Wall of Silence

By

Gabrielle Goldsby

(AKA GabGold)

~Chapter 30~

See part 1 for disclaimer:

I got into the Cruiser and sat with my hands on the blistering steering wheel as if I could somehow channel Riley's whereabouts. Suddenly I felt rage. A rage so hot and dangerous it burned through my heart and came out my mouth in the form of a sob that probably sounded more like a scream. And then there was hatred. I hated whoever took her. I hated them with a passion I had never felt before. I hated them for taking her and I hated myself for letting it happen. Finally, tears streaked down my face and as I reached up to brush them away, I smelled her scent, mingled with the leather of the steering wheel, on my hand.

"Please God. Please," I said as I tried to calm myself. I had no idea where I needed to go, no idea what I needed to do. I was scared and I was without the only person in the world I could ever admit that to. And somewhere out there, someone could have been hurting her.

I walked back into the theater and down to the apartment, a part of me still expecting to find her sitting at the table drinking her water or eating a fucking celery stick. Another sob left my throat when I found the place exactly as it was before. I righted the chair and turned off the water faucet. Should I call Rachel? Should I go to the police? No, they won't look for her until tomorrow and by then it may be too late. There was also the real possibility that I would be arrested. They might not even listen to me.

"Okay. Okay, you have to get it together." Though the first words were a sob the last few sounded stronger. I owed Riley so much. The thought that I might never be able to tell her how I felt, how much I wanted to be with her, was making it hard for me to breathe. "Okay just sit down and figure this out, Foster. You can do this; this is what you do. Remember? Just figure it out."

I pulled the 9 mm's from their holsters and put them on the table then began to add to my diagram. Michael Stratford was actually Michael Albert and he was dead. His tongue had been removed and that was almost assuredly a warning. It was an overly dramatic thing to do, almost as if whoever did it didn't know what they were doing or had read too many damn mafia novels or something...but I guess the question was, who were they trying to warn? Michael Albert worked for Stein who was now missing. I couldn't prove it but I was sure his wife and her boyfriend had something to do with his disappearance. Did they have something to do with Michael's death as well? My gut told me no. Whoever had killed Michael had been cold-blooded and calculated; it didn't seem like a crime of passion.

"What am I missing?"

I stared at the sheets of paper that held the info on Harrison Canniff. I had avoided looking at it for the obvious reasons. I didn't think it had anything to do with this case and it was a painful reminder of how I had almost ruined my life and possibly the reason why Smitty killed himself. The only other link beside myself was Michael.

Smitty. Had Smitty figured this out? Had Marcus? Maybe...maybe I was going at this the wrong way. I shuffled through the reports until I came to the paperwork on Smitty. This too I had avoided. I traced the picture of him with my finger; it had been taken years before when Smitty had been promoted to detective. He was thinner then, the beer belly that he had when I became his partner wasn't there yet and he didn't smile like the Smitty I knew. He looked older than he had when he'd died. I turned the page and continued to read. Smitty and his partner had many commendations when he was in San Diego, something that I knew, but that Smitty rarely talked about. Smitty's partner took early retirement at about the time Smitty moved back to Los Angeles. The dates coincided with about the time I became his partner. I fumbled with the cell phone, Riley's cell phone, I thought mindlessly as I dialed the number to the records department. I couldn't seem to remember if I'd told her that I loved her.

"...Hello? Whoever this is you better talk or hang up the damn phone." I heard her fumbling with the telephone, as if she was about to slam the phone back into its cradle, and I panicked.

"Chandra...Chandra its Foster."

"Damn, take it down a notch. I can hear you. What's wrong?"

"I can't... I can't explain right now. I need you to look up something. I need you to go on the Internet and see if you can find anything on Joseph Smith in the San Diego papers. Cross-reference Monica's name, too. I'm looking for something that would have happened about five years ago. Hell, check Chief James too while you're..."

"Foster, I'm going to have to get back to you. I do have a job you know." Her voice had that bitter sharpness that people get when they're busy.

"Goddamn it, would you stop being a fucking bitch for two min...I...they ...someone took her. She's gone. I need... please can you help me? I need your help, okay?"

"Took who? Riley?"

"Please, Chandra."

"Okay. I'm pulling it up now, okay?" I heard fingers hitting the keys viciously and closed my eyes. "Okay, the first article just quotes Smitty in reference to a case about some church. I don't think this is what you're looking for."

"No, tell me what it says."

"Nothing much just that the police are working on it. Here, let me see if I can find anything else. It's called the Church of the North Star. Says here the police thought the church was set up as a scam. They would entice these women to join them in phony prayer meetings and the like then they would either use them or the kids in porn. They had themselves a regular casting couch. Let me scan this...okay, anyway its founder was...holy shit. Holy shit it was a man named Nathan Stein. He was never indicted because the police entered the place illegally."

"Okay, calm down," I said more for my benefit than hers. "Anything else?"

"Says here that...the police had been watching them since the accusation of abuse, but they didn't have anything." She paused and I could sense her confusion through the phone. "For some reason one morning they opened fire on the place. Some of the women and children were killed."

"Does it say anything else?"

"No, nothing."

"Can you do a search on Harrison Canniff?" The cell phone felt like it was burning into the side of my head.

"Okay, looks like Canniff was killed about three months ago. The autopsy report was inconclusive due to the fact that his body was burned and all of his teeth were missing. His ex-wife made the ID."

"Okay. No, I know about that part...do you have anything else on him?"

I heard her typing fiercely on her keyboard and then she paused. "Holy shit, he was there...Canniff was arrested as well, but they couldn't make the charges stick because the bust wasn't legal."

Now my mind started searching. I felt like I already had my answer, but I needed to follow it through to its most logical conclusion. It didn't make sense, it was crazy, but it had to be true. "Can you find anything on the officers that were involved in the bust? They had to have been disciplined or something."

"It was Smitty and his partner. They were there." If I had been in any other condition I would have been as shocked as she was. But as it was, I felt like I was spent. No emotion, no anger, nothing. Just totally drained.

"Do you have a name, an address or something on Smitty's old partner?"

"Shit, I can probably get it Foster, but I don't know. That's not something I have access to. They were down in San Diego. The only reason I can pull this stuff is because someone entered it into the database. I might be able to pull in a few favors, but you know how hard it is to get into an officer's records unnoticed."

Okay think, Foster. Think. Smitty is somehow connected to this. Smitty and his partner were involved. I can't ask Smitty and I can't very well waltz up to his old partner. I could try Monica but I don't know if she would tell her father.... "Do you get any hits on Monica or Chief James." I heard her fingers moving quickly over the keyboard.

"There's close to five hundred on Chief James."

"No time. What about Monica?"

"There's about forty."

"For now take out the ones that look like they have anything to do with Chief James or the fact that she's his daughter." With my teeth gritted, I waited for her to type in the information.

"Looks like there's seven here. All of them about that charity she runs burying those kids."

"Okay." I rubbed hard at my aching forehead and closed my burning eyes tightly. A pulse began to pound in my temple. "Go back to the oldest one and read it to me."

I listened intently as she read the article. I was certain it was the same one Riley and I had read back in Albion. I opened my mouth to tell her to go to the next one when something she said made me pause.

"Citing a near-fatal accident with her own son, she has made it her life's work...."

"Wait...back up. Read that again." She did as I requested and I pressed the phone hard into my ear as if it would help me understand her better.

"Stop," I breathed after she completed the sentence again. "A near-fatal accident?"

Smitty had never mentioned an accident with Eric. "Did Marcus ever talk to you about Smitty?"

"No, I told you he didn't. I don't think they really knew each other." But something in her voice didn't seem right.

"Listen to me, I need you to think long and hard about this. Did he ever mention anything having to do with Smitty at all? I need to know what he may have known that I don't."

Chandra was silent and when she finally spoke her voice was hesitant there was something there, something she didn't want to tell me. "Anything like what?"

"Why is this so hard for you to understand?" Desperation crept into my voice. "Did Marcus ever say anything about him? Did Smitty's name come up, or Monica's, or hell anything at all to do with them?"

"Uh yeah, I can remember us talking about it a little when the article first came out."

"What article?"

"The one I'm reading to you. About Smitty's wife's charity."

"Okay, what did Marcus say?"

"Uh, Foster look..."

"Damn it, I don't have time for this."

