Summary: Sequel to R.I.P. This Kiss, This Kiss by Dee Creamer ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- All Disclaimers Apply An Explanation of the Title: There's a song by Faith Hill called This Kiss. Some of you may be familiar with it. It's actually that song that got me thinking of this story line, thus the title. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Amanda sat at her desk looking at a pathology report without really seeing it. She was trying to decide what to do about Steve. After she had kissed him, she had felt a bit foolish. He had never given any indication that he was interested in her in that way. What if he didn't share her feelings? What if the kiss had embarrassed him? She might have destroyed a great friendship by her impulsive action. She hadn't had the nerve to go in to visit him again. And today he was going to be discharged. How should she handle it? Should she try to act like nothing had ever happened? But...but what if he DID share her feelings? Amanda's heart beat a little faster at that possibility. What should she do? Steve sat, fully dressed on the edge of the hospital bed. He was waiting for Jesse to come by with the discharge paperwork. Of course, he didn't really need to sit and wait for that, but he wanted some time to think anyway. Amanda hadn't come by to see him again after that one visit. Had the kiss been an impulsive thing that she'd instantly regretted? Steve's thoughts went back to that kiss. It had been almost like an electrical charge had started racing through his body. He'd never felt anything like that before. What if she'd changed her mind, though? How should he handle it, when he saw her again? Should he try to act like nothing had happened? But what if she HAD meant it? Steve's heart beat faster at that thought. At that point, Jesse entered Steve's room, pushing a wheel chair. "Are you ready for a chauffeured ride to your limousine sir?" "Jess, that's really not necessary. I'm perfectly capable of walking out of here." "Steve, you know the hospital rules as well as I do. You've certainly been in here often enough," Jesse grinned. "Grrrrrrrrrr." Steve got into the wheel chair. "Same to you," still grinning, Jesse wheeled Steve out of the room. ***** Mark and Jesse sat in the doctors' lounge sipping coffee. It had been two weeks since Steve had been discharged from the hospital, and both Mark and Jesse had detected a change in the "Four Musketeers", as they'd come to think of their little foursome. "Mark, what do you think is going on with Steve and Amanda? She can't still be angry with him over how he handle the investigation, can she? He did find Ron's killer." "I don't know, Jesse. She may still be getting over Ron's death, though, and Steve may still be getting over how rough she was on him." "Do you think he blames Amanda for his getting shot? After all, if she hadn't been riding him so much, he probably would have been more careful." "No, I don't think that's it, Jess. He might still be upset over how she treated him, but I really don't think he'd go so far as to blame her for his injury. I think maybe it's time I tried to patch things up. The longer they stay angry, the less likely it is that they'll ever really get over it. I'd hate to see that happen." "Same here." Mark got up and headed for the Pathology Lab. When he entered, Amanda was at her desk, reading a report. "Hi Amanda, have you got some time to talk?" Mark asked as he sat down. "Sure Mark, what's up?" "That's kind of what I'd like to know. What's going on between you and Steve?" Amanda was startled by the question. Mark couldn't possibly know about the kiss, could he? Would Steve have told him about it? While she was trying to think what to say, Amanda shuffled the pages of the report and put the folder away. "What do you mean?" Amanda decided to stay noncommittal till she found out how much Mark actually knew. "Amanda, I can see that the two of you have been avoiding each other. Steve hasn't come by the hospital for a visit once in the past couple of weeks, and every time I invite you and Jesse over to the beachhouse, you always seem to have something else to do. Amanda, he found Ron's killer, and pretty darn quickly, too. You can't still be angry with him over that, can you?" Amanda could tell from Mark's tone that he'd be pretty disappointed in her if she answered "yes" to his last question. She wasn't ready to go into the real reason, though. "Mark, I'm not angry with Steve. I guess, maybe, I feel a little guilty about getting him hurt like that." Which wasn't actually a lie, Amanda thought. "I'm not quite sure what to say to him." Which also wasn't a lie. "I really think the two of