Moonlight – Virtual Season 2
Episode Three – Open and Shut
Rating: R
Writer: Mx wwmickd
Beta'd: Writers Group
VS2 Writers Group includes PhotoSue, CIChen, Sunny, Misfit, Evilous, Osage Phantom, mxwwmickd, Night Owl, PhantomPhoenix and Candomom.
Disclaimer: Moonlight and its characters are owned by CBS and Warner Brothers. All use of Moonlight and its characters in this venue are for entertainment purposes and completed solely for the pleasure of Moonlight lovers. The original storylines and episodes have been created by the VS2 Writers and Discussion Group. We hope you enjoy.
MVO Just when I think I have a chance at living a good life, maybe help a few people and redeem myself in my own eyes. Someone else's present becomes my past and I know the scales are still unbalanced.
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"Beth, thanks for meeting me for lunch." Ben rose from his chair as Beth stepped up to the small table covered by a large umbrella. He shook her hand giving it an extra, gentle squeeze as she smiled at him. "There's some things I want to talk about away from the office."
"Hey, I'll choose a pleasant café lunch outside over the cafeteria any day." Beth leaned back in her chair as she watched a young woman come up behind him. "There is of course, the danger of being recognized—I think someone has serious business with you."
Talbot swiveled in his chair, looking over his shoulder. "You're about to meet my sister."
Swooping in to give him a peck on the cheek she announced, "Benjamin Talbot! You have been avoiding me! Since I'm clearly left in the dark about your life and I am barging in on your lunch date, who is this joining us for lunch?"
"Sit down Sis, this is Beth Turner one of my Investigators. Beth, Caitlin--kid sister, emphasis on the 'kid.'" Ben cocked his head in her direction and lifted his eyebrows when his sister stuck her tongue out at him. "See what I mean."
"Well this kid's biological clock is ticking." Ben hid his head behind his hand. "Good, I'm glad to see you can still blush." Caitlin smiled at her brother.
Beth stood and extended her hand to Caitlin. "Why don't I excuse myself, I'm very pleased to meet you." Noticing her engagement ring, Beth smiles, "Congratulations on your engagement."
Beth turned leave and looked back at Ben grinning. "I'm leaving you to your fate. Would you do me a favor and get my lunch to go? I'll see you back at the office. I'm going to be imagining Uncle Ben all afternoon as it is, without hearing about the details of the ticking biological clock."
As Beth leaves Caitlin starts to tease Ben. "You like her, don't you Ben." Caitlin watched Beth as she walked away.
"Your matchmaking tendencies never take a vacation do they? Beth works for me Caitlin, and she's dating someone else."
"That never stopped you before." Caitlin gave her brother a mischievous grin that caused him to laugh.
"Ha, well she's dating a scary guy--a vigilante P.I. who is about 8 different kinds of weird. Girls who like the bad boys never like me."
He frowned with an annoyed look as he thought about Mick St. John being everywhere Beth seemed to be, invited or not. He looked back toward his sister who looked more than ready to continue the conversation he'd been dodging for weeks. He set his jaw then turned to his sister. "Listen Ben," she said, "Whether you like Beth or not, what happens when you meet someone and you want a family? Won't you want to know about our parents then?" Her eyes suddenly soften with a hint of sadness in them.
"I don't plan on having a family and if I do, I will take my chances like the parents who raised us." He leaned forward already uncomfortable with this familiar conversation. This was an old argument which brought up old memories he would rather forget.
"Well I want to know about our parents." She sat back in her chair, exasperated with her brother. "Ben I need your help, you're a lawyer. I can't get past the sealed records. I've placed ads at all the adopted child notices to let our parents know I'm looking for them. Please, Ben." Her eyes were pleading as she touched his hand wanting her brother to see how desperately she wanted this.
"I'm not that kind of lawyer. Did you ever think our biological parents might be dead?" He said in his direct manner which always sounded sarcastic, even to her, his sister.
"C'mon Ben." Caitlin was beginning to get angry. "Don't patronize me!"
"I'm sorry Caitlin, I don't mean to sound cold. I just don't want to know--not like you do." Ben rose from the table and kissed his sister on the head smoothing his tie as he stood up. "Good luck."
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The last sliver of the waning moon is setting. Walking down the beach at night has become an intermittent ritual when the moon and tide cooperate.
Beth slides her arm around Mick's waist behind his jacket hooking her thumb in the waistband of his trousers. Mick squeezes her toward him in a one-armed hug.
"I met Ben Talbot's sister today." Mick said as he looked at the moon hovering above the horizon.
"So did I, Ben had been avoiding her. She ambushed him at the restaurant." Beth smiled a little as she remembered the conversation.
"You had lunch with Talbot?" Mick said looking down at her, giving her a mischievous grin.
"We were going to have lunch but then his sister came by. It looked like she was ready to tell embarrassing family stories, so I excused myself and left."
"Talbot…" Mick said as he looked away back toward the ocean.
"Mick, I'll have lunch with you too, anytime you want to free me from the halls of justice. Take me to a sidewalk café, one on the shady side of the street." She pulled on his waist and smiled as he placed a kiss her forehead. "You're jealous." She gave him a devilish grin looking up at him.
"No, just jealous of your time." He was not going to admit that he was a little jealous of Talbot. His pride wouldn't let him do that. Joking about Talbot had become routine, although he made them both uneasy for different reasons. "I'm going to have to kiss you, reassert my claims." Mick said as he stopped for a moment pulling her tight to his chest. Brushing his lips against hers he pulled back just a fraction until her lips opened. He inhaled sharply to fix the moment, Beth, the night, the ocean air, all in his memory before he returned to kiss her lips.
