When she had asked him all that time ago just what it was they had, when she had wondered to him if it was love or not, Jack had told her No, Claire. Though I don't know what it is.
That was how she felt now.
A few days after the Egan trial it occurred to the police that their second suspect, the one who must have helped him in the bombings, was still at large. Briscoe and Curtis, in a reversal of roles, now headed down to Baltimore to help Pembleton and Bayliss with their side of the case. Finding out who the second man was, even without Egan's help -- he had just stared malevolently at Claire and Jack at Ossining and made conspiracy threats -- had not proved difficult once they knew where to look. Egan's son had been more helpful than his father. Tracing him, however, had been a little more tricky until one of the other detectives down in Baltimore got a tip. "Go look for a boat with wings," he told Pembleton and Bayliss, and they headed to the harbor. What ensued was a chase worthy of a Miami Vice episode -- the "boat with wings" was a small craft airplane with landing gear for the water and the Coast Guard were able to prevent it from taking off with the second man inside. This one was different: Alexander Rausch, one of the army's covert loose cannons, former West Point graduate. He was much tougher than Egan, solid muscle, aging but keeping a youthful constitution, he gave off no indication of being part of a conspiracy. Rausch was the conspiracy, and they had him.
"We want him," Adam told Claire. "Get him. He's ours first."
She put in a call to have the extradition papers drawn up and felt as though she had already dreamed this. Jack had known this would happen; how he knew she would never be able to guess, but he had warned her. And here it was. She hoped she would not have to actually go down to argue the motion; if they were lucky the DA down there -- Danvers, if she recalled -- would not try and take it all the way to a judge. After all, reasoned Claire, we have the law on our side.
The day Briscoe and Curtis arrived back from Baltimore she headed over to the twenty-seventh precinct to go over what they had found. Normally they tended to come down to the courthouse; cops and some detectives could always expect to spend a fair chunk of time at Hogan waiting to be seen or at court, waiting to testify. Claire knew she would go insane if she had to wait that much, but then realized that holding out for a jury verdict, waiting to see judges, arranging motions, idling between Hogan and the Courthouse -- it really wasn't all that much different.
And sometimes, an ADA had to wait for a cop, too. When Claire got down to the twenty-seventh precinct, Curtis was in Cragen's office, punctual and waiting, but Briscoe was still typing a report at his desk and told her he'd be finished in a moment. Captain Cragen asked her to take a seat and he'd try to hurry the process along, but "you know Briscoe," he said, and gave a slight shrug of his shoulders.
Claire gave him a tolerant smile. It was all right; with Egan over her caseload was definitely lighter and she had most of the morning open. Aside from the Baltimore developments, she had a second case she needed DD5s on, some manslaughter charge on a Verlaine character. That was for Ben. Once again, the balance seemed to be returning to the offices -- Ben had been much more civil and back to his old restrained self. She took a sip of her coffee and nearly spat it back, having forgotten how dreadful stationhouse brew was. "Don't worry," she told Cragen as he headed out to Lennie's desk. "I'm not in a rush."
"What, a DA not in a big hurry?" Detective Rey Curtis stood straighter and leaned on the file cabinet. "That's something for the books."
Claire glanced over at him. Logan aside, she distrusted the good-looking cops; they held themselves higher than the ordinary joes who had to work even harder to get perps, particularly women, to talk to them or hand over information. Logan she knew, and had for a long time -- there was something more there with him than just brute macho charm -- and Tim Bayliss, well, that was different, he wasn't with the NYPD, but Curtis she didn't know well, only that he seemed too clean for the job, too well-scrubbed. He had transferred from another division after his Lieutenant came on to him, but Claire wondered about that story. No charges had been filed, no report made. Just a neat transfer, no fuss. It was too clean. Like Curtis himself. And that ingratiating friendliness...Claire decided Jack must be wearing off on her, because she felt more immune to it than ever before. She did not comment back and leaned on the doorjamb, watching Cragen approach Briscoe.
Just then she realized Logan was back at his desk, and Claire widened her eyes. It had not been all that long ago that she had bumped into him, desolate, in the grocery store, but as she caught a fleeting glance of him now -- opening up his desk drawers repeatedly as if expecting something to magically appear -- he looked completely restored. Lennie said something to him and he glanced up, grinning. Claire smiled, too. He and Alexa must have made up. And then her smile faded -- Ben had not seemed any different, but surely this had eaten at him. He must know. She would have to have a talk with him, see if he really was all right.
Curtis snuck up behind her and she turned slightly, pointing with her coffee cup. "When did Detective Logan get back?"
For the first time he seemed an ounce less than genial. "End of last week," he said. "I wrap up this Baltimore thing with Lennie and I get reassigned. Dumb luck."
Which was what Claire thought, too. "So how come everyone seems to be on edge?"
He shrugged. "Some big top secret. They've been like kids over there all morning. But I'm the new guy. Nobody tells me anything."
Claire took a few steps from the office to hear better, and Briscoe's baritone came across more clearly. He had glanced up at Cragen and shushed him. "Just hold it a minute. Mikey's going home early today. Just sit back and watch."
Cragen put a hand on his hip while behind him Claire caught some movement as Alexa stepped hesitantly into the precinct. At his desk, Mike flashed a grin and then made it vanish. Alexa seemed not to notice Claire, who felt all of a sudden as if she was watching a carefully-scripted play, and walked over to Mike's desk. "Afternoon, Detective Briscoe, Captain Cragen," she said nervously. "Long time no see."
Briscoe grinned widely. "How goes it, Alexa."
"Mike?" she asked tentatively, and he looked up as if he hadn't realized she was there. "You gave me this?" And she handed over a slip of paper.
He looked up at her, quite seriously, and read the note as if he'd never seen it before, nodding. "Here, have a seat." And he dragged a chair up next to his desk and started rooting in his drawers again.
"What's going on, Mike? Am I in trouble or something?"
And then, as Mike stopped rummaging in his desk, Claire caught on, and she felt her spine stiffen. This was cute, she supposed, almost too cute for Logan, but she did not see it through his eyes or Alexa's eyes. She knew what he was about to do even before he fell on his knees in front of her and produced a ring from his fist. Claire closed her eyes, wishing this was not going to happen, because she knew what effect it would have where she worked. She knew Ben would fade on her again, and Jack would have a hell of a time over it. And she hated that she was being made the messenger. She heard Mike's proposal, his questioning hesitancy, and then Alexa's voice, clear and bell-like.
"You keep a box of these in your desk for contingencies, Detective?"
Claire opened her eyes and despite her worries a small smile came to her mouth. That was actually pretty funny, when you thought about it. In fact, this whole thing was pretty damn amusing. Life itself, in the end, was just one big barrel of laughs. Claire turned away and headed back into Cragen's office, and missed seeing what made everyone else applaud, missed entirely where Alexa was carried out of the precinct and Mike left for the day.
So much for Verlaine.

