He recognized one of the men immediately, despite the fact his hair was now blond and very short, and he was wearing dark glasses. The man with him looked, in Cole's opinion, like the kind of thug who hung around cheap dives.
"Cole," the first man said, coming over to the case. "It's been a while."
"Over seven months, Keith," Cole replied tightly. "What brings you back to Denver?"
"I think you know." Keith Brooks turned his attention briefly to the thug, saying, "Terrance, please lock the door and turn the sign to Closed. Cole, tell your assistant to join us."
"He doesn't have to tell me," Gideon said, coming into the room. "I heard you. What's going on, Cole?"
Terrance pulled a pistol from under his jacket. "My man here wants to have a few words with him." He pointed the pistol at Cole. "Private like. So, after you turn out the lights, you and me are going to hang out here while they do. We don't want no one seeing what's going on in here. Do we?"
"I guess not," Gideon replied, shooting Cole a quick glance before going to do what Terrance had said. The gallery went dark, except for the lights in the cases.
"Shall we?" Keith said, and Cole saw that he, too, was holding a gun. He gestured to the office.
Here we go again, and me with no hot coffee this time. An insane thought and Cole knew it, but it came anyway.
"Have a seat, and let's get down to business," Keith said after closing the office door. "I saw an interesting article in the paper this morning. Now I might be reading things into it, but my take was that you know the whereabouts of some items I'm looking for."
Cole sat, perching on the edge of the one of the chairs by the coffeemaker chest. Keith took the other one, keeping the gun pointed at Cole's chest.
"Why, Keith?" Cole asked. The professor and archaeologist he had known and admired was gone. In his place sat a desperate and very frightening man.
"Have you ever been married, Cole? No, I guess you haven't. Well, I was, until my darling wife decided she didn't like the fact I was gone more than I was home. Do you remember the dig we were on two summers ago?" When Cole nodded, Keith continued. "She made it quite clear that if I went out on it, she was finished with me. I honestly thought she was trying a power play to keep me home, and I wasn't going to bow to that. When I returned home late that summer, the locks and her phone number had both been changed. As you can guess, I was furious. I finally got hold of her at work, after finding a motel for the time being. She said she'd warned me, then hung up without another word. A week later I was served with divorce papers. The reason? Abandonment. I fought it and lost. She took me to the cleaners. I could barely afford the apartment I moved into. I continued on at the university, then accepted the job at the dig last summer. By then—" He scowled.
"At that point, you decided you could make enough by selling what you had your thugs loot from the dig to what? Pay off what you owed in alimony? Find a new place to live where she couldn't find you?"
"Exactly. And the bastards double-crossed me. By the time we finished at the dig, I was deeper in debt than I had been when I got there. What I should have done was just killed the bitch, but I think the cops would have known it was me."
"No doubt," Cole replied derisively.
"Don't take that tone with me. You have no idea what I've been going through. Then, when the sons of bitches took off with everything… Don't you see? I have to get it all back. So"—his grip tightened on the gun—"you can make it easy on yourself and tell me now where everything is, or, I'll start shooting—maybe your knee, maybe an elbow, or an ankle, until you decide that giving them to me is better than the pain."
"I don't have them!" Cole said vehemently, as he tried not to imagine what a bullet to his knee—or any other part of his body—would feel like.
"Try that lie on someone who might believe you. That's not me." Keith waved the gun back and forth, pointing it at Cole's knee, then his arm. "Eeny, meeny, miny, moe." There was a crazy, desperate expression in his eyes and Cole knew he'd shoot.
"They're in the safe," Cole said, trying to stall for time. Not that it'll do me any good. If Gideon was going to do something, he would have by now.
"What's the combination, and where is it?" Keith asked.
Cole decided to attempt one more time to defuse the situation. "Why didn't you tell me what was happening? I'd have helped you out."
Keith sneered. "How, Cole? Loan me money I couldn't pay back? Some help. No, what I did was the only solution. Now give me the damned combination!"
