The Detective

I had to get out of there. This was tearing me apart! I was already hurting so damned bad from her betrayal and now she was throwing herself at me, begging me for a second chance. I wanted nothing more than to give in, to let her back into my life. But I couldn't! I couldn't just forgive her! I hurt too bad to do anything but strike back at her: to hurt her like she hurt me. That's what she did to me.

"I have to go. I'll talk to you later, let you know who to call and who will represent me. I have to go!"

With that I turned and almost ran from the house. I got into my car and drove as fast as I could away from her and from the life I had come to depend on.

It had been almost two weeks since my confrontation with Carol and things were about to change. I was still in that same single room but I had made arrangements to move back into the house. Carol would stay in the second floor master bedroom and I would take the spare room. It was on the first floor and had its own bath and entrance. It was what they used to call a 'Mother in Law' apartment.

That arrangement had come about purely from a monetary bind. As a cop, I didn't make a lot of money and Carol's job as a paralegal wasn't a lot better. She made almost as much as I did, but we had a lot of obligations. The house, the kids, the two cars and the utilities with food and clothing. I had my attorney contact her attorney and pass on the request: she agreed immediately. She wanted me home and this was in her best interest. I knew what she was thinking but I didn't much care. I wanted to be closer to my kids and this would accomplish that. My lawyer didn't like it but he finally agreed if I continued to maintain separate bedrooms. He came to believe that the money angle would play well with the judge.

We were going to court. She had kept her promise. She fought me every step of the way. She raised objections about child support, and although I knew she found a new job almost immediately, she claimed hardship since she had to quit her job to stay home with the kids. She raised other issues and each one cost me money and time. She was smarter than I suspected but then she was a paralegal. She had access to knowledge that I didn't. But I was stubborn and I fought on. I relied on the department's legal team and they supported me pro bono.

I was with my kids every evening and during the weekends. I worked as few hours as I could and Ed supported me so that I could be home before they were ready for bed. I would eat dinner with them on weekends but I spent each evening during the week eating at one or the other of diners I knew about. I was losing weight and eating crap, but I was determined to make this on my own. Funny: usually it's the wife who has the problem getting by on their own.

When I was alone in my room during the evenings, Carol always made it a point to knock on the door and ask if I needed anything. Each night when I came home, the bed was made and fresh towels were in the bathroom. Everything I would need was there and neatly laid out for me to find. I understood her strategy and I appreciated it. But I didn't let it affect me.

Once I was in for the night, I rarely opened the door but she continued to make sure I knew she was just on the other side, waiting. It was killing me, knowing she was there. It was murder, pardon the pun but I resisted the impulse to open the door and pull her inside. When that urge became too hard to resist, I imagined her on her back with shithead's ass pumping up and down between her leg, and her with her legs wrapped around him. That thought worked for awhile but it soon faded since her description of their sessions sort of said that wasn't what happened. From then on, however, I used my right hand to satisfy the urges!

Our lawyers kept fighting and a month later we were finally summoned to court to find out why we couldn't come to terms. I arrived to find her and our lawyers waiting for me. She had requested a meeting with me before we were forced to let the judge decide. My lawyer was in favor, urging me to settle this civilly rather than have a judgment forced down my throat. He said I would not be pleased if the judge got involved. I agreed out of desperation.

We were shown to a small room without windows and containing a single desk with four chairs. I went in, followed by Carol who stood there looking around. She finally sighed, and took one of the chairs. I followed suit, taking the one across from her. I looked at her and made a motion for her to start.

"When are you going to forgive me and help me get our life back on track? You know this isn't what either of us want. I admit that I fucked up and I promise it will never happen again. I'm sorry for what I did. I'll do anything you want to make up for it. Just tell me what it is you need me to do and I'll do it. Do you want to have your own affair? Fine! I won't ask any questions and I'll wait till you tell me it's over. In the meantime, I'll remain faithful."

