by Alex Gates
“Stop. Listen to me,” I said. “I swear to you, if you’re in trouble, I can help you. Just tell me what’s happened, and I’ll do everything in my power to make it right. But you have to tell me the truth, and you have to tell it right now.”
Amber couldn’t look at me. “I’ll plea out to anything. Whatever you want. Put me in jail.”
“You want to go to jail?”
Adamski couldn’t resist one last threat. “Good, she’ll be there a long time.”
“Do you promise?” The first tear escaped, streaking over her cheek. “Do you promise I’ll go to prison?”
“Sure thing, sweetheart.” Adamski hauled me out of the chair and guided me to the door. “We’ll even throw away the key for you.”
Amber relaxed, leaning back in her chair.
Did she smile?
I wasn’t taking part in this. The poor deluded girl didn’t know what she was saying, and she didn’t have an attorney to tell her to shut her mouth. I pushed Adamski into the hall. The door closed behind me.
“What the hell are you doing?” I hissed through clenched teeth. Didn’t matter. Falconi and Riley should have made some popcorn for this shitshow. “Do you have any idea how to interrogate a suspect?”
Adamski didn’t like my tone, and it was only going to get worse. “I was closing the case.”
“No. You shut her down. We’ll never know what the hell actually happened now.”
“We know enough. She’s signing the confession. Case closed, London.”
He thought he could walk away from me. Not today. Not now. Not after what I saw in there.
“But what about Amber?” I asked. “Don’t you feel it? There’s something she isn’t telling us. Something very wrong. We don’t know why she did this. We can’t let her—”
Adamski rubbed his face. “Look, you want to play social worker? Hand over your badge and gun. If you want to stay on this force and advance your career, you’ll shut the hell up. Read the writing on the wall. Everyone wants this case closed. Me. The lieutenant. The assistant chief. The goddamned senator who just made that baby part of his platform. Close the case so they can tell the world what a great job we’re doing keeping the city safe from the horrors of drug-addicted teenage girls. This isn’t just justice, this is good optics. PR. Politics.”
“I don’t care about politics.”
“Maybe you should. After that stunt on the farm, you need all the backing you can get.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means I’d rather see you in a position of leadership than tethered to a desk…” He broke, resigned to a quiet sigh. “Or buried six feet under.”
“I can handle myself.”
“Sure, on the streets with a suspect. But in this building, you need someone to explain the rules of this game. Believe me. Do your job. Close this case now.”
“And if I don’t?”
“Don’t put me in that position, London.” His stare bore through me. “Because nowadays, there’s a lot more at stake than protecting the reputation of one detective. Stop looking out for everyone else because I guarantee, when the time comes, and that noose is tightening around your neck?” He squeezed my shoulder. “You’re gonna be swinging all alone from that gallows.”
6
“Most people like to talk over dinner…
I think it’s rude to interrupt.”
-Him
Catching a perp was no longer sweet.
I was too young to be this jaded, but goddamn if the world didn’t taste bitter now. Doubted even James’s cooking would un-sour my mood.
I sat on my counter—our counter—and watched him sauté onions and mushrooms. He’d once called the mushroom risotto his white whale, the one dish worthy of mucking up the kitchen again and again until he’d perfected it. Now the process came to him easily. The rice. The garlic. The time it took for the wine and vegetable stock to incorporate into a creamy mixture.
He’d transitioned so effortlessly from his stove to mine. If nothing else, I’d eaten well for the past three months since he moved in.
Yet, it still felt weird to roll over next to him. To move his aftershave off the bathroom sink. To toss my mail onto the desk instead of the kitchen table where he’d arranged his eyedrops—the brightest room of the house.
Life was supposed to be comfortable, but I’d faced my mortality ten years ago. Never thought I’d have the house and picket fence, two cars, and obligatory two-and-a-half kids. Now, when normality stared me in the face? That caused some Through-The-Looking-Glass anxiety. Change places and serve the tea.
I rapped my fingernails on the counter. My bare nails. First thing I’d done when I got home was strip the nail polish off. Not that it did any good. At least I knew where I stood. The department didn’t look at me and see a pair of tits. They saw trouble. No new bra would hide that.
“You wouldn’t believe what he did to that girl.” I’d said it twice since James dropped the rice into the pan to toast. “He completely intimidated her. Didn’t want to hear what she had to say. Didn’t care.”
“Here.” James handed me a browned mushroom. “Tried a different type. That’s an oyster mushroom. Seemed sweeter than usual.”
I couldn’t tell the difference. Most of my meals were horked down and then sprinted off on a treadmill anyway.
“And do you know why he didn’t care?” I tore the mushroom into shreds before chewing. “Because it was politically expedient to close the case. It didn’t matter what happened to her. Her face was covered in bruises, and he just insulted her. Did your pimp hit you? Jesus. And the note she wrote? Chalk it up to hormones and post-partum delusions. No way she could be in trouble—that would ruin Senator Harding’s family values narrative.”
