Coming Back

by Tabitha J Arment

  For a moment, it looked like Blake was going to push back but he decided to let it slide.

  When they left the building Veronica turned to Ben. “Dude, you need to chill. I know that this is a sucky situation and I get that you and Blake are old friends, but you can’t snap at him like that. No matter what your history is with him, he is still the boss. He wears the white shirt, so he can say whatever he wants. If we are going to stay on this case, we have to stay on his good side.”

  Ben continued to stomp to his truck as he ripped the keys out of this pocket. “I get that, but I know how to do my job. I won’t walk around this building having people doubting every move that I make. I didn’t walk out on my job for a year. They have no justification to doubt me.”

  The moment that those words left his mouth, Ben regretted them. He stopped in his tracks and turned to apologise to her.

  The hurt and furious expression on her face scared him because he had never seen it before. As per usual, this did not last long because she covered it up with the calculatedly bland mask she always wore with suspects and people she did not trust.

  Having known her for so many years, Ben could still see the fury boiling below the surface. Most especially in the angry tears that were building in her eyes.

  “Ronnie...I didn’t mean that….You know I never held that against you…And you know I think you’re a good cop...No matter how much time you spent away…”

  His stuttered apology did little to appease her.

  “Save it Ben. Like you said...we have a job to do. Wouldn’t want people doubting me even more...you know since I lost it and left before. Heaven forbid a person take time off to do physical therapy.”

  Veronica shoved past him as she grabbed the keys out of his hand and marched to the car. Once she pulled herself into the driver's seat she rolled the window down. “If you don’t get in I’m going to leave without you.”

  Ben was still frozen in place. Before he turned around to follow her to the truck, he bowed his head to stare at the ground then slapped his palm to his forehead. As he was walking he could be heard muttering, “Stupid, stupid, stupid.”

  This time the cab of the truck was not filled with a comfortable silence. This ride was full of a tense, angry silence that made Ben fear for his well-being when Veronica finally got around to lashing out.

  She had a reputation for a long fuse and low blows. Ben once saw her kick a guy right in the nuts because he had punched her in the breast, accidentally, three months before.

  And that was all in jest.

  There was no telling what she was going to do to him, or when she was going to do it.

  From across the cab of the truck Veronica heard him mumble, “I guess it’s couch city for me…”

  For a moment he thought that Veronica had not heard him, then she leaned over and whispered in his ear. “I think that’s probably safest.”

  If this had been happening to anyone else he might have found it funny, but in that moment he was justifiably terrified.

  It appeared that fiery, redhead temper that he had always loved about her was finally back and it had found its first target.

  “This is going to be unpleasant for me.”

  Veronica’s cold smile brought him no comfort, “You have no idea.”

  Me and my big mouth…

  Having already mapped out where all of the people they wanted to talk to lived, there was no discussion of where to go first. The giant circle they had plotted starting at the home of Jennifer McCordell’s father.

  When they arrived, Veronica paused for a moment. “The second we leave this truck we have to start acting like partners again. I need to know you aren’t going to be questioning me in there. I need to know that we have each others backs at least while we’re in the field.”

  She still was not looking at him, so he knew he was still in trouble. He also knew that she was right. Personally they might be having problems right now, but she needed to find a way to trust him professionally. Otherwise, she might as well get in a patrol car now because it would only be a matter of time before Blake separated them.

  “I’ve always got your back Ronnie. You know that.”

  Still not looking in his direction, Veronica nodded and climbed out of the car. Without waiting for him to follow she walked up to the front door and rang the bell.

  Ben caught up to her and gave her a mildly annoyed look before an older man opened the door.

  Sam McCordell was frail with graying hair and pasty, white skin. His wife had died of cancer about ten years ago and now he had lost his only daughter as well.

  Veronica softened upon seeing him. To her, it felt like looking into a mirror. She too had lost everything and she had deteriorated since then as well.

  She had never been involved with the interviews during the initial investigation, but Mr.McCordell recognised Ben.

  “Unless you’re here to tell me that you finally caught that murderous bastard, you are not welcome in my home.”

  Ben flinched at the accusing tone to his voice but recovered quickly.

  “Sir, the investigation into your daughter’s murder had been reopened recently. We were wondering if we could maybe ask you some questions about what happened.”

  Both Ben and Veronica held their breath as they waited for his reply.

  Anger darkened his face once more. “So you haven’t caught him. I answered all your questions last time and it didn’t do a damn bit of good! If there was anyone following her, she never said anything about it. You know everything there is to know about her life. She was a good girl who never did anything wrong. She worked hard and she never complained. All she wanted to do with her life was help people!”

  Throughout his speech, Mr McCordell’s voice had grown louder and louder until it ended with him yelling. Once he had said everything he wanted to say, he slammed the door in their faces.

  After turning to walk back down the driveway Veronica spoke. “That went well.”

  Although they did not always receive the same violent reception, Ben and Veronica did receive the same information.

