Both Benji and Frib gawked back with their mouths open.
“I know what you’re thinking but the bloods don’t lie. Could take a few hours to verify but… so far it looks positive. I wanted to let you know. If it turns out he did what we think he has done you can imagine the repercussions. It will be an embarrassment not just to the city but the rest of us; cop pulls the wool over the force’s eyes, I don’t think that will sit well with anyone, do you?”
“But- how?” was all Frib could manage.
Goren shrugged, his hand still gripped to each man’s shoulder reaffirming control with a firm squeeze of his fingers.
“We don’t know. But naturally… we have to keep this to ourselves. If word gets out and it is true…” he sighed. “I realize it couldn’t come at a worse possible time…”
Together they all seemed to visually gravitate across the room to where Joel and Joanna could be seen through the shifting crowd still locked in each other’s arms swaying to the lazy beat as they had been most of the night. Even beneath the dim atmospheric lights and the smoke and half obscured from view behind the crowd the looks on their faces made the men drop their eyes to the bar heavily.
“I’m sorry,” Goren uttered.
“So, who was the girl?”
“Kidnap?”
“We don’t know, but we think it could be Ava, Chester’s daughter.”
“What the ****?”
“I know, I know-”
“Then where’s her mother?”
“What you think he broke in and took her and got shot in the process?”
“Why? Why would he bother to come back just to take someone else’s kid? Doesn’t make sense does it?”
“Man, how do you kill someone who’s already dead?”
“No,” Goren intercepted, trying to keep the conversation low and discreet and remain on topic as he quickly assessed the faces of those around them. “He didn’t take her from there. We don’t know how she got there, but her mother’s in protective custody. Has been for a few days. It doesn’t matter how or why we just need to make sure it is him before we put out an APB-”
“Oh Jesus,” Frib murmured unbelievably over his beer.
He sat rubbing his brow struggling to absorb it all as Goren gave his shoulder another firm squeeze again that bordered on consoling. He explained in his typical blunt manner that he had only been following orders and only told them to beat the rumor mill that was already starting to circulate the wires.
“So what now?” Benji asked. He was looking over his shoulder again at his brother and beaming fiancé. “What do we tell them?”
“That’s your call,” Goren said with professional gravity. “But one way or the other, whether this does turn out to be founded or not, he’s going to find out,” he said of Benji’s twin. “It’s probably better coming from one of you than someone else.”
Benji nodded and after affording a second cursory look at the couple in question, he cursed under his breath again and turned back to scull thirstily from his glass. Frib sat poised to drink then decided it was better not to. When he set the glass down he could feel a sick heavy sensation stirring in his stomach that wasn’t totally due to his half drunken state. In his mind, as dizzy and heavy as it suddenly felt, he couldn’t help but consider the implications of what this all meant. If Rob really was alive…
“Hey, Captain, here to celebrate?” Karl asked, appearing behind the big man’s shoulder a moment later.
As Goren recounted his news again, Frib sat unable to tear his eyes away now from Joel and Joanna talking discreetly between themselves blissfully unawares on the other side of the room. Over the din of the music, and the sudden pounding of his pulse in his temples, Frib stared intently, concentrating harder on appearing coherent more than actually listening to what was being said. He didn’t need to hear anything else though to know the outcome was still the same. Just like that the party was over and one of them now had the arduous task of going over there to break it to their team leader.
“Of all the ****** luck,” Karl lamented.
He drained the last of his glass too and set it down atop the bar with a thud. Goren clapped him on the back, nodding at them all and the few familiar faces that passed still blissfully unawares but were uttering the usual high-spirited greetings. When he turned back to Frib and Benji in front of him the previous jovialities had been well and truly quashed and a brooding sense of dread had settled in its place.
“I know, it’s a bad time,” he said, trying to sound consoling and coming off partially unsettling for it, “but we’ve got a job to do. I suggest you get out of here and get yourselves ready. I’ll see you all at the station at 01:00.”
The trio nodded as Goren dismissed himself and sat in silence as the party continued on in a kind of surreal bubble around them. None of them could talk as they struggled to process the news, exchanging awkward eye contact in place of actual words. The scenario was made worse when several minutes later a tattooed arm draped itself over his brother’s shoulder to ask with stirring glee what was wrong with his friends.
“Hey, it’s meant to be a party, what’s up?” Joel smiled as Joanna cuddled into his side contentedly.
Draining his glass Benji slid his eyes aside at them as both Frib and Karl dropped their eyes to the floor.
“What is it? Who died?” Joel prompted.
When he met Benji’s eyes his lopsided smile fell away. Joanna expectantly tensed up in his arms.
“What is it? What’s wrong? Joel?” she asked.
No one could face her let alone utter so much as a word in explanation. It wasn’t until Joel sat upright and Benji put his empty glass down that Benji finally lifted the dark shades from his eyes to face his sibling.
“I just got some bad news,” he uttered seriously as Joanna and Joel stared at him. “And you’re not gonna like it. They think your old man’s alive. And he’s somewhere in the city right now with Chester’s missing kid.”
“I don’t… understand,” Joanna said meekly.
She lowered her eyes to Joel whose arms had tightened around her diminutive waist.
“Joel, what are they… talking about? Old man? My father’s not even…”
Joel’s incredulous grin faltered when he realized that the grave faces of his companions weren’t easing as he expected them to. This wasn’t a joke, as much as they all wished it were. The sound of the music continued on, some energetic beat against the backdrop of conversation and laughter, but for those few seconds no one in that little huddle seemed to hear it. Turning to his fiancé Joel studied her face a moment and forced a smile. It was so wrong for the moment it scared her more than comforted her as Joanna gasped for bad news she knew now was coming.
“They’re not talking about your father, they’re talking about your husband.”
“But you’re going to be my husband. That’s what we’re doing here, remember, that’s what-”
“No, babe, you’re not hearing me,” Joel said with great difficulty. “Your husband, before me, before… now. It’s Rob… they think he’s still alive.”
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On a side note, happy birthday sis <3
hahaha
