Author's Note: Sorry for the delay. December is pure Hell at the post office, and I've been just exhausted and spent. But this is an extra-long chapter, and I expect to have the next ready quite soon. Maybe even this weekend, if I get some time to myself. Here's hoping!
"As I feared, young Samuel is quickly becoming as challenging to raise as his father was. Quiet as he was in his early days, he's rapidly becoming a lively and vocal baby. The dogs are still his loyal guardians, and I am, of course, his doting grandfather. But I wonder what I will tell him about his parents when he's old enough to ask questions. And I wonder what gossip he'll hear around town, as I've already caught wind of it myself--those who suggest that Annabelle only 'settled' for Jacob because her true love, Aaron, diedĄ"
--excerpt from the private journal of Ephraim Barton
Smoky Hills Part 32
Too Much Information
Heero spent most of his evening reading Chang's preliminary report on the skeleton.
The forensic scientist hadn't finalized a cause of death, though head trauma seemed the most obvious. His team was still examining each bone to see if there were marks indicating contact by a weapon, or even animal teeth. Until they were completely finished with their tests, his people wouldn't limit their conclusions.
They did, however, determine that the person was male, around eighteen to twenty-five years of age, and Caucasian. The time of death they'd narrowed down to about five to ten years ago, meaning there was no way it was a tax man bludgeoned to death by Trowa's great-grandfather. That didn't put Dekim, his grandfather, out of the running--but judging by what he knew of the family history, Heero doubted the most recent Barton resident had any reason to murder an intruder.
Which meant that the field of suspects was wide open.
"Shit." Heero leafed back through the pages to look at the pictures of the skeleton again. "If he weighed at least one-fifty, and was carried or dragged that far from the road--assuming no wheeled vehicle could have made the trip--" He shook his head. The body might conceivably have been hauled to its final resting place by a single person--if they used a sled or slid a tarp along the ground. Otherwise, it would have taken two people or an enormously strong one.
"God, Thor," Heero sighed, dropping a hand to pet his ever-present companion. "Would've been so much easier when the clues were fresh. Was it dropped in summer or winter? There might have been tracks in the snow, or even in dirt. Leaves might have been disturbed by something dragged along. But this--? What a dead end."
He shook his head, pushing aside the paperwork and resigning himself to the fact that it might be such a cold case that it would be unsolvable.
"Missing persons," he said quietly. "It'll all depend on that. I could turn up another dead end, or a lucky break, hm?"
Thor nudged him with a whiskery muzzle, and Balder bracketed him on the other side, licking his wrist.
"Time to go out, fellas?"
The dogs eagerly jumped up to accompany him on his nightly rounds, and it made it a point to walk them out around the back of the barn, hoping their canine scent might discourage any feline visitors--large or small.
By the time they went back inside, a light rain had begun to fall, reminding Heero how glad he was he'd taken care of the roof repairs early on in their occupation of the farm. There was no need for him to worry in the least about either Leon's snug home, or his and Trowa's.
He found himself smiling as he headed for his bedroom, realizing that despite how carefully he'd kept calling the place Trowa's, since it had in fact, been a Barton inheritance, rather than Yuy, he still was beginning to consider it his home, too. And he knew damned well his half-brother would insist it was, if he ever brought the subject up.
He fell asleep to the restful patter of rain on the roof, and slept soundly and dreamlessly for a change.
When he woke in the morning, however, all he felt was determination. He was going to visit the local police and see if they'd also received Chang's report and if they had so much as a clue to proceed with.
He went through his morning routine in record time, taking the dogs for an abbreviated run, since it was still drizzling steadily, and by mid-morning, he was driving down the winding driveway towards town.
As he passed the post office, he automatically looked for the red Jeep, and found himself smiling when he saw it. Maybe after stopping by the police station, he could buy stamps or something--anything to catch a glimpse of Duo--and possibly work up to asking him out.
