Bridge Between Worlds Ch. 03

I nodded my head in agreement. "Jacob Kent and his old man blackmailed Barkley into selling the company. Theodore Barkley lived for his company, but he was never the type of man who would have been able to deal with the scandal or embarrassment that it would have brought."

Lacey continued, "So instead he sells the whole kit and caboodle for an undervalued price to Jacob Kent to buy Kent's silence. Her own brother, but why?"

"Greed and jealousy. Marilyn stood in the way of James getting the company. That only doubled the hatred James had for the business. He was second in line to his sister to inherit the Barkley fortune and second in line to the diamond company for his father's love and attention. That's what Marilyn was trying to tell me with the picture."

Gina caught my faux pas. "Marilyn?" she asked quizzically.

I immediately realized my mistake and covered my tracks. "Marilyn, did I say Marilyn?"

"Yes you did"

"Obviously that's not what I meant Gina. I was just thinking out loud." I dared not look at Lacey at that moment. After going over things again in detail, Lacey and I headed out. Gina Torres had more than repaid her debt to me.

~~~ - ~~~

CHAPTER 11

Lacey and I decided to stop for a couple of coffees and then drove back to my house. Along the way we discussed what we had discovered and disconcertingly, how could we ever prove it. When we got back home, it occurred to me that there was only one person that could possibly tell us the truth, Marilyn Barkley.

Lacey and I went inside and curled up side by side on my bed. She held my hand and I could feel she was trembling. I knew she was still shaken up about her experience the last time she nodded off with me.

I peered over at the clock and found that almost an hour had passed and I still had not nodded off. Lacey was fast asleep next to me and had a relaxed look on her face. I began studying it carefully. She had grown more beautiful with each passing year. We had met when we were first out of college and she had that girl next door look. She had matured into a stunning, elegant woman.

I must have dozed off while looking at my partner, because the next thing I knew, Marilyn Barkley was standing before me. She had an excited expression on her face. She approached me quickly and kissed me passionately on the lips and gazed into my eyes. She stroked my face and hair with her hands and then placed my hand on her heart. I knew she was thanking me. But even in my dream I knew that without concrete proof it all meant nothing. These were no ordinary dreams, if indeed they were dreams, and somehow I knew Marilyn would provide me with what I was looking for.

She again handed me a framed picture. It was the same picture of her brother, in fact the same frame that she had given me before. I looked at her with a puzzled expression. We already knew that James was her murderer. Why was giving me a picture of her once again?

Before I could ask her, she hugged me, and faded away. I woke up and looked over at Lacey. She was still sound asleep. The picture frame lay on my chest. I picked it up and stared straight into James Barkley's eyes. If only the picture could talk. If only James Barkley could tell me his secrets. I grew frustrated and slammed the frame on my leg. That's when I heard the cracking sound.

The surge of pain I felt led me to believe I had broken my kneecap, but then I flipped the frame over and found that the frame's wood backing had cracked. In fact, it wasn't the first time that it had cracked. At some point it had been re-glued. I began ripping the back of the frame off. A piece of paper slipped out and floated on to my lap.

'Dear Father, I am sorry for all of the embarrassment that I have caused you. I know that I will not see you again for the place I am going are only for awful persons such as me. I know you could never look at me the same way again after you found out that I had murdered Marilyn. My hatefulness consumed me and drove me to do things that were unconscionable. I no longer want to trouble you with my existence. I'm sorry you had to face humiliation by selling the company. In case you ever want to get the company back you have all the proof you need of Kent's blackmail in the study at the Jefferson's home. Goodbye Father. I know you may not believe it, but I do love you.'

The letter was signed by James Barkley and was dated October 3, 1926.

Another death covered up to protect image. Distraught over what he had done, James Barkley had killed himself. It occurred to me that I was forgetting something. When I read over the letter again, I yelled out loud. "Shit!"

Lacey sat up quickly and wearily asked what was going on.

"The house Lacey, the house."

"What house, what are you talking about?"

"The proof of the murder is in the Jefferson home. I pointed at the letter for extra effect. That's where the party was."

"That's this house! Shit" Lacey yelled.

"Now you're with me Lace!"

We spent the next several hours tearing the place apart. Pillows, books, pictures, everything, was strewn about the house. Frustrated, we flopped down on the sofa, sweaty, tired, and clueless.

"Joe Joe, we have taken this house apart. It looks like a tornado ripped through here. Actually now that I think of it, it actually looks cleaner than it usually does"

