Welcome Her Home with Red Roses (T Rated Version)

by Labyrinth01

After spending a month in Atlanta, Brenda is reunited with Fritz and prepares to start a new chapter in her life. This is the final story in the "Welcome Home" series. (There is also an M-rated version of this story.) THIS STORY IS ON HOLD. I just got so tired begging for reviews that it doesn't seem worth it anymore.

6. Chapter 6

Author's Notes: Long time no update! So very sorry for the significant interval, but I was stymied by the holiday challenges. For Halloween I wrote "Maeve," Thanksgiving I wrote "Cornucopia," and for Valentine's Day "In the Cards." And for Christmas...well, I learned a tough lesson at Christmas. If you want to publish a story and guarantee no one will see it, make it a crossover. The Crossover section on this site is basically Siberia, which was really discouraging, because my Christmas fic, "Although it's Been Said, Many Times, Many Ways," was my very first procedural, and I think it turned out pretty darn good. It is a Major Crimes crossover and it told from the alternating POV of Brenda, Fritz, and Sharon, so if you like this story, I really think you will like "Although it's Been Said." I ask that you give it a try, if you have the time.

As usual, I have wonderful people to thank. Kate Rosen again did a magnificent job editing this chapter. She does more than edit: she makes sure I am true to the characters and to the story. I also want to thank ManateeMama, with whom I had an in depth consult on the inner working of Fritz Howard's mind, which, in combination with Kate's comments, resulted in a rewrite of a major section. Please don't miss ManateeMama's ongoing story "The Path Home."

As always, there is an M-rated version of this chapter.

Since it's been awhile, let's review...

In the previous chapter, Brenda started her new job at the DA's office and seems happy. At long last, she and Fritz closed on their new house and are on the cusp of moving. Brenda's horrendous nightmares about Philip Stroh's attack seem to be in remission thanks to the herbal tea made by their new friend, Lily Powers, whom they met at the airport and had dinner with (see chapter 4).

---

"You do the honors," Fritz said, holding out the packing tape to Brenda.

She shook her head. "I couldn't possibly. You were the one who found the house, honey. You should get to seal up the ceremonial last box."

"If you insist." He pulled off a long piece of tape and closed up a box marked "Kitchen Miscellaneous."

"I hope that's everythin'," Brenda said, brushing a stray hair off her forehead. "It seems like when you're movin', just when you think you've got everythin' and the last box is full, you open a drawer or a closet and there's a whole bunch of stuff you forgot all about."

Fritz lifted the box and set it on top of two others. "Ahh, remember how long I've been packing up, honey. Since before you got home from Atlanta. I'm pretty confident that if there is a drawer full of junk just waiting to spring out and attack, it probably belongs to you."

Her lip stuck out in a pout. "I got everythin', promise. I just double checked. Only clothes I have left out are the ones I'm wearin' to work tomorrow."

"Did you color code your boxes like I asked?" Fritz had a very organized system to assure the movers would put the right boxes in the correct room. A strip of brightly colored masking tape was wrapped around each cardboard box: green for kitchen, blue for living room, and so on, and in honor of Brenda, hot pink for things slated to go in the new bedroom.

She rolled her eyes. "Yes, Fritzy, I put that neon tape on all my boxes and labeled them clearly. Good lord, you're anal." She walked out of the living room and back toward the bedroom.

"I'm organized," he responded, reaching out to lightly smack her backside. "I'm only taking one day off to do this, so I need to be as efficient as possible. Not having to rummage through the house for the correct boxes when we unpack a room will be big time saver." He sat down on the chair and begun to take off his clothes.

Brenda came from out of the bathroom, toothbrush in hand. "I feel so bad you have to do this all by yourself, Fritzy. It's a big job."

"Don't worry about me. The movers will be here early tomorrow morning, and compared to a huge house, we don't have that much. I'm hoping there will be a path for you to walk through when you come home to your brand new house tomorrow evening." He stood up and leaned against the bathroom doorframe, watching her clean off her face with cold cream.

"You know," she said, "I might forget to not come back to the duplex when work is over. You should probably put one of those pieces of colored tape around my wrist to make sure I am delivered to the right house." Her smart-ass expression was visible beneath the layer of Ponds.

"You're a very funny woman, Brenda. And if we weren't stuck having to sleep on the mattress and bedframe on the ground because we took the bed apart already, I would show you just how much I appreciate you." He reached out and caressed her lower back. In response, she shuddered.

"What—" he was about to ask what was wrong, when it became apparent to him. Brenda was staring at the bathroom window, the one Stroh had cut through when he broke in.

"This is the last night I have to wash my face in this bathroom," she said softly.

He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close despite her initial stiffening. "That's right, Brenda," he said, "a new start tomorrow. No more bad memories around every corner."

"Thank god, she murmured.

Thank god, he echoed in his head. This day hadn't come soon enough.

...

Like a new parent who jolts awake at the sound of their child's cry, Fritz had become hardwired to rapidly return to wakefulness when he heard Brenda's voice in the middle of the night. He bolted upright, ready to dodge her flinging limbs and the violent shakes of her nightmares, but he found her side of the bed empty.

He was poised to call out for her when he heard a loud "thump" in the living room. "Nonononono," he heard Brenda wail, and more knocking ensued.

Fritz was out of the bedroom door before he realized his feet had hit the floor. He ran to the living room, which seemed to be the epicenter of the strange sounds. He could barely discern Brenda's form in the darkness, but he could clearly hear her.

"Too much, it's too much, I can't, I can't..." The sounds of desperate ripping and clawing were intermingled with her nonsensical talk.

When he got closer, the light from a nearby window illuminated a sliver of the living room. Brenda was on her knees and frantically opening one of the packed boxes, scraping off the tape with her fingernails and then ripping the top open. When she was done with that box, she stood up and lunged for another sitting on the coffee table. She didn't bother with removing the tape first, instead ripping a corner open with both hands and pulling at the objects within. "Have to unpack, we can't leave..." her voice rose in pitch in concordance with her efforts.

Fritz was frozen into place for a moment, watching Brenda's insanity. As his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he saw that several other boxes had been viscously wrenched apart, a couple with their contents dumped to the floor.

He lunged for her and grabbed her from behind. "What are you doing?" he hissed, as hours of work lay in ruin at his feet. She struggled to escape his grasp, but he just held on tighter. "Brenda, stop. Calm down, now." It suddenly occurred to him that she might be sleepwalking, and he lowered his voice. "Honey, you have to stop this and calm yourself. Let go of the box."

"I can't, I can't, I can.t…" she wailed. "I can't do this. No no no…"

Fritz had had enough. Asleep or not, she needed to snap out of this. He picked her up, squirming and angry, and dropped her on the couch. He lay his body on top of hers and held her forearms tightly.

"Brenda, calm down. Honey, are you awake?" Her eyes were wide open, and she was staring out at the sea of boxes.

"I'm awake, I couldn't sleep, all those boxes, I can't, I can't…" she drifted off, not looking at him.

He shook her slightly to get her attention. "Look at me, Brenda, and tell me what's going on."

She closed her eyes and shook her head like a child refusing a dose of medicine. "I can't Fritz, I won't. Everythin' is gone and I can't leave. I can't leave." She whimpered. "Don't make me, Fritz, don't make me."

"Brenda, make you what? Are you crazy? You just ruined hours of packing. Talk to me, and start making sense."

She looked directly at him then, her eyes wide and pupils huge, and the hysteria within was evident. She trembled a little.

"I can't leave, Fritz, I can't move. It's all gone, all of it. And if this house goes too, I've been erased." She struggled to get out from under him, but he held her tightly.

"You aren't getting erased, Brenda. We're just going somewhere else, where you are going to be much happier. I promise."

"Mama died here," she whispered. "Our weddin' was here. And then, and then…" her voice choked. "Horrible things happened. But I can't go away. Everything else has left and I can't do it. This house is the last thing to be erased." She closed her eyes.

Fritz understood. So much lost in such a short period of time…the duplex was the last remnant of her old life.

"Listen to me, Brenda, please," he said in his best soothing voice. "Your life hasn't been packed up in those boxes, and staying here isn't going to chase your ghosts away. Far from it."

"Ohhh, why did ya have to say that?" she muttered.

"What I mean is that everything that was good from your former life is in your heart," he said, realizing that talking sense to an insane person was about as useful as talking to a drunk one, but he had to try. "Where you live doesn't make a difference, except that we are going to make a happy home."

She nodded, her eyes screwed up. "But everythin' is different now. Even where I live. Not one single thing has stayed in place. I can't do it, Fritz I can't do it."

"Open your eyes and look at me, Brenda," Fritz pleaded. She refused, but he was insistent, repeating his request over and over until she complied.

"You have a constant in your life. There's one thing that's never going to change, no matter where you live or work. That's me. I was your husband then and I'll be your husband forever. Nothing else matters."

