ELEVEN

On the last Sunday in November Kate sat in her apartment as tears fell down her cheeks at even intervals. She had not moved or spoken since the phone call she made just after she arrived home. She had simply curled up on her couch with her feet tucked under her and a blanket draped over her lap and waited for her friend to arrive. Maybe she shouldn't have called him—it was the last day of a holiday weekend and she knew he had been busy working until the wee hours of that morning, but the fact of the matter was she wanted to call him, especially after the weekend she'd had.

She heard a knock at her door, but did not move to get up; she had provided him a key before leaving on her admittedly brief holiday weekend trip in case anything had come up. Nothing had until she called and asked if he would come over, and it appeared he was merely knocking to announce his arrival, because a moment later she heard the key grind in the lock.

"Kate? Sorry I tried to get her as fast as I could but I missed the train and had to wait for—what's wrong?" He asked immediately when his eyes met hers. He dropped down on the couch beside her and asked, "Did something happen to your dad?"

She sniffed and reached for another tissue to add to the crumpled collection beside her. "No, no; he's fine."

"Did you have an argument? Or did something else happen?"

She shook her head. "No, nothing happened…not recently, anyway. It was just…being there around the pictures and memories of my mom."

Maybe it had been a terrible decision to go to the cabin for Thanksgiving, but her father had been so positive about it she did not want to shut him down. He went there far more often than she so he was used to it: the photographs and memories. As the weekend wore on, she became completely overwhelmed by them and it was all she could do not to break down, but she couldn't—not in front of her father. She had to wait until she was safely in her apartment and then it all came spilling out.

"I wanted to talk about her if—if you wanted to listen."

He smiled at her his gentle, warm smile that made her feel safe—like she mattered. "Of course, Kate. I'd be happy to listen. What do you want to tell me about her?"

She shrugged and wiped beneath her eyes with a tissue. "I don't know where to start."

"Well, how about with what she did? Was she a professor like your dad?"

Kate shook her head. "No, but they worked together. They were both lawyers at a big firm. According to them, Dad had a crush on her forever, but she was oblivious and too focused on her work. They got together eventually, though. Obviously." She added with a gentler tone.

"She, um, she eventually quit that firm and started her own—a non-profit meant to give a voice to those who had been victimized by the legal system; to those who hadn't had a fair chance. She'd only been doing it a few years before she was killed."

After dropping her used up tissue to the ground Kate reached for another and sniffled into it for several moments before looking up to him. "I think I told you I was nineteen when she died?" He nodded in confirmation. "It was January, just a few weeks after Christmas. I went to Stanford in California, but I was still home on break. We were supposed to meet for dinner—her, my dad, and I. She never showed. When my dad and I got back to the apartment there was a detective waiting for us."

"What happened?" he asked cautiously.

"She was s-stabbed," she said, her voice breaking on the word. "Left to bleed to death in an alley. She still had her wallet and her jewelry. They never found her killer; the police attributed it to a random, wayward event. She was just in the wrong place at the wrong time."

She felt his hand skim down her back when she reached for another tissue only to realize it was the last one in the box. "Want me to go buy you more?" he asked quickly, standing even before she could respond.

"No, no; there's another box in my bedroom—bedside table just inside the door." She gestured with the tissue towards the door to their left. He disappeared and returned a minute later with the pale blue square box. She thanked him.

"Did the police ever have any suspects?"

"No. I'd like to think they tried, but I'm honestly not sure; it was in an area of town known for gang violence at the time."

"But then…why was she there?"

Kate let out a breathy sound. God, how many times had she asked herself that same question? Countless. Sadly, it always came back to the same answer. "We don't know; we never figured it out."

"I'm sorry."

She shook off his apology before continuing her story. "It was so strange because…in an instant my whole life had changed. Just like that." She snapped her fingers. "I was living one life and then suddenly it just…took a sharp left turn and everything was different."

"I know that feeling." He commented wryly.

Her bloodshot eyes widened in his direction. "I didn't mean to-"

"I know." He closed his hand over her forearm. "It's okay; I shouldn't have interrupted you. Keep going."

She closed her eyes momentarily, remembering the bleak place she had been in. "I had to go back to school and it was…dreadful. My friends didn't know what to say with me—they always looked at me with such pity. I ended up breaking up with the boyfriend I had at the time. Everything was slipping through my fingers—including the family I had left. My father he, ah, turned to drinking to cope with the loss."

"Oh Kate." Rick exhaled, squeezing her forearm a bit harder.

"As soon as I saw how hard he was taking it, I decided to transfer to a school back home; I couldn't be that far away from him. I spent the summer evenings searching for him at every bar within walking distance of our place and hauling him home, drunken and stumbling. It was then I just shut down. Instead of healing up, I callused over and built a wall around my heart. My mother's death was painful enough, but the way my father was kept hurting me again and again and I just…couldn't. I decided not to let anyone in anymore, because if I didn't let them in they couldn't hurt me."

Rick's face contorted into one bordering on agony. He shook his head gently as he looked at her. "You were…twenty years old?"

"Not even."

