SAILING INTO UNCHARTED WATERS

Chapter Three

"You men are all the same. You arrogant bastards!"

In her fury, the woman pointed the gun in the direction of the officers. John realized instantly that Andy had misread her intentions. Acting on instinct, he pushed him to the ground just as the woman fired off a shot. John felt a flash of heat near his bicep, and then nothing.

The woman looked at the gun, then at John, her face confused. Moving quickly, he knocked the gun out of her hand. She then started to run, but he tackled her to the ground.

Christ, he thought, she's a big one!

And she was – wide and strong, and easily John's equal as they rolled once, then twice, around the living room floor.

"Andy," yelled John, "a little help would be appreciated!"

Andy was immediately at his side. Together they managed to subdue the woman, who now lay face down, panting into the rough fibers of the carpet. John cuffed her hands behind her back and took a deep breath.

Andy grinned. "You okay, kid? You looked on the losing end of the battle for a few minutes…"

John said nothing, trying to catch his breath. His face was slightly pale, and there was a sheen of perspiration on his brow.

This time Andy didn't grin. "John?"

"I'm fine," he grunted.

"Let me up, goddam you!" complained the woman. "You got no right to do this! LET ME UP, DAMN IT!"

John threw Andy a look. Can you believe this crap?

"Okay, sister," said Andy, "we coulda done this nice and easy but now you're going to have to take a little ride uptown. Now calm down… we're gonna help you stand up."

Together the cops dragged the woman to her feet. She looked over at her husband, cowering in the corner of the room. Scowling, she spat at him. "Worthless piece of shit!" she muttered.

Andy shook his head, glancing at John. "Nice family, huh?" His eyes drifted toward the husband. "Christ, man, cover up!"

As if coming out of a trance, the man reached for a bath towel that must have earlier fallen to the floor and he wrapped it around his waist.

"What's your name?" Andy asked him.

"Lloyd Brooks." He pointed at the glaring woman. "That's Dorothy… my wife."

"Not for long, you son of a bitch!" she shot back. "If I had my way, I'd be your widow by now!"

"You want to tell us what happened?" asked John, watching as Brooks tried to finger comb his hair. It was a vain attempt at restoring his dignity considering that the man's face and chest was still smeared with chocolate.

"What's to tell? Crazy bitch! Absolutely freaking nuts!"

"Yeah, I'm crazy all right," yelled Dorothy, "crazy for marrying a cheating S.O.B. like you!" Her face red and angry, she glowered at Andy. "None of this would have happened if Lloyd had kept that goddam snake of his inside his pants instead of pulling it out for every slut in the building! No-good, cheating bum. I wish I'd killed him! You hear that, Lloyd? I wish I'd fired that bullet right into your nuts!"

Christ, thought John, shaking his head.

"You wanna know what I came home to this morning? What I came home to after working all goddam night cleaning toilets at the hospital while his lazy ass was home? Why don't you tell 'em, Lloyd!"

"Why don't you shut the hell up!" Lloyd shoved past Andy, and stood in front of his wife. "You're nuts. They're gonna put you away for a long, long time. Next time you get out will be when they're putting you six feet under!"

"Hey, pal, you want to back off? You're pretty brave now that your old lady is wearing handcuffs. Now shut up and let her talk." Andy pushed the man back from his wife.

"Mrs. Brooks, tell us what you saw," said John, suddenly weary. His arm was beginning to ache, and he suppressed the urge to rub it.

"I work nights down at St. Elizabeth's. I'm a janitor. It's damned hard work. People make a mess – always do when they ain't the ones cleaning it up. Anyways, I'm tired, right? So, after the shift's over, I come home, and I start getting breakfast ready for this bum. But guess what? He ain't up yet; he's still in bed. Sleeping. That's what I thought, anyways… until I heard these noises coming from the bedroom."

Great, thought John, suddenly knowing where this was heading.

"What kinda noises?" asked Andy.

"Thumping noises, like something's hitting the wall. So I go take a look and guess what I see? Romeo over there, humping that Phyllis Hanks from down the hall. The both of 'em covered in chocolate, like they're some kinda goddam ice cream cone!"

Uh oh, thought John, a look of trepidation on his face. "Mrs. Brooks… where's Phyllis?"

"Agh," came back the disgusted reply, "I chased her naked ass down the hallway."

