Honestly Love You Chapter 5
Posted by caroline crane
 

"What is wrong with her?" T.C. asked himself as he watched Whitney miss another easy lob. For the past few weeks she'd been going through the motions of her tennis practices, but it was obvious that her heart wasn't in it. He sighed and told himself he wasn't going to lose his temper and yell at her. It wouldn't do any good to make her cry; he'd just have to figure out what was bothering her and fix it. That's what a good coach would do.
"Okay, honey, that's enough for today," he called as she took another frustrated swing and missed the ball. "Come on in, time to hit the showers."

"I'm sorry, Daddy, I don't know what's wrong," she said as soon as she stepped off the court. "I'll do better tomorrow, I promise."

"It's okay, baby," T.C. said through clenched teeth. "Everybody has off days. I probably just need to rethink your schedule. Maybe you need some cross training, something fresh to get your mind back in the game."

"Yeah, I'm sure that's what it is. I just need a change." She smiled brightly and grabbed her equipment bag. "I'm going to hit the showers."

"Sure. I've gotta get to the school anyway. I'll see you at home." He watched as she walked away, wondering what could be eating away at her so much that she couldn't concentrate on the thing she loved most in the world. She wouldn't make it to Nationals at this rate, forget the Olympics. As he turned to go he caught sight of her and his heart stopped for a minute. He'd being seeing her around town more and more lately, and he'd begun to wonder if he was hallucinating her just to torture himself. But she caught his eye and walked toward him, a living, breathing reminder of her mother, and he knew she was real.

"Coach Russell," Sheridan said, smiling warming at him.

"Hello, Miss Crane," he said, working hard to keep his voice even. "Something I can do for you?"

"Please, call me Sheridan. I was just...well, I was watching Whitney practice, and she seemed to be having some trouble."

"Nothing we can't handle, Miss Crane." He felt himself tensing and told himself that if he just made it through this conversation without breaking down, he'd make sure he never found himself alone with her again. She was just so much like Meredith - from her hair to her voice, to those soulful eyes that looked right through you...T.C. forced himself back to the present and set his jaw. "Whitney just needs a little distraction, she's been working really hard toward the Nationals and she's burned out. It happens to a lot of athletes."

"Yes, it does," Sheridan said, watching Whitney's father curiously. She knew from Luis that he didn't have a very high opinion of her family, but for some reason she felt drawn to his daughter. The connection she'd felt between them in the locker room the other day had stayed with her, and she couldn't help watching Whitney practice when she happened upon them this morning. "I have several friends that are professional trainers in Europe, and they often recommended cross training for their athletes. Something fun, a distraction as you say. I was hoping to offer my services. If Whitney's interested, of course."

His first instinct was to turn her down flat - the less time his daughter spent around Julian Crane's sister the better off she'd be. But there was so much of Meredith in Sheridan, and even though it was painful for him to talk to her, at the same time he couldn't help wanting to reach out to her in some way. Even though she barely knew her mother before Meredith died she was the last link he had to the woman who'd given him a reason to live all those years ago.

"What did you have in mind, exactly?" he heard himself asking.

"Now, you'll have to keep an open mind," she said, her voice lilting and almost sing-song as her eyes lit up with excitement. "I realize this will sound like a very unorthodox training exercise for a tennis player, but I was hoping to offer to give Whitney riding lessons. We have beautiful stables on the Crane estate just going to waste, I can't possibly ride all the horses myself. And I've found through the years that connecting with an animal is very therapeutic. It might help her work through whatever's on her mind."

T.C. couldn't help smiling at her intuition - she'd spent a total of half an hour watching his daughter and she could already tell what was wrong with her tennis game. He hated the thought of Whitney at the Crane mansion and he knew Eve would hate it even more, but if she was with Sheridan...

"I'll have to speak to my wife," he told her, but his features relaxed a bit and he allowed himself to smile. "I'm sure she'll agree to it. If Whitney's interested I'll have her give you a call."

"Wonderful. Tell her I'm looking forward to hearing from her." Sheridan smiled again and turned away, leaving him staring after her, wondering if it was a bad idea to let his daughter spend time with Meredith's daughter.

~

Hank pulled open the door of the Book Cafe and stepped inside, glancing around the crowd for any sign of Beth. When he didn't find her he walked over to the counter and ordered a coffee from the girl behind the counter. "Is Beth working today?" he asked, glancing around the crowd again.

"Yeah, she took a late lunch. She'll be back in about half an hour," the waitress said, setting his coffee down in front of him.

"Thanks," Hank muttered, turning back to the sitting area to look for an empty seat. As he scanned the crowd his eyes fell on Ethan Crane, his briefcase open on a table and papers spread around him.

"Over here," Ethan called, staring directly at Hank. He stared back as he wondered what the hell Ethan Crane would want with him. Ethan motioned impatiently for him to come over, so Hank shrugged his shoulders and joined the younger man.

"Hey, Ethan, what's up?"

"Hank Bennett, right? Sam's brother?"

"Yeah, that's right." Hank couldn't help being amused at Ethan's self-important posture and his constant shuffling of papers.

"I wasn't aware that you were in the field," Ethan said, reaching into his briefcase for his Thinkpad. "So tell me, Hank, what makes you think you're right for this job?"

"Job? What the hell are you talking about?"

"I assume you're here to apply for the position...I mean, you are here about my classified ad, aren't you? You were looking around like you were looking for me..." Ethan trailed off, his face clouded with confusion as Hank grinned back at him.

