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Chapter 7
As they walked into the house Elizabeth told herself to remember that Cody was not a man who was prone to exaggeration. He had said the house was trashed, and he was correct. They had been asked to enter through the backdoor, which someone had taken a crowbar to so they could gain entrance to the house. Kicking it in wasn't an option because the center was steel, although from the scuff marks she was guessing they tried that first.
"We will need to do better at the next house." Cody told his boss. "I think because we wanted to hide the steel in between the wood panels, it simply wasn't thick enough."
"No security is foolproof." Jason pointed out. "Plus at the next house we will have cameras."
Elizabeth tried not to wince at that. Jason wanted to put them on this house, but she said no. That she didn't want to feel like she was being monitored in her own home. If they had them, then the guys would have seen the intruder as he broke in.
"How did they get past the alarm?" Jason wanted to know. Because there was a state of the art system installed.
"All the clocks in the house are blinking, but since Port Charles didn't suffer a power outage, the cops did a walk around and found the wires to the house cut." Cody reported. It was a bold move, and had the potential to kill whoever tried it but a lot of money was at stake. According the news reports Elizabeth was walking away with close to three hundred million dollars after taxes. So this response was not surprising.
"We will turn the ticket in tomorrow after the numbers are validated." Jason knew that until that happened people would keep trying. He didn't want one of his guys in custody for killing someone.
"Ms. Webber." Det. Harper came out of the house. "Sorry about your house."
"Thank you." Elizabeth knew him a bit from when Lucky worked at the police station. Both she and Harper had a deep dislike of her ex-husband.
He handed her a notepad. "If you could make a list of everything that is missing, we will get started. If you have a list of serial numbers that would also be helpful." Harper explained. If Lucky hadn't moved away from Port Charles he would have been the detective's first stop.
"Is your email dharper at pcpd?" Elizabeth asked him.
"Yes." Harper said nodding at the same time.
"I'll just email you the list I keep for the insurance company after I walk through." Elizabeth had insurance on all her things. It was a practice she started as a renter, and kept up when she bought this house. And despite what people were probably going to think because the boys were Jason's she had gotten this house on her own. He only did the upgrades.
"Smart." Harper wished everyone did that.
"The only dumb thing I did was Lucky." Elizabeth said walking into the house.
Harper had to laugh at that. He always did like Ms. Webber, and like a lot of folks wondered why she was with Lucky. Now she was with Morgan, who was going to make whoever was responsible for this hurt. "We can start here in the kitchen."
Elizabeth's back up list was on her phone and she was referencing it as they walked through the house. There wasn't a lot to steal. Only one television, her lap top was gone which wasn't surprising. She'd need to change the passwords on all her accounts. Tomorrow it would be smart to move her money to another account at the bank. She wasn't worried about the utilities, but Liz did ask Jason to have Spinelli freeze her credit card accounts. The hacker would move faster than the company itself. She had her cards in her wallet, but the bills were in the house and the account numbers were on them.
Jason stepped away and asked Spinelli to tag the accounts not freeze them. If anyone tried to use the numbers, say for online shopping, he wanted to know. After making his call he joined the small group again as they walked through the house. Just looking at Elizabeth you would think she was dealing with this okay. From the decade he knew her Jason could tell that his girl was pissed. She did hold her temper, until they got to Cameron's room
"Really?!" She said disgusted.
"What? Be specific?" Jason was pissed looking at the destruction in the room. That his son's space was violated like this had him ready to pound on someone.
"Cameron's Pokemon cards are gone." Elizabeth said starting to shake. The fact that her room was trashed left her wanting a shower. She was sensitive to things like that. Her underwear was scattered around the room which made her skin crawl. She would not be washing and keeping those items, they were getting replaced. This however made her temper spike "He's been collecting them all year." The game was a new interest for Cameron, along with superheroes. Trains were still his first love, but as he got bigger his hobbies were expanding.
"We'll replace the cards. Do you know which ones he had?" Jason would rather not ask his son. If possible he wanted to keep this from Cameron. At six he was too young to have to deal with other people's greed.
Elizabeth walked around the room until she spotted the bright yellow paper Cameron kept in his card binder that Audrey gave him. "This is a list of all the cards available." Some were really expensive and hard to find. "The ones with the checkmarks are what Cam had. He paid for them himself. My Gram was giving him jobs to earn the money. Just recently Tracy started giving him jobs too." She wanted her son to understand the lesson of working for the things you wanted. The jobs were small, things like sweeping the kitchen at Grams house, and using the shredder at Tracy's home office. But he worked for the money he got.
