"A Path Not Taken"

Copyright 2009 Penn O'Hara

T

Usual disclaimers apply.

Law and Order Timeline: During Season Two, post “Confession”.

oOo

Chapter Three

“Mike, you either tell me about it, or snap out of it.”

Logan tore his eyes away from the phone on his desk, startled, to meet Phil Cerreta’s amused ones.

“I know the signs,” Phil said, his face a mixture of understanding and humor. “You gave some doll your phone number and now you’re playing the waiting game. She’s not going to call. Not while you’re watching it.”

“She’s not—” Damn, he slipped. Logan often talked about his women to Phil. The seasoned detective and family man was indulgent of his exploits, and often had a word of advice, but Logan wasn’t getting into this one with his partner. Liz wasn’t one of his women, she was his shrink, but the other night had confused him, and he wasn’t getting his phone calls returned.

“It’s a… business call. I left a message—” He shut up. He was only going to dig himself deeper if he kept going.

“No business call has you that riveted, unless you’re thinking of changing careers?” Phil’s eyes widened and he straightened in his chair, causing it to creak in protest. “You changing careers, Mike?”

“No!” Logan shuffled the papers on his desk, making a show of concentrating on the file in front of him.

“Well then?” Phil prompted.

“None of your fuckin’ business, Cerreta,” Logan snapped, hoping to put an end to it, but he got it wrong again. Hostility only piqued his partner more.

Phil’s chair creaked again as he bounced forward to lean across his desk and tap Logan’s papers with an adamant finger. “Who is she?”

Logan stared hard at the other detective, considering how far evasion would get him. Say the wrong thing, and he was going to be in deeper shit.

The truth was, he needed to talk to someone about Liz and that night, four days ago, and how her receptionist wouldn’t put his subsequent calls through to her and how she was ignoring his messages. He needed someone else’s perspective on why his shrink would visit him late at night, run out of his apartment and then kiss him — hell, it was more than a kiss — in the elevator, then run out on him again. He needed someone else’s take on it before he made an ass of himself over a woman with the obvious class of Liz Olivet.

Logan only had one choice.

Lie. And lie well.

There was no way he was going to set himself up for ridicule when he had no idea where Liz was heading with this. He’d just have to wait until their session tomorrow, tackle her with it and take it from there.

“Okay,” he bluffed. “You got me. I gave my card to this gorgeous blonde who’s never gonna call me in a million years, but…hey!” He spread his hands out and grinned. “I gave it my best shot.”

Phil’s eyes narrowed suspiciously, then he leaned back, folded his arms across his ample middle and grilled him with a stare. Logan held his position, evened his breathing and stared back.

Shrugging, Phil reached for the file he’d been working on, rearranged a few papers, then dropped his gaze to it.

“Better luck next time,” he said.

Yeah, Logan thought. Next time he was going in person.

oOo

Liz’ reception area was as utilitarian as her office.

The chairs were lightweight aluminum and vinyl, the magazine table, small and wooden and only lightly scattered with local papers and Readers Digests. The high counter behind which her secretary sat, hid the documents and files on which the latter was working from the public. From his chair near the door, Logan could only see the top of her head, currently bent in concentration, and he considered shaking her out of her professionalism by asking her why she never passed on his messages.

Shifting on the chair, he leaned forward, hands dangling between his knees. “I was wonder—”

The door to Liz’ office opened and Logan half-rose from the chair, then froze. A man, well-dressed in tailored trousers and a fine white shirt set off by a tie with a silken sheen, walked out of Liz’ office and held out his hand.

“I’m Martin Sanez. Come in, Mike.”

Logan took the offered hand automatically, but stayed where he was. “I’m seeing Liz—”

“—who couldn’t make it today. She asked me to stand in for her.” Sanez let go of Logan’s hand, and stepped back, a sweeping hand inviting him into Liz’ office.

Logan had no intention of accepting. He smelled a rat. Liz wasn’t returning his phone calls and was now palming him off to another shrink. He felt the familiar surge of anger that culminated in obstinacy.

“I’ll come back another day,” he said, dodging the other man and stepped up to the receptionist’s counter. “You want me in for another appointment, you call me,” he told the woman behind it, then spun on his heel and walked out of the office, his steps angry and measured.

He’d been stood up before. Hell, women had done worst things to him than avoid him, but he sensed fear, not indifference, and he needed to know why Liz Olivet feared him. It would be short work for him to discover her home address.

He was all for mountains going to the Mohameds when the prophets weren’t playing fair.

oOo

Her apartment building was in the upper east side and easily the type of place Logan imagined in which Liz would live. Elegant and well-kept, with a doorman guarding entry. Heavy-set, with the sense of importance often found in his profession, he was no match for a NYPD detective brandishing a gold shield. Logan didn’t need the lettering on the polished brass letter boxes in the foyer to guide him to Liz’ third floor apartment either. The doorman summoned the lift and hit the floor button for him.

When Liz opened her door, her surprise at an uninvited guest quickly gave way to compliance. She had to have known she wouldn’t get away with keeping him at arms’ length, but maybe she didn’t realize how little time she had. Without a word, she stepped back to allow him entry.

Feeling as if he scored a point with her, Logan sauntered in, looking around at ease. Despite being on her turf, he felt he had the advantage.

He wasn’t expecting an over-abundance of hospitality from her, so he decided to make himself at home. Briefly noting an abundance of modern bookshelves lining the apartment’s walls, and by-passing a cream dining suite with a flower-laden vase as its centrepiece, Logan headed for a claret-colored velvet sofa flanked by a large rug with a geometric motif.

Not his kind of décor, the apartment’s pristine quality mocked Logan’s crassness for coming here, uninvited and determined to grill its occupant.

Shrugging out of his coat, Logan tossed it onto a matching claret chair and settled onto the sofa. He tugged off his tie and released the top buttons of his shirt, before spreading his arms across the back of the furniture.

He eyed Liz still holding the door open. She was dressed in a softly flowing one-piece pant suit belted at the waist, and, bare of make-up and shoes, she looked vulnerable and resigned.

Her eyes darted to him and widened. Taking a deep breath, she turned abruptly to shut the door.

“You know how this is going to end, don’t you?” she asked softly, her back still to him.

“Hell, Liz! I don’t know anything!” he exploded. “That’s why I’m here. To get answers.”

She turned, one hand still gripping the door handle as if it were a lifeline. The vulnerability was still in her stance, but the resignation on her face had been replaced by something else — a yearning, a need to have a decision made.

Aware he was somehow affecting her, Logan felt an even greater sense of power.

She wanted him to make the first move.

oOo

to be continued…