Chapter 6
"Treats, my pets!" House handed Foreman a mini-Mars bar. He went over to Cameron and gave her a Hershey's chocolate kiss hoping she wouldn't read too much into it and then he went back to the table where Chase was doing a crossword.
"Nothing for Chase?" Foreman asked as he opened his candy, after checking that it hadn't been tampered with.
Chase glanced up but when House just stared at him with a strange smile he went back to his newspaper.
"Here you go," House finally said, holding out a lollipop. "I figured I'd give the pencil you're chewing a break."
"Your compassion for inanimate objects is…disturbing," Chase said after he removed the pencil from his mouth.
"You saying you don't want this delicious cherry sucker?" House waved the candy side to side.
"No, I'm not saying that." Chase leaned forward to grab it. "Thank you." He quickly shucked the wrapper and began to work on the spherical treat.
House grinned and watched for a second as Chase held the candy between his thumb and index finger so that he could rotate it with ease. Oblivious to being watched he went about wetting the candy with multiple licks, moving his head to lick all around the sucker before ending the unintentional show and sucking it into his mouth. House blinked a few times, his smiled having vanished, then turned to go back to his office. The content if somewhat devious expression returned when he saw Cameron quickly look away from Chase's unwitting display. House couldn't force the return of a straight face no matter how hard he tried.
He was going to get Wilson good with this.
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"Dr. Chase." Wilson called to the man whose back was to the door. "You called me," Chase turned around, Wilson's statement trailed off as his eyes kept glancing down to the other man's lips.
"I didn't call anybody. I don't even have a patient."
Wilson had already forgotten what he'd said. "Oh. I…uh…must have read the….um…page…wrong." He retreated quickly, leaving a mildly confused Chase alone in the examine room where he was putting away some instruments.
"Would you like to share those naughty thoughts you just had?" House asked, suddenly coming around a corner.
"You paged me!" Wilson accused.
"Guilty as charged."
Wilson was speechless. His outrage and embarrassment had him gaping like a fish.
"Why would you do that?"
"You've known me for how long? Why wouldn't I do that?"
"Yes, I guess that would be a better question," Wilson responded irritably. He had known House for a while and this was no worse than the other stunts the man had pulled, most of them aimed directly at his sexuality or his numerous affairs (both pre- and extramarital). Now, though, House was doing it through Chase and with a malevolence that outweighed the jest.
"Now are you going to tell me what's going on?" He hoped that didn't sound as much like a jaded ex as he thought it sounded.
Wilson stopped walking. He didn't even know where he was going. He just had to escape. "What do you think? You…you…what did you do?" he asked gesturing back the way they came. This most recent event involving Chase was much easier to address than the undercurrent between the two of them that they'd both consciously chosen not to address directly.
"Oh, you mean the lovely shade of red my underling is sporting? Never underestimate the power of food-dye red number four. Now are you going to tell me what's going on between the two of you?"
"Let me think about it?" Wilson said sarcastically and then stormed away trying to get the image of Chase out of his head; the bright hair, lovely eyes and sinfully red lips.
Damn House!
H
Tragedy struck a little under two weeks later. Chase's temporary apprenticeship under Dr. Marlow was over and he was back full time with the diagnostics team. House had stopped giving him red suckers and Dr. Wilson had stopped stuttering. Life was getting back to normal and Zid was supposed to be back from his trip today.
Yes things were looking up. Chase should have known it wouldn't last.
They were all just hanging around in the diagnostics conference room when his cell phone rang. Chase went to his bag and answered it.
"Hello?"
From his office House could see Chase on the phone and he could see the change in his expression as he spoke to whoever was on the other side. This warranted closer eavesdropping. Cameron and Foreman must have thought so too because they were both quietly listening to the one-sided conversation as well.
"What happened?" Chase asked into the phone. "Wait. What things?" He ran a hand through his hair in anxiety. "No, wait! I don't understand. What happened? Just tell me!" Chase glanced up from the floor and became aware of the eyes on him and left still trying to coax answer from the conversation's other participant. Cameron and Foreman looked at each other with varying degrees of worry, confusion and curiosity. House's curiosity exceeded theirs and he followed Chase out the door. The intensivist ducked into a stairwell unaware that he was being tailed.
"Zid, please talk to me…" Chase begged stepping down a few stairs to the next platform.
House slipped silently into the stairwell –the ketamine treatment having made him better at sneaking around –and stepped to the far end of the landing where Chase wouldn't be able to see him if he turned around.
"Zinedine…Zid, listen to me. It doesn't matter." Chase bowed his head listening carefully to the reply. He brought a hand up to rub over his face. "Zid, please, just tell me where you are. I'll come right over."
House couldn't miss the desperation and tension in Chase's voice so it was a surprise when it all seemed to drain away for a few brief seconds.
"I know, Zid," Chase murmured. "I…I love you too."
House wondered what it cost him to admit that. He wondered if it was a lie, or an exaggeration. The way his free hand idly flicked the edge of this lab-coat, and the soft somewhat distant expression relaxing the younger man's face all pointed towards sincerity and House looked away for a moment.
