Authors Note: I know some people are going to wonder where she came from so let me explain exactly who Maddie is. First off, I more or less invented her but she's based on three things. One, in Lagrimas Gabriel confesses to being in love with a girl he meet. Maddie is that girl. In Hierophant Gabriel consults a NYU language specialist. Maddie is that linguist. In Veritas, Gabriel has a lover. Maddie is that girl too. Being a linguist, none of us should be surprised she speaks fluent Bulgarian. On another note entirely, keep up the reviews!

Addled

"Whoo-hoo!" Danny called as Sara walked into the bullpen. "Welcome back sunshine girl!"

She truly had been kissed by the sun. Her skin was at least two shades darker and her hair several shades lighter. Sara blushed at the attention, but it was hidden by her tan.

"So, Sara" Jake asked, walking up to her a little awkwardly. "How was the honeymoon?"

"Let me tell you Jake, they don't call Hawaii an Island Paradise for nothing. It was amazing."

"Yeah, couldn't you tell by all the phone calls we got?" Danny teased. "I felt like I was on the honeymoon too."

"Just trying to spread the love," Sara said with a laugh.

"Petzini!" the aggravated voice of Captain Bruno Dante cut through the room. Sara, Danny and Jake quickly swiveled to see the ten year commander descend on them in a foul mood. "About time you got back!"

"Cap," Sara laughed, "I was on my honeymoon."

"Yeah, leaving us shorthanded while the Murder rate goes through the roof."

Sara rolled her eyes. "Sorry Chief, I'll try to schedule my next wedding for a more convenient time."

"Oh there's and idea, Pezzini," Orlinsky said from across the room. "Scheduling a wedding."

"Yeah, yeah," Sara said, annoyed. She was just going to have to role with the punches on this one. She had to admit, if Vicky Po ran off with a guy who'd just come out of a coma, Sara would not be beyond cracking a few jokes. "If there's such a crime spree, maybe you should stop giving me such a hard time about my wedded bliss and hand me a case."

"Done and done," Dante said. "We just got a report of a body in the dumpster outside of The Wet Monkey Dance Club down on Sixty Eighth and Gilmore."

"Right," Sara said, turning to get her helmet off her desk. "I'm on it."

"Woo, McCarty, I want you guys to be on it too."

"But sir," Danny said, "We've got the McQueen . . ."

"Hey," Dante snapped, "That guy, McQueen, he was a pimp and generally agreed upon bastard. The worlds better without him. Over at The Wet Monkey we've got a teenaged girl, somebody's daughter. Prioritize!" With that the captain stormed out of the room in a blaze of furry.

"Yes sir," Jake muttered.

* * *

"You visited Gabriel Bowman," Kenneth Irons said as soon as Ian entered the large study. "Why?"

Ian took a deep breath and lied. "You were correct master. I have been obsessed with Lady Sara's wedding. I wished to put . . . closure on my state of mind by purchasing her a wedding gift."

"And what, pray tell, did you have in mind?"

"A Sword, perhaps. It would seem appropriate."

"Any sword?"

"I did not have one in mind."

"So you decided to window shop in a place where you've threatened to kill the proprietor? Do you really think he will offer you a fair price?"

"Fair or not, there are few places where weapons of legend and myth can be bought for any price."

"Why did you want to keep this gift a secret from me?" Irons asked smoothly. Nottingham didn't react, outwardly, to the question. Inwardly his mind searched possibilities. Irons could assume that, because Ian had not notified him about his intentions, he was being reticent. Or, perhaps, Irons had bugged the boy's showroom, and monitored it periodically. That was certainly possible. Or, perhaps, there was something more insidious going on. Perhaps Irons and Bowman were somehow connected. Not in league, Ian was sure that the boy was not the type to be threatened, bought or manipulated into compliance. But the more Ian thought of it, the more likely it seemed that something outside the boy's control, but not outside of his masters, was intertwining their fates.

"I was ashamed," Ian lied coolly. "I did not think you would approve."

Irons looked down at his servant severely and then nodded. "Perches whatever you wish to for our Lady Sara and her new husband. I would advise you, though, to use the Internet. I'm sure you'll get a better deal from a stranger whose life you have not threatened."