John heaved a sigh of relief. He looked at Andy. "It was probably Phyllis who placed the distress call."

Andy nodded. "Yeah." He tugged at the woman's arm. "Okay, Mrs. Brooks, time to go for a ride now."

"Hey, what about him?" She jerked her head toward her husband. "If he wasn't so goddam desirable, none of this woulda happened.

Andy pushed her toward the door. "Yeah, yeah… he's a regular Adonis."

"Hey," yelled the skinny man, "don't discount charisma!"

"You," replied John, "shut up. We've had enough of you."

He grimaced suddenly and grabbed his upper arm, unable to repress the urge this time.

Andy noticed. "John?"

"My arm's burning like crazy…" He removed his jacket. Blood had soaked the sleeve of his white, pinstriped shirt. "Ah, shit…"

He looked at Andy. "I can move the arm so it can't be too bad… probably a flesh wound."

Andy frowned. "You better get that looked at. Go on; I'll take care of this. You want me to call Lori?"

"Hell, no! Let's see how bad it is, first. Christ, she's gonna go off once she hears about this."

When Laura walked out of Dr. Sanchez's office, it seemed the colors of the outside world were much brighter, the tones just a little sharper.

I'm happy, she thought. Happy! All the years of disappointment, of negative pregnancy tests, and worries about conception… poof! Gone. A burden she no longer had to carry.

She was going to have a baby!

No, she and John were going to have a baby. Finally!

How am I going to tell him? she wondered, her heart beating just a little faster in anticipation. For a moment, she considered showing up at the station, taking him into a vacant office and sharing the happy news. She smiled, imagining his expression upon hearing it.

Then she thought of Andy, and the idea of showing up at the precinct lost some of its appeal. John was going to be thrilled when he learned of the baby. It would be just like him to run into the squad room to announce it to everyone. She could just see Andy looking at her, and then making some crude comment.

So, Lori… got a bun in the oven, huh?

No, this was too important a moment to allow that little rooster to ruin it.

She knew Andy didn't like her. That was fine with Laura. She considered him a misanthropic boor, and she often struggled to be civil toward John's partner.

Andy Sipowicz had the sensitivity of a rock, and she didn't want his crude behavior to ruin what should be a happy and memorable moment between her and her husband.

For some inexplicable reason – well, inexplicable to her, anyway – Johnny loved the man. He put up with his antics, his vulgar humor and his biting sarcasm. Too many times to count, he'd reminded her that she needed to look beneath Andy's rough surface; that a good man was hiding behind the prickly facade.

John would probably insist that Andy be the baby's godfather. Oh Lord, she thought, and I'll have to give in. I always do when it comes to Andy.

She knew something was going on with Sipowicz. For the past few months, he'd seemed angrier at the world, more crude than usual. In an unguarded moment, John had shared his disquiet about the changes in his partner's behavior. He was concerned Andy was drinking too much, and he worried it might impact his ability to do the job.

Laura worried about that, too, especially since Andy was John's partner. If there was one thing she'd learned from being a cop's wife, it was how much partners depended on one another when they were out on the street. Their jobs were dangerous; they had to be able to rely on each other in moments of crisis.

If Andy was drinking, was he a good partner for John? Could John rely on him?

It wasn't something she could discuss openly with her husband. He was too loyal to Andy, viewing him as a father figure. As if a father of John's would have been anything like Andy!

Still… John wouldn't listen to any criticism of him.

But now – now that he was going to be a father, maybe she could bring it up. He had responsibilities now. Not just to Laura, but to their child.

Preoccupied by her thoughts, Laura was surprised to find herself once again in front of the same store window she'd been gazing into before her appointment with Dr. Sanchez. This time her eyes looked past the display of wooden A-B-C blocks and the antique teddy bear, and she studied her reflection. The woman looking back at her now seemed much happier.

Hmm… maybe I won't tell John, she considered. Maybe I'll wait until we're in bed and he's sleeping. Then I'll wake him up and tell him I need a milkshake. And when he starts to complain, I'll just say, 'Aren't all mothers-to-be entitled to cravings in the middle of the night?'

The thought of John's face when he realized what she was saying made her laugh out loud. An old man passing by stared at her, and she quickly got herself under control.

She was just about to walk away from the window when a foolish idea occurred to her.

Too sentimental? she wondered.