"I don't know what you're talking about, Ethan. I was looking for my friend Beth."

"Oh." Ethan sank back into his chair with a sigh. "Sorry, I just assumed...I guess I was mistaken." He shook his head and started putting papers back in his briefcase. At this rate he was never going to find Chad's birth parents and his only real friend was going to leave town forever.

"Something wrong?" Hank asked as he watched Ethan scowl into his briefcase.

"It's just..." Ethan looked over at Hank again as he tried to decide whether or not to tell a virtual stranger about his frustrating afternoon. "I've interviewed almost a dozen private detectives, and every one of them keeps telling me the same thing - it's a lost cause. I should just give up and move on. But I can't do that. This is my best friend's life we're talking about."

Hank cocked an eyebrow, suddenly intrigued. He didn't know much about Ethan, other than that Sam and Luis didn't think much of him, but he'd never stopped to think that Ethan might have friends that he cared about. "So you're looking for a private detective."

"Yeah, you know any?" Ethan asked sarcastically, slamming his briefcase shut with a thud.

"No, but...aren't you a lawyer? Don't you guys hire P.I.s for cases all the time?"

"I'm in corporate law, we don't have much use for private detectives in mergers and acquisitions." His tone of voice was petulant, as though he was a six-year-old explaining Santa Claus to his dumb kid brother. Hank couldn't help smiling at the thought of the kid across the table from him handling a corporate merger.

"So what's the case?" Hank asked before he could stop himself. The last thing he wanted to do was go to work for a spoiled rich kid like Ethan Crane, but his natural curiosity got the better of him and the words escaped his lips before he realized it.

Ethan sat up again, suddenly interested in the person sitting across the table from him. "I'm trying to help my friend find his birth parents. He's pretty much exhausted all the avenues that he could find, so we're looking for outside help. Do you know anything about detective work?"

Hank bit his tongue before the truth could escape his lips. He'd done a lot of different kinds of work since he'd left Harmony ten years ago, including some surveillance and a little research for an insurance company in New York. It wasn't a fun job, mostly he just hung out in his car and waited for guys on disability to do something they weren't supposed to be doing so the insurance company could quit paying their benefits. But he knew enough about the detective racket to trace some birth records. He took another look at Ethan and cursed the fact that he was such a push-over. "Who's your friend?"

"Chad Harris. Do you know him?"

"You. And Chad Harris. You're best friends?" Hank didn't bother to check the urge to laugh - the thought of Ethan and Chad palling around was too much.

"Look, I know we don't exactly come from the same walk of life..."

"You can say that again, I'm not even sure you're from the same planet," Hank said. He sighed and leaned back in his chair, regarding Ethan thoughtfully.

"So this means a lot to Chad."

"Yes, it does. If he doesn't find his birth parents he's going to leave town and move to New York City. So you can see why I'm so anxious to find someone to help." Ethan held his breath and waited while Hank made up his mind - he could tell that Sam's brother was considering taking the job, all he needed was the right kind of convincing. "It means a lot to all the people that care about Chad - me, the Russells, your friend Beth."

Hank rolled his eyes as Ethan played the guilt card. Now if he didn't help he was single-handedly responsible for running Beth's favorite employee out of town and bringing heartbreak to the entire Russell household. "Okay, you win. I'll help you out. But I'm not promising anything."

"Great," Ethan said, grasping Hank's hand and shaking it firmly. "You won't regret this. I'll be in touch."

"You do that," Hank muttered as Ethan walked away. He had no idea what he'd just gotten himself into, but he was pretty sure he was going to be sorry.

He was still sitting at the table, staring at the wall, when Beth slid into the seat Ethan had vacated. "Do my ears deceive me? Were you just having coffee with Ethan Crane?" she asked, her eyes lit up with amusement.

Hank couldn't help but return her smile, her laugh had always been infectious. "He offered me a job," he confessed, shaking his head at the ridiculousness of that statement.

"And?" she prodded, waiting impatiently for him to spill the rest of the story.

"And I told him I'd do it. But only because if I don't you'd never forgive me."

"What does this have to do with me?" she asked, her voice full of mock indignation.

"I'm supposed to help Chad Harris find his birth parents," Hank explained. "And Ethan made it clear that if I didn't help Chad would be forced to leave town, leaving you and the entire Russell clan utterly heartbroken. So I guess I don't have a choice. Wouldn't want to break your heart, after all. But since I'm doing this for you, you're going to have to help me."

"Me? Why me?"

"Hey, every good gumshoe needs a Girl Friday," he teased. "Besides, we make a great team. Always have."

"That's true. We did solve the great lamp-breaking mystery of 1986," she laughed. "If it wasn't for me your father would never know who broke that hideous thing."

"Yeah, only because you ratted me out for playing football in the living room. You always were a little tattle-tale."

"I was not!" she exclaimed indignantly. "I've just never been a very good liar."

"Well, you're going to get plenty of chances to hone your skills if we're going to get our hands on Chad's birth records," he said, his smile fading as he considered the ramifications of what he'd just agreed to do. "They don't just let people check them out like the library."

"If anybody can do it, you can," she told him, patting his hand reassuringly. "You have to. Chad's counting on you now."

Hank's smiled returned as she closed her fingers around his and gazed at him with the familiar affection they'd shared practically their whole lives. He was glad someone had so much faith in him, because he had the distinct feeling that unraveling the mystery of Chad's birth wouldn't be nearly as easy as it sounded.