She stared at him, eyes wide with nerves and frenzy, and then slowly nodded. "You're my home," she said softly. "You didn't change. You're still here." She burst into tears.

...

It took Fritz an hour, but he managed to calm Brenda down enough to get her back into bed. Fortuitously, one of the boxes she ripped open was the contents of their pantry, and Fritz was able to find the herbal tea their newfound friend Lily made up for Brenda. More rummaging around and he had the teapot, a teaball, and a mug in hand. He brewed her an extra-strong cup and insisted she drink it, even though there wasn't any honey to take the edge off the bitterness.

"I'm so sorry, Fritzy," Brenda murmured as she drifted off to sleep, Fritz rhythmically stroking her hair. "I'm so sorry I forgot. You will always be here with me, won't you?"

When he was sure she was sound asleep, Fritz found the packing tape dispenser and begun to repair her damage. He would be lucky if he got an hour's nap before the moving van arrived.

Fritz was awakened by the tap tap tap of Brenda's high heels on the hardwood floor. He tried to move his face to the direction of the noise, but his cheek was stuck to the leather couch.

"Shit," he groused, peeling himself off the couch and holding a hand over his stinging face. The bright sunlight that poured through the window instantly triggered a headache in his sleep-starved brain, and his lower back ached from sleeping on the uncomfortable couch. It was moving day, and he felt like crap.

It had taken him two hours to reseal the abused boxes Brenda had attacked, and he finally fell into a heavy sleep right as dawn broke. From the looks of things, that was only a couple of hours ago.

"Good morning!" came a cheery voice, and Fritz winced. Brenda came into his view, showered and dressed for work, looking like she got all the sleep in the world. She held out a takeout cup of coffee to him.

"I was just about to wake you up," she said. "I ran down to the bagel shop and got us breakfast, cuz who knows when you're gonna have a chance to eat, and we cleaned out the fridge last night." Her speech was light and breezy. "Better drink up, Fritzy! The movin' van's gonna be here pretty soon. Boy, am I gonna be glad when this day is over."

He glowered at her. "Brenda, would you like to tell me exactly what happened last night?"

"Hmmm?" she said distractedly. "Let me bring your breakfast in here, silly me, I left it in the kitchen, like it matters where we eat this mornin'." Before he could say anything, she was off.

"It's a beautiful day," she yelled from the kitchen, her voice becoming louder as she walked back toward him, paper bag in hand. "High of 80. Looks like we're gonna have a chance to enjoy that new pool of ours a bit before it gets cold." She sat the bag down on the coffee table and knelt next to it and took out the items within.

"Brenda, why—" he began. Her nervous energy and forced brightness scared him almost as her hysteria the night before.

"…got you a bagel and one of those egg sandwiches. Moving is hard work. Thought you should have somethin' to stick to your ribs. Now sit down." She pointed to the couch.

"Honey, are you all—" Fritz tried to interrupt her babbling.

"I stripped the bed like you told me to, and put everythin' in a garbage bag. I'll throw that in my car, along with our packed clothes, just to make sure it doesn't get lost in the move. I left a few small bottles of soap and such in the shower if you need them, just throw them away—"

"Brenda!" he snapped, and she visibly jumped. "What—"

"Well, don't you have a bad case of the grumpy uglies. No need to yell," she said, looking hurt. "I'm right here, you know. Not for long though. I ate my bagel and I'm headin' out, long day today—"

"Stop it," he hissed loudly, startling her into silence. "Just stop talking for a few seconds, Brenda, just stop. I'm tired and stressed out, and sleeping on the couch without a blanket and a pillow is miserable, so I am entitled to an explanation. Tell me what happened last night. What the hell was that?"

"What the hell was what?" she said, her voice a combination of wonder and hurt.

His irritation ratcheted up a notch. "You had a complete meltdown and now you're acting like everything is fine. I was the one who had to clean up your path of destruction, so at very least, you can tell me what's going on. Pretending you're fine isn't going to help, and it's just making me angry."

"Oh honey," she cooed, "I'm not pretendin' anythin'. I so happy that—" her head whipped toward the front door. "Ohh! It looks like the movers are here early!" She jumped up and trotted to the door, flinging it open. "Yep, the truck's early! That's a good sign, I guess. " She waved to someone he couldn't see. "Yoo hoo! Hey y'all! Yup, you got the right house! Come on in." She opened the door wide as she picked up her bag from its spot next to the door.

"Gang's all here, Fritz. Thanks a million for doin' this solo. I'll see you tonight, honey. Love you!" She bolted out the door, and before Fritz could even process their non-conversation, four burley strangers walked into his apartment. Fritz rubbed his aching face and reluctantly packed away his worry for Brenda for the time being as he summoned the energy to face the stressful day ahead.

---

Glasses next to the fridge, plates below, pans in the lower cabinets. Or Maybe glasses above the plates? Fritz stood under the stream of the shower in the master bathroom, letting the hot water soothe his aching muscles, reviewing the layout of their new kitchen and thinking hard about where everything should go. The sheer pleasure of getting clean after running around all day distracted him from his mental unpacking, and he let himself enjoy the water's fingers running down his body. Water pressure isn't bad, he thought. One less thing to fix when we tear this bathroom apart. Brenda had claimed the master bathroom as her own and banished him down the hall. She insisted that she wanted room for all her girly stuff and was tired of sharing a bathroom with a man. His main concern was that he wouldn't get to shower with her anymore, but she promised that wasn't the case. He fully intended to hold her to that.

Moving had gone as well as it could for a process that's inherently miserable. Everything was relocated to the new house by noon, and Fritz was glad he had paid for four movers instead of three. He gave the men healthy tips and headed back to the apartment, leaving Joel to watch over the chaos of the new bungalow. Fritz was determined to get his deposit back on the duplex from the idiot super Boorstein, so he spent a few hours cleaning up the place. He took one last look at the space he had called home for the past four years and was awash in relief to finally be rid of the place that had morphed into a house of horrors. He returned to the new house, arms full of packages from Target, with a renewed sense of purpose. He eyed the beautiful pool hungrily, desperate to strip down to his shorts and dive in, but he forced himself to stay on task. He had to go back to work the next day, and he needed the place to be semi-livable. Fritz put away groceries and spent a few hours cleaning out the kitchen cabinets, which were covered in a layer of sticky jam residue and other undetermined food detritus. Eric Spetman clearly was less than a neatnick, and Fritz wasn't unpacking their dishes until he was sure their new home was spotless. When he finished he took a look at the outdated 70's kitchen with its groovy avocado and brown teapot wallpaper and decided he needed a break. A shower was just the thing.

Being in a new place always felt uncomfortable to Fritz, like the house was evaluating him and deciding if he was worth keeping around. Their furniture looked strange in the unfamiliar, open living space, and the dingy walls did little to alleviate the feeling of unwelcome. It usually took a few weeks for him to feel at home after he changed addresses, until the house wasn't keeping him at arm's length anymore. He knew that one way to speed up the process was to change his environment, to run the new house through his fingers like clay and mold it to himself. Paintfest 2012 starts on Saturday. I don't care what Brenda says. I want every wall in this house painted as soon as possible, so I can move on to retiling the bathrooms. I want to have a genuine home with Brenda, not a house that belongs to her, nor an apartment that was only supposed to be temporary. He had waited a long time for this, and he could hardly wait to get started. The house will learn to love us, he thought as he stepped of the shower onto the mat-less, cold, unfamiliar tile floor and grabbed a towel.

He had just put the first dish in the place where he decided was the most convenient location when he heard keys at the door. After some fumbling with the lock, Brenda walked into the living room and called out, "honey, I'm home!" before finding him in the kitchen. She was carrying a large paper bag in one hand and a garbage bag in the other.

"Hey, how's it goin'? " she asked, reaching out to stroke his arm. "Last time I talked to you today you said everything was on schedule." She looked around the hideous kitchen and grimaced. "This wallpaper. Did people in the 70's have absolutely no taste at all?"

"I guess not. Remember shag carpeting?"

"I do indeed. Had it in our TV room growin' up." She held up the brown paper bag. "I splurged and got us Italian at Maggiano's. I figured we had a lot to celebrate tonight."

Fritz watched her closely, on edge for signs of another impending breakdown, but the flighty, flitting behavior from this morning was gone. She was…just herself. He didn't know whether or not to be relieved or nervous.

"I'm starving," he said, leaning back on the counter, the fatigue of the day settling in bones "Moving is hard work, and I'm never doing it again. I measured the front door to make sure our coffins will fit through when the time comes."

"Ha ha," Brenda said from the dining table, as she busied herself putting the food out. "Place looks good, though. Seems a lot bigger with our stuff in it, doesn't it?"

Fritz joined her at the table and grabbed a plastic fork, ready to dig into the eggplant parm, but he stopped. He couldn't enable her by pretending everything was fine. He put his fork down and picked up her hand.

