“No!” Ellen called out.
“Oh. Whoa. No!” Everyone else yelled.
With a loud slam, the wall cracked and plaster flew about.
“Nothing.” Henry revved back again amidst the second wave of screams in the room.
Slam! Henry barreled it down again, ignoring the reaches for him. Covered in plaster, Henry reached into the hole.
“Robbie,” Ellen begged. “Stop him. Henry, I hope to God you’re gonna clean up this mess.”
“Ha. Fuckin bitch.!” Henry screamed, retracted his hand from the wall, and pulled out the camera. Holding it, he jumped from the chair.
Ellen just looked at Jess when she saw the camera. “Oh my God.” She hurried to Henry who had walked out. “Henry, how long has that been in my wall?”
“A long time, El. A long time.” He marched through the bedroom door and stopped. “Oh, Danny needs you all at his house.”
^^^^
It was packed.
They all crammed into Danny’s house for one reason or another, but they all had a reason to be there.
Aside from the Blue’s Clues bunch of Henry, Danny, Hector, Trish, and Josephine, in the living room, standing, listening, and watching was everyone else who was, in some way or another, affected or hurt by Bev.
Dean, Frank, Ellen, Jess, Robbie, Elliott, Hal, and because he was Council, Jason.
They were all there and all were listening.
“Oh my God!” Frank complained loudly as her stared at the computer screen that showed Dean and Ellen making love. “Do we have to watch this?”
“Yes,” Danny answered. “Not because it proves that sex can actually be fulfilling even if it only lasts two minutes and thirteen seconds. Not that we timed you, Dean, or anything, but . . .” Danny shut off the viewer. “But because it tells us it all. Ellen is center of the community. She hears everything. Ellen also has a big mouth, no offense and I’m uh, talking about talking. What she knows, comes out one way or another, either through talking to that person on the phone in her room or . . . . she may have slept with someone there.”
Frank’s eyes widened. “Who is he? I wanna fuckin kill him, Danny. Who?”
Danny quickly looked at Ellen then back to Frank. “If you’re referring to the guy that Ellen is involved with, sorry, we didn’t get that far in the disks. I don’t know who it is. I don’t wanna know. That is moot. The point is Bev planted the camera and learned all she needed to know.”
Jason slowly shook his head. “How do we know that she planted it? Did you see her?”
“No.” Danny answered. “But Bev works for the Society. The camera was a way to get information on people she wanted to hurt or wanted to get involved in the Society.”
Frank tossed his hands up. “For as much as we want to buy this, Danny, there is no way to prove a connection. We tried.”
“Ah, but there is.” Danny smiled. “Mr. Kusakari. Do the honors and pull up the next demo.”
Frank whined. “We aren’t gonna have to sit here and watch Dean’s little hump again are we.”
The loud blast of scolding ‘Franks!’ made Frank jolt.
“What?”
“Watch the screen,” Danny instructed. “This was supposed to be Dean, supposed to be. See, this wasn’t taken from any disk found in Bev’s house. This is the information I downloaded from Dean’s chip when it went nuts.” Danny nodded and the video played of Bev being orally appreciative to someone. Only a part of the man’s body was seen from a higher angle.
Ellen pointed. “That’s not Dean.”
Frank tossed his head back and rolled his eyes. “Thank you, Ellen, for informing us that you have the ability to recognize Dean’s genitals.”
“I’d recognize yours.”
“Oh yeah?” Frank grinned.
“Can we get back to this?” Danny stated. “Anyway. No, that’s not Dean. Henry could you freeze frame it perfectly please.” He nodded to Henry. “Dean never slept with Bev. We figured she filmed this to try to feed this into his chip and his chip rejected it. Now I know all of you are probably wondering how did she pull this off? Well, of course, she had help. Andrea? Someone else? That remains to be seen. Only little Bevie knows the answer to that. But how she got the power when she’s so stupid is this.” Danny pointed to the still frame. “See this small purple mark? Jason, will you.”
Jason tilted his head and exposed the exact same mark.
