"What the fuck?!" Lauren squawked. She was on speakerphone, and Al, Rachel and Sunny chuckled at her exclamation. 

"Yup. Well, the plates aren't on the van, but it's a white Kia Sedona, and it looks an awful lot like yours." Rachel smiled at their triumph. "We were taking a tour of the addresses of people opposed to the subdivision, and the sprawling complex at one of them has a multi-car garage with one open door, in which is parked a familiar van. Sunny has a pair of binoculars, the resourceful bastard, and we all had a good look at it before determining that it might be the one."

Lauren made a non-committal noise, which made Rachel frown. "Well, if there are no plates we can't be sure, unless you can go and check the Vehicle Identification Number on the dash," she said.

"Well, seeing as there's a gate across the property, I don't think we'll be able to sneak in," Al said.

"Is that you, Al?" Lauren asked. "Am I on speaker?"

"Yup, and I'm here too!" Sunny called from the front seat. For some reason, Al and Rachel had chosen to both sit in the back as if they were being chauffered.

"Sunny too?" She chuckled. "So, you were able to find names off the minutes?"

"Tej came through," Sunny said. "So, we're out here in Aldergrove on my day off, acting like we're thirteen again and peering through Danny Trybek's window."

Lauren sighed. "Damn it, I wish I was there with you, but I'm stuck here doing admin, which is the least favourite part of my job."

"We wish you were here too, girl," Rachel said. "You might have been able to give us better confirmation."

"Maybe. I also would have avoided a rather awkward situation with Ralph today."

"What was Ralph doing there?" Rachel asked. "It's his Saturday off."

"He didn't lock the door to his office last night, so he came in to do it, or so he said. It didn't help that I was in his office when he arrived."

Al gasped. "Jesus, Lauren, are you okay?"

"Yeah, yeah, nothing happened, but it was a little tense. I think he suspected something was up, but he didn't want to confront me directly. Funnily enough, he arrived soon after I got a call for him from this woman, she didn't give her name but I thought she sounded familiar. I couldn't help thinking the two were connected."

Rachel checked the address list. "Would that woman be Carrie MacDougall?"

Silence on the other end of the line for a moment. Then Lauren said, "Son of a bitch. Are you serious?"

"Wait, what's going on?" Al asked.

"This has got to be a coincidence," Lauren said, and Al could tell she was dismayed by the news. "If this is her, she's definitely come down in the world."

"Do you know this woman?" Sunny asked.

"Well... it's been years, but... okay, she was a client of ours. I shouldn't be telling you this, but she isn't anymore, at least I don't think she is. Remember when I told you about the time Joe punched a guy out in a nightclub?"

"Yeah..." Rachel said uncertainly. "What's the connection?"

"He was the husband of this woman. They used to live in the posh Dunbar-Southlands area of Vancouver, but he had an apartment downtown that he used when he stayed overnight for business, or so he said. She suspected he was cheating on her with women he picked up in nightclubs. Joe came with me one time while I was playing the part of one of these women to get evidence on him. He noticed before I did that this guy spiked my drink. That was why he punched him out. After the police got involved, they determined that he'd done this before, drugged women, brought them back to his apartment and raped them."

"That fucking bastard," Rachel breathed.

"Yeah, but, see, when this woman hired me, she thought she was getting evidence of adultery she could use to get a better payout at divorce, but when all these women were identified and informed that pictures of them were found in this guy's apartment, they all sued for damages alongside the rape charges. After all the settlements, Mrs. MacDougall made off with much less than she ever thought she would get. She was quite angry about that."

"Wrong thing to be angry about," Sunny said. 

"Yeah, well, if this is the same woman, Aldergrove is a long way down from Dunbar-Southlands for her, and it means her circumstances are quite reduced. She was a cold, patrician bitch. I never thought she might be a vengeful one, though."

"Wait," Al said. "Are you implying this woman is the same woman who hired you, that she didn't like the end results of your work, and... what... got her revenge by luring Joe and Rachel out here to beat them up and rob them?"

