A Certain Justice

'It's all right.' She ran a hand down his back. 'A lot of people can't play cards very well. It takes a certain kind of mind and you just don't have it. It doesn't mean you're stupid or anything. I mean about other things.'

He turned around, his face a blank. Stepping past her, he hooked a leg, reached an arm out and… 'hey!'… executed an expert judo takedown, lowering her gently the last six inches to the floor. 'Oh. Sorry,' he said, continuing across the room, 'I guess I didn't see you.' He sat in the stuffed chair.

She crawled across the floor on her hands and knees, put her elbows up on his knees, rested her head in his lap. He combed his fingers through her hair. 'I wonder if this is what being married is like.'

'If what is? You're trapped forever so you play gin to pass the time?'

'Well, that's the romantic view, but I was thinking more about this feeling like you're the whole world, like there's nobody else in it.'

She looked up at him, her eyes gone soft. He wasn't teasing her. 'I think that's the way some marriages start out. But I don't know too many people who feel like that anymore, who even think you should. Do you?'

Kevin shook his head. 'No. I don't know if I ever did.'

'Well, your parents – '

'No, not mine. It was everybody for themselves in my family. My dad was always preoccupied with business, and Mom was… Mom was mostly interested in Mom. And Patsy as just Mom junior. Except maybe… Joey.'

'Your brother – '

'Yeah. He was a good guy,' Kevin sighed. 'Anyway, what got us on that?'

'I think we were talking about not feeling like you were in it alone. You still miss him, don't you? Your brother?'

Again a sigh. 'You know, the word came and I didn't believe it. I didn't believe it. I mean, it couldn't have been Joey. They must have got it wrong. Of course, they didn't get it wrong. The one time the army didn't screw up…'

Her head still in his lap, she held his legs tightly.

'So after that, I just… I don't know.'

'You and Wes,' she said.

'What do you mean?'

'I think I'm starting to see why you two guys get along so well.' She told him what she knew of the Mark Dooher story, Wes's loss of faith, the distrust of commitment. 'But that really isn't either of you, is it? That's not who you started out to be-'

'I don't know anymore, Mel. I spent the last three years… well, you know what I've been, how I've been living. I didn't want to get into any of this' – he gestured vaguely – 'this whatever we're in. I sure as hell didn't choose this. This isn't my fight, my story-'

'Maybe it is. Maybe your story is what you wind up doing.'

'I don't want to wind up doing this.'

'Maybe we don't get that option. There's a comforting thought.' She shrugged against him. 'Anyway, it's got us back. That's something, isn't it?'

A long moment passed. He was rubbing gently, moving his hand over her back, her shoulders, her neck. 'I was a jerk. I mean before. With you.'

'Well, that was me, too. I shouldn't have let you be such a jerk. I should have stood up for myself more but I was afraid you'd leave me.'

'I wanted to. That's what I did, see? I left people. I did not feel things, except that I started feeling things about you. I liked you, was the problem. I liked that you were motivated and smart and organized, that you were this quality person…'

'You liked that?'

'Do you have any idea how rare that is, Mel? Yeah, I liked that. Finally, I meet somebody who's not a flake. Who's got some substance.'

'I thought you hated that I wasn't any fun…'

'You were fun, at first, if you remember, until I-'

'It wasn't you.'

'It was too. It scared me – liking you so much – I mean, what if you weren't really who I thought? Then I'd really be up a creek, wouldn't I… so, anyway, I had to see if you were really so tough, so sure of yourself, so competent - and my test was that if you continued to like me when I treated you so badly then you couldn't be so great after all. Not if you'd take that…'

She shook her head, looked up at him, tears in her eyes. 'I didn't just like you, Kevin. I didn't just want a boyfriend. I fell in love with you. I loved you. I still love you.'

'I saw that. That was another strike against you.'

'Why?'

'Why? What was to love? What do you think I'm hiding from with all my craziness? No kidding, I don't see how anybody's got any business loving me…'

She glared up at him. 'Why do you think you're here in the first place, Kevin? Why do you think we're here? Because you, Kevin Shea and nobody else, tried to save Arthur Wade's life. Because you are probably the one person I have ever known who thinks it's important to stay here and get the truth out, even if no one wants to hear it. Not to run, not make excuses, just to do what you've got to do. And you know what? You're right. You've been right all along. And I love you. Am I getting repetitious?'

'A little. I can handle it.'

'And you know, I wasn't so perfect either. Being so controlled all the time. You were right about that. I just needed my… my bottom kicked.'

He patted. 'You mean this pretty thing?'

'That very one. And you did it. Kicked my ass good and proper.'

'And would again, I might add.' He pulled her up the rest of the way into his lap.

'Your ribs,'she said.

'Suddenly my ribs are fine.'

Melanie lay her head in the crook of his neck as he enfolded her to him.

Melanie was taking a bath. Kevin was in the stuffed chair. He had started to take a look at the News at Four, but one of the lead stories had included a statement by Alan Reston on how the fugitive Kevin Shea's tape was inherently not believable – an obvious ploy to evoke sympathy by taking his case directly to the people. It was not going to work. There was a murder warrant out on Kevin Shea and all efforts were still being employed to bring this dangerous criminal to justice. He'd turned it off then.

What was he going to do now? Wes Farrell hadn't been home. He'd called three times in the past half hour. The DA's escalation – the words 'dangerous criminal' – bothered him. He was begi

He couldn't let it come to that. He also couldn't let Melanie stay any longer if he thought it would. The 'dangerous criminal' rhetoric was eating his guts – somebody out there might not be pla

But he was also distrustful of what might happen to him if he was brought to jail – he believed that there was a too real chance that he would not survive inside long enough to get to trial.

He punched the buttons on the phone again. Wes had evidently done a good job getting the tape – finally – recognized and played. But they needed a better way to stay in contact. He hadn't realized that things could move this fast, could cut off his options, take decisions out of his hands. He was getting that feeling now. Events had taken things out of his control, and he had to try to stop their inexorable rush, and without Farrell and some legal plan he didn't have any idea how he was going to do it.

At that moment Farrell was pulling up a chair at the one window table at the Little Shamrock. He had, in fact, gone back to his apartment after his successful mission with the videotape, intent on waiting until Kevin called him again. But ten minutes after he had gotten home Dismas Hardy had called, asking if he could talk with him, off the record, about Kevin Shea. They could meet at the Shamrock.