"Tell me what happened last night, Brenda. I need to understand it."

She quickly pulled away from him and crossed her arms over her chest.

"Oh, that," she said softly, not looking at him.

"Yea, that. The fit or whatever you had that resulted in me having to spend two hours resealing up the boxes you tore apart. Now I know you, and you were hoping if you talked fast enough this morning so I couldn't get a word in edgewise, that I would be too distracted by the new house tonight to ask for an explanation. Am I right?"

Pink infused her cheeks, but she said nothing. She absently encircled her right wrist with her left hand and rubbed. Fritz noticed a slight smudge of blue gray on the boney parts, and a quick glance confirmed that her left wrist had similar marks.

He was hit with a wave of nausea. I did that. I hurt her. Shame bounded through him, hot and familiar. Two months after Stroh's attack and I bruise her. He felt like hell. But then he remembered her deluded single-mindedness the night before, her determination derail the impending move. Did he overreact when he restrained her on the couch? He didn't thinks so, but looking at her marred skin, he felt doubt oozing around the shame.

"Brenda," he said, pulling himself out of his own personal misery, his voice sapped of its previous angry tone. "Honey, I bruised you, on your wrists." He gently ran a finger over the skin in question. Brenda's eyes followed and she slowly nodded.

"S'okay. I bruise real easy. I know you would never hurt me on purpose."

He shook his head. He needed her to understand. "I am sorry, Brenda. Last night it was like you were possessed. I saw you undoing all my hard work, and I pictured what would have happened if I hadn't woken up. The movers would have arrived to an unpacked house and piles of shredded cardboard. Maybe I was rougher than I should have been, and god, I feel horrible. Not to make excuses if I was, but Brenda, everything I've done for this move, it's just been so stressful. Getting evicted, then having to find a house right away by myself…"

"Evicted?" Brenda perked up. "What are you talkin' about?"

Fritz groaned at his own stupid mistake. Oh crap, I never wanted her to know that. "Boorstein stopped by right after you went to Atlanta and said it was in our lease that he could kick us out with 60 days notice. So he did. He didn't like all the recent drama at our place." He decided to nip her inevitable protestations over his omission of this event at the bud. "I didn't tell you, honey, because I found a house and it became irrelevant. Being evicted was just one more thing to add to a long list of injustices." He hoped she wasn't going to exploit his lie to its fullest as a means to deflect attention away from the uncomfortable topic at hand.

"Jerk," she huffed. "Boorstein, not you."

It's a good sign she's not calling me a jerk. Refocus quickly. "'Jerk' is putting it mildly. But back to last night. It doesn't do either one of us a favor if I pretend things like that don't happen," he said. "So I want to talk about it. If you were feeling stressed about moving, honey, you should have told me."

She was silent for a moment, then she shook her head. "No, I wasn't anxious about movin'. I was tellin' you the truth that I was countin' the days until we got out of there."

"Then what was it, Brenda? You talked about feeling like your life was being erased, and the duplex was one more example of that."

She nodded wordlessly.

Fritz felt too tired to be yanking teeth. "Brenda, I deserve a conversation about this. I had to move us into this house today with about two hours of sleep under my belt." He immediately rebuked himself. Way to spread the shame around.

Brenda hung her head down, her long blonde hair practically in her lap. "I'm so sorry, " she mumbled. "I just woke up in a panic."

"About moving?"

"No, no, about change." She looked up at him, and he was relieved to see there were no tears in her eyes. "I hate change, you know that. And my life has been nothin' but change lately. All of a sudden movin' somewhere else was one more huge change, and it felt like way too much, and I sort of lost it."

"Not 'sort of,' Brenda."

"Thanks for that keen observation," she said dryly, frowning at him. "I just panicked at the thought of one more major thing changin' around. I felt like leavin' the duplex I was gettin' erased. I mean, look at my life. Poof, no more Mama. Then no more deputy chief and no more bein' a cop. Now 'poof' the place I lived in for five years is gone."

"But Brenda—" he stopped when she held out her hand and shook her head.

"Fritz, I'm gonna ask you for a big favor, okay? I know I'm supposed to discuss everythin' to death with you, but I'm askin' for a pass on this one. I have been workin' so hard the past couple of months, openin' up to you about things I never thought I could talk about. It's been torture for me, but I've done it, because I know it will make me a better person and bring us closer. I've dealt with horrible nightmares with you helpin' me, which is awful that I dragged you into it. I feel like I've turned myself inside out to become a better person, and it's killin' me, but I'm committed. All I'm askin' is a pass on this one. I don't want us to spend hours analyzin' it, because I'm embarrassed enough. I was anxious about one more change in my life, and I had a fit. But now we're in the new house and I feel fine, and I want to concentrate on gettin' this place all nice and settled. So I'm just askin' you to please let it go. I really would rather spend the evenin' unpackin' and talkin' about paint colors than rootin' around inside my head. Please Fritz, please."

Brenda looked so earnest and desperate that it made Fritz's heart hurt. She's been through so much, and, she has opened up tremendously. Maybe she's right. We can just let this one go…unless there's a repeat performance.

He nodded. "Okay, we'll chalk it up to the stress of moving. But if it happens again, Brenda, I'm going to be very worried."

She breathed a sigh of relief, and pulled the container of ravioli closer to her. "Thank you, honey, thank you. I'd rather spend dinner discussin' house things anyways."

"And we can go over all the things you are gonna do before you go to bed tonight so we have some semblance of order." He expected her to whine and wheedle her way out of it, but to his surprise, she nodded.

"I got a couple old tee shirts and shorts in the bag I brought in, so I'm set to do whatever you want. It would be nice to have the kitchen unpacked, or at least some of it."

"Oh, I'm on kitchen duty, Brenda. But I have a long list of tasks for you, so don't you worry, you won't be bored."

"Great," she said sarcastically. "I just hope you brought that whip of yours, boss-man."

"Always," he smiled.

---

"Oh, this is good fun, Fritz," Lily Powers said with a laugh. "I'm so glad I used the meeting I had down the street from FBI headquarters as an excuse to steal you away for lunch." Lily took a sip of her iced tea and set it down, eyebrows raised at Fritz.

"What do you mean? I didn't know I was such good company." Fritz stretched his arm over the back of his chair, trying to alleviate a low, dull, nagging ache in his shoulder. His exhaustion and stress was knocked down a notch in the presence of the older, serene woman, so a break with her was just what he needed.

"Definitely," Lily nodded, and leaned closer to him. "There are various females in this restaurant trying to figure out if I'm a cougar and you're the young man I have my hooks in."

Fritz looked around and noticed the hostess, plus a group of four middle-aged women, were looking his way.

"Seriously? Are you sure?" He tried not to let Lily see how pleased that made him. He was sore and sleep deprived from moving, and certainly didn't feel like he looked his best.

Lily nodded. "The hostess, who stared intently at your backside as you walked by, gave me a look of both jealousy and confusion." She subtly nodded in the direction of the table of women. "Those ladies over there have been discussing us for quite some time. One thinks you're my son. Two others are debating if I'm your sugar mama." Lily pursed her mouth. "Now they are discussing our ages. If it wasn't so amusing, I would be a bit annoyed at their rudeness."

"Lily, how can you hear them?"

"Oh, working with teens, you learn to train your hearing to pick up bits of conversations, no matter how faint. Plus, I know body language. Our waitress, by the way, thinks you are attractive, and wishes I wasn't here so she could come on to you."

"Stop it!" Fritz said, with an embarrassed laugh.

"Oh, I simply cannot." She looked at Fritz, mischief in her eyes. "After we order I'm going to go to the lady's room for a bit. I am willing to wager a bet that our server engages in some pretty heavy flirting when I'm gone."

Fritz shook his head. "I doubt that, Lily. She's young enough to be my daughter. Maybe 20 years ago that would happen, but not now."

"Oh Fritz, you are a strikingly handsome man, and you seem to be one who only gets better with age. Of course you garner a lot of female attention, you are just too modest to admit it."

Fritz thought back to the night at the Beverly Wiltshire after Brenda got back from Atlanta, when she found the saleswoman's phone number intended for Fritz in the bag with the lingerie he had bought her. Luckily, she handled it fine, but that could have been a disaster.

"The only attention I care about is from Brenda," he said.

"Oh, that is the sweetest thing I've ever heard. And almost believable."

Fritz's comeback was stifled when the waitress appeared. He noticed that she made eye contact with him and was particularly friendly when taking his order, but with Lily she was more perfunctory.

"That, my friend, is proof." Lily gathered her purse and scooted out of the booth when the waitress left. "I'll be back in a few minutes. Let me know what happens." She winked, and before Fritz could protest her experiment, she was gone.

Lily returned after several minutes, an elegant figure in an expensive gray dress, her hair in a fancy updo, wearing subtle but beautiful diamond jewelry. She turned heads of her own, both men and women, because there was something about her grace that drew eyes to her.

