Part 13.
"So when is the wedding?," Skeeter asked Max a few days later, "Welcome back by the way. How's Kenny holding up? And did he pick that ring out by himself? Good taste."
Max laughed despite everything, "I'm not sure what I should answer first. Kenny's fine, going stir crazy. He didn't pick it out, it was his grandmothers. And I don't know. We're working on it."
Skeeter paused, "You two are really happy aren't you? Even with all of this stuff going on around you, you're both happy."
Max nodded, "We are. It's been a wild ride so far, but a good one. I don't think either of us planned it this way, but everything is working out for the best."
Skeeter grinned at her, "Am I invited?"
Max paused, thinking of the beautiful gazebo that Kenny took her to and the wedding they were planning, "Sure. I don't think that anyone from either of our families is coming though. Maybe Kenny's Dad, but that's probably it."
"Ouch," Skeeter replied, "Yeah, I heard that they weren't to happy about your guys, uh, situation."
"My parents didn't take it too much better," Max trailed off, trying to shake off her self pity as she changed the subject, "What's going on with Rachel?"
Skeeter regarded her carefully, "It's complicated, and I know that Jimmy wanted to talk to you about it. Kenny too."
"Max," Jimmy called from the doorway of his office, "I need to talk to you."
"Good luck," Skeeter whispered, as she walk over.
"Rachel," Wambaugh said, pausing outside her cell, "I got your message."
"Good. When can I get out here?"
"Your bail was denied. You know that. Attempted murder is not a bail friendly charge."
"I can't just sit here! They're all judging me when they walk by! You've got to get me out of here!"
"There isn't anything else I can do," Wambaugh insisted, "You're stuck behind bars until the trial."
"That's not good enough," she screamed, throwing herself against the bars, "They're all out get me!"
"How are you feeling?," Jimmy asked, "No more morning sickness?"
Max nodded, "It's gone, thankfully."
"You're going on four months?," Jimmy asked, "I want you to cut back at some point, and we have a very good maternity leave program. One that I expect you to take full advantage of."
Max tried not to smile, "I will. The pregnancy thing is so strange. I could barely button my pants this morning. Everything is different."
"Just wait," Jimmy cautioned, "How's Kenny holding up?"
Max shook her head, "He hates staying home, but he's fine. Getting stronger every day."
Jimmy nodded, "Good. Tell him I don't want him back here for another week."
"Okay."
"Now . . . Rachel. She's being held without bail for shooting Kenny, the ballistics report confirm that the bullet came from her gun and she doesn't have an alibi. Plus, she has plenty of motive."
"Okay," Max repeated, "What else?"
"There is a lot of conflict of interest in this case," Jimmy added, "With her sexual harassment case with me, her relationship with Kenny, and how she feels about you. This case has the potential to explode Max, and I don't want you anywhere near it. Kenny or myself either. We're keeping out of it because of our relationships with her. I don't want any arguments about it either."
"I don't want to be anywhere near her," Max replied truthfully, feeling her blood boil at the thought of that witch shooting Kenny, "She could of killed him Jimmy."
"Trust me, neither do I," he agreed, "Fill me in on the Davidson case."
Kenny hung up the phone and smiled to himself. It's coming together, he thought, as he wondered how Max would react. She's been a little unpredictable lately. Commitment shy too. I guess we'll have to take it day by day, but I hope that she likes it. Hearing a key turn in the lock, he braced himself to tell her.
"Hi," she said with grin, tossing her bag on the chair, "I brought dinner."
"You do make a good pizza," he agreed, as she placed the box on his coffee table, "It smells good."
She shrugged out of her coat and stretched before sinking onto the sofa next to him, "I try."
Kenny smiled as he watched he rub her slightly expanded stomach, "You're starting to show. I can't believe that there is a baby in there."
Max smiled back at him, as she looked up, "It just seems so real now that I can see it. My body is changing more everyday. I need to buy some bigger pants."
"You're beautiful," Kenny replied, tracing her abdomen with his hand, "How was work?"
"Great. It was good to back," she trailed off, thinking about the Rachel stuff, "Jimmy doesn't want you to come back for another week, and Skeeter wanted to know when the wedding is."