He sighed, a bit frustrated by his own cowardice when it came to Duo. He'd never had problems asking for a date in the past. But then, that was before his lover had dumped him during the worst emotional crisis of his life. So perhaps he could be forgiven a bit of hesitation; at least for now.
Heaven help him when Trowa got back though.
Heero pulled into the police complex, and parked in the tiny lot, squaring his shoulders as he got out and casually strolled into the building.
He had a moment of dej¨˘ vue at the sight of Officer Kurt sitting at the receptionist desk, a ball game on the television, and some half-done paperwork in front of him. "Good morning."
Ralph looked up and a brief scowl crossed his face. "This better not be about that skeleton," he said peremptorily. "We just got the report from the Institute yesterday."
"I know. Chang sent me a copy as well," Heero admitted. "I was just thinking that since he was able to pin down a few facts, you might have had a chance to compare them against missing persons cases."
"Missing persons?" Ralph asked, looking baffled. "D'you understand that the crime rate here in Smoky Hills is next to nil, Mister Yuy?"
"I gathered as much from the lack of police presence," Heero said dryly.
Ralph glared, opening his mouth to retort, but Heero cut him off. "I just meant that there's no need for a patrol car on every street or a cop on every corner. It's obviously a quiet town. But that means it shouldn't be hard to look up any missing persons reports from the last ten or so years."
"For what?"
"Chang sent you the age and sex of the victim and narrowed down the time of death to a fairly slender margin of time. Don't you think it's worth seeing if anyone went missing around then?"
Muttering to himself, Ralph yanked open a file drawer and began digging through folders dated by year. It looked like there might be fifty years' worth of folders, and yet they didn't even fill up the drawer.
The officer pulled out the latest fifteen years and plopped them onto his desk. "You wanna look through them, go the hell ahead," he suggested.
Heero raised an eyebrow. "I'm a civilian," he said carefully.
"And the only one who's interested in ten-year-old corpses," came the sour response. "You wanna waste your time looking through domestic disturbances and the occasional trespassing or assault--go right ahead. But we ain't never had a murder in this town, and you won't find anyone missing, neither. Your skeleton came from somewhere else--the same as your killer."
Heero grabbed the folders, letting out a breath of frustration, and took them to the counter, laying them out year by year. At least they were thin enough files that he might actually get through them sometime that afternoon, since he doubted the obnoxious cop would let him take them home, or stay past normal office hours.
Chang had said the bones had been under the tree around five to nine years, so Heero started with the newest time frame and began working backwards.
As the officer had said, most of the reports were for petty crimes like trespassing or shoplifting, with a few more serious ones thrown in here and there--an occasional burglary or bar fight that resulted in assault charges being filed.
The name Duo Maxwell drew Heero's gaze to a report of a drunk and disorderly arrest--something about destroying public property. But it was a juvenile arrest, which meant it had probably been resolved with community service or probation, so he didn't end up with a record.
"Hothead," mumbled the Japanese man, smirking in spite of himself.
About half an hour later and a couple of years further back, he finally stumbled across a missing persons report.
"Thought you said no one ever went missing," he growled at Ralph, pulling out the pages and holding them up. "What about--Solo Stevens?"
The cop looked up and snorted derisively. "He didn't go missing," he said without hesitation. "He left town. And his dumbass boyfriend went ballistic about it and filed a report."
"Boyfriend?"
Ralph's lip curled in distaste. "Yeah, boyfriend. He was a freakin' fag, Mister Yuy. A goddamn stain on the town. And no one ever missed him except the other resident fag, Maxwell."
"Maxwell?" Heero's eyes shot back to the page, and he read the name of the person who'd filled out the complaint--Duo Maxwell.
"Yeah, your mailman's a flaming homo," elaborated the officer. "And I'm not so sure about that Winner guy either, any more. I mean, half the gals in town have asked him out, and he turned every one of 'em down."
