Not my characters, just my story. I only wish I owned Pete. The story is best read if you've seen the series and know the characters. If you haven't seen it lately, watch, enjoy.
A Lifetime in Eight Days
Chapter 12: The Pique in the Parent
She lost her breakfast in the toilet, kneeling against the ceramic bowl and vomiting until nothing more would come up, until nothing more than dry heaves pulled tightly at her insides. Or so she thought. She flushed and leaned back against the cold tile wall between the tub and the toilet, only to be quickly called back to relieve herself of whatever little bit still remained in her stomach. Another flush and this time she fell backwards into the corner, looping her arms around her drawn-up knees and leaning her head back against the ceramic tiles, eyes shut, not enough strength left within her to move any further. That's the way Mother found her, the older woman shoving a glass into her hand and forcing her to rinse and spit and drink a little water. She hung on to the side of the toilet, her face pale and beaded with perspiration, uncertain whether those few sips would have her heaving again. Mother very gingerly lowered her lanky frame to the side of the tub, her fingers gently combing the hair away from Edie's face. The younger woman's head slipped sideways to rest on Mother's knee, her unfocused gaze resting on the opposite wall. For a while neither woman spoke.
"I never knew I could feel like this," Edie finally said, her voice clawing its way up past her sore throat and dry lips.
"Like what, honey?" Mother rearranged her long legs awkwardly, her dress pinching at her sides, the hard edge of the tub uncomfortable beneath her ample bottom.
"Like there's no meaning in my life anymore," she answered. "I love him so much."
"I know you do."
"I hope Pete knows."
"Of course he does, " Mother patted her knee reassuringly. "He knows. And he loves you. I've never seen a man in love with a woman as much as he is with you."
Mother brushed a few more stray wisps of soft honey-colored hair away from the younger woman's face, the perspiration having left them sticking to her cheeks and forehead, then pushed herself to her feet and grasped Edie's hand and pulled her up from the floor. Guiding her into the bedroom, she sat them both down against the wooden headboard of the unmade bed, moving the covers up and tucking them around Edie's waist. The two women sat in silence, consumed with their own private thoughts.
Edie's gaze moved around the bedroom, landing here and there, touching on objects and clothing and furniture. Pete's apartment was almost more of a home to her than her own and no words could describe how she had missed it over the past eight weeks, especially this room. She couldn't count the times she had lain with him in this very bed, making love, talking about each other's day, making out, laughing and teasing, discussing the future, sleeping and waking next to each other. She wanted that back. She wanted Pete back and their life back and she knew with a sudden heartfelt certainty that he would be back and nothing that Jacoby or anyone else could say would shake that belief.
Sergeant Lee Davis heaved a tired sigh and slowly closed the folder he'd been perusing for the past fifteen minutes. Much like Lieutenant Jacoby and Detective Harmon, he was not exactly certain what type of information he was looking for in the stack of files they were searching through. His boss seemed to think whatever it was would just jump out from the pages of one of these manila folders, yelling Here I am! Look at me! I'm the answer to all your questions!, but he himself wasn't so sure. If you didn't know what it was you were looking for then how would you know what it was when you saw it? So Pauly Denner was a creature of habit. So what? Wasn't everybody?
"Tell me again why we're doing this, Lieutenant?"
Davis grabbed another file folder and flipped it open, his eyes blindly noting names and dates and arrest records and known criminal relationships. If some great revelation was supposed to stare glaringly back at him it didn't. And it hadn't done so for the other several dozen files he'd examined thus far. Denner had been small pickings early in his criminal career. They had started with that time period and were slowly working their way forward to the conviction that had sent Denner to prison six years earlier. When Davis didn't receive an answer, which he figured he wouldn't, he directed his dark gaze across the long table to the two other men who had their own heads bent over files. He continued to voice his thoughts out loud.
"No matter which way you look at it, the only common denominators so far in this investigation are Paul Denner, Eleanora White and Peter Gunn. Everything points right back to that case. We all knew Denner killed the White girl but we couldn't prove it. Pete came up with enough evidence on other counts to get Denner prison time. Denner was released from prison and came after Pete for revenge just like he said he would." Finished with the file he was looking at, Davis slapped it shut and dropped it on the 'done' pile. "You know, looking back on it, the only thing we really never found out during that case was where the girl was for that week between her disappearance and when her body was found," he mused. He, just like so many others, found it difficult not to rehash the case in his mind whenever his thoughts drifted in that direction. And they'd been going there a lot lately.
Silence reigned as the three men continued their seemingly mindless routine. Then Jacoby slowly raised his head and stared at Davis, his forehead puckered in a frown.
"Say that again?"
Davis and Harmon both looked up, Harmon following Jacoby's gaze, Davis shifting his own gaze between his two superiors.
"Lieutenant?"
"What you just said. About what we never found out?" Jacoby prompted.
Davis shrugged and replayed his words in his head.
"The only thing we never found out was where the girl was for the week between her disappearance and when her body was found."
Detective Harmon puckered his lips as he tossed several files aside. He thoughtfully rubbed at the graying stubble on his chin as he sat back in his hard wooden chair, lines creasing his own forehead as he considered what Davis had said. His eyebrows slowly rose as he stared into space, his eyes unblinking, the wheels in his head spinning as his thoughts drifted back six years. He leaned further back, bringing his hands behind his head and lacing his fingers together, his chair teetering on its back legs.