She was serious, that much I could tell. I did know her as well as anyone could and I knew when she was telling me the truth. And before you say anything, she never really lied to me before because I never asked any questions. I trusted her blindly. It never occurred to me to question her. So she had no reason to lie.

"I can't forgive you. At least not yet. I still see you and him together and in my nightmares, I imagine all sorts of things. Sometimes I wake and can't get back to sleep because of what I see when I close my eyes. How do you expect me to live with that?"

"Oh God, Pete! It was nothing like that. It was never like it was with you and I making love. It was just quick, dirty sex with no foreplay and no affection. What you saw in the lobby was me trying to convince him to get it over with. That wasn't me enjoying anything! I just wanted it to end and that day was the last for both of us. He had to tell you that I was ending it that day!"

I knew that part was true but so what? She still cheated on me and in doing that, betrayed everything I thought I knew about her. And for what? What did she gain by doing it? I had never asked her that. Why?

"Carol, tell me why you did it? Why would you throw away all we had for a stupid affair with another man? Why?"

"It was stupid and selfish of me. I was spending a lot of time with Jeff and he was a smart, smooth operator who always made it a point to flatter me, to tell me how sexy I was and how much he admired me. He talked about my kids and you and how lucky you were to have me. And he made no secret of the fact that he wanted me too. He kept after me and I began to look forward to his praise and his attempts to seduce me. I had no problem resisting him but I finally got it in my head that I wanted to see what it was like. He was not a threat to you and he never tried to be. I just thought it would be safe to do it once just to see what it would be like. It never meant any more to me than that."

"What about me and the kids? Did you ever consider what it would do to me if I found out?"

"You were never to know! Never! It was my secret and after I found out how guilty I felt, I knew I could never tell you. God, how it ate at me, but even so I did it again. I'll never know why! I should have told you and ended it immediately. I still ask myself why I didn't do that."

I listened but nothing made any sense to me. They were just words that carried with them the pain of her betrayal. I understood then that nothing she said could make it any better for me. I had to live with this and learn to either live with it or move on. I rose and said in as calm a voice as I could, "What can we do to make this happen quicker?"

She looked at me, her eyes brimming with tears as she considered my words. "Nothing! I haven't changed my mind. I don't want this divorce and I will continue to make it as hard for you as possible. You will have to throw me away because I won't go quietly!"

With that, she walked out of the room. We were going to court.

The judge wasn't happy and he made his ruling that the lawyers would get together and work something out or he would take it into his own hands and decide for himself. He told both of us that we were foolish people to force him to do something like that. He mentioned our two kids and wanted to know if we knew what we were doing to them. I listened, but I had heard judges rant and rave for years. I tuned him out. When he slammed the gavel down, I stood and walked out as quickly as possible. I went back to work.

Ed and I had a new case: one that involved a drug deal gone bad. There were two dead blacks and one dead Hispanic lying in the morgue. It was the beginnings of a real down and out drug war between two rival gangs. Right now the Hispanics were ahead two to one and the blacks had vowed to even the score. Ed and I were trying to mediate an end but it wasn't going very well. We were to meet one of the leaders that night and see what we could arrange. We were pretty sure of the shooters and we wanted them bad but we had to end the violence first.

Ed and I made our plans, and we both went in armed to the teeth. It was in a run down section of town but we knew it like the back of our hand. We parked the car in a strategic location, made sure we had plenty of ammo and a clear line of fire and we told dispatch where we were and to have a couple of units available if we called. Dispatch said cars were cruising the neighborhood and would respond when called. We had done all we could and now we just waited for Booker to show up. He was the kingpin we needed to call off the retaliation. If he would.

From the get-go, the meeting was a bust. First, three Hispanic men showed up and looked around as if to ask what the hell was going on. We were in neutral territory so they were in no danger from the other gangs but we didn't expect them and it looked bad for Ed and I. The man we were to meet didn't show at all. Now, we found ourselves in the middle of a bad situation. Ed and I had our weapons out as we faced down the three armed and angry men that thought we were trying to set them up. We had no idea what they were talking about but we were beginning to realize that we were the ones set up. We tried to talk our way out of it but someone, somewhere, started shooting. That's when all hell broke loose!

