Chapter 14

 

Jennifer heard the garage door go up at last. It was nearly eight o’clock. She quickly transferred a dish from the refrigerator to the microwave and rushed toward the entry.

“Hello, gorgeous.” Harvey swept her into his arms, and she clung to him, eager for his kiss. “I’m sorry,” he whispered in her hair.

“It’s okay. You’d better eat, though. Are you all right?”

“Yeah, Eddie force-fed me a chocolate bar a couple of hours ago.”

Jennifer turned toward the door. Eddie was standing unobtrusively in the entry.

“Hi, Eddie, come on in.”

“Thanks, Jennifer.” He followed them in, looked around, then sat down at the kitchen table.

“She’s at Beth’s,” Jennifer said.

Eddie nodded. “Jeff at work?”

“Yes, he went on at midnight. Leeanne will be staying at Beth’s until Monday.”

Harvey took his briefcase into the bedroom, and Jennifer began putting food on his and Eddie’s plates.

“You guys are outdoing yourselves on this case. I hope you’re taking the weekend off.”

“I think so. Unless something unexpected comes up, that is.” Eddie sniffed the food appreciatively. “Seems like I’m never home anymore. Maybe that’s good.”

Because the house is empty, Jennifer thought. She hoped that soon Eddie would be going home to a hot supper and a wife yearning for his kisses.

She heard the patio door open in the sun room and knew Leeanne was using her key.

Eddie stood up when she appeared in the doorway, his eyes brimming with his longing. Jennifer smiled and turned away from the intensity of it.

“Hi, Leeanne. How’s Beth?” Jennifer poured a glass of milk for Harvey.

“She’s doing a little better, I think. Margaret told her to take it easy, and she is. She’s watching TV in the bedroom.”

“Did you go to school today?” Eddie asked.

“Yeah, I had a quiz in statistics.” She grimaced. “I don’t think I did very well. You guys just got home, huh?”

“Rough day,” Eddie said.

Harvey came back, carrying Connor. He’d left his briefcase, suit jacket, necktie, and holster in the bedroom, and had softened into the Daddy mode.

“Look at this boy, Eddie! He’s got another tooth coming through. Gonna be eating moose meat soon.”

Jennifer sat down with them, and she and Leeanne smiled at each other across the table. This is right, Jennifer thought. This is how it should be. She laid her hand lightly on Harvey’s sleeve. He turned to smile at her, then bent over to kiss her again.

“Mushy, mushy, mushy,” Leeanne scolded. “Here, let me hold my nephew. You can’t eat, kiss, and rock a baby at the same time.”

Eddie’s brown eyes followed her as she took Connor in her arms and sat down again. Jennifer felt tears forming.

I’ve got to quit watching these two, she told herself. It was so bittersweet, compared to her own days of courtship. From the day Harvey told her he loved her, she’d always been able to turn to him. They had tragedy and terror to deal with, but it was easier because they faced it together.

Her thoughts changed to a prayer as her sister turned the baby so he could smile at Uncle Eddie. Lord, help them sort it out, please. They’re so right together, and they both love you. Please give them the sweet, tender joy you’ve given us.

“So, what did you think of O’Heir’s statement, Ed?” Harvey asked, forking open his baked potato.

Eddie’s luminous eyes turned to Harvey and focused on him. “Strange. Are we going to have to interview all the female prisoners for the last twelve years?”

“Prisoners?” Jennifer asked, fear catching at her. “The harassment thing extends to prisoners, honey?”

Harvey reached over and squeezed her hand.

“Don’t concern yourself, gorgeous. We’ve had one complaint brought to our attention.”

“You think it will end there?”

“It’s got to end somewhere. And soon.”

“I thought he’d leave Deborah alone after you warned him about the investigation.” Eddie’s voice was edged with sadness and fatigue.

“Me, too.” Harvey drank half the milk down. “I know how he killed the videotape today, but what about in the cell that time? It would be too risky, if he was intending to do more than make a quick threat, like he did with Deborah today.”

Jennifer looked from her husband to Eddie, piecing together what they were saying.

“Didn’t they put in a whole new system in the booking area last winter?” Eddie asked.

Harvey frowned. “I think you’re right. In the duty room and the lockup, too. We need to know what the old cameras were like. He may have been able to walk in under it and just reach up and turn it off, like the one in our interview room.”

Eddie nodded. “The way it’s positioned, I think you could reach it without being taped. Maybe Richard could enlighten us.”

“We’ve been upstairs too long,” Harvey said. “I feel as if I’m isolated from the patrolmen’s area. I had no idea any of this was going on down there.”

“I wonder if the old cameras are still around.”

“And I wonder if Brad has a friend in the courthouse.”

“Kind of hard to nose around there without word getting back to the station.” Eddie took a bite of pot roast.