---

Perhaps, thought Claire on the way back downtown, the best thing to do would be to intercept Ben after work and take him for a drink and tell him then. Or maybe just fast and hard was the best way to drop such news. What theatrics! What melodrama! She had never thought of Detective Logan as a ham, but the way he had just scooped up Alexa and carried her out of there, the way Briscoe described it moments later in Cragen's office...though Claire had never considered getting together with Logan in any capacity, she nonetheless felt a twinge of jealousy. Jack was not a scoop you up sort of person; when he had made that comment about her arrogant jaw was almost the only time he had ever even complimented Claire. She knew that going in, she knew those notions didn't come to him naturally, but she still felt cheated somehow. Yes, the sex was good. But was the sex supposed to be the whole thing?
She sat at her desk for a long few minutes after getting back, knowing Ben was in his office having lunch, knowing he was waiting for her to come back with the report on Verlaine. In the end, since Verlaine was an old file of Logan's and Briscoe's, they had not been able to go over much on that case, and it had taken a good long while after the Logan Floor Show to get Briscoe in any frame of mind to discuss the Baltimore case, and what they had found down there. So what was going to happen when she got back to the office was that Ben was going to ask after Verlaine, and she was going to have to tell him that they had not gone over any of it, and then he would want to know why...there was no choice. She had to face him head on. Hopefully if it really bothered him they could just discuss it rationally. He knew she knew about Alexa; perhaps he might open up. She didn't mind listening.
Her phone buzzed. "Kincaid," she said distantly.
"What'd they find?"
Jack again. "Extradition," she said. "The DA's not happy. I wrote it all down, who the guy is, where he's from. The whole report. I'll come down in a few minutes."
"Nope," he insisted. "I'll be right up."
She sighed. "Jack, look --"
But he had hung up on her. She stared at the receiver for another minute and decided if Jack was coming she had better fill Ben in as quickly as she could -- no doubt Jack would insist on some lunch out and then Ben could hear from someone else...which Claire knew would be disastrous. He deserved better; he deserved to hear it from Alexa herself, or Mike, but since Claire was fairly sure Mike did not know about Alexa's trysts with Ben, and Alexa had seemed overwhelmed at the precinct, knowledge would not be forthcoming from that area.
Without knocking, Claire ducked into Ben's office and shut the door behind her. He finished chewing his sandwich and reading over a dismissal, glancing up at her after a minute. Then, "What'd they say about Verlaine?"
"We didn't actually get to talk about the Verlaine case," she said. "I'll have to go back tomorrow."
He lay the motion down on his desk and removed his glasses. "Claire, we have to get moving with this. You know we've only got until Monday to --"
"Logan left early," she jumped in, and took a deep breath. She saw Ben's face begin to slide from cool business into the realization that Claire was about to tell him far more than he had expected to hear. "He left after asking Alexa Radin in to the precinct and proposing to her in front of everybody. And....she accepted."
The realization turned to a terrible surprise, as if she had kicked him, and Claire turned away for a moment. Ben stood up in his seat and half turned to his window with his hands on his hips, calm, possessed, and for just a second Claire thought, he's taking this really well. But then, in a great sweeping motion he whipped around and knocked everything off his desk, the papers, his lunch, his pens and lamp all making a terrific crashing noise as they fell to the floor. Claire cringed.
"Ben," she said and started over to him.
"Out," he ordered in a strangled voice. "Just get out. I'll clean this up."
Claire had backed away a step and jerked around as someone knocked at Ben's door, then opened it. Jack peered in. "Have a problem, Ben?"
Claire pushed him out. "Not now, Jack. Just a spill. I'll see you later, Ben," she said, and closed the door behind her, hoping she didn't look as flustered as she felt. That had been almost worse than a rant or weeping or whatever she thought he might do -- it had been so out of character for Ben she was rendered completely useless. Out in the hall, Jack tried to peer over her shoulder.
"Not now," she hissed to Jack. "Leave him alone."
Jack eyed her. "This is good. What did you say to him?"
"Nothing," she said curtly. "Let's go over Baltimore."
Jack stared in through Ben's window where the EADA had turned his chair around to face the windows, completely blotting out the mess he had made on the carpet with his spilled food, drink, papers, everything, like guts that had fallen out. "No..." he said. "This isn't just something you're going to toss off. I want to know. That's something I have never seen in twenty years. There is nothing that could make him do that, nothing I can possibly think of." He pointed and stood closer to her.
Claire felt on the verge of tears suddenly. She wanted to go in and at least help Ben clean up the wreck of his office; there had to be all sorts of papers that would not be improved by marinating in soda, she wanted to tell him she was so sorry it happened like this...but Jack's presence precluded any of that. He thought Ben was cold and emotionless, he thought Logan was all face and no head, he thought Alexa was a ninny...and of course some of that was true, just as true as that Claire Kincaid was easily deluded and led on...as she had been for many weeks now...but that was all Jack ever saw. He never considered the dimensionality of feelings, that it was possible for a person to be one thing and another, at the same time. She had attached herself voluntarily to a man who loved nothing, who liked no one, and who when she left him would no doubt just move on to the next assistant, and the next. Claire saw it, she saw what she had tried to avoid at that first drink out.
She was the fourth.
In a continuing series.
"I really hate you, Jack McCoy," she told him, under her breath but loudly enough so that a passing paralegal glanced over at them, then strode off down the hall to the women's room before he could make light of anything more.
But Jack had told her long ago that boundaries did not deter him and he followed straight in after her. "What the fuck was that about?"
"Get out of here," she told him, reaching for a stall door. "I don't have any interest in talking to you."
"You will talk to me," said Jack, and picked up her arm, holding her tightly. "Whatever it is you're trying to not tell me I'll find out anyway. Ben Stone didn't fling papers off of his terribly neat desk for no reason at all, and you're not trying to protect him for no reason at all. There's something outside this office that's got him --" and he paused. "Christ."
"Let go," she said, trying to keep the quaver in her voice out. "You're hurting me."
He dropped her arm. "It's that Alexa Radin, isn't it."
Claire stared at the tiles.
Jack rested his hand on her shoulder. "I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't mean to hurt you. How do you think I feel when you announce in public that you hate me?"
She glanced up at him. "I didn't announce anything."
"Well, do you?"
She narrowed her eyes. "Right now, I don't like you very much."
"That's better."
She scanned his face. "Oh, that doesn't even pass muster. Acting offended doesn't become you."
"What, I'm not allowed to be insulted?"
She shook her head and poked his shoulder. "You can't feel the slings and arrows through that armor."
"Perhaps you've just never noticed."
She didn't know what to believe. It just didn't ring true. Claire shook her head slowly.
"So tell me," he insisted.
"Don't ask."
"But I want to know."
"We don't always get what we want, Jack."
He raised his eyebrows, then leaned over and kissed her once, long, lingeringly, the way she did love to be kissed, and even through her anger she felt part of her heart begin to beat faster. Claire ducked away. "I will tell you, and then you'll say things I don't want to hear you saying, Jack. Please."
"I promise. Straight-face."
She blinked over at him. It was true, he would hear eventually. The question was, did she want to be around when he did? Did she want to know this much about him? Did she want to see what he considered as a triumph: when Ben Stone finally got some of his righteousness thrown back at him? Claire was learning to be a realist, to take the facts as they were, not as she wanted them to be. She had Jack to thank for that. So she decided to tell. "Mike Logan and Alexa Radin are getting married," she said slowly. "He proposed to her today at the precinct. That's what I told him."
Jack turned away after a long heartbeat and washed his hands in the sink, toweling them dry slowly, then gave her a quick glance. "I almost feel sorry for the man."
"You do," she said levelly, waiting to pounce.
But nothing came. He was completely expressionless, and held the women's room door open for her. "Now, can we discuss Baltimore?"