"Of course, master," Ian said, bowing before he wrapped his dark cloak around him and flowed out of the room.

* * *

"So," Pez said with a sigh. "What's the story?"

Vicky Po looked up from the garbage covered body and smiled. "Sara, glad to see you back. How was the honeymoon?"

"Great," Sara said casually, as if there wasn't a corps lying at her feet. "Conchobar and I had a great time."

"I'm sorry I missed the wedding," Vicky said as she stood up. "The news paper article made it sound really nice."

"Ah, yeah," Sara said, trying to sound amused not enraged. "You don't know who did that by the way, do you?"

"Did what?"

"Told the papers."

"Sorry, Pez, not a clue. But I did want to ask you if the first thing he said when he woke up was really 'Will you marry me?'"

Sara laughed, "Not quite. He woke up and said 'Sara,' and I think I said 'Conchobar' and then the doctors and nurses came in and I was usurer out. When they finally let me see him again we talked for a while. It just happened that he proposed right before an overly sentimental nurse was kicking me out for the night."

Vicky tilted her head and looked starry-eyed, "That's so romantic."

Sara found herself more than a little bothered by the M.E.'s sudden sentimentality. She quickly changed the subject. "So, what's the word on the body?"

"Name Dianna Baxter, she's 19 and she was strangled to death."

"Nineteen?" Sara said looking down at the body. "I thought this club was 21 and over."

"According to her fake ID she's 35."

Sara stared down at the corpse. Most of the makeup had worn off her pail face and her hair was a filthy, but she was still marked by the pretty lines of youth, and then there were the dark red lines of strangulation around her neck. This poor girl had truly lived fast and left a good-looking corpse. "I think their bouncer needs glasses. Did Mom and Dad know about her little excursions?"

"Probably not considering Dianna's been living at Juvy for the past two years."

"Two years?" Sara asked amazed. "What did she do?"

"You're looking at an entrepreneur Sara. This girl started a prostitution ring in her High School."

"You're kidding," Sara said.

"Nope."

"Well," Sara gasped, her mind still reeling at the sordid facts of the teenagers life. "How'd she get out?"

"Not my job, detective."

"Yeah," Sara said, forcing herself to focus on her job. "Sorry. Why don't you tell me about the body."

"Well," Vicky said with a sigh. "The girl was found in a dumpster."

"Yeah," Sara said. "I heard that."

"And the idiot who found her thought she might still be alive so he dragged her out, totally ruining the scene."

"What can you tell me?"

"She's been dead about two days. Cause of death strangulation. The size and the shape of the bruising implies hands, my guess, male, but not a big guy, about five-six to five-eight, probably wearing rings. She did have intercourse before the murder but it doesn't look like rape."

"Still, whoever slept with her probably killed her."

"Seems likely."

"I take it you've got enough sperm for a DNA test?"

"Yeah, no problem."

"Well then, we'll get our man," Sara said smiling.

* * *

"Gabriel, come on," Maddie's voice begged across the answering machine. "Please pick up. Please."

Gabriel closed his eyes and thought of her. The way her smile would start on the right side of her face and then spread to the left. The way she would catch a joke about a half a second before anyone else but would confine herself to an insistent giggle. The way she would correct his grammar. They way she changed the color of her hair every other week. The way she looked dreamy eyed as she talked about the linguistic evolution of Latin to Norman to English. The way she could slip easily from one language to another, sometimes within a single sentence. The way she buried her head into his shoulders during the suspenseful parts of Hitchcock films. The way she kissed with abandon. The way it felt just right to wrap his arms around her. The way he loved her more and more every time he thought about her.

He had sworn not to talk to her for her own protection. It was an easy promise to make because, at the time, she'd been in India finishing her six-week mini-mester at the University of New Deli. But now she was back and now she was worried and now he just couldn't stop himself from picking up the phone. "Cunning Medea," he said lovingly.

"Angelic Gabriel," she said back, her voice was a wash of relief. "I've been calling all over. No one's heard from you for weeks! I've personally visited every hospital in the city trying to find you. I was ten seconds away from reporting you as a missing person!"

"Maddie, I'm sorry."