"So," she said, sitting down and picking up a Thai roll, "was I right?"

With much chagrin, Fritz held up a scrap of paper, a page from small notebook ripped in half, with "Chelsea" and "555-7125" written in large, loopy letters.

"Ahh, good to know that even though I'm basically retired, I still haven't lost the ability to read nonverbal cues," she said, looking quite pleased with herself. "And out of curiosity, did the young woman inquire about me?"

Fritz nodded. "She said it was very sweet of me to take my mother out to lunch. I quickly corrected her, since you aren't old enough to be my mother."

Lily waived her hand. "Oh, yes I am. I'm 67, and you can't be more than 45."

"I need to make friends at the airport more often," he grinned. "I'm turning 50 in a few months."

They were interrupted by plates of steamy food set down in front of them. The waitress almost knocked over a glass of water because she was paying more attention to smiling at Fritz than where she put their meals.

"Well, you certainly don't look 50," Lily said, ladling green curry over her rice. "And even so, I'm still old enough to be your mother, albeit a young one." She suddenly lit up and reached into her purse. "That reminds me, and please forgive me for being rude, but my daughter Penny texted me while I was in the car, and I asked her to—oh yes! Fresh granddaughter pictures!" Her eyes were radiant as she scrolled through her phone.

"That's right, you said your daughter just adopted a baby from China. I'm assuming you aren't talking about Alexis."

Lily handed Fritz the phone. "Alexis is fresh in an entirely different sense. No, this beauty is Tabatha Powers-Rowen. She's four months old and is the apple of her mothers' eyes." She beamed.

Fritz looked at the picture. Tabitha was dressed in a pink frilly dress, her shock of dark hair standing straight up, with soft, intelligent black eyes. He had looked into Chinese adoptions behind Brenda's back a few years ago, hoping he could propose it as a compromise to the grueling fertility treatments that Dr. Daily warned them would be necessary for them to conceive due her age and reproductive problems. He was extremely disappointed when he learned that any type of substance abuse was grounds for exclusion. Just not meant to be, he thought sadly.

"She's a doll, Lily. I'm curious about something, though. I thought China had this horrible policy that gays and lesbians couldn't adopt."

"Oh yes," Lily said, nodding her head. "They seem to think it's much better for little girls to live in orphanages than to have same-sex parents. Makes me furious. Anyways, Penny had to lie, and Karen became her 'roommate.' The adoption agency just needed to document that Penny was single, and since gay marriage isn't legal here yet, technically she is. Once that box was checked on the official form, the social workers turned a blind eye to the orientation of their clients. All they cared about was that they were good human beings, as they should."

Fritz looked at the little girl in the picture and wondered, for the millionth time, what it would be like to be a father.

Lily gently retrieved her phone from Fritz's hands. "I feel like I've hit a sore spot with you, Fritz," she said softly.

"Oh no, not at all, I just get a little sad sometimes when I look at other people's kids. " He was amazed how easily he dropped his guard around Lily.

She gently laid her hand on his. "Remember what I told you at my house, Fritz. There are many different ways to parent a child in this world than to give birth to one."

He forced a smile and decided to change the conversation from its depressing track. "You are very right, Lily. Right now, though, Brenda is all I can handle. That and a new house that needs some TLC." He took a large bite of his duck choo chi.

"I can't believe you just moved yesterday! How did you even find clothes to wear this morning? It takes weeks to unpack!"

"I'm organized. And I worked like crazy last night to get the vital things unpacked, like my ties and the remote control. But the real work starts this weekend with painting. The walls are so dingy, they are dampening my enthusiasm as a new homeowner."

"Well, you don't want that," she said. After a pause, Lily asked, "how's Brenda coping with the move?"

Fritz stopped eating and stared at her. She must be one hell of a therapist, he thought. Or a mind reader. "Why do you ask?"

"Oh, it's none of my business. It's just when someone has had a serious trauma like Brenda has that another major life event, even one that's positive such as a new house, can be stressful."

Fritz started to tell Lily all about Brenda's fit the other night, but something stopped him. Brenda had asked him for a pass, a get out of jail free card, and he had granted it. It felt disloyal to Brenda to discuss the situation with Lily, although he would love to have a therapist's input. "Well, she was a little upset the night before moving, but said she's feeling a lot better now."

Lily slowly nodded in such a way that Fritz knew she was aware that there was much more to the story. "Just keep her talking, Fritz, that's my best therapeutic advice. Healing always happens in open spaces, not in the deep dark caves of our inner selves."

"Well said, Lily. And Brenda is working on things. I have a lot of faith in her."

Lily smiled as she picked up the check the waitress had silently dropped off. "Having someone who believes in you can be the most healing thing of all, Fritz. She's a lucky woman to have you."

He guided Lily out of their seats and past the hostess whose eyes were taking a walk all over him to the exit. "And I'm a lucky man to have added a brilliant and generous therapist to my circle of friends. Next meal is dinner at our new house. Promise you'll come."

Lily shook Fritz's hand and tipped her head. "Until then, Fritz. Until then."

---

On the way back to the LAPD, Lily's voice floated through Fritz's head and overrode his profound thoughts on the appropriate shade of paint for his living room. "There are many different ways to parent a child," she had told him, for the second time. Lily was a wise woman, and maybe she was right. Out of the primordial soup of his busy brain sprang forth what he thought was an excellent idea.

---

"Rusty?" Fritz knocked lightly on the doorframe of the Major Crimes breakroom to alert the teen to his presence. "Do you have a minute?"

Rusty looked up from the laptop he was typing on. "Sure, Fritz. I got lots of minutes. I'm basically being held captive by Sharon, so I don't have anything to do." Rusty crossed his arms over his chest and arranged his face in an expression of classic adolescent resentment.

Fritz decided to ignore Rusty's barb at Sharon and sat down opposite him. "I have a proposition to discuss, a money-making opportunity for you, and I wanted to know if you might be interested."

Rusty face morphed into an exaggerated smirk, and, dripping with sarcasm, he said, "I'm used to men propositioning me for money, Fritz, although I'm kinda surprised you're interested, being an FBI agent and all."

Fritz's face burned hot with embarrassment and anger, and he reprimanded himself for not choosing his words more carefully. "That's not funny, Rusty, and you know it. If you don't want to hear what I have to say, just let me know and I'll leave you alone. You don't have to be a smart ass."

Rusty adapted the visage of a chastised puppy. "Er, sorry, that shit just slips out. What do you want, and does it involve getting to see Brenda?" Rusty and Brenda had formed a bond from their shared traumatic experience with Philip Stroh. They had talked on the phone several times when Brenda was in Atlanta, and Rusty asked about her every time he saw Fritz.

"Yes, it does. We moved into Sharon's, um, your neighborhood yesterday, and the house needs a lot of painting. This weekend I'm doing the living room, and I really could use an assistant. I ran it by Sharon and she thought it was a great idea."

"Really?" Rusty sat up straighter. "You want me to help you paint? Sure, that would be cool. But I gotta tell you, I've never painted anything in my life."

"That's okay. You probably won't be doing much painting yourself, at least at first, but I could use help getting the room prepped and furniture moved, and then put back afterwards. After you've watched me for awhile, and if you want to try it, I'll show you everything you need to know."

Rusty nodded his head. "Yea, sure, Fritz. I got nothing to do. Sharon is making me go to some Catholic school her kids went to, but that doesn't start for a couple of weeks."

When Fritz had proposed the idea to Sharon, she was more than happy that Rusty would be doing something more productive with his time than hanging around Major Crimes, and would have the opportunity to earn money doing something other than being someone's street treat. She and Fritz discussed a per hour rate that was enough to give Rusty some pocket money, but not enough so that he would feel he could take it and run.

"That's great." Fritz held out his hand and, tentatively, Rusty gave it a quick shake. He told Rusty how much he'd be earning, and to his relief he was okay with it. "I'd earn a lot more on the streets for less time, but this gig is gonna be a little nicer. You have a pool, right?"

"Yup, and we can take a swim break if you want."

"And I get to see Brenda?"

"Oh yea, she will be working right along with us, although reluctantly. She's not a big fan of painting, but when I tell her you'll be helping out, maybe that will make her enthused."

A faint smile played on his lips. "She should make this interesting. What time do you want me over on Saturday?"

"Can a teenager get out of bed and to our house at 9AM?"

"That early? Jeesh. I guess this teenager can get up that early for the promise of money."

---

Rusty rang the doorbell at 8:50 on Saturday morning. Fritz had just gotten Brenda up and dressed in old clothes, and he barely had time to take off his pajama top and replace it with a tee shirt on the way to the front door.

Rusty walked in the house and, barely glancing around, went directly to the sliding glass doors that led to the back yard. When he saw the large pool, he let out a low whistle. "Damn, that's a nice pool," he said, and looked at Fritz. "You said I can swim for a little bit this afternoon, as a break, right?"

