Back in New York
Chapter 7
Family and Friends
. . . . .
Lanie waited a month and a half.
It wasn't out of some sense of wanting to hold back from her best friend, it was more that Lanie had wanted to be sure. She was a strong, independent woman and had always been that way. She made her own decisions and she dealt with the consequences when they were bad decisions. With Javier, she wanted to have a better idea of where their relationship was going and if it was going to turn into a relationship to begin with. After six weeks of dating, lots of coffees and flirty text messages, not to mention steamy kisses and a heavy makeout session at her apartment after their last date, Lanie was pretty sure what she had could be considered a relationship.
Which was why, on a gorgeous mid-July morning, instead of being out wandering Central Park, she was in her morgue the phone pressed to her ear as she waited for Kate to pick up.
"Beckett."
"Girl, you're on vacation-"
"Sick leave," Kate interrupted.
Lanie rolled her eyes. "You're not working," she allowed, "and you're answering your phone like that?"
"What if it was Montgomery?"
"Has he ever called you while you were off?"
The women shared a laugh. Honestly, it made Lanie happy to hear Kate laugh. There had been a while where she was sure that wasn't going to happen. Sometimes Kate took herself too seriously and Lanie could honestly say she was glad for Rick Castle in her friend's life. Castle forced Kate to laugh, added some brightness to her day and though Lanie would never admit it, probably never even in a court of law, she was both intensely grateful for Castle and a little jealous.
"How are you feeling?" Lanie took the time to ask. With Kate's shooting, Castle had whisked her off to the Hamptons for her recovery and Lanie had been kind of lax in keeping up with her best friend.
"I'm doing well," Kate promised. "Rehab is going well and I haven't killed Rick yet."
"Well that has to be a record."
The detective on the other end of the phone chuckled. "Honestly, Lanie… He's been superb through all of this."
"We expected that," Lanie replied. "We wouldn't have trusted him with your recovery otherwise."
"I'm glad you have such faith in my abilities," Kate said wryly.
"Nah, we just know you," the ME responded. "Castle'll be able to find that fine line between letting you have your space and making sure you do all the right things to be back in the precinct come fall."
"Well, it helps that he sleeps late into the morning and I'm an early riser."
"And how is coffee on the beach first thing?"
"The most fantastic thing in the world," Kate replied unrepentantly. "But I know you, Doctor Parish, so what's going on?"
"Why does there have to be somethin' goin' on?" Lanie asked. It had been the whole point of her call, but that was beside the point.
"Because while I appreciate you checking up on me, I know that tone of voice. So what's going on?"
Lanie found herself chewing the inside of her cheek as she slid into her desk chair.
Kate caught the nervous tension in her best friend. "You're nervous to dish? Should I be sitting down?"
Lanie had to admit she was thankful for Kate's playful teasing. Kate and Javier were close and it felt a little bit like she was about to confide in his sister as much as it would be confiding in her best friend. She recognized it as stupid though. Kate would be happy for her, happy for them.
"There's a guy."
"A consistent one?" Kate asked immediately. It wasn't a secret between the friends that Lanie liked to date, so Lanie didn't begrudge the question.
"Yeah."
"How consistent?"
"Six weeks." Lanie stuck the phone between her ear and her shoulder, and started absently picking at her nails.
"A keeper." Kate paused. "Your guy have a name?"
"Javier."
Silence greeted her admission. "Our Javier?" Kate asked finally.
"Yeah," Lanie replied.
"You've been dating Javier Esposito for six weeks." There was nothing in the female detective's voice to indicate whether she was worried about the relationship or supportive of it. "Is it good?"
The smile was instantaneous, unbidden and unstoppable. "It's really good."
"You sound happy," Kate admitted, her own affection for the pair of them now in her voice. "Well! Spill! Tell me all about it!"
It was just over a week after talking to Kate – and two dates she and Javier had managed to squeeze in – that Lanie went by the Twelfth Precinct, coffee, this time for Ryan too, and Perlmutter's autopsy results in hand. It had been the abrasive coroner that had been on call when Javier and Ryan had picked up their case, but Lanie really, really didn't mind hand-delivering the results. The boys had been running virtually non-stop for the last couple of days as they found and chased down leads, so Lanie and Javier had been relegated largely to phone calls and text messages.
For Lanie, it was odd to feel like she needed to talk to someone constantly. Even she and Kate when weeks and weeks without a single personal conversation. But with Javier, she'd discovered she just, quite simply, wanted to be around him. So she'd taken the excuse of delivering results to go by the precinct, virtually humming as she made her way to Javier's desk. She placed Ryan's steaming cup on his desk before settling herself at Javier's, absently opening Perlmutter's file as she waited. Stabbing victim. Drugs… fantastic.
An irate female voice caught Lanie's attention as it increased in pitch and volume. When she looked up from the report, she froze. She recognized the woman berating the poor officer trying to give her answers. Lanie sprang out of her chair, coffee and report, even her reason for hanging around forgotten.
"Evelyn?" Lanie called.
The screeching continued and Lanie did her best to make out some of the words while simultaneously reaching for the woman.
"Evelyn!" she tried again, shooting the harried looking officer an apologetic look. "Evelyn!"
Evelyn spun on Lanie, shrieking, "They arrested my son!"
Lanie sucked in a breath as Evelyn collapsed against her. The officer took his chance and scampered away as Lanie stroked her hand over Evelyn's dark head. After a moment, Lanie lifted Evelyn's chin, meeting eyes identical to her own. Though Evelyn wasn't her sister, they were almost identical. "What are you doing here? Who got arrested?"
"Danny," Evelyn answered immediately. "And no one will tell me anything."
"If it's not their case, they probably don't know much," Lanie soothed, guiding Evelyn to the benches outside the interrogation rooms. They sat there for a while, Lanie doing her best to calm Evelyn, reassure her that it had to be a mistake. It wasn't until a shadow fell over them that Lanie looked up. And straight into Javier's gaze.
"Mrs Keating?" he asked, though his eyes never left Lanie's. He had to have seen the resemblance between the two women, identified them as relatives. The coroner felt a cold dread settle in her stomach, something telling her that Evelyn's presence and Javier's case were directly related.
"Where's my son?" Evelyn asked immediately.
"Interrogation two," Javier responded immediately. "Detective Ryan and his representative are in there with him."
Danny was fifteen. A minor. Evelyn raced away, leaving Javier and Lanie looking at each other. Finally, he moved, sitting beside her.
"We arrested Daniel Keating this morning," he told her, now no longer able to meet her gaze. "Do you know him?"
Lanie's eyes closed. "Yeah, you could say that." She didn't need to look at him to know the question he would ask. "His mother's my cousin."
I'm not fully comfortable with this chapter. But that's okay. Because it needed to happen. So now it did! Good times.
Review if you're still with me? Pretty please?
And for those of you wondering, There and Back is being betaed/edited and I'm just prepping the first chapter of Hamptons to be posted. The two stories (Hamptons and NY) are just about to cross, so it should be up soon.
But in the meantime, I'm off to immerse myself in Criminal Minds land so it'll be a while before the next update comes up.
Patience is loved!
