"That son of a bitch has ruined everything! Miss Lichtmann – Elsa, I… I'm going to need to stay here now. I'm sorry. I'm sorry I caught you up in this mess."
Elsa had stared at Cole Phelps as he talked, his voice muffled as he held his face in his hands. He'd knocked on her apartment door calmly enough, wearing – as ever – that simple blue suit and hat and a small, sad smile when she'd opened the door to him. He had walked straight in, without looking at her but brushing past her slowly, gently, and when he heard the soft click of the door as the lock nestled back into its place his whole demeanour changed instantly.
His hat still lay upside-down on the mat next to the fireplace where he'd tossed it, his tie was dishevelled, pulled frantically away from his neck as he yelled obscenities into the air, and he had ended up falling onto the edge of Elsa's red leather couch, elbows on knees and face in hands, making soft sobbing sounds that could only be met with pitiful disdain. And then he had told her that he needed to stay in her apartment, no explanations offered, only apologies.
Cole Phelps was acting completely uncharacteristically; and Elsa was scared not of him, but for him.
Elsa sat herself delicately on the armchair opposite Cole. Her belief was of tough love. "I am afraid that I cannot help you at all unless you wish to tell me what is wrong," she said, her voice detached of any emotion other than a kind of tired resignation, one that was only acquirable after living to a certain age and gaining a well full of unbelievable yet true experiences in those years. "And there is no use apologising to me; I willingly helped you."
"I know… I just, I didn't expect this to come into it, we both didn't sign up for this." Cole had raised his head to look at Elsa, and she almost wished he hadn't. His expression, his eyes… he looked like a broken, confused man, humbled where he did not need to be.
But she still needed to be firm. "It would help if you would tell me what this 'this' is."
Cole's eyes drifted absently to his hat as he nodded, mouthing a silent 'yes' with a sudden, clear cut look of determination clouding his features as he snapped his eyes back to her.
"Roy Earle, you remember him. He sold me out; he must have been tailing me when I left him alone after the one-eleven club shooting case… Christ, after I interrogated you in The Blue Room. When I went to your apartment at night… he must have drawn suspicions – wrong ones that he didn't even care to question! The son of a bitch sold me out to weasel his and the entire fucking corrupt system's way out of a scandal!"
"You are a strange man, detective," Elsa replied quietly, standing up and walking over to his hat. She picked it up and stood there, waiting for Cole to explain more, retaliate to what she'd said, yell more obscenities; she didn't know, couldn't possibly guess his reaction. In the short time she'd known him, she knew of his admirable skills, but had also glimpsed at his flaws, his undeniable hubris that almost made this situation laughable; the climax of a sleazy theatre production where the protagonist had been doomed from the start, but was only just starting to deteriorate. This, she thought sadly, may prove to be his fall from grace.
Her reply had sent Cole into a surprised silence before he gathered himself. "Miss – Elsa, do you by any chance read any newspaper?"
"No; American affairs are not really what I call my own, unless they affect me directly. Why?"
"Because right now, there's a front page story of an LAPD scandal spread across every single newspaper in this city. You should read it, it's claiming to be an 'un-American' story and it directly affects you." Cole's mouth lifted up on one side in an attempt of a joking smile, and he tried to mimic a laugh that came out as an exhausted and unbelieving exhale of air. His small, crooked smile never reached his eyes and never really reached his mouth before it abruptly fell. His head collapsed back into his waiting hands.
Elsa was intelligent, and she recognised that it wouldn't take as smart a woman as her to put two and two together.
"He told the men in charge that you are having an affair with me." No question, just a simple statement. One that made Elsa want to raise her eyebrows in disbelief, snort in light of the idiotic assumptions people made, slap Roy Earle around the face – he'd done it to her enough times. None of these, however, were appropriate or practical to the matter at hand, and instead it simply made her stare at Cole with an unwaveringly pitiful expression.
"I'm sorry, Miss Lichtmann. I should not have dragged you anywhere near my investigation. And now to come here… but I had nowhere else."
"You will apologise for the state you are in now; you will not apologise for what has past. Pull yourself together!"
Cole's eyes lit up as he opened his mouth, as if to shout back, but his eyes dulled once more and he looked away from Elsa, breathing heavily. "I've lost my wife, Elsa. I've lost my wife, my daughters, my house, my job. Marie wouldn't even let me explain, she just… tossed out a suitcase after me," he whispered.
"Did you give her reason to be suspicious?" Elsa asked, walking back to the armchair and placing Cole's hat on the coffee table that stood between them. If he had not, Elsa thought, she is one hot-headed woman.
"I…" Cole started, faltering until he noticed Elsa's quick, sharp glare. "Marie asked me if… if I loved you. By then she was clutching at straws. I guess she could have accepted my eyes wandering a bit – Christ, if she only knew the real reason for all this – but she couldn't, and rightly so too, accept that if it was true."
"And what did you say?"
"I… Nothing. I couldn't speak. I was too astonished. The circumstances seemed suspicious, I'll admit, but to think that after all we've done together she… she could so easily believe that I loved another woman, believe that I'd drop our love like that… I had no reply."
"I am sorry, detective, but if that is all you could do I have no sympathy for you."
"I don't deserve any sympathy. But… could I stay here? Just for a little while, I promise I'll get out of your way when…"
"You can stay, but I want no pathetic speeches from you. And for goodness sake you will go to your wife and explain to her whatever story you have tomorrow."
"Miss Lichtmann, I… I can't thank you enough."
"It is just Elsa, detective. Get used to it."
"And it's just Cole, Elsa," Cole replied, lifting his eyes up to her face and attempting another smile that seemed at least half genuine. Elsa stared at the man for a moment, a sad broken man, and shook her head as she turned away and walked into the kitchen, wondering what tomorrow was to bring.