Page 65 of Rebels and Roses

From what Cooper could see, Tom didn’t plan much of anything in his life. It was chaos all around.

“Why on earth would they plan a pregnancy when Tom was just getting clean, and he had all these outstanding debts? It doesn’t make any sense,” Cooper pointed out. “That would be the last thing I would do in their place.”

“Some people think babies will fix things,” Finn said. “I had a cousin, and her boyfriend was a serial cheater, chronically unemployed, and an alcoholic. And those were his good qualities. She decided that having a baby would somehow magically make him a productive member of society. She believed it so much that she had three kids with him in hopes that he’d eventually grow the hell up.”

“I’m afraid to ask how that turned out,” Jane said.

“About as you’d expect,” Cooper laughed. “She and the three kids moved back in with her parents. He’s living with one of the women he was cheating with. He never sees his kids, and he’s never paid a dime of child support. But it’s just an example that when emotions are involved, people often don’t make the most rational of decisions. Either way, Erica says she’s pregnant with Tom’s baby. Now a court has to sort this out.”

In a way it was a relief that Erica had an injunction, keeping Tom here until there was a court ruling. As long as he was here, there was a good chance she would remain as well. Cooper didn’t suspect her of any wrongdoing, but he had questions. It would be easier to ask them if she was close by.

“Did you talk to Erica about checking into the hotel the night before?” Cooper asked. “That’s still an open question in my mind.”

“I did,” Finn confirmed. “She told me that I was mistaken. She came in that morning, not the night before.”

“Did you tell her that the hotel clerk feels differently?”

“I did, and she maintained that he was wrong. Didn’t get upset or anything. She was calm and cool, but she was firm on the timing. She didn’t come in the night before. I have a call into the hotel manager to get this straightened out.”

If Erica hadn’t come in the night before, it changed the entire situation. Sure, it was weird that Tom had passed away literally days after saying that someone was following him. But it wasn’twildly weird until he’d found out that Erica had arrived earlier than she’d said.

It didn’t make that gut feeling go away, however. It was just as strong as before.

He still had a few unanswered questions about Tom’s life.

“It wouldn’t makeany sense for Erica to have hurt Tom,” Jane argued as they pulled into a parking space in front of a student apartment building. They were going to talk to the girl that Tom had been with the night he’d died. “She was pregnant with his child. Unless she’d insured him for a million bucks, she’d want him around.”

Cooper had barely said a word the whole drive here. Jane could almost hear the wheels turning in his head as he thought about all they had learned about the recently deceased Tom Kemp. Clearly, he was struggling with something.

“That’s a good point,” he said after a long silence. “I want to just let this go. Believe me, I do.”

“But you can’t.”

“I can’t,” he sighed. “I feel like Tom is looking over my shoulder, prodding me to keep going. I’m sure his death was an accident. He had an addiction problem, and he got unlucky with cocaine cut with fentanyl. It happens. I see it in the news all the time. I don’t know why I can’t just accept it. Is it just my suspicious writer brain that sees dead bodies all the time?”

“Do you see dead bodies all the time? You should see someone about that,” Jane teased, trying to lighten the atmosphere. “If all your instincts are telling you to keep digging, then I’d go with it. Tom did appear to have a few secrets. With everything he told you about being followed and watched, you’dthink he would have mentioned that his kind of fiancée was pregnant. Was he scared that whoever was following him might be a threat to Erica and the baby? I know I would be worried about it.”

“Exactly,” Cooper said, slapping the steering wheel in frustration. “That’s a lot of where this is coming from. Tom was hiding a whole bunch of shit from me. He asked for my help, but he didn’t give me all of the details. Maybe I’m just pissed off at him.”

“Things have been done for worse reasons. It also might be because…”

“Because?” he prompted. “Are you trying not to say that it might be because of Fiona?”

Yes.

“No, that wasn’t what I was going to say.”

“What were you going to say then?”

“I don’t remember.”

I am such a liar.

“Of all the things I thought might happen today, I didn’t think you would stop telling me the truth. I thought we were closer than that.”

Well…shit. When he said it that way, she felt like crap.

“Okay, fine. Maybe it’s because of Fiona.”

---