Jason heard what she didn't say loud and clear. "I'll only replace the ones lost." He also didn't want his kids growing up with a sense of entitlement. Cameron and Jake had rich parents, there wasn't anything Jason could do about that, but he could teach them that they still needed to earn the things in their lives.
Jake's room was also tossed but not as badly as the rest. "That's everything." Elizabeth told Harper.
"So the ticket wasn't here?" The detective asked her. He had hoped not. He did wonder just what the heck the people responsible were thinking. They would have been detained when they tried to turn it in.
"No." Was all Elizabeth said.
"Good. I'll have a report for you to submit to your insurance company in the morning." Harper said watching as Elizabeth sent him the list. "Any questions you know how to reach me."
"Thank you." Elizabeth replied looking around. At no point had Jason or Cody talked to anyone on the police force.
"I'll wait in the hall." Cody said stepping out to give them some privacy. He would also keep the police from bothering them.
"You okay?" Jason would deal with his anger in the gym.
"I will be. Everything can be replaced. And I'm in a position where even if my personal information is used it won't wreck my life. Hell it won't even wreck my credit." She was about to get too much money for that to be an issue. For the rest of her life she could use cash if necessary.
"It's the boys' things that have you upset." He was struggling with the same thing.
"Yeah." She said looking around Jake's room. "I need to leave here." The longer she stayed the angrier she got.
"Do you want to pack some things?" Jason wasn't sure how that would make her feel.
"I'd like to go by the mansion and get our extra clothes from there. Everything here needs to be washed." Elizabeth said heading for the door with Jason behind her. "The mansion, and then John's penthouse."
"I'll call Em, and tell her we are coming. We can all have dinner together." Jason told his girl as he and Cody flanked her.
"Sounds like a plan." Elizabeth took a deep breath of clean air as they stepped out of the bedroom, and said a mental good bye to her house.
"Hey." John Zacchara opened the door and ushered his guest in.
"I didn't think you would be back for another few days." Jason shook the younger man's hand.
"I wasn't expecting to be back. There was no point in staying." John shrugged. The trip was to check in on Claudia and Anthony. His sister was behind Sonny's death, and Michael's shooting, now she being held in a very pricey mental hospital in Europe. In a perpetual catatonic state. His father was in prison, and John wanted to make sure that didn't change either. In fact sometime tomorrow he should get word that Anthony died in his sleep. It was a brutal thing to kill your own father, but the information John received made it necessary. Anthony was asking questions about Emily, and that couldn't be allowed to continue. "We can talk later."
"Mommy, daddy!" Cameron jumped up from the table where he was playing Clue Jr. with his aunt. Jake was coloring. "Are we going to get ice cream?" Aunt Em sent for some, but it wasn't the kind Cam wanted. His favorite ice cream was soft serve.
"Not tonight buddy." Jason said smiling down at his son. "Tonight we need to stay inside. As soon as we can we'll go get your prizes. I promise."
"Okay." That was good enough for Cam. Daddy always kept his promises. "Want to play with us?" He asked a bit shyly.
"I think maybe you, me, Jake, and Uncle John should play." Jason said walking back over to the table. "Aunt Em needs to talk with mommy. Sound good?"
"Yup." Cameron said clearing the board.
Emily gave her big brother a hug and headed into the living room. "You okay?"
"Some bastard broke into my house." Elizabeth was on the verge of tears from her anger. "They rifled through my things and took Cam's gaming cards."
"Asshole." Emily said watching her friend pace. "Come on." She grabbed Liz's hand. "We are going to go get changed and go down to the gym." The building was locked down and they could move about freely. Still she would call one of John's guys to join them. It would make both her fiancé and brother feel better.
"I could use a run." Elizabeth wanted to work the anger off before hanging out with her sons.
"Can I talk you into leaving the boys here tonight?" Emily asked grabbing workout clothes for her best friend, and then herself.
"No." Elizabeth said shaking her head. "I need them with me."
"I understand." Emily said as they got changed. They popped into the den and told the guys they were leaving. Elizabeth kissed on Cam who for once didn't complain. They went down and grabbed a couple of treadmills. "Where do you want to start?"
"I'm leaving the hospital." Elizabeth told her friend.
"Not surprising." Emily knew this had everything to do with the budget cuts. "Me too."
"Really?" Elizabeth said surprised. "Why?"
