Chapter 35

She couldn't stop grinning as she slid into the booth of a little streetside restaurant just inside Manhattan. And neither, she noticed, could John. "This was a great idea. I've never seen you this relaxed."

"It's been a long time since I felt like I could unwind like this," John admitted as he picked up the menu. "I wasn't sure about this when you grabbed my keys this morning, but it's been a great day. I didn't think I was going to have this much fun." And then, meditatively, "You have a great family."

"They really liked you. I'm surprised. They didn't like the last guy I brought to a family gathering." She put her menu down. "But then, I guess they knew it wasn't serious. Dad said so himself. He was the first guy my brothers had seen me with since Kevin, and I wasn't serious, and neither was he, and my family didn't really like him. But they liked you."

"I've never met anyone's family before." He stared into his glass of ice water. "Jessica and I…we dated for three years, but she…she never told her family about me. I never met any of them." He looked at Iris across the table. "So now this means you have to meet my family."

"I hope I'm included in that category," came a warm but dry voice, and iris looked up as a tall, leggy gorgeous woman walked up. She grinned at John, then focused on iris. "Hi. I'm Zoe Morgan."

Two things flashed through Iris's mind at once. The first was that she'd heard the name before; this was the woman John had said he'd spend the night with occasionally—but that once he'd started seeing Iris professionally, once he realized he had feelings for her, he'd declined. The second was that it definitely hadn't been a serious relationship; Zoe Morgan was very casual in her approach, and her body language didn't evince any possessiveness toward John.

Unlike Iris's own; she knew she'd turned in her chair when Zoe came up, and it had been a slightly defensive turn; her back was angled slightly toward John and her face was toward Zoe. And she knew, from the other woman's sharp look, that Zoe hadn't missed Iris's body language cues either.

But Zoe's body language was relaxed, diffident; not challenging. Iris relaxed. She'd just established that John was hers, and Zoe had acknowledged that—subtly, but she had acknowledged it. So. There was no competition between the two of them.

However, John had said that he'd known Zoe for a while… "Come have a seat," she smiled and slid a little further over in the booth in an unspoken invitation. Zoe hesitated a moment, then smiled and slid in next to Iris.

Iris noticed, with a bit of amusement, that John was suddenly looking slightly apprehensive. She smiled and turned to Zoe. "So how do you know John?"

"We met …a while ago. I'm pretty busy, and so was he, but we managed to run into each other a couple of times. One night we were on a…stakeout…together, and well, things just happened."

Iris smiled. "Hey, perfectly understandable. After a tense situation, you need to relax, so does he, so…" she shrugged. "I've learned he's a bit more relaxed after sex. I can actually talk to him after that."

Zoe laughed. "Yeah. It lightens his mood. You'll have to learn how to do that if you're going to put up with all that brooding intensity."

"Excuse me." John was looking distinctly uncomfortable.

Iris (and Zoe, she noticed) rolled her—both their—eyes. "Shut up John," they both said at the same time. Zoe looked at her in surprise. She returned it with one of bland innocence. Then they both burst into laughter.

John sat back in his seat, the very picture of male annoyance; annoyance that only increased when Iris reached across the table and snagged his keys. "We're not going to leave until Zoe and I get a chance to chat." She pocketed the keys and turned to Zoe. "We just came back from a visit to my Dad's in Westchester. John and I had a great time—he's never played paintball, but he's great at it—"

"Excuse me. Zoe, can I talk to you for a moment?" John stood up, looked expectantly at Zoe.

Zoe looked up at him, sighed theatrically, and turned to Iris. "Don't go anywhere, you and I have a lot to chat about." Iris nodded, and Zoe rose from the booth; when John stepped over to the end of the bar, she followed him.

They both moved down to the end of the counter; Iris watched them as they paused down at the end where she couldn't hear their conversation; but she knew it was about her because Zoe looked back at her once. Iris pretended she hadn't seen the look and busied herself clearing the table so the waitress could put down their plates; but out the corner of her eye she watched John and Zoe together. They do make an attractive couple, she admitted to herself reluctantly. Both tall, and Zoe's got a body a supermodel would envy. Hell, I'm not a supermodel and I envy her! Long legs that seemed to go on forever, and perfectly coiffed hair that seemed to stay in place. Iris was suddenly conscious of her own appearance; the wild red curls that never wanted to stay in place had been particularly unruly today, and she hadn't bothered to try and tame them after her shower at Dad's. And she still wore the light green sundress—although she had put her panties back on.

But Zoe didn't look like the type to do anything spontaneous; she seemed like a methodical planner, and Iris knew that, while John was the same, there was a little part of him that wanted to do something spontaneous and forbidden every once in a while. He would never admit it, but she knew he'd enjoyed every minute of their quickie in the woods, and he had quite obviously enjoyed teasing her in the movie theater, as well as the quick trip down the dirt road behind the movie theater. And she had to admit she'd enjoyed it too.

"Okay. So where were we?" Zoe returned to the table; the waitress, having figured out that Zoe was now sitting with them, had set three full plates on the table; Zoe picked up the grilled chicken salad as Iris grabbed her own burger and moved John's burger to his side of the table.

"Where's John?" Iris glanced up; John was nowhere to be seen.