The tension came back a second later swamping the serene emotion that had been there before. Something had been said and only Chase had heard it.
"Zid? What do you mean?"
House wanted to intervene here because he could see the growing panic in Chase's movements and his posture. This was rapidly heading south and it wasn't nearly as entertaining as a train wreck. He pushed away from the wall.
"Zinedine?…Sorry for what?…..Zid? Zid, talk to me please!…Zinedine!"
Chase pulled the phone away from his ear to check that he was still connected. As he brought it back a sharp sound was heard, a pop, which even from the small speaker of the cell phone's earpiece could be heard by House.
The sound froze Chase. Many seconds passed by and the tremors he'd suffered from after the poisoning returned due to his state of anxiety. He slowly moved the phone closer to him, staring down at the device as though it had all the answers. When he tried to speak, nothing came out. His throat felt tight and his mouth was suddenly dry. In contrast, cool sweat pricked his forehead and his palms were clammy.
"…Zid?" He managed little more than a squeak. He swallowed with difficulty and tried again. "Zinedine? Please answer." His voice was scratchy as though he'd been screaming at the top of his lungs. "…Zid…pick up…"
"Chase."
The blonde whipped around, startled by the call. He'd thought he was alone.
"Chase, give me the phone." Greg held out his hand for it but Chase stepped back and held it closer to his chest. His eyes held such confusion it was almost painful for House to see. "Chase-"
"No," he whispered. It may as well been a yell as it halted House in his approach and his words. Chase looked down at the phone, still connected. Zid was on the other side. He just had to find him. "I have to go," he said hurriedly and took off past House back to the diagnostics department.
Cameron and Foreman where surprised to see him back so soon and looking so jumpy. Chase quickly grabbed his bag and ran out before the other two doctors could say anything.
"Chase!" House's yell could be heard through many corridors and though Chase was not far away all he heard were Zinedine's last words.
"You should hate me but please don't."
H
Both House and Wilson put a great deal of effort into trying to contact Chase that evening. Alas, it was all to no avail. Wilson went home late that night, and though House stayed up later than usual trying to reach his youngest fellow, his messages got no response. Not even his fake page about a hospital emergency had worked. He went to bed vowing that if Chase didn't show up for work the next day he'd go to the other man's apartment and track him down.
As it was, House woke late and arrived in a similar fashion to the hospital. He marched as quickly as he could through the front foyer, past the clinic and Cuddy who was looking particularly unhappy that morning. The elevator took so long in arriving that he'd considered taking the stairs, and though they were no longer the nemesis they once were, he still truly hated stairs. He rounded the corner leading to his office and the playpen for his fellows and halted a few feet from the destination to which he'd been rushing.
They were all there –Foreman with his newspaper, Cameron at the computer and Chase at the table with a mug of coffee. House approached the outwardly normal situation with caution. As he got close enough to accurately read their expression and gauge their moods he noticed the less than subtle glances thrown often in the direction of the still and silent Chase.
House dropped his bag in his office before walking into the strangely charged conference room. None of them looked over to him right away. Cameron eventually cast him a worried look then looked back to Chase. Foreman glanced at him then hid behind his newspaper as if expecting House to do or say something that would set things off –the proverbial House-brand match in the powder keg.
"Foreman, clinic duty. Go. Cameron, you too," House ordered with the quiet force equal to the great dictators. Slowly the two complied, assuming that one of them was supposed to sign in under his name. Chase began to get up too but House stopped him with his words. "Chase, what happened?"
"Why do you care?"
House shrugged in feigned nonchalance and sat down across from him. "I don't but tell me anyway." Chase didn't say anything. "Or I can try to guess." Chase's eyes narrowed as some dangerous emotion built up behind his eyes. "He-"
"He's dead," came the low statement. "Bought a gun…and one shot to the heart."
House dropped his head forward a little. "Sorry," he said looking at the floor and glancing up after a second.
"Yeah, me too." The accent was thicker and the words deeper. He swallowed back something and spoke again in a voice he tried valiantly to make sound normal. "I'm not going to kill someone." The reference to Kayla, the woman he'd misdiagnosed after his father's death was harsh. Even House hadn't been sure whether he'd bring that up.
"Well, now that that's out of the way," he said lightly, "on to the hard stuff." His voice dropped in timber as he told Chase, "This wasn't-"
"Wasn't my fault?" Chase interrupted again. The flash of annoyance on House's face didn't faze the Australian. "Of course not. Why would I expect him to come and at least talk to me face to face before he blew himself away? Why wonder whether I could have saved him if he had?" His voice was too cool and his affect muted. A bitter laugh was the most emotion House saw from him. "Why…" he looked away and bit his lip for a second. "Why waste my time?"
House had never been good at comforting. So why did he put himself in this situation? Maybe he was a little worried. Chase needed to vent and as well as House could give abuse, he could take it too.
"Chase, go home."
Chase did that laugh again, the dead and bitter one that House was really beginning to hate. "Home to what?" he asked miserably.
