endearing trait. Not right now. "It's been almost five months."
He nodded.
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"I was going to tell you when I came home. But Lennie and Claire Kincaid were in that accident. I ended up going to the hospital and by the time I came back it was early morning, I couldn't wake you up, and then the girls were up and I couldn't tell you."
"Why didn't you tell me that night?"
"I went to see Father Morelli. I told you I saw him because I was upset about Lennie getting drunk, but I actually went to see him to confess."
"And he told you not to tell me."
He nodded.
She sat back.
"Deborah?"
She stood, went to the window, stared out at their cold, dark back yard. Five months, she'd been living a lie. The last five months of her life were a lie, and she was completely numb.
Five months, she'd been living with, sleeping with, an adulterer. A cheater and a liar. She'd been her mother, all over again, what she swore she would never be, and he'd been his father and hers, all over again, what he swore he would never be. What she had wholeheartedly believed he could never be.
He'd broken that promise. He'd broken his marriage vows. He wasn't who she thought he was.
Who was he? She turned and looked at him, and he dropped his gaze. How could he have lied to her? How could he have made love to her after being with another woman? How could she mean that little to him? How could their life together mean so little to him? How could their children mean so little to him?
Their children. Her children. She had carried them, given birth to them, and brought them into a home where the betrayals of her own childhood had no place. She had believed that their father would never cheat, never lie, never betray them as her own had.
Lies.
She turned around again, closed her eyes. Leaned her forehead against the window for a long moment.
"Deborah?"
She shook her head.
This wasn't like any fight they had ever had. While they didn't fight often and almost never in front of the children, they both had quick tempers and when they actually fought, it was high-volume and intense. This was deeply frightening, to both of them, because of its very stillness and quietness.
"Deborah."
She didn't turn.
"Please, say something." She'd never heard his voice sound like this. Low, quiet, ashamed... afraid.
She caught her breath, appalled at herself for feeling an impulse to comfort him. To take away the fear in his voice.
No. She didn't know what she was supposed to feel, but concern for him shouldn't be any part of it. She turned and left the room.
"Where are you going?"
"Out for a drive," she said brusquely, grabbing her jacket and car keys. He watched her go, the slam of the front door echoing through him.
All the lies of the last five months, finally out. Like a festering wound on their marriage, lanced and draining, but aching and raw. A wound that is lanced can heal, but it leaves an ugly scar. And if the wound is deep enough, if there's enough poison inside, it can kill.
Oh God. He slowly went up the stairs, to their elder daughters' bedroom. Looked in on them, sleeping peacefully, blissfully unaware of what had just happened.
Oh God. He covered his face with his hands, overwhelmed. He'd finally done it. He had finally confessed to her the worst thing he had ever done, the worst transgression he had ever committed against another human being. And now what? Five minutes ago she had been in his arms and he had been filled with her presence. Now, she might as well have been on the dark side of the moon. She was out there, driving around, and he had no idea what was going on inside her. No idea what she was going to do when she got back. No idea how it would affect the two little girls he was gazing at.
God forgive me, he prayed. I couldn't, I couldn't do anything else. I couldn't live like this any more. Morelli may have been right about wives in general, that they shouldn't be told. But he was wrong about Deborah. She couldn't have made it clearer, that she would want to know, no matter what. How could I hear that and still lie to her?
He stared at his daughters' sleeping forms. Serena sighed and turned over in her sleep, chubby little hands clutched around her favourite doll.
I did the right thing, he told himself. I did the right thing. And they'll be OK. Please God, they'll be OK. Better off than if I continued to lie to their mother. Besides, what's the worst thing that could happen? Yes, she just said she would probably leave me if I cheated on her, but that was before I actually told her I did. It was just a theoretical discussion, and not even a serious one. She wouldn't really leave... would she?
Please, God, let her be able to forgive me. I don't care if she yells and screams at me, I deserve it, but please, whatever happens, please let her forgive me in the end. Don't let her walk out on me. Don't let our children be hurt by this. Whatever the punishment is, please, let me be the one to bear it. He sat on Olivia's bed, stroked her hair, his heart beating fast with fear.
Don't let them be hurt by this. They don't deserve to be. Please don't let my children be hurt by my sin.
===
Outside, Deborah drove through the quiet, winding dark suburban streets of their neighbourhood. She stopped the car in a random parking lot, turned it off. Sat thinking while it slowly cooled, oblivious to the passing of time until her breath came out in puffs of steam. Still numb, but slowly, slowly piecing together her emotions and attaching each one to what he had done.
He had forgotten her. She was hurt.
He had slept with another woman. She was furious.
He had kept this from her for five months. She was humiliated.
He wasn't who she thought he was. She was afraid, suddenly unsure of everything.
