Blood Price

Given her mood. . . . "Do something more useful with your time, Celluci, only abetalipoproteninaemia RP
    includes biochemical defects," he hadn't been the only one reading up, "and that isn't what I've got."

    "Abetalipo protein aemia," he corrected her pronunciation, "and excuse me for caring. I also found out that a number of people lead completely normal lives with what you've got." He paused and she heard him take a drink of what was undoubtedly cold coffee. "Not," he continued, his voice picking up an edge, "that you ever lived what could be called a normal life."

    She ignored the last comment, picked up a black marker and began venting frustrations with it on the back of her credit card bill. "I'm living a completely normal life," she snapped.

    "Running away and hiding?" The tone missed sarcasm but not by very much. "You could've stayed on the force. . . ."

    "I knew you'd start again." She spat the words from between clenched teeth, but Mike Celluci's angry voice overrode the diatribe she was about to begin and the bitterness in it shut her up.

    ". . . but oh no, you couldn't stand the thought that you wouldn't be the hot-shit investigator anymore, the fair-haired girl with all the answers, that you'd just be a part of the team. You quit because you couldn't stand not being on the top of the pile and if you weren't on top, if you couldn't be on top, you weren't going to play! So you ran away. You took your pail and your shovel and you fucking quit! You walked out on me, Nelson, not just the job!"

    Through all the fights-after the diagnosis and after her resignation- that was what he'd wanted to say. It summed up the hours of arguing, the screaming matches, the slammed doors.
    Vicki knew it, knew it the way she knew when she found the key, the little seemingly insignificant thing that solved the case. Everything about that last sentence said, this is it.

    "You'd have done the same thing, Celluci," she said quietly and although her knuckles were white around the receiver, she set it gently back on the phone. Then she threw the marker in her other hand across the room.

    Her anger went with it.

    He really cares about you, Vicki. Why is that such a problem ?

    Because lovers are easy to get and friends good enough to scream at are a lot rarer.

    Running both hands through her hair, she sighed. He was right and she'd admitted as much by her response. As soon as he realized she was right as well, they could go on building the new parameters of their relationship. Unless, it suddenly occurred to her, last night had been the farewell performance that enabled him to finally come clean.

    If it was, she pushed her glasses up her nose, at least I had the last word. As such things went, it wasn't much of a comfort.

    * * *

    "Well, if it isn't old Norman. How you doing, Norman? Mind if we sit down?" Without waiting for an answer the young man hooked a chair out from under the table and sat. The four other members of his party noisily followed his lead.

    When the scramble for space ended, Norman found himself crammed between the broad shoulders of two jocks he knew only as Roger and Bill, the three of them staring across the round table at three young ladies. He recognized the blonde-he usually saw her hanging on Roger's arm-and as the girl next to Bill was being awfully friendly he supposed she was with him. That left one extra. He grinned wolfishly at her. He'd been practicing the grin in his bathroom mirror.

    She looked puzzled, then snorted and turned away.

    "It was real nice of old Norman to keep this table for us, wasn't it, Bill?"

    "It sure was." Bill leaned a little closer and Norman gasped for breath as his available space narrowed drastically. "If it wasn't for old Norman, we'd be sitting on the floor."

    Norman looked around. The Friday night crowd at the Cock and Bull had filled the basement pub. "Well, I, uh. . . ." He shrugged. "I, uh, knew you were coming."

    "Of course you did," Bill grinned at him, a little disconcerted to find that the Birdwell-nerd was at least as tall as he was. "I was saying to Roger here before we came in, it wouldn't be Friday night if we didn't spend part of it with old Norman."

    Roger laughed and all three of the girls grinned. Norman didn't get the joke, but he preened at the attention.

    He bought the first round of beer. "After all, it's my table."

    "And the only empty one in the place," the blonde muttered.

    He bought the second round as well. "Because I've got