How I Met Your Mother Ch. 07

How I Met Your Mother: Loose Ends

Mountford Police Station

Monday

1:33 am

Sitting alone on an uncomfortable chair in the small, cramped interview room, Susan Gosling felt that her world was falling apart. She had been dragged from her warm and comfortable bed in the middle of the night and been given scarcely any time to put some clothes on. Dressed in a pair of faded jeans, battered old trainers and an over-sized sweatshirt she usually wore to the gym, she held her head in her hands as she waited for someone, anyone to enter the room.

The light in the fluorescent tube flickered occasionally, giving the room a cold, austere look to it. Shifting her position on the chair slightly Susan was able to relieve the fledgling pain developing in her back, however the respite was only fleeting as within five minutes the tight sensation at the base of her spine was growing again. By the time the heavy wooden door was opened, Susan could feel that she was starting to seize up.

She looked over her shoulder at the figure that entered the room; her visitor's demeanour seemed to match that of the interview room that Susan found herself in. Shortly after her arrival in the police station, the woman had introduced herself as Sarah Frost; a special investigator assigned to verify claims made to the Select Committee concerning the actions of various government officials, specifically James Blevins. As she watched the raven-haired woman take up a seat on the opposite side of the table, Susan began to feel distinctly uncomfortable.

"Now, Miss Gosling, I'll dispense with the pleasantries as it's far too late in the evening for all that crap. I'm sure I don't have to spell it out for you exactly how much trouble Mr Blevins is in," Sarah was keeping her voice even and calm, whilst simultaneously trying to sound threatening. It was something that her partner Drake managed to look effortless when he did it; however as he still in the hospital recovering from his gunshot wounds she was flying solo at the moment. "And the outlook isn't too rosy for you either as his primary assistant." She could see the colour draining from Susan's face.

"Look, I don't know anything. Whatever James was doing…" Susan replied.

"Please drop the act, Miss Gosling." Frost leaned back on the chair slightly. "You can't convince me that you're completely innocent in this matter. I'm not saying you have any blood on your hands, but I know you have a full and frank understanding of what Blevins has been up to." Susan sat there, nervously looking at her hands. "Now, I'll be blunt; if you help me then I'll help you." Frost said.

"What do you want?"

"Everything Miss Gosling," Frost replied. "Everything."

"Okay." Susan sighed, resignation clearly audible in her voice. "I guess it all started back in Gambia…"

****

76 Burrow Street

Tuesday

Rolling over in the bed, Leah's arm encountered an unusual phenomenon – an empty space next to her. Twisting around, she looked through blurred eyes at the alarm clock that sat on the bedside table next to Andrew's side of the bed.

3:42

Getting out of bed and feeling the cold night time air in the house assaulting her skin now it was free of the bedcovers, she paused to scoop up her robe from the back of the wardrobe door before moving around the first floor of the house. Moving quietly across the landing, passing the family bathroom, she carefully pushed open the door beyond that and saw the two figures tucked up in their beds.

Realising that Andrew wasn't in there, Leah made her way downstairs to the ground floor of the house. Her bare feet moved quickly as she skipped across the cold wooden flooring. Approaching the entrance to the cellar, she noted the slight crack of light emanating from under the door.

As she crept down the stairs her ears picked up the sound of fingers furiously striking keys. Making her way down the steps into the cellar, the puddles of light from the two lamps in the subterranean living space cast a strange, almost eerie glow around the objects occupying the space. In the far corner was the desk where Andrew's PC was sitting amidst piles of source books and cables. Running along the back wall was an old sofa that they had had since they had moved into their first apartment. A wistful smile crept over Leah's face as she looked at it. Andrew called it their first family heirloom when they purchased it and had stubbornly refused to dispose of the battered sofa ever since. This was placed in perfect position to allow him to access a television and a variety of games consoles that were consigned to the other end of the cellar. As she made the first step onto the cold stone floor the sound of the fingers striking the keys stopped.

"I know what you're going to say…" Andrew's voice sounded drained; exhausted almost.

"It's nearly four in the morning," Leah said. "You haven't slept properly in over a week." She walked across to him, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and kissing his neck. She could see the words on the screen that he had been bashing out. "I thought you'd already given a full statement to the Police at the scene?"