Taking a deep breath, Cole told him—as well as letting him know that the safe was concealed under a display counter in the gallery. Not the truth, but it might buy him time to figure some way to…to what? Disarm him? Me?
"On your feet, now," Keith ordered. When Cole complied, Keith pressed the gun to his back, using it to steer him out of the office.
The second Cole stepped through the doorway, he was summarily shoved to the floor. Before he could react, he heard Quint say, "Drop the gun, Brooks. Now!"
"Like hell," Keith shouted. "Drop yours, or he's dead."
There were two shots. One dug into the floor right beside Cole's face. The second elicited a howl of pain from Keith, followed by a thud. Cole hazarded a look. Keith was holding his wrist and moaning, although there didn't seem to be any blood. His gun lay on the floor by his feet.
"That was some fancy shooting," Gideon said, before kneeling beside Cole.
"Practice, my man," Quint replied as he alerted the officers—who apparently had been waiting outside the gallery—that they could come in.
"Are you all right?" Gideon asked Cole, helping him to sit up.
"I'm alive, so yeah," Cole replied as he tried to stop shaking. It helped that Gideon now had his arm around him, holding him tightly to his chest.
One of the officers cuffed Brooks, while Quint read him his rights. Then the officer led him out of the gallery.
"How the hell?" Cole asked. "And where's what's-his-name?"
"Terrance? Stashed behind the counter," Gideon replied.
"Your favorite hiding place for bastards like him," Cole said with a weak laugh.
"Out of sight, out of mind." As Gideon said that, the second officer went behind the counter. With a shake of his head, he pulled Terrance to his feet. The man was gagged with packing tape. There was more binding his wrists behind his back. A small trickle of blood ran down his temple.
"How did you get the drop on him—or whatever you call it?" Cole asked.
"He was too stupid to search me and too dumb to believe that I could do anything. He was watching you and Brooks go into the office, so the second the door closed, I hit him with the butt of my gun and down he went. Brooks has lousy taste in hirelings."
"Why is Quint here? I mean, I know why, but…how?"
"We set it up this morning, before Gideon came to the gallery," Quint replied. "I was staked out across the street, waiting for Brooks to appear, although"—he smiled wryly—"I wasn't expecting him to bring company. Mea culpa. The officers and I were moving in when I saw Gideon turn off the lights."
"As soon as you and Brooks were in the office and I'd dealt with Terrance," Gideon said, "I unlocked the front door to let Quint in."
"And didn't bother to tell me what you had planned?" Cole shot them both a sour look.
"I figured, if you didn't know, you wouldn't do anything to give things away, if Brooks did show up here," Quint told him as he took out his notebook. "Now I need a statement from you about what Brooks did and said once he had you in your office."
Cole got up and, rubbing the arm he'd landed on, walked into the office. He collapsed on one of the chairs, Quint took the other one, and Gideon leaned against the desk, his gaze locked on Cole.
"He went on a rant about why he did what he did," Cole said, then went on to repeat Keith's words as best as he remembered them. While he talked, he saw Gideon's expression darken and fill with pain, and he vowed to find out why—but not at the moment. "And that's
it," Cole said, finishing off. He answered a few questions from Quint before the detective closed his notebook.
"At some point, you'll need to come down to the precinct to sign a statement," Quint told him. "You, too, Gideon."
"Tomorrow morning," Gideon replied. "Right now, I'm taking Cole home."
"I have my car," Cole pointed out.
Gideon shook his head. "You're in no condition to drive, after what you just went through."
Cole wasn't going to argue. He wanted time alone with Gideon so he could find out why Keith's story about his broken marriage had seemed to affect Gideon so deeply. Not that he'll probably tell me. But I have to ask.
*****
The drive from the gallery to Cole's house was done in silence. Cole seemed to be deep in thought, and Gideon wasn't in the mood to talk at the moment. When he pulled up in front of the house, Gideon intended to tell Cole "Good night" after asking him if he was going to be all right now. Cole took that option out of his hands.