"Marcus didn't say anything, okay." She said urgently. " It was me... I told him...I just remember mentioning that I thought it was sort of creepy."

I swallowed. "What...what did you think was creepy?"

"I mean, I understand about civic duties and I think what she does is great. But in her own van? And then how she would bury them and, I don't know, give them names. Marcus went over to the cemetery. He said all of them had her last name, Foster. I know Smith is common, but ... I mean she had her own son in the same van she carried those dead babies in."

"Can... can you print the articles out? I need to see them."

"I'm not sure I can get away."

"Please, Chandra, you have to...they might...I have to find her."

I felt like I was imploding. Nothing seemed to be adding up but in the back of my mind something was. It was sick and it was dirty, and I had let Riley fall into that tide pool of filth. I had to get her back.

"It's okay, Foster." Her voice was calm, almost as if she was talking me down off a ledge. "I'll get away, okay? I'll bring it to you."

* * *

Chandra agreed to meet me in the parking lot of a KFC about two miles from the theater. She got into the Blazer and handed me the articles.

"You okay?" she asked quietly.

"No." I tried not to notice how dead my own voice sounded as I scanned the articles. There wasn't much more to them than what I already knew, but something was telling me that these articles could have been what Marcus keyed in on.

"Listen, I'm going to follow up on a few things. If you don't hear from me in four hours, go to Detective Pierce, tell him everything you know and that you think I'm in trouble. Do you understand?"

"Maybe you should go to him now."

"No, I can't. I can't run the risk that they might haul me in before I find her."

"What are you going to do?"

"I'm going to find Riley."

I watched Chandra drive off and then got back on the freeway heading toward Monica's. I pulled a small card out of my back pocket, reached for Riley's cell and dialed the number with one hand.

"Hello?"

"Sherm?"

"Who the fuck is this?"

"Foster Everett."

"I thought you were going to call me...."

"Sherm, don't. I need help, okay? Please...they took my...they took Riley."

"Who took her? Where are you?"

"I ...I don't know who took her. I'm on my way to see my partner's widow. I think she may know something, but I'm not sure..." to my horror a sob escaped my throat. "Sherm, can you...."

"Tell me what you need."

"I need her back, Sherm...I can't...I need her back no matter what."

"I know," he said. It was no comfort to me that he did know. Marcus was dead. And I thought the people responsible now had Riley.

I gave Sherm directions to the theater. "I'm going to talk to Monica first. I'll meet you there in about two hours."

"All right," he said and hung up the phone. I didn't know what I expected Sherm to do, but just knowing that I wasn't in it alone helped.

I pulled up in front of my partner's old house and noted with dismay that Monica's van wasn't there and that a "for sale" sign had been placed in the yard. I left the Blazer running as I sprinted to the side of the house and peered through a window. The room that used to be Eric's was now empty, even the border of multi-colored balloons had been pulled down. I ran to another window that illuminated the hall of the house. The pictures of Monica's mother were gone and in their place, a wall of pristine white. There wasn't even a lightened area to prove that the pictures had ever been there.

* * *

It took me an unusually long time to get into the house. I couldn't seem to keep my breathing or my hands steady as I worked at the locks. Once inside, the smell of fresh paint assaulted my nose as I walked from room to room and back again. In the family room I got to my knees searching for indentions in the carpet where a pool table had sat for all the years I had known Smitty. There were none. It was as if someone had gone through and wiped every piece of evidence that this house had ever been lived in away. I stood up and walked into Eric's room thinking that small children leave prints, dirt evidence of their existence. There was nothing, even the light switches were spotless. This felt so wrong, off kilter somehow; like watching a glass of water that was tipped on its edge but that never fell.

Perhaps it was that very feeling of disorder that made me so alert because I felt it the instant someone else walked into the house.

You know the feeling. You can tell someone is there because the air moves even though you don't actually hear anything. My first thought was to pull my gun, open a window and scurry out. My second thought was that whoever was out there might know where Riley was. I pulled the .38 from my ankle holster and placed it in the deep pocket of my cargo pants. No brute force and no threats. I had to let myself get caught.

"Well hello there. I hoped you would stop by." I turned around, already reaching for the guns at my back. "Go on, go on and pull the gun. I want to have to kill you." I gritted my teeth and reluctantly brought my hands up in front of me as I stared angrily at Wilson and down the barrel of the .45 pointed at my head.

"Where is she?" I clenched my fists and fought down the suicidal anger that threatened to make me jump on him, gun and half-baked plan be damned.

"Oh, you mean your big friend? Tell me the truth; she helped you in your apartment didn't she? We figured it must have been her."

When I didn't answer Wilson chuckled, his ponytail catching the light and making me vow to pull it straight out of his head after I found Riley. "Come on," he gestured with his gun and stepped out of the doorway so that I could walk before him. "Stop right there." I stopped and he quickly removed both 9 mm's and just as I had hoped, didn't bother to pat me down.

"Tell me where she is," I demanded. Wilson pushed his gun into the small of my back to edge me forward.

"Well, let's see. I figure right about now she's getting the shit kicked out of her, but I can't be sure." We had just reached the living room and with a final shove to my back he sent me stumbling forward. I growled, and then felt my body tense as a searing pain started at the back of my head, went down my neck, and sent me to my knees.

"Goddamn it man, don't kill her. He said bring her ass in alive. He needs that tape."

"I didn't kill her, that was payback. This bitch tried to kill me last time."

"Yeah, whatever. Just get her up, McClowski."

I heard McClowski holster his weapon and, cursing under his breath he bent to help me up. As I was dragged to my feet, my hand went to my pocket, but at some point after I had been hit, the .38 had been removed from my pocket. I couldn't seem to keep my head from hanging down as I tried to catch my breath. I felt the prickly sensation of blood as it rolled over my cheek and then seeped into my mouth warm, coppery and somehow comforting. "W...where is she?" I said to give myself time to regroup.

"Don't worry, we're going to take you right to her. But first we want the tape."

"I don't have any fucking tape."

"Look, we know that drunk stole it. Smitty said you and he were the only ones that had access to the tapes."

"I didn't take anything. I turned in everything we had."

"We know how Michael Albert got hold of the tape. We talked to him." The curl of Wilson's lip was meant to be a smile Instead, it just seemed cruel, almost as cruel as the damage done to Michael's body. "He swore he didn't have it anymore. We're starting to think he gave it to you."

"You're crazy I don't even know him."

"Then how did you know about the house in Barstow?"

"How did you know about it?" I fired back.

McClowski smirked. "His girlfriend told us."

Damn you Alicia. "So what makes you think she didn't tell me the same thing?"

"Their apartment's been watched ever since the van was towed."

"What van and what did Michael's girlfriend tell you?" I'm sure my face gave nothing away, but mentally I winced. McClowski knew nothing about Alicia. The girlfriend he was referring to was the woman Michael was living with at the time of his disappearance. Smitty and I had questioned her about Michael when we were looking to speak to him about our kidnapping case. Her fear and worry felt genuine and I had been convinced that she was telling the truth when she said she didn't know where he was. Smitty and I could very well have walked right past the van and never thought anything of it.

McClowski really laughed this time. "You don't think we are going to tell you everything do you."

"You know what I think? I think you're just guessing. I don't think you know your ass from a hole in the ground..." The next blow barely even bothered me, but I pitched forward anyway and lay as still as I could. I was starting to understand something but the pain in the back of my head was making it hard for me to connect. I felt a tight hand on my arm. "Ok, I'll tell you where the tape is. But first I want to know where you took Riley," I said weakly.

"Man, she doesn't look so good." The note of worry in McClowski's voice gave me a small sense of pleasure. Never mind the fact that my life was seeping out of the back of my head.

"Yeah, well maybe you shouldn't have hit her so fucking hard."

"Tell me...where Riley is. And I'll get you the tape," I said as Wilson roughly helped me to my feet.

"The boss has her and that's all you need to know."

"Who's your boss?" I asked. But I already knew the answer. There was only one person powerful enough to have two cops on their payroll. The question was, why all of this? What could be so bad that...

"You'll find out soon enough. Now tell us where the tape..."