House wanted to slap him, shake him hard and just yell at him not to fall to this. He recognized too much Chase's tone and knew vaguely the sense of loss that must have been suffocating him. He didn't want Chase to just let go. He was already hanging on by just a thread, probably had been since his mother died. House didn't want this to be the final blow. He didn't want Chase to end up like him, a shadow of a person, wandering the land of those who truly and wholly lived and watching it all pass him by, unwilling to try again.
Ignorant of House's tormented thoughts Chase got up and retrieved his bag.
"Don't go to any bars," House warned softly as he watched Chase leave.
"I know whose son I am," Chase said without turning around. He was well aware of the possible predisposition towards alcoholism he may have, the possibility he'd gotten more than his looks from his mother.
Chase paused at the glass door then left without saying anything more and House let him.
"How is he?" Wilson asked as he walked in once Chase was out of sight.
Greg leaned back in his chair and tapped the table. "Depressed and distracted." Same way he was when Rowan Chase died. He gave the table a few more taps before walking out of the room. "Gotta go check on the serfs."
"Of course, sire." Wilson walked back to his office.
He and House had come to the correct conclusion yesterday when they were looking for Chase. House's candid description of the pop he'd heard from the phone and the conversation preceding it had them both thinking self-inflicted gunshot. Even after confirmation House didn't seem outwardly concerned, probably because he was counting on Wilson's concern to take care of the problem. And while he didn't want to be predictable James couldn't change who he was.
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"It's open," came a soft accented voice after the two knocks on the wood. Dr. Wilson slowly opened the door and poked his head in. The greeting in his throat died on his lips as he saw Chase. James stared sadly for a moment, wondering if he should leave. He closed the door, the hush returned.
Basking in the midst of the silence and stillness Chase sat half on the windowsill, one leg raised with his bare foot on the ledge. A striped button-up shirt hung loosely from his shoulders, the sleeves reaching his knuckles and the bottom reaching past his mid thigh. The thin shirt wasn't done up leaving parts of him exposed to the chill drifting through the apartment. Eyes fixed to the dark outside, thousands of faint lights dotted the dark canvas of the clear night. His thoughts had taken him just as far away as some of those stars and the vast empty cold between them. He let himself drift, riding the currents of desolation, hoping they would soon take him somewhere that he could be free from it.
"Robert," his name from the ghost in the darkness. He turned to real person, away from the reflection in the glass. "I'm sorry."
Rob nodded. "You don't have to be here," he said quietly, barely disturbing the peace. The old and worn hardwood floor drew his attention for a moment then he looked back outside.
"You need somebody here."
The eyes in the reflection caught him. The hand on the base of his neck wasn't a surprise –he'd seen Wilson move to touch him in the glass. Gentle insistence in the touch had him moving from his perch to the couch. He faced forward and drew his knees to his chest. The shirt draped around him.
James sat next to him, close to him. He wasn't sure what to say. All the training and lessons about death that he'd received in med-school and all his experiences with comforting distraught relatives seemed to have fled, leaving him unarmed.
"His shirt?" James asked eyeing the item that was clearly too big for the man next to him. He looked like a little boy who'd raided his father's closet, a very sad little boy.
Rob nodded to the oncologist's question. "I guess it's a little too big." He raised one arm judging the excessive length before wrapping it around his knees again. "He left it here a while ago. I just…put it on."
"It's a nice colour," James said.
"Yeah, he has a better sense fashion than me…had a better sense of fashion." Rob rested his forehead on his knees, letting his hair fall forward as a shield from sight.
Wilson wouldn't let him hide. He brushed a hand through the soft strands, tenderly pulling back the curtain of light hair. "You'll be okay," he assured. On a whim he pulled Chase towards him, the younger man unfolding from his position before wrapping his arms around the other doctor and resting his head on his chest. With his ear pressed against Wilson's chest he could hear the dull rhythm of a heartbeat.
He felt the shuddered breath leave Wilson and clutched on a little tighter. He knew how Wilson felt about him. He'd made that pretty clear a few months ago but at the time he'd been with René and the incident had left him a little shaken due to his guest's state of inebriation. Since then they'd been nothing but friends.
Right now, he didn't want to think. Not about how this may make things more complicated and not about how wrong it was to be this close to someone who was in lust with him. It was just that letting go, being alone, was too hard. Only tonight, Rob thought to himself. Then he could be alone, he was used to it after all. Or he'd become used to it again.
"It's okay to cry," James murmured in to the soft hair just beneath his chin.
Rob nodded weakly . "I know."
Zinedine deserved his tears. So had his mother and so had his father but they hadn't come then either. He was sure there was something wrong with that. When you lose someone you love, you're supposed to cry. He couldn't explain why his tears never came.
His eyes were shiny with wetness that wouldn't flow over his lower lashes. There just wasn't enough to let them fall. He wasn't trying to hold them back. They just didn't want to come and he wasn't quite histrionic enough to force them.
"I'd like to cry for him," Rob said softly, too softly for James to make out. "I don't know why I can't."