"The hell you're sorry! I've been panicked! You've turned off your cell phone, you're not answering your e-mails. It's like you don't want to exist anymore. Where were you?"

"Maddie, I can't explain."

"Well you had better . . ." she started before quite reregistering what he said. "What?"

"Of all the people in the world, Maddie, you're the one I want to tell this to the most. But . . . I'm dangerous right now. Stay away."

"Dangerous? Gabriel, what's wrong. You can trust me."

"I know I can," he said. "But there are other people I can't trust. If you stay away from me they'll never know you exist, you'll be safe."

"Tell me what's going on. I can help."

"Maddie, no," Gabriel said as forcefully as he could. "Please, if anything happened to you I'd go nuts. Please, just stay away from me. Please."

"But, Gabriel, I love you."

"I love you too. Trust me. Please, trust me."

There was a long silence, he thought he heard a sniffle, but when Maddie's voice came back it sounded resolute. "I will trust you Gabriel. I love you and I will trust you. But if anything happens to you, so help me god, you'll regret not having me there to save you."

Gabriel laughed. It was the first time he'd laughed for what seemed like forever. It felt so good, so right to laugh, and laugh with her. It took all the resolve he could muster to say what he said next, "Maddie, I have to go. In case I don't see you ever again . . . I love you."

"Ever again . . . Gabriel . . ."

"I love you so much."

"I love you too, but Gabriel, hold on . . ."

"Goodbye."

He hung up the phone. He felt like bursting into tears, but he couldn't, not yet. He had to unplug his phone, his last connection to the world, and take the tape out of the answering machine, and wonder onto the roof and burn it. Then he could cry.

* * *

The buzzer to the apartment rang, waking Conchobar from a light nap. He slowly pushed himself off of the couch and headed towards the door. There was another loud buzz, and then an insistent knocking.

"All right, all right," he grumbled to the impatient person on the other side of the door. "I'm coming."

He opened the door and saw a man in a UPS uniform talking to the crack in the door where Mr. Matthis, the cranky old man next door, could be seen scowling.

"Please, this is my last package for the day, could you just sign for the damn thing?"

"Ask him to sign why don't ch'a?" Mr. Matthis said.

The UPS man turned around and forced something that might have been a smile. "I've got a delivery for Sara Pezzini."

"She's not here right now."

"Will you sign for it?"

"I suppose," Conchobar said, taking the little electronic box and the pen that the deliveryman was pushing on him. "Wha' is it?"

"A package," the man grunted as he turned out into the hall. Conchobar leaned out of the apartment to look down the hall. The man was, rather awkwardly carrying a package that was approximately ten feet long, two feet wide and four feet deep. And if the delivery man's face was any indication, very very heavy. "A little help?" The deliveryman practically demanded.

"Sorry," Conchobar said as he watched, bewildered, as the smaller man struggled to get the long brown box through the door. "Doc says I can't do any heavy lifting."

"Asshole," the deliveryman muttered a little two loud. Conchobar decided he didn't deserve a tip.

The box was dragged in and hit the ground in the living room with a thud. Conchobar nodded at the deliveryman, who was waiting expectantly. A distracted, "T'anks," was all he got.

A couple minutes after the door was angrily slammed by the deliveryman, the phone rang.

"'Ello, Pezzini residence."

"Hey Baby."

"And how is my wife?"

"Better now I'm talking to you. How you doin?"

"At the moment I'm confused. Who's Ian Nottingham?"

"Why?" Sara asked. Her voice sounded afraid.

"He sent us a wedding gift, Sara, who is he?"

"A guy."

"Yeah, tha' I guessed."

"He's ah, he was obsessed with me. It's pretty complicated."

"Is he dangerous?"

"I, ah, I don't think so. I mean, I know he could be if he wanted to be but . . . he respects me."

"Respects you?"

"He knows what I can do. I don't think we have to be afraid of him. To be honest he's more annoying than anything else."

"Well, the UPS man was annoyed with him. This wedding present, it's very odd."

"Odd how?"

"It's long and heavy."

"Well what is it?"

"I'da'know. Didn't open it."

"Go ahead."

"Don't ch'a wanna be here too?"

"If your willing to wait."

