2005
"What do you suggest then?" Charlie scrowled at him.
"We could get his DNA, but the sneaky way, then I could pull some favors at the lab to do a comparison against yours as soon as possible"
"Okay." Charlie nodded. Quickly he went into the kitchen, got a zip lock bag, took a hair out, and put the strand in it. The dead skin cells on it would give his DNA.
"Here."
Don went to the bookstore a few hours later, and got what he needed. Then he took both samples to the Los Angeles F.B.I lab. Some days later, the two brothers talked to the lab technician.
"The D.N.A match was a negative" she told them.
Charlie didn't know what to feel.
Don thanked her, and the two brothers talked at the agent's office.
"What now?" Charlie asked.
"We need to continue the investigation."
1999
The engaged couple had a late breakfast, as they had the day off.
"Guess who I talked to last night?"
"Who?"
"David Lev!" Brian grinned. "I asked him when he was going to have his next show and he said sometime next year."
Meanwhile, Don and Cooper busted into an abandoned house to capture a fugitive, who had been hiding there.
"FBI!" they both screamedwhile brandishing weapons"Put your hands up!"
"I've got a bubble protecting me!" the fugitive said defiantly.
"Put your hands up!" Don ordered, with worry. He knew that the fugitive was high on something.
"Or what?" the man stepped closer.
2005
"How?" Charlie wondered aloud.
"That's a good question." Don mused with a sigh. David interupted them with some break on a case, and Don had to go.
A couple of days later, Charlie returned to work. As he struggled to focus on his job, Alan again spoke to Margaret's photo.
"I'm sorry that I had to break my promise" he lamented. "What else could I do? Don figured it out, and I had already half let the cat of the bag with Charlie. Knowing him, he's probably trying to figure out who his biological father is. He's lost all trust in me, and we've hardly spoken..."
Between classes, Charlie updated Larry on the investigations.
"Why don't you ask Alan?" Larry suggested carefully. "He might have some inkling of who your biological father might be"
"Why? So he can lie to me again?" Charlie angrily snorted and glared at his friend for making such a suggestion.
1999
"Our guns can penetrate your bubble!" Cooper said firmly. Don mused inwardly that he'd find this situation funny if he weren't living it..
"You're bluffing!" the man scoffed. "Shoot me and you will be melted by my ray gun." He held an imaginary weapon in his hand.
Cooper shot him in the foot after a long while of arguing and threats between the F.B.I agents and the fugitive
"They lied! Bastards!" the fugitive cried out, as he fell. Cooper handcuffed him, while Don called an ambulance.
"How are we gonna explain this?" Don asked his partner as the medics treated thefugitive and put him in the ambulance.
2005
" Just a suggestion" Larry said softly while putting a finger on his chin. He could sense his mentee's anger.
Later that week, Charlie came to Don's apartment with a list of other possible canadates, mostof whom ran their own businesses when the boys were young.. The mathematican basically remembered the various small businesses the family would go to when he was young.
"I need you to do what you did with Fran's husband." Charlie said when the agent let him in. "Here's a list of possible...you know"
"Zack the ice cream truck guy?" Don gave his brother a 'what the hell?' look as he was reading the list. "And Mr. Malone, the agoraphobe?"
1999
"We'll just say that he tried to strangle himself with his own bare hands" Cooper whispered.
"They'll ask why he doesn't have bruises on his throat" Don pointed out.
"Good point"
Eventually, they came up with a story, that only got them a slap in the wrist.
2005
"Zack's route took him right to the house, and we'd see him a lot at your little league games."
"Why is Malone on the list?" Don asked.
"I heard he was a very smart guy. Maybe his sister asked mom to look in on him one day...?" Charlie couldn't bear to finish.
"He was an instruction manual writer, and very boring, from what I've heard!" Don argued.
"We need to consider all possibilities!" Charlie countered. Don could see how his brother really wanted to find an answer.
"Buddy..."
"Malone's house is on the way to the store" Charlie said. "Why don't you talk to the neighbors? Ask if they ever remember him having a girlfriend?"
"I guess I could do that" Don assented with a sigh.
The next afternoon, Don came to see Charlie at his office.
"What did you find out?"
"I poked around. He had a girlfriend or two over the years. One was a redhead and the other was a blonde. They were seen coming in and out of the house."
"Mom could have worn a wig"
"What?"
"She had an affair!" Charlie said bitterly, as if that explained his theory.
"Why don't we check out the other men you have on the list?" Don suggested gently, as he put a hand on Charlie's shoulder.
2005
"Greg, the stationary store owner."Don mused as he again saw Charlie's list. "He draws and paints."