Wilson leaned in to the corner of the couch where the back and armrest met. He held Chase close to him with an arm over his shoulders. The hand grasping James' shirt loosened when Wilson's free hand settled over it. He trailed his other hand up and down Chase's side and back relaxing the tension from the muscles. Every so often he let his hand drift further up to card through light-coloured hair, moving it futilely away from the face he couldn't see from his angle only to have it fall back down again when the locks slipped from his fingers. James continued his massage even after Rob fell asleep. Maybe he'd convinced himself that he could keep the demons away from the upset man's dreams or maybe it was that he couldn't give the touch up yet.
Zinedine's shirt, the one Chase wore, was thin. It didn't even mask the warmth of Chase's skin underneath or the slight shifting and bunching of muscles when he moved. Wilson traced the back of his fingers up and down the valley at the small of his sleeping friend's back, barely able to keep his touch from slipping under the edge of the Chase's dark pants which sitting loosely around his hips. He forgave himself for the brief occasions of weakness when his fingers brushed against the back of Chase's pants or over the rise of supple flesh concealed underneath.
Staring up at the ceiling he asked any divine entity in the neighbourhood for guidance, for answers, for strength. He'd been unable to ask Chase for the details of Zinedine's death. Chase didn't seem ready for that sort of discussion yet and Wilson wasn't ready to hear it yet. So he sat there giving as much generic comfort as he could.
Chase woke early the next morning from a fitful slumber. The living pillow he'd been resting against the night before was gone. He surmised that Wilson left some time during the night. He had his own home to go back to after all.
From the window bright, early morning sunlight entered his apartment, painting the opposite wall in bright and shadows from the objects interrupting the beams. Rob stared for a moment at the brightness and shook his head as he turned away, his hands bunching into tight fists.
It was always felt strange, the new morning. No matter the catastrophe no matter the loss, the world went on as though nothing had changed. Indeed for most nothing had. For him and a few others though, a dear friend had been lost and they were the only ones who would mourn. Other people got up went to work. Kids went to school. The earth turned. It was infuriating at first and at late, comforting. Day by day, he would find a way to pick up and survive, each sunrise pushing him back to normal even if he went along with a once again empty heart.
"You didn't have to come in," House said as Chase walked into his office.
Chase didn't respond to the comment. "I need Friday morning off. Funeral."
House nodded, unwilling for the moment to play around with this issue. Maybe later. "Well I guess the other two will have to do without us that day."
"Where are you going to be?"
"District Attorney's office. They want my opinion on what I think a suitable punishment for Moriarty is." House spun his chair ninety degrees while he looked up at the ceiling in thought. "Red-hot poker to the groin should cover it. Don't you think?"
Chase winced mildly at the thought, unable to conjure the repulsion such a suggestion deserved. "You don't want to know what I think," he said as he went to the conference table. He pulled out his newspaper from his bag and began on the crossword.
A few minutes later Foreman and then Cameron arrived to the normal scene of Chase masticating a writing tool and House just being a tool playing his video game. The tension that had been flowing off Chase in waves yesterday was gone. He still seemed a little prickly, as though the picture of normalcy he was portraying didn't jive entirely with his internal state. They too had assumed it had something to do with René though they wisely refrained from asking. Chase had never been one for sharing his personal life with others. Tragedy wasn't going to make him start now.
Friday rolled around with Chase going to Zinedine's funeral and House to his meeting with some assistant DA's. Chase returned first, changing out of his black suit at home and then going straight to PPTH. The funeral had been sad and depressing, like most funerals. When other friends and family were sharing stories of their lost friend and loved one with the other mourners, he had remained quiet. Many of the family members, cousins, aunts and uncles, didn't even know Zid had an interest in men. He figured they didn't need to know.
"Hey, Chase. You okay?" Cameron asked when he walked in. He gave her a weak smile and a nod. She had no choice but to accept both knowing better than to try and force any information from him.
"When's House going to be back?" Chase asked to deflect attention from his absence.
"No idea. Foreman went to consult on another case, which just leaves you and I."
Cameron was on her laptop at the small desk in the corner of the conference room. She was reviewing medical journals for interesting cases. Chase had a different method for passing the time. He went to the computer at House's desk and began playing Sudoku –nothing like cold, unfeeling numbers to ease a mind in turmoil. After he completed the first game rather quickly he spared a thought to wonder how exactly House's meeting was going.
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"How do I put this lightly? You're not exactly the most heart-wrenching victim." The woman in her suit crossed her arms and looked down at the last victim seeking justice.
"So what? I need to be a Care Bear before you can get a conviction?"
David Spencer removed his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose. The officers on the shooting case had warned him about Dr. Greg House but he'd just thought they were being overly sensitive. Nobody could possibly be that abrasive, that rude.
"Maybe you should find another line of work. I saw this lovely establishment on my way here. It's called Hooters. Perhaps you've heard of it?"
Spencer watched the other Assistant District Attorney, Marla Rogers. Her eyes got unimaginably wide, the colour in on here cheeks rose, drowning out the delicate rouge that she'd painted on at the beginning of her day.