you need to talk about this. The longer this goes on, the harder it's going to be to make things right again." "I'll...think about it, Mark." Feeling somewhat defeated, Mark got up to leave. "Amanda, I know if the two of you could just start talking again, you could smooth things over." Mark decided to let it go at that and left the room. ***** That evening, Steve came home with a file folder full of paperwork. Mark decided not to tackle the Amanda/Steve problem till he found out what kind of a mood Steve was in. "Hey Steve. Is that a new case you're working?" "Hey Dad. Yeah, it just came in this afternoon. A woman, Phyllis Oaks, found dead in her bed, with an empty bottle of pills on the nightstand." "Suicide?" "I don't know. It looks like it, but I got the feeling that something was *off* about it. The husband, Paul Oaks, is the one who found her and reported it. When I questioned him, I got a feeling that he might be involved in it. He wasn't acting at all like a bereaved husband. He said he didn't know what had happened, that he'd been "out", but he wouldn't tell me where he'd been. When I tried to explain to him that, if anybody else had seen him while he'd been "out", it could provide him with an alibi, he just got all huffy and said that his wife had committed suicide so why did he need to worry about an alibi. I told him that until all the reports were in, we had to treat it like a homicide. He just stuck to his guns, though, and wouldn't say anything other than that he'd been out." Steve lowered himself into a chair. "Dad, I don't know what it was about him, but I have a really strong feeling that he did it. It's going to be tough to prove, though, unless the autopsy comes up with something conclusive to say that it wasn't suicide." "Is there anything I can do to help?" "There may be. Let me think about it. I've got a bunch of information coming in tomorrow - financial reports, bank statements, credit card statements. I'll see where we stand and then let you know." "Okay, always ready to help. You know that," Mark grinned at his son. When Steve smiled back, Mark thought it might be okay to broach the subject of what was going on with Amanda. "Do you want a cup of coffee? Dinner will be ready in about an hour." "Sure. Thanks Dad." Mark brought two cups over to the table and sat down. "Steve, I'd like to talk to you about something that's been bothering me. I've noticed that both you and Amanda seem to be avoiding situations where the two of you might have to be in the same room together, and I'm concerned. Are you still upset with Amanda about the way she was treating you after Ron's death?" "It's not that, Dad." Steve fumbled for something more to say. He couldn't lie to his father, but he didn't want to go into the real reason for what was going on. It was too embarrassing to have to admit that Amanda had thought twice about having anything to do with him. "If it's not that, then what is it? Steve, I don't want to pry, but I'm worried that if the two of you don't patch this up soon, it will be impossible to go back to the way things were. You two had a great friendship going and I'd hate to see that ended. I think that if you two would just face it and talk about whatever it is, you could fix things between you." "Dad, I'll think about it, okay?" Once again, Mark felt like he'd failed, but, once again, he decided to leave it at that. Maybe with the two of them thinking about it, one of them would make the first move to set things right. ***** The next day, after getting all the reports he was expecting, Steve decided to bite the bullet and go to Community General. He wanted his father's help on this case and he couldn't go on avoiding Amanda forever. There wasn't really any reason to anyway. She'd made it pretty clear, by avoiding him, that she was regretting what she'd done. All he had to do was act like nothing had happened and then maybe she'd relax a bit and things could go back to normal. The first place Steve looked was, of course, the doctors' lounge. He found his father, Jesse and Amanda sitting around the table drinking coffee. "Don't you guys ever do any work around here?" he asked as he poured a cup of coffee for himself. "I'll have you know," Jesse started with indignation, "that this is the first break we've had in hours. We've just finished up dealing with the last of the patients from a major pile-up on the freeway." "Yeah, right," Steve grinned at him. When Steve sat down, he couldn't quite bring himself to look at Amanda, so he looked toward his father as he said, "Dad, I'm glad you're all here. I got the reports I told you about last night and it's not good. There's nothing in the autopsy to rule