February 15th
Tom sighed and shook his head. Life was just getting better and better. "So we're looking at six months to a year before I will be fully recovered."
"Nerve tissue regrows at roughly an inch a month. I was able to reconnect the severed ends, but healthy tissue has to regrow over the damaged tissue and connect to the muscle." Dr. Franklin said. "So for the next three weeks you will need to keep the arm immobilized, I want to see you once a week during this time. We'll discuss physical therapy then."
Tom nodded. "When can I go home?"
"Tomorrow morning." He said.
"Thanks."
Liam had stayed an additional two weeks, insisting on waiting for the surgery to be completed. No matter how much Tom pushed he was not going anywhere until he was certain his son was alright at least physically. He waited for the doctor to leave before speaking.
"I'm sorry, Son."
Tom nodded. "Even if I was cleared of all possible charges and reinstated tomorrow I won't be able to work for up to six months to a year depending on how fast I heal."
"How can I help?"
"You can help me pack. I was going to put off moving until the last minute. I don't think there is much point now."
"I told you that your mother and I discussed it and we can help until you get back on your feet."
"I know," Tom said. "But I'd rather just … move." He loved his apartment. He was going to miss it. But it was better not to wind up being evicted. He'd done the numbers earlier and he could only manage another three months there if he wanted to have electricity and food and all the upkeep on a car as well. After that his Savings would be falling fast. He'd been hoping that he could get the situation of the internal affairs dealt with by then and get back to work. Now it looked as though that wouldn't matter at the end of the day.
"I think you're making this harder on yourself than you have to."
"If there was an end in sight I'd probably take you up on it. But this could be a year or more depending on if Internal Affairs ever comes to a decision. That's just too long, Dad. I can't do it. I can take care of myself. I just have to make adjustments."
"As frustrating as it is, I'm proud of you too. Just don't hesitate if something comes up, do you hear me?"
"Yeah, Dad. I hear you. I'll be fine." He said, "Besides helping me move while I'm down to one arm is a huge help."
"I guess I'll go pick up some boxes and a news paper," Liam said. "We can look over the classified ads tonight."
Tom nodded. "Yeah, sure. I'm really tired. If you don't mind I'm just going to go to sleep for a while."
He nodded "You do that. I'll sneak you in something to eat later. This hospital has the worst food."
Tom smiled despite himself. "Thanks Dad,."
"It's been two weeks. Are you telling me you are no closer to solving the Elias case than you were the day the woman died?" Harry demanded.
"We have chased every lead we could find and some things that weren't leads," Cassie said. "There is no way to figure out when she went missing much less why or if someone abducted her before she was shot. The more questions we ask the more we have."
"I don't have to tell you that Cyrus Elias is a powerful businessman. He's putting pressure on the mayor to get this handled."
"Why do they always do that?" Will asked. "Do they think that we're just sitting on our hands and blowing off cases?"
"No, they do it because they are grieving and angry and come from a world where pushing buttons gets them what they want," Harry said. "It's not abnormal psychology. Speaking of which, what about the shrink that gave you the cold horrors?"
Cassie shook her head "Nothing. I can't find anything to indicate he ever saw the victim outside of his office and when she was at his office the driver dropped her off and picked her up. Everyone eventually points fingers at her husband." She said "But there isn't even circumstantial evidence for that. Just suspicion and his unpleasantness. Unfortunately, there is no law against being a jackass or creepy. I get the feeling that the person that killed her hasn't even come up on our radar yet. I've been putting feelers out to women's shelters and groups that help battered wives escape and start over. Maybe she contacted one of them and that will give us a new lead."
Harry nodded. " Well, back to work you two. I'll be out of the office for a while today. "
"Everything alright?" Cassie asked.
Harry considered his words, "Tom had his second surgery today. I'm going to go visit him and take his father to lunch."
"Second surgery?" She asked.
Harry nodded "They had to repair one of the nerves in his arm."