"That's beside the point," Heero said curtly, waving the pages at Ralph. "You've got a report dating back almost eight years, which is squarely within Chang's time frame. The missing person was male and eighteen--and you know damned well that the lab confirmed a male victim between fifteen and twenty-five years of age." He slapped the papers down on the desk. "You need to check with local dentists for possible records that might help rule this 'Solo' guy out--or maybe provide positive identification."
"You gotta be shittin' me! Solo skipped town. It's simple as that. An' you expect me to waste time seeing if the dentist in town still has his files?"
"Yes."
Ralph rolled his eyes, looking frustrated beyond belief. "I'm tellin' ya--even if Doc Schbeiker has the old records, they won't match up. Solo ain't dead. He left. And while we're on the subject of that lowlife hoodlum, it'd be more likely that he was the killer than the victim. Probably iced some bum from the railroad yard and then took off so he wouldn't get caught."
"Caught by this police department?" Heero scoffed, though his analytical mind had to acknowledge the possibility of Solo's being the murderer instead of the victim, disturbing as it might be.
"Okay--you're out of line!" Ralph growled, grabbing the missing persons report out of Heero's hands and slamming it down on the desk. "If there'd been a crime, we'd have investigated it. But even you've gotta admit there's no proof of anything here. We don't even know that the skeleton was someone from around here."
"But checking Stevens' dental records might prove it was."
"An' it might prove it wasn't."
"Exactly." Heero smiled triumphantly, when he saw the defeated look on Ralph's face. "So, if you're keen on proving me wrong, how 'bout you check it out?"
"I will," came a defiant retort, as Ralph slid the papers next to the phone. "I'll give Doc Schbeiker a call right now, and have him look through his records. Be able to prove you wrong by supper time!"
"Really?" Heero asked sarcastically. "You have a way to get the records to Chang that quickly for a comparison?"
"Hey--we've got a fax machine. You may think we're just bunch of hicks, but we're not all that far behind the times. Might not have the answer today, if your precious Doctor Chang don't get back to us--but when he does, you'll see I was right all along. Solo Stevens walked away from Smoky Hills under his own power."
Heero gave a shrug, pleased that his lead would be followed through on, though he was a lot less pleased at the sudden connection to Duo. "If I were you, I'd keep this pretty quiet until you have results--no need to go alarming people or tipping off a potential killer--"
"You can leave now," Ralph grumbled, as he was reaching for the phone. "I'll call you with the results, Mister Yuy, since this is a police matter, after all. You've cluttered up my office long enough."
"Pardon me," Heero said unrepentantly. "And when I turn out to be right, don't bother to thank me for doing your job for you."
"I won't."
Heero's annoyance with Ralph was far overshadowed by his smugness at forcing the man to actually work a case, and he left the office with a smirk on his face.
It faded, of course, once he was in his car and headed back home, and a sick feeling of dread settled in the pit of his stomach as he thought about how likely it was that the victim would be identified as Duo's former boyfriend--and how much of a shock it would be to the braided man.
He recalled their lighthearted chat at the mailbox, and Duo's casual and irreverent attitude about the skeleton.
"Damn, he's not gonna know what hit him," Heero sighed to himself.
He almost hoped they'd find out the skeleton wasn't Solo, though it would open up a whole new avenue of possibilities with him as the perpetrator instead of the victim. Heero didn't think Duo would like that scenario any better. Either way, the braided man was in for some heartache.
Despite the slim possibility of error, Heero was already convinced the dental records would positively identify the skeleton as that of Solo Stevens. No matter how much Ralph Kurt insisted the guy had just run off one day, in his gut Heero knew better.
Hell--one look at Duo was enough to convince him no one could have walked away without so much as a goodbye. And according to Duo's missing persons report, Solo and he had talked about leaving together; it made no sense for Stevens to have gone alone, despite notes from the investigating officer saying he'd obviously done just that.
It was pretty apparent that the cops had talked to a couple of Solo's friends or co-workers and concluded he wanted out of town badly enough to leave his under age boyfriend behind. Heero wondered how long it took them to reach their abrupt conclusion--one hour, or two?