“We need a female detective who’s not involved in the case.”

“Emily,” said Eddie.

Harvey nodded. “I’ll talk to Cheryl Monday. If she thinks it’s indicated, I’ll ask Legere to loan us Emily Rood.” He finished the food on his plate.

“Apple pie?” Jennifer asked.

“No, I don’t think so.”

“Eddie?”

“Okay.”

“I’ll get it.” Leeanne passed the baby to Eddie and got up. “Do you want coffee, Harvey?”

“Well …” He looked sheepishly at Jennifer, his electric blue eyes subdued in the soft evening light. “I’ve been trying to cut down on it at work, but it’s a hard habit to kick.”

“How much did you drink at work today?”

“Probably too much. Paula’s cutting it, I think.”

Jennifer frowned. “I’ve been watching your sugar. Do I need to start watching your caffeine?”

“I don’t know. An old guy like me needs to be careful, I guess.”

“Drink decaf.” Leeanne placed a steaming mug in front of him.

“You can always tell,” Eddie objected.

“Can you? I can’t.” Leeanne brought Eddie’s pie and a mug of coffee and sat down again.

“I think if you two got enough sleep, you wouldn’t need it,” Jennifer said. “Here, Eddie, let me take Connor so you can eat.”

“No, let me,” Harvey protested, and stood up to lean across the table and take his son. “We ought to do something with him tomorrow. He’s not going to know what his daddy looks like.”

“You want to go someplace?” Jennifer asked. It seemed like ages since they’d had an outing.

Harvey sighed. “I’d really rather stay home. Rake some leaves, maybe. We can bundle him up and take him out for a walk. Then I’d like to have a fire in the fireplace and just sit and read. With you and Connor.” He smiled wistfully at her over the baby’s head, and his eyes crinkled.

“Sounds good.”

“It sure does,” Eddie murmured. Leeanne’s hand rested lightly on his sleeve, and he reached over and clasped her fingers. “How about a walk tonight?”

“In the moonlight?” she smiled.

“It’s chilly,” Harvey said.

Eddie shrugged. “It’ll wake me up.” His gaze returned to Leeanne. “I need to be awake, so I’ll know later what we talked about.”

She smiled. “You want to run home and change first?” She eyed his necktie and dress shirt.

He smiled ruefully. “If I go home, I’ll probably collapse.”

Jennifer realized that Eddie, like Harvey, had changed his habits of dress since she had known him. “Hey, how come you’re always wearing a tie to work now? You used to wear a denim jacket and jeans.”

Eddie shrugged. “Less undercover work, for one thing.”

“Why?” She turned to Harvey. “I know what happened to you. You got promoted and felt you had to dress for the job. Which is very nice, by the way. In fact, you both look great lately. But Eddie … you both used to do a lot more undercover, didn’t you?”

“You mean before my face got plastered all over YouTube?” Eddie grimaced.

“It’s not just that,” Harvey said. “Mike’s style was different. We get a different kind of crime now, too. Five years ago, we were out on drug raids a lot with the detective squad. Now Ron’s men handle almost all of that, and we do more homicides and investigative work. I don’t know, it’s a subtle shift, I guess.”

“Mike liked to kick down doors,” Eddie agreed. “Now I feel as if the Priority Unit has more class. We use computers a lot, and the cases we get are more … cerebral. Espionage, art theft, celebrity murders.”

“You think the criminals are getting more sophisticated?” Jennifer asked.

“Maybe. Our cases sure are.” Eddie shrugged. “I’d like to think it’s partly because our captain is a genius.”

Leeanne smiled. “So, who solved these cerebral cases before you guys matured into it?”

Eddie shrugged. “Maybe nobody. I don’t know. Some of the things we handle seem unique. The first case like it in Maine.”

“Well, this harassment thing isn’t unique, unfortunately.” Harvey shook his head. “I’m thinking the sooner we get Brad Lyons out of uniform, the better for the city of Portland.”

“Are we taking that walk?” Leeanne spoke brightly, casually, but Jennifer thought there was nervousness in her voice.

Eddie smiled at her. “D’accord, mon enfant. You got a jacket over here?”

“Don’t stay out late,” Jennifer couldn’t help saying. “Beth’s alone.”

“We won’t,” Leeanne assured her, dropping a kiss on her sister’s cheek.

They went quietly out the breezeway, and Jennifer began to gather up the mugs and silverware.

“Leave the dishes,” Harvey said, and she laid them in the sink.

“You’re tired. You want to go to bed?”

“Let’s sit for a while.” He held Connor carefully against his shirt as he stood up.

Jennifer put her arm around his waist. “Where are we heading? The couch?”