James dumped another cup of vegetable stock into the pan and gently stirred the rice. “I’m surprised you haven’t encountered any interagency politics yet. Legislate the problems away. That’s an everyday occurrence at the bureau.”
“Yeah, but the FBI can still do their job.”
He laughed. It wasn’t supposed to be a joke.
“But what Bruce said was worse than politics.” I stole a second and third mushroom. “He ordered me to do what was best for my career. Can you believe that?”
“I’m also surprised it took this long for someone to issue that command.”
“Don’t you see what’s happening? They’re willing to put that girl in jail and call this case closed even though someone might be out there threatening her and the baby.”
The risotto turned creamy. James tossed the mushrooms into the pan, added a handful of parsley, and topped it all with an obscene amount of cheese. An extra twist of pepper speckled the final product. He dipped his fork into the mixture and offered me a bite.
“Taste good?” he asked.
He’d missed my mouth and splattered my lip, but he didn’t complain as I licked it off. “You’re a regular gourmet chef, James.”
“Maybe once I’m done at the FBI, I’ll become a chef.” He added a pinch of salt to the pan. I knocked his hand away before he tossed in a second. His blood pressure would thank me. He grinned. “But with my vision, I probably couldn’t tell the sugar from the salt.”
And that day was coming. Soon. “Don’t talk like that.”
“Cheer up, London. Once you ruin your career, you can be my sous chef.”
Damn it. I hopped off the counter in disgust. “That’s not funny. If Bruce is thinking it, then others are thinking it too.”
“Thinking what?”
“That I’m…” I took a plate from him but I wasn’t hungry anymore. I played with the shredded parmesan cheese instead. “They think I’m dangerous. Deliberately reckless.” I waited, but James’s silence was the greatest I-Told-You-So he could offer. “I’m not.”
“Okay.”
“You know I’m not.”
He wouldn’t answer. I read him just as easily as he saw through me. Neither of us liked that truth.
“Look,” I said. “I know people are still upset about what happened on that farm.”
“Not upset, London.” His words softened. “We were terrified. Do you understand that?”
“I did what I had to do.”
“Then you don’t understand.”
“You expect me to waste time with procedures and regulations and safety when a little girl’s life is on the line?”
“What about when your life is on the line?”
“Come on, James. I’m fine.”
“Sure. You are.” He tucked into his dinner, batting my hand away from the bowl of cheese. “That’s twenty bucks a pound. Don’t squish it.”
“A gourmet and a big spender.”
“You could have been killed. Too much blood has spilled. London, the trials haven’t even started yet. Hell, Internal Affairs is still interviewing you. That’s why Adamski is worried. You can stare down the barrel of a gun, but you can’t keep your cool when a commanding officer gives you an order. Think you’ll handle it when a defense attorney grills you on every regulation and rule and procedure you completely disregarded?”
“Yes.”
His eyebrows rose, but he stuffed a forkful of rice into his mouth before saying something he’d regret. “There’s more to justice than saving people, London. You’ve gotta do right by them after the fact too. Did Amber offer you any indication that she was in trouble or needed help?”
“Are you taking Bruce’s side?”
Question answered. He nodded. “Okay. She didn’t ask for help. You just felt it.”
“I’m right.”
“That’s what makes it delicate, London. You have the finesse of a tsunami, and the case is high-profile. It’s a PR disaster waiting to happen. People are relating to this baby. They need to know the police are watching so their kids are safe at night.”
“Everything I do is to protect those kids.”
“No one is denying that.”
I didn’t want to eat, but I stole a glug of his white wine. I used to need a full glass or more to get this honest with James. At least my liver liked our new commitment.
“Amber was definitely abused,” I said. “Her history proves it. She’s got those bruises on her face, and, when I found her in the parking garage, she was terrified. Not for herself, but for that baby. God only knows what they’ve gone through. More terrible things than most people can imagine.”
“But you can imagine it.”
His words stung, unintentionally, but he was right. “It’s not about me.”
“That’s never true, and you know it.”
And we weren’t talking about it. “They deserve more than petty politics. We need to know what happened to be able to help them. But how do you fix a problem if you can’t verify it exists?”
James sighed. “You don’t. And you don’t make more trouble with your commanding officers and a senator looking over your shoulder.”
Damn it.
He wasn’t cynical, just a realist. I surrendered and stole a bite from his bowl.
“Let me ask you one question…” I played it innocent. “What sort of girl abandons her baby after birth?”
“Professional opinion?”
“Always.”
He pushed the rice with his fork but didn’t take a bite. “It happens. There’s a lot of potential reasons. Depression. She might be too despondent to even consider raising a child, especially without the adequate means to care for it. She’d have limited income. Even more limited support. There’s still a social stigma to teenage pregnancy, of course. And, likely, she wasn’t educated properly. She might not have realized she was pregnant or even understood the consequences of having sex.” He saved the worst for last. “Or she might have been sexually assaulted.”
“Might?”