"You're right. That was the main reason we couldn't come up with enough evidence to prove Denner's guilt to a judge or jury. He had an airtight alibi of some sort for every hour of every day that girl was missing. We were never able to place him anywhere beyond where those alibis put him." His chair dropped back into place and his arms fell to the table, his hands clasping together on the hard surface as his thick brows drew together. "She had to be somewhere."
"A creature of habit. That's how Bennie Marconi described Denner." Jacoby looked thoughtfully at the several piles of folders scattered about. He quickly began grabbing them and redistributing them among himself and the other two men. "We need to go through everything again. I think I know what we're looking for."
Edie Hart listened to the silence on the other end of the phone line. Not quite a complete silence. A low buzzing tickled along the wires, letting her know that the line was open, that the perceived silence was there simply because no one was speaking. Edie couldn't talk because the tears wouldn't stop falling. She was afraid of what the man would hear in her voice if she tried to say anything further. Frank Gunn – Francis Patrick, named for his Irish father's side of the family – wouldn't talk because he was honestly afraid he might say something he would never be able to take back. Would utter words he would later regret. He was angry. Angry that it had taken a week for someone to notify him of the disappearance of his only child. He was scared. Scared of the possibility that he might never see his son again. He was overwhelmed with raw emotions that he couldn't define and wouldn't define because he was afraid they would explode against the woman who had called him. This woman that he had never met but who his son loved. So the silence continued.
Edie swiped ineffectively at the tears coursing down her cheeks and glanced at Mother. The older woman raised her eyebrows and reached out, silently offering to take over the conversation and relieve the younger woman of the burden of trying to communicate with the man who sat by himself almost a thousand miles away, silently attempting to come to grips with what he'd been told. Edie shook her head, resolutely accepting the responsibility to handle things herself. Her fingers were white where they gripped the telephone receiver. She held it tightly against her ear, straining to listen lest she miss anything Pete's father might say. Pop. That's what Pete called him. He had laughingly told her to call him that once when they had talked on the phone. She'd never had the courage to do so but somehow wished she had. Maybe it would have made things easier now.
"I'll be on the next plane I can get a seat on." The man's emotionless, taciturn voice finally broke the strained silence. "It may be a while. We've had storms and fog and flights have been grounded on and off for the past few days. I'll sit at the airport until I can get something. How can I contact you when I know my schedule?" His frustrated sigh tumbled along the line.
Edie took a deep breath and rubbed at her eyes in an attempt to compose herself. She had to swallow past a thick lump in her throat before she could get any words out in response to his question.
"I'm at Pete's," she finally got her voice to work after making several attempts to say something. "Or you can call Mother's. Talk to whoever answers the phone. I'll make sure they know where I am if I'm not here." She started to give him the number for the club but he interrupted, telling her he already had it, and she nodded silently into the telephone even though he couldn't see her.
"I'll call when I know something."
There was a brief moment of silence then a click across the distance as the man hung up. Edie continued to hold the receiver to her ear for several seconds, hoping that maybe the click had just been a noise along the wires, before slowly lowering it and releasing it into the telephone cradle as the normal hum of an unused line returned. After that she sat and stared at the phone for a long minute, thinking perhaps they'd been disconnected due to the weather Frank Gunn had mentioned, hoping the phone would ring and it would be him calling back. But it didn't. She leaned back against the cushion of the couch and closed her eyes tiredly, feeling Mother take her hand into her own warm one and giving it a comforting squeeze.
"He's just upset, honey."
"I know," the young woman nodded. "I should have called him sooner."
"Did he say that?"
"He didn't have to. I heard it loud and clear in what he didn't say." She opened her eyes and gave a choked and watery laugh. "Just like Pete." Edie repeated what the man had said about rain and fog and grounded flights. "He said he'll call when he has a flight and then he hung up. He wasn't just upset. He was angry."
Back and forth. Back and forth. Paul Denner restlessly paced the hard floor. He smiled to himself. It was funny really. Here he was. Here they were. Him and Peter Gunn. And Charlie Malloy, keeping watch through the slatted front window. Not that Malloy really mattered. Only Gunn mattered in the grand scheme of things. Fading orange streaks of sunlight reflected off of other buildings and bounced back through the window, glancing off of Denner's scuffed black shoes as he walked. They hadn't been shined in at least a couple of days. There hadn't been time. And again, not something that really mattered at this juncture. Why care what your shoes looked like when your greatest desire was about to be fulfilled? When an outcome that you'd waited six years to accomplish was within striking distance?
Denner paused in his pacing long enough to check the cylinder of the small snub-nosed revolver he held in his right hand. Six bullets in the chamber. He would only need one. That's all it took to kill a man if you did it right. Place the barrel against his temple or up above his ear and pull the trigger. Stand back so the spatter, if there was any, didn't get all over your hands and clothes. He glanced across at the black Plymouth sedan. The trunk was standing open. Gunn was still alive but barely. The man was hanging on by a thread. He had to give him begrudging credit for that, for hanging on for as long as he had, longer than most men he had observed under similar circumstances. But soon even that thread would be gone. Unraveling until it snapped. At just the right moment. A moment that had been long in arriving and that Denner planned to savor to the utmost.