John's breath catches in his throat as he sees her skip down the stairs. She has changed out of the skimpy outfit she was wearing before, but this one isn't much better. Her white blouse is sheer silk and low cut and it drifts softly over a short black skirt, which has a split up one thigh. However, knee-high black leather boots transform what might have been a subtly feminine outfit into something else all together. As she pins her hair up, she looks downright vampy.
John's eyes follow her as she checks her makeup in the mirror and then starts to cross the room back to the front door. He freezes as she suddenly stops short and turns around slowly. She looks speculatively across in his direction and he ducks back out of sight as she walks slowly towards the windows. His heartbeat pounds in his chest, the adrenaline flooding through him as she chews on her lip, her golden eyes narrowed. Then she stops, looks at her watch and turns back to head for the door. It is only when John is convinced that she is gone that he lets out the breath he is holding.
Closing his eyes, he groans noiselessly. She might not be Marlena, but it's still Marlena's body and he still wants her. He can't help the very physical reactions he has to her, he never has been able to help them and it makes him feel exceedingly guilty in this case.
He takes a moment and then enters the living room again. He needs to see what else he can find out about this stranger before she comes back. Before things get even more screwed up. Before she slips out of his fingers forever.
His determination renewed, he steps back into the living room and looks around. He is immediately struck by the fact that there are absolutely no pictures in the room any more. And not even just pictures of him. There are no pictures of any of the children.
He sighs heavily as he goes to the desk and pulls open the drawers. There are several credit card receipts stuffed messily on top of Marlena's papers and he smoothes them out and looks over them. Disbelief is etched on his face as he takes note of the charges. Whoever she is, she likes to spend money. Folding the receipts, he stuffs them in his pocket and closes the drawer.
Upstairs, he stops long enough to poke his head into Belle's room. Nothing has changed and he is grateful, not for the first time that Belle is away from Salem. The only thing that he can imagine that would be worse than what is actually happening is that if Belle had been hurt by this woman claiming to be her mother.
He shivers as he remembers again the chilling smile as she looked down on Hope. A would be murderess in her blood red gown, a goddess fallen from on high.
John clenches his fists as he moves purposefully to the bedroom. Opening the door he is assaulted by her scent. Not Marlena's. Marlena has been stripped from this room as surely as she has been stripped from his life. He aches physically as he walks into the room, the embracing familiarity of his wife deleted as though it had never existed.
He looks at the bed, the cream satin sheets rumpled, a silk negligee draped carelessly across the covers. He fingers it and wants to weep. He feels so empty without her and with every step the void inside him stretches out to engulf everything.
There is an empty martini glass on the bed stand beside the phone and another on the dressing table. Clothes are strewn across the sofa. The door of the armoire hangs open, revealing clothes that John has never seen before.. None of it is Marlena. None of it.
Going to the bureau, John pulls open one of the drawers. His heart stops at the sight of the lingerie inside. He skims shaking fingers across the crimson and black lace. It all looks excessively expensive and he's sure it is. He is also sure he's paid for it all.
He swallows, but the saliva sticks in his throat. He can't help put envisage Marlena in some of this stuff and his body betrays him at the mere thought. He slams the drawer, literally trembling as he closes his eyes, trying to ignore the omnipresent headache that clouds his objectivity.
He gives a short, hard bark of a laugh. Objectivity? Where Marlena is concerned? Since when has he ever been objective about Marlena? He loves her so much it's as though the man he is, is slowly crumpling inside without her. Even without the ever-present pressure of the mercenary, he is not sure he could endure this.
He turns and looks at the negligee on the bed, a seductive bronze coloured number. He picks it up and sits on the bed, unsure whether he wants to hold it close because it is a tenuous link to her body, or cast it away because it represents everything about her that is not Marlena.
His eyes drift closed again as he recalls a time once before when he was fighting for her. At least that time, he had known who the enemy was. Even if it was Roman Brady.
He can still see Marlena as if it were yesterday. Standing there in her virginal white nightgown and in the back yard of the house they once shared. They'd fought over the possibility that he was the father of the baby she carried, that precious life that he had wanted so badly to be his. He had known then that it would tie them together, that the strands of their love would be bound together in one tiny, perfect, incredible human being. And he had known that somehow, that child would make her his forever.
Since then, they had fought so hard, such tiring battles, and just when he thought they had overcome everything....
He can't be sorry for the child Hope has lost. To him, that child was an abomination, conceived from deceit and violation. The complete antithesis of everything that Belle represents. He hasn't even been to see the unconscious Hope in the hospital. Just the sight of her repulses him to a level that he cannot even comprehend.
His heart pounds as his fists clench and the flimsy fabric of the nightgown tears under the strain. He looks down in shock, dropping the sheath so that it spills onto the floor but he cannot tear his eyes from it for several moments. Finally, he stands and with an empty heart, goes to Marlena's dresser and begins wildly pulling open drawers. A mere fifteen minutes later, he leaves the apartment, knowing little more than when he went in.