He didn't love her, couldn't love her if he could do this to her. She was devastated.
He had put their children in the same position she had been in as a child, same position he had been in as a child. She hated him.
She hated him, and she had to get away from him. Had to get their children away from him. Her children.
She restarted the car and drove back to the house.
===
She entered the house and walked past Rey, who had come downstairs upon hearing their car in the driveway. Headed for the stairs.
"Deborah?"
"Don't come near me."
"Where are you going?"
"My mother's house."
He slowly followed her up the stairs and into their bedroom. "For how long?"
She didn't answer him.
"Please don't do this."
She whipped around and glared at him, and he flinched and stepped back. No emotion for him other than loathing. He'd seen her angry at him, irritated, annoyed, even disappointed a few times, but never this.
"What about the girls?"
"I'm taking them with me."
"Hon, they're asleep-"
"Don't call me that. So they're asleep, they can wake up." She started to put clothing into a suitcase.
"Please. Please don't."
"Get away from me."
He covered his eyes with his hand for a moment, deep tremors starting to shake him.
"Please." He couldn't seem to think of anything else to say. He'd said everything he could, and this was her answer. She didn't want to talk, and he didn't know what to say other than don't go. "How long are you gonna be gone?"
"Until you're out of the house." He felt a stab of pain. Her voice held nothing for him except impersonal distaste.
"You want me out?" She nodded, not looking at him. He swallowed. "Look... Deborah... if you just want me gone... I'll go. I-I'll pack a suitcase, go to a hotel or something. You don't need to wake up the kids-"
"No. I want you gone. I want your clothes gone, I want your books gone, I want you out of this house."
Excising him like a cancer from her life. Just like that.
"You want me to move out."
"Yes."
"Deborah, please don't do this. Please talk to me."
"There's nothing to talk about. You broke your vows. You lied to me. For five months. There's nothing to talk about. I have nothing to say to you."
He felt his world dissolving, disappearing. This was exactly what she had said she would do. What he should have known she would do if he ever cheated on her, given her childhood. Given his childhood, too. "So that's it?"
"That's it."
"Our marriage, our life together - it's over?" he heard the shaking in his voice, powerless to stop it. If she heard it, she gave no sign.
"I'd say so."
"Just like that?"
"Just like that. It was over when you broke your vows. Excuse me," she went past him with another suitcase, and quietly went into Olivia and Serena's room. She took clothing for them out of the drawers and put it into the suitcase, then brought it out to the hallway as he watched helplessly, feeling everything ending.
"What are you gonna tell them?" he asked quietly.
"Why should I have to tell them? Why don't you?"
"What do you want me to say?"
"Why don't you make something up? You seem to be good at that."
He breathed out, acknowledging that he probably deserved that. He followed her to the front door.
"Please. Talk to me for just a few minutes."
"No."
"Just five minutes, Deborah! Christ, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm not asking you to forgive me or even agree to work things out. I'm asking for five goddamn minutes of your precious time and I don't think that's too much to ask after six years of marriage, no matter what I've done!!"
"Fine."
She checked her watch and faced him, face blank, black eyes flat and cold. He paused, not sure what he wanted to say to her, knowing she'd give him no more than five minutes. "I want to see the girls. You don't have to talk to me, but I want to see them."
"I don't think that's a good idea."
"I'm their father. I don't want you to - I don't want you to cut me off from them."
"They deserve better than you as a father," her voice was full of contempt. He breathed out, trying to keep calm.
"Let me see them."
"No."
"Then let me call them, for god's sake! At least let me call them! You can't - you can't just yank them away with no warning, it's not fair to them. Think of them for one damn minute."
"You should have thought of them five months ago." It felt like a slap. A slap that he deserved. He clenched his fists.
"I didn't. I didn't think of anybody but myself that day. Don't add to what I did and hurt them more than they have to be hurt."
"Fine. You can call them," she allowed grudgingly, tapping her foot impatiently, checking her watch. He sighed with relief.
"When?" he asked.
"I'll give you a call tomorrow."
OK. He nodded, trying to think of what else to say.
Suddenly his pager went off. She felt slight surprise as he turned it off without even looking to see who was paging him. To her knowledge he had never done that. No matter what was going on at home, when he was on call as soon as the pager went off he was in work mode. Now he'd turned it off like it was a nuisance, barely worth acknowledging.
Deborah felt a flicker of sympathy for him, quickly quashed it. What a pathetic thing to hold on to, she told herself. So what? For once, for today, right now, their conversation about his complete betrayal of her and their children held his interest more than a page concerning a person who was dead and wouldn't get any deader if he delayed answering for half an hour. Good for him. It shouldn't make any difference to her. It shouldn't make her think that maybe she and the children did mean something to him after all. If they had meant anything, he wouldn't have done what he did in the first place.
