Ice Breakers

by Heather C. Myers

  “Oh?”

  “I catch a quarter of your perps. There’s a reason why your numbers are so high, Beech.”

  “You think you make me a better detective?” He snorted. “Unbelievable.”

  “Are you calling me a liar?”

  “Did those words come out of my mouth?” He took a step closer to me, and then another one, until he was directly in front of me. My entire body stilled. “I saw you in your office. I saw the way he looked at you. He has something for you, Chalmers, and if you don’t see it yourself, then you’re blind.”

  I snorted, shaking my head. “Something for me?” I repeated. “Are you crazy? You think Eric Foresburg has – I mean, you can’t even label it. That’s a reach, Beech, especially for you.”

  “Not when it comes to my gut.” He looked at me unflinchingly, his voice tight. “You can laugh at me all you want. I know what I saw. He wants you. I don’t know if it’s just sexually, or if there’s more behind it than that. But he wants you.”

  “So what?” I rolled my eyes and kicked at a stray rock. “I’ve had clients who want me and I was still able to do my job. If you don’t believe me, I can get you references.”

  “It’s more than just that,” he insisted. “It’s like he knows you.”

  “What?”

  “Are you seriously making me repeat everything I say to you.” He removed his sunglasses and inspected the lenses. “You do understand English, don’t you?”

  I rolled my eyes. The clear blue sky promised a beautiful day, but the cold reminded me autumn was here and winter was coming. In a few weeks, the regular hockey season would start. With Eric’s arrest, I did not think my dad was able to protect him from being suspended the way he had before.

  “I’m trying to see what you’re trying to insinuate,” I said.

  “Stop assuming and just answer me. Why does Foresburg look at you like that? Why do you call him by his first name? Why are you so invested in this case? I don’t think you realize it, Chalmers, but you never would have asked me for a rape kit during an open investigation. You know better than that.”

  “Is that why you were such an asshole earlier?” I asked. I wasn’t about to give him a reason for justifying his behavior, but I did want to know why he acted the way he was acting.

  “I was an asshole because you’re acting in a way I don’t understand and you’re putting me in a position I don’t like being in.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “Being tempted to risk my job to make you happy,” he admitted.

  I stopped. I wanted to analyze that line, to try and figure out what he could possibly mean by that.

  Before I could do that, he continued. “I was an asshole because you aren’t acting like your normal self, and that pisses me off,” he said. He rubbed away whatever dust accumulated on his glasses before putting them back on. “I don’t know if it’s because of this extra pressure you feel because this is your dad’s case he asked you to solve or if there’s something you aren’t telling me when it comes to you and Foresburg. I don’t know, and not knowing also pisses me off. And yeah, I have my own issues, with the sergeant and the DC and the chief all up my ass to solve this as quickly as possible, not to mention all the phone calls and emails I’m receiving, I have my own goddamn issues I need to sort through.”

  I nodded my head, but I wasn’t sure what to respond. I looked at the ground.

  “To answer your question about the rape kit,” Beech said slowly, causing me to look at him, “I can’t give it to you. What I can tell you is that it was taken September nineteenth and no semen was found inside of her that night in question. But there was a pubic hair on her and it does match Foresburg’s DNA. Before you ask, we have his DNA because he voluntarily gave us a swab of his saliva and some hair from his head to compare it to when this whole thing broke. I can’t prove rape definitively, but they did have sex that night.”

  Chapter 13

  I barely made it home before I found myself throwing up. Eric, a rapist?

  Just because there was a pubic hair did not mean rape occurred, a little voice reminded me.

  That much was true. And yet, I could not assuage my stomach from spilling its contents into my toilet. Because, deep down, it was more than the rape. I hated the abrupt evidence that he was sleeping around with people like Ashley Dunham. I absolutely hated it.

  When I was finally done, I flushed the toilet. Instead of moving from my position on the floor, I leaned my back against the wall and gave myself a moment to catch my breath and confront what I had been denying for a long time: I still cared about Eric.