I jammed my fingers into washed out gray eyes and clawed for all I was worth. The scream that rent the air would have been satisfying if I hadn't been so worried about getting shot. I used the now floundering McClowski and pushed him hard into Wilson, hoping to make him drop the gun when he hit the wall. He didn't. He managed to get off a shot that I felt zip past my ear before my fist made contact with his chin. I put both hands around the hot barrel of the gun and pushed it up and away from me. I heard McClowski cursing behind us and knew that if I didn't get control of the situation immediately, it would be two against one. I never liked those odds. So I released the gun just long enough to smash my right fist into Wilson's throat. Heat seared my left hand as he either reflexively, or in an effort to shoot me, pulled the trigger. My eardrums protested as the sound of the second shot echoed throughout the house until there was nothing left but the steady hum of the refrigerator.

I pulled the gun from Wilson's hand and he continued to stare at me blankly as his body slid down the wall leaving a trail of vivid crimson. The floor stopped him and I watched as the life left his body, his knees up and together like a demure schoolgirl. I turned the gun on McClowski.

"Oh God. Oh God," he screamed hoarsely. "You killed him."

"He killed himself," I said. "Get up."

Four long scratches ran down both of McClowski cheeks like demented red sunbeams on a child's crayon drawing. Snot dribbled from his nose as he stared fixedly at his partner, as if he had never seen a dead body before. I pulled the phone out of my back pocket and without removing my eyes from McClowski, demanded his boss' phone number. He bit out the number and I dialed it, but before I pushed ësend' I met his eyes. Something about his reaction bothered me. He didn't seem like someone who could cut out someone's tongue, not to mention what they did to Marcus.

"Who killed Marcus Vansant?"

"Wilson did," he said without hesitation.

"And Michael Albert?"

"He killed them both."

"Why?"

"The boss just said they had to go."

"And what did you do while he was killing them?" I asked.

"What? Nothing!"

"You didn't do anything?"

"No, I didn't. I didn't want any part of.... I just kept quiet. He was, he was crazy. He seemed like he was enjoying...."

McClowski stopped talking then. Maybe he saw something in my eyes that he recognized. Because in that moment I felt like I would have enjoyed killing him. I think I would have enjoyed it a lot.

I held out the phone. "Tell your boss you got me," I said through thinned lips. "Tell him to meet you back at the theater with Riley, and that I won't tell you where the tape is without seeing her alive first. If you try anything, you die." I pushed send.

McClowski carefully took the phone from my hand as if he was afraid to touch me. I watched calmly for any sign, any reason, any excuse to kill him. He gave me none.

~Chapter 31~

We left the house in Wilson and McClowski's unmarked car. I put the gun against McClowski's ribs and kept my eyes on the rearview mirror to make sure no one was following us. McClowski was completely quiet the whole time he drove. I halfway wanted him to protest, to do something that would allow me to hurt him. In the police academy they tell rookies that killing will never come easy no matter how often they have to pull the trigger. They're lying. "I want you to pull into that grocery store and park."

"Alright. Alright." He said as if placating a crazy person.

"No." I pressed the gun more firmly into his side as he pulled into a parking space. "Go to the back." He looked at me and I tensed, waiting for him to protest. I was out of luck. He slowly eased out of the parking space and drove toward the back of the store and parked. "Good. Now get out."

"What ...what are you going to do?" he whined.

"I said get out." I kept the gun pointed at him as he scrambled out of the car and I came around and opened the back door.

"Please, I got a kid and a wife. That's why I did all this. You know how hard it can be."

I ignored his amateur attempt at negotiation. "Give me your cuffs," I said and he reached in his pocket and handed them to me. "Turn around." He did so and started to cry.

"You're not going to shoot me are you?"

I opened the car door and stared at the back of his head for a moment. "No." I slammed the butt of my gun into his skull, then grabbed the collar of his white shirt and tried to guide his limp form into the backseat. I checked his pulse before pushing his legs in behind him and closing the door. "Paybacks are a bitch aren't they, fuck-head?" I got in the driver's seat, picked up the police radio that now felt foreign to me, and said, "Patch me in to Captain Gail Simmons."

"Please repeat your unit number."

"Just fucking patch me in to Captain Simmons, damn it. This is an emergency. Tell her it's Foster Everett."

I waited for a response but got none, so I closed my eyes and leaned my aching head against the headrest. The pain ripping through my scalp reminded me that that wasn't a good idea. I gently dabbed at it with my fingers trying to assess the damage.

"Everett!" Captain Simmons barked and I jumped like I always did when the Captain called my name and fumbled with the radio.

"Captain, I..."

"Everett, you are in big trouble."

"I know. I don't have time...."

"Where are you?"

"I won't tell you that until you listen. They have my friend and they're going to kill her over some videotape that I don't have."

"Who are they? You're not making sense."

I closed my eyes. She was right I wasn't making sense. This thing was a lot bigger than I was and I was going to need more help than a small-time hood and a data clerk.

"Captain, remember...remember you said that I was going to need your help one day?" I felt my eyes blur. "I'm nothing but trouble. I'm not worth risking your ass for, but Captain, Riley is. And they're going to hurt her and I don't know why. Please, I'm begging you to help me."

"Tell me where you are."

After I gave her the address to the theater there was silence on the other end of the phone finally she took a deep breath. "Okay, I don't know what the hell is going on, but I know there's more to it than you killing a child molester. You stay put until you hear from me. Understand? Everett, you there..." I turned off the radio, started the car and pulled onto the street. I had already wasted too much time.

Evening used to be my most favorite time of the day. But at that moment I could feel the darkness closing in on me as I pulled into the theater parking lot. A black Expedition and a tan Cadillac were the only other cars in the lot. The Expedition sat in a darkened corner with its lights and engine off, while the Cadillac was parked in front of the theater door as if it had every right to be there. I leaned forward trying to see who was behind the tinted glass of the SUV. About two minutes passed before one of the windows rolled down and a man, a boy really, with a black "do rag" around his head and dark brown skin glared out at me. I immediately got out of the car and walked over to the Expedition. The door swung open and I slid in to find Sherm alone in the back. Two Uzi subs sat on the floor along with three semi-automatics.

"Damn girl, who the fuck clocked you?" The wound realized that it now had my full attention, and began to throb. I winced and reached down and pulled my t-shirt up to wipe away some of the blood.

"Here." Sherm handed me a handkerchief and I wiped the blood from my neck then held it to the back of my head.

"Sherm, you've got to get out of here," I said finally.

"What? You said you needed..."

"I know, but I panicked. I don't want to drag you into this."

"They got your girl inside and you don't want my help?"

"No, I do want your help. But I don't want any more innocent people getting hurt. Not for me. Sherm, I had to call Captain Simmons. This is something big. I'm afraid they're going to try to pin some shit on me and I don't want you getting involved."

"So you just going in there alone?"

"Yeah, I have to. I'm afraid they might kill Riley if I don't show up soon. But I want you to do something for me. You know Pistol Pete?"

"Yeah, who doesn't?"

"I want you to send someone to get him. He's over at the old Montgomery Wards building in the parking lot. I want him hidden somewhere until I tell you it's safe." I looked around the cab of the vehicle. "Do you have a pen and paper?

"Yeah," Sherm reached up front and was immediately given a pen and a Taco Bell napkin. He handed it to me and I scribbled Smitty's address.

"The Blazer is in front of this house. I want you to go and get it before it gets impounded. There are some papers under the passenger seat. Make copies and send the originals to Captain Gail Simmons her address is on here too." I leaned forward and handed him the napkin.

"You sure you can trust her?"

"No, I'm pretty sure she had a warrant taken out for my arrest, but I don't have a choice. I need someone high enough up that, if I get out of this, people will listen to me. She's my only option. But if she doesn't follow through I want you to send those articles and my notes to every reporter in this city."

"Yeah, but I ain't going..."

"Sherm, you're the only one I can trust. I need to know that these people will get caught no matter what. Please."

"All right but here, take these." He handed me two extra gun clips. I was now prepared for a mini war and although I was pretty sure I wouldn't have time to fire this much ammo, it did give me some comfort.

I got out of the Expedition and shut the door without looking back. I heard the engine start and the tires crunching on pavement as Sherm pulled off. With both guns securely in their holsters I jogged toward the door of the theater, my head pounding like someone had taken a jackhammer to it.

* * *

I used the lock picks and let myself into the building. As I crept down the hall, my heart pounded in tune with the pain in the back of my head. I could already hear voices as I moved toward the stage, gun raised.

"Goddamn it. Where is it?" A man's frantic voice echoed throughout the theater. I stopped breathing; the air seemed to thicken with tension. "Tell us where it is and we'll leave you alone."