"I think that would be just fine." Fritz had yet to try out his amazing new pool, and perhaps between coats of paint would be perfect time to do so.

"Rusty Beck!" Brenda had a huge grin on her face when she walked in the room. "It is just wonderful to see you. How are you doin'?"

Rusty's smile matched Brenda's in wattage. "Good Brenda, real good. Well, Sharon's still a bitch and driving me crazy, but…" he saw Brenda's smile slip off her face and his did the same.

"Rusty, I told you this on the phone, but now you're in my house, where I make the rules. I don't want to hear you talkin' crap about Sharon. Not one word, or you can go straight home and we will finish the paintin' ourselves. You got that?" Brenda put her hands on her hips for emphasis.

Rusty raised his hands. "Yea, I got it. Shit Brenda, I was all psyched to see you and you start yelling at me. I'll watch what I say, I swear."

"Good. If you drink coffee, there's some in the kitchen. If not, maybe you and Fritz can pull your eyes away from the pool and get started." She turned and walked away.

"Hey, if Fritz and I are painting the living room, what are you doing?" He followed her into the kitchen. "Oh, god, this is the ugliest wallpaper—oh sorry, no offense." He pointed to the coffee pot and Brenda poured him a mug.

"No offense taken. This kitchen is a nightmare, and this wallpaper is just about the most hideous thing I've ever seen in my life. What were the old couple who lived her for a long time thinkin'? 'You know what would make me real happy? Lookin' at brown and green teapots every time I cooked a meal for the next 30 years.'"

"That's what Brenda is working on, Rusty, to answer your question." Fritz pointed to the wall near the fridge, where a piece of wallpaper was missing. "Brenda said she can't stand to live with a kitchen like this until we can redo it, so she tested to see how easily the wallpaper comes off, which was pretty easily. So she's going to be ripping down wallpaper and painting here while we are doing the living room."

"Gotcha," he said, finishing the last of his coffee. "We getting started anytime soon?"

Fritz showed Rusty how to wash the walls, then the intricacies of masking every window in addition to taping the tarp to the floor. He started on one end of the room and Rusty on the other, and when Fritz looked up, he was surprised how neatly Rusty was performing his task. The windows were carefully protected by masking tape in even, clean lines, and the floor was perfectly sealed without the smallest crack of hardwood floor showing through. It was every bit as good as what Fritz had done.

"Great job, Rusty," he said. "You're very organized."

He shrugged. "Yea, maybe that comes from being really good at chess. You learn to think things out and measure them in your head. I had one teacher tell me I was 'analytical,' whatever that means."

"It means you have an organized, logical mind. That will suit you well in life." Fritz turned back to the task at hand. "And now that we are done with the prep, it's showtime." Rusty helped him carry in two gallons of sage-colored paint, along with brushes and all the other accoutrements of painting, from the garage. When Fritz was ready to roll on the new color, he had Rusty go help Brenda in the kitchen. Occasional peals of laughter were heard, and he was glad Brenda and Rusty got along so well. He could use all the parenting he can get, Fritz thought, as the first swipe of new paint on the dingy walls raised his spirits considerably. This is going to be nice, really nice.

Rusty switched back and forth between Fritz and Brenda, and the first coat of paint was completed by mid-afternoon. Fritz declared a pool break was imperative if they were going to finish the walls that night.

Brenda made sandwiches and iced tea, brought them to the patio, and sat them down on the round glass table. Rusty grabbed one and ate the whole thing in a few bites, eager to get down to swimming. Fritz watched him jump in, cannonball style, and was ready to join him when Brenda walked out in her bathing suit.

Fritz was instantly reminded of his steamy fantasies about fooling around with Brenda in a pool. She wore a simple one piece suit with a modest bustline, the black contrasting nicely with the creamy white of the swells of her breasts. It was cut up a little high at the thigh, making her shapely legs look long. He felt his body respond but then he sharply reminded himself that they had company.

"You look hot, honey," he said. "Real hot."

"Cool your jets, Fritzy, we got a teenager here. And you've seen me in this old suit a hundred times."

"It still takes my breath away." He put his arm around her and whispered in her ear. "Any chance, any chance at all, that you own a bikini? Now that we have our own pool I'd really love to see you in a bikini. The tinier the better."

Brenda elbowed him in the ribs. "You are awful. No, I don't have a bikini, Fritz. It's against the law for a woman my age to wear one."

He pulled her close and kissed her on the temple. "You have the body of a 20 year old and you know it. Think about picking one up, just for me, pretty please?"

"Hey, are you two gonna just paw each other over there, or are you coming in? Cuz the water is awesome." Rusty dove down and his head emerged halfway across the pool. "Nice suit, Brenda. Now get in here." He floated on his back and looked at the two of them.

"You heard the kid," Fritz said, and took Brenda by the hand. "Time to test out our pool." Our pool. He really, really liked the sound of that.

...

Despite a prolonged pool break, the living room walls were done around eight. Fritz taught Rusty how to paint and the kid did an amazing job, far more meticulous than he ever thought he would be. With two people painting, the second coat went on very quickly.

"Can you come back tomorrow to help with the ceiling and the trim?" Fritz asked, as they washed brushes out in the sink.

"Yea, no problem. I kinda liked this. We started out with these crappy walls, and then a few hours later, the whole place looks so much better with the green paint."

"I always found painting very rewarding for just that reason," Fritz said. "You get almost instant results."

Rusty nodded. "You gonna paint more rooms? They look like they could use it. And I'd be cool with helping out."

Fritz didn't want to offer Rusty any more work until he had assessed him today, but he had proven himself more than adequate. "Yea, we are painting every room in the house, and I'm tearing out the tile in both bathrooms. If you have the time once school starts, you got a part-time job for the next several months."

"Awesome," Rusty said, bobbing his head. "I could do that."

Fritz wiped off his hands. "Let me go get your money for today."

"No man, it's alright," Rusty said. "You can pay me tomorrow."

Fritz was surprised but said nothing. Could it be that the distrustful street kid had a small seed of trust growing in their home? Most likely Brenda was the gardener, but Fritz couldn't help but feel he was tilling the field too.

After he left, Fritz met Brenda in the living room. "It's completely different in here!" she said. "It's amazin' what a coat of paint can do. It looks great, Fritz." She snaked her arm around his waist.

He nodded. The sage paint changed the entire room, and even without pictures, it already looked more homey.

"And it's amazing how nice the kitchen looks without that groovy wallpaper," Fritz said. "You did a good job, Brenda."

"Well, I think sayin' the kitchen looks 'nice' is exaggeratin' a bit. But yea, it looks a lot better with white walls." Brenda yawned and pulled away from Fritz. "I'm gonna go and take a long bath in 'my' very own private bathroom, and when I get out, I'm gonna unpack a lot of girly stuff and leave it on the counter without worryin' about someone crabbin' at me for being a slob." She stretched and smiled a slow Cheshire smile. "Cuz it's Brenda's bathroom! And some day it's gonna be pink."

"And what are you doing after you take your bath in your very own private bathroom, Princess?" Fritz had some very definite ideas about how they could spend their first Saturday night in their new house.

"Oh, I'm drinkin' a cup of real bad anti-nightmare tea and I'm fallin' asleep. I am just beat." On cue, she yawned.

He reached out and grabbed her arm as she turned toward the bedroom. "But Brenda," he whined, "we haven't inaugurated the new house yet!" He didn't want to go to sleep. He was tired, yes, but he really wanted some Brenda. Swimming in the pool was incredible, but nothing relieved stress like really hot sex.

"Honey, I hate to say it, but not tonight. We've been up late every night this week gettin' unpacked, and we've been paintin' all day, with more ahead tomorrow, than back to work on Monday. If I don't get some sleep I'm gonna drop."

He felt desperate. "But—"

She put her hand on his and squeezed, and he released his grip from her arm. "Sorry Fritzy. But I can promise you when I'm wide awake, our christenin' of this house will put the one the Titanic got to shame." With that she slipped away toward the bedroom, leaving a disappointed and frustrated Fritz standing in the now psychedelic teapot-free kitchen.

---

"You're going shopping? Right now?" Fritz was incredulous. "Brenda. There is more than enough work to do in the house." He gestured around the living room with its classic signs of being in mid-paint: painting tape and drop-cloths everywhere. "If you and Rusty start on the trim while I do the ceiling, we can be done with this room this evening."

"Oh, you and Rusty are workin' so fast together, I'd just get in y'all's way." She stood on her tip toes and kissed his cheek.

"Excuses, excuses," Rusty said.

"Oh hush you two, I should be back by early afternoon. I'll bring y'all some subs." With that, she swung her purse over her shoulder and walked out, smiling.

"What is it with chicks and shopping?" Rusty asked.

"Brenda hates shopping," Fritz said. "But she hates painting even more."

