Author's Note: I haven't forgotten about this story! I have been in the middle of another story, and I just haven't posted this chapter yet. I hope that you will enjoy this final chapter.
Chapter 3
Joanna walked over to the sofa and lowered herself on it. It seemed as though the entire world had gone crazy in believing that immortality existed.
Everyone but Jo. Jo didn't believe in any of this nonsense. Her sensibility was one reason that she had hoped that the young detective would succeed her if she was promoted to precinct commander or if she needed to leave the force.
Joanna's mind went back to earlier in the day. Oddly, Jo acted like she was expecting something bad to happen at dinner tonight. For as long as Joanna knew the other woman, Jo went with her instincts. If she had suspected that there was something wrong with Henry's story, she would have acted long before now.
She reviewed everything that she had known about Henry and what he had just told her. She inhaled. A person couldn't know everything that he knew and experience everything that he had unless….
It shouldn't be possible, but it was. In fact, it explained every mystery that was Henry Morgan.
She watched as the two old friends caught up on the past 60 years before turning back to Henry. She couldn't believe that he was a father. A widower. A former Army doctor. A former doctor. Someone who might have seen the city that she loved and had vowed to serve and to protect grow up to see the metropolis of today. Someone whose life encompassed over 200 years of history.
He sat waiting for her response. She took a deep breath and looked at him.
"You've told Jo about this?" It was the only way outside of witnessing one of his deaths that Jo could believe it.
He nervously nodded. "I told her shortly after we closed the investigation into Blair Dryden's and Xavier deSoto's murders."
Joanna glanced down in thought. Henry and Jo's relationship was strained for three months after that case. She had assumed Henry was trying to regain Jo's trust until Henry had mentioned that—.
Her eyes widened. Jo didn't have difficulty accepting his immortality then. Based on their conversations, she was realizing the implications of having an immortal partner, and she wasn't sure what to do about it.
He laid his hands on his lap. "The exact circumstances involve my stalker." He stood up, removed a picture from the mantle, and joined her on the sofa. "She returned my pocket watch and this photograph." He held it out to her. "This is Abigail and Abe when he was an infant."
Joanna took the frame. They seemed quite happy in the black-and-white photograph.
She looked back and forth at Abe's baby picture and the two seniors in the kitchen. It was hard to believe that Henry knew her mother when she was a child.
She handed him the frame. "I'm still wrapping my mind around all this. It sounds incredible…"
Suddenly, his odd reaction to the four cases made perfect sense. Due to his condition, for lack of a better word, he felt as though he couldn't trust her, Jo, and Mike to help him. He couldn't give his testimony, identify his stalker, or even tell them his suspicions about Abigail's death since everything in his life sounded so incredible. So, he took the law into his own hands because he felt that it was the only way to obtain justice without revealing his immortality.
She studied the nervous medical examiner. If the roles were reversed, she might have done the same thing.
I guess I do believe that this is real. She inhaled. "I have so many questions to ask you." She briefly looked at her mother. "Some can wait until tomorrow." She didn't want to know about his deaths right now.
"Don't get Pops started on his deaths or his antiques downstairs." Abe called out to them. "You'll be here all night."
That's why they have so much inventory. They're what Henry's collected over the years. She wouldn't be surprised if he gave her the world's longest art and history lesson.
Speaking of lessons… She leaned back on the sofa. "How do you know about the legends?"
He widened his eyes in surprise and then chuckled. "They were a part of my education. When I was a boy, I was taught grammar, logic, rhetoric, arithmetic, geometry, history, music, and astronomy. The grammar component consisted of studies in Greek and Latin so we could read civilization's classics without the need for an English translation. My knowledge of the rest came later through either my readings or a return to a university setting so I could update my knowledge of medicine."
That sounded more advanced than what she was taught. "They certainly don't teach that anymore."
Henry chuckled. "You could imagine my surprise when Abe had brought home his first homework assignment. It was in that moment that I decided that I would teach him everything that I knew in order for him to have a more well-rounded education."
"He was a real bear then." Abe's voice contained a chuckle.
"Abraham!" Henry growled.
She stifled her laugh. They sounded exactly like her and Paul when they ribbed each other.
Henry glanced down again. "I had wanted to tell you about myself after I told Jo." He tilted his head to one side. "Lucas found out about it by guessing the truth before I could say anything to you, and I've been dealing with the consequences ever since."
She buried her head in one hand. If there was one person whose ideas were crazier than Henry's, it was Lucas.
"My sentiments exactly."
She looked up at the point of agreement.
He continued with a disgruntled look. "There have been times in which he has really tried my patience." He then unexpectedly smiled. "He, however, has proven to be quite the friend and confidante."
She raised her eyebrows.