She looked stunned "That wound wasn't that bad. It was just a flesh wound."
" In case it has escaped your notice, St. John you are a police detective, not a doctor and this isn't the movies. Gun Shot Wounds require medical attention no matter what they look like. The union is about to be breathing down everyone's neck for that debacle. Just be aware."
She bristled but nodded. "Yeah, okay." She wasn't worried about the union. She hadn't been in charge of his arrest or where he'd been taken afterward. She'd just made the call to report where he was. She was more worried about Tom, even though she didn't want to be. She couldn't think about him without hearing him tell her how she'd been his biggest mistake and that he'd never loved her at all. Every time it broke her heart all over again. "Well, we have work to do." She said getting to her feet.
Harry shook his head but said nothing as she left the room. This was not healthy. Or maybe it was. Maybe he'd made a mistake throwing them together again. He'd been thinking of their ability to solve crimes more than what it might do to them emotionally.
"Should I be worried? About Cassie I mean." Will asked. "Did this guy do a number on her?"
Harry took a deep breath. "They have history."
"I know they were married."
"Long story short, No." He said, "You don't need to worry about Cassie, and no he didn't do a number on her." Things were said that shouldn't have been. Even the nice guys could be assholes sometimes. Especially when they were trying to push someone away. He was surprised Cassie hadn't seen through that. "Don't worry about her and Tom, worry about whether or not you two can actually solve a case together. I haven't seen much in the way of that with you two. Get back to work."
He pulled on his jacket and motioned for Will to leave his office ahead of him. He'd arranged to meet Liam Ryan at Tom's apartment. He rapped on the door and walked inside.
"What's all this?" He asked, seeing the bundles of moving boxes stacked against the wall.
"Tom has decided that he can't afford his apartment anymore. I tried to talk him into letting me help with that but he refuses. I think he's trying to punish himself for something."
"Where is he moving to?"
"Don't know yet. He just dropped this bombshell on me after the doctor told him it could be up to a year before he was fully recovered."
Harry sighed. "Alright. I'll put some feelers out. Maybe we can keep him out of a dive. Make sure that it's my number he puts on for a work reference, not the department in general. If they find out he's on indefinite suspension it will be almost impossible to get a decent place."
"Tell me the truth, Harry. Is Tom ever going to get his job back?"
"I don't know." He said honestly. "Internal Affairs seems determined to prove he's a murderer."
"Internal Affairs or Sean Galloway?"
"Unfortunately as far as Tom's situation is concerned they are one and the same. I don't like the man. I don't like how he's running this investigation if you can even call it that, but what I do and don't like carries no weight with Internal Affairs."
Liam went to the kitchen and began to pull out some of the leftovers from the fridge. He cooked when he was worried and he'd been worried for weeks now. "We have a wide selection, help yourself." He ran a hand through his hair. "He's been pushing for me to leave since I got here."
"He pushed Cassie away too." Harry said "He told her the one thing he knew would make her turn her back on him. I don't know if he intended to do so or if it was just that he was drunk and feeling sorry for himself at the time, I suspect it was probably both." He looked over the spread of food and loaded up a plate. Most of it was things Frannie would frown upon because of things like cholesterol and spice levels. She was right of course, and he'd pay for it later, but he wasn't going to let that slow him down.
"He said she doesn't want anything to do with him anymore. I don't know… that doesn't sound like Cassie. It must have been one hell of a push for it to have worked that well."
"He told her he had never loved her, and that she'd been the biggest mistake of his life," Harry said. "He didn't spare details in his taped confession."
"Confession?"
Another sigh. "He's innocent of murder but other things… Tom screwed up and he knows it. If he'd stayed put instead of trying to take care of it himself we might be looking at a completely different situation."
"Including him being on trial for murder." Liam pointed out.
"I don't know. I can't for the life of me figure out what this was really all about. Virginia Archer set him up to kill her husband. A three-month long con. I can't help feeling she had another agenda as well. I will tell you one thing, if Archer's hands hadn't tested positive for GSR then Tom would already be on trial."
