“Yeah, but you won in the end, and I'm here now in Philly, put in my place due to some nasty bit of political palua so convoluted I didn't see it before I was blindsided and pushed out. Nothing to do with our mutual friend Kowona or anything we might want to keep buried. Trust me.”
She breathed deeply at this. “That much is… is good.”
He advanced on her, and now they stood staring into each other's eyes, a pencil's width apart, each smelling the other's tension. His cologne reminded her of their parting in Rome a year ago, a parting she had not known would be their last, a parting that ended their four-year-long love affair. It had been the longest relationship with a man she'd ever had-or ever managed, as her shrink would likely put it.
He reached out and pulled her to him, roughly kissing her, his tongue searching her mouth with a fire she had not felt since their last time together.
She allowed the kiss to last a moment too long, but then pushed him away, hard, and nearly shouting, “Damn you, Jim! Damn you, get away from me. Get out. This isn't happening.”
“Sweetheart, Jess-”
“No, no! I'm not your anything, Jim!” She pulled from his grasp again. “I said get out!”
“We could have what we both wanted before; we could have it now, Jess. Now that I'm in Philadelphia… we're close enough now so that we can try for a real relationship.”
“There's no we any longer. I put you out of my head, out of my heart. I love Richard now.”
He stepped back, his face going hard and cold, as if her words had frozen him. Looking crushed, he fell into a leather chair, his head in his hands. “I've tried fighting it, Jess; didn't want to grovel at your feet, anything like what just happened. Kept away for that reason. Same time, I've… I gave it a lot of thought.”
“Please, James.”
“How we both wanted the same things, a family someday, a stable life, and how neither of us could give the other anything resembling stability, and now-”
“It's over, James, truly over now.”
“-that I'm looking at making my home so close to Quantico, and you're so near now, that… well…”
Ironies all around, she thought but did not say. She returned to stand behind the desk. Safe distance, safe barrier, yet long ago, when he walked out on her long-distance fashion, she had built up in her mind an impenetrable barrier against James Kenneth Parry. She had had enough therapy to know herself, to acknowledge that she didn't “do” forgiveness, not well and not genuinely.
“Forgive me for saying so, Jim, but you were the one who ended our relationship. You had your chance, but now it's over. Long over. I'm in love with Richard Sharpe.”
“Sure… sure. Lot easier to love a guy who's an ocean away. You found that out with me, and now with him. Makes sense for a woman like you, Jessica.”
She glowered at him. “An ocean away and content that way, James Parry. Now, I told you before, and I'll tell you again, get out!”
“You can't say there's nothing left between us, Jess. I won't accept that.”
She gnashed her teeth, unable to respond to this, and repeated, “Nothing. Nothing whatever. I'm finally free of you altogether, James. I guess your coming here tonight made me realize that; for that favor, I thank you.”
He continued as if not hearing her. “Now that I'm here, now that we finally have a real chance to commit, you have another man in your life. Timing is impeccable. A little too impec-”
“Please, Jim, just go… please.” He pushed himself up from the chair as if his body fought to hold him back. Standing now, looking beaten, he made his way to the door. “Think maybe it was a mistake to attempt to work this case together, but now we're in it, we've got to make the best of it, Jess. Think we can do it?”
“I can if you can, Jim, but no more talk of us.”
“That can be arranged, I'm sure.”
“Jim, there is no us in that sense any longer. I've grieved a long time for what we had, and that grief and despair gave way to a new hope, one that doesn't include you.”
His lip quivering, he nodded. “So much has happened since we first met. Hard to let go of it all, Jess, especially now, after seeing you again.”
She said no more, allowing him a silent, dignified exit.
When Jessica heard the elevator door mechanically open and close, she began to sob. She cried for her pain, and she felt it was a good cry, the cry of someone who has finally let go of the past.
After ten minutes alone, she heard footsteps coming down the darkened corridor, and she feared that Parry had returned, or that it was Dr. Shockley, Dr. DeAngelos, or possibly Heyward. At any rate, she didn't want any of them to know she was sitting here in the dark crying. She wiped at her tears, and hearing someone just outside the open door, she looked up to find Kim Desinor poking her head around the jamb.
“Kim, it's you.” Jessica sniffled and tried to hold back tears. If she could cry over this ending with anyone, it would be Kim.
'Told you you had to face him, get it out. You've gotta be feeling better.” Kim leaned into the door jamb at the exact spot where James Parry had stood.
How did she know about Jim's visit? Jessica wondered, suspecting her tears had given her away. Had Parry lingered in the building? Had Kim run into him on his way out? But Jessica simply responded, “Like a goddamn Ford truck's been lifted off my back, yeah. Maybe now I can focus on the case.”
“I hope you can forgive me.”
Jessica looked across at her friend. “Forgive you?”
“For a couple of things, yes.”
“What's there to forgive, Kim?” Jessica recalled her initial reaction to Kim and Eriq Santiva's railroading her onto this particular case at this particular time.
“Well, first because I told Parry where he could find you tonight.”
'Tonight? You did that… for me?”
“More than that, I confronted him in his office, told him you had a right to face your accuser, in this case him, and put old hurts to rest.”
“Had it out with him, did you? Straightened him out, huh? Sent him over here just so I could kick him in the teeth, huh?”
“Yeah, I stuck up for you.” Kim halfheartedly lifted a victory fist.
Jessica nodded. “I see. Told him off good, did you?”
“Damned straight; damned right.”
“So he came straight over here to hit on me, and talk about rekindling our passion. 1 have you to thank for-”
Kim gasped. “He did that? The bastard.”
“So what else do I have to forgive you for, Kim?”
“Wait a minute, you haven't offered your forgiveness for this part yet.”
“All right, forgiven. What else?”
“When Santiva came to me about the case, he told me I'd be working with James Parry. I immediately told him I wouldn't do it without your help, so…”
Jessica took in a deep breath, filling her lungs with air and her mind with information, and tried to calmly negotiate the minefield of emotions it aroused. “All for my own good, no doubt?”
“Eriq was at first completely against it, but I convinced him otherwise, that you needed to have it out with Parry, else you'd never be totally free of him. Eriq took some convincing. Don't go blaming him, okay? It was totally my doing.”
“I see.”
Kim held firm to an amulet around her neck as she stepped into the room. “You needed to see him, Jess. Don't try to deny it.”
Her fists again clenched, her jaw set, Jessica replied, “You concocted this whole charade to get us together?”
“I hoped it would be… would go more… pleasantly. I only wanted you to heal and get on with things.”
“The best of intentions, and Eriq agreed?”
“Like I said, I made him see the light.”
“I knew you two were cooking up some kind of nonsense together.”