  I didn’t actually think I was reacting because I was jealous or because I wanted him back. It was more of a confusion. Why would he break up with me so abruptly only to sleep around with meaningless women? Had he gotten scared? Did he miss his freedom? And now, because of that choice, this was where we were. He was accused of rape and there was legitimate evidence against him. It was much more than just a simple he-said, she-said. A pubic hair indicated that sexual activity took place between them; now, it was just a matter of proving rape.

  I closed my eyes and clenched my teeth together. Eric’s idiotic decision to have sex with this person, to completely botch the dates (which seemed to imply he was heavily inebriated because I highly doubted Eric would forget something as simple as that unless he was drunk), was now biting him in the ass. More than that, I was now involved in this and it was the last thing I wanted.

  I didn’t want to hear that my ex raped another girl. I didn’t want to hear he was having sex with other people, even if it wasn’t rape. I wanted to go on, pretending he didn’t exist until my father casually brought him up in conversation during one of our dinners as a hockey player rather than a person who meant the world to me.

  I picked myself off the floor of the bathroom and grabbed my toothbrush. At this point, I was left with two options: I could stay on the case and see it out to the end or I could quit.

  I grabbed my toothpaste and squirted some of it onto the brush, before running water over it and sticking it in my mouth. For one thing, I wasn’t a quitter, and that was what I would be doing if I decided to stop. Eric was entitled to have a personal life, despite what I thought, despite our history together.

  Because that was what Eric and I had – a history. Not a future, and not a present. We were part of each other’s past and that was that. Eric could do whatever and whomever he wanted, and it wasn’t any of my business.

  However, I couldn’t dive any deeper into this without talking to Eric. I called his attorney, who assured me he would make bail by the end of the day. At that moment, someone knocked on my door. I furrowed my brow, picking myself up. When I reached the door, I looked through the peephole.

  What was my father doing here? He did not seem happy, either, what with his hands on his waist, tapping his toes on my doorstep.

  I unlocked the door and opened it. He barreled in without waiting for an invitation, throwing his hands up.

  “Eric was arrested!” he exclaimed, as I shut the door. I could hear him stomping into my kitchen. “What the hell for?”

  “Well, it was only a matter of time, Dad,” I said tentatively, following him into the kitchen.

  He grabbed a bottle of wine from the top of my fridge, the only alcohol I kept in my apartment, saved for those particularly long days when I had a shitty day of work and needed to unwind. The last time I drank was a few weeks ago.

  I think.

  “How is that?” He took the bottle to my sink, resting it there before opening my cabinets and procuring two wine glasses. “There’s no evidence –“

  “There is evidence,” I said.

  He uncorked the wine and began pouring the alcohol inside. A couple of drops splattered on the sink.

  “Besides her story –“

  “A rape kit. With a pubic hair. Eric’s pubic hair.”

  My father’s mouth dropped open. When he realized he was gaping, he shut his mou
th, shook his head, and turned his attention back to the wine. He moved to fill the second glass.

  “That doesn’t prove anything.” His voice was quieter. He put the cork back in the wine bottle and placed it back onto my fridge. “Maybe he had sex with her –“

  “Twice?” I pressed my lips together and looked away. I hadn’t wanted to say anything at all. Especially to my father. But it came out before I could stop it.

  My father sighed. Conflicting emotions warred on his face. He handed me a glass of wine.

  “People change, Mika.”

  “Yeah, but Ashley Dunham?” I threw out my arm, all my frustrations spilling out. “He isn’t the type to sleep with someone twice, Dad. And Ashley Dunham -?”

  “What if he forgot he had?” my dad pointed out. He took a seat at my kitchen table. “What if he didn’t remember her? What if he was so drunk, he didn’t realize what he was doing? What if someone spiked his drink and he didn’t know?”

  “Dad…” I let my voice trail off and took a small sip of the alcohol. There was no way I’d be able to finish the drink with the amount he had poured in my glass.