"Women," Rusty said, sounding bored and worldly. "Let the ladies shop and we men will get the work done." Rusty squatted down and stirred the paint at his feet. "Forget about her and show me how to paint the mantelpiece, Fritz. I want to do it right."

Determined to get things done, Fritz concentrated on training his protégé and working as fast as he could.

Brenda came back around 2PM to two very hungry men. "Starving here!" Rusty said as a greeting. "It's almost dinnertime!"

"Oh for heaven's sake!" she said, carrying a bag marked "Dagostino's" and a shopping bag into the dining room. "Hold your horses. I got you boys enough food to feed an army." She pulled out several subs, bags of chips, cookies, and cans of soda. "Dig in, and I'll be right back." She headed toward the bedroom.

Rusty had a sub unwrapped and a giant bite in his mouth by the time he got to the table, where he sat down heavily. Fritz was hungry too, but very pleased with their progress. Once he was comfortable Rusty could handle the fireplace, Rusty put in his iPod and Fritz put in his, and they worked for four straight hours. He didn't realize how hollow he was until the smell of the food made his stomach rumble.

"Oh man, she better have gotten a meatball, " Rusty whined, fishing through the other subs on the table, the one in his hand already half eaten. "How many people did Brenda think were gonna be here when she got home anyways?"

"Yea, she does that with subs. She buys extras and brings them to work for lunch. Or, I should say, she intends to do that, but she either forgets or gets called on a case and I eat them for dinner when I'm alone in the evening." He found a veggie sub and claimed it as his.

Rusty's silence made Fritz look over at him after a minute. Rusty was staring at him, a strange look on his face. "Hey Fritz, where were you?" Rusty asked. It was his tone, not his words, that made Fritz abandon his food.

"Where was I when?" he asked cautiously. The dip toward seriousness alarmed him.

Rusty sat down opposite of Fritz and played with the tin foil wrapping of his second sub. "I'm asking where you were the night Philip Stroh broke into your guy's old house." He looked directly at Fritz. "I'm just wondering why you weren't there. We really could have used you."

A familiar, acrid poison spread through Fritz, perfused by his accelerating heart rate. The Greek chorus that followed him around for days after Brenda was attacked piped up again, singing its only song: "you should have been there." It was all he could do not to put his hands over his ears and crawl under the table.

Rusty was looking at him expectantly, a tiredness to his eyes that were a clash to such a young face. Fritz took a deep breath to steady himself. "I was in DC for the night," he got out, his voice sounding thin to his ears. "I never would have left if I thought Stroh was going to…" his gazes drifted off to somewhere over Rusty's left shoulder. He had failed the young man, too. Not only had he not been there to protect Brenda, but he hadn't been there to protect Rusty, and he had been yet another adult in Rusty's life who didn't take care of him. He hung his head.

Rusty cleared his throat. "Nah, it's okay, I was just wondering, you know, how that all went down. How did Stroh know you weren't home?"

Fritz felt worse and worse. "He was watching the house, watching Brenda. I left at the worst possible time."

"Wait, he was spying on you and you didn't notice? Brenda's a cop and you're FBI? What's up with that?" Rusty frowned.

Fritz had no idea how to answer. Nobody had any idea how long Stroh had surveyed Brenda's house, but most likely from the moment Rusty dragged him out of the woodwork. Fritz left for DC the next day, so there wasn't a lot of time to notice surveillance. He was thinking about how to explain this to Rusty when Brenda walked in.

"Shoppin's hard work, so I sure hope that meatball sub is still up for grabs…" she stopped and looked at Fritz and Rusty, the tension in the room like pea soup. "Guys, what's goin' on?"

Fritz stretched to rouse himself. He forced a smile and said, "nothing, honey. Have a seat." Brenda was dressed in a torn and stained blouse and cut-off jeans, clearly ready to pitch in with the work.

Fritz could tell Brenda wasn't fooled. Her spine took on the certain rigidness it did when she was amidst conflict, like an animal prepared for fight or flight. She slowly moved toward the table and sat down next to Fritz, her eyes moving back and forth between the two males.

"Uh huh," she said slowly. She looked across the table, and, trying to appear casual despite her wary posture, said, "so Rusty, what were y'all talkin' about when I walked in here? Didn't sound like you were gabbin' about the paintin'!"

Fritz wanted to kick Rusty under the table, but it would be neither appropriate or, he suspected, successful at shutting him up. Like most teenagers, Fritz didn't notice an overabundance of tact in Rusty.

"We were just talking about Philip Stroh, that asshole," Rusty said, picking up his sub and pulling off a wilted onion from the top.

Brenda was silent, then said softly, "oh really? And what we're y'all sayin' bout 'that asshole'?'" Fritz didn't like the way her eyes were clouded over. He tried to think of something to say, but Rusty beat him to it.

"Oh, I was just asking Fritz why he wasn't at home the night we got attacked," he said, in a conversational tone. He didn't sound angry, just intense. "I mean, I'm just wondering why an FBI agent didn't notice a serial killer was casing your house and decided to take off for DC. Not that I'm blaming you for anything, Fritz," he said, as an afterthought.

Fritz opened his mouth to reply, not sure exactly what he was going to say, but Brenda put her arm on his shoulder, and lightly applied pressure, indicating for him to hush.

"Rusty, you and I never talked about certain things when we spoke about that night," Brenda said. Her tone was solemn and her speech slower than normal, as if discussing a very serious topic with a child in whom she had faith could handle it, which was pretty much the situation. "It was bad enough discussin' what we went through together, you and me, never mind all the behind-the-scenes stuff." She looked directly at Rusty as she spoke.

"Yea, okay," he said, sounding curious and uncertain at the same time.

Brenda clenched her hands together, and he knuckles slowly turned white. "I had been on Stroh's tail for three years, and everyone thought I was obsessed and had lost all perspective," Brenda said, her voice even. "I'm not gonna bore you with all the details. Suffice it to say that when it was clear to me Stroh was the guy you saw buryin' the bodies, at first no one believed me. They all thought I saw Stroh in every rape and murder. Includin' my own squad." Brenda's voice grew hard and cold for a moment. "Except Fritz. He had more reason than most to believe I had gone off the deep end when it came to Philip Stroh, but he asked me if I was sure, and when I said yea, these dead women were Stroh's handiwork, he took off for DC to get a behavioral profile to help out my case. He wasn't there that night, Rusty, cuz he begged his supervisors to allow him to fly across the country on my word. And he didn't notice Stroh hangin' around the house watchin' us because he was too busy runnin' around helpin' me out."

Fritz reached out and touched Brenda's ramrod straight back, gently caressing it, hoping to express his gratitude for her trying to alleviate his guilt.

"And so we're clear, Rusty, so everythin' is straight between you and me, since we're neighbors and all and I'd really like you to come and spend time with us whenever you can, not just as our handyman but as our friend, it was my fault you got attacked that night." She took a deep, shuttering breath.

"Brenda—" Fritz said her name in unison with Rusty.

Brenda put her hand in the air. "Both of you, let me finish. I spent an entire career where I used everythin' and everyone to get a case closed, and I never learned how much it hurt people until it was almost too late." Her voice waivered for a split second and then righted itself. "Rusty, I used you as bait, you know that. I borrowed your hat and used that as bait too. I almost got you killed because I wanted Stroh so bad. And I am really, really sorry about that." Her voice was thick with regret, but to Fritz's surprise, given her recent emotional state, she remained in control.

Rusty leaned back and looked down at his hands before returning her earnest gaze again. He shrugged. "It's all good, Brenda. Like I told you when you were in Atlanta, it's not like you took the knife and stabbed me in the leg yourself. That piece of shit tried to kill me in Griffith Park, and you weren't the one who hired me, so it wasn't even your fault I was there in the first place." He looked over at Fritz. "Wasn't your fault either, man. I did a good job taking care of myself that night, and Brenda did a kick-ass job too."

"I know," Fritz said carefully, knowing if he implied somehow that Brenda was in need of rescuing that night he was taking his life into his hands. "I just wish I was there to…help."

"That would have been awesome," Rusty said. "Maybe you would have blown that bastard's head off."

Fritz silently agreed.

Rusty rifled through the pile of subs in front of him and pulled out a meatball. He handed it to Brenda, along with a bag of chips. "You know what's funny," he said, opening a can of coke, "is my own mom isn't big on taking responsibility. I mean, she left me in a zoo when I was just a little kid so she could run off with her boyfriend like a stupid teenage girl." He took a swig. "And now I got all these adults—you two, Sharon, and Provenza—feeling all responsible for me, apologizing for things that aren't your fault, and you barely know me. That's messed up, you know?"

"Well, it's certainly messed up about your momma leavin' you, Rusty, but as far as a bunch of adults carin' for you and fillin' in for her, I think that's a wonderful thing." She smiled at him.