“What is that, Jason?” Danny asked.
“I call it my cryogenic birthmark. All of us that were frozen have them from the electrodes.”
Danny held up his hands to silence the loud eruption of questions. “Bev was cryogenically frozen. And why not? If you were about to wipe out a country the world or at least a major portion of it, wouldn’t you want to see your children live?”
Josephine hiccupped loudly. “She’s a Hadley!”
Ellen’s eyes widened. “Bev is George’s daughter?”
“Absolutely,” Danny responded. “I found this out thanks to your brother. He recognized her and he must have recognized her a while ago. His chip isn’t bad. He just was drugged by her or something like that. He’s insisting that happened, so you may want to check it out.”
Ellen was so stunned and could only nod.
Danny continued. “It was a brilliant plan to take down Beginnings from within.” He looked at Frank, Robbie, and Hal. “Hurt your father, destroy what he built.” He turned to Dean. “Break the community by breaking the spirit of our most brilliant scientist who, by the way, is our brilliant chemical defense man. Maybe even have him leave and go to their side.”
Jess had a question of his own. “What about Andrea’s participation in this? Did she help Bev?”
Danny shrugged. “Don’t know. Only Bev does. But she did need medical help and that’s the sad part. I’m sure Joe can get it out of her. I know all of you are angry because all of you were hurt by this but Joe deserves to be the one to bring her in. This is his community and so many people he loves were affected by this. Tell him first thing when he arrives home and give him the honors. She’s not going anywhere.”
“There’s still one mystery.,” Ellen spoke up. “How did she get pregnant by Dean?”
“She’s not,” Dean answered. “She is not carrying my baby. It’s actually really good how she pulled it off, El, and, like me, how stupid you are going to feel because we missed it.” He stepped to her. “Keep in mind, you, me, and Andrea were the only ones aware of this. That we know. See, yeah, the amnio fluid when tested, sure, it proved it was my baby. We could test it a million times and still it would come up as my baby. Why? Because it is,” Dean said. “But, had we’d just tested it differently, we would have seen . . . it was your baby too. Not Bev’s. Remember the old amnio fluid of yours down in the cryo lab? B . . .” Dean stopped himself from saying ‘Brian’. “Billy’s?”
Ellen closed her eyes. “Was it gone?”
“No. Not really,” Dean stated. “It was just put in place of Bev’s real fluid, that’s all.”
“Oh! Yes!” Frank blared out. “Yes! Who’s the man! Yes! I knew. I was the only one who one hundred percent believed him. Yes!” He pointed at Ellen. “Feel bad, don’t you? Don’t you? I told you it wasn’t like Dean. I told you he wouldn’t do it.”
“Frank,” Hal gave a Joe-style warning.
“No. Everyone got mad at me. Everyone called him a dick. You, Hal, punched him. You, Robbie, stole his woman. Elliott moved right in. Not me. I held firm.” Frank was excited. “Who’s the man? Who is the man? Ha!”
Ellen looked at Dean who stood right before her, as if waiting. “I know,” she spoke softly. “Words, words can’t say it. They can’t. I’m so . . .” Ellen grew emotional and closed her eyes. “I’m so sorry, Dean.” Saying nothing else, she hurried, turned, and left Danny’s house.
“See Frank,” Dean backhanded him.
“What?”
“You made her feel really bad.”
“She should feel bad,”
Frank argued.
“It doesn’t matter.” Dean looked around the room then at Danny and Henry. “Danny, Henry . . .” He closed his eyes. “Trish, Josephine. All of you. Thank you. I mean it. Thank you.” In his move to the door, he stopped before Elliott. He spoke low, trying not be heard by anyone but him. “Sgt. Ryder, I know you care about her. I do. But I’m going to ask you as a gentleman, and on the honor of the UWA, to step back from my wife. Thank you.” Dean went to the door and opened it.
“Dean,” Frank called him. “Where you going?”
Dean hesitated with a deep breath. “I’m going to get my things, Frank, because I’m . . . I’m going home.”
The door closed.
