WE TRUNDLED back into the station late in the afternoon. Both of us were hot, irritable, and didn’t know much more than we had before. The parents became close-lipped as soon as we approached the subject of threatening calls or letters. Some of them admitted having received menacing calls; all of them denied having received a sinister letter. Our gut feelings told us a different story.
We tried gentle coaxing, we tried sending them on a guilt trip, but nothing worked. In retrospect it was a miracle that we had gotten the letter from Alex.
“Trenkins, Woods, a word please,” Williams called out for us as soon as we reached our desks.
Parker and I exchanged a suspicious glance. I heard Parker muttering, “I swear, if he’s going to bitch, I’ll lose my temper.”
“You better not. Not finding evidence even though our instincts tell us there’s something going on is bad enough. I really don’t need to work on this case with a new partner.”
Parker bestowed a look on me I couldn’t interpret. “Either you’re the most selfish bastard I’ve ever known or you just told me you like me.”
I shrugged and flashed him a grin. “That’s up to you.”
“Wow, Jeff, I never knew you had this playful streak. Guess the boy’s good for you, huh?”
Flinching, I glanced around. One of the other detectives frowned at me. A glare directed at him cured that quickly enough, though. He averted his eyes and I shoved past Parker. My voice barely registered as a hiss when I said, “Want me to tell the other guys about your preferences?”
“What? I didn’t tell anyone! Why are you so mad?” Parker asked, bafflement obvious in his voice.
I took in a deliberately deep breath before I turned back to face him. In a very quiet voice I answered, “You said, and here I quote you, ‘the boy’s good for you’.”
Parker blanched. In a nervous gesture, he rubbed the back of his neck. Quietly, he replied, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—”
“Woods! Trenkins! Anytime soon would be great!” Williams bellowed.
Parker touched my arm briefly as he passed me. I stared at him, simmering, then followed him. I had always been so careful, never giving a hint about my sexual orientation. Oh, I’m quite sure that some of my coworkers suspected me of being gay. Which wasn’t so hard to conclude since I’d never brought a woman to any event. Yet, it was different to be really out. I wasn’t ready for that, especially without having a partner to show off.
I blinked. Now where the hell did that come from?
I shook myself out of my weird thoughts and, after a nod from Williams, shut the door behind me. We all settled around the small round table Williams used in his office for briefings and waited.
“So, what did you find out?” Williams asked after he’d sat down and smoothed the crease in his left pant leg.
Usually, it would be up to me to rattle off the information we had gathered, but I figured Parker owed me for his slip a minute ago. I fixed him with a hard glare and he gave a long-suffering sigh. Williams eyed us curiously as he listened to Parker’s report. I let my mind wander partially.
I wondered how Alex had spent today and who’d be looking after him and Sean during the night. The ultimatum posed in the letter said the brothers should leave by the twelfth and we still didn’t have the slightest idea who was behind that message. Dread caused me to squirm in my chair. As much as Sean made me uncomfortable, I didn’t want anything bad happening to him or any of the other children. Although it would be so much easier to date Alex without Sean hanging around.
I froze. Swallowing hard against the bile rising up in my throat, I clutched the armrests of my chair. When had I become so cruel and selfish?
A hollow feeling settled in my stomach and from there spread out through the rest of my body. Everything was numbed; I couldn’t even feel the wood of the armrests under my palms anymore. Parker’s and Williams’s voices were too muffled to be understood. The shrill ringing of my phone loosened the clamps of shock my mind had been trapped in. I jumped up to retrieve my cell from my pocket, which gained me strangely bewildered looks from Parker and Williams.
I turned around and snarled, “Woods.”
Chandler’s cheerful voice greeted me. “Hey, Woods, who’s going to take over for me here? My shift’s almost over.”
“Uh,” I replied. A second later I had made a decision. Whether it would be a good one or not was yet to be seen. “I’ll be there as soon as possible. Hang on a second.”
Turning back to Williams, I said, “Sir, how long is this briefing going to take? Chandler’s shift is almost over and I’d like to take over for the night.”
Williams raised his eyebrows, whereas Parker’s face turned impassive. Neutrally, Williams asked, “It won’t be long. Weren’t you there last night already? Don’t you want to go home?”
“Yeah, I have. Sure, I’d like to go home,” I lied halfheartedly. “Do you have another detective to spare?”
Williams grimaced. No, he didn’t. I had counted on that. “No. You go ahead. Trenkins is going to take the next night. If it’s still necessary, that is.”
I nodded, told Chandler I’d be there in about an hour, and ended the call. The earlier numbness and coldness vanished, only to be replaced by anger and disgust with myself. Although unsure if I liked it better this way, I could at least function and participate in the briefing.