He cleared his throat. "What do you want me to tell them now?"
"Tell them we're going to see Grandma."
"They're gonna want to know why right now, in the middle of the night."
"Make something up."
"I - I can't."
"Haven't you had enough practice at this?" Deborah said bitterly. She thought for a moment. "Tell them we're gonna give Grandma a surprise." That was true after all. She glanced at her watch. "Anything else?"
He shook his head. She stepped past him and started to take the suitcases to the car. "Do you want me to get the girls?" he asked. She nodded on her way out.
===
Rey tucked the blanket under Olivia's chin and kissed her forehead, smiling slightly as she murmured in her sleep. Olivia was an incredibly sound sleeper, and had woken up only enough to nod when he told her she was going to take a trip to Grandma's house. Isabel, used to being transferred around in her sleep, hadn't even stirred as he put her in her car seat. Serena had asked a couple of drowsy questions, but had docilely accepted what was going on and hadn't made a fuss when told where she was going. And now Deborah was in the car, impatiently waiting for him to finish saying goodbye.
He stroked Isabel's cheek, wishing he could wake her and say a proper goodbye, but knowing she'd probably scream for the whole three-hour trip to the Pequot Reservation in Connecticut if he did. He smiled at Serena and gave her a kiss.
"How come you're not coming, Daddy?" she asked sleepily.
"I have to stay and work, baby," he told her. "Be good for Mommy, OK?" She nodded solemnly. "Love you."
"Love you," she answered him. "See you when we come back." He nodded to her, got out of the car, and closed her door. He opened the front door next to Deborah.
"You'll give me a call when you get there?" he asked her. She didn't bother to look at him. "Just leave me a message so I'll know you made it OK." She nodded stiffly, grudgingly. There was a brief silence.
"Deborah..."
"Close the door, please, I have to back out," she said flatly. He swallowed hard, straightened up and closed her door. She backed the car out of the driveway.
He watched the car taking his family away, feeling lost.
Now what?
Well, get out of the freezing cold, for one thing. He wasn't dressed for this weather. He entered the house again, noticing that Isabel's favourite bear had been left behind. Damn. She was going to raise hell tomorrow when she found out.
He picked up the little bear and stared at its empty black button eyes, feeling completely unreal. Abruptly hoping that somehow he could wake up from this and discover that his wife hadn't just up and left in the middle of the night, taking his children out to the Rez for who knew how long. That his whole world hadn't just come crashing down.
Stood there simply feeling blank for a while until he remembered the pager going off. And the phone, which had begun to ring as he and Deborah had put the girls in the car. She'd turned off the ringer impatiently and he hadn't given it another thought.
He found his pager, turned it on. Damn. Three pages. He picked up the phone to call the dispatcher back, grateful for the distraction.
===
3:10 am
Lennie yawned as he finished up with the crime scene. Dead girl at the bottom of Brooklyn Bridge - probably a jumper, but they still had to investigate. He rubbed his eyes tiredly. This was the nuisance of being on call. You so often got woken up in the dead of night for nothing. He didn't mind so much when he had to get up and catch an actual murder, but being dragged from a very pleasant dream for a damn jumper was damn annoying.
Besides, this was supposed to be Rey's night for first call, not his. He was only supposed to come if Rey assessed the situation and decided he needed help. Instead he'd been woken up by the dispatcher telling him she couldn't reach Rey, and would he take first call.
Where the hell was Rey? Usually Rey was quick to get to a night-scene, even though he lived out in the suburbs. Rey still hadn't realized that their vics really weren't going to go anywhere if they took the time to wake up properly before getting to the scene. Oh to be that young and enthusiastic again.
Lennie skimmed over his notes so far. He hadn't expected the body site to give him much, but they needed all the info they could get. See if anybody had seen anything, look at angles of trajectory, etc. etc. No point looking too closely at the vic - the ME would tell them if there was anything off about the body. Thank god, because this one had landed face-down. Yech.
Well, nothing else left to do here, now he needed go up to the top of the Bridge.
===
At the top of the Bridge, Rey spoke to the Crime Scene Unit officers. He'd finally arrived, an hour late, and found that Lennie had already been called and was down at the bottom with the body. Judging that there probably wouldn't be much for him to see down there, Rey stayed where he was, nodding as he wrote everything down and tried to take in the scene. Mind on the job, he reminded himself. Forget home, forget all of that. Not that difficult to do, since what had just happened at home was so unreal that it wasn't difficult to put it out of his mind. It hadn't really sunk in. And a crime scene wasn't the place to let it sink in.
"What happened to you?" Lennie asked as he and Profaci got out of a car.
