Conspiracy

Chapter Nineteen

I woke up what I figured was a couple hours later and the bed next to me was empty. There was a note on the pillow next to me. I shouldn't have been surprised but a small part of me was. I looked up at the ceiling for a while before grabbing the paper and unfolding it.

Baby,

I know you have so many questions and I promise I will explain everything soon. I needed to see you tonight. I missed you so much. I love you Kelly more than I could ever explain and I promise this isn't what it looks like. I hope that you can believe in me for long enough to let me prove it. 

Yours Forever
  A

I didn't know what to do at this point because every part of me wanted to believe her but the cop in me knew that she could be playing me. She could be using our history and my feelings to get what she wanted. So the question is do I tell them? Do I tell Angelica? Fuck do I tell Bailey? She'll kill me if I don't, but she'll probably kill me for sleeping with her last night too. It was still the middle of the night so I rolled over and decided I would figure it out in the morning. No matter how complicated that night was the first night I slept in a really long time.

My alarm was going off in the morning and I almost picked up my phone and threw it across the room. When I finally reached over to turn it off my hand hit the note and it all came flooding back to me. I sat up in the bed really not knowing what I was going to do and then I got a text.

A: "Did you want to drive in together?"

It really didn't make any sense for us not to but man was that going to be weird.

"Ya sure, lobby in 30?"

A: "Perfect"