"Why doesn't that clear him?"
"Because there is no way of knowing when it got on his hands. He could have gone to a shooting range. Could have shot someone else earlier in the day for all of that. It's just as possible as him shooting at Tom."
"How long is he going to have to wait for them to make a decision? He's getting desperate, angry, and depressed. I don't know how much more of this he can take."
"Believe me I wish I knew," Harry said. "There's a reason I tried to make him get rid of all of his guns. I wasn't worried about him going out to hurt someone else. I was worried about him hurting himself."
"I wouldn't stop worrying just yet if I were you. One more thing… just one more thing could be too much. He's determined that I need to go back to Boston. I can't force myself on him after we get him moved into a new apartment. I know your hands are tied, but I don't have anyone else I can ask."
"I'll do what I can. You know I will."
"Thank's Harry."
Tom looked up as his hospital room door opened. He was expecting his father or maybe a nurse, but what he didn't expect to see was Frannie Lipschitz.
"Hi." He said quietly. "Does Harry know you're here?" He knew that Harry was keeping his distance for political reasons. Not that he was covering his ass. It was more that he was trying to fly under the radar and help where he could rather than being cut out of the loop entirely.
She smiled warmly "Oh honey, Harry's going to meet me here." She stepped closer to the bed. "You look miserable. Do you need me to get a nurse for pain meds?"
He shook his head. "No, I'm fine pain-wise." It hurt, he wasn't going to lie but it was bearable. "Don't mind my face, it's feeling sorry for the rest of me. It's annoying me truth be told. It has my Dad convinced I'm fragile and now it's worrying you. I should get it replaced."
"I like your face and I'm pretty sure you are fragile right now and feeling alone. You'd be less than human if you weren't."
He laughed almost silently "Less than human might be preferable. So… tell me what's been going on in your life. I don't have the inside track anymore."
Frannie made small talk, doing everything she could to get even the faintest smile from Tom. Worried didn't begin to describe how she felt. The man was struggling to keep his head above the proverbial water. If people weren't careful they were going to lose him in the effort to save him.
Harry entered the room 20 minutes later along with Liam.
"How are you, Tom?" He asked.
"I'm alright." He said. "I ahm… I'm going to be one-armed for three weeks and then we see whether they were able to fix things or not. You know doctors, he's convinced he did everything perfectly and it's just a matter of time." He gave a one-sided shrug. "I've heard that before." Two surgeries on his shoulder and now another two on the same arm. "I'm going to have to start injuring the other side. This one is almost toast."
"Don't even joke about that," Harry said. "There are times when equal dispersal is not the preferred method."
"I think you can stop hurting yourself altogether." Liam said.
"You should listen to your father," Frannie said. "You know what they say, Father knows best."
"I like her." Liam said "I can see why you keep her around. Wise woman."
"You don't know the half of it," Harry said.
"She keeps him in line," Tom said. "No small feat."
Cassie approached Tom's door and paused outside, listening as they talked. She almost knocked on the door, almost walked inside, and almost attempted to mend fences. Almost isn't the same as did though. She shook her head and turned on her heel, walking away.
February 16th
Tom entered his apartment and looked around. "Were you up all night packing?" He asked his father as he shrugged off his jacket.
"I couldn't sleep. I figured I could pack up the things you weren't going to be using for a while. I've been checking out some apartment listings." He said and pointed to the newspaper on the counter.
"Okay," Tom said and picked it up, taking it with him to his sofa. "I know it's going to be slim pickings on my budget so there won't be a lot of places to apply for."
"We'll manage. I was thinking,"
"Dad-" Tom sighed.
"I was thinking that when I leave I am going to rent a car for you for the remainder of your time in a sling."
"I have a car." He said, shaking his head.
"You have a great car. With a standard transmission. Not something you're going to be able to drive with your arm pinned to your chest."