I rolled onto the stage and in a crouch started searching for an opening in the heavy curtains.

"Why can't we just go?" The question was a sob, almost indistinguishable, but the familiarity robbed me of my anger and once again fear began to grab hold. It's not Riley, Riley doesn't cry like that. You've got to calm the fuck down. You'll never get to hold her again if you get yourself killed.

I took a deep breath and eased the curtain back. The light from a solitary bulb illuminated a man in a pristine white dress shirt. Shirt sleeves rolled up to his elbows, he hovered over a slumped form in a chair.

He suddenly spun around. "Shut up, damn it. This is all your fault. If you hadn't...just shut up."

There was a flicker of movement and then a sob from the darkened corner to his left. Monica, I thought and had to blink against the immediate pain in my chest.

My eyes went back to Chief James as my mind tried to comprehend what I was seeing. I had recognized Chief James' silvery head of hair before I recognized anything else. With shock, I realized that his white shirt was opened down to his t-shirt and there were small splatters of blood on it. My God, what the hell is going on?

"Stop, please," Monica cried out. "She doesn't know. Damn it Daddy, don't you think if she knew she would have told you by now?"

That was all I needed to hear. I trained my gun on Chief James and walked out into the open just as he raised his hand to strike again.

"I don't need a good reason, you know," I said it so calmly I thought I was going crazy.

He looked at me, eyes narrowed under his bushy white brows. He slowly lowered his hand as I walked closer; my eyes bore into him as he waited in rigid silence, the corners of his mouth turned up. "I'm really glad to see you. Thank you for coming. I'm sure your friend here is glad to see you as well." My brain froze then, something told me not to look at her, but I couldn't stop myself from seeking her out. My eyes clung to his like a drowning victim. And then, as my body warred with my heart, I slowly broke contact and sought out Riley.

The front of her shirt was covered in blood. She sat slumped in a chair, one of the same chairs that I sat in when we ate dinner together. For a second that seemed eternal, I thought she was dead, and then I saw the rise and fall of her chest.

"Riley," I choked out. She flinched, but didn't look at me. Her lip was split in two places, blood trailed from her mouth, one eye was swollen and there was a large knot on her forehead.

"Riley," I called her again. "Riley, it's me, Foster. I'm going to...I'm going to get you out of here, baby. We're going to go home." She didn't answer me.

A movement out of the corner of my eye caused me to return my attention to Chief James.

"Please, make me kill you," I told him through clenched teeth. A quiet sobbing from Monica caused me to shift the gun to her, "What have you done?" She just shook her head and continued to weep.

I moved the gun back to the Chief. "Over near her. Now." Without a word he backed up until he was standing nearly in front of Monica. She began sobbing harder.

"Oh God, Foster. Oh God, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. I didn't know. I didn't know."

Chief James looked down at his daughter contemptuously, "How could you not know? You were his mother!" He trained his eyes on me as I eased over and, moving the gun to my left hand felt for Riley's pulse with my right. Her body flinched away from me and I blinked in reaction.

I wouldn't look at her anymore, I couldn't. I knew if I did I would break down. Instead, I gently leaned her head against my hip, the gun still trained on Chief James and the pathetically sobbing Monica. I felt Riley sigh as her head became heavy and I had to will myself not to cry out.

"Why?" The gun shook as anger flooded my body. "Why, goddamn it?"

"For my family of course." He looked almost as if he were giving a speech in front of a delegation of important people. And in that moment I wanted someone, anyone, to make me understand why. Why someone as sweet and wonderful as Riley had to be hurt. Why Marcus was killed, and why my partner had committed suicide and I now had his widow and father in-law looking down the barrel of my gun.

He looked back at his weeping daughter. "Do you want to tell the story or shall I?" Monica's only answer was a sob. "No, I didn't think you would." I tightened my grip on the gun, he was looking entirely to calm. "You see I was already slated to become Chief, so when Monica told me she was leaving Joseph, that she was getting involved with some ...some religious nut, well you understand how upset I was. I mean I couldn't have my grandson being raised in an environment like that." Chief James paused as if he expected me to agree with him. I continued to stare, wondering where the hell the Captain was and how long I could keep myself from shooting him.

"I did everything in my power to get her back, but would she listen to me? Of course she eventually finds out what's going on and sends word to Smitty that she wants to come home but they won't let her. You sure you don't want to tell this part, Monica? Isn't this where you find out the love of your life was no better than the fucking pedophiles that he catered to?" I felt Riley's body jump and Monica's sobbing seemed to have tapered off to a watery sniffle.

"They used her to try to keep me away from their operation and it worked until Joseph decided he wanted his wife and child back. By the way, he never had any idea that Monica was having an affair with Stein. My innocent daughter kept that from him. Didn't you, sweetheart?" He turned to look down at Monica but continued talking, not expecting an answer and not receiving one.

"Don't you see, Everett? Everything I did was for Monica and Joseph. I was trying to protect them."

"You didn't give a shit about Smitty," I said with so much venom it threatened to choke me. "All you cared about was your career. You didn't want it to get out about your daughter's affair, so you tried to cover it up. Smitty didn't need your help."

"Oh he needed my help all right. He begged for it. In fact..."

"Look, save your breath. I don't want to hear any more. The police will be here any minute and you can tell them your story."

"Fine, fine. But who do you think they'll believe? You destroyed your credibility when you killed Harrison Canniff. To them you're a murderer, Everett. Instead of taking responsibility for your own actions, you blamed me, the Chief of Police. You kidnapped Monica and I and when your friend tried to get you to let us go, you killed her."

"Nobody is going to believe that."

"No? I'm sure they will. Monica and I are heroes. She's the wife of a slain officer. Oh, by the way, you admitted to us before you died that you killed Joseph before you sent him off that cliff."

I sucked in my breath, my arm lowering slightly. "You, you killed Smitty?"

"Of course not ...oh I see you hadn't put that little part together. I wish I had killed him but I didn't, he took himself out, that made me look bad. His mistake is what caused all this. He was supposed to wait until Monica was out of the compound with the baby but he didn't. He went in and shots were fired." For the first time Chief James' voice broke. "My grandson...my grandson was killed, as were two other kids and a few women."

"Smitty was cleared of those charges," I said tightly.

"Of course he was, that was me too. Oh wait, what did he tell you, that there was a group who helped cops when they were in trouble? Where do you think he got that? He knew about it because of me. That's what I told him when I pulled his ass out of the fire. There is no conspiracy here Everett, only a bunch of greedy people who are waiting for me to grease their palms, or give them appointments and promotions. Joseph was either too dumb or too blind to care."

"Smitty..."

Chief James cut me off vehemently. "Smitty should have gotten rid of you like I told him to, but he didn't. Instead, he started acting like this was all my fault, as if I were the cause of Eric's..." Chief James's voice hung in the air like a solid entity. Again I felt as though a predator were watching me, waiting for me to make that final mistake.

Don't think about it, Foster. Don't think.

"What are you saying? I saw Eric a few months ago."

Chief James smiled. "Oh wonderful, so you didn't watch the tape?"

"Watch the tape? I only saw one, it was enough."

"Yes, rather gruesome business that."

Monica's soft sobs had quieted and my focus was purely on Chief James. "What's on this tape?"

"Well, it seems Stein didn't trust anyone. He had cameras set up so that he could watch the members of his church constantly. The barn was being utilized as childcare in the daytime and sleeping quarters at night so the cameras were on twenty-four hours a day."

"The raid was taped?"

"Taped and sold on the streets like a snuff film."

"W ...what?"

"Harrison Canniff recognized Joseph from the tape, he said that if Joseph didn't let him go he would tell what he knew for a free ride. Joseph had to kill him."

Smitty had to kill him. Shock reverberated through my system. "Smitty...?"

"Oh yes, your precious Smitty wasn't as innocent as you like to believe. He wasn't a hero, he was a man trying to protect his family just like me."

"He was nothing like you," I growled before nausea forced me to close my mouth as I realized what he was saying.

"Oh no? He was willing to let you believe that you had killed someone, someone he actually killed."

"B... but why? If it was all an accident the tape would have shown that."

"Oh no, you have it all wrong." The triumphant smile on his face caused my stomach to heave again. "The bullets that killed them weren't from Joseph's gun. No, a high-powered rifle killed those people. Joseph only had a .38."