Rusty rolled his eyes and looked disgusted. "Uh, yea, whatever, Brenda. Just please don't get your maternal hormones all over me, okay?" And the three of them laughed.

...

After lunch, Brenda was surprisingly eager to help with the painting. She became Fritz and Rusty's assistant, taking orders without complaint, running back and forth to the kitchen to clean their brushes, picking up their drop clothes, and performing whatever tasks they presented her with. A few times she mumbled to Rusty that she was just sure Sharon would want him home at a decent hour, and before he could let loose with a snarky answer, she whirled away, a veritable home improvement sprite. Outside of a murder investigation, Fritz had never seen her work so hard.

The last bit of blue masking tape came down around 7:00. Brenda stuffed it in a garbage bag along with the paint-encrusted rags and splattered newspapers and tied it shut, wiping her hands on her shorts. "Boys, I'd say this is a job well done," she said, putting her hand on her hip. "Rusty, we can't thank you enough. You comin' back next weekend to help us with our bedroom?"

He shrugged. "Yea, okay."

She looked at her watch. "Oh, would you look at the time. Fritzy, why don't you get Rusty his money? I'm sure Sharon's wonderin' where he is." Fritz retrieved his wallet from the kitchen and pulled out several bills. He slipped Rusty an extra 20 bucks in the wad of cash he handed him. The kid had done a really great job.

The bills had barely left Fritz's hand before Brenda was leading Rusty to the door. "See you next weekend! Bye now, bye!"

"Jeez, Brenda, you sick of me or what? Why are you—" He heard the door click shut.

"What's up with you?" Fritz asked, when Brenda walked back into the newly painted living room. "You really gave Rusty the bum's rush."

"Well," she said, a small smile on her lips. "I guess I was just eager for an adult swim tonight."

He raised an eyebrow. "Really? You want to go swimming now? Isn't it a little late? I thought you would want to spend the evening get ready for work tomorrow." The muscles of his neck were aching from arching to paint the ceiling. He really needed a hot shower.

"Oh, I got better things to do tonight then go over a bunch of cases." She slowly lifted a petite hand to the top button of her paint-spattered denim shirt. "And so do you." She undid the first button, then the second.

His interest was piqued. "Um, Brenda, are we swimming, or you are you stripping? Because if this is a striptease, I can think of a lot sexier clothes for you to take— oh." He couldn't believe what he was seeing.

Button by unbutton, Brenda's messy top was revealing soft white skin, until it wasn't. A flash of red alerted Fritz to the fact that Brenda was dressed to do more than just paint. It didn't take long for his suspicions to be confirmed.

Under her deceptively frumpy shirt, Brenda was wearing a bright red bikini top. It reminded him of 1940's pinup girls, as it looked more like an elegant bra than two triangles of cloth on a string. The top seemed to push her breasts together and up, and cleavage spilled over fanned cups. Fritz had seen sexier bathing suits on the beaches of LA worn by women who were eager to show off their flawless bodies, but he had never seen a bathing suit so deliciously matched to the woman it adorned, gently nipping and tucking and pushing in all the right places.

Brenda stood still for a moment to give Fritz a good look, and he could tell she was immensely pleased with herself. She licked her full lips and played with her ponytail with her finger, her eyes glued to him to gauge his every reaction.

He could barely breathe. "Shopping trip?" he croaked.

"Took me four stores to find the right one," she said. "But I don't mind goin' to a little effort to fulfill a fantasy of yours, honey."

"And for that, I'm grateful." Breathe, Fritz, breathe. The image of that top floating in the pool flitted through his mind.

Brenda reached down and unbuttoned her cutoffs, slowly lowering the zipper. "Need some help, honey?" he asked, starting toward her.

She shook her head. "Thought you might like to see the show." She pulled her shorts down and kicked them off her legs. And oh, what a reveal.

The bottom was, like the top, an old-fashioned style and thus modestly cut, with small bows on each hip and ruching across the front, and somehow the nod toward modesty made it all the sexier.

"You look incredible, Brenda," he breathed.

She turned away from him, and he got a good look of her delicious ass. "Grab a couple towels, loverboy," she said, looking over her shoulders. "And throw on your trunks. Meet you in the pool in five." Fritz watched her slowly walk away, her hips swinging seductively, and he didn't move until he couldn't see her anymore. Then he became a man of action. He had washed the beach towels they used from the previous day, so he quickly ducked into the laundry room and grabbed a few. He reached for his bathing trunks lying on a nearby drying rack, but then stopped. He had a much better idea. He stripped off his paint-stained clothes, dumped them in the hamper, wrapped a towel around his middle, and padded through the house to the back patio.

He turned on the pool's night-lights and a couple of the outdoor lights, as dusk was approaching. Brenda was floating on her back, looking like a Hollywood star from the golden age with her red bikini and blonde hair. She startled when the lights went on, but when she turned her head and saw him, she floated into an upright position.

"Come on in, the water's great," she said, treading water.

"Don't mind if I do," said Fritz, grinning as he tossed his towel on a nearby chaise longue and walked to the stairs on the shallow end, stepping in.

"Fritz!" Brenda hissed, when she saw he was naked. "The neighbors, for heaven's sake! What are you doin'?"

The water was cool to his warm skin, but he braved the bite and swam over to her. "It's okay, no one can see us." He put his arms around her waist and pulled her close. She resisted at first, then gave in, and he buried his face in her neck.

"Walkin' around naked!" she huffed. She pulled back, and Fritz was annoyed his nibbling was interrupted. "How in the world do you know if the neighbors can see us or not?"

"Brenda, we are on a corner lot." He nodded towards the direction of the street. "There's a good amount of land between us and the people next door, and we have an eight foot stockade fence. The houses on this street are almost all the same, which means no one around us has a second floor to spy on us from."

Brenda looked all around her, in every direction Fritz mentioned. "Besides," Fritz said, eager to make his point and get on with things, "Eric Spetman told me it was completely private."

Brenda's eyebrows shot up into her scalp. "You. Are. Kiddin'. Me. Fritz, did you buy this house cuz some twenty-somethin' assured you that it was safe to have sex by the pool?"

"Uh, no? I bought this house because I really liked it and it had great potential. The fact that it had a pool was a huge bonus for me. Jeez, Brenda, I'm not that horny, and thanks for discounting all the work I did to find this place."

"Oh, I didn't mean—"

"I know you didn't." He snaked a hand around and squeezed her ass. She squealed in surprise. "It just so happens that the second I saw the pool, which was after I toured the inside of the house and I really liked it, by the way, I started to get really hot fantasies about you in a red bikini."

"Which I'm doin' my part to fulfill," Brenda said, snaking her hand around and grabbing Fritz's ass, much to his delight. "I just didn't know how much, er, fulfillin' could safely be done out here."

"Well, one of the times I was looking at the house I was asking Eric about the privacy fence, thinking I was being really subtle, and he just came out and said it: 'dude, you can totally have all the sex you want to out here and the only people who are gonna see it are Google maps.'"

Brenda snorted.

"And he proceeded to tell me how he outright asked his next door neighbors if they could see in his backyard, and the husband assured him he couldn't, not since the previous owner's kids put up the privacy fence."

"How did he…" Brenda started.

"…put that to the neighbors? I can only guess. 'Yo, I wanna get it on with my girlfriend, can you like see us or anything?' Honestly, I have no idea. But I do know we're safe."

Brenda turned around 360 degrees in Fritz's loose arms, then pulled her body close to his. "When I was student at Langley, I got good marks at detectin' surveillance. And I agree that no one is at a vantage point where they can be watchin' us. So I say, let's fulfill that fantasy of yours."

"Oh, how I love you."

Brenda responded by wrapping her legs around his waist and rubbing against him, creating friction by bobbing in the water. "Well then, I guess we can start christinin' the house out here," she whispered.

He admired how beautiful she looked in the bikini, how the top perfectly flaunted her curves without making her look cheap. "I love this suit, Brenda. You look like a goddess in it."

"Glad you like it, cuz I bought it just for you. Tell me what you want, Fritz. This is your fantasy. I'm all yours."

I'm all yours. He liked the sound of that. He reached around his back and tugged at Brenda's feet and said, " I want you to take the top off for me. Nice and slow."

Brenda winked at him and let go of his waist, swimming about five feet away into the middle of the pool, where the water came up to just below her ribcage. She slowly dragged a hand up from her stomach, lazily outlining the bottom edge of her bikini top, then turning upwards to trace a series of concentric circles on her chest. Fritz felt lightheaded and wondered if it was the chlorine. Of course it's not the chlorine, it's your wife fulfilling one of your fantasies." You getting turned on, Brenda?" he asked her.

"You know I am."

"Good. So am I. Now take off your top like I told you to."

She cocked her head and gave him her sexy/evil look that he loved, and before he could blink, she was gone. Swimming like a selkie, Brenda's head popped up in the deep end several seconds later. "Gettin' to it," she gasped, before diving under the water again.