"Headed for the boys' room. He'll be along in a little bit. I told him he needs to lighten up and he didn't take it too well." Zoe grinned at Iris. "I also told him you're good for him—whatever you guys have been doing today, I've never seen him this relaxed. Ever. And that's after knowing him for about eight years." She raised an eyebrow. "So how did you meet John?"

"I'm the departmental psych consult for Manhattan South Homicide," Iris said quietly. "John was ordered to come see me for a psych evaluation for a brief time. We…continued talking after I cleared him, and…it…"

Zoe chuckled and sat back. "If you're wondering what I'm going to think about your having a relationship with a former patient, don't. It's not the first time I've heard of it happening. It's not even unusual. I'm actually glad it happened with John—he keeps so much bottled up inside, and Lord knows I'm definitely not the right one to help him with that. I don't carry anyone's baggage but my own. You're better equipped to deal with him than I am."

Iris relaxed. So Zoe didn't have any attachments to John except the physical, and that only casually. There was no deep affection, even buried or unacknowledged, inside John for Zoe—Iris had already figured that out—and now she knew there was nothing deeper than casual sex for Zoe. She wasn't at all interested in John mentally or emotionally—in fact, Iris rather got a feeling that Zoe deliberately kept her contact with John casual so John wouldn't form those attachments.

Her loss was Iris's gain. "John's one of the most fascinating men I've ever met. The only man I've ever met who appeals to me both…physically…" she knew she was blushing, hurried on, "…and mentally. He's so complex, it's a challenge getting under the layers to see who he really is inside. He doesn't let many people in."

"Two others that I know of. Jessica, the first woman he was ever serious about. She died in a car accident. And then there was Detective Joss Carter—she was his equal in every way that counted, but he was too afraid to let her know how he felt. And then she died too." Zoe regarded Iris over the rim of her glass. "I know you've noticed by now he's very protective. So here's my advice; take care of yourself. For his sake as well as your own. You didn't look surprised when I mentioned Jessica, so he must have told you about her. And that means he let you farther in than he's ever let anyone since Jessica. If something happens to you, he might never let anyone in again."

"Get out of town for a few days."

Iris was shaken. She thought she'd seen all of the different sides of John, but she'd never seen this dark, dangerous, hard man standing across the precinct coffeemaker from her. She'd seen the tension in his body as he crossed the room toward her, movements seemingly casual but masking his real purpose; he'd been focused on her the moment he walked in. Something was going on, something dangerous; and as she looked into those intense blue eyes, she saw, under the hardness and the steely determination, a man who was afraid for her. And Zoe's words from the diner the night John had met her family ran through her mind; if something happens to you he might never let anyone in again.

"Am…I going to lose you?" It was the only thing she could think of to say. Suddenly the thought of life without him was unbearable. Images, quick snapshots of their time together, flashed through her mind. John, shirtless and shoeless, cooking chili in her kitchen; John, walking Bear through the park while she walked Snow; John working with the dogs at the shelter; John, smiling at her as they played chess. She would miss that. Miss his gentle touch, the way he could make her feel. She would miss him.

He hesitated, then said, "When I get back I promise you I'll tell you everything." Everything? Everything she wanted to know about him, his life, what he did with Harold? Oh, she would hold him to that.

But that night, when she got home, instead of grabbing her bag and packing for a trip to her father's she went to the back of her closet and took out her old Academy piece. It had been a while, but she still remembered how to disassemble, clean, and reassemble—though, she thought dryly, John could probably do it in a quarter of the time she took to do it. But as she racked the slide back on her Smith and Wesson M&P and checked to make sure the safety was well oiled and she could slide it back in a moment's notice, all she could think of was his promise. It's easy to promise something if you know you're not coming back to fulfill it. And as she sat on her couch with Snow snuggled against her, she sent a quiet prayer to whatever powers might exist in the universe to keep John and his friends safe.

Whatever they were doing.

Author's Note:

Okay, now it's done. For the moment. We'll have to wait and see what happens when the new season of POI begins.

I'm sorry for the long gap between updates. There was a story on the news a few weeks ago about a 10 year old boy whose father handcuffed him to a radiator and beat him; by the time cops got him out of there he was comatose, and he died in the hospital three days later having never opened his eyes again. Neighbors heard him screaming, called the police; the mother answered the door, said that he;d just had a nightmare and sent them away; neighbors called a second time when the screaming started again after cops left. This time police forced their way in and found the boy. Father has been arrested for manslaughter and the mother is facing obstruction and accessory charges; both will also be charged with child abuse because when the boy's body was autopsied, they found various injuries in different stages of healing. Someone I know had a son who was the boy's friend; she remembered the boy coming to her house to play with her son, and she kept crying that if she'd known that was going on, she would have kept him at her house and called child protective services.

It made a deep impression on me, and it also made me start thinking-if The Machine would give Harold the numbers for women whose lives were in danger from their domestic situation (like Jessica) wouldn't The Machine give Harold the numbers for children too? And if Harold told John, John would move mountains to protect the child. So my muse took another side trip and I started working on the details of that story. It's a deeply personal one for me, and I don't know if I'll ever post it on here. But in the meantime, here's the last of 'What the Hell' and I'll start posting to 'Redemption' next week-can't leave Joss pregnant forever!