I was starting to feel dizzy from the blow to the back of my head and from the weight of what he was telling me. I realized too late that Chief James had backed up so that I could no longer see Monica and that she had stopped crying.

"You can put that down now," he said as if he was telling me to put down a bag of groceries. For the second time that day, I was staring down the barrel of a gun.

"No," I said grimily. "You put it down." How much of that was a lie? How much of it was just so that he could get me off guard. Well it worked and because of my own stupidity, Riley and I are about to die.

"I'm sorry, Foster, I had to give it to him. You don't understand, they're going to take my boy away from me if this comes out," Monica said.

"What the fuck are you talking about?" I yelled as hot tears trailed down my cheeks.

"Joseph confessed about Canniff soon after it happened. I gave him money to shut people up and those he couldn't shut up, I arranged to have killed."

"Wilson and McClowski. You had them kill Marcus. Why?"

"Monica caught him sniffing around the graveyard one day, so we bugged his computer. It didn't take long for me to realize that he was getting too close, so I had him eliminated. And now I'll have to do the same with your accomplice in the file room. What's her name? Mrs. Kennedy, isn't it?" I felt my face go slack as I realized that I would be responsible for Chandra getting killed as well. "I suppose I owe her a debt of gratitude. I would have never known you were back in town if not for her."

"She used Marcus' computer. You never removed the bug."

"You're starting to catch on. Now put the gun down."

"Why should I? You're going to have to kill me anyway." I stalled and sent out a prayer for Captain Simmons.

"Because if you don't, I'm pretty sure I can hit your friend there before you kill me. I also know where her family lives and I'll make sure they don't make it through another week."

The gun was already shaking in my hand and at this point, I wasn't even sure if I had the strength to pull the trigger. I wouldn't put it down though; the chief couldn't let us live if he expected to get away.

"Why did you have to hurt her? Why not just find me?"

"Because I needed the tape, and I knew if you had it you wouldn't just give it up. I was pretty sure you weren't stupid enough to carry it with you and I didn't know if you would give it to me if I had you both. I figured you would to save your friend. Those two idiots were supposed to rough you up a little, get you to tell them where the tape was."

"So all of this was over a tape that showed people getting killed in a bust? Why didn't Smitty just admit that he fucked up? That his wife and kid were there and he lost it? The most that would have happened is that he would have lost his job, especially if he didn't pull the trigger."

"It wasn't about the fuck up. It was what he did afterward."

Again the hairs on my arms stood up and the ones on the back of my neck followed suit. A subtle change in atmosphere that usually meant someone was behind me. A small flicker of hope passed through me. I wanted to look at Riley, but I couldn't. The Chief must have felt it too because his eyes searched behind me. A snarl transformed his features as he pointed the gun at Riley.

"Drop the guns! Drop the guns!" In slow motion I heard a loud roar and saw a look of anger and then sorrow pass over Chief James' face as he went rigid. I felt like I knew what was going to happen even before he did. The gun went up and he aimed it at Riley and me. I pulled my second 9 and backed into Riley hard, sending her and the chair crashing to the floor as I began to fire. It could have been a hallucination, it could have been real, but I saw my bullets hit him. I watched them as they went towards his chest and for some reason I thought he saw them too because he smiled before he fired his gun.

The bullet slammed into me, spinning me around and knocking the gun from my left hand. The 9 landed on the wooden stage floor and slid to a stop at the edge of the curtain. I landed on Riley.

The Chief's body seemed to pause mid-air, then topple forward. His head crashed into the edge of a table before he slumped to the floor. Someone was screaming. I thought it might be me but my throat was too tight to scream. I looked down at Riley, her eyes were open, but they looked at nothing. I could feel her trembling beneath me. She's alive, I thought weakly as my hands went up to the sides of her face. Her hair was barely contained in its braid, and for some reason I wanted to help her braid it again because I knew how neat she liked to keep it. A tear slipped down my cheek and fell onto hers.

I heard people yelling and running around us, but it didn't matter. I had found her. I had found Riley. She looked so hurt, so bruised. My body started to shake as I tried to make her look at me, but her gaze was blank. She didn't recognize me. She didn't recognize anything.

"No," I said as I felt someone touch me.

"You've been shot... hurt pretty bad." I continued to stare at Riley.

"He should have taken me...I would have told him anything he wanted to know as long as he didn't hurt you. He was wrong. You're the strong one, aren't you? You wouldn't have told him. Even if you knew, you wouldn't have made a sound." I was babbling and she wasn't moving. My tears mixed with her blood and rolled down her cheek.

Suddenly everything made sense. And there was something so fucked up about it that I wanted to scream. I was lifted from Riley's body and my shirt was ripped open, I felt a sharp pain that caused me to inhale. I sucked in another breath but it wasn't enough and suddenly I could hear myself gasp and moan for air but there was none. I was moving fast, so fast, and someone was shining a light in my face.

"Get that fucking light...I'm going to kick someone's...please help her. I need to tell her...I need...."

"She's going into arrest. We're losing her. We're losing her..."

"Foster..."

"Goddamn it, Everett, breathe, breathe..."

"No...Foster..."

"...."

"She's gone."

~ Chapter 32 ~

Heaven...you want to know what it feels like? Do you really want to know? All right, I'll tell you. It's like being held close and protected by the most beautiful light in the world. It's like...it's like knowing you will never be beaten, hurt, tired or hungry again. It's knowing that no matter what, you will be cared for. That's what heaven feels like...at first. But then you remember...you remember that there are people who love you back there in that hell called earth. People who are hurting because they will miss you, and if you're lucky, like me, there's someone whose heart is breaking every time yours stops beating. And knowing all that...knowing what kind of pain you've left behind, what kind of heaven would heaven be, anyway?

So I simply decided not to stay. And when I opened my eyes, Riley was there asleep in a chair across from me. For a moment I felt peace. The only thing that mattered was that we were both alive.

Dawn filtered through the partially opened blinds segregating light and shadow on Riley's sleeping face. Her lip was almost healed making me wonder how long I had been out. Wisps of dark hair had broken free from the restraints of her braid; she looked so disheveled that it broke my heart. White plaster encircled her arm from knuckles to elbow. Another cast? Damn, I'm sorry, baby.

Even in sleep she frowned, her fist balled up in her lap as if ready for combat. I winced uncomfortably because I somehow knew that if she weren't in that chair she would be curled into a fetal position.

For hours I watched her every breath and I listened and waited for those beautiful eyes to open. And when they did, it was like drinking lemonade on a sunny day, just the best feeling in the world.

She sat up in the chair, her good hand gripping the armrest so hard that I was sure it was going to crumble under the pressure. Neither of us said anything, she just stared at me until I was forced to blink from the heat of her eyes. And then suddenly, she smiled so widely that if I didn't know her better I would have thought she was going to laugh out loud. Then almost as quickly as that grin appeared, it disappeared. Her smile crumbled away like the foundation underneath an eroding building and I was holding her as she shook so hard it scared me.

"I thought I had lost you," she said in my ear.

"No," I said even though my throat felt like someone had tried to scrape it raw.

"Thank you."

I didn't answer her. How do you answer something like that? You don't.

* * *

"I'm sorry you were alone last night. The Internal Affairs interview just ended and I came straight back."

I smiled at Riley and shook my head because it still hurt to talk. Riley told me that I had been shot in the chest. The bullet had passed cleanly through my lung and nicked my heart. They were able to repair the damage but when I didn't wake up they hadn't held out much hope for me. I slipped into a coma for three weeks.

I watched her as she hovered, her eyes unconsciously checking my monitor as she pulled a blanket around me. Initially, I was so relieved that she was okay that I didn't notice the dark circles under her eyes, how pale her face looked or how her hand lingered against my heart while she adjusted my bedding one too many times. For three days she sat and pretended not to watch me breath. And for three days I let her without complaint, because I knew how she felt. I was glad she was alive too.

"Everett, can I speak with you for a moment?"

I looked up to see the Captain standing in the doorway. I'm sure my expression hardened, but it wasn't directed at her. It was directed at the people responsible for putting me in that bed; the ones who had killed Marcus and were to blame for the fragility that hovered just below the surface of Riley. I hated that the most because it was a constant reminder to me that I had failed to keep her safe.

I nodded and Riley stood up.

"No, stay," I rasped and Riley looked at the Captain.

"I don't mind if you stay, Riley." She seemed to soften her voice when speaking to Riley and I wondered if she sensed it too. "You have just as much right to hear this as she does."