I playfully sneered at her and stuck my tongue out. "I don't know Lace, without smashing through the walls and tearing up every floorboard I don't think there's much else we can do. And no, we are not going to do that."

"Damn, might have been fun."

I stood up and began pacing back and forth in the hope that an idea would strike me. I stopped for a moment and slid my hands into the back pockets of my pants. I was scouring over the living room, looking over everything in minute detail, when something sharp jabbed at the ring finger on my right hand. I reflexively said "ow" and quickly removed my hand.

"What happened, Joe?"

"Something stuck my finger. I reached back in my pocket and pulled out a key."

"Lucky you didn't sit on it, Joe". She quickly curtailed her giggle when saw the puzzled look on my face. "Joe?"

"Lace, I have no idea what this key is to. I've never seen it before."

"Discounting someone else wearing your pants, how could it have gotten there?"

I recounted the dream of hours earlier. That was it. "Just before I woke up, Marilyn hugged me. It didn't occur to me until just now, but I was wearing my clothes in this dream. She must have slipped it in there."

"She is one resourceful spirit, Joe. Time to search the house again, huh?"

"No" I replied. She turned around to look at what my gaze was fixed upon.

I said my thoughts aloud. "Where did that come from?"

Lacey turned back towards me. "Joe, what is it?" I was staring at the wood cabinet that leaned against the far wall. The cabinet had been here when I moved in. I had kept it because of the texture and smell of the oak wood. It was the only piece of furniture in the house when I moved in. I never noticed the small keyhole on the side however.

I quickly approached it and attempted to slide the key into the opening. It was a perfect fit. The side of the cabinet completely fell away from the main structure, revealing yet another cabinet wall. At the bottom, lay a dust laden manila envelope. As I picked up the envelope and started blowing the dust off of it, I knew I held gold in my hands.

"Lacey, I think we hit paydirt." Lacey rushed to my side and grabbed my arm. We both looked at each other and nodded our heads as if to say, "Let's do this." I pulled the contents from inside the envelope.

In my hands were several letters from Jacob Kent to Theodore Barkley. Each one read similarly to the next. Kent knew that James Barkley had murdered his own sister and he was threatening Barkley to sell his family the diamond company or he would go to the authorities. James must have hidden these letters here, I speculated out loud.

"Lace, call Bill and tell him to meet us at the office. I don't care if he complains about what time it is. I stared at the papers. "Tell him he's got his story."

How this was all going to come together was still not clear to me. We had a great story, but did we have enough proof? The next evening Bill, Lacey, and I met with Dennis Morgan, the regional FBI director. Morgan was straightforward and to the point. It was unlikely that law enforcement officials could do anything at this point after so much time had passed.

Money would not be granted to exhume and re-examine the remains of Marilyn Barkley either. Since she was poisoned, DNA testing would have no purpose. Basically there was no way of proving that any of the letters were authentic. Sure, experts could give an approximation of how old the paper was that they were written on and could do handwriting analysis, but basically we could be held liable.

Morgan, as expected, warned us that if the story was printed, Kent's family would definitely sue the paper, and might very well sue Lacey and I as well. The feelings of accomplishment brought on by finding the truth were tempered by the reality Morgan had shown us.

But, I knew that wouldn't stop Bill from printing the story. This was too big of a headline to let fall by the wayside. Morgan told us he would set up a small team to investigate, but couldn't promise anything, and there would be no timetable.

After meeting with Morgan the three of us headed over to O'Reilly's to compare notes.

The crease in Bill's forehead foretold that he was weighing all the issues out in his mind.

"Kids, you know as well as I do that stories of this nature are risky. As Morgan mentioned there are credibility issues, lawsuits, etc. The paper could be seriously damaged by such accusations even with what we consider solid proof. Therefore I have come to a decision which was not an easy one.

I interrupted, "Bill, no, we have to run this story. It's..."

Bill raised his right hand in a motion to cut me off in mid-sentence "Joe, I never said anything about not running the story. You're damn right we're going to run it. What you didn't let me finish saying was that we are going to go after Kent even more. Delve deeper into his and his family's background and see what else we can dig up. If they are capable of blackmail, who knows what else they are into."

"Way to go William", Lacey chimed in. She was the only one who could get away with calling the chief by his given forename. Bill had been Lacey's mentor when she had started out and he was the city editor.

