A/N: All original CBS characters are owned by CBS. Everyone else, is my creation and owned by me. Aside from that, this story is pretty self-explanatory. Enjoy, thanks so much for reading, and please review! :)

Chapter 1

Mac sighed and rolled his shoulders and neck in an attempt to relieve the ache that spread across them and down his back and willed the Excedrin he had taken, to work faster. It was one of those days where everything hurt, and he was reminded of the damage his body had taken over the years as both old and more recent injuries made themselves known again, and that he wasn't getting any younger. He picked the micropipette back up, and measured out its contents to the next row of small tubes. He didn't work in the actual lab near as much as he used to, but on days like this when his body was being contrary and making him remember certain things he usually preferred not to, he liked the distraction and the focus required for the task at hand.

He heard a knock behind him and looked over his shoulder to see Jo.

"There you are," she said. "I've been looking for you. You alright?" she asked, looking closer at him and noticing the tension which he hadn't been able to entirely erase from his face.

"Yeah, I'm fine," he said, straightening up slightly.

Jo shot him a somewhat skeptical look that let him know she didn't really believe him, but she didn't press him further.

"What's up?" he asked.

"What looks like a domestic turned homicide in Queens, and you've looked like getting out would do you some good."

She was right, as usual, he thought. What with one thing and another demanding his attention as head of the whole place, he essentially hadn't left his office or the building for the last three days. The kind of stress he incurred from such confinements and responsibilities he knew was no small culprit of the accumulated tension and physical discomfort he was currently in.

"Ok," he said, "Give me ten minutes to finish this up."

"Sounds good," said Jo as she smiled at him before leaving.

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As he stepped out of the truck into the sun, it hit him just how warm the weather was. He loved it. Just because he had grown up in Chicago and now lived in New York, didn't mean he liked cold or cooler weather. Squinting up into the mid-afternoon sun, he took his suit jacket off and threw it on the small seat in the back of the truck and rolled up his sleeves. Retrieving his case, he followed Jo into the old apartment building and up the stairs. As he took in the worn steps, walls with residue that he really didn't want to know how long it had been accumulating, and the shaky banisters which would never stop anyone who happened to fall into them, the apparent backwardness of how going to a murder scene made him feel less stressed struck him. It brought a small, fleeting smile to his face.

The officer outside the apartment where they were headed opened the door and let them in. A small kitchen was immediately to their right, and looking straight ahead was the living room behind it and a hall that led to three doors behind which Mac assumed were two bedrooms and a bathroom. A dilapidated wood floor lay in the kitchen, and a completely worn down carpet covered the living room and hall. The place wasn't particularly dirty, but empty beer cans lined the counters and the place definitely looked like there had been a fight. From a hole in one of the cupboards and dents in the walls, it certainly hadn't been the first. Mac took it all in in a matter of seconds

The homicide detective on scene came from around the corner to meet them, and Mac felt the last of the tension weighing on him, disappear.

"Mac, Jo! How'd I get so lucky?" Flack greeted them with his broad, easy smile.

"Hey, Don," Jo replied.

Mac returned his friend's smile. "What do you got for us, Don?"

"Pretty obvious open and shut case if you ask me," Flack replied, leading the pair into the living room where their victim lay. She looked to be in her late twenties with her apparent COD being the open skull fracture on the side of her head. "Aubrea Matthews, 28, husband's name is Jason." Flack said, flipping open his notebook. "According to the neighbors there were often sounds of shouting and occasional fighting. Apparently the cops have come out a couple times, but no charges were ever filed." Flack gestured backwards towards the door as he continued, "There's no signs of forced entry, and since I don't see this place exactly attracting the burglary sort, I'm going with another domestic assault that this time led to murder."

"You found the weapon yet?" Mac inquired, kneeling down and pulling on his gloves to more closely inspect their victim's presumed fatal injury.

"No," said Flack, "Haven't searched every nook and cranny in the apartment, but it's nowhere just lying around I'll tell you that. And I got unis looking in the nearby dumpsters and trash bins as well. Certainly doesn't look like a murder anyone put any thought into so I don't anticipate it's gone all that far."

Mac nodded, picking up one of the victim's hands. "Defensive wounds and abrasions," he observed, "Finger shaped bruising on her arms…definitely confirms the history of domestic violence." He sighed. It was one of those things which escaped him. From an intellectual psychology perspective he could understand what led to spousal abuse and the mindset and perspective most abusers had; but on a personal level, he couldn't fathom even the slightest dimension of it.

"Mac?" Flack interrupted his train of thought.

"Yeah," Mac replied, looking up.

"Neighbors say there's a kid that lives here as well. Said they'd hear crying as well as fighting," Flack continued quietly.

Mac's heart sank. He hated it when kids were caught in the middle of a hopeless and senseless situation like the one that had clearly gone on in this apartment. "How old?" he asked.