"Another week? I'm gonna go crazy Max."
She took a big bite of pizza, "Umph. So good. This is heaven."
"I found us a place to live after we do get married."
"What?," Max asked, as she tried not to choke on her pizza, "What are you talking about?"
"Here," he said, handing her a napkin, "Max, we both have one bedroom apartments and no where enough room for a baby and all of it's stuff. So I looked around at some stuff."
"Were you every going to tell me?"
"I'm telling you now. Just look at these will you?"
Max took the printed papers carefully and skimmed the listings thoughtfully, "You want to buy a house? Can we afford that?"
"Or rent," he countered, "We gotta think about this stuff Max. There are yards, and this one has four bedrooms. Plenty of room for more kids."
"More kids?"
"Don't you want a big family?"
Max pulled back slightly, trying not to feel overwhelmed with what he was telling her, "I'm having trouble with just one for now. Do you have our whole future planned out for us Kenny? Two point five kids, a house, a dog, mini-van? What else?"
"Hey! Max. Calm down sweetheart."
"Don't sweetheart me. I knew this was going too fast."
Kenny grabbed her wrist, as she sprung to her feet ready to bolt, "Will you just listen to me for a minute? What's the big deal? We're already getting married, so what's wrong with finding a place to live together? What did you think? We'd get married, and live apart? Come on Max."
"I," she trailed off, as the full impact of what was going on hit her, "Everything is just changing so quickly. This isn't how I pictured my life turning out. I wasn't even sure I wanted kids."
Kenny pulled her back down on the couch next to him, and studied the fear he saw in her eyes, "Are we going to keep on having the same fight? It's one step forward, two steps back with you sometimes. I know you're scared Max, but you can't run away from this."
"I'm not running away. I just don't like having my life planned out for me."
"Well I didn't plan on you getting pregnant," he shot back, feeling frustrated with her, and her gun shy reaction to commitment, "Isn't this how everything started?"
Max yanked herself away from him, as she geared up for a fight, "Well I didn't plan on getting pregnant either. Sorry for inconveniencing you."
"So do you not want this baby either? Or is it just a life with me?"
"What are you talking about? I want both, you know that."
"You've fought me on every little thing Max," he retorted, feeling his heart break when he looked at her, "I proposed to you half a dozen times before you said yes, and that's probably just because I was shot. You don't want to be a mother, get married, live with me, or have a life together. Just admit it!"
"I'm not admitting that! How can you even think that?"
"By the way you act whenever I bring up getting married, or something! It's obviously not as important to you as it is to me!"
"Just because I didn't run off and elope with you the day I found out I was pregnant doesn't mean that I don't want to marry you! God Kenny!"
"Bullshit! What the hell are you waiting for? What good could possibly come from waiting?"
"Oh, I don't know! Maybe the fact that we're finding out we're not so compatible after all? We obviously don't want the same things, so it's better we find that out now!"
"Yeah it is! I wouldn't want you raising my kids anyway!"
Max fell silent at that, and stared at him like she had never seen him before. Rising shakily to her feet, she walked out.
"Jimmy," Skeeter said, knocking on his the door the next morning, "Uh, I think you better come down to the cells for a minute. There is a problem."
Jimmy looked up from the mountain of paperwork in front of him, "She didn't escape did she?"
Skeeter shook his head, "No, she's most definitely in her cell, but . . . I think she's dead."
Jimmy rose slowly to his feet, "What? How?"
"I think she hung herself," Skeeter trailed off, as Jimmy followed him out into the office, "No one has been back there since last night, so . . . she had plenty of time."
"Max," Jimmy called, "Come with us."
"You okay?," Skeeter asked, giving her a once over, "You look like you're going to pass out."
"Fine," she said flatly, trying not to think about last night, "Carter is on his way."
"My god," Jimmy said under his breath, as he saw the swinging body in the cell in front of him, "Unlock it."
Kenny paced around his apartment for what seemed like the hundredth time since Max had left last night. What did I just do, he thought, did I just ruin the best thing in my life? Hell, she's at work, and probably needs time to cool down. Plus she'd shoot me on sight about now. What happened last night?
"Dammit," he said aloud, plopping on the couch, "Dammit."