"It does sound kind of far fetched when you put it that way," Lauren said. "It may be a different Carrie MacDougall, and that might not be my van in her garage. In fact, that would be the more likely explanation."

"Fuck that, I like the other one better," Rachel said, and they all chuckled.

"But how are we going to prove it, that's the question."

"Stakeout!" Rachel said.

"I don't think that's a good idea. Are you on an open stretch of road?"

They all looked around. "Yes," Al said.

"And you're parked on the side?"

"Yes," Sunny said. 

"How far apart are the properties?"

"Very far. We can't see the neighbouring ones from here," Rachel said. 

"Then I think it's going to be pretty easy to make you. You might have already been spotted using your binoculars."

"Shit," Sunny said. "We better get out of here, then. Unless we can find a way around the back of the house."

"I wouldn't bother. You have the name and address. I think you should pass it onto the RCMP, since they're handling the stolen vehicle report."

"The old Lauren would have hopped the gate," Rachel grumbled.

"The new Lauren wants to stay out of prison. You can get away with a lot more when you're a minor."

"Fine." Rachel sighed. "I guess we should go."

"I would like to go home and spend time with my family," Sunny said.

"Okay, thanks for the input, Lauren," Al said. 

"Stay safe, guys."

"You too!" Rachel admonished her. "Take better care to stay out of Ralph's way."

"I will. Talk to you later, bye."

She hung up. They all looked at each other, slightly deflated. They really thought they'd struck gold here, but maybe it was just iron pyrite.

As Sunny drove them back onto the highway, Rachel said, "Hey, Sunny, could you swing by Joe and Lauren's house?"

Sunny looked at them in the rearview mirror. "Want to visit Joe, see how he's doing?"

Rachel blinked in surprise and then smiled. "Yes, as a matter of fact, I do. I bet you'd like to as well."

"Yeah, why not, we can stop by, cheer him up a little."

"Great. Then Al and I will just take the Skytrain home from Brentwood Station."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, no need for you to drive us all the way home."

"Okay."

Al was surprised when Joe's mom answered the door, but he probably shouldn't have been. With Lauren gone, the kids wouldn't be allowed to answer the door, and Joe's parents must have been over to help look after him. She peered up at them for a moment as if trying to place them.

"Hello, Mrs. DiTomaso," Rachel said, always the first of them to engage adults when they were kids. "Can Joe come out and play?"

This only seemed to confuse the older woman. "Rachel?" she asked. "You okay?"

"As well as can be expected," she replied. "I still have a bit of a black eye, as you can see, but my bruises are almost all gone."

Now she seemed even more confused. "Wha happen to you?"

Now it was Rachel's turn to be confused. "I was with Joe when those men attacked us. I got hurt too."

"No!" she breathed in shock. "What you doing there? Why you go too?"

"Bella, let them in!" Joe's dad called as he shuffled into view. "It's cold out there."

She nodded and stepped aside for them. Al and Sunny greeted them with handshakes.

"How's Joe today?" Sunny asked.

"Eh," Joe's mom said noncommittally. "You can ask him youself."

"Hello?" Joe called from the living room.

"Hey, buddy!" Al called. "We're all here."

"Sunny and Rachel too?" he called back, sounding brighter.

"We were on a road trip, and we thought we'd stop by on our way home," Rachel called.

"Auntie Rachel! Auntie Rachel!" Naomi and Tosh called at the same time, running up to them and bouncing on their feet. Naomi especially idol-worshipped Rachel after watching her walk down the aisle last year. 

Her happy expression was in sharp contrast to the open suspicion she'd showed Al Monday night, and Al felt renewed guilt at the whole situation they were in; the last thing he wanted to do was give Naomi and Tosh reason to worry about their family's stability, and every moment he even thought about Lauren in any way that wasn't purely platonic threatened that stability.

"Hey, kiddos!" Rachel squealed, kneeling and wrapping her arms around both of them.

"Are you feeling better, Auntie Rachel?" Naomi asked.

"Much, thank you for asking. Are you taking care of your daddy?"