"No, if it's okay I'll go ahead and get cleaned up." She looked down at herself and up at me in embarrassment.

"It's alright sweetheart, go," I said.

"I'll come right back, okay?"

"Okay." I whispered watched her head for the door. She paused and looked back, her mouth opening as if she was going to speak. But instead, she pulled the door open and walked out, leaving the Captain and I alone.

"How are you?" The Captain asked as her eyes shifted to my right. She's nervous. I wonder why.

I lifted my shoulder slightly and continued to look at her my eyebrow raised.

"Look, Everett, you're a good cop. I never believed you had anything to do with this mess. I asked them to bring you in to talk to me, and when you ran it just looked so bad that I had to get the warrant so that we could haul you in. I had no idea that those two were in with the Chief, they came highly recommended," her mouth twisted, "by the Chief, so I..."

"I understand."

She shifted uncomfortably, both of us probably wishing we could take back some of the shit that we had said and thought about each other in the past. All of it seemed trivial now, at least for me it did.

"Riley said that..." I stopped, frustrated that the pain and breathlessness left from having a ventilator shoved down my throat kept me from voicing my thoughts. I looked over at the chair that Riley, aside from restroom visits and a trip to the cafeteria, had sat in since I woke up. I had also learned that she had basically lived there for the three weeks I was in a coma too. The Captain had made that possible and I was grateful to her for that. Not for my own sake, but for Riley's.

"Thank you."

"For what."

"For being here...when I ...we needed you," I huffed.

"You should thank Big Sherm and Chandra. Without them telling me what was going on, the outcome could have been different. I wish you would have come to me earlier."

"I didn't know who I could trust...other than Riley."

"She cares about you a lot. I thought she was going to rip us apart when we first tried to give her medical attention." I smiled at that.

"I, uh, wanted to tell you how.... sorry I am that, you know, we never..."

I shook my head. "I was an asshole."

She smiled. "So was I."

I raised my eyebrow. "Was?"

She looked startled for a moment and I smiled to soften the comment. The animosity that I used to feel for this woman seemed like it belonged to someone else. Like rumor and innuendo that had proved incorrect, whatever she had done to me, whatever perceived misunderstandings we had, were gone.

"Okay, now that we have the warm fuzzies out of the way maybe we can get down to business." I grinned as she pulled out her pad.

"I thought you could tell me what you pieced together. I already talked to Riley and she told me what little she knew. We also found your notes, but I couldn't make heads or tales of some of it and, on the advice of her lawyer, Monica isn't talking. The Chief is dead, and we can't find this mythical tape, so it's kind of up to us to piece together what happened."

I pointed to my throat and grimaced after she finished talking.

"Oh shit. Sorry," she said and we stared at each other for a minute before I rolled my eyes and pointed to her pen and paper. She looked down at it, then up at me and I moved my head forward and held out my hand. Finally it occurred to her to give me the paper and pen.

"Smart ass," she said under her breath and if I hadn't known it would hurt like shit, I probably would have laughed.

"What are you doing here? Why didn't you assign this to someone?" I wrote with large question marks.

"You've been out of commission for three weeks and I'm sure Riley didn't tell you, but this has turned into a media circus." I closed my eyes. I hadn't thought about the blow it would be to the department.

"Sorry."

"Not your fault."

"I know, but...still."

She nodded and I began to write most of what I knew and some of what I had pieced together in the last few minutes before all hell broke loose. After 15 minute of writing my penmanship had degenerated to the point where even I was blinking at it. Finally, I shook my head and handed the pad to the Captain. She stared down at it, a frown on her face.

"So you think this Michael Stratford went in and stole the tape from Pete's room?"

I shrugged. "Only thing that makes sense."

"But why? Did Canniff put him up to it?"

She handed the pad back and leaned in close so that she could read what I was writing.

"Michael is the one who paid Pete to move the boxes. When the tape turned up missing he knew who to look for."

"But why take the tape in the first place?" The Captain asked after reading my scribbles.

"Security blanket," I said.

"So he was going to take the tape for blackmail?"

"No."

"Alicia said he was trying to get away from his boss. When they found out the tape was missing they probably panicked and he knew he had to get it back. The tape would get him out from under Stein's clutches. They let him go with no strings attached, he gives the tape back. They go after him, he goes to the police and makes a deal."

"Instead they kill him? Makes no sense. Why? They still didn't have the tape, otherwise why would they have gone after you and Riley?"

I shook my head. "Wasn't... Stein. Wilson and McClowski."

The Captain closed her eyes and shook her head. "I didn't even clue in to them until I found out about the bag."

I cocked my brow and she explained. "I didn't buy the ëoh yeah, and we forgot to mention we found a plastic bag with her fingerprints on it story'. So I had the damn thing tested. I found out the day before you were shot that the plastic bag came from the same batch that we use in our office. I would bet a month's salary that they used the bag from your own garbage can to try to frame you. You wouldn't be that stupid."

I grimaced as I remembered picking up my trashcan to throw it across the room over something the Captain had said. Something so trivial that I couldn't even remember what it was. The prints would have been fresh and ripe for a framing. It was yet another occasion where my own temper and lack of control had almost cost me more than I cared to think about.

"I can't believe two of my cops killed that man." The Captain's voice broke into my morose thoughts.

"Marcus too," I said, my voice cracking on Marcus' name.

"I'm sorry, Everett."

Ignoring her apology, I began to write." I don't know where the tape is. All I know is that Chief James said that Smitty didn't fire the gun...he said that he wasn't the one that killed those kids, but it was something he did afterward. If I'm wrong about Stein, and he's still alive, maybe he can fill in some of the blanks."

The Captain shook her head. "Stein's body showed up in the morgue a few days ago. We got a positive ID yesterday. A blow to the head is what killed him, but his body was mutilated post mortem. We found your notes on Mrs. Stein and her boyfriend and turned them over to homicide. They're trying to gather enough evidence to take to the DA but so far it doesn't look good."

I nodded not really caring how their investigation was going. My eyes strayed to the door as weariness made my eyelids droop. I wondered where Riley was. I wanted to see her before I fell asleep.

"Oh Everett, one thing we did find out from Monica. She claims that Smitty admitted to killing Canniff in his suicide note. He said he was sorry he let you go through all of that for so long. She claims her father forced her to forge a new one omitting that fact. She seems to think that Smitty purposely made his death look suspicious hoping someone would investigate."

I blinked rapidly. I hadn't even thought about Smitty. I hadn't thought about anyone but Riley. But now pain coursed through my chest as I realized that my partner, the man I thought of as my best friend, had let me go through hell. He had let me believe I was a murderer to suit his purpose.

I think I retreated into myself for a moment and when I came back the Captain was holding my hand and patting it awkwardly. I was touched that she would even try, but I was growing weary of this question and answer session. All I really wanted was to be left alone so that I could grieve. I pulled my hand away and picked up the pen.

"Thank you, I'm sure that at some point it will mean something that he left a note. But right now it just..." I stopped because I didn't want to think about how many lives Smitty and Monica had ruined.

The Captain sighed. "Well, I should go." She placed the pad in her briefcase and stood. "It's our niece's birthday and I promised I would get her a new doll. I'll stop back by in a few days if I have any more questions."

"You have... family?" I said before I realized it might have sounded rude.

She grinned. "My partner has two sisters, two brothers, three nieces and one nephew, with one on the way. I guess you wouldn't have known that." She sounded almost regretful. "Well I better go get that damn doll before the stores close. Lord knows she needs a new one. The one she has looks like its been through hell. Give me a call if you need anything, Everett," she called over her shoulder as she approached the door.

I frowned. Something was bugging me. "Captain," my taxed throat finally gave out completely. I shook my head and mouthed, "Doll?"

"What about it?" she was looking at me as if she thought I was nuts. I pointed at her briefcase. With a frown and a glance at the wall clock she reluctantly handed me the pen and pad.

"What you said about the doll, it reminded me of something. Michael Stratford bought his daughter a doll right before he went into hiding. I remember it because of how fucked up it looked. You know for it to be only a month old. When I picked it up it sort of felt like something was moving around inside."

"You think the tape's in there?"

"Could be, the doll was probably big enough to hold a small tape."

"I know it's got to be hard for you to just sit back and let me take care of everything. But I want you to concentrate on getting out of this place." She looked around distastefully.