---

Claire wasn't certain which was worse: seeing the reaction or knowing that he was repressing it for her benefit. She felt pandered to, but she was the one who had asked him not to say anything. In the end, whatever she said to Jack did not matter -- he was not about to change who he had been for fifty years just because she wanted him to. Inwardly, she sighed, and went over the details of the Baltimore case with him down in his office. At some point his secretary Mandy brought in sandwiches that Claire had not ever heard ordered, and they ate as she finished spelling out what needed to be done. Rausch was wanted for a case they already had half-done up here. Jack told her they could get enough evidence and empanel a jury within a month or so to try him, and that would have to be the arguing strategy against whatever their DA might throw. There was a kind of treaty of extradition between the states of New York and Maryland, and since New York could try him first, they should be allowed first crack. Whereas the Baltimore department had barely begun to reopen a five year old case of a church bombing, and would take much more time to get a trial together.
"Sounds good to me," said Jack, and finished his tuna on rye. "You've got the hearing scheduled for..." he glanced at her notes, "Monday. Okay, I'll get tickets for Monday morning's train. I think there's an express."
"So you'll argue the case?" Claire's brow twitched. She had not thought Jack would want to go.
"Can't see why not. You're tied up with that case of Stone's, so I might as well."
Claire nodded. "Okay," she said, and a small part of her was disappointed. "That's just fine."