"I did – this is for those folks from the Select Committee." Andrew replied, leaning back against the chair. "It keeps popping up in my head like a bad penny and I want to make sure I have everything down properly."

"You know that you're becoming obsessed with this." Leah said, trying to sound soothing as well as scolding. "You need to let it go."

"I know – and once I've done my bit then I will – but until then…" Leah nodded.

"I can always rely on your moral centre, can't I?" she said. Andrew smiled.

"Yeah – I wonder who I get that from?" He looked over his shoulder at her with a sly grin on his face. "I'll be twenty minutes, maximum, and then I'll be up."

"Okay then." Leah replied, heading back to the cellar stairs. "But if you're not then I'm coming back down here and kicking your ass."

****

The sound of Scott and Cassie talking to each other in excited, animated tones woke Leah with a start. Grabbing her robe and slippers, a familiar smell struck her nostrils as she made her way downstairs. Following the combination of noise and smell to the kitchen she was pleasantly surprised to see Andrew standing at the cooker, frying pan in hand, and her two children sitting patiently at the breakfast bar. Scott looked up at his mother as she entered.

"Dad's making pancakes." He said, a smile beaming from his face.

"Really?" Leah revelled in her children's delight at something as simple as this.

"Yes," Andrew replied without looking up from the frying pan sitting on the gas burner. "It was either this or kippers and I know how you hate the smell of fish first thing in the morning."

"Jesus, yes." Leah said, remembering how the smell had become routed in her subconscious during her pregnancy to the point that even the faintest whiff of it before lunchtimes even after giving birth to the twins made her feel violently sick. She looked over at the children. "Have you washed your hands?"

"Yes Mom." They chimed together. Leah nodded as she turned around to approach the kettle.

"There's tea already in the pot," Andrew said as he dropped a stack of pancakes onto the table that were swiftly descended upon by Cassie and Scott. Pouring the tea into a waiting mug with milk in it, she watched their children begin to eat; Leah turned her attention back to her husband who was preparing a second batch of pancakes on the hob. She moved over to him and wrapped her arms around his waist while resting her head against his shoulders, facing away from her offspring.

"Why are you doing this?" she whispered.

"Couldn't sleep." Andrew muttered. "Besides, it's good for the kids to do something like this before school once in awhile."

"It's good for us to." She replied, smiling as she sighed. She looked over at the children, and then buried her face in Andrew's back. "I feel like I've missed so much of this. I just wish they didn't have to go to school sometimes…"

"What?" Scott suddenly looked up, instinctively picking up on his mother's last few words. "We don't have to go to school today?" Cassie paused in mid-flow, a forkful of pancake soaked in maple syrup hovering above her plate.

"No, you two still have to go to school," Andrew said, prompting moans from both of them. "But we'll do something fun when you get back tonight."

"What like?" Cassie asked before continuing to eat. Andrew shrugged his shoulders.

"Not sure – but I'll think of something." The sound of cutlery being placed against plates signalled that both children had finished eating. "All done?" Andrew watched as the pair of them nodded. "Okay – go and finish getting ready; then I'll take you to school."

As Scott and Cassie disappeared from the kitchen, Andrew served the second batch of pancakes up onto two plates and placed them on the table. Leah sat down opposite him. He passed her the maple syrup as she picked up a pair of cutlery.

"So, what's on your mind?" her question rolled out of her lips before the first mouthful of pancake was inserted.

"What makes you think there's anything on my mind?" Andrew replied. Leah scrutinised his facial expression. To her surprise, his face was an impenetrable mask of calm.

"You only cook early in the morning when you're thinking about things or when you're up against a deadline, usually when you're stressed." She said. Andrew nodded. "And you're not sleeping properly. Do I need to get an appointment sorted out with Dr Ingram for you?"

"No, I'll be fine once all this is behind us." Andrew replied as he ate. "So, are you going to tell me how you know Grace Cook?"

"What makes you think I knew her?" Leah was surprised.