"Okay… I can't argue with that." He wanted to argue. He did.
"Good. Because otherwise, I wouldn't be able to make myself leave."
"There are such things as buses and cabs you know."
"If you could afford to go everywhere by cab then you could afford to stay in this apartment and not have to move. Buses … there would be a lot of jostling and we don't know what the service will be like where you'll be moving to. This is the practical solution."
"Okay… I'll turn it in once I can use my arm again. Thanks, Dad."
"Thank you for letting me help." He said, "I have to tell you, I'm not used to being helpless when it comes to my kids' lives."
"I'm sorry I've been an ass lately. I'm not used to being helpless either. It doesn't exactly bring out the better side of my personality."
"I feel that I need to bring something up, and I don't want you to be angry."
"I kinda live there right now." Tom said, "But I will do my best."
"I'm worried that ahm… I don't know how to say this… I'm worried that you're depressed."
"That's normal under the circumstances," Tom said.
"I'm worried that if you're alone you're going to… " He searched for the words.
"Eat a bullet?" Tom supplied for him.
"Crude but accurate."
"I'm not completely without hope yet." Tom said. "Don't worry, Dad. Besides, my life insurance doesn't pay out if I eat a bullet and Cassie has expensive tastes."
"She's still your beneficiary?"
"I never changed it. I almost made the dog the beneficiary after our divorce, but then she let him get out and he got hit by a car. So I didn't change anything. Until I started seeing Virginia there wasn't anyone else I wanted to put on the policy." He shook his head. He was finding that he no longer thought of Virginia with love or any form of fondness. All he felt there was betrayal and rage… and shame. "I should probably change it. Put you and Mom as the beneficiaries."
"I'd rather have you alive."
"Me too." Tom said and turned his attention to the news paper, so that his father couldn't see the lie in his eyes.
Cassie shook her head "I hate outdoor crime scenes. Especially in public places."
"If this is even the actual crime scene." Will said. "It looks to me like it might be another body dump."
"I think you're right. I hope we have better luck with this one than we have with the Elias case. I'm starting to break out in a cold sweat every time I see Harry." She said.
"Yesterday he asked me if I liked being a detective. He suggested I might find the private sector less demanding."
She laughed. "He's said that to me before. And asked if I liked riding in a patrol car once. It's just his way. You'll get used to him. If he likes you he'll stand by you no matter what."
"Did he like your ex?" Will asked. Cassie glared at him and he dropped the subject. He couldn't tell if she hated Tom Ryan or if she was still in love with him.
"Hey, Stirling, anything interesting?" She asked.
"Well, I'm going to say that this is not the original crime scene. There are ligature marks on the wrists and ankles. She struggled to be free for quite some time, there's bruising around the throat, who ever it was used their hands, several times. It wasn't what killed her though. She was shot through the heart."
"She was tortured then." Will said.
"Yes." Stirling said. "I'll do an SA kit when I get her back to the morgue. I won't know anything until morning. I've got a back log that you wouldn't believe."
"Thanks." Cassie said. She spoke to the forensics team and no one had found any personal effects or identification. "Only in Palm Springs are there naked bodies left on golf courses."
"Oh I don't know. I'm pretty sure golf drives people to homicide the world over." Will said.
She laughed a little "Okay, I can see that." She said. "But you would think they'd still have their clothes on and maybe a golf club or something."
"I would bet money on this having something to do with Golf or the country club." Will said.
"I don't know… she was clearly kidnapped and held hostage for a while. This wasn't a crime of passion. It was planned. It was personal somehow."
"Or it could be a rapist like that guy in Chicago a few years back leaving all of his kills on hiking trails. I think they may have decided he was a serial killer though."
"Oh no. We do not use the S word until we have to. So far this is the only body we have found that has this signature. We don't even twitch about the S word until a second body turns up." She said.
February 23rd
"Tom, come on, we can find you a better apartment than this one. It's not too late to change your mind about this. It's a postage stamp… a dingy little postage stamp on a soiled envelope."