I nodded, as my eyelids grew heavy.

"I'll give you a call if I need anything else," was the last thing I heard her say before I fell asleep.

* * *

"If someone doesn't take these goddamn Swedish meatballs out of here, I'm going to open up a can of whoop ass in this mother fucker," I yelled as I pushed the button for the nurse's station. I reached onto my platter and picked up one of the monstrosities, preparing to lob it at the next white-clad person that walked in the door and wasn't carrying a box of See's Candies. The thing is; I was told I could order from the cafeteria menu since I was leaving the next day, right? So I pick a hamburger and fries and what do I get? Those brown blobs swimming in liquid.

I watched with relish as the door inched forward and paused. Oh yeah, come to me baby. I thought. "Yes!" I hissed and was preparing to launch my attack when I recognize the stern but amused eyes that peeked around the door.

"Foster, don't you dare!" Riley walked through the door looking like she had just spent a week at a spa, whereas I looked and felt like shit. It had been two weeks since I had come out of a three-week coma in which my heart had stopped beating twice. They said I was a miracle, I felt more like road kill.

"Hi, baby," I said petulantly because I hadn't seen her in hours.

"Foster, you promised you would be good while I was gone."

"I am being good."

"No, you're not. We could hear you all the way down the hall."

"Well I'm hungry," I said.

"I thought they were letting you eat whatever you wanted now?"

"I'm not eating that."

"Why not?" she asked as she removed the platter from my lap.

"ëBecause it's Swedish meatballs."

"Uh huh. Well the way you're acting I may not give you your surprise."

"What surprise?"

"You have visitors."

"It's not Big Sherm is it?" I said wide-eyed. I looked around the room to make sure that there were no wayward pens in grabbing distance. Big Sherm had visited me not once, but twice, each time bringing me an embarrassingly huge bouquet of flowers, and each time overstaying his welcome.

Riley shook her head.

"Is it the Captain again?"

"No, it's not her."

The Captain had refused to come by since her initial visit. I think she knew I wanted to keep my hand in everything that was going on. She refused to tell me how the investigation was going, stating that she would let me know everything when I got better. I think it was some kind of twisted payback for all the mean shit I had said when I worked for her. It was working; my curiosity was driving me crazy.

"Well then, who is it?"

"Is it safe to come in...?" Rachel peeked around the door, a smile on her face.

"Yeah, she's awake and grouchy. Come on in."

I blinked as Rachel and Brad came into the room. I blankly accepted the stuffed toy from Rachel and the brown paper bag from Brad and just stared at the two of them.

Brad leaned forward in his chair. "Uh, I know you can talk. The whole ward heard you yelling a few minutes ago."

I flushed and looked down at the bag in my hand. "Hi," I said like an idiot and then looked up at the two of them through my lashes. "You guys come down to see about Riley?"

"Yeah and you, even though you did leave without saying goodbye," Rachel said with a gentle reprimand behind her words. I gripped the bag and stared at her in surprise.

I shook my head and pathetically blinked at her again. "I'm sorry."

"I know." She leaned in and kissed me on the forehead. "We're just glad you're okay. You gave us all a scare."

I was saved from having to reply by a furtive scratching noise coming from the paper bag. I opened it to find two beady red eyes staring up at me.

"Bud!" I yelped and scooped him out of the bag.

"Shh, you're going to get me in trouble!" Brad said, but he grinned and I grinned back. Bud looked fat and sassy and I was embarrassingly happy to see him.

"I don't know, Brad. Our reception wasn't near as welcoming," Rachel observed.

"I was just thinking the same thing," Brad said with a straight face. "If I didn't know better I would think she was going to try to hug that mouse." Brad looked so disappointed that it took me a minute to figure out he was teasing. I was struck speechless until the laughter started. I grinned at all four of them just happy that they were there.

"We'll let you get some rest, Foster. We just wanted to say hi and let you see Bud."

"Thank you," I said and watched sadly as they put Bud back in the paper bag. "Uh, Rachel? Can I... can I talk to you for a minute?"

Riley turned back to look at me curiously before following Brad out the door.

"What's on your mind, Foster?" Rachel sat down in the chair that Riley had occupied for nearly a month.

"Listen, I just want to... I just want to apologize about, you know, leaving like I did. We'd just had that talk and ...I wasn't trying to hurt Riley..."

"I know. Riley explained it all."

I sighed. "Oh."

"So, what now?"

"What now?"

"Yeah. What now? You've been fully exonerated and health-wise you'll be able to go back to work eventually..."

I suddenly realized what she was asking me. I had that second chance that Riley was always talking about. I had an opportunity to get my life back. The question was: Did I want it?

"I haven't really had the chance to think about that much," I said truthfully.

She reached out and brushed the hair from my eyes. "I just want you to know that you have a home, a family with us. Riley loves you and Brad and I would love the chance to get to know you better. If you want to come home with us for a while...well, we would be glad to have you."

I blinked back tears as I watched her leave.

See what I mean? Sometimes life is like that. Like lemonade on a sunny day.

* * *

Riley and I sat in Captain Simmons' office, both of us probably looking like several miles of bad asphalt. Whatever glow I had managed to get in my weeks with Riley at the cabin was gone, and in its place were the hospital pallor and a case of the jitters that seemed to attack at the most inopportune moments. I didn't really trust myself to walk alone yet, so I made sure that Riley was close at hand to help if my body decided to take a dive on me.

I was still worried about Riley. She didn't look quite right to me. She had lost her peace and I felt responsible for that. She was still sleeping with her hands balled up and her eyes closed too tightly. I wanted to go somewhere where we could nurse each other back to the way it had been before. Only this time, there was no reason for me to hold anything back and I was looking forward to that.

"Are you sure you're okay with this?" I leaned over and whispered. "You don't need to be here, Riley. You've been through so much already." My eyes wandered to her fingers, which were already picking at her plaster cast. I had revised my opinion of medical personnel. Nearly every nurse in the hospital had signed Riley's cast. Something that gave me a twang of jealousy, until she shyly explained that she had saved a place for me.

"I'm staying," she said firmly, and I rolled my eyes at the Captain who looked at me with brows raised.

I squeezed Riley's good hand. She grinned and we both reluctantly gave our attention to the tape that had caused so many deaths.

The tape began to roll and immediately a black and white picture came into view. The barn was actually a converted wide-open space that had beds lined up from one wall to the other. With cradles lining each side and people walking in and out of view it looked more like a summer camp for adults than a church daycare.

"Is there sound?" I asked without removing my eyes from the screen.

"No, doesn't seem like it. But we can have some specialists look at it later. You don't need sound to figure out what happens."

All of a sudden there seemed to be chaos on the tape we were watching. Smoke billowed around the room as people ran out of the camera's view. If there had been sound, I'm sure I would have heard terrified screams that would have left me sick to my stomach.

"Pay close attention here," the Captain said quietly.

For about two minutes there was nothing, then what could only be a younger version of Smitty came into frame. I could see now how much this whole affair had aged him. Even though the film was only about five years old, Smitty looked a lot younger than thirty-five on the tape. I saw him bend over a basinet; his face contorted in what was obviously rage and grief. Surprisingly my heart ached at the sight. I didn't know if I would ever be a mother, never thought I wanted to be, but I hoped like hell I never knew the pain that Smitty must have felt in that moment. He reached in the basinet and picked up a small bloody bundle and held it close.

I saw his mouth move. "What...what did he say? Is he talking to someone?" The Captain rewound the tape and played again.

Both Riley and I leaned forward as Smitty said something, probably to the dead baby in his arms, then placed it back in the crib.

"He said ëI'm sorry I didn't get here in time...Eric.'" Riley's voice was sad as she read Smitty's lips. The Captain looked questioningly at me and I mouthed "later".

I turned back to the screen and watched Smitty turn in a slow circle and then pause, his face slack and blank looking, his .38 hanging limp at his side. He moved out of camera range. "What is he doing?" I asked the Captain.

She shook her head. "Just watch." Smitty came back into view caring a baby. He patted the small bundle for a minute, and then walked over to the basinet that held the body of his dead son. He reached in, removed a blanket and wrapped it around the baby then walked out of the frame again.

"What just happened?" I looked at Riley and then at the Captain. "Did he leave Eric's body..." and then it came to me just like it had come to me right before I had been shot. It was a burst of realization so clear it was as if I had been there in that barn years before.