against suicide. If I don't come up with something pretty compelling pretty fast, it's going to be closed as a suicide and I'd hate for that to happen. I *know* the husband had something to do with it." "What do you want us to do?" Mark asked. "Well, if you and Amanda could go over the autopsy report and the statements taken at the scene, maybe you'll spot something we missed." "What about money as a motive?" Jesse piped up. "Is he going to become a very rich widower now that his wife is dead?" "Well, yes, but I don't think that's going to help us much," Steve said. "There was a surviving spouse type insurance policy in effect - a 3 million dollar policy as a matter of fact. It's the kind where if one person dies, whether it's the husband or the wife, the survivor gets the money. It's been in effect for a number of years, too. Uh, seven to be exact," Steve said as he looked at his notes. "So why wait till now to kill her?" "Can we assume that there was an "Incontestable Clause" in the policy?" Mark asked. He remembered a case where the so-called "incontestable clause" had been a key factor. The clause basically stated that if a person committed suicide after the policy had been in effect for more than 2 years, the insurance company had to pay, even though it was suicide. "Yes there was. That's one of the first things I checked," Steve smiled at his father. He also remembered that earlier case. "But still, Dad, if the policy has been in effect for 7 years, why kill her now? There's got to be something somewhere that will give us an idea as to why he decided to kill her now." "Here again, Steve, what about money? Was he in financial difficulty? Is there anything in the bank statements?" Jesse asked. "According to the financial statements, he was in good shape. His salary was into six figures, and there doesn't seem to be anything to indicate a sudden need for more money." "What about a new mistress?" asked Amanda, who had finally got up the nerve to say something. Those words caused a definite change in the room, not because of what had been said, but because Amanda had finally spoken up. It was as if the tension, which had been present for the past couple of weeks, had suddenly disappeared. "That's a good idea Amanda. Why don't you take the credit card statements and see if there's anything in there that looks promising." "What about me?" Jesse asked, not wanting to be left out. "Jess, since you like to talk about money so much," Steve grinned at his friend, "you can go through the bank statements and see if there's anything there that strikes you as odd." "Okay, great! Now what are you going to be doing while we're doing all your work for you?" "Well, with you guys doing all my work for me, I'm headed down to Baja for some surfing." Everyone smiled at this. Mark, Amanda, and Jesse knew that Steve would still be putting in some long hours until the case was solved. "Why don't we get together at the beachhouse tonight for dinner and then we can go over what each of us has found out?" Mark suggested. "Sounds good, Dad." "Sure," Jesse agreed. "I'll be there." This last comment from Amanda went even further toward bringing their group back together again. With that, the four of them went to start working their various assignments. ***** After dinner that evening, the four were gathered around the table to discuss any progress on the case. Steve started off by summarizing the results of his talks with people who knew Phyllis and Paul Oaks. "Phyllis's friends seem to think the marriage was in trouble. Paul's friends all said that everything was fine, but I got the idea there was something going on that they weren't talking about. I'm going to try again and see if I can get one of them to talk, maybe be a bit more *persuasive*. Dad, did you find out anything?" "The drug that she took was an anti-depressant. I think it would be a good idea to talk to her closest friends again to see if we can find out what it might have been prescribed for. I didn't see any mention of relatives. Did she have a sister she might have confided in?" "No. There are no known relatives, Dad. Do you want to try talking to the friends? Maybe they'll open up for you more than they would for a cop." "Alright. There's something else, though, Steve. The drug she took isn't normally lethal in large doses. It would normally have just knocked her out, maybe made her very nauseous, but not killed her. Is there any way that Amanda could take a look at the body?" "Sure. I'll make the arrangements." "I also noticed something in the autopsy report," Amanda added, "but I won't really know if it's significant till I see the body. There was a mention of some light discoloration