  Every woman that their killer chose was a good person, but the only specific commonality was their appearance.

  ◆◆◆

  When they returned to the station to check in with Blake at the end of the day, they had no new theories to give him. Neither one of them could look him in the eye for fear of reading the disappointment there.

  Worst of all, they feared finding out that Blake knew they were not going to get anywhere with this line of questioning and they had just proved it to him. All they could hope was that Mark had more success today than they had.

  When Blake released them, they returned to the detective’s office to see if Mark would share any information with them.

  “I know what they used to make the bomb. I’ve talked to everyone in the area to see if they can remember anything. I’m also having the lab run more tests on the notecard that was on your car. Hopefully, I’ll come up with something soon.”

  They realized that after a whole day of work nobody was any closer to coming up with new information. Glumly. they trudged over to their respective locker rooms to cool down a bit before leaving for the night.

  Although much of the anger that Veronica had been feeling before had faded away, a deeper depression had settled into her heart.

  After starting the day in such a wonderful mood it was twice as horrible to feel like this now. As she crossed the building to get back to the parking lot, everyone who saw her noticed the change. She had been bouncing and glowing when entering the building, now she appeared to have lost all her color and drooped as she walked.

  They also noticed that Ben was walking around in the sort of frustrated way that they had always attributed to women problems in the past.

  When they met in the hallway, Veronica walked straight past him and Ben slumped as if in defeat.

  All of their friends watched them leave and wondered what Ben had done to i
ncur Veronica’s wrath. Once they left the building several people made bets on how long it would take Veronica to get revenge.

  Cheyenne and Erica could be seen bickering over who they thought would win whatever argument Ben and Veronica were having.

  ◆◆◆

  Not a word was spoken all the way to Ben’s house, nor were any words uttered as they walked across his front yard to the door.

  They tried to muster some enthusiasm to greet the pets with, but it was a half-hearted effort.

  The silence continued once they were in the house because neither one of them could come up with words for one another.

  Ben went to the kitchen to start making dinner and Veronica went upstairs. While Ben was at work in the kitchen, Veronica made her way into the master bathroom and drew herself a bath.

  As she lowered herself into the steaming water, Veronica tried to let go of some of the tension that had been building in her body all day. She had hoped that the warm water would help her to feel better, but all it did was clear her mind enough let it wander to the things that were bothering her.

  With her eyes closed her mind began to run over Ben’s tirade in the parking lot. Words could not describe how much that had hurt her. The most frustrating thing about it all was that she could not understand why it had hurt her so much. Logically, she knew that he was frustrated, but she could not let it go.

  After lounging in the water for a time, Veronica dressed in her pajamas and went back down the stairs.

  When she arrived in the living room she found Ben on the couch with a plate of spaghetti.

  Charlotte was on the back of the couch near his head with her tail dangling down. She was tickling Ace’s ear because he was on the couch next to Ben trying to steal some food off of his plate.

  In spite of her wounded pride, Veronica could not help but laugh at the moment she had walked in on.

  When Ben looked up to see a smile on her face, relief flooded through him. The way that she carried herself told him she was still hurt, but the smile lead him to believe there was hope that they could move past this.

  “There’s a plate waiting for you in the kitchen. It’s probably still warm.”

  Veronica nodded and moved into the next room.

  When she got there she found that the food had cooled down significantly while she was in the bath. She placed her plate in the microwave and went to pour herself a glass of milk.

  She heard Ben enter the room, but she did not pay any attention to him until she felt his presence right behind her.

  He reached around her and guided her hands to place the jug of milk and the glass down. Then he wrapped his arms around her.

  She leaned back into him and drew a breath, “You told me you understood. You told me you had my back. You told me that you would never think less of me for staying away so long.”

  Ben rested his head on her shoulder, “I know I did. And I don’t think any less of you. I’m sorry about what I said. You know I didn’t mean it. I was angry and you know that I say stupid things when I’m angry.”

  Veronica pulled out of his arms and turned to face him. “I know that, but you wouldn’t have said it if some part of you wasn’t thinking it.”

  Ben stepped forward, “I’ll admit when you first said you were coming back I wondered if you would be okay. But I don’t wonder anymore. It only took a moment for me to realise that you’re as good a cop now as you were then.”

  By this point they were standing toe to toe looking into each other’s eyes. All it took was one small dip of the head and Ben’s lips found hers.

  For the first moment, they were both shocked by the turn of events. Ben had not planned to kiss her and Veronica had been so steadfastly ignoring the urge to kiss him that she never expected it to happen.

  Ben was the first to get past his surprise. He took her shock as a bad sign and hesitantly started to pull back.

  Their lips breaking contact jolted Veronica into action. Before she gave herself time to overthink it, she followed Ben and reclaimed his lips.

  When she returned his kiss Ben found his arms wrapping around her waist so that he could pull her closer to him. The kiss continued until the microwave interrupted them by beeping.