"His son died so he just...he just took another baby?!"

The Captain shut off the video. "That's what it looks like."

"But wouldn't...wouldn't someone miss their baby?" Riley asked.

"Not if they thought he was dead, or if the mother was one of the women killed in the raid," the Captain explained. "Most of the people were either runaways or transients before they joined the church. Stein made sure that ties to interfering family members were cut. One of the ways he kept control. Several of the bodies were never claimed. In fact, most of them had to be buried by a charity.

"I think Eric might be Stein's child." I didn't realize that I had spoken aloud until I saw the shocked look on Riley's face.

"What? How's that possible? Wouldn't Caroline know her own son?" she asked.

The Captain shook her head, bent over her desk, and started writing furiously. "The baby Caroline Stein buried died from extensive gunshot wounds. There wasn't much that was identifiable."

"So you've already considered that possibility?" I shouldn't have been surprised that the Captain had put one and one together and come up with the same thing I did, but I was.

"We can't prove anything yet, the footprints from the hospital where Monica and Smitty's baby was born were too damn smudged to get an accurate match." I recognized the sneer as one that had been directed at me on many occasions. "I wish they would get those people better trained. Anyway, we're going to have to wait on the DNA test. What I don't understand is why they would leave the original tape just laying around."

"I think I stumbled on the answer to that when I was talking to Caroline Stein." The Captain put her pencil down and gave me her full attention. "When Terry found the tapes, Stein probably got scared and was forced to move everything over to the video store just in case Caroline decided to poke around. That tape would be the last thing he would want her to see. Unfortunately, when his driver, Michael Stratford, hired Pete and Pete took the original video, all hell broke loose. You gotta figure, Michael knew that Stein was going to blame him, so he had no choice but to run. He probably tracked down Pete, stole the tape back and hid it where he knew no one would look."

"In his daughter's doll," the Captain said with disgust.

"But how did Marcus get the name Michael Albert?" Riley asked.

"Now that one, I know the answer to." The Captain slid a folder across her desk and I opened it to the first page.

"Michael Albert witness testimony? Where did this come from?"

"San Diego, apparently Marcus called down complaining that one of the detectives had torn some documentation out of a file. He asked them to send copies but as you know we have been shorthanded so they didn't get opened until a couple of weeks ago."

"My god, I'm the one that called this to his attention."

"But that still doesn't explain how Marcus got the name."

"I called down and spoke to the manager in San Diego. He said that he and Marcus had a really lengthy conversation about the missing document. He can't swear to it but there is a distinct possibility that he mentioned Michael Albert's name."

As the Captain spoke to Riley, I scanned the documents only half listening to what she was saying. "Michael was a member of Stein's church; in fact he was there during the raid. I'm pretty sure the only reason Smitty pulled these pages was to remove any mention of Monica from the witness testimony."

"But Marcus couldn't have known all of this." I closed the file in exasperation.

"No, he wouldn't have known everything, but there was probably enough there to make him suspicious."

"I know where he got Nathan Stein and Michael Albert, but who the hell is Eric Ann?"

The Captain pulled out several pictures and slid them across the desk. I picked up one and Riley picked up another. "You never went to the funerals, did you, Everett?"

"No."

"Me either," she admitted. "I wonder if that would have made a difference."

I was looking at row after row of tombstones; most of them marking the grave of a child less then two years of age and all of them with a the last name of Smith.

"Foster?"

I looked over at Riley, her voice sounded odd. She handed me a picture of a tombstone that read, ëHere Lies Eric Smith'.

"They...all of this was? They buried him?" I glanced at the Captain for conformation.

She nodded and Riley handed me another picture. A single tombstone that was right next to the one marked Eric Smith.

"Shit, we read an article that said Monica named one of the babies Ann, after her mother. That's what must have tipped Marcus off. He went to the funerals. I never did. He saw them all and ..."

"He probably never knew what he had, Foster. He just knew something wasn't right. I think all of us thought it." The Captain shifted and looked down at her notes. "I always thought there was something odd about it, but ... I was just so happy that someone was taking care of them. Taking responsibility for giving them a good burial that I didn't think to ask why. Bottom line is; Monica wanted to bury her son, so she started a charity for unclaimed babies."

"But if he was the first didn't anyone think it was odd?" I slid the photo; face down, across the desk toward the Captain.

"She didn't start naming them until she had about fifteen already buried along with Eric. Guess it made sense that she would name them. You can't have forty Johnnie and Janie Doe's." Even though she had had more time to deal with everything, the Captain looked momentarily overwhelmed, but quickly regained her composure. "I guess I'll see you two back here in a few weeks for the inquest. Make sure you get some rest, I have a feeling we all are going to need a vacation by the time this is over." Riley nodded and I prepared to stand up. "What about after you get better?" A small smile lit the Captain's face as she asked the question that had been tormenting me. "You planning on coming back to work?"

I could feel Riley's body tense and then she squeezed my hand. "If you want, I could find something here or go back to work at the university," she said.

I directed my answer to her even though the Captain had asked the question. "I am so confused about everything right now." To my embarrassment, my throat started closing up. "But I do know that I really need to spend some time with you." I think the Captain was starting to get a little bit green around the gills by our display because she cleared her throat. I knew from prior experience that this was our cue to leave. I pulled Riley to her feet and we stood there awkwardly. "Uh, Captain thanks for, you know, being there and ..."

"Everett? Get out of my office, please."

"Uh, yeah. All right, Captain." I grinned and Riley and I headed out the door.

"If you need anything, let me know, okay."

I stopped and turned back to her with a grin. "Um, there is one thing?"

The Captain looked at me suspiciously as I pulled the two parking tickets from my pocket that Riley had gotten during my impromptu run after Popeye. "Would you mind taking care of those for me?" I slid them onto her desk and she blinked as if she had never seen a parking ticket in her life.

"Thanks, Captain." I loved having the last word.

I was stopped a few times as I walked through the office. It felt good to be vindicated, but I couldn't help but glance in the direction of the desks that Smitty and I had occupied for three years. I figured that I hadn't really dealt with my pain yet; I hadn't really dealt with any of it. I knew that at some point, it was going to hit and it was going to hurt.

I reached for Riley's hand; she squeezed it and pulled me closer. At that moment it just felt good to be alive. We got off the elevator to the sound of snapping gum and laughter. I walked up to the window to see Chandra sitting at her same desk. I smiled at her and she smiled back, holding her finger up as she got off the phone. Then yelling to two heads that were almost hidden behind a stack of files, that she would be back. The door swung open and she walked out still popping that damn gum.

"So you guys are out of here, then?" she asked.

"Yeah, I guess so." My mouth dropped open as Chandra quickly brushed a tear from her cheek. "Well damn, Chandra. I don't know what to say," I joked, hoping to get a smart assed comment from her.

"You're a good person, Foster Everett." I looked at Riley hoping she would help me out but I only got a smile and a shrug.

"Thanks Chandra, so are you," I said weakly.

"Ya'll better get going before traffic gets too bad. Call me when you get there." She sniffed and grabbed me in a bone-crushing hug. "I'm going to miss your trifling ass." She released me and pushed me toward Riley.

Riley and I stared at the closing file room door. "What the hell was that?" I looked up at Riley and back at the door. "What does trifling mean, anyway?"

"I think it means you've got yourself a new friend." Riley smirked, and then her body started shaking. I bumped gently into her with my shoulder before grabbing her good hand and pulling her toward the elevator.

"A new friend, huh? Cool." I grinned, quite proud of myself. I had myself a new friend, a family and best of all a woman who loved me more than I could ever hope to deserve.

I felt really good. Like something I had been missing all my life had been found. Like I was whole. I don't know, complete and wanted. And to think I'd been running away from belonging for years. But shit, who knew?

I heard Chandra tell someone to ëget off the phone and get to work', then a barrage of annoyed popping that I found both comforting and sad. I would miss her too.

Riley squeezed my hand and pushed the button that would send us up to the first floor and our illegally parked Land Cruiser. Her eyes silently asked me if I had changed my mind. I smiled and shook my head before kissing her casted hand. "I was just wondering...do you uh, think she would've taught me how to pop my gum like that?"

Riley's body started to shake and I laughed too. The steady pop, pop, pop of Chandra's gum serenaded us as the doors slid soundlessly closed on my old life.

(c) 2002 Gabrielle Goldsby

THE END

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