on the face. I don't know if it's anything or not, but it is a bit odd." "How soon can you look at the body?" Steve asked, hopefully. "How soon can you get it to me?" Amanda smiled. "I'll make the call right now." Steve went to get the phone and arrange for the transfer of the body. "Doesn't anybody want to hear what I found?" Jesse asked plaintively. "Don't tell me," Amanda said. "You found something to do with money, right?" She grinned at Jesse. "What about money?" Steve asked as he reentered the conversation. "You scoff," Jesse said, "but I'm telling you, sooner or later, money always comes into the picture somehow." "And how does it come into this picture?" Steve asked, with a smile. "The bank statements showed a periodic transfer of funds to another bank, but the account number the funds are being transferred into doesn't match up with any of the account numbers in Paul's financial report." "How much money are we talking here," Steve asked. "Four grand a month." Steve let out a low whistle at that. "How long had that been going on?" "A few months." "A new mistress," Amanda nodded knowingly. "Or blackmail, maybe. Jess, could you make up a list with the bank, the account the money is going to, and the dates of each transfer? I'll see if I can find out who that account belongs to." "Sure thing." "Okay, guys, we've made a good start," Steve concluded, "but we're still a long way from proof. How about we meet here same time tomorrow, unless somebody gets the solid proof I need before then." Three heads nodded agreement. "Great. Say, Dad, didn't you get some stuff for dessert?" Mark smiled, "I certainly did." He got up and went to the kitchen. ***** But it wasn't dinnertime when they met again. Steve was sitting at his desk when Amanda called him. "Steve, I've found something interesting when I examined the body. Can you come over now?" "I'm on my way." When Steve got to the Pathology Lab, his father and Jesse were already there, and they were standing around Phyllis Oaks' body. "What's up?" Amanda motioned him over. "First of all, Phyllis Oaks didn't die of a drug overdose, she died of suffocation." She raised a hand to forestall Steve's questions. "I'm sure this is just a case of the person doing the autopsy seeing what they expected to see - a drug overdose. When I looked for the "light discoloration on the face", though, what I really saw was a pattern. The light bruising was just around the nose and mouth. That got me thinking suffocation, and when I looked further, the signs were all there." "Enough to convince a jury?" Steve asked eagerly. "I would say so, yes." "That's GREAT Amanda, thanks!" Steve exclaimed. In his excitement and without really thinking, Steve put his hands on both sides of Amanda's face, pulled her toward him, and kissed her forehead. It was the sort of thing he would have done before when they were "just friends", but for Amanda, the effect was vastly different from what it might have been in the past. The contact of his hands on her face and his lips on her skin started a fire in her body. She couldn't think of any remark to make, and it wouldn't matter anyway because she didn't have any breath to say it with. Steve hadn't seemed to notice anything, though. He just continued with his remarks. "You know, I traced that account that Jesse had mentioned to an Amy Koehler. I've got an address and phone number, but nobody's home. I'll try again later today. According to the landlord, she moved in a few months ago." This time it was Jesse's turn to whistle, "So we've got him!" "Well, not quite yet, Jess. We still have a ways to go." "But we're getting closer," Mark commented. "I talked to Alicia Farmer, the person who was supposedly Phyllis's best friend, and learned quite a bit that she hadn't passed on to the officer who had questioned her before. According to Alicia, Phyllis thought that Paul was having an affair. She also seemed to think that Paul was going to try to kill her." "WHAT?" came from three mouths, simultaneously. "Phyllis told Alicia that every now and then she'd catch Paul looking at her with a funny look on his face. When she asked him what he was thinking about, he'd say that he was just thinking how much he'd miss her if anything happened to her." "Maybe he was trying to drive her crazy!" Jesse spoke up. "Jess, she's not crazy, she's dead." Steve scoffed. "You know, Jesse may have something there," Mark looked thoughtful, while Jesse looked smug. "Maybe he was trying to make things bad enough so that she would see a psychiatrist, as a way of establishing that she had mental problems. It would make a suicide seem more plausible." "Okay, Dad, you may be right," Jesse was looking so