I jumped in the shower quick to rinse off and wake up. I got out and got dressed and headed down to the lobby. She was waiting there with a coffee in hand and I couldn't help but smile. "Thought you might need this," she said handing it to me. "You have no idea," I said as I reached out for it in desperation. "I definitely slept but knowing what kind of day I had ahead of me was already making me tired. We got into the car and I felt awkward so I decided to go right into it. Even though I could tell she was ready to ask me if I was ok. "So have you heard anything back from your people?" She nodded, "Ya, I talked to the morons watching the house. I don't know how they missed it but they went back and checked the camera's they had set up because of the inability to hide in the area. The reason why they didn't notice it was because Justin didn't do any of the moving himself. They were following him while he was running errands in the city and trucks drove in and emptied out the house. How they lost him altogether is another issue and we are trying to track his movements after they lost him." So Justin was on the run and clearly was guilty of something, but the question remained was Amy a part of any of it? "Any sign of Amy on the camera's?" It was the first time in a long time that saying her name didn't cause me pain and I think Angelica noticed the difference but she answered anyway. "Not as far as we can see. Has she tried to make any further contact?" Now I knew for sure she had noticed the difference, but even if I did tell her there was no way I was telling her before I told Bailey. She would kill me. "Nothing since last night." It was technically not a lie, or at least that's what I told myself. We got to the precinct and Bailey was already there. She was standing at my desk waiting for me and as we walked in she started walking towards me. "You, outside, now." Angelica just looked at us but I shrugged since I had no idea what was going on. She pushed me outside and as we made it out the door she started, "Ok, so what happened last night?" I just looked at her in utter shock, but tried to play it cool, "What are you talking about, you were there?" She rolled her eyes, "Mc, do I look stupid to you?" I looked her up and down, "Well..., and she pushed my shoulder. "Shut up, seriously the note she left. I know what that meant. Did you go see her?" In all that happened I had almost forgot about the first note. When she had made reference to the one thing that always connected us. When we were first looking to go away to college we weren't sure if we were both going to get into the same place. I took her to this spot that my dad had told me about that he used to take my mom, before they fell apart. I took her there to give her a promise ring, and I told her that night as we looked up at the sky that no matter where we ended up that when she looked up at the sky at night I would always been looking up at the moon and stars thinking of her. After that night it became our spot. It was actually where I had planned to ask her to marry me one day. So when I had walked back into my hotel room last night I had every plan to head to that spot and wait for her. I must have been zoned out for a while because she pushed me again, "Dude?" I shook off my daze, "No, I didn't go see her." I knew I should lie to her and I probably could have done a better job, but even as I said it I knew I was giving something away. "Ok, so you didn't go see her. But, " she took a step back to look at me. You have that I just had sex look and I know you didn't go back to Angelica after seeing the video. So she came to you?" I turned to walk away from her before I got a lecture but she grabbed me and turned me back around, "Mc, I get it ok. Just please be careful." I nodded and we both headed back inside. We walked over to the desk and Angelica just looked at me asking the question with her eyes, "She just wanted to tell me about this girl last night, I had interrupted them." She just shrugged, "Alright, well I'm going to make some calls so I'll be in the conference room." I felt bad for lying to her but for now it was the best way to go. I sat down and started going through the paperwork on my desk. My mind was completely fuzzy as I looked at what seemed like the same words over and over and then I saw it. Justin's name on the list of a company down the road connecting him to Lawyer. Bailey saw the look on my face, "What's up?" I tossed the paper at her, "About half way down." As she's gazed at it I looked at the conference room and could see Angelica walking back and forth while she was on the phone. She was stressed or angry or both but I had a feeling she would be back to us with some sort of news, even if I didn't want to hear it. "Shit, really," was what Bailey said when she finally saw it. "Well it's not something we didn't already know but I kind of hoped." I put my head in my hands and mumbled, "Me too." It was then that Angelica came out of the conference room, "What's with the face?" Bailey handed her the paper and I just wanted to hang my head against the table. "Well we kind of figured this right?" I nodded, "Ya, just hoped I guess." I didn't think I needed to say that it was about Amy and she seemed to get it, but her face told me she had worse news, "What is it?" Bailey came over and sat on the end of my desk and we waited for an answer. "Well," she started but hesitated. "Just tell me," she leaned back on the desk next to mine, her hands were at her sides on the desk and she had her head down. She looked up at me, "That phone call was my tech guy. He's heading the team combing through the video footage." She had my attention and I felt Bailey's hand on my shoulder. "They found footage of what looks like Amy around each of the locations days leading up to the shootings." I felt the squeeze on my shoulder, Bailey knew what I was likely to say and she was trying to stop me. Angelica continued, "I have him sending me the videos but it looks like she was casing the place." I shook my head and ignored Bailey's nails digging into my shoulder, "No way. There's no way that she was involved in the shootings." I knew I was being loud and it even felt over the top to me, but right now I didn't care. I stood up, "I know her and she would never be a part of killing anyone." Angelica looked a little surprised, "Look Kel, I get it but you don't know that." My eyes went wide, I was definitely yelling now, "She's the love of my life, are you really trying to tell me I don't know her." She stood up clearly done with me screaming at her, "If you knew her so damn well then why didn't you know she was alive?" That was it, it was like she had stabbed me in the gut. She might have been right but there's no way I was going to believe that my Amy was capable of it, so I said the one thing that was equally as low to say, "You're just jealous." I heard it before I felt it, her hand coming across my face, "Fuck you Kelly." She pushed passed me and stormed off. I had my hand on my face and I looked at Bailey. She wasn't happy, "I know B." She walked over to me and poked my chest with her finger. "Fix it," was all she said and she went outside. I sat down in my chair and put my head back with a giant sigh. How did I get here. How the hell did this happen. Is Amy playing me? Even if she isn't I'm smart enough to know that this is where the evidence is pointing and Angelica's just doing her job. I got up and went to the bathroom and found Angelica. When the door swung open I walked towards her and she tried to blow past me. I grabbed into her arm to stop her, "Ang wait." She stopped but was still reluctant, "Look I'm sorry. There's just so much going on in my head and I don't know what to do with it all." She rolled her eyes, "You don't think I know that Kel. I know I'm to blame for blurring these lines but I really thought you were better than this." I still had a hand on her arm and I grabbed the other one too so I could face her, "I know. Honestly, I really am sorry. It's no excuse but part of the reason this is so hard is because it's all happening now." I took a half a step closer to her and I could feel her body relax a little, "I haven't felt much of anything since Amy. Losing her changed me into the person I am today. I know that we never had a real conversation about where this might be going," I put my hand on the side of her face. "But I think we both know that there's something more than sex here... and that terrifies me." This was probably the worst thing I could say to a woman when the love of my life just came back from the dead but it was true. I was finally admitting not just to her but to myself that I felt a connection to her more than the usual women in my world. "I don't know what is going to happen, but I care." I leaned in to kiss her and our lips barely touched before she put her hand on my chest to stop me, "You think you can just tell me that and kiss me and it changes any of the work stuff?" She was right. I needed to do my job, no matter the outcome. I still had my hand on her face and I rubbed her cheek with my thumb, "I know and I'm sorry." I smirked at her, "Are you really not going to kiss me?" I leaned a little closer and our noses brushed against each other. A smirk came across her face. "Well I had to make you work for a little," her hand came across the back of my neck and she pulled me in for a soft kiss. It wasn't like the other times we had been close. This was different. It was short lived though, when the door spun open, "Let's go jackasses." It was all I heard before the door swung back closed. I was still looking at Angelica with a smile, "I guess we should go." She leaned back in for another small kiss, "Let's go."