---

Adam was behind his desk, on the phone, when Jack and Claire entered to update him on Rausch. He waved them over to his desk, and they stood for a few minutes in silence while he talked genially, openly. Obviously a friend on the line. Claire watched him, wondering what it would be like to be the DA, have that much power, that much responsibility. It occurred to her, not for the first time, that if she stuck with this job she might have a stab at that seat one day, too. It was hard to be in this office of Adam's and not want to have it as your own. She slid her eyes to Jack, who was focused like a laser sight on Adam's waving hand, and her stomach churned. He did so badly want that position, he had been here this long because he wanted it, and when the time came he would do everything in his power to get it. That was why he continued to argue with Adam, that was why he insisted on carving out his own space here. Perhaps once he had liked the old man, perhaps once he might have let Schiff mentor him, then realized in order to survive he had to evolve, or at least do something to make himself stand out. Ben was an unusual sort of litigator; Jack was likely to be unsure how to counter this righteous, highly personal way of trying cases. Possibly someone had told him along the route that Ben would burn out, that there was no way to work for five, ten, fifteen years with that attitude.
She almost could picture it. Though she never imagined Jack as precisely one of the world's kindler, gentler attorneys she did not think he had always been so politically motivated, or even as eager to give everyone a hard time. Claire thought that had taken twenty years to build up. Outside the office, she thought, he was as close to what he had wanted to be, or once was, years ago, a person she had not ever known but who still liked to think that to create his own rules and follow along the paths that he liked best was rebellion. And it was, to a point. But rebellion for the sake of pissing someone off...that didn't seem very brave to her.
And how disappointed he must have been when Ben did not leave for corporate practice, or to teach, that Ben did not burn out or end up rendered ineffective. Claire wondered how long it had taken Jack to realize the advice he had been given was bad. By then, she assumed, it would have been too late to alter the course, so the combative pose he had adopted became de rigueur. So...let him go to Baltimore. It did not matter that much to Claire. She had never opened Bayliss' delivered envelope.
Adam hung up the phone and glanced over at them. "So, we have to go play fetch with Rausch, do we."
"You know already, Adam?" Claire raised her brows in surprise. News did travel fast.
"That," he said, "was the Baltimore DA."
"Danvers?"
He shook his head at her. "Danvers is one of his assistants. Nice fellow, but won't let Rausch out without going before a judge. So I hear Monday's the day you head down, Ms. Kincaid. Good luck with it."
"Claire's not going, Adam, I am," said Jack.
"What for? You suddenly get a hankering to visit the South?"
A cloud passed Jack's expression for a moment, then he said, "This is an important case, Adam. I don't want there to be any mistakes."
"And you don't trust your own assistant not to make them?" Schiff glanced at Claire, then back to Jack, and his mouth twisted. He had never looked more like an old man than he did right then. "Or is it you don't trust your assistants without your guiding hand?"
Jack's eyes blazed and Claire lost all color in her cheeks, feeling as if she had been drained of all life. "Adam, I'd prefer to have this discussion in private." He turned to Claire. "You can head out."
"Hold it," said Adam to her, then glanced back up at Jack. "You're so worked up about including Ms. Kincaid in every transaction this office has. Stay right where you are. Now. Is that it, Jack?"
"I want to handle this hearing personally," said Jack thinly. "That is the only reason."
"Well, you're stuck," said Adam, punctuating himself with a nod. "Monday is the Mayor's Brunch and you're going to be there with me representing your job, not twittering off to Maryland when you can send an assistant to do the hearing just fine."
"Adam." Jack's voice was almost threatening.
Claire thought, Oh, Jesus, he's going to make this such a big deal. She thought of Adam's resigned comment to her after that very first argument she had witnessed between the two of them. He was right, of course. That hadn't been the first fight, nor would it be the last. Jack was like the fisherman's wife, never satisfied with good enough.
"Go ahead," said Adam, boredom creeping into his voice. "Hand in that resignation of yours. That is where you're going next with this, aren't you?"
Jack was silent.
"Only you won't do it because you won't see me begging you not to do it. You won't see me falling to my knees and insisting you can walk all over this office. And I won't do those things because I never have. And Ms. Kincaid knows full well I never have, either. Don't you, Ms. Kincaid."
She sighed and stared at Jack. "Yes, I do know."
"Oh, this is cute," said Jack, who clearly had not expected Claire could hide anything from him. "Just wonderful. Fine," he told her. "You go. I couldn't be bothered. You want it that much, you go."
"It's not that big of a deal," she told him.
"It's not," said Adam. "And that is why you are going. My office, Jack. My assignments. My rules. I hope we understand this."
"Naturally," said Jack tightly.
"Good. We're done here, then," said Adam, sitting down and putting on his reading glasses.
Jack did not speak until they were back at the elevators. "I hope you're happy," he told her then. "Free trip to Baltimore."
"Jack, it doesn't matter to me."
The doors opened and they climbed in. Claire pushed the buttons for the ninth and eighth floor and Jack reached over her, pulling the stop lever. She looked at him.
"You protesting," he said, "only make it worse."
And she realized he was no longer darkly angry as he had been in Adam's office, but actually distressed, and threatened. He had just had power wrested from him, and now he was greatly fearing of losing something much more tangible. "How," she asked softly.
He put his hands on her upper arms. "You know why. Do I have to explain?"
Claire thought of him in the bathroom. "Yes. You do. You made me tell what I didn't want to say. Now it's your turn." She stared hard at him.
He broke free of her eyes and looked away.
"What happened to 'my love has no earthly boundaries,' Jack? It isn't love, you said so yourself. And you're not a needy person. So what is it I have that you want so badly? Is it only Tim Bayliss? Is that all, just one person, who makes you nervous? It can't be. There has to be something more."
"I was wrong," he admitted to the ground, then glanced up at her. She had seen him vulnerable before and been taken in; there was no way to know if the expression he wore now was for real or put on. She had never understood him, and she never would. "There are boundaries. And they're as big as this elevator. They start here," he kicked a side wall, "and end there." He pointed. "The space I can see you in."
"This room is too suffocating," she told him. "I can't live in this room."
He nodded. "I know. I shouldn't have made such an issue of it. Do what you will, Claire. Truth is, I'm not Ben Stone. I can't be with someone who really wants to be with someone else. I can't do it."
"Jack," she said carefully. "I think you're giving Detective Bayliss far too much credit."
"Am I, Claire?"
She nodded. "You've thought of him more than I have lately."
"I wonder," he said, and flipped the switch on the elevator.
There had been a time when he would not have ended the conversation voluntarily, and Claire knew there had been a few weeks there when she would have been the one to take the easy out by moving beyond the discussion. But there was a coolness in his demeanor now, something that did not trust her any more, perhaps since he learned what Adam had told her, perhaps since he had learned she could keep a secret from him. But Claire did not stop the elevator again. Instead, she spoke to the doors, seeing herself and Jack distorted back in the burnished metal. "I suppose you're right," she told him. "I never have understood you."
When the bell in the elevator rang on nine, she got out and let the doors close around him.

