Chapter Twenty-Eight

Slowly, the house was packed, but neither Jamie nor Eddie touched Joey's things. Eddie was laser focused on getting the family ready. Jamie was working but wanted to call and check on things while he had down time

The phone rang three times before Mary answered in a very professional way. "Hello this is Mary who is this please?" Jamie smiled at his girl

"It's Daddy," Jamie replied. "How come you're on the horn? Let me talk to Mommy."

"Mommy isn't here Aunt Hailey is. She's with Bella, Bella made an awful stinky."

Jamie laughed at Mary's description. "Where did Mommy go?" This was not like Eddie, not at all.

"Out. Aunt Hailey is here playing games with us she's so much fun at Uno not like you and mommy but don't tell her that."

Jamie chuckled, "Okay, thank you sweetie. Listen don't tell Mommy that Daddy called okay. It's our secret. I love you, Buttons."

"Love you too daddy see you soon, I miss you lots..." Mary said

"Miss you too," Jamie replied and hung up. Eddie had gone out with a friend and it was not Hailey...where could she be?

Jamie left the precinct as soon as he could. He had to find Eddie, if she was out with a "friend" that meant that she was either out alone again or had gone to meet…he couldn't even go there. The first place he went was the ice cream shop, he heard from some friends that she had been seen parked there a few times, only she wasn't there. Next, he went to a local coffee shop they favored and saw her sitting there with someone...he was furious and heartbroken. As he walked closer he realized of all people it was Marie Renzulli. He quickly got back in his car trying to read their lips, their body language, not even thinking that Eddie would make him.

Eddie held her coffee with both hands. She felt cold and so incredibly sad. "I don't know what to do, Marie," she sighed. "Jamie is just so angry with me over what happened with Steven, sometimes I think he actually hates me. That he will never be able to forgive me for what I did, he can't even stay in our bed with me."

Marie gave the younger woman a gentle smile. "I'm sure he doesn't hate you."

"I don't know..." Eddie sighed. "There is just so much anger there."

"Jamie is angry, but he's angry at himself too, and mourning his son," Marie advised.

"And more than that, and hear me out, I think he thinks that you did what you did out of anger, out of wanting to hurt him as badly as he hurt you." Marie stopped then and waited for Eddie's reaction.

"I didn't, I mean, I was angry," Eddie admitted. "But I told him I warned him and look what happened." Marie only nodded, sensing there was more. "Still, it wasn't on purpose and neither was the thing with Steven. Both things were stupid, but they just happened. What happened to Joey was not Jamie's fault and I know that, I really do and I need him to know that too."

"That's going to take some time honey," Marie replied. "Jamie's so angry with himself for Joey's death he's projecting that all over the place. Until he's ready to accept that it's not his fault, at least not all his fault, he's not going to be able to let go of the anger."

Eddie sighed, "I don't know how long I can keep this up, Marie, I really don't know. I'm trying focus on the girls, on the getting the family ready to move, but…"

"You keep doing that," Marie encouraged. "And know this in your heart, Eddie, Jamie has to realize that he's angry with himself, and he has to forgive himself, before he can forgive you. That goes both ways, you have to forgive yourself before Jamie can forgive you. You two are moving to a very lovely and peaceful place, let this go and start new. Take it from me, I've been married to Tony a long time, he's like a 12 year old one day and 82 the next, I'm used to the ups and downs of passionate men."

That made Eddie smile.

Eddie headed to the car with Marie and saw Jamie sitting in his car. He fired up his engine as they walked toward him and made tracks for home hoping she didn't actually see his face or the plates. Too late.

Jamie was home when Eddie arrived, rocking Bella to sleep. "I sent Hailey home," was all he said.

"I see that," Eddie replied. "I also know you only did a few seconds ago because you were spying on me tonight."

"No I wasn't," Jamie defended. "I wasn't spying on you, Eddie, I was looking for you. You never mentioned going out and…"

"And you thought I was going out with Steven, even though I haven't been to group or anything for over a month!"

Jamie wanted to tell her that Steven never crossed his mind, but that would be a lie, so instead he said nothing. "Your silence is answer enough! You are not going to trust me again are you? You are not going to forgive me for this, even after I… "Why even take five more months and move us away if you can't even trust me anymore?" Eddie felt the tears beginning to choke her. She stopped and wouldn't go on...

"Even after what?" Jamie pressed. "What, Eddie, talk to me." Maybe this was what they needed. Maybe this would clear the air once and for all.

She shook her head and swallowed her tears, "It doesn't matter anymore. I'm going to put my girls to bed, then I am going to bed and pray that when I wake up we find out this entire three months was just a nightmare."

Jamie didn't know what to say, all he knew was he had hurt Eddie again. They were locked in this washing machine like vicious cycle with seemingly no way out.