"Y'know what? You deserved to get shot!"
House looked to the exasperated ADA Spencer. "This is reason free from emotion? Aristotle must be spinning in his grave."
Spencer sighed. "Dr. House, what my partner means is that we have to refute the defence's argument."
"So you can shoot people as long as you hire the debate champion?"
"Lieder is no debate champion," Rogers scoffed, clearly she didn't have a very high opinion of this man either. "But if this goes to trial they're going to go for an affirmative defence. And considering the victim," her dark eyes slid towards House, "they might have a chance."
"We're looking to offer a deal." Spencer watched carefully for a reaction from Dr. House. "Aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, he serves at least five years."
"How long is the max?"
"Ten years. Is that alright with you?"
"It'll have to be won't it? Considering the victim," he said, looking at Rogers. He got up and left a moment later.
"Make the offer to Leider. And try not to offend him in the same sentence."
Rogers shrugged and walked away. "No promises."
H
Trenton State Prison was a maximum-security facility to house the worst criminal offenders. Rapist and murders called this place home for the duration of their sentences. For some that would be for the rest of their lives. It was where Jack Moriarty found himself between trips to the courthouse. The judge at his arraignment had quickly remanded him to the prison when the prosecution brought up his initial escape attempt at the hospital after he'd shot that bastard.
He wasn't sure if it was worth it now, but he couldn't take it back. Didn't really want to take it back, he just didn't want to be here.
"Hey, fuck off!"
Moriarty shook his head, hardly believing his life had come to this. Up and down the tier of his cell block and from the tiers above and below, he heard the crass conversations of the worst of society. He'd learnt to stay below the radar, joining the ranks of the unaligned inmates, mostly old men who wanted nothing but to serve their time in peace.
"You don't look like a killer," a deep voice said from the open doorway of the cell. Moriarty stared disinterestedly at the intruder. All the cells were open, leaving the inmates to mix and mingle. Moriarty preferred it when the doors were locked shut –all the animals in their cages.
"What do you want?" he asked, trying not to sound anything but neutral. Though he hadn't been here long he'd learnt who the leaders of the various packs were. The man currently darkening his doorway was one of them. Rumoured to have connection with the Massucci's, Antony Yarrow was a dangerous man. He'd been convicted of several counts of money laundering and some other pretty white collar stuff but that was only because the DA hadn't been able to make the string of murders stick to him. Even with the convictions it was only a set back for Yarrow and his business partners. The majority of his works were still well hidden from law enforcement. What the DA had on him barely scratched the surface.
"I have a proposition for you."
There was a long stretch where neither spoke. The sounds of the rest of the prison filled the silence that would have been. "What kind?" Moriarty asked, thinking that maybe he wouldn't have to spend the next five years of his life in this toilet. He was still considering the offer his lawyer had passed on to him. A man like Yarrow however probably had the pull to get his sentence shortened drastically.
"I can make your legal troubles go away," Yarrow began, his light brown eyes wide as he tried to put the wary man in front of him at ease. "All I need you to do is share some information about the man your cronies poisoned."
"You're mistaken. I haven't poisoned anybody." His denial was nonchalant even though his heart raced.
"Come now. I know about your attempt to kill that doctor; House. I know you screwed it up. Even at point blank range. I also know that a man like you doesn't give up. Your revenge is all you have." Yarrow let himself in and sat down on the lower bunk next to Moriarty. Moriarty was too busy trying to keep his apprehension from showing to worry about the physical presence of the powerful man next to him or his goons guarding the exit. "They botched it though. Got that boy instead. The way I see it it's a win-win situation if you give me what I want. You'll get access to my considerable resources and you'll get to torment the source of your misery."
Moriarty couldn't deny it sounded like a good deal. He'd been informed about how House had reacted when the poison meant for him ended up taking down one of his underlings. Though their access to the hospital was limited they'd found a way and passed the details on to him. The only way House's torment could have been worse was if the young man had died.
It seemed Yarrow was also somewhat informed about his business and Moriarty could not say for certain if that was a good or bad thing. What the mobster planned to do if he handed over the information gave him pause but he still considered the offer.
"You think about it," Yarrow said and stood to leave. "You could be very comfortable for the short time that you're stuck here."
Moriarty responded before he got to the door. "I don't need to think about it." Yarrow looked over his shoulder. "You've got a deal."
Yarrow nodded and left.
Moriarty sat back against the cool concrete wall dividing the cells and considered that he shouldn't be dragging another person into this mess between him and House. Hadn't enough people been destroyed because of that man? Tears welled in his eyes as he thought of what had been lost to him. His guilt over the decision he'd just made was drowned by the grief and anger. Dr. Chase and the others weren't his targets, didn't even know their names until recently except for Dr. Cameron. If he'd wanted to hurt them then he would have shot them when he shot House two months ago. However, if this was the only way he could hurt the craggy asshole and make him feel as badly as he did, then Jack would take it.