"Should we go talk to him?" Charlie asked impatiently.
"We need to think this through." Don said, then had an idea. "He likes to sell his artwork, at his store,doesn't he?"
"Yeah. He always did" Charlie remembered.
"I'm going to go buy one of his cheaper pieces, and then you can have your friend from the art department compare it to the drawing." Don said. Charlie had told him what said friend's opinion about the drawing.
"Okay" Charlie took out some money.
"Don't worry about it, buddy"
The next day, Charlie had both works to show his friend, Sam.
"Could you tell me if these were made by the same person?"
"Nope. The drawing of the little boy in the sand, while a mere imitation, shows greater skill than the one of San Pedro Harbor."
"Really?"
"Yes."
"How?"
Sam went into great detail.
Somberly, Charlie called Don with the results afterwards. Later, the two had dinner together and discussed the next person on the list.
1999
David could not believe it, when he sat on a bench at the park, to find Charlie hunched over a book on the grass about a few feet away. Soon, he noticed Margaret come to join him, with her own book. She spread a picnic cover near Charlie, and coaxed him into sitting there. Before David could hide, Margaret saw him, and , after seeing that Charlie was absorbed in his work, came over with a fury of an angry mother tiger.
"Why are you following us?" she demanded.
"I just happened to be here"
"You'll have to leave." she ordered. Margaret did not want David anywhere near Charlie.
"This is a public park!" David retorted. "I've got a right to be here, and more importantly, a right to know my son!"
"He is not yours!"
"Come on! You probably knew he was mine the minute you first saw him. He probably had massive dark little curls and a big gander of a nose, though I can't say for sure because you robbed me of being his daddy!" The anger of many years started to show.
2005
" Sean McKiernan." Don mused. The man had been an art teacher at their high school. "He's a good choice."
"I did some research and found that he started working at our school about a year before I was born, and lives near us." Charlie told him. "Could you do what you did with Fran's husband?"
"Let's get a sample of his work, first, then if your friend Sam tells us that he did that drawing, we'll go for the DNA test."
Don did some legwork and found that a local cofee shop sold some of his paintings and charcoal pieces. He bought a small charcoal piece, and gave it to Charlie.
Again, Charlie went to see Sam.
"It wasn't the same person." he told the mathematician. "Why are you so curious about this drawing?"
"I'm a uh..very curious person" Charlie lamly lied.
Right after their talk, he told Don of the results.
1999
"He'll hear you!" Margaret hissed, as she looked over her shoulder. Charlie, of course, was absorbed in his work.
"He damn well should!"
"David!"
"Look..."
"Who's he going to believe, me, or a total stranger?" Margaret retorted.
2005
At Don's apartment, the two brothers talked some more, but they were interupted by the doorbell. It was Alan. He had figured out that the two were trying to figure out who Charlie's biological father was. The ex city planner, had thought about it and knew, in his heart, that he'd want answers as well.
Charlie started towards the kitchen in a huff, when he saw Alan at the doorway.
"I uh..need to talk to the two of you."
"And tell us more lies!" Charlie snorted.
"Charlie! Wait! I know who your biological father is!"
"Who?" Don asked.
"David Lev, the famous artist"
"What?" Don said in disbelief.
"STOP LYING TO ME!" Charlie screamed.
1999
"You haven't heard the last of me!" David decided that finding out this way would not be best for Charlie. With the warning, he left.
Shaking, Margaret sat on the picnic spread, cried a few tears, and stared into space.
"You're okay mom?" Charlie asked worridly.
"I'm fine, baby. What are you working on?"
Soon, she found herself listening to a full lecture about some aspect of abstract number theory.
2005
"Charlie...calm down" Don told his brother, then turned to Alan. "Why do you think that?"
"You mother had made some...uh..personal drawings of him, which I uh..found and one day I saw that same man in the arts section of the newspaper." Alan didn't want to get into details as to what kind of drawings they were. .
However, Don had figured it out and gasped. He thought about what he would havefelt if he had found out that Kim, when they were together, drew another man in the nude. His anger towards Margaret festered even more.
"David Lev is based in the Pasadena area" the agent remembered. "And didn't your friend say that the drawing of me in the sand was in the style of David Lev?"
"He said it was an imitation." Charlie corrected him with a scowl.
"It was meant to be a quick sketch to give to mom, not an elaborate work" Don theorized.
"Why are you believing his lies?" Charlie glared at his elder brother.
1999
Alan noticed that Margaret was quiet and somber at dinner.
"What's wrong?" he gently asked when they were alone.
"I'm worried about Don."
"He'll be fine! We raised him well" he put an arm around her.
TBC