"Hey, sorry I'm late, grabbed a ride," Rey launched into a description of what he'd learned so far. The vic's car, presumably, left open, nobody around, cars zipping by. An unidentified 911 call, the girl's ID. Normal. Everyday. No different from any of the hundreds of other crime scenes he'd worked, except it was damn cold and his wife had just walked out on him.
He held out the vic's ID. Karen Whatney of Borough Park. "Twenty-eight years old, nice looking girl."
"Not any more," Lennie commented.
"Detectives!" called out a uni. Officer Wheeler. "We got a woman's blouse over here." He brought it over.
Profaci took the blouse, then handed it to Rey. "So she's stoned on something, she runs her car into the guard rail, peels off her shirt, and jumps." Rey peered closely at the blouse.
"You sign off on that and we can all go back in," said Wheeler.
"Left sleeve is ripped. There's three buttons missing," Rey noticed. "She didn't take this off, somebody took it off for her."
"911 call said she jumped," Wheeler pointed out.
"Maybe this somebody also helped her off the Bridge," Rey said scornfully, and walked off.
"Break out your thermals, Wheeler, we're not going any place," he heard Lennie say to the uni. '911 call said she jumped.' Idiot. Oh, well, why don't we just let 911 do our job for us?
===
9:30 am
Next morning, they were at the mother's house. This part of the job was always hard, but necessary.
The mother, of course, was devastated, didn't want to believe it was her daughter at the bottom of the Bridge, didn't want to believe it was suicide. Who would want to believe somebody they loved had committed suicide? Even if, as in Karen Whatney's case, life hadn't exactly been going well at the time of her death? Whatney's boyfriend had left her, she had no job and no money, but her mother maintained that things hadn't been bad enough for her to take her own life.
Rey was inclined to agree with her. Something weird had definitely happened to the girl. You're suicidal and jump off a bridge, you're not going to tear your shirt off first. She could have been whacked out enough to rip off her own shirt, but... you rip off your own shirt in a frenzy, you're going to tear it along the middle. Not along the sleeve.
Still, suicide seemed likely. Shirt aside, this might be a nothing case.
Rey found himself hoping it wasn't. Hoping it was as messy and complex as possible. Just to have something to do, something to think about. A way to just spend the next few days working eighteen-hour days, only stopping to sleep. Deborah always hated it when he did that, but that didn't exactly matter right now.
He took a quick breath. It kept hitting him, this thing. He'd managed to not think about it much so far - worked at the crime scene until about five in the morning, grabbed a couple hours of sleep at the precinct, and continued on, focusing on the job and not on the fact that nothing was right. But when he least expected it, there was that sharp pain, that reminder that there wasn't a house full of kids waiting for him back home, that his cozy little world was simply not there.
And no idea of what was going to happen next, that was the terrifying part. He'd try to head off the negative feelings by pretending that Deborah was just at her parents' for a few days, but it wasn't that easy to fool himself, to stop worrying about what was going to happen next. The future seemed like a big gaping maw of uncertainty, but he did know one thing. Deborah wasn't just going to come back in a couple of days with a bunch of stories about her parents and the Rez, a cheery, "Give Daddy a hug and kiss!" for the girls, and a soft, "I missed you," for him.
Whatever. Right now is not about you, he reminded himself, it's about the vic. Thank God. Because you can do something about her. He brought his attention back to Karen Whatney's mother.
===
"Hey, no job, no boyfriend, I'd be singing duets with Billie Holliday," Lennie reflected as they walked back to their car after finishing with Mrs. Whatney. Didn't seem quite right, but the mother had probably been unaware of how badly her daughter was doing.
"Yeah, I don't buy it. I wanna talk to her friends."
"Sure," Lennie agreed. The mother had said Whatney had probably gone out with one of her friends yesterday. That might yield a few clues. "So last night where was everybody? One of your kids have a medical emergency?"
"Nah, Deborah took the kids to her parents' for a few days," Rey said casually, taking out his notebook.
"Just like that?"
Our marriage, our life together, it's over? Just like that?
"Yeah, just like that," Rey said, more bitterly than he meant to. He looked at his notebook. "So uh, girlfriend works on the West Side?"
Lennie opened the car door, a little puzzled. Wait a minute. That didn't make sense. Rey had been paged in the middle of the night. Why would Deborah taking the kids to her parents' place have anything to do with him not showing up at a crime scene in the middle of the night?
Besides, Rey hadn't said anything about his family going out of town. In fact, Lennie recalled him saying something about taking the kids to some event this week. And now they were gone?
Lennie gazed at him for a moment, sensing something slightly off, then mentally shrugged and got into the car. West Side. Right.
===
11:56 pm
Rey paid the cabbie and got out. Back home.