"Mmmm, I definitely feel reclaimed," Beth said breaking their kiss. "So are you going to tell me about Ms. Talbot, or invoke the client confidentiality clause?" Mick released her with a sigh of disappointment.
"Actually I told her I wouldn't take her case when I figured out she was Talbot's sister. She wants to find their biological parents." Mick took Beth's hand as they continued up the beach.
"They're adopted? There's a story there—when Ben came back to the office he asked me about being taken. He said, 'How much did I really want to know?' And if I had a chance to find out more, would I take it." Beth looked at her feet as the sand began to squish
between her toes. Mick guided them closer to the waves. The wind off the ocean began to blow her hair across her eyes.
"What did you say?" Mick asked gently, thinking about how Coraline had stalked them as Morgan Vincent and how Beth's fierce desire for the truth had stripped away any protection granted by forgetfulness.
"I told Talbot I had found out more about being taken and that it was a lot to process."
Beth feels herself stiffen, just mentioning it tonight is enough to replay the memory. Coraline clinging high on the wall, the fight, the fire and the charged sexual atmosphere that she didn't understand as a child.
Mick hears her pulse jump and listens as her breathing starts to become shallow and rapid. "Is it still a lot to process?" He squeezes her arm; his touch and the concern in his voice brings her back to the present.
"Sometimes," Beth whispers, the memory begins to recede and her focus returns to the moment.
"Sit down with me." Mick suggests. As they arrange themselves on the sand with Beth resting herself against Mick looks down at her. "You amaze me Beth. You do know that?" Stroking her cheek with his thumb he thinks to himself I'm a lucky man.
As the moon finally sets, Beth regretfully shifts gets up. "I need to get back, I have to work tomorrow." Mick stands up and looking disappointed extends a hand to lift Beth from the sand.
Walking back Mick says with a grin, "Talbot's sister told me she got the idea to hire a Private Investigator from him. He mentioned one of his investigators was dating a 'scary PI' who was eight different kinds of weird."
"So what'd she do, when she figured out you were the 'scary PI.'" Beth tugged on Mick's arm playfully.
"She ran screaming from the room." Beth laughs, something between a giggle and a snort. Mick elaborated, "Actually she looked embarrassed and apologized. I hope she has a half a dozen kids, she'll need that many to stay out of trouble." Pulling Beth close in to his side, he says," It's a new moon on Friday and unless you have to go in on Saturday…"
"It's a date."
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(Music: Escape – The Piña Colada Song)
"Moonlit walks on the beach, drinks by the fireplace; wasn't there a song about that in the 70's. You know drinking songs used to be lusty and bawdy." Josef looked at the tip of his dart giving it a curious stare.
"Josef... if we are going to play darts...you have to stand behind the line." Mick stopped, waiting for Josef to step back. Josef laid his dart down on the bar in his den and leaned back on his elbows staring at the dart board with a look of disbelief, this was a game?
"I could sing a few bars, 'If you like... walks on the beach' of course they weren't singing the praises of a certain AO negative. I could rework the lyrics if you like. What are we playing here?" His frowned as if to concentrate on what he and Mick were doing here.
"301, 401, 1201 how much time do you have. You still keep a lute player on staff-how Elizabethan." Mick threw his shot and shook his head as it missed the mark, so much for vampire skills.
"Jacobean actually, I was a child during Elizabethan times. Why do you insist on having the line so far back; I laid off the minstrel because the freshies prefer satellite radio." Josef grabbed the dart noticing how Mick had missed the target. Damn it, he would have to get the wall repainted—served Mick right though, for insisting they throw from across the room. Still, this was a chance to beat Mick at his own game. He threw the dart, "Bulls eye. I think I like this game!"
"Rework the lyrics all you like, it's the melody that gets stuck in your head, trust me you're playing with fire." Mick shook his head and went to the bar to pour a drink--it was going to be a long night. Every night without Beth was a long night.
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Zandra, can we sleep with Red tonight? The pit-bull was snorting and rolling a mattress laid out on the floor trying to dislodge the butterfly barrettes clipped to her ears. "We made her a necklace of clover but she shook it off." Brother and sister are laughing.
"Sure you can sleep with Red, but you've got to keep her quiet, Mommy's going to have a visitor."
"Zandra…"
"Mommy," The woman in the flimsy transparent nightgown corrects the child. "Mommy means it. Very quiet, or…" She looked down at the child with a warning glare.
"We get a beating," the adolescent laying across a white enamel and brass daybed says in a dull voice… The white ruffled bedding is dingy, decorated with pink princesses, a character popular with girls more than a decade ago.
Zandra looks at her daughter with narrowing eyes, "Or Mommy gets crabby. You two, your daddy is coming back tomorrow night—so be good." Wide eyed the children listen to the irritated slapping sound of Zandra's baby doll slippers retreating down the hall, the sound gradually fading as she descends to the ground floor.
"Ow! You pinched me." The child said as she rubbed her arm glaring at the teenager.
"Ssshh. Listen, or I'll pinch you again. I wasn't kidding about beating—you don't want one. Keep the dog and your kid sister quiet. I'm sneaking out."
"You're supposed to be babysitting, don't leave us." The small voice was filled with panic."
"You're not really my brother and sister. There are worse things than a beating after my Mom has company."
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Red lifts her massive head—butterfly barrettes now attached to her collar. She heaves herself up and off the mattress, head down, nose to door growling at the same time quivering with fear.