"Do you mind coming in with me?" Cole said. "I could use the company, at least for a little bit."
"Until the fact that this is over finally sinks in?" Gideon replied with a small smile.
"Yes. Please?"
Against his better judgment, Gideon said, "Okay."
As soon as they were inside, Cole headed to the kitchen to make coffee. "Unless you want something stronger."
"No. Coffee's fine." Gideon followed him, leaning against the counter. "It'll keep you awake," he pointed out with small grin.
"I probably won't sleep anyway, for a while. I'm too keyed up." Cole punched the button on the coffeemaker then turned to look at Gideon. "Are you all right?"
"Of course. I'm used to this kind of thing. At least, more than you are."
Cole nodded, got out cups, then poured them coffee when it was ready. They took it into the living room, settling on opposite ends of the sofa.
After taking a drink, then a deep breath, Cole asked, "Why did Keith's story about his wife and the divorce hit you so hard?"
"It didn't," Gideon protested vehemently.
"Yeah, it did. I was watching you." After a pause, Cole said, "I know it's none of my business, but are you and your wife having problems?"
Gideon closed his eyes, shaking his head. "I'm not married," he said, barely above a whisper. "I never have been."
"Oh."
Opening his eyes, Gideon looked at Cole. "Never have been, never will be. It's not…me."
"Because you'd rather spend all your time working? Or"—Cole nodded slowly—"working gives you an excuse not to be involved with someone?"
"Both?" Gideon replied with a ghost of a smile.
"Surely there have been women in your life that you thought might be the one."
"Have there been men in your life you felt could be the one, as you put it?"
Cole shrugged. "Sure. Though it never lasted. And you avoided my question. You're good at that."
"Practice. And I'm not avoiding. I'm just trying to decide how to answer."
Cole looked at him over the rim of his cup. "Truthfully?"
"One option," Gideon admitted. "All right. Yes, there was someone, once. A man."
Cole blinked. "A man? You mean—?"
"That I'm gay? I am, not that anyone knows."
"He must have."
"Well, he's dead now, so my secret is safe."
"Oh." Cole put down his cup. "I'd ask what happened, but if you don't want to tell me, I'll understand."
"I'm not sure I can," Gideon replied. "It was too long ago. I've…I've done my best to put it behind me."
"Not terribly well, if your reaction tonight when I was telling Quint about Keith, is any indication."
Gideon lowered his gaze to his hands, realizing as he did that they were tightly clenched together. "It…brought back memories."
"You can tell me," Cole said softly. "It might help if you talked about them."
Gideon shot him a brief, tight smile. "Going all shrink on me?"
"No. Going all friend," Cole retorted. "That's what friends are for, to listen when someone needs to talk." He touched Gideon's arm, quickly pulling away again. "I think you do."
"You won't want to be my friend if I do."
"If you killed him, I might start having second thoughts," Cole replied with a bit of a grin. "Otherwise…"
"I did," Gideon replied. "Or, I was responsible for his death, which is the same thing."
Cole looked at him in dismay, saying quietly, "Tell me."
Staring down at his hands again, Gideon did. "I was going for my masters in art history. Robin was two years younger than me, majoring in… Well, it doesn't matter. What does, is that we met and fell in love. Robin moved in with me three months later and things seemed to be perfect for the first couple of years. Until"—Gideon's expression darkened as he lifted his head to gaze off into space—"until jealousy reared its ugly head. I graduated, then started working at a small museum, in their conservation and restoration department. I spent—well, to be honest—most of my waking hours there, since I was fascinated with the job. That impacted my home life." He shook his head. "Eventually, I was coming back to an empty apartment or Robin being there, but virtually ignoring the fact that I was. After a while, I became certain he was seeing another man to make up for my absence. Robin denied it, of course. One night we had a horrible argument that almost came to blows. It ended with him running out of the apartment. I followed." Gideon shuddered, closing his eyes against the memory.