The day had been pretty much a complete waste of time, following leads that had gone nowhere. Whatney's friend had said that Whatney had been hoping to get some money from her former employer, which seemed a little strange, so they'd gone to see him. Hoping to find something, maybe a connection, some kind of motive - bad feelings over her being fired, an affair, blackmail, something... no dice. The employer, a kindly-looking older man, hadn't fired her, he'd just lost his factory to a fire. And no, no affair either - the guy was a widower. As to why she thought she was getting money from him, well, it turned out she'd worked for him since she was a kid.
Waste of time.
They still didn't even know that it wasn't a suicide. Except for the ripped blouse, it looked like a suicide, maybe drug-induced. Rey had almost been willing to concede defeat on the issue when the ME said she had bruises on her left arm that weren't due to the fall and the tox report came back negative except for Midol.
"Well, that gives a motive," Lennie had quipped.
"She jumped because it was her time of the month?" Van Buren had asked, amused. "I hope you come up with a better reason before you go home to your cave tonight."
They hadn't. Well, tomorrow was another day. They'd traced the 911 caller and Rey had been ready to go see him right away, but Lennie had pleaded exhaustion and gone home to bed. Rey had stayed at the precinct, reluctant to go home, catching up on paperwork from other cases until the words got too blurred to read.
They'd go see the 911 caller tomorrow. They'd give the Whatney case one more day, then call it a suicide and move on to cases where the cause of the death wasn't as obvious as a flying leap off a bridge with a vague 'something's-not-right' of a ripped blouse and bruised arm.
Rey entered his house, realizing that until that moment he'd been sort of hoping to find his family there. Which was ridiculous.
It was pretty easy to imagine that everything was still OK, as long as he was working. As long as he was thinking about motives and witnesses and clues. That world, the world of work, was intact. But then his other world... was this. An empty house.
Don't think. Just get something to eat and get ready for bed.
He went to the answering machine, its red light blinking steadily. Several messages.
"Detective Curtis, this is Dispatching. There is a possible homicide at the Brooklyn Bridge, please call to confirm." Three repetitions of the same message.
"We're in Connecticut," Deborah's voice, clipped, unemotional. "I'll call you at the precinct tomorrow at noon." Beep. End of messages.
Thanks, hon, he thought. Would it have been that big a strain for her to at least let the kids leave him a message too?
Apparently, it would have. He pushed down his irritation at her. After what he had done, he could hardly expect her to just pretend everything was fine. Sure, his mother used to do that as a way of life, and so did Deborah's, but they had both vowed they would never be their parents. Just because he'd ended up walking in his father's footsteps was no reason to expect Deborah to walk in her mother's.
He automatically ate, brushed his teeth, changed into a t-shirt and boxers, put aside his suit to take to the dry cleaners. Noticed a glint of gold on the dresser drawer as he hung his suit up on the bedroom doorknob.
Deborah's wedding ring. He felt a stab of alarm but took a deep breath and forced himself consider this reasonably.
It didn't mean anything. She was just angry. Deborah tended to get a little dramatic when she was really, really mad. Of course she hadn't missed the opportunity to make a symbolic statement, but she'd calm down. She would. And then they might be able to work this out.
He got into the bed and lay there, staring at the ceiling, trying not to think about Deborah's ring on the dresser drawer next to him instead of on her finger.
He turned over. Shit. This was awful. He was dead tired, but this was incredibly painful, lying alone in a bed that should have had Deborah in it. Going to bed without saying good night to his girls.
What were they doing? Where were they? Were they wondering what had happened? Or were they just doing their thing, happy to be at Grandma and Eric's house? Playing with their cousins, visiting the Pequot Rez?
He closed his eyes and told himself to go to sleep. He was too damn tired not to. And there was just no point in staying up, feeling bad. Sleep. Now.
He turned over again, finally feeling sleep overtaking him. Wasn't that ironic? He'd had a lot of trouble going to sleep in the last five months, often staying up worrying for hours, his stomach churning from the guilt of what he'd done, what he was continuing to do, lying to Deborah. Now, he was fine. He felt like crap and he'd probably destroyed his family, but he could sleep on demand.
Feeling vaguely bothered by that, he drifted off.
===
Tuesday, October 17
11:10 am
Lennie glanced around. Nice spot. Very woodsy.
He and Rey had gone to speak to the caller from 911, only to find that, surprise surprise, the guy hadn't seen much. Other than a truck from the Daily News, some black guy in a maroon Volvo saying the girl had gone over the Bridge, and a lot of people watching the show.
Not willing to track down every maroon Volvo in the city, they'd checked out the Daily News. Tracked down the guy who'd been delivering the papers at that time, to find that he also hadn't seen a thing. Except for a truck from the Parks Department with a man and a woman in it, enjoying the show too.