  Ben and Veronica awkwardly pulled apart, retrieved her dinner, and moved back into the living room.

  They did not discuss their kiss that night, nor did they repeat it.

  In fact, they went about their night acting like nothing at all had happened. When they went to bed there was no discussion of who would sleep where. They climbed in on the sides that they had slept on the night before and continued to act like nothing romantic had happened between them.

  DAY 6

  When they woke, Veronica found they were spooning. Much like the morning before, they did not allow themselves to feel awkward when the woke up. The routine that they had established was repeated.

  They were friendly with each other, but they never touched. Neither one of them knew how to react to what had happened the night before, so they silently agreed not to do anything about it until they could decide what they wanted it to mean.

  When they arrived at the station they both independently decided to ‘act natural.’ As they entered the building, they were both acting so courteous and polite that the people who knew them best knew that there was something going on. The people who did not know them well still knew enough to try to get out of the bets they had made the night before.

  They spent some time in their respective locker rooms, dodging questions and getting changed. Then they met up again in the hallway and moved over to the detective’s office.

  Before they could make it there, Veronica was waylaid by a small, curvy blonde that was seriously pissed off.

  “Some nut job with an obsession breaks into your apartment and you don’t call me! What the Hell is that?!” Natasha stood in front of her best friend with her hands on her hips, tapping her foot, waiting for her answer.

  Ben looked past Natasha to see Cheyenne and Erica peering around the corner so that they could watch this conversation take place. He smiled smugly and turned to Veronica, “Someone’s in trouble. I’m gonna let you deal with this.”

  He tried to move past Natasha but she grabbed his sleeve and yanked him to a stop. “Oh, no you don’t! I have a bone to pick with you too. You have to wait your turn. Idiot best friend trumps just plain idiot!”

  This time it was Veronica’s turn to be smug. She stuck her tongue out at him, “At least I’m not the only one in trouble. I wonder what you did…” she mused.

  Ben shoved her off balance, so she punched him in the arm after she caught herself.

  Natasha eyed them suspiciously as they rough housed, but she let it slide because that was a conversation she needed to have alone with Veronica.

  Natasha’s gazed fell once again on Veronica, “I am waiting for my explanation!”

  Veronica could not stop herself from laughing when she saw the anger flashing in her friend’s eyes. She had known Natasha for so long that it was hard for Veronica to take her seriously. “Tasha, take it easy! I’m sorry I didn’t call you. Things got so crazy. I got home and there was this stuff all over my living room, and we had to call it in. Then we had to deal with Blake because he was even more angry than you, if you can believe that. Then we had to go over to my old house and deal with another crime scene. We didn’t get home until late and then we had to be here early to meet with Blake again. Then we spent the rest of the day working on this investigation and dealing with Blakes fabulous new rules… It was just... all so insane.” Veronica looked at Natasha imploringly, hoping that she would calm down.

  Natasha was silent for a moment so Veronica thought that everything was okay again, “Okay... I guess I get that. Now you have to explain to me why you didn’t call me last night. If something this major had happened to me I would have called you in a second.”

  Veronica’s shoulders slumped as she tried to come up with a reason for her radio
silence. The truth was that with everything else that happened, she had not thought to call Natasha.

  Fortunately, Ben tried to come to her rescue. “We were both tired when we got home last night so we ate and went to bed.”

  The same suspicious look that she had before appeared on Natasha’s face.

  Veronica knew that Natasha wanted to question her on who went to bed where, but she wanted to avoid that entire conversation. She knew that Natasha had enough tact not to bring it up with Ben in the room so she made a tactical retreat. “Well, Tasha, I would love to keep talking but if Blake thinks I’m slacking off I’ll be in serious trouble. I’ll leave you to attack Ben now.” Veronica winked at Ben and practically skipped into the detective’s office.

  Cheyenne and Erica were snickering at the corner.

  No sooner had the door to the office closed then Natasha turned on Ben. “So... my best friend can’t or won’t go home because some psycho broke into her apartment. I have a guest room in my place, and you have her sleeping on your couch. Tell me she wouldn’t be better off staying with me.” The challenge was evident in her eyes, but there was also a hint of something else. She was enjoying watching him squirm. Natasha was certain that neither of them were sleeping on the couch, she needed to get one of them to admit to it.

  Ben glanced around the room and pulled Natasha into the less populated corridor leading to the equipment locker. He answered Natasha in a hushed but insistent voice. “Veronica is most certainly not better off staying with you. For one thing, I can protect her way better than you can. I know you’re going to say that she can protect herself, but she is so much more safe living with another trained police officer. For another thing...she’s not sleeping on the couch.” His voice became even quieter as the humor in Natasha’s eyes intensified. “I’m pretty sure you already guessed that, so the questioning is unnecessary. And before you ask...yes, we just slept. If you want anymore information than that, you are going to have to ask Veronica. I don’t do girl talk, so don’t even try.”