God--Duo was in for a hell of a shock, if the remains turned out to be Solo's. Heero almost groaned at the thought of that brilliant smile dimmed by grief. It wasn't something he looked forward to, and he wished, not for the first time, that Thor had never brought that first bone home.
"Ignorance is bliss," he muttered to himself as he was passing the post office, and the familiar red Jeep parked behind it. "I can always hope I'm wrong--on all counts."
The remainder of the drive passed quickly, and when he pulled up by the house to find Catherine's car parked there he felt a rush of relief. He wanted nothing more than to hurry into the house and blurt the whole story out to Trowa.
But of course, with Catherine there, it would have to wait.
The door opened as he walked up the path, and Thor and Balder bounded out to greet him.
"Where ya been?" Trowa asked, stepping out behind them, but staying up on the porch out of the rain. "These two just about bowled me over when I walked in. Acted like they'd been alone forever!"
"Yes, I was gone a whole hour or two," Heero said dryly. He noticed the two dogs ran back up to Trowa, demanding more attention. "I think it was you they were missing."
"Aw, sweet," Trowa teased, fondling the shaggy heads. "How 'bout you? Did you miss me much?"
"Hardly noticed you were gone," Heero said with a smirk as he passed by. "Where's Catherine?"
"Right here," came the girl's voice as she stepped out of the kitchen with a mixing bowl in her arms. "Whipping up a decent meal for you two."
Heero gave Trowa a disapproving look. "You're making her cook? Isn't she a guest?"
"She wanted to!" Trowa defended himself. "She seems to think men are useless in the kitchen."
"Really? Then how does she explain the fact that you and I are both alive after months on our own?"
"Take-out," she called cheerily, heading back into the kitchen after bestowing a quick kiss to Heero's cheek.
"I dare you to find a single take-out container in that refrigerator!" Heero shot back with a glare she wasn't there to see.
"Just because you know how to dispose of the evidence--"
Heero looked at Trowa. "How long is she staying?"
"Just for dinner," Trowa answered with a grin. "You won't have to snipe for very long."
"She's driving all the way back to Sanc tonight?" Heero's sense of chivalry kicked in then. "You and I could double up and give her my room if she'd rather go in the morning--"
"Naw. She's got some hot weight-lifter guy on the hook, and he expects her back tonight."
Heero frowned slightly. "You check him out?"
Trowa's smile turned warmer. "'Course I did. He's okay. Nice fellow. And I told him if he didn't treat her right, I know a place where we could bury his body and no one would ever find it."
"Thor could," Heero pointed out, heading into the kitchen to see if Catherine needed help with anything.
Trowa's laughter followed behind him. "Goin' upstairs for a shower, Yuy. See you two at dinner."
Heero grunted acknowledgment as he turned the corner. "What can I do to help, Cathy?"
She looked up from her work and jerked her head towards the refrigerator. "Dig out the chicken breast and start chopping it into half-inch pieces, would you?"
Heero kept himself occupied with the simple tasks she gave, though his mind kept drifting back to what he'd learned at the police station, and how much he wanted to share that knowledge with Trowa--to see what his brother thought he should do about it.
Distracted as he was, it seemed a short time before they were sitting down to eat.
Trowa wandered in at the last possible minute, freshly showered and dressed in comfortable sweats. "Hey, you never even asked about Sandy," he pointed out, sliding into the chair across from Heero and reaching for the casserole dish.
Heero looked up from his contemplation of the jumble of noodles, chicken and sauce on his plate. "What's to ask?" he managed in a teasing tone. "You're bringing home another stray."
"--says the man with two wolfhounds and a parrot," Trowa riposted, grinning.
"Yes, but my strays don't have the potential to eat people."
"Naw, they just bring home the remains." Trowa gave a victorious smirk. "Speaking of which--"
Heero cut in swiftly, before his brother could ask the obvious question. "So tell me about Sandy," he demanded. "You mentioned an amputation; can she walk okay, or will she need special flooring or ongoing vet care?"