That was New York for you - girl jumped off the Bridge to her death and nobody saw anything. Nobody willing to admit to it, anyway. Still, they'd shlepped over to the Parks Department, found that a guy called Marsh had brought his truck back late that night. But the funny thing was, Marsh had told the guy who ran the motor pool that he'd been stuck in the mud on Randall's Island. Not on the Bridge.
Lennie and Rey had glanced at each other, detective instincts catching something weird. Nobody else had a Parks truck out that night. It had to be this guy. He obviously hadn't done anything to Whatney or the newspaper guy would've said so. So why would he lie about being on Randall's Island?
So they tracked Marsh down to his current worksite and asked him.
"Monday night. Nope... nothin' special jumps out."
"The guy who runs your motor pool said you brought your truck back three hours late," said Lennie. "And you told him you were stuck in the mud on Randall's Island?"
"Uh, yeah, that's right. That was a bitch."
Lennie hazarded a guess. "You married, Mr. Marsh?"
"Yeah," said Marsh, a little surprised at the non-sequitur.
"And you were at Randall's Island all by yourself?" Lennie asked skeptically.
"No. There was me and an owl."
"You know, that's funny," said Rey, "because somebody said they saw you on the Brooklyn Bridge with a female human passenger right around the same time."
"I wasn't on the Bridge. I was by myself."
"You mean, you weren't with your wife?" Rey needled him, ignoring the twist in his gut as the guy looked away uncomfortably. Son of a bitch, he thought. Running around on his wife, except this guy was apparently lucky enough that his wife didn't know about it. Hadn't walked out on him - yet. And he was gonna keep his dirty little secret, even if it meant lying to the police. Worthless piece of crap.
Lennie suppressed an impatient sigh. Some day, and Lennie really hoped it would be before he retired, Rey would get it through his head that not every guy who committed a minor peccadillo deserved that kind of attitude. Suspects, sure. You rattle'em by throwing all their dirty laundry in their face, see if a confession about an actual crime falls out. But not witnesses. You don't go after a witness like he's got a big scarlet A on his forehead and you're the Puritan Inquisition because that just makes him clam up. Lennie stepped in, trying to salvage the situation.
"Hey, we don't need to pry into your private business, Mr. Marsh. What we do need to know is what you saw on the Bridge."
"I was on Randall's Island," Marsh repeated stubbornly. "I don't have anything more to say about it." He got into his truck.
"Asshole," muttered Rey as the guy drove off. Lennie grimaced at him.
"You think you coulda been a little more tactful?"
"What?"
"The guy's obviously got extra-curricular activities. Fine. He's also got information about this case. Which we don't have now, thanks to you deciding you work for the Morality Police instead of Homicide."
Rey turned without a word and went back to the car, leaving behind a slightly off-balance Lennie.
What the hell was with Rey today? Lennie wondered as he got into the car. Moody, irritable, looking tired, and about as much fun as reading the Tax Code. Not that Rey was normally a barrel of laughs, but he had, over the year that Lennie had been working with him, at least started to unbend a tiny little bit. You couldn't tell from the last couple of days though - he seemed to be reaching for new heights of grim humourlessness.
===
12:00 pm
Rey picked up his phone at noon, motioning Lennie to go ahead into Van Buren's office.
"Curtis."
"Well, I'm calling."
He was at a loss for a moment. "How... how are you?"
"Fine. I said I would call so that you could talk to the girls."
"I - I can't right now, I'm at work-"
"I figured that. So pick a time when you won't be at work."
"Um - tonight at seven? Call my cell, though, I might not be at-"
"Fine. Goodb-"
"No wait! Don't hang up-"
"What?" she asked impatiently.
"Deborah, come on, don't be like this." There was a small sound of annoyance on the other end of the line, and Rey paused for a second. "What have you told them?" he asked quietly.
"What do you mean, what have I told them? I told them we're visiting their grandparents."
"I mean, what have you told them about what's going on?"
"Nothing."
"Well... how long are you gonna be at your parents?"
"Until you're out of the house."
"Deborah, come on, don't-"
"I didn't call so that we could talk about this. I called because you said you wanted to talk to the girls."
"I can't talk to them if I don't know how much you've told them. And if you want me outta the house, we better figure out some way to explain that to them. Because they're gonna notice it when they come home."
"You think so? You're gone most of the time anyway."
"Deborah, that's not fair-"
"I'm hanging up now-"
"What, you're gonna pretend I'm dead?"
"The thought has crossed my mind."
"Jesus, Deborah," he said in disgust. Silence on the other end of the line. He cleared his throat, made himself maintain a civil tone. He glanced around the squad room, reminding himself to stick to Spanish so that as few people as possible would overhear his end of the conversation. Not an easy thing to do, since he and Deborah, both raised bilingually, usually slipped from English to Spanish and back without even noticing in the course of a conversation. "So what do they think is going on?"