Remembering the expression on her face when she left, he grimaced. I lied, he thought, I can't imagine a better mother for my kids. I know how scared she is that she'll be terrible at it, and I . . . she's going to hate me forever.
"I'll put the time of death at between two and four in the morning," Carter confirmed, "See by the way the blood has settled and rigid mortis. . ."
Max tuned him out, as she watched Rachel being wheeled away and tried not to cry. What is happening in this town? I'm scared to read what is in her note.
"Max," Jimmy called, not liking her melancholy mood one bit, "I need you in here."
Gathering her thoughts together, she ventured back into the cell. Later, I'll deal with it later, she promised herself trying to think about Kenny. I've lost him, she couldn't help thinking, as she began to comb through the cell. All because I was too stupid and scared to let go and trust in what we had. I was so afraid of getting hurt, I just ruined it. I can't believe he said that though, I never thought he felt that way about me.
"Her note explains a lot," Jimmy said catching their attention, "She admits to shooting Kenny because she was upset about their break up and his relationship with you Max. She wanted you to feel as badly as she did. As for me . . . she admits she made it up. She wanted someone to pay attention to her again, even if it was in not a great way. She was afraid to face everyone after the mistakes that she made."
Max ducked her head and swallowed back her tears at Rachel's last words. No one really understood her, Max thought, least of all me. I never thought Kenny and my relationship would do this to her. Although I guess that it's finished now.
Jimmy watched his two deputies closely the next week. What's going on with them, he thought? Thinking back to Rachel's funeral and burial, he remembered how they avoided each other, and stayed on opposite sides of the church. What happen between the? True to their word, they weren't letting effect their work, he thought, but hell, they both look absolutely miserable. His gaze traveled down to Max's stomach, and he smiled at the bump emerging there. She's glowing, despite looking like she's going to burst into tears.
"Kenny," he called, beckoning him into his office, "Now."
"What's going on?," Kenny asked, as Jimmy closed the door behind them, "Jimmy?"
"Have a seat," Jimmy replied, "How is everything? Jill said that everything was healing properly."
"It is,"Kenny verified, "I'm fine."
"Good. Then tell me what's going on between you and Max."
"Nothing."
"Obviously there is something," Jimmy countered, "You're both avoiding each other like the plague."
"I mean nothing. We're done. Finished. She doesn't want anything to do with me anymore."
Jimmy sat back, somewhat shocked, "What happened? What about the baby?"
"I don't know. We haven't talked about that yet. I don't think she'll ever want to talk to me again."
Jimmy gritted his teeth at his two stubborn and pig headed deputies, "You're both idiots. Don't move."
Kenny watched as Jimmy stormed around his desk toward the door, "Jimmy."
"Shut up," he snapped, throwing the door open, "Max! My office! Now!"
She walked slowly because she knew Kenny had gone in a few minutes ago. I don't know what to say to him, she thought, and I don't know what else he could possibly say to me.
"Sit," Jimmy demanded, pointing to the chair next to Kenny, "Now."
Max swallowed, and avoided looking at him as she lowered herself into the chair silently. Very conscious of his presence next to her, she turned her attention to Jimmy.
"I don't know what happened with the two of you," Jimmy began, feeling irrationally angry at their break up, when they were so miserable apart, "But you're going to work it out now. This is exactly what I was afraid of when you two started dating. Stop running away from each other, and work it out. Talk to each other dammit. There is a child involved now."
"There isn't anything else to say," Max offered softly, as Kenny's last words to her played over in her mind.
"So you're going to ignore each other for the rest of your lives?," Jimmy replied, wanting to shake them, "Stop being so stubborn! Kenny, you love her right?"
"What?," Kenny asked, hating the defeated look in her eyes, "Jimmy, come on."
"Answer the question deputy. That's an order."
Kenny wasn't sure what her reaction would be if he said anything to her, but he knew that he wasn't going anywhere until he did, "Yeah, I do. Max. I love you."
"Good," Jimmy said, nodding, "Max, do you love him?"
"Yes," she said softly, despite how hurt she was, "That's why this hurts so much."
Jimmy nodded, rising to his feet, "I'm going to leave you two here to work this out."
To be continued . . .