Trowa happily launched into a description of the big cat, right down to the crooked whiskers on one side of her face, and the way she purred when her ears were scratched.
"She lets you that close?" Heero wondered, glancing over his roommate for signs of scratches or mauling.
"She's a pussycat," Trowa said warmly. "Hand-raised and apparently unaware that she's supposed to be Queen of the Jungle."
"Good. One cranky lion is enough." Heero absently rubbed the healing scratch on his arm. "Hey--speaking of that, I think we had a feline visitor out here," he mentioned.
Trowa raised an eyebrow.
"I think a mountain lion left tracks around the back of the barn earlier this week."
"No shit?"
Heero quirked a smile. "No shit--just tracks."
"Har har," drawled the auburn-haired man. "I meant to ask if you were serious, as you well know. So tell me--what did the tracks look like?"
"I made a sketch of one," Heero told him, getting up and retrieving the paper he'd copied the tracks onto. "Actual size," he added, as he laid it down next to Trowa's plate.
"Wow!" Catherine leaned closer, spreading her hand across the track for a size comparison. "That's a big cat all right, though I'd guess at a female or younger male."
Heero looked skeptically at her. "You can tell that much from a track?"
"Actually, yes. Adult males are noticeably larger than females, including their tracks."
"You said it was near the barn?" Trowa asked.
"Yes. It woke me in the middle of the night with a downright blood-curdling shriek." Heero smiled wanly. "Could've given Zero a run for his money. I went out and looked around--turned on lights and made enough noise to chase it off, I think. The next morning, I poked around the area where I thought I saw something, and found those tracks."
Trowa glanced at the window and the still-falling rain. "I suppose they're gone by now."
"That's why I took the time to trace one."
"Well, it'll probably come back around, if it's attracted by Leon's scent," Catherine pointed out. "You may get a first-hand look at it."
"I'd rather not," Heero said decisively. "I prefer my lions in cages, thank you very much."
"Perhaps you should report the sighting," the girl added. "I mean, they can't be very common around here--"
"They aren't," Heero agreed. "From all I've heard, it's actually a hotly-debated topic whether they actually live in the state or not. But I have no intention of telling anyone a wild mountain lion came to visit our illegal African lion."
"Good point," Catherine conceded.
"Well, hopefully Sandy's arrival will settle Leon down," Trowa spoke up. "And if he stops calling, maybe your nocturnal visitor will drift away."
"I hope so. I hadn't even considered native species as a potential complication," Heero sighed.
"We'll have to take that into consideration," his brother agreed. "Smaller species won't be an issue; but bears, moose and mountain lions are formidable creatures. Our caging will need to exclude them as well as keep in our livestock--especially if we end up with prey animals, like zebra."
Heero raised an eyebrow. "Is there something I should know, Barton? Are you planning to adopt a zebra next?"
"No! I'm just thinking ahead," Trowa hastened to assure him.
"Hn," grunted the Japanese man. "Your thinking has a tendency to take a turn into action."
Catherine laughed at Trowa's sheepish look, and Heero's dark scowl. "Well, boys, as much fun as it's been, I think maybe I'll head out before you get into the discussion I see looming on the horizon."
"No discussion--" Trowa protested.
"Says you." She started gathering the dishes, heading for the sink.
"Leave those," Heero commanded. "You cooked. We'll clean." He stood up and carried the casserole dish over to the counter. "Besides, I hear you've got a hot body-builder waiting back at the circus. Wouldn't want to keep you from your fun."
She gave him a good-natured smack on the arm. "My fun's none of your business, Yuy," she chided. "But I'll tell Sven you said 'hi.'"
"Sven?" he asked with a smirk. "You mean there are actually guys out there named Sven?"
She narrowed her eyes dangerously, though they glimmered with mirth. "Yes, and my guy is one of them. No wisecracks--Heero. It's not like your name is any less unusual."
"True," he conceded.