^^^^
She stood in the kitchen, sipping her coffee mixed with the sweet liqueur Ellen found herself addicted to. It relaxed her and she really enjoyed it. She set down her mug when she heard the front door open. Ellen hurried to the living room. “Dean.”
Dean set down his duffle bag. “Hey, El.” He walked to her and kissed her. “Sorry it took so long.”
“What ... what are you doing here?”
Dean smiled. “What do you think? I’m home.”
“Dean,” she whispered out. “I told you I was sorry and I am. I am so sorry I doubted you, but so much has happened. I doubted you and you, rightfully so, were and probably still are bitter about it.”
“A part of me, yeah. But I’ll get over it. I’ll get by it.”
“I don’t think I can get over what I felt and I put myself in the frame of mind to move on.”
Dean nodded. “I see. Elliott.”
“Excuse me?”
“It’s Elliott.” He held his hand up in defense. “No. Listen. I’ll be good with it. If you want to continue with him, if you want the understanding to be with him, I’ll accept that. I’ll work with him. Besides, he’s in New Bowman. Mentally, that will work in my favor and . . .”
“He’s dying so he won’t be around that long?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to.” Ellen moved further back. “How can you be such a dick about that? I care about Elliott If you got to know him, you wouldn’t even question why.”
“El. Stop. This isn’t about that. Let’s not argue now. Not now. Let’s just enjoy everything being behind us.” He stepped to her.
“It is.”
“I know.”
“I mean everything. Us, our marriage. It’s behind us. I have moved on.”
“Tough.” Dean grabbed his duffle bag.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m not going anywhere.” He moved across the room. “Too bad if your little mystery lover doesn’t like it. He’s gonna have to deal with it.” Dean hit the hall and spun to her. “This is my home. My kids. You are my wife and you can’t go running to Daddy now. Before, yeah. You thought you had reason but I didn’t do anything wrong. You have no reason to kick me out now. You don’t love me? I don’t buy that. You don’t like me? Right. We get along great. I never slept with Bev. I never dogged you. I never got her pregnant. All I ever did was love you and that won’t stop.” He started to march down the hall. “Tough. Deal with it. I’m not going anywhere. I’m back.”
Ellen listened to his voice trail off and then heard the bedroom door slam. Just as she closed her eyes she heard it open again and then Dean called out with a whole change in his demeanor.
“Hey,” he sounded actually pleased. “Who fixed out door? Wow.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
November 4
Beginnings, Montana
The lines on Joe’s face seemed to deepen overnight. Even the long rest did no good to take away the tired look and paleness across his face. But that was coupled with something else as he walked with Robbie toward the living section with Johnny, total disbelief, anger, and shock.
“And that’s it in a nutshell,” Robbie explained as they approached the second row of houses.
“Unbelievable.” Joe shook his head. “Johnny, I know you were trying to help, Dean. Was there any indication of this?”
“No, Pap.” Johnny’s heart pounded.
“Christ. Where is she?”
“In here.” Robbie opened Bev’s front door. “After the little pow-wow revelation, it became evident that you deserved to be the one to arrest her. You deserved the honors.” Robbie led them up the steps. “We knew she wasn’t going anywhere because she had no reason to think she was busted. None.” He stopped before the bedroom door. “Then came the little problem.”
“What problem is that?” Joe asked.
Robbie opened up the door.
Joe stepped inside. “Dear God.”
Johnny took one look. “Oh, shit. Oh, shit.” He backed up, gagged, spun, and raced from the house.
Robbie peeked out into the hall then shrugged. “Anyway . . . we have a dead Bev.”
Slowly Joe stepped into the room. Frank was in there, apparently picking up evidence and placing it in bag. “Frank.”
“Hey, Dad.” Frank put down the bag and took off his gloves. “Our first true murder.”
Had the desk not been in plain view of the door, it wouldn’t have even looked like there was anything wrong, but the desk showed it all. The wall behind it was splattered with blood as if someone painted it then tossed a bucket of it there. Bev was slumped over on the desk, her arm dangled and dried blood laced the limb. Blood came from Bev’s head where a huge piece was missing. Her exposed eye stared blankly.