  “What?” my dad said defensively. “If Eric was a girl, I’m sure that would be one of the first things suggested, but because Eric is a big guy, you’re assuming he can’t have his drink spiked?”

  I let out a sigh. “Even if that was the case, how am I supposed to prove it?” I asked.

  He shrugged. “That’s your job, not mine,” he pointed out. He took another long sip of his wine. “I need you to do something, Meeks. Bob wants to suspend Eric, especially after his arrest. And honestly? I can’t think of a reason why this shouldn’t happen besides me wanting him to be able to start in a few weeks.”

  I play with the edge of my wine glass with my fingertip, tracing the circle without much thought. “Well, Dad, can you blame him?” My voice was quiet and I couldn’t bring myself to look at him just yet. He wasn’t going to like what I had to say but I had to say it. He had to hear it.

  “Mika,” my dad growled. “You aren’t helping.”

  “Not helping!” I dropped my hand so it slapped the surface of the table. “Are you seriously telling me I’m not helping?”

  “It’s not –“

  “Dad, you need to think about this after removing yourself from it,” I told him. “Eric raped someone allegedly. Keeping him on the team if it’s just a he-said, she-said is one thing. You stand by your player, fine. Commendable, even. But now he’s arrested. Do you really think he’d be arrested unless there wasn’t compelling evidence?”

  “You tell me!” he exclaimed, throwing out his arms. The wine sloshed on the floor of my kitchen. “That’s what he hired you to do, isn’t it?”

  “Eric has yet to pay me, so right now, I’m doing this out of the goodness of my heart.”

  My father narrowed his eyes. “So you need a check to stop half-assing this and do something?”

  “I’m sorry, did you just tell me I was half-assing my job?” I gripped the edge of the dining table. “What is your problem, Dad? I didn’t even know if I was going to take this case in the first place and only decided to do it after talking to you.” A small half-truth he didn’t need to know wasn’t completely true. If I could twist a stab of guilt into him, I would be satisfied, especially with the words he was spewing at me right now. “And just for your information, Beech wouldn’t have arrested Eric without evidence. He already has the weight of the world on him with such a high-profile case. You know he doesn’t even work rape cases, right? His sergeant specifically assigned this to him.”

  “You seem to know a lot about this Detective Beech,” my dad said, not bothering to hide his suspicion. “You need to realize you’re both on two separate teams.”

  I pinched the bridge of my nose, standing up. I definitely needed a drink but I would not give my father the satisfaction of seeing him have such an effect on me.

  “Actually, Dad, you’re wrong. We aren’t on separate teams. We have the same goal. We want the truth. And if that truth proves Eric is guilty, then there’s nothing that can be done. He deserves to be arrested. He deserves to be suspended.”

  “How can you say that?” My dad stood up, taking his empty wine glass and carefully placing it in the sink. It didn’t surprise me that he wasn’t washing the dish. After Mom died, somehow that task was regulated to me even though we never discussed it beforehand. My mom used to joke Dad was allergic to doing the dishes in any capacity, even with a dish washer. “You know Eric –“

  “I’m getting really sick of everyone telling me I know Eric,” I said, “when the fact of the matter is, I don’t. I don’t know Eric anymore and honestly, Dad, you don’t know him on a personal level either.” I wiped my face with my hand. “You can see yourself out, can’t you? I have some things to do.”

  I grabbed my purse from my couch and made my way to my front door.

  “Where are you going?” my dad asked.

  “Office,” I stated and shut the door after me.

  The truth of the matter was, I needed to get away from my dad. He was preventing me from thinking things through. It didn’t help that he was lecturing me. It didn’t help that, whether he intended it or not, it sounded as though he blamed me for this whole mess. I wasn’t sure if he assumed I would have solved the case by now, or if he was merely annoyed that I didn’t automatically believe in Eric’s innocence. If I was being honest with myself, part of me thought what Eric was going through was deserved simply because of the choices he made. Instantly, I banished the thought, guilt coursing through my body. That wasn’t fair. I knew that.

