D.R.T.

"Rob, quiet down a bit, settle. The commissioner's office set the read in up. It was in their office. An IA Lieutenant..."

"Parker?" I interrupted.

"Yeah, Parker. He lead the read in. The commissioner sat in himself."

"Were Rosen and Turner read in?" I asked.

"No. I asked they be read in; Parker said he didn't think it was time, yet, that they could always read them in later. The commissioner agreed. Rob... this chat could cost me my career. I'm definitely done, regardless, in moving up the food chain." I looked around when he said that, and noticed that at least two people were taking an interest in two old friends sharing a cup of coffee.

"Regardless, you need to stay out of it. Someone has it for you, hard. Someone's trying to put you in the role of the Capo on this one. And you need to be careful, because..." Sean glanced around. "Because I think someone high up IS involved. No proof, just a feeling. My gut tells me someone has not only stepped over the line, they're not even in the same area code as where the line was." I could see the seriousness, the concern. "Whatever you do, you have to protect yourself. You have to stay out of it."

"Would you? Would you be able to stay out of it if was Laura and not Bree that was dead?" I asked, citing his wife. His wince at the thought answered my question, before rising.

"Do what you have to do, Rob; I can't stop you. But I have to tell you, as your boss, as your friend... stay out of it. You may not like what you find, and you are only putting yourself more at risk." He stared at me for a moment before walking off.

I watched him go, picking up my coffee, pondering what the two, Sean and Larry, had said. I picked up my phone, and pulled out the napkin.

"Dr. Claire Mather's answering service, how may I help you?" the cheery voice on the other end intoned.

"I need an appointment, as quickly as possible, and one of my friends recommended... demanded that I see his psychiatrist. So..."

I proceeded to get pushed through to the scheduler, and then an early appointment for the following morning. Picking up my empty cup, and the now cold coffee that Sean had left, I walked over to the trash to deposit them when I felt a presence behind me.

"I've been told to give you a message", the male voice behind me said, while pushing against me and pinning me to the trash can, keeping me from easily twisting around. "You are too nosy, and you need to concentrate on your wife's funeral. I'm sorry for your loss, but in this city... loses can happen. You understand me?" I felt the pressure leave, and heard footsteps moving away. Turning, I saw the back of a male, possibly Hispanic, about 5'10", medium build, wearing slacks and a T-shirt walking away. I quickly snapped a picture, mostly of the man's back, but got some of his face, and forwarded the picture via Text to Larry before calling him, before getting his voicemail.

"Larry, the guy in the picture just attempted to 'persuade' me to drop everything, and made a veiled hint that something could happen to me, too, if I persisted. Can you shake that lead, too?".

I returned from there to the hotel, waiting for Larry's message. It never came, except for a quick text, "OI. B strong", 'on it, be strong'. Little comfort, but sometimes time takes... time.

- - -

The next morning dawned, dark and dreary. I was suffering through the most salient fact: the woman I loved, the woman I lived for, the woman who was my other half and I trusted implicitly... was dead, and had been cheating on me. She and her lover had been murdered while in the act, in the most sacred spot in the world we had shared. I'd never bewable to live in that house again. I still was having a hard time processing that and keeping a calm, rational head. Part of me wanted to go into headquarters and start tearing the place, and the people, apart to find who at the top was involved. And why. Why me, why Bree? Why were we worth so little to someone sworn to protect the city and it's people? Why were a few dollars so important?

So I had breakfast and took the El to Dr. Claire Mather's office downtown. I arrived almost an hour early, took one look at the magazines, and then just sat, neither picking one up, watching the TV, or, as so many do, looking at my phone. I just sat, staring at the receptionist. After a while, the obviously uncomfortable woman go up and found something else to do in the office, somewhere else than my thousand mile stare, leaving me alone with my dark thoughts.

