Nine
She'd only been in his apartment once before, after his mother's funeral, when they sat on the couch together and he told her all about Mark Ford Brady. He broke down crying. She left when he fell asleep.
Today, after returning from the hospital, she showered while he tossed her clothes into the washing machine in his building's basement. He waited downstairs while she changed into the old shirt he offered her. (Hannah might have snickered at that, she couldn't help thinking.) She ate half a deli roll, fell asleep on the couch, covered by the blanket he'd left for her, and slept for six hours.
When she awoke, it was almost dark out. "I'm going to have terrible jet lag," she joked.
"You'll sleep more later." Goren left the kitchen and stood tentatively over his partner.
He was wearing jeans and that unfortunate day-off plaid shirt she'd never been too crazy about.
He suggested that they order in, assuring her that the eggplant parmigiana from the restaurant up the block was exactly what she needed.
When she went to the kitchen to eat with him, she wrapped herself in the blanket. There was no point in changing clothes again until morning.
"How are you feeling?" Goren asked, titling his head slightly. Was it concern, suspicion, or was he trying to read her?
"It'll be much better as soon as Gary gets to see Marina." Eames absentmindedly twirled her spaghetti on her fork. Without looking at him – focusing entirely on her plate – she added, "You know, after Hannah slept with Gary for the first time, she spent three days drunk and crying."
Goren nearly choked on his eggplant.
"See, we need to clear the air here, Bobby," she continued. "I don't want you to spend three days drunk and crying."
They laughed, hard, together, like old friends.
"You said to me after Hannah's funeral that you didn't want to come up here because you were afraid you'd make a pass at me solely for the sake of honoring Hannah's wishes."
"Is that what you think I'm doing now?"
"No, Detective, not at all."
"So, when," she began, once again emboldened by her pseudo-jetlag, "did you start wondering?"
"That day they put you on the stand and made you read your request for a new partner, and you teared up." He swallowed hard. "You?"
Robert Goren never asked a question that wasn't loaded.
"Every once in a while," she said.
"Every …"
"Hannah brought it up last year."
"Hm." Poor Bobby, at a total loss for words. But, they had to figure this out before another eight years went by.
"I like … watching your hands. I watch your hands and I wonder."
They finished eating in silence. After she helped him clear off the table (leaving the blanket on the chair), he placed one hand on her side, along her ribcage, and began a slow waltz. "You wonder …" he whispered in her ear, and that was the end of their eight-year professional partnership.
Eames woke up at eight o'clock and saw her partner – Bobby – the man whose bed she'd slept in – still sleeping beside her. She showered, changed into her now-clean clothes from the day before, and headed for the door.
She worried that they'd started something they couldn't finish, or maybe that they'd finished something they shouldn't have started.
Still, he made her shiver.
"You could stay for breakfast." She turned around and saw Goren in his T-shirt and boxers, leaning rather sheepishly against the wall.
"I have to see how Gary's doing."
"Right. Do you need company?"
"Bobby." She moved away from the door, towards him.
"You need to think awhile. That's all right," he said, his voice flailing as it often did when he tried to contain himself.
At the hospital, they didn't let her see Gary until noon, because his in-laws had been in to see him earlier and intensive care had strict visiting rules. When they finally let her in, they gave her ten minutes with him.
"I saw Marina today," he said. He was still breathing laboriously, but sounded far less panicked. "They held her up at the window, and she waved … and cried. I just want to make her feel safe."
"I know," Eames said, reaching over the guardrail to take his hand.
"Thank you for getting to her in time."
"Hey, we …" She stopped when she realized that Gary hadn't been told the whole story, that they hadn't gotten there in time and actually had Andrew Haber's not-so-sharp shooting to thank for saving Marina's life.
"Alex, there's still a chance I –"
"Don't say it."
"For practical reasons. Hannah's parents are in their seventies. She has no other relatives left, neither do I. You're our closest friend …" His glassy eyes turned from Eames' face to the wall. For a split second, he must have forgotten that Hannah was dead. "You'll think I'm crazy or full of meds – I am both of those right now – but you're the one person I know can keep her safe."
Eames closed her eyes and nodded. "Okay," she said, trying not to think about the lofty promise she'd just made. All she wanted was for Gary to be comfortable.
"And one more thing."
"Hm?"
"Let me play the death card again and say I think you should forgive your partner."
"What?" She laughed and gasped at the same time.
"I know how mad you get when people don't do right by your family and friends. You probably blamed him for putting me here. Don't."
"Gary?"
"Yes?"
"Now I know you're going to pull through."
"How?"
"You just 'played the death card' and took time to worry about me and Bobby."
The nurse who'd been standing outside opened the door. "Time's up," she announced.
Eames leaned in and kissed her old friend's forehead. She wanted to say "I love you," but those words had not escaped her lips since Joe's death.
"Be good," she said instead. "I'll come back tomorrow, or tonight, if they let me."
She didn't want him to wake up alone, just like Bobby didn't let her wake up alone after her kidnapping.
In her mind, she flashed back to that first night in the hospital, when, woozy from injuries, meds, and fear, she'd awakened to find her partner gazing at her, his eyes filled with guilt and endless concern.
This was a man who loved her.
After Joe, she wanted to be there for her siblings, friends, to date, have fun, work, anything but be with a man who loved her.
"But seriously, Alex," Hannah had said one night at the bar after a round of beer and teasing, "something in you has been – I don't know – missing since Joe."
"Well," she'd said matter-of-factly, "Joe."
"I watch you and Goren smile at each other sometimes, and –"
She didn't remember how Hannah had finished that sentence. Less than two weeks after her death, and she couldn't reconstruct her friend's voice in her mind.
But Hannah had been right; something had been missing.
Walking down 16th Street alone, Alex Eames knew for once exactly where she was headed.