"When the Police escorted her away you kept looking over at her, plus you had that don't I know you look on your face when you saw her in the bedroom after she shot Little Miss Psycho Killer." Leah nodded, acknowledging Andrew's observations.

"She was an intelligence asset that Alison and I had to recover from some hell hole in North Korea back in 1999." She replied, placing her cutlery down on the plate. "I only met her once and I only remember it because it was just before you proposed to me…" Andrew's hand crept over and embraced hers. "What time is Bryant coming over today?"

"Lunchtime." Andrew said. "He wants to run through everything in my statement before it's submitted."

"Well, that will give me some time to run some errands while he's here." Leah finished off her plate of pancakes.

"Leah, I won't do this if it's going to get us into trouble." Andrew stated. "If there's any risk of reprisals…"

"Andy, it's okay. You're doing the right thing." She said, reassuring him as best as possible under the circumstances. "You know that you have my unconditional support one hundred percent in exactly the same way you've supported me over the years – what's that old saying you keep wittering on about? The one you tell the kids when they aren't sure what to do? The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to sit and do nothing."

"Well, Burke's actual quote goes something like "When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle" but that's close enough." The wry smile on his face lifted Leah's spirits for a moment. She walked around the breakfast bar and kissing him.

"Look, I'll take the kids to school – you can clean up the kitchen and make a fresh pot of tea for when I get back." She replied before whispering in his ear and running her fingers lightly across his neck. "And when I get back I expect to find you in bed, naked." Her wicked grin was all the prompting Andrew needed to agree to her suggestion.

****

Amidst the chaos that was the entrance to Hollygate Primary school, Leah gripped the hands of Cassie and Scott tightly to avoid them being swept away from her amidst the sea of other parents. Navigating their way towards the entrance, a voice called out to them from the teacher's car park area.

"Leah!"

"Morning." Leah said as she stopped to wait for Hilary and Hayden Barlow to catch up with them.

"Are we still on for the gym tomorrow night?" Hilary asked. Leah nodded.

"Sure – Andrew's picking the kids up from school tomorrow so we can go the minute you're done."

"Fantastic – I need to get some serious work in before the holidays start." Hilary added. "Did you manage to sort out that Christmas present of Andy's?"

"Well, I'm hopeful that…" As the two adults engaged in conversation, a separate discussion was being conducted some thirty inches beneath them.

"When do you get your cat?" Hayden asked.

"Next week." Cassie said excitedly. Scott pulled the bag off his back and began rummaging around inside it. "She's going to sleep in our room with us."

"Look what I got from Dad's room in the cellar." Clutched in his hand was a worn and dog-eared copy of the Encyclopaedia Cthulhuiana. Hayden's face lit up.

"Wow!"

"Scott!" Cassie exclaimed. "That's Dad's book! What are you doing with it?"

"Miss Hawthorne wanted us to talk about what we read during the half term holidays. I read this so I'm going to talk about it." Hayden managed to pry the book from Scott's hands and began to flick through it.

"Man, it's got pictures in it too!" Hayden's hands stopped and turned the book to face Scott. "Argh! That's gross! What are those?" He pointed to an image of a conical shaped creature with several appendages sprouting out of the apex of the beast.

"Erm, they're called The Great Race of Yith." Scott replied as Cassie continued to frown at her twin brother. "They all turn into beetles in the future!"

"Cool! I love beetles!" Hayden exclaimed as he carried on looking through the book. Cassie softly punched her brother in the arm.

"You're going to get into trouble again." She said as Leah and Hilary finished speaking and herded them inside the leaf-covered gates of the school. Leah watched as her children followed Hayden and Hilary inside the building, a mixture of feelings running through her mind as they waved goodbye to her. After exchanging a few pleasantries with the other parents before everyone began to break up, Leah pulled her cell phone out of her jacket pocket and picked out a number from the speed dial.

"Emma, its Leah." Her voice was low and quiet. "I need another favour from you…"

****

76 Burrow Street

11.43 am

By the time the door was opened, Bryant Mayhew's finger was aching from repeatedly pressing the buzzer for it. Upon opening it, the image greeting his eyes was one of a somewhat dishevelled looking Andrew Hargreaves, dressed in a faded red and white striped dressing gown and black jogging trousers.