“You have your theories…” He trusted that instinct at least. “But often, these women are emotionally stunted in some way—immature. Possibly due to a chemical or psychological imbalance. Combine that with the trauma, shock, and panic of labor, and it’s a perfect storm of bad decisions.”
“So, what if I tell you that Amber plotted her way into the hospital?” I asked. “Knew enough about her body and reactions to time a serious but non-lethal allergic reaction? She was sick enough to be immediately admitted into the lowest security area of the hospital, but, as soon as she received treatment, she recovered enough to sneak upstairs, set a diversionary fire, and escape with the baby.”
“So, she’s smart?”
“Extremely. And if she’s a drug addict…she fooled me.”
“No symptoms?”
“Maybe hidden. She has track mark scars, but nothing recent.”
This intrigued him. “What do you think happened?”
“I know a sexual assault victim when I see one.”
“Do you think the rapist is threatening her?”
“Yeah.”
“Would he hurt the baby?”
The implication turned my stomach. I stole the rest of his wine and pushed away my plate.
“She seems to think so.” I stared into the glass, breathing out the last bit of frustration before guzzling it down. “You should have seen the little thing, James. Just so tiny and frail. Absolutely helpless.”
He poured himself another glass of wine and added a bit more cheese to his plate. “You’re connected with this baby.”
I knew that tone. Couldn’t hide it, even with a mouthful of rice. “Get out of my head, Doctor Novak. Are you really analyzing why I sympathize with that baby?”
“I don’t have to. You’ve already figured it out.”
I smirked. “Fine, Brainiac. We’ll say it together on the count of three. One…two…”
I dropped three fingers down. James adopted a rather sly grin.
“She saw the darkest side of humanity,” I said.
“You want to have a baby.”
Oh Jesus.
I flinched like he’d spilled the rest of the rice over me.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa. Easy there, fella.”
James grinned. I didn’t.
“Hit thirty and everyone starts shoving fertility pills down your throat,” I said. “And I thought Mom was bad.”
“Don’t you want kids?”
Was now the time for that conversation? I twisted, giving him the best optimistic shrug I could manage while every muscle in my body coiled to pop.
“I…haven’t really thought about it,” I said.
“Really?”
The awkwardness settled so thick it’d break the risotto. I crossed my arms tight, but I made the effort, returning to the counter with a couple nods.
Sure. We could talk about this now.
And afterwards I could juggle the knives in the sink’s soapy water.
“Do…you think about having kids?” I asked.
“Yeah.”
“…Soon?”
James never stopped eating, as if the thought didn’t shatter his every bone. “Soonish. I’d like to be able to see my kids.”
“It’s too early to play the blind card.”
“London, it’s not a card. Believe it or not, it’s a normal part of life. People settle down. Start a family.” He winked. “Some people are even happy.”
Happy. Right.
Like I could bring a child into this world. Hell, I couldn’t even function around Baby Hope. The little baby was pure. Innocent.
And I was…
“I have a lot of work to put into my failing career,” I said. “Especially if Bruce is right, and I have a future in a leadership role.”
“You work well with kids.”
But playing Barbies wasn’t like asking a traumatized child to point on a doll where she’d been hurt. “We’re not doing a lot of finger-painting and patty cake.”
“Maybe that’s what you need.”
“For what?”
“You tell me.”
“Don’t play coy.” Forget the glass. I took the entire bottle of wine an
d threatened to walk out of the kitchen. “You know exactly why I don’t want kids. I told you I was fucked up. You knew that getting into this relationship. And I’m working on it. We live together. We’re having a family dinner, for Christ’s sake. But you can’t expect a damn miracle out of me.”
James never raised his voice, never got angry, never lost his patience with me. He simply ate his dinner and invited me back to the untouched plate of risotto beside him.
“It’s called healing, London. Give it a try. I think you might like it.”
7
“You can’t expect anyone to give you the truth.
You have to earn it.”
-Him
I didn’t often find myself on this side of the law.
The security doors clashed shut behind me. Not a big evening rush for visitors to the Allegheny County jail. The cafeteria-styled visitor area welcomed only two other people—an older woman presumably visiting a child and a wife with two children in tow. The kids padded across the black and white tile floors and rushed to the secondary playroom, full of hand-me-down toys and a TV. Both parties appeared to have been here before. Many times.
But the courthouse was where my part usually ended. Sometimes testifying. Sometimes watching justice get served. I spent my life putting people into jail. Never thought I’d regret a minute of it.
Amber belonged behind bars, but her secrets did not. She’d hid too much during the interview, information I needed to ensure both she and her baby stayed safe. Maybe she hadn’t talked in our department, but the county offered me a full hour now. Just me and her.
Nothing would stop me from getting answers. Not the department. Not whatever phony political game they played.
Not even Amber.
I took my seat on a cold, metal cafeteria table bolted into the floor. The guards escorted the inmates to their guests. Amber panicked as soon as our eyes met. She shook her head. Refusing. But, after a week locked in her cell, unable to meet her bond before the judge’s sentencing completed her plea deal, she was willing to spend a little time outside of her room. After all, she’d be there for the next fifteen years.