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Two weeks later, the second week of August and the moderately warm days were warning that summer would soon be coming to an end. The sweltering days of July and late June were now just memories of sweat and the joys of air conditioning. For those in PPTH it meant that vacation season was over and that the intermittent vanishing of hospital to play their summer sports or take family trips would be ending, bringing the hospital back to it usual state of fully yet somehow still understaffed.
"Doctor Robert Chase?"
Chase turned. "That's me." Two men approached and flashed their gold NJ detective badges at him. Chase put the patient file he'd been looking at back on the stack that took up a corner of the Nurse's station in the clinic. "Is this about Zinedine?" He'd been interviewed briefly by a couple of detectives about the events of René's suicide. Apparently it was just a routine investigation but the appearance of two of New Jersey's finest had Chase wondering if perhaps something else had been discovered. A reason would be nice because though he searched for weeks he could find nothing that gave this tragedy any sense. As close as Rob thought they were, looking into his boyfriend's life after his death proved to him that there was a great deal about Zid that he hadn't known and even more that he still did not.
The younger of the two officers, dark hair and pale skin, glanced at the older more experienced one before answering. "It might be connected –to him and to what happened to you before."
The mention of his poisoning threw him for a bit of a loop. He'd given up on ever finding out who was behind that after the lack of progress reported to him. Chase ushered them to an empty exam room so that they could talk more privately. They introduced themselves as Detectives Hank Morrison, the younger man, and Drew Freedman, the older, quiet one.
"Do you know, or know of Tina and Andrew Islington?"
Chase shook his head after a moment of thought. "If I saw them as patients it's more than likely I just don't remember." So many people came in and out of the clinic and the ICU that after a day or two they were wiped from his mind and replaced with more recent patients. Only particularly memorable cases stuck out.
"Have you received any threats or ominous messages in the past ten weeks?"
"No…what is this about?"
"Where were you the night of Thursday, May eighteenth?" Freedman asked suddenly, ignoring Chase's question.
"That was months ago." He glanced at the two. They waited for a response so Chase huffed and tried to recall. He went to the small calendar pinned to the wall and flipped back a few months. May 18 was a Thursday. "I'm not sure. Probably here or at home."
"Can anybody vouch for that?" Freedman again.
"Vouch for where I was when I'm not entirely sure myself?" Chase looked sceptically at them. "If I was at the hospital then I signed in. If I was at home then I was probably alone." He'd started dating René in early April but as busy as they both were they hadn't hung out during weekdays that much at the time. It wasn't until later that they gave the other a key to their respective dwellings to maximise the time they spent together. "Am I a suspect in some crime?" He crossed his arms. His initial welcome of these two had, with their questions evolved into wary mistrust. Chase knew he hadn't done anything and his mistrust further evolved into disbelief at the older detectives next words.
"I think we should continue this down at the station."
Shock lit the specialist's. "Am I under arrest?"
"Would you like to be?" Freedman pulled out a pair of shiny cuffs and twirled them around one finger.
They allowed the physician, their suspect, a brief visit to the diagnostics conference room to retrieve his belongings and hang up his lab coat. Foreman was the only person there. They interrupted his reading of a medical journal. Chase gave him a brief explanation, asking him to pass it on to House and Cuddy. Foreman had eyed the two detectives. Even from his seated position his expression looked down on them especially the older one. One part bully, one part hypocrite, he thought comparing them to the officers he ran into when he was a kid and the one he'd watched died of a brain eating parasite that he too had suffered from.
The younger detective seemed alright, a little green and still optimistic. The older one had lost all his optimism and probably his morals too, Foreman thought as he watched them leave. The look tossed back at him from Freedman didn't help settle the inkling of warning that had been building since he saw their badges. Once they were out of sight Foreman abandoned his journal and went in search of House.
H
"So, Doctor Robert Chase," Freedman said reading from a paper. "You're kinda young to be a doctor."
Chase glanced at the man across from him then to the one-way window beyond and responded absently. "Yeah, I get that a lot." He felt uncomfortable, a little on edge, which he surmised was the reason they built interrogation rooms like this. He knew there were people on the other side of the tinted glass. Just because he couldn't see them, didn't mean he couldn't feel their eyes on him.
"You're an intensivist. What exactly does that mean?"
Chase wasn't sure what aspect of the interrogation this was for. He answered anyway. "It mean's I'm an ICU specialist. I treat mostly critically ill patients."
"That must be tough."
Chase didn't respond. He didn't feel he had to since it wasn't a question and he didn't like this man.
Freedman, also tired of the good cop act went to something that was more familiar. He pulled out several crime scene photos and spread them out across the table. The images were gruesome, spatters of blood on the floors and walls, a couple staring with lifeless eyes and large exit wounds bloodying their backs and floor on which they had lain.
Chase glanced at the images and then back to Freedman waiting for whatever was to come next.
"You don't seem to mind," the detective commented with narrowed eyes.
"I've seen similar in real life. I suppose I'm a little desensitized." He didn't look back at the images. They were disturbing but he wasn't about to puke or anything so dramatic. If he could watch a man's sternum being sawed in two and then the ribcage being forced open exposing all the protected internal organs, then he could handle the crime scene photos.