"Then what happened?" Cole asked very gently.
"Rather than wait for the elevator to get away from me, Robin took the fire stairs. They were concrete. In his panic, he stumbled. Fell. Died," Gideon replied, barely above a whisper. "The police put it down as an accident, despite the circumstances. I knew differently. If it hadn't been for my spending too much time working—and my inability to control my jealousy and the resulting anger—Robin would still be alive."
"It was an accident, Gideon," Cole said, reaching for Gideon's hands, holding them tightly.
Gideon jerked his hands free. "It wasn't! I drove him to it. I was too wrapped up in my job to notice until too late what it was doing to him—to us. Then, when I blew up"—he clenched his hands again—"I might have hit him, if he hadn't run. He knew that. The…the last thing he said, that he screamed, as he left the apartment, was, 'There is someone else and he loves me.'"
Cole wrapped his arms around Gideon, not letting him pull away. "Nonetheless, his falling was happenstance. Nothing more. You have to know that—intellectually. Emotionally? Yes, that's a different story." He looked at Gideon, shaking his head. "You were young and impressionable."
"I was twenty-five."
"Hear me out. You were much younger and less worldly than you are now. As a result, for nearly twenty years, you've lived with the guilt. Locked yourself away from any chance of finding someone you might care about, all because of something you couldn't have prevented."
"I could have!"
"How, Gideon? By giving up a job you loved because he was a selfish bastard who wanted all your attention? The way Keith's wife wanted him to? You would have been miserable, and you know it wouldn't have solved the underlying problem. I think—maybe I'm wrong because I didn't know him—but I think Robin didn't love you as much as you thought he did. If he had, he would have talked to you about how he felt. I'm betting he never did."
"No." Gideon frowned. "No, he didn't. He just wasn't there emotionally—or even physically—a lot of the time."
"So, by the time you realized he was pulling away from you, it was already too late. If he'd been half the man he should have been, he'd have told you he'd found someone else and was going to leave, then done it. If that was even the truth."
"Why stay with me, if that was what happened?"
"Oh, Gideon. You are so naïve. I bet you were his meal ticket. Did he have a job?"
"No. He was still in school. He…" Gideon grimaced. "He decided to change ma
jors. I didn't argue with him. I cared about him. If his doing that made him happy, who was I to interfere?"
"So he was living off you and taking advantage of the fact you weren't around half the time to play the field."
Gideon blew out a long breath. "I think maybe you're right. But, if I hadn't argued with him that night, he'd still be alive."
"No. If he'd been honest with you, he would be. You argued with him because he wasn't. I'd be willing to bet that he ran, not to get away from you, but to go to his other lover. Maybe he was afraid, too, but more likely he wanted the last word. He wanted to throw it in your face that he'd found someone else who was…better than you? Who knows?"
Gideon sighed. "Not me." He eased out of Cole's embrace. "And here I am, today, alone and lonely. Maybe, if I hadn't let my guilt rule my life, I might have seen what happened differently. How could I have been so stupid?"
"Because you're human. You watched him die—fairly horribly from what you said—after what sounds like a vicious argument, followed by the words he used to try to destroy the last of what had been between the two of you. You weren't ready to cope with what happened at that point, so you… I think they call it internalizing. Rather than talking to someone, you kept it all inside, where it festered and became the ruling force in your life."
"If I work twenty-four seven—" Gideon grimaced. "If I do, then there's no chance I might meet someone and ruin his life, too."
"No!" Cole replied forcefully. "Get it out of your head that you ruined Robin's life."
"He died. It can't be much more ruined than that."
"He died because he was greedy and stupid and because he didn't see what he had—a good man who loved him." Cole gripped Gideon's shoulder. "Remember that. Make it your…your mantra. Then, maybe, you'll meet someone you can love, and he'll return your love ten times over. You deserve that, Gideon."
It Takes an Archeologist Page 8