Evie took a week at home, spending most of the time in bed; most of it in her bed and most of it alone. After that was three weeks of absolutely being confined to the desk – between them, Tamura and Reed barely let her out of their sights. She had needed to see the police medics and she had been put on a regimen of physio, which had not included running. Her morning runs had been suspended, the jarring causing too much pain in her shoulder. She had been told to take the month... she had managed two weeks and had then taken a gentle jog, doing half the distance she normally did. Two weeks away and she was more than aware that her fitness level had dropped. She had finally past the full fitness test and been given her wings back. There was the occasional visit from Rick and she made the occasional trip to Bel Air. Evie and Rick enjoyed each other’s company and they enjoyed each other in bed. In the end though, the combination of Rick’s past, his present in the form of his son (not that Reed had ever been told), and Evie’s job led them to decide that a permanent relationship was not the most practical of options; they hadn’t ruled out the possibility of a succession of one-night stands but something permanent, exclusive, enduring... it wasn’t really what either of them wanted at that moment in their lives.
At the start of the week she had returned to desk work, word had come through that her Glock had indeed been used to shoot and kill Father Drew. At the time she heard, it didn’t really seem to sink in. The weapon hadn’t been returned to her at that point; that took until the end of the week. When it arrived back at the station she had gone down to the armoury on her own to pick it up but when she saw it, she realized that it wasn’t something she wanted back. She had taken it; what else could she do? She had said nothing to Reed but had gone home at the end of the day and picked up a large bottle of scotch. Reed had ultimately heard and it had been James that he had called. James had turned up on Evie’s door when she was about a third of the way down the bottle. He had stayed with her, helped her drink a little more, and had given her the shoulder to cry on. He slept in her spare room, had gotten her out of bed mid-morning and cooked her breakfast, practically force feeding it to her. Then, he had insisted she take a drive with him. James had been on the phone to Reed and the two of them had agreed to meet up at the Academy shooting range, the same place they had all been competing a few weeks before. Between them James and Reed effectively put Evie through her paces; reminding her that guns didn’t kill people – people killed people and then making her work the competition course again and again and again, firing her own weapon again and again and again. Initially Evie had dug her heels in – as James was more than expecting – but he could be equally obstinate. Once he and Reed had convinced her that they were going nowhere until she did what they asked, she relented. It was almost dusk by the time they left and Evie had gone through boxes of ammunition and even though this wasn’t about accuracy, she had finished up scoring three perfect rounds consecutively. James drove both of them to Malone’s with Reed following in his own car and Evie bought them all dinner as a thank you.
That weekend had effectively been the closure that everyone had needed on the Randell case. Almost. James was still the only one of the four of them who thought that Simon had gotten away, but they had all agreed there was nothing they could do except wait... and hope that James was wrong.
And things pretty much returned to normal. Steve and James had returned to their own divisions, as did Jack once he had had a couple of months enforced leave and then restricted duty. They were all well aware of the fact though that Jack was still working; they all knew the name ‘Clayton Snow’ very well. But when Jack asked Reed and Evie to meet him for lunch, neither one of them suspected what was coming.
Evie had sat through the lunch quietly as Jack had explained what he thought, what he had managed to set up, and what he needed from them. To his credit, he didn’t leave anything out; he had even told them that Steve wasn’t too happy about any of this. That was perhaps what worried Evie most of all; her Dad was putting her in the middle of him and Steve – two men she worshipped (although it would be a cold day in hell before she admitted that to either one of them). It wasn’t as if the two of them had never disagreed on police matters before of course; Steve was very much his own man. But Evie had never been asked to stand on one side or the other before. That Tom had his misgivings too reinforced the fact that maybe Jack was wrong on this one; maybe it was a bit of a forlorn hope to think he could ‘save’ this girl. And if someone else got shot as a result...? But how could Evie deny her own father and when Tom had ultimately agreed, the decision was made. When Steve had found out that Jack had wanted Lisa with Evie, James had needed to practically pin him to the wall of the locker room to stop him storming up to their father’s office. Truth be told, James was really with Steve, but his Dad, Tamura, Reed... there were a lot of people who thought this was gonna to work okay. “Dad wouldn’t put Evie at risk... you KNOW that. Besides... she’s a good cop. How could she not be with you and me teaching her everything she needs to know?” James’ last comment had gotten Steve to stand down... for now.
Evie had sympathy for Tataglia – she seemed to go from one ‘worst cop’s nightmare’ to another – but she also knew that she couldn’t come close to understanding how it felt. And she silently prayed that that would always be the case. She wondered how she would respond if she did ever find herself in that position; her family would be a big part of it – what James and Reed had done that weekend... and that was a minor problem by comparison. One thing she was sure about though; she couldn’t ever see herself putting anyone else – particularly another cop – in danger. If it came to that, she would quit first!
The day had started with the run, the coffee, the drive into work (she had so far managed to avoid hitting anything with the Mustang or being hit by anything so James had lost his bet). She pulled into the parking garage and jumped in the elevator up to the squad room. At some point this morning, she would be introduced to Lisa Tataglia. She found Reed finishing the report from the last smash and grab. As she took her third cup of coffee of the morning, she read through what he had written. She looked up at the downtown map they had on the wall with markers in representing each store that had been hit. There was no pattern that they could see. But every four-six days seemed to be the time period involved. Today was day number four.
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