Chapter 4

"Let me guess…you're thinking about how you're going to tell Rick," says Mitch, walking into the living room and finding McCall curled up on the sofa. Her legs are tucked underneath her pink satin robe, her hands wrapped around a coffee cup and her new engagement ring sparkling in the soft morning light from the window behind her.

"Mmmm? Rick? Oh, no...he's going to be happy," she says with a smile. What she was thinking about was the simple quarter-carat solitaire she and Steve had picked out together so many years ago. It was all he could afford at the time, but she didn't care. She was twenty years old and madly in love. All she cared about was being Steve's wife — a diamond on her finger was just a formality. It almost seems like all that happened to a different person. Maybe it did. This time, the diamond is much larger, with smaller diamonds surrounding it and even more diamonds set in the band. It's beautiful, and almost gaudy. Mitch had picked it out himself — this is what he thought she would like.

With a sigh, she reaches out for Mitch's hand. "Hunter has always known this day would come. He wants me to happy, I can promise you that."

Mitch nods assent and sits down beside her.

"Besides, I don't have to leave my job right away, right? When…I guess if…a baby comes along, we can address it then."

"True. But, I have a feeling that even when you are no longer his partner, he's still going to call in the middle of the night. Just because."

"You're probably right about that," she says laughing.

"Well, as long as you are in my bed and not his I guess I'm okay with that," Mitch teases and nuzzles her cheek.

Pulling herself into his lap, she playfully kisses him. "That will not be a problem." The kissing continues, soft and fun at first, but going further than she had planned, and when his hands slide inside her robe she pulls away. Breathless, she presses her face against his cheek. "I have to get ready for work."

Mitch grunts in aggravation. "Damn work." But he pulls his hands out of her robe and wraps them around her middle for a hug.

As McCall slowly stands up, he asks, "So how do you plan to tell Rick?"

"I don't know yet, but he's out the next two days so I have time to think about it."

"He's actually taking a vacation?"

"No, it's personal leave." She continues walking toward her bedroom, not giving Mitch a chance to ask more questions. She doesn't know why Hunter is taking two days off from work; he certainly had not offered her an explanation. She's hoping Hunter's silence has something to do with Rachel and his preference to keep his relationships private, but her intuition tells her it's not.

XXXXX

Truth be told, she is glad that Hunter is not across the desk from her today. Her mind keeps wondering to Mitch's proposal the night before, the effort he put into creating the atmosphere with the music and the candles and the dahlias. Oh, the dahlias. It make her smile every time she thinks about it. Their relationship began over a discussion of the Black Dahlia, and he had decorated her house with pink ones. When she asked him why pink, he joked, "Well, black ones would have been creepy."

They had talked and planned and dreamed together all evening. Mitch had picked up lasagna and cannolis from her favorite restaurant, and they ate it amongst the candlelight. It was easily the most romantic night of her life.

As Mitch rattled on about how excited his family is going to be, McCall was fantasizing about hosting barbeques for his students, large family dinners at Christmas and how cute their kids are going to be. Neither one of them could stop smiling. It was his smile that first attracted her to him. He is not the best-looking man she's ever dated, but his smile is infectious and his easygoing personality is comforting. Most importantly, he has fully accepted Hunter as an integral part of her life, even if he doesn't entirely like the man himself. At least he tries, and has never shown any jealousy — that alone speaks volumes to McCall's heart.

They talked about a spring wedding, probably something small and intimate. It will be a second marriage for both of them. Mitch's first marriage ended shortly after he had accepted an assistant professorship at UCLA. His ex-wife had her own career in Chicago — Mitch's hometown – and had refused to make the move with him. They had tried a long-distance relationship for a while, but it did not work out.

"Excuse me, um, Sergeant McCall?" A timid, soft voice interrupts McCall's reverie. She looks up to find a young woman anxiously standing next to her desk, waiting for her to respond.

"Yes, sorry, yes, I'm Sergeant McCall," McCall says, slightly embarrassed that she has been caught daydreaming. "Can I help you?"

"The man at the desk," the young woman turns and points to the desk sergeant, "he said that I should talk to you about the three UCLA fraternity guys that were killed?"

"Uh, yes, I am the detective working on that case."