He stifled a yawn. “Yeah, that’s good. I feel like I ought to stay up until Eddie’s truck pulls out, you know?”

“You’re too good, Harvey.” He sank down on the living room sofa, and she settled in beside him.

Harvey put his left arm around her and cradled Connor with his right. He leaned back and closed his eyes as Jennifer’s head pillowed on his shoulder. “Don’t let me sleep out here,” he warned.

Almost instantly he was asleep. Jennifer lay with her cheek over his heart, feeling his strong, rhythmic breathing. His muscles relaxed almost imperceptibly, and she reached over, gently easing Connor from his grasp. She curled down against Harvey’s side, holding the baby on her chest, and Harvey stretched out a little, turning toward her, his arms holding her lightly, and they all drifted into sleep.

 

*****

“Harvey’s beat.” Eddie walked slowly down the sidewalk, holding Leeanne’s hand loosely. He kept his other hand in his pocket and tried not to shiver.

“Like you’re not.”

He shrugged. “I need to talk to you. If I wait ’til I’m not tired, it may never happen.” He looked up at the cold half moon in the cloudless sky.

“It’s supposed to freeze tonight,” Leeanne said.

Eddie dropped her hand and slipped his arm around her waist. He held his breath for an instant, and slowly her arm crept around him. Then he breathed.

“How’s the book coming?” he asked.

“Slow but sure. I’ll need to go over the police records with you sometime, but you’re so busy now, I thought I’d wait until you close this case.”

“Merci. I just couldn’t do any more right now.”

“I know.”

He squeezed her a little. They passed the Smiths’ house, with a lamppost at the end of the driveway. The next house had plastic pumpkins lit on the steps, and a scarecrow propped in the middle of the lawn.

“Halloween decorations already,” Eddie murmured. He rubbed her hair with his cheek. It was cold, and his whiskers were scratchy. Was tonight the night he would kiss her again? He wished he had shaved.

“Leeanne, I’ve been reading what the Bible says about … about husbands, and fathers, and … families. Pastor got me going on it, you know? From the Bible study a couple of weeks ago.”

“Uh-huh.”

He stopped and turned to face her on the sidewalk. They were nearly to his house, and there wasn’t any traffic on the street.

“Cherie, there are women in the Bible who are in business. Not many, I guess, but a few. But … it seems like they tend to their families first.”

Leeanne nodded solemnly, her eyes dark and glistening in the moonlight.

“I don’t want to talk about this,” he confessed. “I’m afraid you’ll get upset again, but I don’t see how we’ll ever make any progress if we don’t talk it out, and I want to make progress. Oh, sweet, sweet Leeanne, I want to get past this and go on.”

He pulled her against him, his lips brushing her cool, smooth forehead, wondering if his tears would freeze if he cried.

“I want to, too,” she whispered.

Eddie took a deep breath. “Can we sit on the steps?”

“Sure.”

They walked slowly up the driveway to the house. Our house, Eddie told himself with a pang of loss. At the steps, they sat down close together. The stairs were like ice, and he put his arm around her again. She let her head drift slowly down onto his shoulder, and they sat in silence.

“If you wanted to work,” he said at last, “I think I could stand it for a while. I mean, I would hope it wouldn’t last forever, but if you really wanted that...”

She nodded. “I would never put my children in daycare, Eddie.”

“Me either. I could wait a few years, maybe, if you wanted to. But … my wife … I would hope that when we had babies, she’d be home. I think I could support us so that you didn’t have to work outside. But if you wanted to do something like writing ... I mean, Jennifer is still making computer programs, but she doesn’t go off to some office every day to do it.”

“I understand. And I think you’re right. I’m sorry I ever said you were wrong, or implied it.”

Eddie shivered and pulled his suitcoat tighter.

“You’re freezing,” she whispered. “Go in and get your coat.”

“No, I—I’m all right.”

Leeanne put both arms around him and felt the leather holster strap through his jacket. “You’ll get sick, baby,” she said. “I’ll wait here.”

Eddie stirred. “Come inside.”

“I can’t.”

He swallowed. “It’s our house, Leeanne. You’ve been in it lots.”

“I know, but—”

He thought about the hours they had spent there together, painting the dining room and moving his things in. “Just step in out of the cold. I’ll get my coat.”

She hesitated, then stood up slowly and waited while he unlocked the door.

In the entry she stopped. “This is where the N.C. Wyeth was.”

“Yeah.” He eyed her curiously, relieved at the warmth that washed over him as he closed the door, and wondering what was going through her mind as she gazed at the spot where the previous owner’s art had hung.

“We ought to get a print or something to hang there.” She turned toward him.

His stomach lurched. She was still thinking of it as their house, too, then. She was perhaps not the most beautiful woman in the world. Perhaps. He could debate that. But regardless of the outcome, she was the one who would always hold his heart.

