CHAPTER ELEVEN

Starsky looked around his trashed apartment in shock and dismay. Nicky and Jessica were gone as he had demanded, but they had vented their anger before leaving. His clothes had been pulled out of the closet and the dresser; several of his favorite shirts lay on the floor, torn to shreds.

Someone had taken a knife to his waterbed mattress, slicing deep gashes in the plastic and soaking the bedroom carpet with the water. Pictures had been torn off the wall, the glass in the frames broken, and several photographs, especially the ones of him and Hutch, torn into pieces.

The rest of the place was just as much of a mess. The couch had been overturned, and deep gouges cut into the coffee table and end tables with a knife. All the food had been removed from the refrigerator and left out on the counter to spoil. Dishes and glasses had been shattered on the kitchen floor. A rag had been stuffed into the kitchen sink and then the water had been turned on, leaving the sink to overflow onto the kitchen floor. Several of Starsky's model ships had been broken and scattered around the living room. Someone, Starsky assumed it had probably been Jessica, had taken red lipstick and scrawled on the living room wall 'Fuck you'.

Starsky turned to look at Hutch and sighed heavily. His renter's insurance would cover most of the damage, as long as he filed a police report, but it wouldn't replace the personal possessions and pictures that had been maliciously destroyed in the rampage.

"Well, it looks like they're gone," Starsky said dryly with a thin, bitter smile.

"Personally, pal…I think you got off lucky," Hutch said, clasping his friend's shoulder gently. "I'll call Dobey to tell him we won't be in today after all, and then help you clean up this mess."

For the next four hours, the partners worked side by side restoring some order to the apartment. Starsky would have to repaint the walls, replace his coffee table, end tables and most of his dishes. But the bedroom had suffered the worst of the damage. The carpet and his bed would both have to be replaced, along with most of his shirts

As they cleaned, Starsky discovered several items missing. Some jewelry that had belonged to his deceased grandmother, a collection of silver dollars, and a silver chain with a star and moon charm that Hutch had given him years ago. Starsky suspected that Nicky was the culprit in the thefts. He knew how much the jewelry was worth as well as the sentimental meaning of the silver chain.

After they had established some order to the apartment, Starsky grabbed them each a beer and then called his attorney. He instructed him to file the divorce petition against Jessica. He would provide him with an address for her as soon as he had one.

Three days later, Starsky received legal papers of his own, served to him at headquarters. As he skimmed over the legal documents, his face turned ashen and he looked at Hutch with a stricken look in his eyes. "Jessica is suing for sole custody of the baby." Starsky said in a choked voice. "Hutch…she claims I'm not the father." Starsky's eyes darkened with rage, turning a deep violet, as he crumpled the papers in his fist. "I'll kill the bitch if she's been lying to me all this time!"

"Calm down, buddy," Hutch said quietly, rising to his feet to calm the agitated brunet. "Tell your lawyer that you want blood tests to establish paternity as soon as the baby is born. That's the only way you'll know for sure."

"How could she do that, Hutch?" Starsky demanded, looking at his partner, his eyes filled with anguish and pain. "How could she lie to me about something like that? Did she think that I was that big a sucker? That I'd never find out?"

"I don't know, pal. Maybe you should talk to her doctor? Find out what else she might have lied about."

"Will you come with me?" Starsky asked hopefully. "Right now, I'm so pissed off I'm liable to go off on him if he tells me that baby isn't mine."

"Of course I will. Let's go."

The two men left the squad room and drove to the downtown medical center where Jessica's pediatrician had his office. The elderly man ushered the two men into his inner office and smiled warmly, "I'm glad to finally meet you, Mr. Starsky," he said cordially. "I encouraged your wife to bring you with her to her appointments but she always said you were too busy."

"It's Detective Starsky," Starsky corrected him. "And Jessica would never let me come with her to any of his appointments." For some reason he felt compelled to correct Jessica's lie about him being too busy to come to any of her appointments. "I need to know if there's anything you can tell me about Jessica's pregnancy."

"I'm sorry, Detective Starsky, but I'm not sure that I should tell you anything unless you can prove you are who you say you are."

Sighing, Starsky pulled his badge and identification out of his pocket and showed it to the doctor, who examined it closely. Apparently satisfied with Starsky's identification and his right to know confidential information about his patient, he handed the ID back to Starsky.

"What would you like to know? There was nothing usual about the pregnancy and the baby should be born right on schedule."

"In August, right?" Hutch asked.

"August? No, the baby is due in the next two weeks. July 5th to be exact," The doctor said with a puzzled frown.

Starsky's face turned pale at the doctor's words. Jessica had lied about when the baby was due, which explained why she had gained so much weight so quickly. It also meant that she had been at least six weeks pregnant when she told Starsky that her period was late and led him to believe that the baby was his. He had only been dating her for a little over a month when she told him that she thought she was pregnant. There was no way that the baby could be his as she had led him to believe.

"You're sure about the date?" Hutch asked, "There couldn't be some mistake?"

"Well, the last time I saw her, I did tell her that the baby could come anytime within the next two weeks, which would make it a bit early based on the date she gave me for her last menstrual cycle," the doctor said, "But, women are often mistaken on the dates of their last period when they think they are pregnant. I did tell her that she should have contacted a doctor sooner so that prenatal care could have been started. She had to have suspected that she was pregnant for at least a month since she was already almost three months along when I first examined her."

"Thank you, doctor. You've been very helpful," Starsky said in a tightly controlled voice. He had found out what he needed to know.

As they exited the building, Starsky growled, "She lied to me. She knew the baby wasn't mine all along! She used me and tricked me into marrying her!"

"The big question is why." Hutch said thoughtfully. "Why you? Why come up with such an elaborate scheme to make you think you were the baby's father?"

"I don't know, but I sure as hell intend to find out," Starsky vowed in a fiercely determined voice. "Jessica is going to tell me the truth once and for all."

"Do you know where she is?"

"Yeah, she's holed up in some motel on the west side with Nicky," Starsky said in a cold, calm voice that Hutch knew meant trouble if Starsky didn't get the answers he wanted. "I had Minnie do some checking around for me. The room is registered to Nicky. He didn't even have enough sense to use a different name."

"Want some company? You shouldn't talk to them without some backup."

"You can come along if you want." Starsky said as he twisted the key and turned on the ignition, the tires squealing in protest as he pulled away from the curb. "But, it's my show!"