"Yes!" Tosh said proudly. "Mostly he's just been on the couch."

They all chuckled. "Well, it's his poor knee, isn't it," Rachel said. "It hurts to get around. You kids don't know how much you appreciate your knees when you get older, you're all young and spry right now."

They had no retort to that.

"So, Rachel," Joe's dad said, "How's you dad?"

They all looked at him awkwardly, but Rachel, veteran of many updates of this nature, said, "Still dead, Mr. DiTomaso."

"Oh, yeah, right, you tell me already," he said, shaking his head in frustration at himself. This wasn't the first time he'd asked, having forgotten she'd already told him. Those circuits not connecting again.

"He's at the cemetery in New West, if you ever want to visit," she said, and it occurred to Al that he and Rachel had never visited the graves of either of their fathers since they'd gotten together. Other than the mock seance they'd had two years ago, when Rachel had told all of her departed loved ones, including her father, everything she'd wished she'd told them when they were alive, she hadn't evinced much sentimentality about those who'd gone before her. Neither had he, really. It had never occurred to either of them to go visit a grave. 

Maybe it was just their generation, he thought; they were the first to never have to face the awesomeness of death in the form of war, deprivation, or some horrible disease that ravaged the population, like the Spanish Flu. They had no respect for death, and felt no need to offer aves to the dead. He thought maybe they should; he would mention it to her soon, a quick trip to see them, one in New West and one in Coquitlam.

Joe's dad nodded sadly and said, "Maybe I join him there soon enough."

That made everyone feel sombre, except the kids, who didn't get the full meaning of what he'd said. Mrs. DiTomaso's lip quivered, and she furiously wiped her eyes and drew him down the hall to have a quiet word with him out of earshot. The rest of them took seats in the living room where they could. Naomi and Tosh took seats on either side of Joe, who sat like a king on a throne, taking up most of the sofa, his bad leg raised on an ottoman. He was dressed in his robe, Al noticed with dismay, the same robe he'd worn Monday night, and pyjama bottoms.

"So," Joe said, smiling at them, pleased at their visit. His face had improved much since Al saw him last; much less swollen, the cuts healing well, his eyes not so puffy but sporting a couple of shiners. His arm was still in its cast, now with signatures from his family. "You said you were on a road trip?"

"Tej looked into the zoning hearings for your development," Sunny said, "and she recorded the names and addresses of people opposed to it, of which there were quite a few, I'm sorry to say."

Joe sighed. "We only build where we're told to build; it's not up to us to create goodwill for the project we build. So, what, you went looking at where these people lived?"

"Nothing too dangerous," Al assured him. "Just seeing if anything stood out."

"We think we might have seen your van at one of the houses," Rachel said.

His eyes widened. "Seriously?"

"We're not sure," Al said. "The plates were off, but it's possible."

"The house belongs to a woman Lauren thinks might have been a former client of hers," Rachel said.

Joe looked horrified. "What? How could that be?"

"We don't know that, yet, but we'll follow up on it," Sunny said.

Joe closed his eyes and sighed. "This is getting weird, guys."

"You're telling me," Rachel said. "I'm starting to think that if I never had that party last Saturday, we'd all be okay right now."

"How would you have known what would happen, though?" Al asked.

She turned to him and said pointedly, "I know what wouldn't have happened, at least."

Al felt like she'd slapped him, and he began to worry that maybe they weren't as okay as he'd thought they were. When he looked at Joe and Sunny, he knew they were thinking the same thing. Him and Lauren, making out in front of them. He blushed, cleared his throat and said, "I want to apologize to you, Joe, for... anything you might have seen that night."

It was all he could say with Joe's kids sitting next to him, but Joe must have known what he was talking about, because he nodded. "Thank you. If Rachel has forgiven you, then I can, too."

"Thank you." He looked at Rachel, who nodded, stone-faced.

No one said anything for a moment, and Al thought he could cut the tension in the room with a knife.

"Actually, Joe," Rachel said, "can I maybe take you for a walk outside, have a private chat with you?"