Claire Mathers was a 5'5" blonde with cornflower blue eyes, roughly 40 years old, svelte, with an obviously nice figure, but dressed conservatively, in a dark blue woman's "suit" with a pale yellow blouse. The mid-calf length skirt led to what appeared to be high quality stockings or hose, landing in a pair of one inch wedged healed, closed toed shoes. Jewelry was light, a small pair of pearl earrings and a light gold chain around her neck, a small silver broach in the shape of a dipped lead on her lapel, and what appeared to be an engagement and wedding ring set on her right ring finger, marking her as probably a widow, since she looked "American", whatever that meant. Her features were pleasant, skin smooth, and her hair was coiffed in what Bree used to call a "messy bun" arrangement. The glasses she wore were stylish, but not garish, and gave her a look of honest, earnest helpfulness. She made a positive impression for her role as a shrink and emotions counselor.

"Hi, I'm Dr. Claire Mathers, but you can call me Dr. Claire or just Claire, if you want. I'm sorry to hear about your loss, but if you'd like to come back with me, we can discuss it, how to handle your grief and anger, and how to move on. Can I call you Rob?" she asked, in what seemed like a softly honeyed voice. My positive impression of her rose.

"Yes, I'm Captain Rob Elliot of the Chicago Police Department, Crime Scene and Forensics. Yes, you can call me Rob. I'm your 9 o'clock." I added, lamely, realizing I was off my normal rest,as of course she knew who I was and what my appointment time was.... she'd just used my name in greeting me. She smiled a light smile and turned to lead me inwards into her offices.

Walking into her office, I observed a large desk with a comfortable chair, a pair of nice leather chairs side by side on one wall facing the desk, a book shelf filled with tomes to numerous to gather behind the desk, a classic upholstered chaise sofa on the wall angled towards one of the leather chairs, with a small end table and lamp between them, and, strangely, a car table with folding chairs beside a toy box on the side of the room adjacent to the doorway. All in all, it seemed to tick all of the cliché boxes for a psychiatrist or counselor, even down to the box of tissues on the end table. After surveying the room, while Claire stood beside me, I walked over and took the chair beside the end table. "A test to see your patients reaction even before you begin?" I asked.

Smiling a grin between a smirk and an honest smile, Claire walked over to her desk and sat in her highback chair. "Yes, actually. Some patients expect, or even prefer, the classic 'couch' situation; if you had chosen that, I'd have grabbed my notebook" as she picked up a notebook from atop the desk "and would be sitting in the chair you chose. If you'd chosen the card table, I'd have sat in one of the other chairs, either beside you if you'd chosen to face the wall, or across if you had chosen one of the other two chair. And if you'd chosen that chair", she pointed to the companion leather chair "I would be sitting again in the chair you chose. But I think you know that. Your glance around the room, your hesitation, and then your choice... you knew which chair I would choose based on your choice, didn't you? However, letting you chose also broke the ice for us. You made a choice about the type of relationship we're going to have going forward. And choice..."

"Is the first step in healing. It finally starts to allow people to take control of their life when their life is out of control. I get it." I interrupted. Her smile told me that she liked the way I understood her process a bit already.

"Rob, normally I record these sessions for my own private review, for my notes, and on the of chance that I need to consult with someone else. Is that ok? I know that in this case... your wife's murder, well, it's been in the news. I saw the broadcast Friday night myself. Is it alright, or do we need to have these talks without recordings? Be aware that while a warrant may be able to get some records...."

"No, I think you had it in the right with the possibility of not recording them. There are a few facts you aren't aware of, yet, that would make it dangerous to record them."

She looked at me oddly as she showed me that we weren't recording. "You are aware that I can't report you for any crimes you confess here..."

"No crimes of mine. Just... something that someone is doing in the CPD. I mean, what's new, right? Rachelle Jackson, Homan Square, Finnigan, Zuley, Van Dyke... the force hasn't exactly been on top of things. For every ten or twenty good cops, and they are good cops, we have one of those over the last twenty years. And my wife's murder... well, even if it's not a stain directly, the department's handling is going to be a big stain. You see...." and I began my tale of woe, death, shock.

My tale of the ending of my personal and professional happiness, even maybe my of my professional and personal life. We talked. Or rather, I talked, mostly. I found once the taps were opened, I couldn't stop. For only the second person in my life, I couldn't keep my thoughts to myself. I told her my findings, my fears, my shattered dreams.

And I wept. For the last ten minutes of my appointment, that may have been all I could do. After a while, Claire stood up, grabbed the box of tissues, and knelt on the floor beside me.