"You suppose? Or maybe you've just seen them before." He slid two smaller drivers licence photos to Chase's side of the table. "Tina and Andrew Islington. Good, decent people. Not a spot of bad credit. Worst thing in either of their records were parking violations." Freedman eyed Chase and waited.
Chase shifted uncomfortably in the silence. What did the detective want him to say? He didn't know these people and had nothing to do with this crime. He didn't have anything to say except, "I didn't do this. I don't own a gun and I've never seen these people before."
"I think you're a liar. I mean you're already a coward and a screw up."
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"Well the way I see it Doctor Cameron is the pretty and compassionate one, Doctor Foreman is the smart one, which just leaves the one that makes them look even better by comparison, professionally anyway. You know what I mean." Freedman smiled harshly at him. "According to my research you're the only one to have killed a patient. What was her name again? Kathrine?"
"Kayla! And I didn't kill her! I made a mistake…"
"An error in judgement that cost her life! Maybe you made another mistake and it cost Tina and Andrew their lives?"
"No! You can't equate what happened with Kayla to this," he gestured to the scattered pictures.
"What happened to her? You can't even say it? You killed her!"
"I didn't–"
The single door to the room burst open. "Hey, what's with all the shouting?" Detective Bobby Goren of the NYPD marched in, an innocent smile on his face. "Hey Bobby," he greeted Chase jovially, jesting at their shared first names.
"Freedman." The stern voice from the open door called the other detective out. Freedman rose from his chair with a grunt and a glare at Chase. Once he slipped out, Goren slipped into the vacated chair.
"Let me get these out of here," Goren said, rustling the scattered photos together in to a neat stack.
"I thought you worked in New York?" Chase asked as he forced himself to calm down.
On the other side of the mirror four people listened. Detective Eames watched the reaction of the suspect carefully in search of any tell that would confirm his guilt or innocence. When the New Jersey cops had informed both her and her partner that they should remove Robert Chase as a victim in the string of poisonings they were investigating she'd been confused and then amused as they told her the alternate theory they'd concocted.
There was no way the young man sitting across from her partner had killed two people so ruthlessly and then in some round-about retaliation someone had poisoned him. She'd been at this for a while and Robert Chase wasn't the type. The motive was also rather weak. The story the locals were running with was that Chase, desperate for funds, had agreed to threaten the Islington's into working with an organized crime group but something had gone wrong and what was supposed to be a simple roughing-up ended in a double murder. However, if Chase had done this for money then where was it? Sketchy on the details, all the Mercer County cops had been willing to share with them was that there was a connection to a mobster already imprisoned in Trenton. Though there was no clear path they thought this guy, Montrose, was the one calling the shots.
In the interrogation room Goren continued his carefully crafted conversation with the suspect. "Thought this might be related to our case so we came over again. You ever been to New York?" Goren asked in a friendly manner.
Chase greatly preferred Goren to Freedman. He didn't trust him but Goren seemed less likely to just try and pin a crime on the most convenient target.
"I've been once with a couple of friends. It's an alright city, a little loud."
On the other side of the tinted glass the door burst open and an unshaven man walked. "Heard you caged my Aussie."
"Dr. House," Detective Eames announced for the benefit of the others. She tucked a piece of blonde hair behind her ear as she warily anticipated the fallout the man was about to cause.
Back in the interrogation room the conversation continued.
"Honest answer. I like that." Goren added with a smile. "So why did you become a Doctor?"
Chase shrugged.
Goren noted the guarded posture and expression. "You're father, Rowan Chase, was a well renowned physician. He made quite a bit of money from the talks, the research he did, and the textbooks he wrote." Chase didn't respond. Goren could almost see the defences going up at the mention of his father. "What continues to…to confound me is that…well, look for yourself." He hands Chase a paper from the folder Freedman had brought in at the beginning of the interview. "You're up to your eyes in debt and your accounts are nearly dry."
"So what?" He didn't see how this was connected to the murders.
Goren understood Chase's confusion. He orchestrated it on purpose. It was his tactic to keep his interviewees of balance and the subject of his father was an easy way to get him there. "So, why didn't your father pay your school bills? It wouldn't have taken much for him to clear the debt that you're struggling with now, most of which should have been his responsibility anyway."
"He just didn't." Chase wanted to bring this subject to end. His financial troubles were nobody's business but his.
"He left you vulnerable again, even after you went to medical school to get his attention. But when you got there you realized… what? That he wouldn't have cared either way. Or that even if he did care it was too late." Goren tilted his head low until he finally caught Chase's eyes. "He'd already left you with your mother, abandoned you with an alcoholic. You were only what? Twelve thirteen?"
"It doesn't matter," Chase denied tersely. This was the last thing he wanted to talk about.
"Of course it matters! He set you up to fall all over again! Here you are struggling to make it and he doesn't even leave you a penny in his will!"
"I don't want his bloody money!" Chase yelled.