Joe looked at her and nodded in understanding. "Yeah, you know what? I think I can use a walk. Don't want to let stiffness creep in. It'll have to be just the balcony, though, I don't feel like taking stairs." He chuckled. "It'll be just like last weekend, eh?"

She stood and offered her hand. "I'll be your crutch once more for old time's sake."

The rising wasn't as smooth as Joe might have liked, and Sunny helped him to his feet just enough so that Rachel could take over and lead him outside on to the balcony, where they made a slow circuit. Rachel made sure to slide the balcony door closed before they began, and they talked in low tones so Al couldn't make out what they were saying, but he knew what they were talking about. This was Rachel's main reason for coming, regardless of what she'd told Sunny before.

"What's Auntie Rachel talking to Dad about?" Naomi asked as she watched them take another lap.

Sunny looked at Al with the same question on his face. Al cleared his throat and said, "I can't really tell you, it's something only for grown-up ears to hear. Your dad and Auntie Rachel went through a lot in the past few days, and I think they just need to talk about it without making you feel sad for them."

"I'm eleven, now," Naomi said stubbornly, and Al knew she was continuing her enmity from Monday night. "I can handle it." 

It sounded so mature for such a small person, and it reminded him so much of Lauren when she was younger, that bravado, that it made him want to chuckle, but he didn't because it would have been patronizing, and Al knew that would have made him furious if he were in Naomi's shoes.

If he'd heard Naomi on Monday morning saying that Lauren had been just a couple years older than her when she'd stopped a bad man, he would also have reeled at the absurdity of it. How young they'd been! How naive and reckless! He could only hope they'd learned enough from their own mistakes to not allow their children to repeat them, and that they knew enough about the darkness in this world to protect them from it, if only for a little while longer.

Instead, he said, "I'm sure you could, Naomi, but I'm afraid Tosh isn't quite ready to hear such things."

She nodded soberly at this obvious truth. "Maybe Dad will tell me later, without Tosh around."

"You can't leave me out!" Tosh protested. "Mommy said you need to include me in everything."

"Sorry, buddy," Sunny said. "Maybe that's true now, but soon enough it won't be."

Tosh's eyes widened. "What's that mean?"

Sunny shook his head and said, "You're both getting older. Eventually you'll have secrets you won't want the other to know."

Tosh looked stunned at this notion. He looked at Naomi, who shrugged awkwardly and nodded, already cognisant of the coming changes; perhaps she'd even learned about them in school already. 

To Al's horror, Tosh began to tear up, and he realized that he and Sunny might be unintentionally damaging Joe and Lauren's children. "Hey, hey, it's not that bad," he said soothingly. "It doesn't mean you'll love each other any less."

"Al's right," Sunny said. "I had... have... a younger sister, and we were inseparable when we were kids, and even though we grew older and wanted a little more privacy from each other, because we had our separate friends and stuff, we still loved each other very much..."

Now, to Al's greater horror, Sunny was getting emotional, obviously remembering his murdered sister, and he didn't know how to prevent this situation from turning into a sob fest. "See? There you go," he said, a bit too brightly, while Sunny got a hold of himself. "You two are going to be pals for life, okay? You'll just have your own friends and your own interests, and that's completely natural, but you'll always come back home at the end of the day, and say goodnight to each other, and feel safe knowing the other is there, sleeping next door."

Al was well aware that last statement was a little rosy; he never had a sibling so he had no experience of the sibling bond, but he was sure it was rarely that Norman Rockwellish. This was the twenty-first century, after all. Tosh seemed satisfied with it, though, because he wiped his eyes and nodded, but said nothing more and, mercifully, Joe and Rachel stumbled back through the balcony door and pulled everyone's attention back to them.

It was also at this time that Joe's parents strode back into the room, Mr. DiTomaso looking exhausted and chastened, as if he'd gotten a good telling off, which he might have.

Mrs. DiTomaso nearly shrieked when she saw Joe being buttressed by Rachel. "Giuseppe! Why you up! You gonna make Rachel fall!"

