Hello again! I was gonna update last Monday but then I had to go to Reykjavík and I wanted to keep my Monday-update-habit so I waited a week…

whitetigers, thunderknight, FrankMustGetHurtSomehow and Jolly001: thank you all so much for reviewing last chapter!

Slippery Brink

Gertrude couldn't help but grumble. -Not that she didn't also mourn for Laura. She had been a good woman and it was perfectly understandable that Fenton was upset. But in her personal opinion, he needed to get a grip.

She sighed and put the grocery bags down on the porch while she searched for the keys in her pockets.

She gasped when the door burst open and Fenton came striding through it.

"Where are you going?" she demanded.

She didn't get any answer. But she did notice the pistol in the holster that was attached to his belt as his jacket blew open from the air his haste was causing.

Gertrude rushed into the house, quickly found the cordless phone and dialed Sam Radley.

"Radley here."

-"Hello, Sam, it's Gertrude. Something odd is going on with Fenton, he just left the house and he seemed… I don't know, homicidal?"

-"What do you mean?"

-"He just had that… expression."

-"Know where he went?"

-"No. He was headed towards Maple Street, though."

-"Oh, of course. We keep an emergency car there."

-"Oh. Then he probably went to get it because the boys have his car."

-"Do you have any idea at all what he might have needed it for?"

-"No, I don't… Unless… Hold on a minute, Sam."

Sam waited and heard a rumble through the phone and then muffled voices. Then Gertrude's voice came back.

"Sam, I know where he went."

XOXOXOX

Sam sped up the highway. Outside the city limits in the south there was a large area with facilities for all kinds of outdoor sports; hiking, golf, kayak paddling amongst.

Sometime, decades –maybe centuries –ago, there had been farms around the area and there were old roads –or more correctly: traces of roads –that led to a small lake. -A place that often attracted young couples. This was a very remote place in winters and hard to get to.

Sam saw that two cars had gone down the side road. The trail disappeared into the trees that surrounded the area.

He decided not to drive to the end of road which was by the lake but only into the forest, thinking about the advantage he had on foot; it was harder to see and hear him.

He got his handgun from the glove compartment, loaded it, stepped out of the car and looked around.

It was very quiet. Once in a while the smallest tree branches gave in to the weight of the snow on top of them and the snow fell to the ground with a little qwish-sound. The frost dry gravel gave a crunch sound when walked on so Sam tried not to walk on the footpaths. With the weapon ready, he crept further down the road until he came to the lake.

He hid behind a tree and saw Fenton pacing back and forth on the waterside. He pondered his options; go and get Fenton now? Or wait until this self-proclaimed murderer appeared? Or possibly call the police? No, there wasn't time for that.

Sam looked up the tree trunk; he could maybe climb up there for a better view over the place and a better aim because he was quite sure that it would end with something getting shot.

It was so obviously a trap and normally such a skilful detective as Fenton –or a lesser one for that matter –never would have thrown himself into it headfirst like that.

Not that Sam wouldn't throw all reason overboard and jump at the first chance to blame it on somebody if something happened to his own wife, Ethel.

He shook his head so he wouldn't loose his focus.

"You came."

Sam was startled by the voice and tried to keep a low profile behind the tree and hoped there was only one opponent to deal with.

"Who are you?" Sam heard Fenton say with a boiling rage beneath the calm voice.

"Does it matter?" Sam ventured to take a peek from the cover of the tree to see the speaker. It was a tall and muscular man, he was bald with a long and skewed hawk nose, like it had been broken a few times.

"Have we met before?" Fenton asked.

-"Maybe."

'He's stalling,' Sam realized. A "practical killer" would have shot Fenton from distance but this guy was up to something. Sam didn't really want to find out what.

"Tell me then, if you murdered my wife; how?" Fenton's voice was starting to get less controlled.

"It was simple. I followed her from New York, ran her car off the road. Ok, she wasn't supposed to die, I was going to hold her for ransom but you know how that turned out. But it's a bonus, to see you, up close, like that; like a ghost…"

'Pathetic liar,' Sam could just tell how this made no sense, having read the police report thoroughly. He wondered how he could get behind him, moving was a big risk but from where he was standing he'd risk shooting Fenton if he fired now.

"Then what do you want now?" Fenton asked.

-"World peace, of course! How about you? What do you want, Hardy?"

-"I want you to cut this crap and tell me what the hell you're up to?"

-"Honestly? Well, I was expecting you to shoot me right away. Why haven't you?"

Sam now understood the trap. He'd seen it before; it was ridiculous, so very very incredibly ugly that it was mad… Or brilliant, depending on which bank of the river you stood on…

The man continued. "You know, I didn't see it very clearly, but I think she was still alive when I left… must have been painful; too feel the life leave you slowly…"

As expected, that was when Fenton's composure vanished and suddenly the man lay on the ground, spitting out blood and front teeth.

Sam hurried out of his hiding spot. "Fenton, stop it!"

He grabbed the fist in the air and forced it down with all his strength. "Stop! Listen to me, he didn't do it!"

Fenton tore himself free and stared at his friend in disbelief. "Are you defending him?"