I remember Ed yelling, me calling Dispatch for backup, telling them "shots fired!" and both of us returning fire. We were trying to move back behind the car for some cover when I felt a smack in the middle of my chest. Then everything went quiet.

I saw Ed look at me in shock, I saw him get off a few shots and then he was talking to me, but I could hear nothing! I knew I had been hit and I thought Carol would be pleased that our divorce wouldn't be a problem since I would be dead. I realized at that instant I was going to miss her. I loved her with all my heart and the wave of sadness that washed over me caused my eyes to water and my heart to pound. I wished I had tried to work things out, to find some forgiveness, but it was too late now. I was afraid that by my refusal to forgive her, I was going to go to hell. I was shaken by a wave of pain those last thoughts brought. That was the last thing I remembered.

I woke suddenly and in panic. I looked wildly around me to see if the shooting was still continuing and if we were in trouble. I knew I couldn't hear the sound of gunfire but I knew it had to still be going on. I was trying to get up and having no success when someone put a hand on my shoulders and pushed me back down. I found I had no strength to fight them and let my shoulders slump back. I was surprised when what I lay down on was soft, rather than hard concrete. I closed my eyes, squeezed them tight like they taught us in academy and then opened them again.

I found myself looking directly into Carol's eyes. She was above me, looking down and her eyes were glassy and wet. I blinked again, several times, and tried to make some sense out of things. Why would she be here in the middle of a firefight? She could get killed! I tried to tell her that and couldn't get my mouth to work right. All I heard was a few mumbles that made no sense. And then it hit me: I could hear! And I noticed that there was no gunfire and no sounds of yelling or sirens in the distance. Nothing that should be there. I shut my eyes and tried to think.

"Pete, open your eyes! It's me and you're OK. You're in a hospital. You were shot and you've been asleep for a long time. You're safe Peter. Open your eyes!"

I heard the words and they seemed to answer some of the questions that were whirling around in my mind: why had the gunfire stopped and why were there no sounds of sirens and street cops and everything else. I had apparently been hit and I had been taken to a hospital. And I was alive! That was the most surprising thing of all. I was alive!

I opened my eyes and saw Carol staring down at me. When my eyes stayed open, she pulled back with a smile on her face. She seemed happy as she turned to call the nurse. I just watched her as she went out into the hall, holding onto the doorjamb as she motioned for someone to come. I had time to look at her as she stood there and I saw with surprise that she was dressed in a drab sweater over a worn looking housedress. That seemed so out of place for her that I noticed it even in the state of confusion I was in at the time.

After that, it was more confusion for a while. There were doctors and nurses all doing things to me and to the machines around me. I was feeling nothing from my apparent wounds but I was also not feeling much like celebrating. My head felt fuzzy, my stomach was definitely unhappy, none of my muscles wanted to obey my commands and I had an overall feeling of lethargy. I just wanted to go to sleep and sleep for the next week or longer. Anything to get my body to feel like mine again. I shut my eyes and felt it all drift away.

The next two days were strange for me. I woke later that day to find the nurse unhooking me from my support machines. I had to sit up, lay back, sit up, and in general move my body like a puppet. The best part was that I felt little pain in my chest where the bullet had gone in. The doctor who came in that afternoon told me they were able to get the bullet out and seal me up which was fortunate since the bullet was very close to my heart. If it had to stay inside, it would have moved eventually and killed me. I had been unconscious for almost forty eight hours. He told me my condition had been upgraded to satisfactory and that I could be discharged in a few days if nothing else changed.

Ed came in along with several of my friends from the department. Lots of uniforms, buddies from when Ed and I had done our time among them visited over the next two days and I felt better after their visits. Good friends make recovering much easier and faster.