"What?"
"Have they asked how come I'm not there, how come I haven't called them?"
"I told them you were busy."
"And you're gonna keep saying that for how long?" More silence. "You don't think at least Olivia's smart enough to figure out something's wrong?"
"Fine. I'll let them know that their father cared more about a random piece of ass than he cared about us, and that's why Mommy and Daddy aren't married any more. Happy?"
Rey swallowed hard and rubbed his forehead, forcing himself to keep calm. "No, I don't think you need to go into detail-"
"Would you like me to make something up?"
"No, I'm not saying that, I'm just saying don't just tell them nothing. That's as bad as lying-"
"Don't you dare tell me not to lie! You of all people!"
"Deborah-"
"I'm hanging up. Now."
"No! No don't-" too late. Damn it. He slammed the phone down, knowing he was probably getting a few odd looks and battling the urge to hurl it across the squad room. That would raise a few eyebrows for sure.
Fuck. He was seized by an urge to scream with frustration, destroy something, beat on somebody. No, no, no. Take a deep breath, he told himself. She has every right to be upset. This is your doing, not hers. Maybe you can try to talk to her again tonight.
Now take another deep breath, push this down, and go back to work.
===
"Whoever was with him, it wasn't his grandmother," Van Buren commented in her office as Lennie told her about Marsh.
"Marsh was on the Bridge, all right, but proving it could cost him his job and his marriage," he said, looking out at the squad room, where Rey was on the phone. Looked like whatever was going on was pretty heavy. "What's with Rey?" he asked irritably.
"I don't know, he's your partner."
"Maybe you oughtta remind him of that. He doesn't say squat to me," Lennie stopped as the door opened and Rey came in.
"Everything OK?" Van Buren asked him.
"Yeah. Deborah says hi," Rey said casually. "So. Uh... what do you wanna do - put an ad in the newspaper? 'Witnesses wanted - flexible hours?'"
"The newspaper truck driver - he's on the Bridge same time every night?"
"Give or take," said Lennie.
"How many more are regulars like him?"
"We could throw up a roadblock and find out."
"And let's get the truck driver and Mr. Marsh in here," Van Buren suggested. She frowned slightly as her detectives left the office. Lennie was right, there was something going on with Rey today. He seemed tired and distracted. Probably one of his kids was sick or something, she thought as she picked up a report. It was always hard to balance family and the job.
"So, you gonna take off and get some sleep before gathering up the night owls tonight?" Lennie asked as they got back to their desks.
"Nah, I'm gonna finish this file for the Tate case."
"Rey, go home, take a nap," Lennie said absently as he picked up his messages. "We're gonna be up all night and you look like crap." Rey frowned and started to answer, but Lennie interrupted. "Oh - hold on," he read over one of his messages again.
"What?"
"The Mother in Law From Hell. Jamie says they've set up the hit man sting." One of their current cases involved the attempted murder of a young man, and the trail had led them to his wife's former mother in law. Turned out she'd put a hit on the guy. They had figured she would try again, tracked down the guy who had connected her to the first hit man, and made him set a trap for her. It seemed she'd decided to walk into it.
"Good."
"Yeah, I get to be a hit man," Lennie said enthusiastically. Rey smiled. "Oh - never mind, it's for this afternoon. I'll let Jamie know we better reschedule," Lennie picked up the phone.
"Why?"
Lennie sighed. "Rey, we already know she's guilty. One more day isn't gonna make a difference in this case. The Whatney case, we haven't figured out yet."
"We got nothing but dead ends on Whatney. The only thing left to try is the roadblock, which won't be till 2am."
"Yeah, and I wanna take a break before then."
"I don't."
"What are you, the Energizer Bunny? We don't get brownie points for closing this one day early."
"I want the overtime."
"All right, fine," Lennie gave in good-naturedly and started to dial Jamie's number. "What, your wife's fashion taste finally getting too much for your detective's salary?"
"She's a Pequot, remember?" Rey answered, keeping his voice casual. "My salary's not what keeps her in designer clothes."
"Lucky you. You ever get a divorce, she'll be paying you alimony," Lennie chuckled.
===
7:10 pm
This was unreal, Rey thought later that night as he listened to Olivia excitedly tell him all about the Rez. He and Lennie had arrested the Mother In Law From Hell and her first hit man, and arrived at the precinct just in time for him to duck into an empty interrogation room and answer his cell phone precisely at 7:00 pm. He leaned against the wall wearily.