Bill continued, "When this story breaks there will be attacks from the Kent family, the descendants of the Barkley family will be looking to reclaim what was theirs, the national media will come calling, and every kook from here to Oshkosh will be claiming they have information. A lot of work lies ahead for the two of you, don't be afraid to ask for some help. Now, stop wasting time here and get moving."

We grinned and started to get up from the table. Bill stopped us for a moment. "One more thing, I'm really proud of you two."

"Thanks Bill," we both humbly replied.

"Joe, you had me worried for a while there, everything all right now?"

"It couldn't be better, Bill!"

"All right, you kids get going."

We walked out of O'Reilly's, flashing each other a huge smile. I started the car and hurried towards home. Lacey and I had to someone to meet with, and we didn't want to keep her waiting.

Lacey and I sprawled across my bed and nodded off within minutes. Marilyn appeared, her smiling beaming even more than it ever had before.

She spoke in a tone that was much more peaceful than she ever had before. "I want to thank you both for giving peace to my soul. "Joseph," - she had never called me that before- "I knew you were special the day you moved in to the house."

She looked wistful as she said, "I wish I had never gone there that night, but that is behind me now."

I spoke up. "Thank you Marilyn, for giving us feelings we had never experienced before. It's hard to put into words how much you have affected our lives, and I mean that in the best way."

Marilyn smiled and moved forward. She kissed each of us on the lips and joined Lacey and my hands together. "This is what is meant to be" she said, and with that Lacey and I woke up.

We looked in each other's eyes as if to say, "What do you think?"

The kiss between us gave us our answer. We kissed for several minutes, deeply and passionately. I looked into her blue eyes like I had never done before. They were amazing. I nuzzled her neck and inhaled her scent. My hands ran through her silky hair. She really was my best friend and I never wanted to lose her.

I told her in not so many words how I felt about her and a tear rolled down her cheek. I kissed it, tasting its salty flavor. The touch of her hand to my face told me she felt exactly the same way.

We began to kiss again. I reach down and began unbuttoning her blouse. My mouth moved from hers to the underside of her neck. I kissed my way until I was between her voluptuous cleavage. I removed her blouse and bra and began sucking on her nipples. They were round and hard and I couldn't get enough of them.

Lacey began moaning and talking softly. "Oh yes baby that feels so good." She stared into my eyes as reached down and started rubbing my cock through my pants. Her fingers ran slowly over the metal zipper, pulling down to its clasp. She reached in the opening of my boxers and freed my cock. It pulsated in her hand as she slowly stroked it. My mouth covered her nipples, alternately tonguing and sucking on them.

After we removed our clothes, we cuddled, kissing each other's lips, necks, bodies, etc., for a lengthy period of time until Lacey sat up on the bed and moved over me, straddling my mouth. "Taste me, Joe Joe" she said with a soft lilt. As I began licking her hardened clit and tasting the inside of her very wet pussy, Lacey leaned forward, grabbing my cock with her mouth and began tonguing and sucking it.

We were both very aroused and the feelings that were going through my mind were very different than from those on the one-night stand we had experienced years earlier. I groaned loudly as Lacey slid her lips down to the base of my shaft. Sounds of pleasure continually filled the room as we tasted each other. We repeatedly told each other that we loved one another.

Lacey's body shuddered as several orgasms began moving through her body. Without letting go of my cock, she slid around my body and positioned herself over my cock. She eased herself down on my shaft, allowing my cock to enter her moist pussy. Watching my cock disappear inside her was amazing. She rode me slowly at first and then varied her speed. At times, she rode me so hard it felt as if she would propel herself off of my cock.

As she began to pound down harder on my cock, Lacey rested her hands on my chest. At the peak of arousal, we both let out a loud groan and orgasms flowed through us. I could feel my cock becoming drenched with Lacey's juices. At the same time I was unleashing hot liquid deep inside of her. It seemed as if we reflexively came more as we fed off of the other's energy. I felt like my entire body was drained of cum.

We made love for several more hours, caressing and talking the whole time. We knew that this was no night of "Just sex." This was taking that risk that we didn't originally want to...to the next level of our relationship. As we lay in bed and spoke, we both felt that maybe this could work out after all. One thing was for sure, from our words and actions, we both were going to give it our best shot.

Physically and mentally exhausted, we drifted off to sleep in each other's arms, my cock still deep inside her. Lacey's head rested on my chest, her soft hair splayed across me. When I awoke the next morning, I felt completely at peace for the first time in my life. That night I had dreamt that Lacey and I were sitting on a beach in some tropical setting. An infant lay in Lacey's arms, suckling at her breast. I never dreamt of Marilyn Barkley again.