I also saw my two kids, Julie and Jimmy, when Carol and Ed sneaked them in. They were too young to visit by hospital rules but we were part of the police department and the hospital gave us some privileges. I guess they saw too many of us hurt or injured and they tended to favor us. Not better care, just more caring. I spent almost ten minutes with Julie and Jimmy and that was the highlight of my day. I needed them, in more ways than one.

Carol was strangely different now and I was struggling to make sense of it. Neither of us had mentioned her affair since I had wakened. She was trying very hard to be the perfect wife: solicitous of me, always asking if I needed anything, telling me how much she loved me and how anxious she was for me to get well and come home, but she had trouble meeting my eyes and looked away often. She was clearly nervous and sometimes when the pain or the discomfort got to me, I would curse or make a growl which caused her to hunch her shoulders and turn her head away. Somehow that made me angry, angrier than arguments or words of apology would.

Only once did I say anything related to the affair when I said something about finding a place to live when I was discharged. Carol's face turned white, her breathing became rapid and strained but she didn't say anything. She looked back at me for a second, her lips quivering like she wanted to say something but then she looked away again. Instead of a rebuttal, she said that she was going to try to get the kids in to see me if she could and I quickly asked her how she could arrange that. The moment was forgotten and we continued to coexist, albeit uncomfortable.

Ed and Carol seemed to be getting along fine. That surprised me since Ed knew what Carol had done and Ed was fiercely loyal to me, as I was to him. I watched them together and they seemed to get along just as they always had. Carol and Ed's wife were close friends and Ed liked Carol. Always had. Still, it seemed strange. I decided to ask him about it when we were alone. That didn't happen till a day later, just before I was to be released. He was sitting with me, talking about the case we were working when we were shot.

"Seems Booker set us up that day, partner. He claims he got word we were gonna take him down and charge him with the murder of them guys. Wouldn't tell me where that came from but he knows now it was crap. He never apologized as you'd suspect but I could see in his eyes he was gonna get even. Know what partner? I called the team off. I don't give a shit and I ain't gonna try to stop him this time. Let 'em shoot each other up and see if I give a shit. It's cost you too much, us trying to stop those assholes from killing each other. More power to them!"

I agreed with him although it hit me in the gut to allow murder to happen. But sometimes, you have to turn your back and let things go down. Too many people would get hurt trying to stop something that seemed inevitable. So, let em go at each other and then let God sort them out. I nodded as he spoke and then agreed.

"Don't see any other way Ed. I have to agree. Let them do what they have to do and we'll sort it all out later.

"Say Ed. What's with you and Carol? I would have expected a little more loyalty from you, knowing what she did. Don't expect you to hate her or anything, but you two seem to be just fine."

Ed looked at me for a few moments, his mind obviously trying to filter out what to say to me. I had seen that look before, when we were working a case and questioning a suspect. Ed was very careful in his words and he always had control. I watched him come to a conclusion as to what to say. One thing I knew: I could believe whatever he told me.

"Pete, I have to say something to you now. You're my partner and I love you. You know that and you know what I mean when I say that. So, OK, here it is. I was the one that told Carol that you had been shot and that you were in serious condition. Pete, she went to pieces! She lost it man! She went down like she had been shot. She was so far gone, I had to pick her up and carry her to the couch. She was a wreck. I called 911 and sat with her until they could get there.

"I called Helen and she came over to get the kids when they came home from school and we waited until the bus got there. The emergency guys got there and gave Carol a shot to calm her down cause she was a complete wreck. Pete, she went to pieces, man. I hope to hell I never have to see that again with anyone. It made me seriously think about what we do, I'll tell you.

"Anyway, it was clear to me that you are her life, man. The thought of losing you was almost enough to kill her. Any woman who loves her man that much can't be all bad. You have to know that Carol is beside herself, knowing that she fucked up and almost lost you twice; once to a divorce and once to a fucking bullet. I don't know which was worse for her.