Flack shrugged. "I've gotten everything from 2 to 6 years old. I get the feeling most people here stick to themselves pretty closely."

Mac wasn't at all surprised at Flack's latter assessment. 'Keep your head down, don't get into other people's business, and don't get the cops involved.' was generally the mantra amongst such locales. "That's still a pretty wide age range," he said, "No sign of the kid though?"

Flack shook his head.

Mac looked at his watch. It was 3:47pm. "Well, if they're five or six, they could be in school yet," he guessed.

But Flack shook his head again. "Already checked," he said. "I called over to the local elementary school. They have three kids with the last name of 'Matthews', but two are in fourth grade and one in third, and none of them have a parent named Aubrea or Jason."

"Do we even know if it's a boy or a girl?" Mac asked.

"A boy. They think. Not even sure on that score," Flack said. "And yes, I've got the alert out on both the husband and the kid separately as well as together. But my guess? The husband took the kid when he ran. What?" he asked, as Mac suddenly paused and looked over his shoulder.

Mac waited a few seconds before answering. "Nothing," he said, "Just thought I heard something."

Flack listened briefly as well before shrugging his shoulders. "I don't hear anything," he said, although certainly not glibly. Mac had an almost scary ability to pick up on things either long before anyone else did, or that most would have been missed entirely.

"Probably just someone next door," Mac dismissed. And Flack was probably right about the location of the kid, Mac thought, his heart settling heavier at the thought of the young child in the sole company of the man who had probably just killed his wife. Getting out his camera, he and Jo set about processing the scene.

But fifteen minutes later he paused again, setting his camera on his knee and listening.

"Mac?" Jo inquired.

But he simply held up one hand to quiet everyone and frowned slightly in concentration.

"Mac, what is it?" Jo asked in a low voice.

Mac didn't say anything, but something had sparked in his eyes and body.

Suddenly he put his camera on the ground and stood up, turning sharply to face down the hall and lay one hand on his gun. Jo and Flack immediately followed suit.

Mac edged down the small hallway to the first bedroom and pushed the door all the way open. There was a single, dilapidated looking sleeping bag shoved against the wall in one corner and precious little else in the small space besides a small dresser and a single stuffed animal. Jo found herself fervently hoping this wasn't where the child slept. Mac put his finger to his lips and reached out one hand to the single closet door. He quickly pulled it open and stepped to the side. But peering into the space, all he saw was a small foot just poking out from behind a stack of towels that were on the floor. Dropping his hand away from his gun, he knelt down and quickly removed the top half of the stack. And there, pushed into the back corner, was a little boy who looked no older than three. His face was streaked with tears, and at the sudden appearance of the three of them, he burst into crying that was nothing short of pure fear.

"Hey, it's okay," Mac said, reaching one hand out towards the little boy. But the terrified child shrunk away from him, practically shaking, and panic edging into his cries. A sick feeling entered Mac and anger flew through him as he noticed the finger shaped bruises on the boy's upper arms and what looked like three very fresh cigarette burns on his legs. He suddenly wondered if the domestic assault was the end result and not the beginning of the whole thing.

He slowly removed the entire stack of towels save one, leaving it in place so the boy didn't feel completely exposed. "It's okay," he repeated, staying kneeling in place and speaking in a volume that was just below the little boy's cries. His eyes never left the child's face who still wouldn't even look at him. "I'm not going to hurt you, it's okay." As he made no move toward the boy, but simply knelt in the closet doorway, the tone of the boy's crying and body language slowly changed slightly. Even though fear still radiated off him, Mac was no longer the one he was crying about.

"Daddy's going to kill me," the boy sobbed out in true terror.

Mac felt the anger that had been simmering, surge through him. There was no excuse for a child to live their life with that kind of genuine fear. "I promise, I will never let that happen," he told the boy.

For the first time, the child raised his eyes to meet Mac's, searching his face for the reassurance of the conviction and safety that had been in his voice.

"Come on," Mac coaxed, as the boy's crying calmed to silent chest heaves.

Slowly the boy inched from the back of the closet and towards Mac who remained kneeling in the doorway.

Mac picked him up, and the child instantly clung to him, his arms so tight around Mac's neck that Mac thought he might choke. And holding him, Mac could feel just how small and thin the boy was.

"Mac," Don said softly, now able to fully see the boy.

Mac looked up.

"It's not good," his friend said gently, his gaze scanning the child.

Mac felt his heart sink at the instant look of horror, anger, disgust and pain on Jo's face, and unfortunately he could only too easily imagine what the rest of the boy's body looked like.

Jo lay a gentle hand on the top of the boy's back.

Mac felt him instinctively flinch and tighten his small body against Mac's even further and start to cry again. He closed his arms reassuringly and protectively around the little boy.

"It's ok," Jo told the boy quietly, "What's your name?"

But he refused to answer or lift his head out of Mac's neck.

"What's your name?" Mac repeated softly in his ear.