It was so easy to think that this was just a regular Rez visit for the girls. Forgetting the context as he listened to Olivia's stories about a beautiful indoor pool, and Grandma and Eric's house and Eric's clarinet. And cousin Frankie, who had challenged her to climb up a tree. Which she would have, except the tree trunk was too cold. He nodded as he listened, saying all the appropriate things. Not that Olivia would have noticed if he hadn't said a word - when she got going she could talk for hours with no input from anybody else.
"Rey," Lennie said with relief, finally finding Rey in an empty IR after searching for him all over the precinct. Damn it, of all times for his partner to pull a disappearing act. "What the hell are you doing? We need to finish up the arrest report."
Rey waved him off. "Yeah?" he spoke into the phone. "And then what happened?"
"Rey!" Lennie repeated. "Jamie needs the report. Now!"
Go away, Rey mouthed, turning his back to Lennie. Oh for God's sake, thought Lennie. He grabbed Rey's arm and Rey whipped around, shoving him back. Lennie felt a flicker of alarm along with annoyance as he stumbled back slightly.
"Sweetie, hang on for just a sec - Livie, hang on. Olivia!" Rey said firmly. "Sweetness, I have to talk to somebody for a sec, OK? I'll be right back." He paused. "No, don't - don't give the phone to Mommy, I'll be right back. Don't forget you were telling me about Frankie and the tree, OK?" He turned back to Lennie, who was staring at him in puzzlement and considerable irritation.
"What the hell was that?" Lennie asked. Rey glared at him.
"What the hell was what?! I'm on the god damn phone!"
"Yeah, with your kid. Tell her you'll call her back, we need to wrap up this case-"
"Back off!" Rey hissed, eyes glittering with anger and covering the cell phone so that Olivia wouldn't hear. "Since when do you need me to hold your hand through an arrest report?! Get out or I swear-"
"All right, all right," Lennie cut him off, profoundly annoyed, but also bewildered as hell. Rey was not only getting on his nerves, he was starting to worry him. "Go back to your phone call," he muttered under his breath as he left, startled as Rey slammed the door shut behind him. He turned and stared at the door for a moment, then mentally shrugged and went to write the arrest report.
Rey took a quick breath and switched mental gears. Forcing all irritation at Lennie, at Deborah, at himself, at this whole situation, out of his voice as he came back to Olivia.
"OK, sweetie, I'm back. Sorry about that. You were telling me about the tree?"
"Oh yeah Daddy it was way cool and I coulda done it but it was too cold. You know how you taught me to find the toeholds when I'm climbing? Frankie said I couldn't do it but I said you showed me how and when it's not so cold I'll show him."
Rey chuckled, remembering the day he'd taught Olivia to climb the small tree in their backyard. Remembering Deborah rolling her eyes and saying he was going to get them both killed, then taking Serena and Isabel out to a friend's house so that Serena wouldn't be tempted to try climbing too. He brought his attention back to Olivia.
"... you gonna come too?"
"What, sweetie?"
"You gonna come too, when we visit the Casino? 'Cause I miss you Daddy."
"Olivia, it's Serena's turn," Rey heard Deborah saying sternly.
"Bye bye Daddy gotta go," Olivia said breathlessly, getting off the phone before he could answer. He made himself greet Serena cheerfully as she began talking rapidly, plunging into a story right in the middle without saying hello.
His thoughts wandered despite himself as he listened to her babble. Was this all there was going to be to fatherhood from now on? Small snapshots of his children's lives? Was this what Deborah wanted? Phone calls to keep the kids from being too disoriented by his sudden disappearance, tapering away as they got used to his absence and stopped asking about him, until finally he was gone from their lives as if he'd never existed?
No, get a grip, he told himself impatiently. Don't think in worst-case scenarios. That may be what she wants right now, but it's only been two days so of course she's still pissed off.
They're just at the Rez for a few days. You'll see them when they get back.
You will.
He firmly brought his attention back to Serena.
===
Author's notes:
Spoilers for Legacy, Menace, Barter, and the LA Trilogy (D-Girl, Turnaround, Showtime), Matrimony, Working Mom, and Double Down.
For people as obsessive as me: people who read the date cards on the show may notice that the dates here are wrong, for the scenes from the show that are in the story. On the date cards, Menace happened from November 16 to January 19, and Barter happened from December 5 to February 5. I moved Menace and Barter back by a month, and may move Matrimony around a bit since some of the days when they were investigating that case in New York, they were also investigation the LA Trilogy case in LA. I like Lennie and Rey too much to give them the kind of jet-lag they'd suffer if they did that.
Other than the date cards, everything that's from a scene on the show is exactly the same - dialogue canon, thought processes not. Except that Mr. Marsh actually said "Wednesday night" in the original, not Monday, but the day/dates had to change since I moved Menace back.