But time passes, and my appointment ended. While I had started fully feeling the next stage of grief, I knew I would need more help. And Claire, for all that she'd simply listened to me and been there fore me, had helped. I didn't need the platitudes, the advice, not yet. I just needed to release. And she had given me that. So I made another appointment for the following day. Day-to-day, that was the operative phrase.

As I left the office building, walking aimlessly, my new phone rang. It was strange; the number was one I recognized, but not one I'd contacted with my new number.

"Sharon? How did you get my new number?" I answered.

"Larry Edwards told me I should meet with you. He gave me the number. I need you to meet me on the Red Line, Clark/Division to 95^th, 3:43, second car. Today." And with that, she hung up.

Anxious as I was, it was tough waiting the four hours downtown for the appointment. Multiple times, I had the feeling I was being watched. Multiple times, my internal danger meter pegged, but nothing happened.

I made the appointment.

She was sitting on a bench, looking bored with the world, at least to those who didn't know her. To me, she looked tightly sprung, like a tiger about to tear out of it's cage, like a cobra about to strike. I sat beside her.

"Sharon...." and she gave me a look that all but stopped me cold.

The next stop was coming up, and she stood. Doing so she handed me a manila envelope from her shopping bag. As she began to walk away, she murmured "Be careful with this." and walked out the door.

I realized that she felt either she or I might have been followed, but for the first time in a bit, I felt "clear", without a tail or shadow. So I took a moment to look through the folder.

Toxicology had identified a specific formula for the junk in Bree's system, the same formula known to be Thornton's product, in quantities that indicated he'd given her a fix not long before death. Death itself had been instantaneous, for Bree, as she'd been shot in the head, just in front of her left ear, from the doorway for the first shot. Thornton had been about the same. Clean hits, two shots, two kills. The additional four shots had been postmortem, coup de grace shots not needed.

Ballistics on the bullets had confirmed the weapon was linked to three additional homicides in the last five months. So we had an efficient, highly proficient, but stupid killer on our hands, stupid because he was still carrying a gun now linked to five homicides, one very high profile. A talent, egotistical, or stupid, criminal.

I got off at Roosevelt, barely, but I knew I needed privacy, and I needed to call Larry.

I found a quiet area to lean against a building for a moment and made the call.

"Rob? What's up?" Larry answered.

"Got something, not sure it's useful. I'm near the Roosevelt El station. When and where can we meet up?" I asked as a man came close stumbling by me, causing me to turn slightly.

"Well, I know this guy who will always pick up my check..." was all I heard before I felt it. Somewhere between the third and fourth rib on my left, just missing my heart. I heard Larry stop, and I heard his voice as the man walked off, rapidly, still holding the small automatic he'd shot me with. I heard screams of some passersby, and I heard Larry's voice asking "What, Rob, what was that? Rob are you ok? Rob? Rob?" Then all I heard was silence, until I started hearing the steady beep-beep of the machinery in the hospital.

Later, I found out that Larry was the first person to get through to 911, and the only one to let them know it was a police officer who had been shot. Generally, the uniforms were the first to show up, but somebody broke records getting there when the call went out that an officer was down. The two beat cops were the ones who staunched the blood loss; Larry's call was what got them there that fast. Between the three of them, they kept me alive for the paramedics to get to me, and those guys kept me alive to the hospital. I guess, in retrospect, I owe Larry more than just free steaks. I would go on to spend the next three weeks in North Western Memorial Hospital.

The hospital might have been the turning point. I woke up three days after being shot, handcuffed. Kinda tells you how warped things could be, my wife was murdered, I was nearly murdered, and I was officially the leading suspect. Could it get more asinine?

It was about two hours after I woke up that Parker showed up, and cemented himself on my list. He stood there staring at me for a moment, with the uniform guarding the door listening. "It appears the guy you hired kill your wife and her lover decided you were late on making your payment. Even used the same gun"

If I'd had my service piece, I really would have been a strong murder suspect at that point. "What was it, a revenge hit by your partners? We have everything we need. You should just sign a confession and let the force and the city move on."

"Fuck you, Parker. I'm going to find whoever killed Bree. And I'm going to nail your butt on a cross in Daley Plaza when I do for that bull shit with leaving them there after the search warrant was carried out." I hit the call button for the nurse, but even as I was pressing it, she was coming into the room.