"I'm staying out of this," Trowa threw in with a shrug. "Catherine's got the only 'normal' name among us."
By the time they'd cleared the table, Catherine had visited the powder room and was ready to leave, giving them both hugs and kisses on her way out, and promising to remind Sven she was an expert with throwing knives, if he ever thought of breaking her heart.
Heero grinned at her departing back, and then turned to his brother. "I like that girl. No pushover."
Trowa gave him a gentle punch to the arm. "Too bad she's not the right sex for you, eh? Speaking of which, how's the hot mailman? Any progress on that front?"
"We had a pleasant conversation at the mailbox yesterday," Heero said, his expression sobering as he recalled the catalyst for their encounter, in the form of Chang's report.
"You don't look as thrilled as I'd expect, for a man with a date lined up."
Heero's frown morphed into a scowl. "We didn't get quite that far. But he said he enjoyed talking to me, and he'd see me again soon."
"Ugh," Trowa grunted, heading back for the kitchen. "He's as chicken shit as you are. I may have to kick his ass, too."
Heero followed along, heading for the sink to start cleaning off dishes.
"Want tea?" Trowa asked, reaching for the canister on the counter. "I'm making some for me."
"Sure."
Heero busied himself with the mundane chore of dish washing, his mind returning to the somber news he'd acquired that afternoon. By the time Trowa had finished brewing their tea and brought it over to the table, he was done with the work, and ready to join him.
"Okay, brother. Spill," Trowa said curtly, eyeing Heero over his mug as he approached.
"Hm?"
"You've been somewhere else all evening. What's up?"
Heero sat down, running a hand across his face. "You started to ask earlier, but I didn't want to discuss it in front of Catherine. I got news from Wufei yesterday, via express mail."
"Uh-huh." Trowa studied his face. "Hence the chat with Duo, I suppose. What's got you so rattled--and I'm guessing it's not the prospect of some day growing a set and asking Duo out. Something in that report--?"
"Kind of." Heero shrugged. "The lab had age, height, weight, sex and had narrowed the time of death down to between five and ten years ago. Duo said something at the mailbox about how he'd have thought the person would've been missed. So today I went to the police in town and asked if they'd had any missing persons cases that might provide a lead." He sighed, closing his eyes and rubbing at them. "Officer Kurt couldn't be bothered looking, but he let me."
Trowa watched his brother's face tighten. "You found something?"
"Almost eight years ago a young man named Solo Stevens went missing. The cops insisted he took off on his own, but his boyfriend filed a missing persons report anyway."
"Oh, shit," Trowa began, jumping ahead. "Don't tell me-- Duo was the boyfriend?"
Heero nodded.
"Holy shit!" Trowa numbly set his cup down before his suddenly-unsteady hand dropped it. "Do you think it's him? The skeleton, I mean."
"It fits the age, sex and height," Heero said with a raspy catch to his voice. "The timing would be right, too."
"Holy fucking shit!" Trowa blurted, pushing back from the table.
"Yeah," Heero agreed weakly.
"Does Duo know?"
"No. No one does," Heero said quickly. "I told Officer Kurt to keep his big mouth shut about it until he can get his hands on Stevens' dental records, if there are any, and fax them over to Chang."
"There's a fax machine in Smoky Hills?" Trowa quipped.
"Probably only one," came the snide response.
"So--when will you know something for sure?"
"That depends. If it turns out the skeleton isn't Stevens, Kurt will be dying to tell me I was wrong. Otherwise, I'll probably have to wait until Chang contacts me."
"But you're ten times the cop any of these hicks could ever hope to be!" Trowa protested. "You should be leading the investigation."
"I already explained my reasons for holding back."
"Yes, but that was before you knew Duo might be involved."
"If anything, that makes it even more imperative that I stay out of it." He gave a frustrated sigh. "I nudged the Smoky Hills cops in the right direction. I'm going to give them a chance to follow through."
"And if they don't--?"