“Leeanne!”

Two tears spilled over her eyelids and slid down her cheeks. She stared at him, pain and fear in her gaze. Her chin went up a fraction of an inch. “I want to live here with you,” she whispered.

He pulled her toward him fiercely, holding her head tight against his chest, his breathing choppy and fast as he fought the tears. “Je t’aimais toujours, Leeanne. I’ve always loved you.”

She laughed the tiniest laugh and gasped, burying her face in the front of his shirt, sobbing. He remembered the first time he’d told her, and she had laughed like that. You love me in two languages. He tightened his arms around her, wanting to hold her forever. Her hands came up in fists, on either side of his tie, and he thought she was going to pound on him, but her fingers relaxed and stretched out, slipping up toward his collar, until they met at the nape of his neck. He shivered again, but not from the cold, and closed his eyes. She caressed him slowly, letting his hair tumble over her fingers.

“Can you forgive me?” she choked.

He heaved a ragged sigh. “That is not a problem, my love.”

He traced her jawline with one finger, and tipped her face upward. With excruciating slowness he bent toward her, his lips meeting hers in a joyful shock. The last coil of bitterness unkinked inside him. He kissed her mouth, then her cheekbone, her temple, her earlobe. “I need to get you home,” he whispered.

“Get your coat,” she said, but she didn’t loosen her hold on him.

Eddie took two deep breaths, then straightened. A tear hung trembling on her eyelashes. He fumbled for his handkerchief. “Here, ma petite. Let me wipe your eyes.”

“I love you, Eddie. Don’t ever let me be so stubborn and mean again.”

He smiled at that. “What would I do?”

She laughed and caught the tear with his handkerchief. “Hold me down and kiss me until I treat you right. I don’t think I could resist.”

He sighed. “I would be afraid to do that. All this time, I’ve been afraid to touch you again.”

She sniffed. “And I was afraid you never would.” Their eyes locked, and she laughed again. “Get your coat, Édouard Jean.”

Eddie swallowed hard. He still felt it was a risk, but it was all or nothing tonight. He put one hand up to her cheek. “I have to ask you something.”

“What?” Her lips trembled.

“Are you wearing the cross I gave you?”

The look that crossed her face almost made him laugh. Wonder, consternation, perhaps a teeny letdown.

“Always.” She unzipped her jacket and reached inside the collar of her blouse, pulling the gold chain up with one finger. The little jade cross dangled from it.

He smiled at her, and she smiled back. “There’s one other thing.”

“What?”

“Come into the kitchen.”

“The kitchen? No, Eddie, I can’t.”

His smile broadened. “I’ll be good. I promise.”

Slowly she went with him through the living room, her eyes devouring the home she had craved for months.

He nodded toward a bare corner. “We were going to put your computer there.”

“Yes.”

He took her hand and drew her on into the kitchen, stopping between the range and the refrigerator. She looked up at him, bewildered, and Eddie smiled slowly.

“Let’s do this right.” He dropped to one knee, holding her hand in both his, looking up into her intent blue eyes. “Dearest Leeanne, I love you. Will you be my wife?”

Her other hand reached out to him, and she slid her fingers through his thick, dark hair. “Of course, my darling.”

He stood up and kissed her tenderly, then again, more decisively. When he released her, she collapsed against him. He wanted to save that moment forever, but he remembered his purpose in choosing this location for his proposal.

“Pardon, ma belle,” he said softly, reaching out and pulling the freezer door open.

Leeanne looked around at the sound, then twisted back to face him, baffled.

“Here you go.” He lifted out a small box and placed it in her hands. She stared at it. Mr. Edouard J. Thibodeau, 187 Van Cleeve Lane, Portland, ME, in her handwriting.

“Oh, Eddie, you froze it.”

She was so mournful, he laughed again. “What did you think, little lamb?”

“I thought—maybe—I don’t know. Maybe you gave it back to your Mémé. Or threw it out the window, or something like that.”

She smiled up at him through tears and lifted the lid of the box. Inside was the square jeweler’s box. Eddie lifted it out and opened it. He took the ring out and clenched it in his fist.

“It’s cold,” he whispered, and she nodded. He held it up to his lips. “Encore froid. Still cold.” He hid it again in his fist, and Leeanne stood waiting, smiling.

The second time he raised it to his lips, he nodded. “Your hand, ma cherie.”

She held it out eagerly, and he slipped the band onto her finger, then kissed her fingertips.

“Eddie!” She flung herself at him, her arms around his neck, and he lifted her off the floor, kissing her over and over. Finally she pushed him away, gasping. “Get your coat. You need to take me home to Beth’s.”

He placed one more kiss gently on her lips. “I think we need to tell Jennifer and Harvey, too.”