Williams told us the mayor, Miller, was driving him crazy. Parker muttered something that sounded like “Welcome to the club” before Williams went on. Miller wanted results and he wanted them immediately. He had arranged for two bodyguards to stay with the Andersons as the police obviously weren’t taking the threat seriously. Williams wasn’t pleased and wanted to hear our opinion on the case so far.
Parker and I shrugged a little helplessly. “We’re waiting on the results from forensics. Fisher gave us the threatening letter and they’re still examining it.”
“You mean, they don’t have time to do it right now because of the bus accident,” Williams intervened. “I’ll call them up and will strongly advise them to be fast with the letter.”
We gave him the rest of the information we had gathered, which still wasn’t much. We mostly relied on our gut feeling that the parents had hid something from us and that they stayed silent because they feared for the lives of their children. Williams grunted in acknowledgment when we ended our report. “There’s not much more to do today. You’ll continue the interviews tomorrow, right?”
Parker and I nodded. Williams stood and picked up the phone. He indicated we should leave his office with a curt wave of his hand. “Trenkins, you type up what you found out so far. Woods, you go and relieve Chandler.”
At our desks, Parker threw himself into his chair and grumbled, “Great, I get the fucking report and you can go,” he glanced around and lowered his voice before he went on, “and play lovey-dovey.”
“More like getting back into his good graces.”
I shouldered into my jacket, suddenly feeling weary and exhausted. What could I say? What should I say? How would Alex react to seeing me again? Would he demand that he be guarded by another detective? I couldn’t force him to accept my services, but I couldn’t leave Sean and Alex alone either. An uneasy feeling that something bad was about to happen nagged at me. I had learned to listen to my gut feelings, at least when they were work-related, really carefully.
Parker’s hand shot out to grab my jacket sleeve. “Try being nice to the boy and he’ll be delighted to see you again. Remember he is smitten with you. No matter how hard he tries not to be.”
“I’m not comfortable around kids.”
“You better get used to it, don’t you think?”
Inwardly, I cursed Alex for having to care for Sean. The one time after years I fell for another guy and he had to come with an appendage. Even though I’d only used the word “appendage” in my mind, I felt embarrassed. What was wrong with me?
Parker eyed me with open curiosity. To thwart any more comments about Alex, Sean, and myself, I asked, “Why are you so mad at the mayor?”
His expression shuttered in an instant. I watched Parker bend the corner of a folder this way and that way, his whole concentration focused on it. When he lifted his head and looked at me, his face had a haunted expression. “Remember those five siblings I told you about?”
I nodded.
“Miller dated one of my sisters. He wasn’t mayor then, of course. He was my sister’s first man and promised her the world. She was only sixteen.” Parker’s voice got a bitter edge. “When he dumped her, she drifted away from our family. She’s been on drugs ever since.”
“I’m sorry,” I blurted, genuinely horrified.
“Yeah, me too.” He straightened up in his chair before he forced a small smile on his face. “Now go, fix things with your boy and accept that you if you want him, you’ll get the kid too.”
I cuffed Parker lightly on the head. “Yeah, and that’s going to work out well.”
Parker’s laugh followed me as I walked out of the bullpen. I grinned even though it was unwilling.
I DROVE by my own apartment, where I stuffed some essentials into a sports bag. Ignoring the tingling unease that seemed to wind its way up from the base of my spine to my head, I rushed back to the car. During the drive to Alex’s place, I became more and more on edge, as I still didn’t know what to say to him.
I parked on the side of the street opposite Alex’s building, close to the spot where I had seen the mysterious man standing last night. After throwing the bag over my shoulder, I strode over to the house and called Chandler’s cell.
“Hey Chandler, it’s me, Woods. I’m here to relieve you.”
“All right,” I heard him say shortly before the door opened.
I followed him inside to the living room, where Alex lay sprawled on the floor next to Sean, blowing soap bubbles into the air. Sean chirped when he saw me. For some reason, he didn’t seem to be overly surprised to see me again. Neither did he seem to mind. I couldn’t say the same for Alex.
“What the fuck are you doing here again?”
“I’ll be here for the night to look after you two.”
Alex got to his feet. “No. Absolutely not.”
Chandler frowned while he rested his hand on Alex’s bare forearm in a calming gesture. Alex pulled his arm free abruptly. A look of curiosity replaced Chandler’s frown. He cast a quick glance toward me. I shrugged, indicating I had no clue to whatever was going on.
“Mr. Fisher, is there any problem with detective Woods staying with you?”
I gritted my teeth when Alex opened his mouth. He snapped it closed with an audible click. He held himself stiffly and his voice dripped ice as he replied, “No, there’s no problem other than that he’s probably tired and won’t be able to do a proper job of protecting us.”