Joe took a deep breath and looked around. “Do you have anything, Frank/”
“Nope. Us three, and I guess now Johnny, are the only ones who know about it. I was up at the back fence. Fuckin killer babies learned how to throw things. Anyhow, I was up at the fence with Tony when we got the call about a gunshot in town. I came down. Here she was.”
“What time?” Joe asked.
“Three-thirty.”
“We’ve been collecting up the evidence, Dad,” Robbie stated. “And . . . we have an entire list of suspects.”
“I bet. Like everyone that was at Danny’s house.” Shaking his head, Joe walked over to the desk. He saw a pen lying on the floor. It was covered in blood. “Was she writing something when she was shot?”
Frank stepped closer. “It looks that way. Check under her head.” He pointed. “We left that for you.”
Joe moved to Bev’s body. A piece of paper with writing on it clearly lay beneath her shattered skull. Using only two fingers, Joe grabbed her hair, lifted her head, slid out the paper, and dropped her again. Though covered in blood, the words could still be seen. Joe read them.
Robbie heard his father’s heavy breathing. He peered at Frank and stepped to Joe. “Dad?”
Frank moved in as well. “What is it?”
“You can say . . . I guess you can say this note just reiterates the right thing was done with Andrea. “ Walking away, Joe handed the note to Frank. “Let me know what you find.” Taking one more look around the murder scene at hand, Joe sadly looked to his sons, then left the room.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Barflies. That was what Joe and Jason seemed to be as they sat alone in the Social Hall that evening with Sam the bartender before them. They had drinks and cigarettes in hand, along with something else.
“Hal, Robbie, Ellen, Jess, Elliott, Dean, Danny . . .” Joe read.
“Henry, Trish, Hector, Josephine.”
“What?” Josephine lifted her head from the end of the bar.
“Nothing.” Joe waved her off. “Lay back down.” He leaned into Jason. “It’s one hell of a suspect list.”
“It’s gonna be tricky.”
“Christ. All we needed was another mystery to solve.”
“Any fingerprints yet?” Jason asked.
“Nil. We have no weapon. We have lots of motives, a body, and a time.”
“Time.” Jason sat up straight and grinned.
“I see that look in your eye.”
“Joe, I have been
waiting for another reason. We have the . . . time.”
“No.” Joe shook his head and puffed his cigarette. “Absolutely not. We decided against it.”
“But not only can I get it up in a couple hours and functional enough to make the trip, we can solve this before this day is over.”
Joe closed his eyes. “It’s cheating. Besides . . . is a trip in a time machine admissible in a court of law?”
“Maybe not,” Jason shrugged, “but evidence is. We can at least confirm on who we have to dig up evidence.”
“It’s not right.”
“Nobody has to know. Just me, you, and the person we send.”
“What about . . .” Joe pointed to Josephine.
“Nah, she’s out.” Jason waved his hand. “What do you say? Let’s have some fun.”
“If we would, who would we send?”
“I know who.” Jason finished his drink. “He’s perfect. He has a solid alibi and he . . .”
“If you’re thinking about who I think you’re thinking about, he also has a reputation of screwing time up.”
“Not this . . . time.” Jason grinned. “All he has to do is go, look, and come back.”
“How long will it take to get the Regressionator ready again?”
“A couple of hours.”
“Will it work? You rigged it not to.”
“It’s not perfect anymore. We can try. The thing that can mess this up is we miss our shot and get there too late or too early. Or worse case scenario is our traveler could get sucked into some sort of dimensional time warp and never return. That’s the worst case scenario.”
Moving his mouth from side to side in thought, Joe downed his drink, slammed the glass on the bar, stood up, and grabbed his cigarette, “let’s go.”
^^^^
Frank moaned, annoyed, in the Quantum lab.
“One more time,” Jason said. “You know what to do.”
“Yes.” Frank nodded. “I go through. I go to Bev’s. I hide out and wait. I watch. I see who goes in and then I leave.”
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