"Ma, it's okay," he said. "Rachel walked with me for miles like this. A few times around the balcony won't do any harm."

Unconvinced, Mrs. DiTomaso insisted on taking his other side and helping Rachel lower him back on the couch, unaware of the irony that without Rachel there she might have crumpled under Joe's weight herself; she seemed to be in denial that she wasn't young anymore, and Al couldn't help noticing that she also resented her husband for getting old. He couldn't blame her, really; the change wrought by his illness was nothing short of devastating, leaving him a husk of his former self. It would make anyone bitter, especially the woman who'd enjoyed the love of a man who was once so strong and virile.

Once Joe was settled, his leg back on the ottoman, Rachel said, "Well, we should get going."

"You don't wanna stay and eat?" Mr. DiTomaso asked. "Have some wine, maybe?"

"No wine for you, 'Berto," his wife admonished. "You on blood thinners, is no good for you."

Mr. DiTomaso smiled and winked at them. "Ah, bella, a little won't hurt."

"Dad," Joe said sternly, "don't push Ma today, she has enough to worry about. Anyway, I'm sure Sunny would like to get home to his family. We shouldn't keep him."

Al felt like they were fleeing, and he wondered if Rachel and Joe's conversation hadn't gone as well as Rachel had hoped. "We'll visit again soon," he said. "Maybe we'll take you up on it then."

"Take it easy, guys," Joe said.

Naomi saw them to the door. She leaned into Rachel and asked, "Can Dad tell me later what you two were talking about?"

Rachel looked horrified. "Absolutely not!" she squawked. When Naomi looked stricken, Rachel softened and said, "Sorry, sweetie, that's something that's just going to have to be between your dad and me. But how about I tell you something else I bet your dad never told you?"

Naomi nodded eagerly, and Rachel leaned in and whispered in her ear. Al smiled; Rachel had made it a secret, and no child could turn down a secret, and by telling Naomi alone she'd made them friends for life, an ample consolation prize for not telling her the other thing.

As Sunny drove them to the Skytrain station, Al asked, "So, what was it you told her?"

Rachel gasped in mock indignation. "When girls share secrets, they don't tell boys what they are. That's, like, rule number one of boy-girl relations, didn't you know?"

Al chuckled. "Okay, fair enough."

"I will say this," Rachel said with a mischievous smile. "Joe's not going to be happy with me the next time he sees me."

Sunny chuckled and said, "Something embarrassing from his childhood, maybe?"

Rachel shrugged and made a zipping of the lips motion, and Sunny was still laughing as he dropped them off at the station.

Later, on the Skytrain home, Al asked her, "How are the two of you, really? How did your conversation go?"

"About as gut-wrenching as I predicted, but Joe was remarkably civil, probably softened up by our shared experiences. I think he's torn between being angry about the affair and aroused by the thought of his wife touching another woman. But I let him know in no uncertain terms that I'm not interested in tearing Lauren away from him or his family. I don't think he's thrilled about it, but he told me he won't stand in our way, so that he can keep the marriage together."

Al thought about telling her what Lauren told him last night about Joanie, but then he would have had to tell her that Lauren had called him, and then Rachel would ask him why he hadn't told her already, and then any explanation he gave would only sound hollow, and she would only grow suspicious of where things stood between him and Lauren, and he couldn't blame her. So, instead, he said, "That's very big of him."

She nodded and sighed. "Regardless, I think both of our marriages are entering minefields, and we have to be very careful how we step if we're all going to remain friends. The last thing I want is to lose everybody so soon after I got all of you back."

Al put his arm around her and said, "Whatever happens, you're not going to lose me."

She nodded, but looked preoccupied, and Al was painfully aware that this notion didn't seem to pacify her as much as he'd hoped.

It's one step forward, two steps back with progress in finding out who was responsible for what happened to all of them. Thanks for reading this far. If you liked what you read, hit the "Vote" button and leave a comment. Now let's finally see what happened to Lauren the day of the party, and close off the distance between the end of the first novel and the beginning of the second, by clicking "Continue reading."