---

There was such a thing, thought Claire, as too much good cheer. With the holidays approaching suddenly the city had switched from being fast-paced and frenzied, full of too many people staring at their shoes as they humped to work each morning into hysterically frenzied, glittering like a disco ball, bells ringing at every corner, and those same drones grabbing and pushing and insisting on gifts. It was supposed to be a season everyone looked forward to, but from her usual caseload and the sudden obligatory parties most nights, she stared at the calendar for the next few weeks and wished she had saved her Tuscany holiday for those dates.
The good news was that Jack was not much for holidays either; he told her one night while they were drinking wine and poring over old pictures, "Well, we can be Grinches together." Claire had tipped her glass to him and agreed.
But some parties did not accept no for an answer, and though they were less obligated than other members of their profession working in corporate law firms, a few events came by which Jack discovered he could not worm his way from. So he had invited Claire to join him.
"The problem with that is, see, Jack, they'll notice that we're together." Claire was always nervous about being known.
"The only people who don't know about us right now just aren't paying attention," Jack had argued. "Like, Ben for one."
Claire had sighed. "I hadn't realized we were so obvious."
"We're not. In fact, I've never worked so hard to be circumspect."
Claire had flashed her eyes at him, wounded, reminded yet again of her status, though he hadn't meant to be cruel, at least not that time. Jack was almost never awful to her, though she had never figured out why. Certainly she was a prime target for ridicule...but then again, they were sleeping together. She knew where she stood with him, and he knew where he stood with her. It was perfectly equitable.
But neither of them had ever really called it love.
In the end, during the week before she headed to Baltimore, Claire was seen out with Jack at several parties, where they showed up, drank one or two of the watered down drinks, made a few introductions, then slipped off together in the elevator. "Near miss," he told her after every party, and both of them would think about how close they normally stood for just a few measly floors in the elevator at work.
"The good thing about these corporate law firms," she once told him back, moving closer to where he stood, "is it takes a really long time to get to the ground floor."
"Not long enough," he had told her, but his eyes lit and he had wrapped an arm around her waist. They became expert in how far they could go while the elevator did its slow plummet sixty, seventy stories down. They would feel the rush of descent under them and kiss and reach and touch until the car would slow, coming to the ground or another floor where more people would get on. When the elevator car occasionally got full Claire would stand up against him and he would run his hands down her hips and pull even tighter. She could breathe him wanting her, and that made her want him. Those were the times, somehow ever more fleeting, when she did not sense this distance between them. Had she outgrown Jack McCoy? Had he tired of her? In the elevators it did not seem so. But other places...she was never sure. Like cold spots in a haunted house, their relationship had developed ghostly passages.
On the Saturday before she was to leave for Baltimore, however, there was one party she simply did not want to attend. It was actually less of a party than a get-together of Harvard grads, the ones who simply littered the areas top law firms, all attending some play on Broadway and then adjourning for cocktails at the Harvard Club afterwards. "Think of the networking possibilities, Claire," Jack winked at her over the lunch table. "We could get you a real job."
She rolled her eyes at him. "I hadn't realized you went to Harvard, McCoy."
He grasped his chest theatrically. "Spent one tremendous summer in Cambridge not going there, but technically registered for a seminar. It seems to count."
"It seems like an awfully expensive Christmas party."
"These are awfully expensive people," said Jack. "Note, however: expensive, not always...quality."
"Like you and me, of course."
He winked. "That exactly what I meant."
"I suppose...it might be interesting to see you wear a tux, Jack McCoy."
For the first time he looked dubious. "Oh...that. Well, I do have one. If the moths haven't eaten it."
She swatted his arm and nearly knocked over her water glass. "You lie like a dog. I saw it hanging in the coat closet with one of those cleaning bags around it. And the ticket was from six months ago."
"Ah, yes." He busied himself with the menu.
"Face it, McCoy. You love looking like a swell just as much as I'm going to like wearing velvet."
He raised his eyebrows. "Velvet. Is that promise?"
"I suppose so."
"Then we might not make it past the first act. I'm very sensitive to touch."
"Keep your hands to yourself." But she laughed.
"Look," he said, leaning forward. "You do this for me and I promise we'll get a big meal after the show. Expensive. Top of the line. To go with your dress and my tux. Deal?"
Claire pretended to think about it. "Absolutely."

