For that very reason, I clung to the outrage like a lifeline.
Ben turned and glanced out the fogged door once again, pushing it open for a moment to get a better view. When he looked back to me, he broke the silence. “The guys from the CSU just pulled up. They’re gonna hafta search the house.”
“I pretty much got that from the handful of papers. What are they looking for?”
“Look at the warrant. It’s all listed.”
“I did and it’s pretty goddamned ambiguous, Ben.”
“Yeah, well that’s how they write ‘em.”
“Obviously. So what are they really looking for?”
“I can’t tell ya’. You should know that.”
“Uh-huh, that seems to be your answer for everything right now.”
He shook his head. “They’re lookin’ for evidence, Row. Evidence.”
“Dammit, Ben. This is wrong and you know it.”
“Call your lawyer,” he said. “And light a candle…or burn some incense…or whatever the hell you Witches do. ‘Cause I’m tellin’ ya’ now, Felicity’s gonna need it.”
“This isn’t over, Ben.”
“Jeezus, Row, believe me…I hope like hell you’re right.”
“I want to talk to her before you go,” I demanded.
“She’s already in custody.”
“Yeah. No shit.”
“What I’m sayin’ is that means I can’t let ya’ talk to ‘er. Not now. Not yet.”
“Bullshit! Get out of my way. I’m talking to her.”
“I just told ya’, you can’t,” he replied in a far more stern tone, punctuating it with a shake of his head. “Don’t make this any harder than it already is.”
“The hell I can’t!” I shot back as I started forward.
I didn’t get very far.
I was stopped cold as the palm of Ben’s hand thudded hard in the center of my chest. I wasn’t surprised that he would do something of the sort, but I also had no intention of letting it stop me for very long. I instantly lashed out, swinging my right arm wide in a roundhouse punch.
Of course, I should have realized that he would be expecting it. As turbulent as the past few minutes had been, he had probably been waiting for me to do something stupid all along. And, stupid was putting it mildly.
My friend’s left arm shot upward out of trained reflex, sliding against mine and deflecting my angry fist harmlessly away. With a quick thrust of his right, he pushed me hard. Since my wildly careening punch already had me off balance, it didn’t take much for him to launch me backward across the room.
I stumbled a pair of steps before completely losing my footing, and a split second later sharp pain shot through my buttocks as they impacted the floor. That sensation was almost instantly followed by a stab of agony lancing into my left elbow when it came down against the hardwood, and finally there was a dull thunk on the back of my head from striking the arm of the chair. That last blow didn’t exactly do wonders for my already throbbing grey matter.
I heard myself yelp, and then I started to scramble upward but only came a few inches off the floor before dropping back down with a heavy thud. Dull pain was radiating from my tailbone up through my lower back, and my nerves were more than just a little jangled.
“Jeezus! Fuck me! Goddammit, Rowan!” Ben sputtered with more than enough anger to fill the room to capacity. “GOD DAMMIT! GOD DAMMIT!”
I was definitely stunned from the fall, and my ears were now ringing, so his tirade came at me as a muted string of syllables. Fortunately, I didn’t feel any queasiness or a blackout coming on, so I didn’t think I was truly injured.
However, I just kept sitting there, motionless, letting my rage work as an anesthetic for all the pain, emotional as well as physical.
Ben’s tone ratcheted down the scale from anger to remorse in the span of a single sentence. “Awww, Jeez, Row…Man…What’d ya’ hafta fuckin’ go an’ do that for?!”
I assumed the question was rhetorical, not that I had really intended to answer him if it wasn’t. Still, I couldn’t help but throw one of his earlier comments back in his face.
“I think you know,” I spat.
“Jeezus…Are ya’ okay?” He stepped forward as he spoke, extending his arm and offering me a hand up.
I simply shrugged away from him.
“Row…”
“Fuck you, Ben,” I told him.
“Dammit, Row, this…”
“Get out of my house,” I ordered, my voice a low growl, fully devoid of any compassion. “Just…Just get out of my house.”
He stood there, looking down at me with abject sadness welling behind his eyes. What just happened was something neither one of us was going to be able to fix, at least, not right at this moment. And, the way I was feeling, I wasn’t sure if I ever wanted it fixed. I had a sickening notion that I was going to need every bit of my anger just to get through what was coming, and that was assuming that I was going to make it through at all.
The silent pause continued with us both staring at one another, him pained, me incensed. I allowed it to continue for what seemed a full minute but was in reality probably no more than a scant few seconds.
“You heard me you sonofabitch!” I finally screamed. “Get the fuck out of my house!”
With a dazed shake of his head and one last look of sadness, he turned and headed for the door.
CSU technicians were already coming into the house as Ben was lumbering out. One of them shot me a concerned look, glanced over his shoulder at Ben’s back as he disappeared down the front steps, and then returned his gaze to me.
“Are you okay, sir?” he asked.
“No,” I snipped.
He reached his hand toward me and started to ask, “Do you need…”
“No!” I cut him off, my tone still livid. “Just leave me alone!”
He shook his head and muttered a sarcastic “Excuse me” as he took a step back then turned away and joined up with the other techs as they began fanning out through my home.
I didn’t bother to drag myself up from the floor until I heard Ben’s vehicle back out of the driveway then speed away, taking my entire reason for living with it.
CHAPTER 5:
“This isn’t good,” Jackie’s voice hummed from the earpiece of the phone.
Our attorney had patiently listened to me as I relayed to her the story of Felicity’s arrest, interrupting me only when necessary to ask for clarification on particular facts. Then, following a proverbial pregnant pause at the end of my diatribe, those three words were all she said. Unfortunately, they were far from what I wanted to hear.
Jackie had a habit of thinking out loud, and I’m certain that the comment was nothing more than her rhetorically voicing her thoughts. However, I was still at least five notches beyond pissed off, not to mention the fact that a handful of crime scene technicians were turning my house into a disaster area all around me as I stood there. Therefore, I was really in no mood for listening to someone tell me something I already knew. Especially when it wasn’t helping to fix the problem.
“No fucking shit,” I spat into the handset. “Are you billing me for that? Because I already had it figured out on my own.”
“Okay,” she returned, far more calmly than I expected. “The first thing you need to do, Rowan, is settle down. Biting people’s heads off isn’t going to help the situation. Especially when the head you’re biting off is mine. I’m on your side, remember?”
“Yeah, well you’ll have to excuse me. I’m still trying to pry a knife out of my back that was put there by someone else who was supposed to be on my side.”
“Your friend the cop? The one who arrested Felicity?”
“I wouldn’t exactly call him my friend. Not now. Not after this.”
“You might need to take a step back and look at it from a different perspective, Rowan.”