"You have to talk to that boy, Tony!" Marie ordered when she got home from her coffee date with Eddie. "That poor girl is heartbroken, grieving alone for her son when they should be together. He's so locked up in his own self-hatred that he can't see the damage that's being done. Going with the brother, and the baby being killed, it was stupid, it was a stupid choice, but the responsibility falls with the thugs that pulled the trigger, not with Jamie."

"Thank you, Dr. Phil," Renzulli replied. "I tried talking to him, Danny's tried, the Commissioner tried and he can talk the ear off a dead rhinoceros, if he can't do it, who can?"

"You," Marie replied. "You were his training officer, you always said how special that relationship is. Use that now and get through to him before he moves away and takes all this crap with him. I mean it!"

Renzulli had no doubt she did and he had no doubt he'd be in the doghouse if he didn't have one more go at Jamie.

He called the next morning to set up their own coffee date at the same coffee shop and just like Eddie, Jamie didn't say that was where he was going or what he was going for, he simply tacked it on to the end of his day.

"Have a seat, Harvard," Renzulli instructed. "Or should I be calling you numb nuts, cause that's what you are."

"Thanks a lot," Jamie replied. "You know, I don't need this kind of crap right now. The dog peed in my shoe this morning even though he doesn't pee any place else but the paper or outside and I had a huge fight with Eddie so…"

"Park it," Renzulli ordered. "This is about Eddie so listen to what I have to say."

Jamie sat down. "If I don't talk to you at the very least, my ass is going to be sleeping on a park bench cause my missus is all riled up after she talked to Eddie last night. Marie's got it in her head, and she usually ain't wrong, that you are so upset about this Steven guy because you think Eddie slept with him to punish you for Joey. Believe that nonsense?"

Renzulli could tell right away his tactic was working. Jamie was listening and he was thinking, even if he was wasn't ready to agree yet.

"Yeah, that's nonsense all right," Jamie replied. "I'm angry about Steven because she slept with him and that was something that was supposed to be sacred between us as husband and wife."

Renzulli nodded, "You have me there, but wasn't it just a stupid mistake that had a huge consequence? It wasn't like she set out to hurt you, she was just hurting herself and it happened. Sometimes things just happen."

"If your goal here is to get me to say that Joey's dying just happened and Eddie's affair just happened like an act of God, I won't do that," Jamie replied. "My son is dead because of me."

"No," Renzulli replied. "Your little boy is dead because of the person that pulled the trigger. That who's wrong here, the thug that shot at a car full of kids. What you did was stupid, because you knew Danny was in over his head, but this wasn't your fault. It's the shooter's fault and the sooner you realize that and forgive yourself, the sooner you can forgive Eddie and move on."

Jamie wasn't ready to hear that, not yet. "I can't forgive her, I know it wasn't on purpose, but it made a bad situation worse, and I can't forgive myself either…not for my son and not for pushing Eddie so far she had to find solace with another man. I can't yet, I just can't."

Renzulli left Jamie a half hour later, feeling a little more secure in the face that he got through. Jamie took a long breath, "I'll try harder," was his promise.

When he got home that night, Eddie was packing the living room. After their dinner and tour with the Sheriff next week, things would rapidly accelerate and they would leave this apartment and hopefully the bad memories behind for good.

"Hey, you need some help?" Jamie asked. "You've packed almost all of this yourself."

"I know," Eddie replied. "I told you that was going to be my focus. Oh, I called Milton S. Hershey hospital and they can meet with us on Thursday before the Sheriff's meeting, I thought you'd want to be involved in that part of things."

"Oh yeah, of course," Jamie replied. "I want to make sure we chose correctly, I think we did."

Eddie nodded, "Good, that's all settled then too. Is it settled with your father to babysit and dog sit?"

"Yeah, he's excited to have the dog but I haven't had the nerve to tell him it's name just yet." Cupcake came over and greeted Jamie with a nudge. "Did you find your papers?"

"I washed your slippers and yes, he was good all day," Eddie replied. "He got excited because you usually take him to walk with you I think."

Jamie scratched the dog's ears, "Yeah, I know he's still a puppy, I know old men that can't hold their bladder when they get too excited."

Jamie surprised her then and placed a soft kiss on her temple, "Thank you for working so hard to make this happen for our family."

Eddie sighed, "I made the same deal you did, so let's get through the next five months and see but this…this is not going to work, not like this."

She got up and headed for her bedroom, Jamie wanted to follow, but that wall was still so tall he wasn't sure how to get his head over it anymore. He had spent so much time and energy fortifying that wall that he had built he wasn't sure how to start tearing it down.

Jamie had a thought, he needed to remember how and why he fell in love with Eddie in the first place. If things were truly going to be like a rebirth he had to recapture that feeling and help her to do the same, it was there for him the first time he realized she belonged to him. Eddie was his soulmate.