"Get him out of my sight!" I told the nurse. With one last look and a smirk at me, Parker walked out before she ordered him out.

I relied on Larry during my hospital stay; three long weeks of hospitalization, with physical therapy starting three days after I came out of it. Always, always, during that first week with a young cop standing outside my door, or following along beside me, handcuffing me to the walker (over the objections of the doctors and physiotherapist). The only reason Larry was let in was there was no other next of kin. He was my emergency second contact after Bree. And even then, it took some calls from Sean. Tuesday, ten days after I had come home, they buried Bree. From the pictures, it looked like a quarter of the force had shown up, a sea of black wool and blue shirts. I was lucky enough that one of the cops guarding me arranged for me to watch live. I was even allowed to call Sean and give a brief "Thank you" to my friends on the force for honoring her life as the wife of a cop, one of the hardest jobs in the world. I saw a few wives in Bree's coffee clatch start crying over that; they were all wives of cops, retired, working, or dead. A few of the husbands might have been teary eyed, too.

And I felt rage as I rattled the shackle Parker had put on me, keeping me from my wife's funeral.

Claire came by that evening; she was able to get in by virtue of the fact she was still one of my doctors. That, and the fact none of the guards that I could tell was hostile to me, just following order. The session went a bit better than the last, and it felt good to have someone there to mourn with; Larry couldn't come that night because he had to do the "show the flag" after the burial as my stand-in. He filmed the entire thing on his iPhone via the expedient of putting the phone on record and placing it in his top jacket pocket, lens facing out. I ended up seeing it the next day when Larry came by.

After we'd talked, and I'd watched some of the video, he got down to it.

"Rob, I've got a lead on something. It may not pan out, but I've got to follow it up. If you don't hear from me for a day or two, don't worry too much, unless you see them wheeling me in here to be with you."

"What's the lead?"

"Not saying, Rob. It's way too dangerous. Hell after what happened with you, I'm wearing a vest now when I'm out and about working this."

"Oh, come on, Larry, how much more dangerous can it be? I'm already in the hospital." I groused.

"You could be dead, Rob. We just buried Bree, I can't lose my brother from another mother, too."

Three days later, the Illinois State Police came in, and the cuff came off.

"Captain Robert Elliot? I'm Lieutenant Sam Reynolds, Illinois State Police, Division of Criminal Investigation. Can I talk with you a few minutes?" he asked, while unlocking the cuff. "We want to talk with you and see if we can get an identification of your assailant. We think it's connected with the murder of your wife and another man, and we've heard... well some disquieting rumors flowing around the case."

As I rubbed my sore wrist, careful not to tug on the IV lines, I bid him to close the door and stay a while, evoking a pleasant, if melancholy, memory of a character in an old computer game I had played with Larry in our youth, Diablo, and the character Deckard Cain,

Over the next hour, I went through everything I knew, every lead, every bit, leaving out only Sean, Sharon, and Larry's names and direct involvement. It was obvious from the depths of my knowledge that I had inside sources, and probably suspected that I was holding back on how much Brian and Bill had told me at breakfast that morning. But then again, with the fact I was well liked and respected on the force, I could have had twenty different sources; everyone knew this was the entire department's priority, so a lot of good cops were working various aspects of the case.

After I'd given them my information, and my thoughts, I could tell that, at least in their eyes, I wasn't a suspect. Given I'd been known to be in Atlanta during the event, I never really should have been.

"I can't tell you who, but we do, in fact, have a suspect for your shooter. He's still at large, though. We also think he's not the one giving out orders... there's someone higher up. That... well, we don't have much there." Reynolds admitted. "We're looking hard for your shooter; it's definitely the same person who murdered your wife and Thornton, or at least the same handgun. We'll get this bastard. You have both the local force, and the state involved, and I know that your Chief is considering calling in the Feds to at least provide some support. The guard outside your door has been doubled and their duties changed, though... they are now your protection. We're worried this guy may try again, or the guy giving orders may have someone else do it. We're picking up a lot of bodies on the street that seem to be related to this.... someone is cleaning up after themselves."