He jumped as suddenly Brenda's hand appeared on his thigh. She teased him for a minute before breaking through the water with a gasp.

"I didn't know you were a mermaid, Brenda."

"A very naughty, naughty mermaid," she said, taking several deep breaths. She again leaned in to kiss him, deep and thorough. Just as he reached for her again, she swam out of his grasp.

"Now Fritzy, what was it that you were asking me to do?" She put her finger on her chin as if in deep thought. "Oh yes, now I remember. You want me to take off my bikini top. Is that right?"

"Yes, that's right. As they say in New Orleans, 'show me your tits.'"

She rolled her eyes. "Charmin'." Her hands slowly moved back behind her, and Fritz sent a silent thank you to Eric Spetman for putting in underwater lights. After what seemed like forever, the front of the suit sagged, and Brenda relaxed her arms. She shimmied one arm out, then the other. She had a look of pure smugness on her face, and Fritz was sure it was in response to his tongue hanging out of his mouth and touching the water. Brenda reached up and gave the top a yank, pausing to give Fritz a glance before tossing it his way.

He surprised himself. His eyes didn't instantly feast on the site of Brenda's chest, but instead it followed the arc of the top, which landed with a splat a couple of feet to his right. It floated, right-side up, riding invisible waves, looking every bit as hot as it did in his fantasies.

As did Brenda, when he finally looked at her. She walked until she was in waist deep water, most likely so he could get the full effect.

And what an effect it was. The red of her bikini bottoms shown through and contrasted with the light aqua of the pool, reminding Fritz that she wasn't naked, she was topless, and that make it all the more erotic. He could stare all day at that beautiful, milky flesh, those , round, full breasts on her petite body and not get bored.

"If I told you I was gonna leave you if you didn't look me in the eyes right now, could you do it?" Brenda said.

She needs to go into deeper water so I can watch her breasts float. "Oh, uh, did you say something? Hey Brenda, go out farther into the deep end, will you? But wade backwards, I don't want to—"

His train of thought was broken by an exaggerated sigh, and he reluctantly tore his eyes away from his feast.
"What?" he asked.

She laughed and shook her head slowly, then raised her arms and did a graceful backwards dive into a backstroke. She looked incredible, naked from the waist up, taking languid strokes in the deeper end of the pool. She stopped and watched him as he slowly breast-stroked over to her, his head above water, not wanting to miss a thing.

"Like what you see?" she asked, treading water.

"Oh, yea."

She again wrapped her legs around his waist and whispered, "I really like what I feel." Their wet hands leisurely wandered all over hidden nooks and crannies beneath the water as they moaned into each other's mouths in the warm California night for a long, long time.

Fritz finally pulled away and took her by the hand. "Come with me, Brenda. I think it's time for dry land." Fingers enjoined, they swam awkwardly to the ladder on the side, and crawled out. He handed her a towel and she dabbed at her hair and her damp body before turning toward the house. Fritz grabbed her. "Oh no, you said we were christening the new place and we're starting out here." Before she could say anything, he led her to the overstuffed chaise lounges that he had paid Eric Spetman leave behind. He lay down a dry beach towel and then leaned down to whisper in her ear. "Take off the rest of your bikini and get comfortable, Brenda. Full christening is about to begin."

...

Afterwards Fritz was in a state of near bliss. Afterglowing next to my pool. Life doesn't get any better than this, he thought, kissing the top of Brenda's head. She was curled up next to Fritz on her side, her leg draped over his. After awhile Fritz noticed Brenda was shivering. It was probably 80 degrees outside, but there was a slight breeze blowing and it didn't take much to make Brenda cold, especially since she was damp.

Fritz was reluctant to leave his little aquatic kingdom, but it was probably time to go in. "Brenda honey, why don't we go inside and take a shower? You seem like you're chilly."

"Mmmmm." She stretched and sat up on one elbow to look at him. Small tendrils of hair had escaped from her wet ponytail and were drying around her face. This cherubic feature combined with her "just laid" unfocused dreamy eyes gave her a childlike sensuality that was captivating.

"What?" she said, poking him. "Wipe that goofy grin off of your face."

"Never, not in a million years," Fritz said, tweaking her nose.

Brenda untangled herself from Fritz and the lawn chair and stood up, wrapping a towel around herself. "Fritz, do you mind fishin' my bathin' suit top out of the pool before you come in with one of those long hook thingies? I don't want to leave it in the pool overnight."

"No problem."

She turned towards the house. "And tonight's shower will be hosted by me. In my tub. Located in the soon-to-be pink master bathroom." She smiled and walked into the house, leaving Fritz outside to bathe in his contentment of the moment: he had a crazy, beautiful wife and a perfect pool with a bikini floating in it. Things could be worse.

---

On Monday afternoon Fritz found himself in familiar territory. In the morning he had learned that over the weekend there had been quite a conflict when Major Crimes was called to the scene of a triple homicide where two of the three victims were FBI informants. Provenza, as Incident Commander, ignored Raydor's direct order to call Fritz and get him involved. Both she and Fritz were livid, and they took turns yelling at Provenza for 30 minutes.

Finally, Raydor held up her hand and snapped, "I've heard enough! Provenza, out of my office! Out! Now!" And Provenza, looking relieved the barrage was over, turned tail and ran.

Raydor collapsed in her chair, panting. "This is all my fault," she moaned, hand on her forehead.

"No, it's not," Fritz said. "As Incident Commander, he's in charge at the scene, but he can't defy a superior's direct order."

"Oh, it's not that." Sharon slowly sat up and opened her desk drawer, pulling out a mini snickers and a Reese's, the latter which she tossed to Fritz. Does she have a candy drawer now, too? Is sugar addiction a requirement of the job? "I should have been at the crime scene. I've been assigning Provenza all after-hour roll-outs." She popped her candy in her mouth and chewed, sighing.

"I was always trying to get Brenda to delegate and trust her team a little more, Sharon.."

"Trust, hell. I don't trust any of them and they don't trust me. The real reason is Rusty." She sighed. "I can't bring that broken kid into my home and leave him alone at night. I'm trying to provide some semblance of a normal family life, and it' s a struggle to have dinner ready by 8 o'clock.. I can't be working 80 hours a week. School starts soon, and I need to be there in the morning to make sure he actually shows up." Fritz noted how tired she looked, and it was one of the few times he thought the beautiful woman actually looked her age.

"Hey Sharon, since we're neighbors now, why don't you give me or Brenda a call if you're running late? Rusty can come over and have dinner with us. Brenda will make sure he gets his homework done probably using interrogation techniques she learned in the CIA. And if you're stuck at a crime scene or get rolled out late, he can spend the night with us so he won't be alone. That is, once our guest room is set up."

Sharon took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes. "Oh Fritz, I couldn't ask that of you and Brenda. You have done so much already. Rusty loved the painting job, and he told me you hired him to help with the rest of your house, which is great. But beyond that would be imposing."

"It's not imposing at all. You should have seen how happy Brenda and Rusty were to see each other. They get along great, and it seems to me, the more adults around to help out, the better." Fritz paused. "Besides, I think he carries around a few scars from Stroh's attack, and the only person who can understand that is Brenda." He told Sharon about the conversation over subs from the evening before.

"Oh my." Sharon stood and looked out he office window. "I'm sorry he gave you a guilt trip, Fritz. He clearly didn't understand."

"It's okay. He had every right to ask why I wasn't there to protect him that night." Fritz looked down at his watch for a distraction from the certain tidal wave of guilt, and was startled to see how much of his day was taken up by Provenza's screw-up. He tucked the candy in his pocket for later and stood. "I think taking an active role in Rusty's life could be one positive thing to come out of Stroh crossing paths with Brenda, don't you? In addition to him coming to live with you, of course."

He walked to the door and had his hand on the knob when Sharon said his name.

"Forgive me for overstepping, Fritz, but I've watched you go through terrible stress this past year. You always seem to be so focused on what Brenda needs."

He shrugged. "What else would I be focused on?"

"Consider for a minute how these events may have affected you."

He frowned. "I don't have time for that."

Sharon walked over to Fritz. "That is exactly my point. Perhaps you should give some thought as to what you need instead of worrying all the time about other people. "

Sharon's words floated though his mind for the next minute or so, then they mixed in with all the detritus of his day. I'll think about what I need once I get a handle on Brenda's emotional barometer and figure out if her pre-move meltdown is an omen of things to come. And now that Rusty's going to be around more, I'm worried about him having some type of normal life and what I can do to help make that happen. And the house, that's a huge priority. I want Brenda to have the perfect house. And a pink bathroom. Gotta fix that bathroom up for my girl.

END CHAPTER 6

Do you know what turns me on as much as the sight of Brenda in a bikini does to Fritz? Feedback, that's what! Float a little feedback my way and I'll promise I'll upate this story a hell of a lot sooner for the next chapter.

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