Conchobar stared at the package for a moment. "I'm gonna open it. Hold on."

He put the phone on the floor, pulled out his pocketknife and made quick work of the cardboard and tape. Sara listened to him huff and grunt at the labor with bated breath. Finally he got back on the line.

"Sara, who is this Nottingham guy again?"

"Just this guy I know from a case I did once. Really he's no one for you to worry about. What did he send us?"

Conchobar stared down at the package. The cardboard had been ripped away, Styrofoam peanuts had spilled out onto the wooden floor, and a large steel blade, almost nine feet long, with a intricately sculpted hit portraying two lovers in an intimate embrace surrounded buy thick vines. "A claymore."

"What?" Sara asked, flabbergasted.

"It's like a, a really big sword."

"Yeah, I know what it is. He sent us a claymore?"

"I's a pretty erotic claymore at that."

"That freak!" she said. Conchobar couldn't help but laugh at the tone of her voice. Apparently he wasn't the only one because he could hear Sara say, "Shut up Danny, you know I can kill you."

Very faintly in the background he could even hear Jake say, "Better be careful Danny. She's got a really big sword."

"You wanna send it back, Sara?" Conchobar asked, knowing instinctively that she did not see this as at all funny. "There's no return address, but how many places sell gigantic swords in this city?"

Sara sighed. "No, not unless you want to. Believe it or not, from this guy, and erotic sword is kinda sweet."

"Really," Conchobar asked, not sure what to make of that kind of character testimonial. "I'd like to meet this man sometime."

"If he stay's true to form I don't think you'll be able to avoid it," Sara scoffed. "And hey, speaking of avoiding, Danny wants to have us over for Dinner tonight. Wadya say?"

"Will I have to make a salad or desert?"

"Neither, I'll pick up some wine on the way home."

"Then I say we should go."

"Great," Sara said. "I'll be home around 5:15. We can leave for their place by six."

"Are you gonna wear that dress you bought in Honolulu?

Her voice was low, he could imagine the blush on her tanned cheeks. "If you really want me to I will."

"If I had my way you'd always wear that black dress," he said. "But then, if I had my way we'd never leave the apartment, and only rarely leave the bedroom."

"Goodbye Conchobar," she said, her voice playfully annoyed.

"I love you."

"I love you too."

* * *

"Dear Sara," Gabriel started writing. His palms were sweating and his hands shook. He hadn't really written anything in years. He was a child of his era, much more comfortable with keys and screens than pen and paper. But it seemed wrong to say what he was about to say in an e-mail.

"This letter is a confession, an explanation and a goodbye. I know, after everything I'm gonna say, you're going to want to save me. Please don't try. I can't trust myself and I don't want you to get hurt. I told you once you were of this world and I wasn't. That's true. If I'm a casualty of this war so be it, just make sure you keep fighting."

He took a deep breath and read over his first paragraph. He thought it sounded pathetic and unconvincing. Yates he was not. With a sigh he started on his second paragraph. "First off you should know that, before you came to me three weeks ago . . ."

Suddenly a cold force griped him and his entire consciousness was shoved in the back of his head. Even after weeks of being forced into the back of his mind, Gabriel still tried to fight it. But he had no weapons, no defenses, and no skills. He fell with little more than a push by his opponent.

"Well," Gabriel heard his voice say coldly. "Mr. Bowman is confessing. Very noble, to damn ones self in order to implicate another, truly altruistic. I, however, have no use for altruism."

Irons, using Gabriel's hands, reached forward and crumpled the paper with the confession on it. Then, seeming to think better of it, he smoothed the paper out again. "However, a confession will be characteristic, not to mention, believable. A person is very rarely noble one day and corrupt the next, any such lapses inevitably result in a twinge of conscious. A twinge, however misplaced, which you Mr. Bowman have been feeling for quite a few days now, it would seem.

"It's a pity that hand writing is developed in the mind and not a purely physical attribute. It would be more convincing if Sara could read it in your own hand. But your technological savvy allows me to reproduce this paragraph, along with some of my own design, on the computer. Sara will accept a typed letter without question.

"Congratulations, Mr. Bowman. You've found a way to accelerate your own demise, as well as that of our dear Sara."