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tends to overuse his metaphors. When he got to the door, he heard Loraine’s voice echoing on the other side. Andy could hear a mixture of sobs and shouts of profanity. Although he wasn’t a religious man, he muttered, “God help me,” before turning the knob and stepping through the door.
    What have we done?” Loraine said as Andy walked into interrogation room two. Her back to the door, she didn’t turn to see who had entered. She seemed instinctively to know it was Andy. “You know why he did it, don’t you? He knew about us. He knew I kicked him out because of you.” Slowly she turned and looked Andy in the eye. He hardly recognized her in this state. “He always told me that he would make me wish I were dead if I ever left him. Well, he was right. I wish I was dead right now.” Her voice broke as the words spilled out, tears began flowing from her swollen eyes. “Oh, God, what have we done?” She bent over, sobbing, then sunk to her knees, her shoulders heaving.
    Andy hesitated. His first instinct was to cross the room, put his arm around her, and comfort her. But stabs of guilt froze him in his steps.
We?
he thought.
We?
His mind went into quick rewind. He thought back to the efforts he’d made to get to know Gabe. At the time it felt like the right thing to do. Loraine seemed like a struggling single mother, and boys in that kind of household need a man who will take an active interest in their lives. Even though Gabe talked about his father, Andy wondered what kind of relationship the two of them really had. Maybe guilt was driving him. The amateur psychologist in me wants to say he transferred his relationship with me onto Gabe. Since my old man had abandoned me, he must have figured Gabe’s dad had done the same. This was his chance to play the hero, by filling the void in a poor child’s heart left there by a heartless father. That’s what I would like to think was going on. The truth is probably less noble. My pop probably figured the best way to stay in the mom’s pants was to act like he cared for her kid. Women just love a sensitive, caring man.
    Now Andy wasn’t so sure about anything he’d done over the past six months. His no-strings-attached, purely physical relationship suddenly had strings, and he felt those tightening around his neck. He knew he should have walked away from this relationship, right from the very beginning. It didn’t take the death of Gabriel Phillips to make Andy realize he had been using the boy’s mother. He’d known it all along. From their first night together he knew he never intended to build any kind of long-term relationship with her. The only reason they’d lasted this long was because she initiated the contact when she wanted him. He’d phoned her once, maybe twice, in their entire time together. That is, until he got to know her son, but even then he wasn’t pursuing her. He felt more like a Big Brother volunteer with fringe benefits than a serious boyfriend. Some benefits. The boy was dead, and Andy felt responsible.
    I don’t know how long Andy stood there watching his woman break down on the floor. A little internal battle broke out between his internal cop and boyfriend. Getting involved in the case in more than a professional manner could bring down everything for which he’d worked over the past ten years. But Loraine cried harder, and Andy finally decided,
Screw it,
and walked across the room. He knelt down beside her and pulled her close to him. She didn’t fight him, but she didn’t melt into his arms, either. Like everything else about their relationship, she reacted with warm restraint, if that makes any sense. They stayed like that for what Andy said felt like an eternity. Finally Loraine looked up at him and said, “You aren’t going to let him get away with it, are you?”
    “Don’t worry,” Andy said in a near whisper. “I’ll personally look into this. If he had anything to do with Gabe’s death, I’ll take care of him. I