No, you took off like a Kentucky thoroughbred on Derby Day.  Couldn't get out of Boston fast enough.  Got to the airport five hours before your flight the next morning so you wouldn't have to deal with the consequences.  Coward. 

So you skulk back to your pitiful existence, vowing to stay away from the information-gathering temptation of the computer sitting on your desk.  You bury yourself in work.  Try to convince yourself it's still fulfilling.  Pretend you don't see her every time you close your eyes.

*

Three days later, you give in.

Her number is unlisted in the general directory, but you have access to more information than the common citizen.  Feeling the barest tendrils of guilt, you use your office computer to track her down, assiduously avoiding the other information available to you in the database.  Just the phone number.  Nothing obsessive.  You scribble it on a small scrap of paper and shove it in your pocket, vowing to throw it away later and forget about her.  That night, you take the slip of paper out of your pocket and lay it gently on the dresser next to your wallet.  You dream about her, bizarre dreams with shipwrecks and a talking dog and tequila sunrises. 

The next morning, your fingers hesitate briefly over the paper before reaching for your wallet instead.  You get as far as the refrigerator before you return to retrieve it.  By the time you get to work, your fingers have every nuance of the paper memorized.  You fold it over and over again between your fingers, methodically, like a scrap paper rosary. 

By lunch you've rubbed the paper into a pulpy mass.  You think about throwing it away, but put it in your wallet behind your driver's license instead.    You can recite the digits faster than your own Social Security number.  You consider calling.  You laugh out loud at yourself. 

All afternoon, you stare at the telephone.  It just sits there, inviting.  Begging. 

You put the phone in your desk drawer.  You feign innocence when a colleague drops by and wonders why he called but couldn't get in touch with you.  You begin to feel like you're fourteen again.  You tell yourself at least you haven't dialed all but the last number and hung up. 

*

That night, you dial all but the last number and hang up.  You feel like an asshole.

*

The almost-call becomes part of your nightly routine.  You come home, eat a late dinner, watch a few minutes of whatever game ESPN is showing, and pick up the phone.  You dial without thinking, wondering how the hell you've come to this.  You always pause after dialing the ninth digit, thumb hovering over the final button, wondering if tonight will be the night you grow the balls to go through with it.  You hit the "end" button instead.   

You go to bed, gritting your teeth against temptation.  Not tonight, you vow.  Not anymore.  You're veering dangerously close to psycho territory, and it's not a pretty picture.  You continue to repeat that to yourself even as your hand strays toward your boxers, and then she's all you can think about as you feel your dick grow hard in your hand. 

You avoid your eyes in the mirror in the morning.

*

In May you get called back to Boston.  You tell yourself you'll stop by her apartment, ask her to dinner.  Maybe a ball game.  You drive around through the late afternoon and evening, trying to get your head on straight.  You get as far as her street corner before you realize she probably has a boyfriend by now, some hot young doctor or lawyer or insurance executive with a promising future and boundless energy in bed.  You drive by her apartment anyway, looking up to see if there's a light in the window.  There isn't and you don't know whether to feel disappointed or relieved.

*

In July, your phone rings again, a profile request from the Boston field office.  There's a possible serial killer.  Three victims in three weeks.  You could go -- probably should go -- but instead you put together a profile and send your latest wunderkind in your place.  He'll do just fine, he needs the experience, and you're only a phone call away.  A phone call and 460 blessed miles. 

He calls two days later to tell you they found a new victim.  You discuss possible changes to the profile for a while before casually inquiring about the ME on the case.  DuChamps, you are told. 

You frown.  Doesn't sound familiar.  Not Cavanaugh?

He laughs.  Cavanaugh is persona non grata around here right now, he says.  Went off the deep end a few weeks ago and disappeared. 

You open your mouth to ask for more details, but catch yourself.  Don't want to seem too interested.  You dispense some more sage advice and quickly end the call.

*

A quiet inquiry with a friend at the Boston field office nets you some basic information about her last days in town.  You dig up some back issues of the Globe and read about her role in setting Redding free from the mental hospital -- including the possibility that the prosecutor is now considering charges against the police who investigated the case for falsifying evidence.  You dig a little deeper and discover that her father is one of the cops in question.  You have a bigger part of the picture now, but you're certain there's a piece missing. 

You begin to call in favors to get more information without raising red flags.  You just want to make sure she's all right, you tell yourself.  You're not stalking her.  You ask your favorite "independent contractor" to hack into the Boston ME's computer system and learn that she was reprimanded and placed on a 30-day leave of absence just before she skipped town.  You gain access to her bank statement and credit card bill and see her most recent purchase was two days ago at a gas station in Tempe.  Your stomach twists in relief.  She disappeared, but she's not dead. 

You consider getting on a plane right away and flying to Tempe to find her.  Your hand makes it halfway to the phone to call the airline before you realize how very fucked up this is getting.  She's a grown woman and you haven't even spoken to her in more than six months.  If she needed rescuing, you're sure as hell not the person she'd be calling.  You have no right to force yourself back into her life as her knight in shining armor.  Instead, you keep an eye on her bank accounts and wait.

*

That night it occurs to you that if she's not home, she's not going to be answering her phone.  You dial all ten numbers this time and wait for the machine.  When it clicks on, you close your eyes and soak up the sound of her voice.  You hang up before you get to the beep.  Sixteen times. 

You hope to hell she doesn't have caller ID.

*

Two weeks later, the number of Boston murders has grown to five and you decide to head up there to lend a hand.  The agents in the field office are more than competent, but you can't help feeling there's something you could see there that you're missing in DC.  The fact that her ATM withdrawals are again coming from Boston has nothing to do with it. 

*

You've spoken with DuChamps several times and admit a grudging respect for the woman. She knows the case cold, and she also knows when to talk and when to shut up and listen to you.  Your profile is coming together better now, and with the help you're getting from the ME's office, you figure you have a 50-50 shot of catching the guy before he kills again. 

Flipping through some files, you see "Cavanaugh" scrawled hastily on a report about a set of skeletal remains and can't help but think those odds would be 70-30 if you were working with her.  You get the impression she's on thin ice at work, though, so you use it as an excuse not to see her.  No need to disrupt an already tenuous position, you reason.  But it doesn't keep you from making the nine-digit hang-up every night from your hotel room or from moaning her name when you come. 

*

The next day you're taking a walk to clear your head when you see her sitting in the afternoon sun having a cappuccino at a little coffee shop a few blocks from work.  Her eyes are obscured by her giant black sunglasses, but her posture you recognize at once, had seen it in yourself all those years ago: she is broken.  You feel as though you've been punched in the stomach and ache -- ache -- to go her, to wrap your arms around her and pet her hair and murmur that everything is going to be all right, which is bullshit, but that doesn't mean it's not nice to hear.