I gaped.
Chandler fared way better than I. After blinking away his astonishment, he cleared his throat and used his most placating voice to tell Alex, “Mr. Fisher, be assured that Detective Woods wouldn’t be assigned to stay with you if he weren’t fit enough.”
“Oh, is that so.” Alex sneered.
He sneered, for Christ’s sake! I had the sudden urge to shake him, but instead of giving in, I beckoned Chandler to me with a curt nod. “Go home, Chandler, I’ll take it from here.”
Alex snorted and Chandler’s doubtful gaze jumped from Alex to me and back. Alex crossed his arms above his chest and jutted his chin defiantly. I barely suppressed rolling my eyes at this adolescent conduct. Putting all the calmness I could muster in my voice, I repeated to Chandler, “Go home. Everything is fine. By the way, how’s your wife doing? I heard this pregnancy is hard on her?”
Chandler’s interest in Alex crumbled immediately. With a weary sigh he ran his hands through his thin hair. “There was some bleeding and she had to be hospitalized for a week. She’s doing better now, but she’s easily exhausted.”
“I’m sure you’d like to get home to see and take care of your little daughter.”
Chandler nodded and I quietly ushered him out of the apartment. Not without noticing the furious glare Alex shot at me. I had manipulated Chandler into leaving, but so what? Although I hadn’t been overly subtle, I meant no threat to Alex. On the contrary, I came back to protect him and Sean, as well as try to salvage whatever there was left of our affair. The one I still didn’t know if I wanted to develop into something deeper or not.
I locked the door after I had assured Chandler that I had the situation under control. When I turned around I almost bumped straight into Alex. He stood there, hands on his hips, trying to glare a hole into me. I raised an eyebrow inquiringly, which resulted in him thumping his fists against my chest. Surprised, I gave a pained noise but didn’t defend myself.
When it became obvious that he wasn’t going to stop his attack, I pulled him flush against me. In panic, he tried to push his knee right into my crotch, but I blocked him just in time. I whirled him around and caught his wrists in my hands, crossing his arms above his chest with no leverage to free himself. I adjusted my stance and leaned my back against the door when Alex’s control flew right out of the window.
He snarled, twisted, and writhed but otherwise stayed eerily quiet. He didn’t even try speaking, just kept on trying to wrench free. Oddly calm and collected, I listened to his ragged breathing and kept on restraining his thrashing body.
Rage and frustration had erupted, right in my arms. It wasn’t directed solely at me, I was certain about that. Still, it had boiled over, and I was actually glad to be able to provide a safe space for Alex to let go.
It took several minutes for him to stop fighting. He slumped back against me and I rubbed my cheek against his, noticing the slight dampness of his skin. He drew in a shuddering breath as I pressed a chaste kiss on his jaw.
“I’m sorry,” I murmured.
“For what?”
“A lot of things.”
“And you think that’s going to appease me?” he gasped out.
I had nothing better to offer. Telling him that would probably get me in the doghouse again, so I settled on pressing a series of small kisses on every patch of his face I could reach. Alex chuckled as he ducked his head.
“Are you going to attack me if I let you go?”
Alex shook his head and muttered, “No, and I’m sorry too.”
I let go of his wrists but put my hands on his hips and turned him around. Alex darted a quick glance at me, then hurriedly closed the gap between us and rested his head on my shoulder. He slung his arms around my waist and squeezed tightly while I brought my own arms around his torso, sensing the slight, almost imperceptible tremors running through him. It struck me how well we fit together, how well he molded against me, and how much I craved to hold him close. Feeling my breathing turning irregular, I recognized the first signs of my imminent bolting. There were too many emotions, strong emotions, to be dealt with at once. I couldn’t deal, I just couldn’t.
A hesitant chirp from the living room rescued me from making a fool out of myself. I sighed in relief and heard Alex sighing as well. Whether he sighed in relief or annoyance I didn’t know. Alex loosened his embrace but I didn’t want to lose the connection we’d just built. I cut off his retreat by snatching his chin. I gentled my hold on his face, although I still forced him to look at me. I still had no clue what I wanted to say to him. Somehow he seemed to understand me anyway. He brought one hand up to cup my cheek, which caused my eyes to close for a split second. When I opened my eyes again, he looked at me with an intensity that scared me to no end.
“I’m not sure this is a good idea,” he said.
“Neither am I, but we’re only going to find out if we give it a try, right?” I sounded bold, confident to my own ears, though I absolutely didn’t feel that way. I could only hope Alex interpreted my comment positively.
“I don’t know if I can stand it when we find out it’s not going to work.”
My next words left my mouth without my permission. “We simply have to try our best so it won’t come to that.”