J.M.J.

Author's note: Thanks for reading! I've decided to go with an epilogue, so that will be published on Friday while we get the final chapter today. Thank you to Candylou, max2013, MargaretA66, Bkworm4life4, ErinJordan, BMSH, Cherylann Rivers, and t4swp for your reviews on chapter 9!

Chapter X

The End of an Era

Even after years of training and experience for this sort of thing, Fenton couldn't keep a tremble out of his knees as he walked from the alley to Gregorio Moretti's disabled car. There was no way to tell yet who had killed Gregorio, whether it was Fenton or Mitch. That was a question that the department shooting board would make sure to answer, though. In some ways, it didn't really matter. They had both been shooting and both held some of the responsibility. Besides that, Fenton was a lieutenant and held a great deal of the responsibility.

He glanced over at Mitch, who looked as shaken as Fenton felt. "You okay?"

"Yeah, it's just…" Mitch let his voice trail off. "We'd better check on those kids and find out if our backup is planning on coming sometime this year." He shuddered. "Fenton, I should have thought…"

Fenton shook his head and raised his hand. "You did the best you could. Even if you had called dispatch for backup, he could have still intercepted it. He could have taken the call himself or sent somebody to the wrong place, and we would have been in the exact same position."

"There's no way he would have gotten away with that," Mitch replied.

"Yeah, well, there's no way he's getting away with what he did do." Fenton clenched a fist. "I'm going to make sure of that."

The car was closer than where they had left Angelo and Isabella, so they went there first. They found Sam crouched next to the open passenger door, trying to comfort the girl inside while Mario clung to him, sobbing. He looked up as the officers approached, but he must have read it in their faces that what had gone down hadn't been good, but that it was over now. He didn't ask any questions.

"We're going to need an ambulance here," he told the newcomers. "I don't think she's hurt too bad, but she's got some glass in her eyes or something."

"Who's there?" the girl asked, gripping Sam's sleeve. "Is it my daddy? I want to talk to Daddy!"

Fenton turned a shade paler as he glanced at Mitch. So this was Gregorio's daughter. Fenton crouched down next to Sam and patted the girl's knee.

"Your daddy can't come right now," he told her. "An ambulance will be here in a few minutes and they'll take to the hospital and they'll take good care of you."

"Who are you?" the girl demanded.

"My name's Fenton. I'm a police officer."

The girl stiffened. "You're the cop who was chasing us. You made us crash!"

"It was an accident," Sam told her.

"My daddy's dead, isn't he? And it's your fault. And I'm going to be blind, and that's your fault, too. All of you."

"Hey, hey, calm down," Fenton said. "You're going to be okay. It's all going to be okay."

The girl's chest heaved with a sob. "Leave me alone! I'd rather die than have you help me! I'd rather die than be blind, too!"

"Fenton, I'm going to go check on the other kids," Mitch said. "Mario, you want to come with me?"

"Good idea, Mitch," Fenton told him. Mario was upset enough already; he didn't need to witness the girl's hysterics, too.

Fenton and Sam continued to try to calm the girl, but she only became more agitated. Finally, to their great relief, an ambulance arrived, along with their long-awaited backup. Fenton made room for the paramedics who came to take care of the girl and turned around, practically running straight into Alex Casey as he did.

"Lieutenant, what happened?" Alex asked. "We got here as quickly as we could, but…"

"I'll bet," Fenton replied. "You're under arrest."

"What?" Alex seemed so genuinely shocked that if Fenton had been only a little less certain, he might have second-guessed himself. As it was, he didn't have much room left for doubt.

"I said, you're under arrest," Fenton repeated. "You have the right to remain silent…"

"What…I…Arrested for what?" Alex interrupted, stammering in his agitation.

Fenton doggedly continued reading him his rights and then asked him if he understood them at the end. For a few moments, Alex continued to splutter around, but when it was obvious that Fenton wasn't going to back down, he finally said, "Of course, I understand my rights. I've only read them to a dozens of people before now. But, Lieutenant, what is this about? You can't arrest me without telling me what it's for."

"Interfering with a police investigation, aiding and abetting, endangering minors, endangering police officers, and probably accepting bribes to begin with," Fenton said. "Hopefully, I'll be able to pin a conspiracy to commit murder charge on you, as well, but we'll have to wait and see what evidence we can turn up on that one."

"Have you lost your mind, Lieutenant?" Alex protested. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"What's going on here?" Officer Brink asked as he approached.

"Put this man in handcuffs, take him down to the precinct, and book him," Fenton ordered.

Brink looked from one officer to the other. In the end, either Fenton's higher rank or his reputation won out because Brink said, "Yes, sir," and placed handcuffs on the still protesting Alex Casey. Before he led him away, he asked, "What are the charges, sir?"

After Fenton had repeated the charges, Alex made one last attempt to protest, "Do you have any evidence for this, Hardy?"

"Yes," Fenton told him in no uncertain terms. "I wouldn't be doing this if I didn't. You know you'll be better off if you make a full confession, Casey, especially on the possible conspiracy charge. Maybe you didn't know Black Rose would kill Odin Hannigail when you told them that we were going to pay him a visit."

Alex's shoulders slumped slightly, but he raised his chin and said, "You don't have any proof of that."

"Get him out of here, Brink," Fenton told the other officer.

As soon as Alex was out of sight, Fenton leaned against one of the parked patrol cars and breathed out a long, heavy sigh. This wasn't at all how he had hoped this mess would turn out. He just needed a minute to process all this.

Long before that minute was up, Mitch approached him, with the Beretta children following behind him. "Say, Lieutenant, I'm going to take these three back to the precinct. I think they're all okay, but it's probably best to get them out of here. So, unless there's a reason I need to stay here…"

"No, go ahead," Fenton told him. Then he sank back into his gloomy thoughts. It was going to be a long night with more long days to come.