"It's also temporary." Tom said "I'll heal and find work doing something… else." The thought of not being a cop anymore was hard to take, but if he wasn't back on the job in six months he was never going to be. "It's a month to month lease. I'm not chained to it. I promise, Dad, it's only temporary. Who knows. Maybe when this is all over I'll buy a house. I was looking at buying with Virginia. No reason I can't buy one without her. I'll get another dog. I'll be fine."
Liam nodded. He didn't like it. He wasn't a snob. He'd been brought up just this poor. Living at the bottom of the barrel hoping that his parents had figured out how to put the next meal on the table for him and his brothers. He didn't hate the neighborhood because of some unrealistic belief about the poor and disenfranchised. It was because it reminded him of what he had fought so hard to climb out of, and what he had sworn never to let his children go through. Now here they were. His eldest boy was forced into that position because he wouldn't let them help him.
"Come on, Dad. Lets go get the uhaul and go for Pizza and beer." He waited for an answer then sighed. "If I can't make things work here, once I'm clear, I'll come home okay. I promise. I'll come home at least for a visit. And if it looks like Alexander is going to press charges you'll be the first person I call."
Liam frowned. "I guess that's going to have to do." He said. "But you're going to call home every week. I mean it son, you miss a Sunday afternoon phone call and I will be on the next flight down here."
"I'm not going to hurt myself." Tom said. Not yet. Not while there was hope. Not so that it would be obvious.
"Every Sunday." He repeated.
"Okay. Every Sunday. I promise."
Donnie di Barto handed a glass of port to Vittorio Rossi. "Remind me to send Tony a thank you gift for letting you do this little job for me." He'd pay the going rate, that wasn't a problem. It would be worth it to see Patrick Galloway gone from this world.
"Family is important. Tony is all about family." Vitto said with a shrug. "He could hardly refuse." He took a sip of the fortified wine. "How do you want this handled? Am I sending a message or am I just putting paid to the bill."
"Just put paid to the bill. I don't want it to look like a hit. I just want him to stop breathing." Donnie said. "As far as Palm Beach PD is concerned I've gone legit. This isn't the time to change their minds."
"It takes longer if you want there to be no suspicion what so ever." He said. "I need to get to know the target."
"Take all the time you need just don't expect me to pay by the hour." He stroked the little dog in his lap.
Vittorio shook his head. "I wouldn't expect you to. Just give me a little while to get this guy's number" A bullet to the head was quick and easy. Get on a plane after breakfast, make the hit, get back on a plane and it's home by dinner. Making it messy took a little extra time because you had to find the right place to take your time. But what di Barto wanted was a work of art. That took time, it took skill, and it took patience. He had all three.
February 25
Tom drove his father to the airport to prove that he could indeed drive an automatic with one arm strapped to his chest.
"See, I'll be fine, Dad." He said as he parked in the parking garage.
"I know. I do." Liam said. "I am your father, I'm allowed to worry when you are in trouble."
"There is nothing else to be done but waiting." Tom said "And I'm lousy at waiting. I'd be impossible to live with especially in the new apartment."
"There isn't room for you in that apartment, much less anyone else."
"Maybe that's intentional." Tom said sadly. "I don't mean you Dad."
Liam laughed a little "Yes you do. I don't blame you." He said "I don't think I could have lived with my father for long either, even under the best of circumstances. Now remember, you're going to call every Sunday. If you don't maybe it will be your mother that comes down next time."
"Now that's not playing fair." Tom said. "She'll cry and I'll cave. Mom tears are kryptonite."
"Yes they are. So keep that in mind on Sundays when you think you might just skip that phone call."
"Yes sir." He said "Do you want me to wait with you inside?"
"No. Go on home. Enjoy the left overs in the fridge." He got out of the car and took his suitcase out of the back seat.
"I'll talk to you on Sunday." Tom promised.
He stopped on the way home to pick up a bottle of scotch.