-"No, I'm not, he can go to hell for all I care," Sam looked disgustedly at the thug –who was trying to rise to his knees while coughing up blood –before knocking him out with his gun. "But he didn't kill Laura…"

Fenton winced at hearing her name and Sam said more softly: "Somebody must have hired him, just to show up here and have you beat the crap out of him, possibly kill him," he sighed angrily, "Damn it, I should have seen this coming. Of course they'll all be trying to push you over the edge. There are probably witnesses somewhere around here that have been paid to tell the police that you attacked him out of nowhere or something, who knows? -And then what? -Prison? You wouldn't last five minutes. The point is: Nobody killed Laura; she died. She's gone and there's nothing you can do about it except maybe try and go on living. Think about the boys, Fenton, they need you."

Fenton had gone downcast and shameful under Sam's speech.

"You're right, I'll try to stay levelheaded."

"That's good. Now I'm going to call Collig and I'll wait for them to pick up this one here," Sam pointed towards the unconscious man, "And you should go home. Are we clear?"

-"Yeah."

XOXOXOX

He was absent minded while driving back but he safely made it into the city. Then he noticed that he was running low on fuel. He gave blinkers to the right and turned, knowing about a gas station nearby.

He filled the fuel tank and paid through an automat.

"Good afternoon, Hardy," Fenton turned around to see an enormous man with short blond hair come out of the gas station, smiling at him.

"'Afternoon, Hooper, how are you doing?"

He didn't really know Michael Hooper but they always sat together when they attended a football game where they cheered for their sons.

"Been better, but not that I'm complaining. I mean, what with your situation and all…oh, that was terribly tactless of me, I'm sorry," Mr. Hooper said, mentally kicking himself.

"No, it's ok, don't worry about it" Fenton smiled weakly.

-"You look like you've been trying to wrestle with a ghost; you on a tough case?"

-"No, not really, it's just been a tough day."

Mr. Hooper shook his head sympathetically. "I think we could use a drink. I was headed for the pub if you want to join me…"

Fenton hesitated for barely two seconds. And that was how this whole self-infliction began.

XOXOXOX

The teens crowded in the farmhouse's living room. Biff jumped back-first on a red grain sack in front of the TV; Chet found a CD which he put into the stereo while munching a muffin, Iola and Callie sat on the sofa, chatting about cosmetics, Frank sat on the arm of the sofa and toyed with Callie's hair and Joe found a GameBoy on the shelf next to the CDs and started to play it.

It was a nice, sort of fuzzy, weekend laziness feeling. Then the phone had to go and ruin the atmosphere by ringing.

"Mom!" the siblings both called but Kimberly had either gone upstairs or outside because she didn't answer.

Chet looked at Iola. "Are you gonna get that?"

Iola eyed him thoughtfully before making her proposition. "Swap chores with me tonight."

-"What? Taking out the trash instead of loading the dishwasher? Deal."

Iola hurriedly got up and ran into the hallway to pick up the phone. "Hello? –Iola Morton. -Uh-huh. –Oh…yeah, sure." She stuck her head into the living room. "Frank or Joe? Mr. Radley wants to talk to either of you."

Joe was closer so he stood up and took the call. They talked for a few minutes. Frank forced himself to stand up and walk over to his brother and try to follow the conversation. Joe frowned when he hung up.

"What was that?" Frank asked.

"Someone tried to set dad up by saying he had…killed mom," Joe answered in a low voice.

Frank's eyes flashed in anger. "And?"

-"It's ok. Sam got to him before anything really happened, he sent him home. He just wanted to let us know that he might be…disoriented or something when we came home."

-"Should we go check on him?"

-"I don't know. Maybe we should just give him a moment to recover…"

They agreed on that though neither admitted why; being around Fenton always brought up memories of their mother because he so obviously never once stopped thinking about her.

Frank went back into the living room but before Joe could follow, Iola grabbed his hand and pulled him further down the hallway.

"Is everything ok?" she asked.

He nodded. "Yeah, sure, it's fine."

He cleared his throat loudly to keep the awkward silence from enclosing them. He failed. She stood there looking at him with her large eyes and her lips were forming a little thoughtful pout. Should he kiss her? He couldn't deny he wanted to…

"So, what are we?" she suddenly asked.

He was taken aback. "What? What do you mean?"

-"I mean, we were great friends when we were little. U.F.A.B.B.; United in the Fight Against Big Brothers, remember? Then you went to high school and totally started to ignore me…"

-"Iola…"

-"And then I went to high school and you're still ignoring me, am I not cool enough or something?"

-"No! No, that's not…No, you're way cool!"

She growled exasperatedly.

He sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. "Look, if you haven't noticed it already, I suck with the whole talking thing so… Can I rather do something to make this up to you?"

She crossed her arms and the pout on her lips became teasing instead of annoyed. "Keep talking."

Joe realized she was playing at something. He was not supposed to mess this up. "Um…" What could she be talking about? Then it struck him. He snapped his fingers. "Fabiana's party!"

Fabiana was their friend Tony's older sister and she was turning 18 next week and she'd be throwing a party next Friday.

The tease pout turned into a sly smile and he knew he was on the right track.

"So, you wanna go with me to Fabiana's party next weekend?" he asked coolly.

The tease pout came back. "I'll check my schedule," she replied and walked away.

Joe laughed to himself. "Oh, yeah. Score for me."

XOXOXOX

Heaven or Hell? He couldn't tell. –And didn't really care. Although the vomit was pushing its way up his esophagus and any minute now he might choke on his own swollen tongue, the numb sense of unreality was the perfect escape….

Yeah… with the direction I'm trying to pull this towards, it's not very easy to maintain excitement so… it just has to be this way…Please comment…