"You're earlier than I expected." Andrew said in a flat voice. Bryant nodded, stepping into the house and removing the expensive grey trench coat that covered his navy blue suit from Davies and Son on Savile Row.

"And yet you still aren't dressed." Bryant jibed. Andrew chuckled.

"Hey, I was busy."

"It's a quarter to twelve in the morning. What could you possibly have been doing other than lazing around in bed?"

"Morning Bryant." The sight of Leah walking down the stairs in her dressing gown told Bryant all he needed to know. As she reached the bottom step she gave him a friendly peck on the cheek.

"You know, that's just nasty." Bryant said before he cast a grimace at Andrew. "Get me a cup of coffee before I turn around and leave your arse hanging high and dry."

****

"So, let me get this straight," Andrew said as he leaned back in his chair. The last three hours had been spent discussing his written statement with Bryant and his back was starting to ache. Leah was looking through several sheaves of paper that were piled up on the dining room table as the two men continued to discuss the matter at hand. "You managed to negotiate an anonymous sealed testimony where I don't have to appear before the Select Committee? No one is ever going to know about my involvement in all of this? How the hell did you do that?"

"Let's just say that I'm a damn good lawyer," Bryant replied. "And the Chairman of the Committee owes me at least one or two favours for keeping his son out of prison and out of the newspapers."

"Outstanding." Leah said as she skipped through another few pieces of paper. "So, did they tell you what the full remit of this Committee was?"

"From what I can understand it's was convened to investigate intelligence failings following numerous recent security cock ups." Bryant loosened his tie slightly. "There was that exploding terraced house in Newcastle at the start of the year that seemed to have been part of a wider network of Eastern European ne'er-do-wells, the bombing of HMS Ulysses in Gibraltar last month and that whole attempted assassination thing in Brighton back in June."

"Oh yeah – the militant who nearly got to the Prime Minister at the party conference," Andrew muttered. "I'd almost forgotten about that."

"Yeah. So, whatever initial remit the committee had, it's now been expanded to encompass everything that the intelligence services have been doing for the last three to five years. The minute they got wind of this they were on it like a flash."

"That far back?" Leah tried to contain her shock. "Jesus…." She looked at one piece of paper and Andrew heard her take a sharp intake of breath. "Is this everyone they are going to interview?"

"Yeah – big list isn't it?" Bryant said as Leah handed it to Andrew. As his eyes scanned through the documents there were several names that popped out at him. "Anyone and everyone who has dropped the ball in some respect are all coming under close scrutiny. From what I gather, they are looking at the department heads only though – the powers that be want this wrapped up before they break for the winter recess."

"Why crucify the Indians when you can nail the Chiefs, right?" Andrew asked. Bryant nodded.

"It's possible there could be criminal prosecutions as a result of all this – especially in the case of Mr Blevins." Andrew's eyes suddenly saw three names he recognised on the list, although he knew his wife would have spotted others.

Thomas Benedict; James Blevins; Grace Cook

"I've only been allowed access to a redacted copy of Miss Cook's transcript but if even half of it is true then its explosive stuff. Really, I mean, this Blevins guy was running his own murder-for-hire organisation using state assets." Bryant continued. "However, they are closed hearings, meaning that the public will never hear a word of it beyond the official sanitised report." He took a drink from his cold cup of coffee. "I've even had to sign a non-disclosure agreement – never to repeat what I've learned from all this to anyone for fear of a long and unpleasant prison sentence."

"So, no one gets to find out about the Government's dirty laundry, right?" Andrew said. Bryant nodded.

"Dead right." None of them spoke for a moment as Bryant looked through Andrew's typed statement. "Well, all of this looks fine to me. I still can't understand though why some crazed loon with a gun would kidnap you."

"Beats the crap out of me." Andrew lied. "Then again, you know what I'm like for being in the wrong place at the wrong time."

"Yeah – I guess you're just unlucky like that." Bryant began scooping up the pile of papers and placing them inside his briefcase.

"Can we get a copy of that?" Leah asked. Andrew looked puzzled for a moment. "You know, for our own records." Bryant looked at her, and then at Andrew before a knowing look swept across his face.