"I am, I mean, I was," she lets out a shaky breath, "I'm Lisa Brown, Jonathon Cates' girlfriend. He said you talked to him yesterday. I found your card in his room this morning." She pauses, waiting for a signal from McCall to continue. "I think his broken arm has something to do with those deaths."

"Please take a seat, Lisa. Now, what makes you say that?"

"When I got to the hospital that night, he was high. Jonathon has always been a strict no drugs kind of guy, you know, so I couldn't believe it. And it wasn't painkillers, either. He was freaking out, like he was scared of everyone. He kept trying to hide from people and couldn't sit still. He had to be strapped to the bed so that the doctor could put the cast on. Several of his brothers were there, and I kept asking them what was wrong with him, but no one would answer me. They all seemed scared, like they didn't know what to do." Lisa pauses for a moment, tucking her wavy blond hair behind her ears. "When I asked Jonathon about it the next morning he got really upset with me. Told me some story about tripping on a curb and falling down."

"Wait, hold on just a minute…," McCall says, shuffling through her reports until she finds the one from Jonathon's interview the day before. She quickly reads through it, looking for the story he had told her and Hunter. The stories do not match, she notes to herself. "Ok, sorry about that, please continue."

"A couple of days later, Jonathon came over to my apartment upset. He finally admitted that he had been snorting coke that night — that he had been forced to by Levi."

"Levi?"

"I don't know his last name. He's an officer in the fraternity, I think, or something like that. Everybody knows him. He drives that huge Suburban that we all joke about it being his 'drug-mobile.' Groups of people are always coming and going from it during parties." Lisa looks down at her hands, wringing them in her lap. "I guess it's not really a joke anymore."

"Did Jonathon say anything else to you, about that night?"

"No, he's scared, though. He won't talk to me, but I know he's scared of something."

"Ok, thank you, Lisa, for the information," McCall says.

XXXXX

"Welcome back," McCall says as she sees Hunter walking toward their desks. She's been sitting at her typewriter for two hours already this morning, and has two broken nails to show for it. It's a relief to see his lanky figure enter the squad room again; she was starting to get lonely.

Hitting return on the keyboard, she notices her bare ring finger before turning to face Hunter. "Why are you taking it off?" Mitch had asked her that morning as she placed the sparkling diamond in her jewelry box. She hadn't worn it to work yet. "It doesn't exactly say tough cop," she had responded with a laugh. "It just doesn't seem like something I should be showing off in my line of work. I will wear the wedding band, though, I promise."

"Solve any cases while I was gone?" Hunter asks. He pulls the sports section of the newspaper out of his jacket pocket and sets it on his desk, just like he does every morning.

"As a matter of fact I did," she says with an arrogant smile.

"No kidding?"

Usually, she would have called him — checked in with him while he was gone, caught him up on what was going on there. But she didn't this time. Something about the way he left work Monday evening — distant, purposefully avoiding conversation. She felt like he was trying to get away before she started asking questions. "I can't actually take any credit. It kind of all fell into my lap."

"Well, are you going to tell me or do I have to guess?"

"Jonathon Broken Arm's girlfriend came to see me — with enough information to finally get a search warrant for Levi Jenson's Suburban, where we found blood that matched two of the victims. So we arrested Levi, Jonathon and four other fraternity members. Ten minutes into interrogation and Jonathon cracked like Humpty Dumpty. And you won't believe this part. Levi's father owns a metal pipe distribution company. The pledges had been taken to his warehouse for what they called a 'trust the brotherhood' exercise. The pledges were told to lay down on the floor, shoulder to shoulder, and four other members lifted a three-foot wide by twenty-five-foot long cast iron pipe over them. You can guess what happened — the pipe fell. Travis, Kevin, Skip, Jonathon and one other, who has a shattered foot, didn't get out of the way in time. You know, I'm surprised you didn't see this in the news last night. The university is scrambling with all the publicity. They are shutting down the fraternity and threatening sanctions on the whole Greek system. It's quite a mess. And I haven't had more than a few hours sleep the past two nights."

"Congratulations. It sounds like quite the hazing bust. Let me buy you a drink tonight to celebrate."

"Hmm, make that ice cream instead and I'm in. I have something I need to talk to you about, anyway."

...to be continued...