She didn't care. It was a time for sentiment!

She went inside the store.

John glanced down at his watch before entering the apartment. Eight p.m. Damn…

He knew his wife wasn't going to be happy. He should have called to say he'd be late.

The visit to the ER took longer than he'd anticipated, and then there was the paperwork back at the station to catch up on, in spite of Andy's nagging him to take the rest of the day off.

Taking a deep breath, he walked into the apartment.

"Hi babe," he said, spotting his wife sitting on the sofa, surrounded by papers. He leaned down and kissed the top of her head. "Sorry I'm late. What are you up to?"

"Catching up on casework. I have to file a 'motion to dismiss' tomorrow; I want to make sure I haven't missed anything. I'm going before Judge Thompson, and he's a stickler for detail." She sat up straight, stretching out her back. "I'm just about done. So, where were you?"

He hesitated.

"Johnny?" she asked, suddenly alert. "What's wrong?"

He slid off his jacket, tossing it on a chair. Laura's eyes grew wide as she saw the bandages on his arm, the missing shirtsleeve. "What…?"

"Look," he said quickly, "there's nothing to be alarmed about, okay? It was a domestic dispute. The wife had a gun and I couldn't get out of the way in time. The bullet's just grazed the skin; it didn't even enter my arm."

Laura stood up and walked over to him, looking closely at the bandages. She raised frightened eyes to his. "Nothing to be concerned about? She fired a gun at you, John! Where was Andy during all of this?"

"Andy was doing what he had to do."

"Really? Does Andy have a gunshot wound, too?"

"Stop it, Lori. It was a freak accident. Everything's fine. Don't make more of it than it is."

She frowned. "I hate this! You might have been killed today. I'm not buying that Andy did what he had to, either. He's a loose cannon."

John didn't like the direction the conversation was going in. It made him uncomfortable.

There was some truth in what Lori said. Andy's judgment had been off today – he'd misread the woman's body language. Worse, John thought he'd smelled liquor on Andy's breath before they went out on the call. But even if Lori had a point, John wasn't going to let her go off on Andy.

"Lori, I'm beat. Let it go. I'm okay. That should be enough for you."

Laura's eyes looked down at the jacket laying on the chair; John's shield, still pinned to its pocket, mocked her.

How had she ever chosen a cop to fall in love with?

She didn't want to end up like Johnny's mother, widowed with a small child. The scare at seeing John's injured arm and his casual disregard for the danger he'd been in angered her. It also bothered her. She had a baby to think about now.

"I'm going to bed," John said, unaware of his wife's turbulent emotions. "I'm exhausted."

"You don't want anything to eat?" she asked, her voice toneless.

"Nah, Andy grabbed me a sandwich from the deli a couple of hours ago. I just want to sleep. I think it's the drugs they gave me for the pain. They make me tired."

Laura watched him head for the bedroom. She didn't know what to say or do. The evening hadn't turned out the way she'd imagined.

The police badge on John's coat caught her eye again. She turned away, biting her lower lip, and switched off the lamp next to the sofa. Unhappily, she followed her husband into the bedroom.

It might be the middle of July in New York, she thought, but tonight was going to be the dead of winter in the Kelly bedroom.

Several hours later, John awakened with a hard, driving thirst in his mouth. Damned drugs, he thought. He glanced over at his wife, curled up on the opposite side of the bed, sleeping.

Quietly, he got out of bed and wandered into the dark hallway, heading for the kitchen and a glass of water.

He flicked on the kitchen light, squinting against the brightness, waiting for his eyes to adjust.

When they did, it took several moments before his mind comprehended what he was seeing.

Sitting on the table was a teddy bear and several wooden blocks, spelling out one word.

B A B Y

Oh, Lori! he thought.

Feelings of excitement, happiness and remorse battled one another for dominance.

The glass of water forgotten, he rushed back to the bedroom.

To be continued.

Authors' Note: This is a continuing story from the writing team of WriterJasmine and Teeheehee1234. It's meant to be a fun attempt at writing a story together based on words that readers provide to us on a weekly basis. For more information about this, please read our profile and please feel free to participate. The 'bolded' words throughout the story are words that some of our reader friends sent our way this week. The words utilized are: restoring; snake; janitor; ice cream; trepidation; tests; misanthropic; milkshake; shield; scare.