smug that Steve refused to acknowledge his contribution, "but how could he count on the psychiatrist giving her drugs, though?" "I think that was just plain luck on Paul's part, Steve. All he really needed was to establish that Phyllis was seeing a psychiatrist, so that her suicide would seem reasonable. Then he would come up with a way of killing her that would make it look like suicide. If she hadn't been on any drugs, he might have slit her wrists or put her in the car, with the motor running, in the garage. The drugs just made it a little easier for him," Mark explained. "Of course, he obviously didn't know that the drugs she was taking wouldn't kill her. He probably waited for a while for her to die, and when she didn't, he got impatient and decided to hurry things along. "Dad, that's great. With that and with what Amanda found out in her examination of the body, we just might have enough to nail him. If it turns out that this Amy Koehler IS his mistress, that will be just another nail in his coffin. Well, I'd better be going. I need to talk to the DA about this. I'll see you guys later." With that, Steve rushed off. ***** The next day, Steve stopped by Community General to fill everybody in on the latest developments in the case. The DA was proceeding to bring up charges against Oaks. As it turned out, Amy *was* Oaks' mistress. When Steve confronted her with Paul's possible involvement in his wife's death, she admitted that Paul had kidded around with her about "bumping off" his old lady so they could be together. When Steve had mentioned that they could probably live very well on 3 million dollars, she'd looked shocked and then angry. Steve had the feeling that Paul had never told her about the 3 million dollar insurance policy. As, Steve walked past the Pathology Lab, a hand pulled him into the room. A body pressed his against the wall. A hand behind his neck pulled his head down. A pair of lips, warm and soft, pressed against his. The contact started the electric shock racing through his body, just as he'd remembered it from the last time. This time, though, he returned the kiss, instead of just receiving it. As the kiss drew out, Steve's heart started to race and he could feel his legs starting to go rubbery. If he didn't sit down pretty soon, he was going to fall down. As if by mutual consent, the kiss was broken off. Steve sank into the nearest chair. Amanda, who had also gone for the nearest chair, wound up landing on his lap. Amanda quickly moved to her own chair. "Sorry." She didn't look particularly sorry, though. "Amanda, I can't keep doing this. Either you want to be friends or you want to be more than friends, but you've got to make a decision and stick to it. I can't keep going back and forth like this." "Steve, I never said I wanted to go back to being just friends. I only acted the way I did because I thought that you didn't want anything more than just friendship. But I decided to find out for sure before I gave up on us completely. That's what this was all about. It was pretty obvious by your reaction, the passion with which you returned my kiss, that you want the same thing I do. So I guess now we need to decide where we go from here." "I don't know, Amanda. I think, before we try to decide where to go from here, we need to be really, really certain that we both feel the same way about this," this time it was Steve who was smiling, as he leaned closer to Amanda. Amanda nearly melted into a puddle at that smile, and she leaned closer to Steve. The kiss was more tender, this time, and lasted longer, since they were both sitting down and didn't have to worry about silly things like rubbery legs. Jesse walked into the Pathology Lab. "Hey Amanda..." he stopped, stunned. "Ummmmm..." neither Steve nor Amanda seemed inclined to acknowledge his presence. "Uh, I...guess...I'll just...come back a bit later." Still dazed, he turned and left. As he started down the corridor, he almost ran into Mark. "Sorry, Jesse. Have you seen Steve? He said he was on his way here to fill us in on the Oaks case." Jesse just stood there, unsure of what to say. "Jesse, this is not a difficult question," Mark said patiently. "Just answer yes or no. Have you seen Steve?" Jesse just nodded. "Okay, this is a bit more difficult. Where was he when did you see him last?" Involuntarily, Jesse's gaze went to the Path Lab. "Good. Thank you Jesse," Mark looked at Jesse, puzzled by his attitude. He turned to the Path Lab door, opened it and walked in. Jesse just stood there, waiting for the explosion. After a couple of seconds, Mark came out again. He quietly closed the door, a big, silly grin on his face. "Jesse, how about some lunch, on me?"