---

She came out of her bedroom fastening an earring and flipped her head to the side, staring in the mirror a moment. "Sorry, sorry. It's my prerogative to be late, the cab will just have to be patient."
Jack, who had been waiting for nearly ten minutes on her sofa, staring at the knicknacks on her side table, did not say a word.
She peered at him through the mirror and caught his admiring stare. It was true, she had found an excellent shade of deep-hued black-red velvet for the dress, which caught the curve of her waist and hung loosely down to her ankles, not quite billowing but more like loose sails, rippling. She turned and put her hands on her hips. "It's not nice to stare, Mr. District Attorney."
"Sure it is," he told her, rising from the sofa and walking slowly over to the mirror. "When there's something worth staring at."
She smiled, both at his adoration and the fact that despite his protestations to the contrary, Jack McCoy cut a very dashing figure in a tuxedo. It heightened his slimness the way suits could not and made him seem even taller than he was. The silver in his hair contrasted sharply with the blacks and whites and he looked, to Claire, almost Presidential. "Why did we wait so long to play dress-up?" she asked after watching him move to her.
Jack slipped his arms around her back and dipped her halfway to the ground. The blood rushed to her head and she felt secure, safe, held in place like a dancer. Curling her arms around his neck they kissed once and then she remembered her lipstick. When she pulled back she had to run to the bathroom to give him a Kleenex to get the dark paint from his mouth. "Aw, let's skip this," he said. "Let's just stay in."
Years later she would wonder how things might have been different if they had decided not to go, but Claire was not about to be cheated of a night out after spending all this time and effort getting done up. "I'm not that kind of girl," she told him, and took her coat from the closet.
"I know exactly what kind of girl you are, Claire Kincaid," Jack told her, and they headed to the taxi.
Except for the sign in the front box office window indicating this was a private showing of the musical, Claire would have been hard pressed to realize that anything special, like a Christmas party, was going on behind the big glass doors of the lobby. People streamed around as if in someone's living room, sipping their drinks, making all sorts of chatter, and she and Jack just sailed right through, Jack's hand on hers, leading the way. They had been made late by Claire's slow dressing habits, but not too late -- Jack insisted they had a few minutes before the overture. "Want a drink?" he asked.
"My turn," she told him. "Remember? I still owe you a round."
The reference to the first time they had gone out tickled him and he bowed slightly. "As you wish."
Claire headed off to the bar and stood for a few minutes behind a thick wall of lawyers -- that sounds like some kind of joke, she thought, how many lawyers does it take to make a wall? but she had no punchline. One turned to see who was behind him and backed away, staring at her, trying to place her face, and unable to do it.
"Here," he told her. "Please. You go head."
That was the first instance she had of another lawyer deferring to her so blatantly, and Claire amusedly wondered if she shouldn't consider wearing the dress to trial sometimes, to get the attention of the jury better. She had a bad flash that in another fifty years dress codes would be completely out the window and lawyers would all wear low-cut dresses to impress a jury, or put things in their pants like rock stars did. She shuddered slightly and stepped up to the bar.
When she came away with two Scotches, Jack was not where she had left him. But over by the coat check she did recognize a face, and she glided to the other side of the room, not even thinking, in amazement. Lowering her voice to a husky drawl she leaned forward. "Can I offer you a drink, sir?"
Ben Stone turned, startled, holding his claim check. He stared at Claire, unsure who she was, then positive she could not be who she resembled. "My God, Claire," he said.
"Well, not exactly the deity," she smiled. "This is quite a get together."
"What are you doing here?"
Then she realized her folly. In theory, she really did not want Ben to think she was with Jack. But at any moment they could turn out to be standing side by side. It was a bad situation. "Friends," she said quickly. "I didn't go to Harvard but friends did. There's a whole squad of us. They're all inside. Mostly." And once she felt the fear of discovery inside her she realized she was seeing it on his face, too. "Ben...why are you here?"
He sighed and glanced over her shoulder. "If you'll excuse me, Claire."
Ducking into the men's lounge with his tail between his legs was the worst exit Claire had ever seen, which meant only one thing. He's here with Alexa, thought Claire. For a second she did not know who she disliked more, Ben or Alexa, and then felt the surge of righteousness fade. It was silly to disparage either one of them. Everyone had their secrets. And their bad habits. Perhaps this was some last big fling before she committed to Mike. Perhaps she had come to her senses and dropped Mike altogether. Who knew. Claire was sure of one thing, though; after this she would never be without information. If she had to be the nosiest parker around, she was going to be in on everything. That would mean getting to know Alexa a lot better than she did now. So be it. She took a deep gulp of her drink and turned to head back to the main lobby and find Jack.
As she was about to turn the corner, however, a scene on the other side of the lobby stopped her. Alexa, done up in a long black satin outfit that made her incredibly radiant, almost glow, was speaking with an overdressed, overjeweled couple. Next to Alexa stood a slightly stout, bearded man with a wide grin, who was acting as if Alexa was his near, dear friend. After a moment the bearded man strode across the room to the bar and Claire took a few steps into the lobby towards the group, planning on at least saying hello to Alexa, whether she was planning on being the next Mrs. Stone or Mrs. Logan. Whatever. She seemed a little lost, a lot alone, and perhaps as though she needed a friend just then.
But before she could get more than a few steps a fourth joined the group, a lean man in a tuxedo. Jack. He blew right on over, never even glanced at Claire, and likely never even saw her just a few feet away. For half a second Claire was offended. And then...then she felt something different. Something she could not put into words yet. So she hung back, stepping a little closer, leaning up against a column that supported the ceiling. And even though Ben had warned her about listening in on people, it was a habit she could never break. This time, she would eventually realize it was the best thing she could have done.
Just ahead of her she heard Jack speaking, and the overdressed couple almost fled away, tossing Alexa strange, frightened glances. Claire thought she looked like a cornered mouse, and noticed how Jack was focusing tightly on her. Claire wanted to step forward and then could not bring herself to do it. She had to see. She had to see this for herself. She wanted to know if what Jack had held back in the bathroom the other day was now about to come out. Her throat tightened.
When the expensive couple had departed, Alexa flashed at Jack, her eyes flaming. "I don't know who you are, Jack McCoy, but you've got some fucking nerve."
Jack broke out in a wide grin, taking a step toward her, and she backed up against the wall. Claire sympathized; Jack did that to her but there was usually other intent when he did it. "Now that's the Alexa I've heard so much about. I like when the mask comes down. You look almost human."
"Who are you?"
"Nobody special, my dear. Just another Executive Assistant DA."
Alexa lost the angry look and her fear returned. Claire could see it spread over her face and the urge to swoop in and end this came to her, then held her back. It was like watching a car wreck.
"And...funny..." Jack continued, edging closer. "I seem to have run into one of our mutual acquaintances this evening. Now where did Ben Stone go to?"
She pretended surprise. "Ben Stone? He's here?"
He laughed shortly and raised his hand up so the palm rested on the wall. Alexa shrank against the wall, pinning her hands behind her. "You're a terrible liar, my dear."
"I am not your dear."
"But you are lying. I have an acute interest in something. Tell me, Alexa, my dear, how many people in the general Manhattan judicial system have you not slept with?"
Oh, no, thought Claire. She closed her eyes.
"I can think of one I won't be sleeping with," she parried weakly.
Claire brought the now-watery Scotch to her lips and drank, inwardly laughing because the whole situation was so ridiculous. Funny old world. She took a few steps back, still watching, but dragging herself away.
Jack laughed. "Don't be so sure of yourself," he said. "How many would you say?"
Claire turned and headed back to the coat check, and on her way was nearly sideswiped by Ben, who also had no eyes for her now. Funny thing, thought Claire, how I become invisible when Alexa's in the room. It wasn't quite jealousy, just a lawyer making a notation. She watched Ben burst in on the two of them, say something, and a moment later Jack straightened into fighting pose. She had been backing up all of this time, and as the two old fighters raised their hackles she stopped at the edge of the lobby. They glared at one another and Claire expected at any moment for it to come to blows. It's what they've been working towards for so long, she thought, may as well get it over with. But no one lashed out or was struck; the bearded, stout man flew over from the bar with a drink in hand and pressed it to Alexa's palm, kissing her once on the cheek. His presence dissipated the instant acrimony between Jack and Ben, and Claire felt her breathing return to normal. More words exchanged. Jack glanced between the two other men, then did that funny half-bow of his and turned away.
And caught Claire watching openly.
She fled; there was nothing more she could think of doing.
Jack, as always, caught up with no effort. "Claire, Claire," he said in a firm, definite voice. She stopped moving away and turned to face him, her eyes like black coals. She did not speak. Not just yet. "Claire, that wasn't what it looked like."
She stared at him.
"I was just introducing myself."
"No." The word fell like a rock.
His forehead wrinkled. "What?"
"No. You weren't introducing yourself. You were pulling the wings off of a fly, that's what you were doing."
His face twisted. For many weeks she had thought about Jack's hit list, and slowly she began to realize she was precariously close to being on it. How odd, the lawyer taking notes in her thought, to go from admired sex object to despised enemy so quickly. But in truth, it had not been very quickly. She had been mulling over so much in her mind since Adam had explained things. Ever since then it had been congealing, and now it was clear.
She did not love Jack McCoy.
But there was more to it than that.
"You went out spying, didn't you, Claire," he said in a tight voice. "Listening in where you shouldn't sometimes means you learn things you didn't want to know."
"And sometimes," she told him in an unemotional, unforgiving tone, "you learn exactly what you've been afraid to believe."
"What the hell does that mean."
She shook her head. "Give me my coat check."
"What for?"
"I'm going home," she told him. "And I'm not going home with you." She held out her hand.
He reached out to steer her away from anyone's ears but she did not budge. She was tired of being herded around. This was the last stand and she had made it five feet from a coat check in the Randolph Theatre in Midtown Manhattan. "Claire, stop this," he ordered.
"Give me the coat check."
"I want to talk with you."
"No," she said. "And I'm not leaving because you spoke to Alexa. I'm not leaving because you terrorized her. I'm not leaving because you stood up to Ben Stone. I'm leaving because I don't like being around you any more, Jack. I don't love you. And I don't like you. You can't kiss this away. We're done."
It was like pulling the bandage from a sore place in one quick rip; his face turned completely empty, pained and wracked for just about the length of her speech. And then he covered over it again and thrust his hand in his pocket. "As if you have ever had any clue what love is. You're swollen on your own opinion of yourself, Claire Kincaid, when the truth is you're a mediocre lawyer and your principles are scattershot. I only wanted you with me on Egan because you were pretty damn good in bed. Just thought you should know that." He held up the coat check in two pinched fingers and tossed it aside. "Go to hell, Claire. I don't need anything from you. I'll find someone else to do Rausch."
To her amazement, the words rolled off. She felt the aura of the correct, the one who had not done wrong here, and a smile crept to her mouth, a thin, small smile. "Thanks, Jack," she told him. "You've made me feel that much more sure of myself." She narrowed her eyes, lost the smile, and took a step closer to him. "But if you even attempt to remove me from second-chairing Egan you will be sorry. Schiff will want to know why. And I promise you, he will learn the reason." She strode to the coat check and leaned to the woman behind the counter, describing her coat. The woman, who had been watching the whole scene, sympathized and went to go find it.
"You're a child," he told her in a smoldering voice, and she half-turned to him, "and you think and speak like a child. You haven't a chance in this world if you don't wake up, and if you don't take what you can when it is offered, Claire. You're making a big mistake."
"No," she told him. "I made my big mistake. And I actually liked it for a while. But now, I'm unmaking it. And I have lots more time to stop being a child, if I still am one. You, on the other hand, will always be a small man in a big pond, Jack." Her coat arrived and she turned to accept it, handing the woman some money. When she turned back, Jack had gone.
Claire thought briefly of dragons flying.