"No, you want the father that was owed to you!"
Chase glared at him for several seconds seeing something of himself reflected in the other man. "Isn't that what you wanted?" Goren blinked and sat a little further back in his chair. The expression on his face slowly, almost imperceptibly closed off. "It was your mother too, wasn't it? The one you blamed for driving him away for ruining everything because she was…" he couldn't find an accurate adjective so he left it blank. Goren would get his meaning anyway. Chase was sure. "Still you can't up and leave her to go follow him." She needs you. Chase looked away for several seconds. His eyes were locked on a crack in the old floor. His mind was trying to bury the hurt this discussion had dug up.
Goren sat silently watching the suspect as he closed the doors on his own issues. He considered returning to this ploy, trying to get Chase so riled, directing him so subtly that he blurted out the truth but he knew that the man was already there. All he had to do was wait and watch.
Chase turned back and reached for the stack of photos. He shifted the pile with his right hand, fanning out the pictures until he found the one he wanted. The crime scene photographer had snapped this picture to record the devastation in the living room of the townhouse. Chase noticed the picture not because of the toppled table or the shattered lamp on the hardwood floor or even the glimpse of a bloody hand at the corner of the photo. His eyes had been drawn almost immediately to the blood-stained portrait hanging on the wall in the photograph. The portrait was of Tina and Andrew Islington and their two children. Both of them were girls and they looked to be about eight and six years old. The smiling faces of the two dark hair cherubs stared back from the portrait through the photo with innocent, shadow-free eyes.
Chase sighed and pulled the picture from the group.
"I've got my problems," he smiled bitterly for a moment, "but I wouldn't do this. Especially not to them."
Goren knew that Chase was referring to little girls in the portrait without having to be told. He wasn't sure how he knew. It was the same way he knew that Dr. Chase hadn't killed these two people, no matter what his money troubles were. "For what it's worth," Goren started solemnly and met Chase's eyes, "I believe you." Goren's instinct wouldn't be enough to exonerate him. He'd bet that only his partner Eames and their boss would believe him if he told them Chase was innocent of this crime. His opinion, his instinct didn't hold any weight very far outside their jurisdiction.
The younger man looked away weary of the beating his composure had taken.
Detectives Morrison and Freedman chose that moment to enter. "Our suspect. We'll take over the interrogation," Freedman announced. He watched with satisfaction as the doctor's shoulders slumped. All he had to do was break his guy down and he could get him to admit to anything. Goren had showed him the big red button and he planned on pushing it constantly. He shook his head as he sat down across from Chase. It always came back to the parents.
"You want a drink?" Morrison asked. He placed a can of soda in front of Chase.
"No, thanks."
"Look I know you're tired but we've just got a few more questions," Freedman said. The underlying edge of hostility was poorly concealed.
The door opened again and a voice familiar to Chase burst in. "Anymore questions will have to wait. He's not under arrest, so he's free to go. Come on Chase." House beckoned the other doctor over.
Chase glanced between House and the detectives. He had no knowledge of the American legal system outside of what he'd seen on TV. He got up, willing to take the out if it was available. These cops were barking up the wrong tree anyway.
"Fine if that's how you want to do it." Freedman said darkly as he stood and rounded the table cutting off Chase's most direct path to the exit. He grabbed the arm of the blonde man. Chase tensed and pulled back.
"What are you doing?"
"Stop resisting!" The veteran law enforcer slammed Chase into the solid wall with enough force to have him loosing a breath. "Robert Chase, you're under arrest for the murders of Tina and Andrew Islington." He went on to recite Chase's Miranda rights while shackling his hands behind his back with the cold metal cuffs. Chase's eyes were wide with absolute shock. They were arresting him? For a crime he didn't commit? His eyes searched frantically, and in the end in vain, for something, anything that made sense. All he found was a similar though less obvious expression of shock on his boss's face.
"I didn't do this," Chase finally found his voice enough to make a weak protest.
"That's what they all say," Freedman said with a cruel smirk. He manhandled Chase out of the interrogation room to the lock-up for booking. House tried to interfere but Detective Morrison easily kept him at bay. He could only watch helplessly as they dragged Chase out of his sight.
"Get out of my way," House groused at the young detective as he tried to leave. He shoved the man, not too hard since he was in a building full of cops. Morrison glared at him but didn't stop him from leaving. House walked out flipping out his new cell phone (thank you Wilson) and dialling a number he knew off-head, though he wasn't sure why. He waited patiently for the call to go through and then for the other end to pick up. To his relief somebody was home and it was the one he was trying to reach, not her husband.
He tossed the pleasantries and got straight to the point. "Stacy, I need a favour. Do you know any good defence attorneys in Princeton?"
A sigh was sent over the line. "Greg, what have you done now?"
H
End Chapter 6
It took so long to find information of the New Jersey Penal code. I hope I interpreted it right. I just sort of skimmed the relevant parts. :p (Can you blame me? It was 238 pages long!) The REALLY good stuff starts in the next chapter. I gotta get revising. Thanks for all the feedback! I love it so much!