So, guess who's back? Real life intruded on this fic, but I promised myself I'd finish. So R&R, and I promise it won't take me another two months to update.
The past three years had obviously not done Eli very well, Lilly decided. Dante had grown into quite the intellectual college student, though guilt-ridden, and Ryan into a handsome student teacher, even though he yearned for what might have been. Both of them had been individually scarred by Renee's death, both of them carried pieces of her with him, but neither had been robbed of their youth. Eli, however, had aged. He had thirty years of burden placed on his nineteen year old shoulders; eyes sunken, skin pale. He was good looking, but far too grave for a kid not even yet twenty. His look was a haunted one that Lilly frequently recognized in herself, but Lilly couldn't tell whether the haunting was from losing his first love, or from guilt.
Lilly stuck with Scotty outside the box, and watched Vera and Jeffries enter, fervently chewing a pen. She could usually tell on sight whether or not there was a shot that the suspect was the doer. Eli was a puzzle. Presently, he was sitting at the metal table with his cheek pressed against steel, scuffing his shoes.
Vera shoved the table a bit, jolting Eli up from his sitting position.
"Better."
Eli should have looked resentful, but instead, he kneaded his hands and looked Vera square in the eye. "Renee was amazing. I never hurt her."
Vera looked surprised. "I didn't mention Renee, did you, Jeffries?"
"Sure didn't. But you know about it?"
"I don't know anything, detective."
"And yet you knew what we'd ask."
"Oh, come on. Every one knows that you're investigating the suicide… saying it wasn't a suicide."
It was bait, and Jeffries took it. "And you know she didn't?"
"I don't know anything, detective."
Vera circled the room, appraising Eli through the severe narrowing of his eyebrows. "But you know you were stalking her."
Eli's laugh was both spontaneous and sinister. "You police are such extremists. I was a love-struck kid. Nothing else."
"So you loved her, Eli? That why you set up a blank profile to follow her online? That why you heaved her into that ditch? What's love gotta do with that?"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa. I might've been… overzealous with Renee, but that? I loved her. There's no way, absolutely no way."
Outside the box, the scent of Scotty's cologne permeated Lilly's reverie, a welcome invasion of her space. He whispered, "You get the vibe he's hiding something?"
She mumbled through her throat, "Kid's wasting away. Guilt or grief?"
"Who knows? He's a teenager. He'd be angsting it out anyway. Call it biology."
"I guess you'd remember that better than I would, huh?"
"Damn right, old head."
Lilly lightly bumped his left shoulder with her right, inconspicuously, because the boss was watching. She shoved the pen into her mouth again, and steeled her eyes like she always did when she was trying to sift through information and extract what mattered.
Jeffries spoke in his soft voice, adding an approachable aspect to Vera's intimidation. "No one's trying to frame you, or hurt you, or anything like that. But if you know something—if you did something, it would go better for you just to say it."
"I don't know anything, detective."
Vera raised his eyebrow sardonically. "I hope you had a bigger vocabulary when Renee was alive. Was that what it was? She dumped you because you couldn't handle her? Was she bored with you? We hear that you caught her on a date, and she never wanted to see you again. That jive?"
Eli stood up defiantly, and snatched his hands out of his pockets. "I don't know who you've been talking to, but you're misinformed."
"So you did talk to her. She agree to meet you? Say, Fairmount Park?"
Eli's face was the face of a kid who had said too much, and spilled the beans on some surprise. Lilly frowned, and whispered to Scotty, "He's hiding something. But it's not that."
"Speak for yourself."
Back inside the box, Eli was trapped. "I met her. At the coffee shop."
Jeffries laughed, trying to establish some sort of camaraderie with the guy. "When did kids start drinking coffee? I missed that whole thing."
"Renee actually hated coffee. But she started going there in September… it was the strangest thing. Guess she liked to feel grown up."
"And when was this—coffee date?'
Eli sighed. "Day before she died."
"And how did that happen? You follow her there?"
"No. She asked me to come."
Scotty leaned over to Lilly again. "Now you know that's not true. I don't buy it."
Lilly flicked her blue eyes back inside the room, and listened intently. Scotty knew better than to cross her then, as she chewed the pen harder. Lilly had a way of docking herself inside people's heads and having a look around, and she was clearly doing that now.
Jeffries voice was lightly skeptical. "She asked you."
Eli nodded in earnest. "The girl was destroyed."
Renee is sitting at a corner table, gulping down a cup of coffee. She is talking to employee 'James' when Eli comes in, and grasping his hand. Eli starts to head out the door, and Renee waves him over. As Eli sits at the table, James runs off, giving Renee eyes of reluctance.
"You invite me here to I could see you on a date? Low blow, Renee, even for you."
"Even for me? What's THAT supposed to mean?"
"You're a tease. You broke up with me for no reason, and now, you're here to rub it in my face because you can."
Instead of responding back as Eli would expect her to, Renee looks down into the depths of her coffee cup. "Can we not today? Please?"
Eli leans across the table and clasps her eyes with his own. "You're scaring me, Renee. What's going on?"
"James isn't—we arent't—"
"It doesn't matter. What's up with you? This is not you. Why'd you call me here?"
"Because you… I've known you all my life. I didn't know who else to call."
"Ryan? Dante?"
"I'm not a slut, you know. So you can stop that."
"I don't think that about you. No matter who you sleep with… I never could."
"I'm not sleeping with anyone. Not that it's your business."
Eli's voice is instantly quiet, gentle, and intimate. "Why'd you call me here?"
"I don't want to bother you with it. Just… family stuff."
"You fighting with your parents?"
"I wish. That would be easier."
"So, what is it?"
Renee's eyes scatter around the coffee shop, weaving through the people. Her eyes fall on James, who is sitting at the counter with his arms crossed. "You don't want to know. Really. I just… needed company."
"That's what I'm here for."
Eli's eyes were full, almost begging to be believed. Vera had his arms defiantly crossed, and Jeffries was looking at the table. Scotty's eyes were narrowed, but the wheels in Lilly's head were turning. She was recalling one consistency in the case, a consistency that was ridiculous in its insignificance. She remembered one sentence from Renee's blog.
You're always there, and I watch you over my cup of coffee…
Lilly whispered fervently to herself, "That's how she knows him." She turned to Scotty, briskly, head still spinning. "Hold the boss down. I just thought of something."
"What?"
"I don't even know myself. Just cover for me, okay?"
Scotty's furrowed eyebrows deepened. He hated it when Lilly went out to chase leads on her own. It made perfect sense that she would, considering how wildly incoherent her theories were when she first thought of them, but he still didn't like it. He had not yet forgotten when Lilly had last put on her Detective Rush costume to go chase a lead—in the woods. The turnout hadn't been too bad, but who knew if Lil would be the one to pull the trigger the next time? Of course, he was not allowed to be protective, but he was allowed to be worried, even if there was no sign of danger on this case. The job hadn't yet taken away his ability to care about people. All in all, he could have thought of a million things to say to stop her, but the time the protests reached his lips, she was already gone.
Next chapter we have the big revelation. Any ideas?