---

Baltimore's odors hit her even before she stepped from the train, a fishy tang that mixed with spices from the McCormick factory and a faint whiff of industrial fume, a smell that she had not expected and did not find entirely unsavory: it had a life to it she had either gotten used to or never had found in the first place in New York. "Welcome back to Charm City, Rey," she heard Briscoe tell his partner behind her, irony heavy in his voice. "Feel like a commuter."
"Nah," said Curtis. "We're just making a quick pick-up."
"I think I like it," she told them, to be contrary. Neither detective responded. They had been cool to her on the ride down, obviously disliking being used as prisoner transportation, but with the city budget-crunching private cars were out, and they knew the case, they knew who they were dealing with. Cragen had insisted. And Claire decided they had transferred some of that resentment on to her: if you weren't being so hard-nosed about having Rausch first, we could be on the street, where we can do some good. She had spent much of the train ride reading the file again, going over her arguments for the hearing. She did not think of anything -- or anyone -- else.
Outside the station on North Charles Street they were greeted by a heavyset, grinning black man who told Claire to call him Gee. He was the Cragen of his homicide department, and he told them he had volunteered to come to the station because he had to hear this for himself, first. "You can't really intend to take him with you," he told Claire, who sat up front with him, in a rumbly voice that seemed to emanate from somewhere in his feet, it was so deep.
"Orders," she shrugged. "Just following orders."
"Now where have I heard that before," he mused, and laughed broadly. "Fric and Frack in the backseat don't exactly look like they enjoyed the trip."
"I don't think they're fans of your city."
"Baltimore makes lots of people grumpy, Ms. Kincaid. That's why we have such a large homicide division. Have you been here before?"
She shook her head. "Washington, D.C. is the closest I've come. The whole tour of the capitol. Jefferson. Lincoln. Those things."
"Have someone take you to the aquarium, Ms. Kincaid. If you like fish." He pulled into the cobbled parking lot of the police building.
"I'll keep it in mind," she smiled, liking him, liking his broad sense of authority. As they had driven in she had occasionally glanced at the buildings and decided the colonial structures of much of the town, not to mention the occasional brick-paved street, was...well, charming. Hard to imagine someone like Rausch taking root here.
But the insides of police stations are essentially the same everywhere, and as soon as Claire entered the homicide door she became all business, and Gee did much the same. "You know, Detectives Pembleton and Bayliss have been working this guy pretty hard. They're not going to make it easy for you to just walk in here and take him."
"It's not up to them," she said, rooting in her briefcase for the court order. "It's up to the judge."
From around a corner she could hear the familiar clipped voice of Frank Pembleton, and Gee strode ahead. "I think you better hear what she has to say first, Ms. Kincaid."
On the other side of the corner appeared Frank Pembleton and Tim Bayliss, looking a little tired, but with a fire in their eyes that spoke of a long interrogation. Claire had seen it before in detectives, she knew it was exclusionary and righteous. They were focused and wanted to remain so; this was an unnecessary interruption. "Hello Detective Pembleton, Detective Bayliss," she said, all business.
Bayliss had obviously not expected anything, or at least not expected Claire. His voice was small, hushed, surprised. "Hi," he told her.
Claire glanced up briefly, surprised at the tone, and quickly looked away. None of that, she thought to herself. Business. But she doubted that ruse would last much past the hearing. It was difficult for her to resist someone so obviously smitten. She pushed forward the paper in her hand. "This is a court order allowing me to take Rausch back to New York."
Pembleton took it from her and made a face, jutting out his jaw. "Where's the punchline on this?"
Gee rested his coat over his hands. "I'll go call Danvers."
"I don't give a damn what your court order says, he's ours, and he stays here," Pembleton told Claire.
Curtis appeared in his face. "Give the crusade a rest, Pembleton."
Claire didn't have time to argue; she didn't have to convince the detectives, and turned back around. "I gotta get ready for court."
"Hey!" Pembleton shouted after her, and she turned. "He's not going anywhere."
Briscoe frowned. "Why don't we just cut him in half. Worked for King Solomon."
Tim folded his arms in defense and stood alongside Pembleton, who said, "He's mine," but more weakly.
Curtis followed Claire and Briscoe out. "It's up to the judge, man."