Back at the Salem Inn, John slams the door of his jeep closed with a little more force than is necessary and with agitation marking his strides, he walks through the front door of the hotel.
The reality is that there was nothing much at all to help him at the penthouse. Simply more visual proof that it is no longer Marlena in their midst. All her clothing has changed, her scent is gone, another in it's place. And still there is no *hard* evidence to prove anything. He supposes he should be glad. At least there is nothing that he can find to connect her to Roman's death.
He steps into the elevator and hits the button to his floor. He starts as a hand waves in between the sliding doors and his heart feels as though it slows as Abe enters the elevator.
Abe waits until they are moving before he turns to John. "Would you like to tell me what the *hell* you thought you were doing?"
"I'm sorry?" John returns his glare with a helpless look.
"You know what I'm talking about," Abe growls. "Do you realize what kind of a position you've put me in?"
"I'm sorry," John still manages to look confused. "I *don't* know what you're talking about Abraham." He's already determined that the best way to handle this is to play dumb.
The elevator doors slide open on the fourth floor and John steps out. Abe follows him, staying silent until he reaches his room. Once they are inside, Abe slams the door shut and turns to glower at John.
"I told you about that evidence under strictest confidence John. What you did was a *felony*. You could serve time for this."
"Hey, wait, wait man," John holds up his hands. "*What* are you talking about? If I'm being accused of something you might do me the courtesy of telling me what it is."
Abe stares at him in exasperation and then spins away, running the fingers of his right hand through his hair. "John, don't play dumb with me, okay? I've known you for far too long."
"Abe," John sighs and drops into the chair behind him. "You've completely lost me."
Abe lets out a noise of pure frustration before he turns back to John. "Those hairs that I told you about this morning. They *disappeared* this afternoon. Right after someone answering *your* description visited the lab." Abe pauses but there is no answer from John.
He sighs and shakes his head "John, Benny said you were at the station asking about some lab result that I supposedly wanted. You said you would go down there and get it yourself and shortly thereafter Janelle Singer talked to a man who called himself Andy Sommers in the lab. She went to get Dave Carson and when they came back, Andy was gone. Along with the evidence."
"I don't know what to tell you man," John shrugs. "I talked to Benny sure, and I even said that I was going down to the lab, but I was really just trying to get him out of your office."
"And why would you want to do that?" Abe frowns.
"I was trying to help you Abraham," John looks disconsolate. "I know you're having a hard time with this and with the D.A.... Well, I thought if I had a look over the files I might see something you missed." His expression becomes earnest. "You know, I thought fresh eyes and all."
"And did you?" Abe asks, not believing John's story for a minute. "See something I had missed, I mean?"
"I only wish I had." John pushes himself up from the chair and goes to pour himself a glass of water.
"So you're saying the fact that Janelle Singer identified you from a photograph is a complete co-incidence," Abe demands.
"I guess that's what I'm saying," John turns back to Abe. "Why would I do something that stupid, Abe?"
"That's what I've been asking myself for the last hour," Abe replies pointedly. "Why would John risk a jail term to remove forensic evidence from the station?" He pauses as he gets up from the bed. "And then of course the same answer keeps hitting me over the head. That evidence could possibly link John's wife to a murder."
"That's ridiculous," John scoffs at Abe's suggestion. "We've had this conversation, Abraham. Marlena had nothing to do with Roman's death."
"You know what John?" Abe looks at him, suspicion clearly evident in his eyes. "I thought that at first, but there's something going on that you're not telling me." His lips are thin as he takes a step towards John. "You're my best friend John, you and Marlena mean the world to me. But I have a responsibility to get to the bottom of this. I know one thing right now, and that's that you are both lying to me. And I'm telling you, I'm going to find out why."
With that, Abe turns and walks towards the door.
"Abe," John blurts out and Abe stops and turns back to look at him. "Knock yourself out man," John shrugs again. "I'm telling you, there's nothing to find, but if you want to waste your time...."
"John," Abe takes a step back towards his friend. "In one day I find out Marlena left you handcuffed to a bed, *she* tells me she had an affair with Craig Wesley and then I find you have betrayed my friendship," there is pain in his words as he speaks, "and stolen important evidence. I'll be damned if there's not *something* going on."
"Marlena told you *what*?" John staggers backward slightly, feeling as though his heart has been torn from his chest. Abe's words ring deafeningly in his ears, even as he speaks.
"On the night Roman was murdered, Marlena met up with Craig Wesley," Abe sees the colour drain from John's face and he realizes what he's done. "She told me you knew John. She said she'd told you." He watches John turn away and the pain in the room is almost palpable. "God, John I'm sorry, I had no idea..."
"Just go," John's voice is rough as he lays his hand against the wall, almost as though he is trying to hold himself up. "Just get outta here."
"John..." Abe feels like absolute shit.
"I said get *out*," John roars as he turns back to Abe and Abe gets the immediate impression of a wounded animal. Swallowing, he nods and quietly leaves.