Heero shook his head. "They will--if only to spite me. Officer Kurt was pretty irritated at my suggestion they contact a local dentist to see if there were any records. He'll at least get that much done, hoping to be able to say he told me so when they don't match the remains."
Trowa looked uneasily at him. "What do you think the odds are?"
Heero grimaced. "C'mon, Tro'. The age, sex, timing--all fit. And he was a gay guy in a town full of intolerant jackasses."
"So you think he was murdered?"
"Chang hasn't confirmed a cause of death--so there's an outside chance it was some sort of bizarre accident."
"What about an animal attack? Cougars have been known to go after humans. And they bury their kills to conceal them from scavengers."
"Yes, but do they strip them and bury them neatly, without taking parts away for consumption?"
"Hm. Probably not," Trowa conceded. "I mean, you could explain the naked part if the guy was skinny-dipping in the reservoir or something--but that wouldn't account for the skeleton being as intact as it was."
"Exactly. Whatever happened to that victim, it involved another human. I'd bet my badge on that."
Trowa looked searchingly at his brother. "Are you going to tell Duo?"
Heero snorted. "Probably won't have to. The way the local cops spread gossip, he might hear the results of the dental records comparison before I do."
"You should warn him," Trowa suggested. "It doesn't sound like the Smoky Hills police are very tactful. And if Stevens was his boyfriend, the news might be easier to take coming from someone who gives a shit."
Heero hesitated, recalling Officer Kurt's scornful description of Duo as the other "resident fag," as well as his suggestion that Solo was the killer rather than the victim. He shook his head. "I can't, Trowa. At least--not until the results come back. Kurt brought up a valid point that if the skeleton's not Solo Stevens, and his disappearance coincides with the time of death, we'd have to consider him a suspect."
"Fucking hell," Trowa muttered. "Either Duo's boyfriend's dead, or he's the prime suspect in a murder? There's just no way to sugar coat that."
"No, there's not. I don't think Duo would take accusations against his boyfriend much better than he would the news of his death, though I'd almost prefer that scenario." He looked at Trowa with haunted eyes. "I've had to tell a lot of people a loved one was dead. I'm not putting Duo through that until I'm sure it's necessary."
Trowa smirked slightly. "You've got it bad for the kid, don't you?"
Heero shrugged. "Maybe. I just know that yesterday at the mailbox he was so happy--so full of life. He's got an amazing smile, y'know. And I won't take that away without good reason."
"Then you better call Chang and tell him to give you a heads up on the dental records, so the local cops don't dump them on Duo out of the blue."
"Yeah, I'll do that," Heero promised. Then a faintly amused gleam entered his eyes. "Speaking of phone calls--don't you have one to make?"
"Me?"
"To a certain blonde postmaster?" Heero pressed, gesturing to the phone. "He should still be at the office."
"Now?" Trowa yelped, panic entering his eyes.
"I'd appreciate it," Heero said blandly. "I ran into him at the library when I was looking for information about mountain lions, and he was very friendly. I'd like you to make your interest clear to him before he does something stupid like ask me out.
Trowa's eyes widened comically. "You? He's interested in you?"
"You say that as if there's nothing to like about me," came a droll reply.
"I didn't mean it that way," Trowa babbled uneasily. "I just meant that I thought that day at the post office he and I hit it off so well. And now you're saying he came on to you--?"
"He didn't 'come on' to me. But he asked about my hobbies and interests, and I wasn't completely comfortable with his level of curiosity." Heero picked up the receiver and held it out. "Call him. Or I'll call him for you."
Trowa took the handset, swallowing hard.
"The number's right there," Heero added helpfully, pointing to a scrap of paper on the phone stand.
"I know that," Trowa growled. "D'you think you could give me some privacy here?"
Heero rolled his eyes. "You're just making a date, Barton--not having phone sex."
Trowa's glare could have melted steel. "Out!" he barked sternly.
Smirking to himself, Heero headed out to check on Leon, giving Trowa his privacy and breathing a small sigh of relief at the potential progress.
TBC...
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