"He is analyzing everything that I have told him about my early life to see if he could find the cause of my immortality. Some of his theories are very far-fetched, but others are much more intriguing. Recently, he and Abe have been looking at my family tree to see if I have an immortal ancestor without realizing it. I personally doubt that they will find anything, but they insist on exploring that possibility." He chuckled. "At the same time, he's interested in my stories, and, surprisingly, his company isn't bad."
Tricia's laugh and "do you remember" drifted into the room. Joanna shook her head in amazement at the situation.
He turned his attention to her and chortled. "I can't believe that I didn't recognize your resemblance to Tricia. I guess that I was so caught up in trying to preserve my secret that I haven't noticed it until tonight."
"I would have done the same thing." Besides, her mother was so young when they had left the apartment. He probably wouldn't have noticed how much she looked like her mother even if he had tried.
She glanced back into the kitchen before turning to the immortal doctor. "What was my mother like when she was younger?"
Joanna smiled as she set her glass down and listened to the story that her mother, Abe, and Henry were telling. Almost everything was exactly like her mother had said life with the Morgans as neighbors was like. Abigail wasn't there, but Joanna could still feel her presence by the way the men and Tricia talked about her and in the meal that Abe had prepared from a family recipe. Later, she would get a glimpse of the musical side as Abe had promised to play a little bit of jazz on a piano that they stored in an another room.
She glanced down at the food and sighed. What she wouldn't give to have more moments like this. Unfortunately, departmental policy prevented her from fraternizing with everyone who worked under her, even with the people whom the NYPD consulted with. Tomorrow morning, she must act like this had never happened.
She thought back over the past two and a half years. Policy hadn't stopped her from telling Jo, Mike, Lucas, and Henry a little bit about her life or from sharing her opinion about theirs. Maybe she could pull Henry aside whenever she wanted to hear a story about the past.
Tricia's laugh broke through her thoughts. "Say, whatever happened to Fawn Mahoney and Lyle Ames? They were in our class."
Abe swallowed his bite. "They got married and had a couple of kids. Lyle died about two years ago, and I reunited with Fawn at his funeral." He shot Henry a look warning his father about embarrassing him. "Fawn and I have been talking to each other ever since."
Joanna raised her eyebrows and stared at a bewildered Henry. That was what he meant by his comment that he was Abe's wingman at a funeral.
A phone rang, and the older Reece reached into her pocket. "Excuse me." She jumped up and walked into the living room. "Hey, baby. How are you doing?"
Joanna looked at the curious men. "My step-father. He's finishing a project in Atlanta before coming here for the holidays."
Henry leaned forward and smiled. "You took his surname out of your love for him."
She stared at her precinct's ME. On the one hand, his simple statement perfectly summarized her and Paul's relationship. On the other hand, she swore that Henry could be the inspiration for Sherlock Holmes.
To answer him, she nodded.
She listened as her mother explained that they were at the home of one of their daughter's friends. She now knew why the older woman had said that Henry was more skittish than she remembered. The years that he, Abigail, and Abe had spent in their apartment at 69th and 2nd were probably the only period of time in which he had felt relatively normal. Once his secret was out, he lived in constant fear of exposure again.
Yet, maybe he was starting to feel that sense of normalcy once again. When she had first transferred to the 11th Precinct, he was a very private person. At first, Jo was the only person to spend any length of time in the shop, but, soon, Lucas was coming here as well. Now, with dinner tonight…
"Paul says hi." Tricia pocketed her cell phone and took her seat. "He's on the first flight out tomorrow morning. He also told me that he got the visas to take me to Paris over spring break." She rubbed her hands over her face. "I need to find a guide book. There are so many places to see in just a week."
Joanna looked at her mother. "Ask Henry. He's been there before." She knew of one instance, but she hoped that he had been there prior to that time.
Henry shot a pointed look at an interested Abe. "I can assure you that nothing happened when Lt. Reece sent Jo and me there for a case."
Henry's defensive posture and tone and the speed in which he had mentioned the case indicated that, in spite of his denial, something had happened which had brought him and Jo closer together. It was a matter of time before they would mention it in front of her. In the meantime, she could start placing her bets on when they would start dating.
Joanna smugly smiled as she took another sip of wine. Like she always said, she knew everything that happened in her precinct.
Author's Note: Two notes here: One, Mike doesn't know Henry's secret yet, and, yes, Henry tells Lt. Reece that during their dinner conversation.
Second, I have several stories about Henry and Jo's first trip to Paris in my head. The case that Henry's talking about in this story is a different set of events from "A Desired Regimen". (That story's sequel is posted at the same time as this one!) Still, like Lt. Reece suspects, there's more to the story than what Henry's letting on.