  When I got to the office, I distracted myself with other, less pressing cases. I hadn’t heard from Eric’s attorney and I hoped that was a good thing. I hoped Eric was out and I hoped he was being smart about his freedom and at home, flipping through television channels and microwaving a pizza.

  I wasn’t expecting him to walk into my office. I wasn’t expecting him to close the door and sit down across from him. And I wasn’t expecting the relief to spread across my body like the chicken pox when I saw that he was okay.

  “Hey,” I said.

  “Hey,” he responded. He looked down at his lap. “So. I’ve had an interesting day.”

  “That’s an underestimation if I’ve ever heard one.” I looked at him, really looked at him. He was still the same striking, beautiful man I had fallen in love with, but there was a weariness to his pale blue eyes, a sallow look to his skin. He wasn’t handling this well.

  “Eric, I need you to be honest with me,” I said, setting the file I had been flipping through down so I could focus my attention on him. “I think we all want this to be over, but I can’t do that if I don’t have all the information.”

  He nodded his head. “Ask me anything and I’ll answer,” he said. His wrists hung limply from the arms over the chair, exhaustion gripping his body like a possessive lover.

  “I know you’re inclined to spend the night with different women,” I said. Before Eric could interject – to defend himself or maybe to explain – I held up my hand. “Honestly, it’s your business what you do with your life. I don’t care. I just need to know if there’s a possibility you had sex with Ashley Dunham twice. I’m not saying you raped her. What I am saying is that the two of you engaged in sexual activity when you said you did and when she said you did.”

  Eric looked like he wanted to say no. I wanted Eric to say no. And for the most fleeting of moments, I thought he would. Up until he picked his eyes up from the floor, a resigned look on his face.

  “Yes,” he finally said. “Yes, we did have sex twice.”

  Chapter 14

  Twice. Apparently Ashley Dunham was different because Eric deigned to have sex with her twice.

  All attempts at trying to be professional was thrown on the backburner. My anger, my bitterness, my jealous, got the better of me, and I leaned forward. My fingers gripped the edge of my desk so tightly, my knuckles were white.

>   “Are you kidding me right now?” I asked in a hiss. “I honestly don’t remember you being this stupid, this reckless, when we were together.”

  I didn’t know why I had lowered my voice. We were in the safety of my office and I wasn’t expecting any other clients to show up. There always was a possibility for Ryan King to drop by and he would be skeezy enough to try and listen in on this conversation, even with my door closed. But I doubted he had the time to be here anyway. He had a pretty easy case, thanks to Eric’s stupidity.

  “Yeah, well, I never had a reason to be stupid when I was with you,” Eric pointed out. He, too, kept his voice low, but there was an edge to it. I knew him well enough to know that his anger wasn’t directed towards me but at himself. It made me calm down, if only slightly.

  “How did this happen?” I leaned against my chair before reaching into my drawer and taking out a stress ball. Sometimes, I forgot I had this thing only because I rarely used it. Now, however, I was squeezing it so tightly, I wouldn’t be surprised if I punctured it with my fingernails.

  Eric sighed, running his fingers through his hair. It was one of the few times I remember it being loose, falling into his face, rather than slicked back with some kind of hair product. The only time he wore it like that was when he went to bed. At least, from what I remembered.

  “Honestly,” he said, finally picking his eyes up from my floor and looking at me. “I forgot we slept together in the first place.”

  I blinked once, then twice. I squeezed the ball again and held it in a vice-like grip. Kind of like the way I wanted to hold Eric’s neck currently.

  “You’re telling me,” I said slowly, “that you slept with her in the summer, during the off-season.”

  “When the season ended,” Eric said, nodding his head once. “I remember her specifically because Kevin introduced me to her. I don’t remember how he knew her in the first place. I think maybe they worked together?”