"John purchased the free clinic from Nikolas. So I'm going to be working there." Emily wasn't in the surgical program at the hospital. That wasn't her calling. She wanted to be a general internist. Since she didn't need the money working at the clinic, which paid a below average salary, and giving care to those who needed it was what she wanted to do. "I could use some good help. With all the certifications you have all you need to do it take the state test to become a nurse practitioner." Emily put the idea out there. "I'm officially done my fellowship in August, so I'm taking over the clinic in September. Think about it."
"Don't need to. I'm in. We will work out a schedule at a later date." Elizabeth smiled. "I'll get the testing schedule." Piph had suggested that Liz go for that certification as well.
"Next?" Emily wanted to know.
"Jason and I are getting a house." Elizabeth shared.
"John and I are as well. We should see if there are two houses near each other." Emily suggested. "But not too close." They wouldn't want to be on top on each other.
"Sounds good. The plan was to shop next week, but I'm not sure we will be here." Elizabeth explained. "Or how limited my movements will be if we are."
"John has asked that I keep my movements limited as well." Although his request was business related. Something about this trip had her guy rattled. Emily knew he would share what he could. "Want to talk about Cameron?"
"Did he hear the news?" Elizabeth wanted to know.
"I never turned on the television or the radio." Emily promised. "He really liked the cabin. I really liked the cabin." The young doctor said grinning. "I was wondering where you and my brother were spending your free time. I like the furnishings."
"Jason decorated it." Elizabeth shared.
"No shit? Why the hell doesn't he have any furniture in the penthouse then?" Emily was surprised by that bit of news.
"He wanted me to be comfortable at the cabin. I don't spend much time at the penthouse." Elizabeth told her friend what the difference was.
"You two are so cute together." Emily gushed, and when Liz laughed she felt better. Things had happened at Mach speed today, but they handled it. Even Tracy had been on top of things. Emily was impressed by her aunt. Jason would make sure Liz relaxed, and Em would do her part as well. For now they would finish their workout.
After dinner when the ladies took the boys to the bathroom Jason and John had a chance to talk. "Francis is removing Karpov."
"Good." John wasn't surprised by that. "I gave the order to remove my father." They didn't have a lot of time to talk so it needed to be to the point.
"Why?" Jason was surprised by that.
"He was trying to find someone to gather information on your sister." John was sending a message.
"I would have handled that." Jason would not have asked John to eliminate his own father.
"She's my girl Jason." John smiled at that. "Her safety is on me. It was time." John always knew it was going to end like this. "I'm okay with my decision. So I'll be seeing Shawn?"
"Yes. As soon as arrangements are finished I'm taking my family on vacation." Jason told his friend.
"Congrats on that." John had already guessed about Jake, but Cam was a surprise. "There had better be some sand involved in that vacation or your eldest will hurt you." John said laughing.
"There will be." Jason said as everyone returned. "Ready?"
"Yeah." Elizabeth said smiling at her sons. They were excited to sleep at daddy's house. Hugs were exchanged and the family headed out.
"Are we all sleeping in the big bed?" Cameron wanted to know.
"Sweepover?" Jake asked looking at his mom.
"Yes, we don't have beds for you guys here just yet. So we are all sleeping over." Elizabeth said making it sound like an extra special treat. "Tomorrow we will talk about the beach."
"I wike the beach." Jake said walking over to the bed.
"I know." Elizabeth pulled back the covers.
"What side are you sleeping on daddy?" Cameron wanted to know.
"This one." Jason pointed to the side closest to the door. He wanted to be between any possible danger and his family.
"Okay." Cameron got in the middle but picked the side that would put him next to Jason.
Jake got in next to him and the little boys laid down. Elizabeth got in too. It wasn't that late but it had been a busy day. Plus she didn't want the boys to be afraid up here alone. Since everyone was in bed Jason got changed and joined them. He read the boys a chapter from his book on Germany, and in no time they were out.
"If you want to go down we'll be okay." Elizabeth didn't know if Jason needed to do anything since he was gone for the first part of the day and with her during the second.
"I wouldn't miss this for anything." He said softly. His girl, and their sons were in his home sleeping. Their home. "I love you Elizabeth." His heart was really full right now.
"I love you too Jason. Thank you for my boys." She was grateful to have them.
"They are amazing. You've done a great job with them." He was going to be with her from here on out, but she didn't really need him. She was strong enough to provide them with a good life on her own if it was necessary.
"From now on it's going to be both of us." She said echoing his thoughts. "Which is how it should be."
Jason just smiled. "Get some sleep."
"Yup." She said before giggling. "Jake gets up early." Liz warned him.
"I can handle that." Jason said stretching out and letting his body relax. Tomorrow morning would be one of the best of his life.
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