HBHBHBHBHB

It was two weeks later, early in the morning. Fenton felt like he could whistle as he was entering the precinct at the beginning of his shift, carrying an envelope with him. He felt lighter than he had in the last weeks. Perhaps that was partly because he was, for once, well-rested and well-fed and had woken up to Laura and the boys in the apartment on a bright, sunny morning. Perhaps it was also because of the decision that he and Laura had made. Even though it had been a hard decision, it was good to have it made. Now all there was left to do was the final steps toward embarking on the new adventure that it would entail.

Mitch Johnson met him at the door of his office. "I've got good news for you," he called as soon as he saw Fenton.

"It's a good day for it," Fenton replied. "What is it?"

"Casey finally broke down and confessed everything," Mitch said. "Naturally, he'd do it while we were both off-duty, but I've got the full transcript right here. He knows a lot more than I expected."

"Great." Fenton pushed his door open and both men entered. "Maybe we can lay Black Rose to rest now."

"No luck there," Mitch admitted. "He doesn't know anything about them, or so he says. I'm inclined to believe it, though."

"Yes, your theory that Black Rose adherents have orders not to allow themselves to be taken alive." Fenton frowned. "Well, even if we can't get rid of them altogether, hopefully, we've at least made things hot enough for them that they won't be rearing their heads again."

"Hopefully. At the very least, we now have enough to keep Casey locked up for a very long time, as well as somebody else that we've hoping to nail. One guess."

"Alessandro Moretti?" Fenton asked hopefully.

"Bingo." Mitch laid the confession transcript on the desk. "Evidently, Casey was selling both Alessandro and Gregorio information, and because of that, he's got some great dirt on Alessandro. He's going to get sent up, and not just for income tax evasion, either. Casey has definite evidence of him hiring an assassin to put one of his rivals out of business."

"Excellent. I suppose Casey want leniency in exchange for this information."

"He got an FBI agent killed and was a dirty cop, so I don't think they're going to go too easy on him," Mitch replied.

"That's true." Fenton picked up the transcript and began to read. "I don't suppose he knows what that shooting that started this whole thing was about, does he?"

"No, but it's not hard to guess."

Fenton nodded. "Gregorio trying to muscle in on his dad's territory, no doubt. What about the Berettas?"

Mitch's face clouded. "Yeah, he knows all about that, because he had a direct hand in getting them killed."

Fenton also frowned. "So they're definitely dead?"

"Yeah. Nico apparently was wanting to get out of the business he was in. It's a risky game to get out of, though, and he tried going to the police anonymously. Casey got hold of it, figured out who it was, and told Gregorio, and the rest is history."

"Has Giovanni been notified?" Fenton asked. Naturally, Giovanni Beretta had been informed of Gregorio's dying words concerning his brother and sister-in-law, but there had been a faint hope that they had been interpreted.

"John," Mitch corrected him. "Ever since he left New York for the seminary, that's the name he's been using. Says he wants to put the past behind him as much as possible. And yes, they've already told him. Apparently, he took it pretty well. It wasn't a big surprise, I guess. He's formally dropping out of the seminary and will raise the kids himself. Good luck to him. It's got to be quite a shock to all the sudden have your life completely changed and three kids on your hands, especially when that Angelo is one of them. Mario and Isabella seem like nice kids, but I'm guessing he's going to have some trouble with Angelo."

"Hopefully not too much," Fenton replied. "They've all been through enough as it is. By the way, any word on Evangeline?" When Gregorio's daughter had finally calmed down in the hospital, she had told the doctors that her name was Evangeline Moretti, that her mother had died, and that she didn't have any other family that she knew of, besides her grandfather.

"Nothing new," Mitch said. He shook his head. "It's too bad. It's really looking like she's going to be permanently blind."

"And I guess Casey's confession is going to put an end to Alessandro trying get his hands on her," Fenton said. "That's a good thing, though. Even foster care has got to be better than being raised by him."

"Yeah, but it's rough. Apparently, she's pretty stuck on the idea that everyone at the scene of that crash is to blame, even Mario just because he was there. I'm afraid she might have more issues than just being blind."

"Poor kid. Hopefully she can get some help."

"So, that's not what I think it is, is it?" Mitch nodded toward the envelope that Fenton had laid on his desk as he looked over the transcript.

"Afraid so," Fenton replied. "It's my resignation that I'm going to hand over to the captain. I'm giving a whole month's notice though."

"No chance of changing your mind?"

"No. You know Laura and I have been thinking about this for a while, moving to a small town. It's just now we've got a plan that might be feasible."

"It still seems kind of sudden," Mitch said. "You're sure it's not this case making up your mind for you?"

"This case did kind of make up my mind," Fenton admitted, "but it's really not an impulse decision. It's been a long time in the making." He noticed Mitch's somber expression. "Hey, cheer up. It's not like we're moving to the other side of the world. I expect you to come up to Bayport for a visit every now and then."

"We'll have to see about that," Mitch replied with a small teasing twinkle in his eye. "After all, I'm going to have to do enough work for both of us from now on. Not that I didn't have to before."

Fenton picked up a paperclip from his desk and threw it at him. "You know I'm still your superior for the next month. I could still have you demoted."

"Fat chance. I'm probably going to wind up with a promotion out of this, finally getting you out of the NYPD's hair."

Fenton snorted. "As if. If the captain gets it in his head that you're the reason I'm resigning, he'll fire you to try to keep me."

"In your dreams." Mitch chuckled. "I'd better go. Some of us have work to do."

Fenton chuckled as Mitch left the room. He was going to miss him and the other officers he worked with. For that matter, there was a lot he was going to miss about New York, after all, but at the same time, he could hardly wait for the adventures that awaited him.