"And…and you've felt that way ever since? You've never met anyone who made you want to change?"

She shrugged, too consumed by her aching heart in that moment to realize how disheartened his tone seemed. "If I did, I never got close enough to find out. If ever I found myself drifting into that space with someone, I ended it."

"That sounds lonely." He concluded. "And that's coming from someone who knows lonely better than the back of his own hand."

She smiled gently for the first time since he arrived. "It wasn't that bad. For me, it was better than the alternative—all that heartbreak and pain…I just couldn't."

He grunted and remained silent for a moment before asking, "How long did it take for your dad to get help?"

Her lips twisted wryly. "Which time? He picked himself up by October after his sister had some pretty stern words with him and tried to quit cold turkey. He did well for a while, then he'd drift back, then he'd do well again…and drift back. So on it went until right after I graduated college and went to the police academy. He was really bad then, but he finally went to rehab and has been sober ever since."

"I'm glad to hear that—for both your sakes."

She nodded. "Yeah, no I'm really proud of him. Really, really proud. There were many times when he could have fallen off that wagon again, but he didn't."

"So then what part of this weekend upset you so much?"

A smile flickered on her face before she changed positions on the couch, turning to face him and sitting with her legs folded in front of her. "Do you remember that 5K we did and how you kind of tried to ask me out after?"

He let out a laugh of recognition and rolled his head back. "That feels like a lifetime ago."

"It's been seven months." She reminded him. "But I know what you mean."

How far had their relationship come in that time? Back then, she'd just thought he was a quirky guy who made a killer cup of coffee. Sure, he'd mentioned the kidnapping, but for all she knew at that point he was gone less than twenty-four hours. She could never have fathomed the horrors he had experienced, but she was indescribably glad that she had been able to get to know him—all of him—and help him even in a small way to blossom into the incredible man that sat beside her.

"I told you then that I wasn't able to date because I was so busy with work, but that wasn't exactly true. The truth is that I had been trying to look into my mother's case—to solve her murder—but I failed."

His brow wrinkled at he looked at her. "What do you mean failed?"

"I didn't find her killer; how else would you say that."

"That's not failing." He assured her. "You can only fail if you didn't try. From what I know about you, I'm certain you tried harder at this than anything before in your life. Just because you couldn't solve a cold case doesn't mean you failed."

"But I failed her—that's how it felt, anyway. I was able to get closure for so many other families, but I couldn't for myself." She shook her head bitterly. Even almost a year later the notion still bit harder at her soul than anything she'd ever experienced. "You're absolutely right – I did try harder at that than anything before. I looked into every possible lead. Re-interviewed her coworkers, people she was affiliated with at the time. I thought it related to one of her cases, but those all seemed to be dead ends. I poured over her notes and files again and again. I dedicated my life to it for months until I realized it was slowly eating away at my life—eating away at me. I had to let it go, and it was the hardest thing I ever did in my entire life."

Rick reached out and picked up her hand in his. "When was that?"

"January; seven years after her death." She sniffed back a new batch of tears before continuing. "I knew I had to let it go, but it was such a strong draw for me. I thought for months if I just looked at it one more time then maybe I'd see it: the key that opened Pandora's Box, but it's not there. I know that now. That's what I was trying to accept when you asked me out. I had to put that case behind me for good or it wouldn't have been fair."

"And," he began tentatively, "have you done that now?"

She nodded. "I had…until being around her things for three days reminded me what a wonderful person she was and how shitty it is that whoever killed her still gets to walk around free."

"It is shitty. It's terribly shitty. It's shitty for you. It's shitty for the other victim's families whose cases also went unsolved, but Kate you can't fix the world. You do a damn good job of trying—a damn good one. You're incredible at what you do, truly, but you can't solve every case and you have to let go of the ones you can't. I understand how hard it is to let go of something that's a part of you like that, but you have to try."

"I know." She nodded. "I know that and I will get back to that place where I want to be—that place where I can be in a relationship with someone."

He sat up a bit straighter and looked at her with intense curiosity. "A real relationship? One where you're open and not walled off?"

She hummed and brushed her thumb over the back of the hand holding hers. "Yeah; I think I'm almost ready for that, too."

"Well I…" He swallowed noticeably and then cleared his throat. "I'm glad to hear that; you deserve it."

"Thanks," she said, dipping her chin. She hoped, though was not entirely sure, that he caught her implication—that he was the only man she could even fathom being with in that way. He was the man she'd chosen to open herself up to, to tell all her dark secrets to, because he was the only one who could understand.

She knew she probably shouldn't have—that with his atypical past when it came to relationships it might confuse him or mislead him in some way, but she just couldn't help herself from doing it anyway. After mopping her cheeks one last time, she fell forward and rested her head against his shoulder, snuggling her body against his. He responded by looping his arms around her and holding her tight without saying a word.

"Thanks again for coming over."

"Of course. Would you like me to stay the night?"

She should have said no, but it felt so nice not to be alone—almost as though the wounds on her heart were already beginning to heal. "That would be nice, but only if you want."

"Of course, Kate." He promised. "I'll stay as long as you want."