---

Judge Amdell gazed over at the podiums and pointed her pen at Claire. "Miss Kincaid --"
"Your Honor," Claire began, smooth and concise, "the District Attorney's office of the County of New York would like to remind this court that the state of Maryland is a signatory of the Uniform Criminal Extradition Act." She glanced briefly at DA Danvers, a slim, fair-haired man who looked older than his years and who reminded her disturbingly of someone else, but whose name she could not place. "And as such is bound by the Full Faith and Credit Clause whereby they are beholden," she punctuated the way Ben did, "to abide by the petition signed by the Governor of the state of New York."
"Mr. Danvers?"
Danvers held his hands out. "Our position is: we got 'im, we're gonna keep 'im." He twiddled his pen up and down.
"How elegant," said Judge Amdell, not impressed.
Danvers continued, "Your Honor, we're not ignoring the Uniform Extradition Act, but Colonel Alexander Rausch has been indicted in the murder of Stephanie Egan. He is also a prime suspect in the murders of six people at a church five years ago. His extradition now will cripple the ongoing investigation to solve those crimes."
That was patently untrue, and Claire knew she shouldn't have been surprised at the tactic, but did not let it show. "Mr. Rausch," she countered, "is also the prime suspect in a terrorist subway attack in New York. After he is tried we'll send him right back to Baltimore to answer for his crimes here."
"How soon could you reasonably expect to go to trial?"
Danvers made an annoyed noise in his throat. "Your Honor..."
Judge Amdell shushed him. "I'm just asking a question, Mr. Danvers. Relax, count to ten."
Danvers cleared his throat again.
Claire said strongly just what Jack had promised, and undercut it a little. "Four to six weeks."
The Judge did not look convinced. "You'd be able to find a fair and impartial jury that hasn't heard of this case that fast?"
She had undercut too much, and Claire felt herself drop the ball.
Danvers picked it up. "Your Honor, he's here, we are ready to proceed."
Claire frowned. He was so smooth -- but there was no way his office was ready to put Rausch to trial. It had all happened too soon. She realized she should have bluffed more, and her gaze caught Frank Pembleton leaning forward in his seat, and briefly Tim Bayliss next to him, watching, intent.
"I've heard enough," said Judge Amdell. Go and break bread and make peace. I'll hand down my ruling in two hours. We're adjourned." She rapped her gavel and left the courtroom.
Annoyed at losing it in those last few minutes, Claire started to shuffle her papers. Two hours. Whatever would she do for two hours, trying to wait? Well, she could phone Jack, let him know what was going on, have to deal with his attitude, whatever that would be -- they had not spoken since the weekend. That was one thing she could do, and --
"Hi," came a warm whisper near her ear and she turned, surprised. "Hi."
He had come up behind her and she had not even suspected. "Hi," Claire said, wondering where her conversational skills went when Tim Bayliss was standing nearby. He shrugged his coat over across his hands and looked like a man wanting to get something off of his chest and didn't know exactly how to do it. He could have been smooth, like Logan, or openly charming, like Jack, or even like Dean...who had been simply assertive...but Bayliss was not any one thing. He was confident enough to approach her more than once, but still hesitant, as if he didn't do this very often. She immediately trusted him. And he did have terribly long eyelashes for a man. She felt her heart beat faster.
"Would you...ah..." Tim began, "like to go waste some of your life with me?"
It was one of the better lines she had heard in her life, and he had said something like that in the cab ride to New York's Penn Station, which made it even more fun to hear again. This was what Jack had feared, not all of it, but it was a start. For a half second she thought of him again, first the way his face had been twisted when he told her those terrible things that he thought. It did not matter whether he believed them; Claire did not think he did, but he had said them regardless. And then she struggled to picture one time when she might have really cared for him, when she really might have approximated what love was supposed to be. There were parts of him she loved, his composure, his wit, his devil-may-care attitude, his wonderful experienced face. But the parts would never make a whole for her. They were done. The next few weeks would be very hard around the office as they brought Rausch to trial, but somehow she would get through. And then she would not visit the eighth floor so often. She doubted the requests for her services would be forthcoming, in any case. The best she could say about the past few months was that they had happened, and she did not regret any of the days. She would always remember the unnameable bar, the unpronounceable soup, the wild rides on his motorcycle. But she did not belong with him. The differences were too great. Still, one look from those dark depthless eyes and a thin smile on his face was a good memory to take with her. That was enough.
Claire turned to Bayliss and smiled. "Sure."

---

Her phone buzzed again.
"Rachel, no calls," Claire said, fighting to get the dreaminess out of her voice.
"Just wanted to tell you Mr. Duffy was back."
"Ah. Um, okay. Can you get him for me?"
"No problem."
Claire felt a stinging in her eyes, and had not realized that to remember all of this was also to relive it, to picture every detail as it had come and gone. In a moment she would tell the man who was going to marry her a little more about Jack McCoy than he would probably care to know. But they did not discuss former lovers as a rule; there was something too tacky behind that. So he would not hear about Bayliss. Tim was another story entirely. Claire opened her desk drawer and reached far in the back. A thin envelope, opened once, lay stashed back there, undisturbed for years at a time, but never discarded when cleanup time came. She thought about how Tim had asked after the letter Pembleton was supposed to have delivered, how she had sheepishly admitted to not knowing whether to open it or not. How he had opened it for her.
She slid the envelope towards her from the back of her desk and tilted it. A small chain fell out and a folded, faded note followed. It said simply, "Claire, a little souvenir from Charm City. Bayliss." Claire fingered the tarnished chain but realized for the first time the tiny old-fashioned key dangling from it had retained its luster. Keys. The key. Words were funny like that. She pressed it between her fingers. It was real gold, just a tiny, genuine amount. Sometimes that was all it took. She put the bracelet, charm, and letter back in the envelope and slid it to where it would not be found again for a long time.
Her office door opened and her face broke into a smile. "Caleb."
 

end

Afterward