But the poor child was beyond speaking and simply hung on to Mac with a level of exhausted desperation. And Mac felt something else stir inside him. He'd always had a soft spot for the kids and youngsters who'd crossed his path, seeing them as the most valuable and vulnerable of those around him, but there was something about the impact of the implicit trust that this child had decided to place in him that awoke emotions he hadn't ever really experienced before. Ones that were a step beyond those of the protection and care he usually felt. It shook him slightly, and he found he didn't want to let go of the boy either.

"Mac, he needs a hospital," Jo told him quietly.

Mac nodded. "I know," he said, "Go ahead and all an ambulance."

Jo fished out her phone and stepped away slightly.

"And Don?" Mac continued, "See if you can find anything around that'll let us know his name and his age."

"You got it," Flack replied, heading off to search the apartment and grabbing a couple officers to help him.

"…ok, thank you," Jo slid her phone back into her pocket. "They'll be here in about ten minutes," she told Mac.

Mac nodded, not once loosening his hold on the little boy.

Jo went up to Mac's shoulder again, where the child still hadn't lifted his head from. "Sweetheart?" she said gently. The boy didn't say anything. "Would it be alright if I lifted up your t-shirt a little?" she asked, laying an experimental, feather-light hand on his back. His body tightened slightly, but this time he didn't pull away. Jo carefully took hold of the bottom of his t-shirt, and Mac moved his arm slightly so she could pull it up. He lay his hand on the back of the boy's head and held him close. He was so little and helpless and fragile. If it wasn't for his level of speech, Mac still wouldn't have guessed the boy was any older than three.

From the look on Jo's face, Mac already knew what she was going to say and what she had seen. He shook his head at her. He didn't know why, but he didn't want to actually hear it. He just stood in the small, spare bedroom, his arms entirely around the little boy, his cheek against his head, murmuring in his ear and further calming him down.

Flack finally reappeared just as Mac could see the ambulance pull up next to the curb.

"I found his birth certificate," Flack said, "His name's Devon, and he turned four two months ago."

Hardly four years old, Mac thought, disgust and anger boiling through him at what the child had endured in his short life. The poor kid was now lying limply against him, utterly exhausted, but with his arms still locked around Mac's neck. "Is your name Devon?" he asked the boy as he heard footsteps approach from down the outside hall.

The small, blond head that hid in his shoulder nodded.

"Devon, do you know what an ambulance is?" Mac asked as Jo disappeared.

Another nod.

"Do you know what paramedics are?"

A slight pause, then a single shake 'no'.

"Paramedics are the people who work on ambulances and help people out and take you to the doctor to make you feel better," Mac explained.

"Is an ambulance coming here?" Devon asked in a very small voice.

Mac's heart about broke at just how truly little the boy sounded. "Yes," he said just as there was a knock on the door. The boy immediately cinched his arms around Mac's neck, burying his head in the small of Mac's neck and re-tightening his body against Mac's with a whimper of fright. Taking two steps to his left, out of the corner of his eye Mac could see around the doorway of the bedroom Flack letting the two FDNY medics in and escorting them over while giving them a brief rundown on the situation. They both looked to be only in their mid-twenties, but exuded and moved with an air of quiet, easy experience. "Hey, it's okay," Mac soothed Devon. The poor child probably thought it was his father coming back. "It's just the paramedics and ambulance I told you about. Remember?"

The little boy nodded marginally, and Mac could feel him slightly relax.

The young woman who appeared to be the lead medic approached them. "Hey there little guy," she said in a soft voice, laying a gentle hand on Devon's shoulder. "My name's Georgie. What's yours?"

But Devon refused to look up.

"It's okay," Mac assured the Devon, running his hand over the boy's hair. "You can answer her, she's one of the paramedics."

Leaving one arm draped around Mac's neck, Devon tucked his other one underneath him and against Mac's chest, and turned his head sideways against Mac's shoulder so he could peek out. "Devon," he finally replied in a quiet voice.

"Oh I like that name," Georgie told him. "And how old are you, Devon?"

"Four," Devon told her in an equally reserved voice.

"Four? Wow, you're getting to be quite a big boy, aren't you," said Georgie with a smile.

Devon didn't say anything, but Mac could sense his wary but increasing acceptance.

"Devon, do you hurt anywhere?" Georgie continued.

But Devon just kept himself tucked against Mac's chest and didn't answer. Mac resisted the urge to shift the boy in his arms which, small as the child was, were starting to let him know he'd been holding him the same way for a little while now.

"Do your legs hurt?" Georgie asked as she gently felt both his legs, carefully avoiding the round burn marks.

Devon nodded his head minutely.

"How about your arms?"

Devon shook his head, and Mac felt the boy's soft, fine hair against his neck at the movement. The something he'd felt earlier surged forward even more strongly, and he couldn't have cared less that his arms were starting to burn from holding the little boy so securely.

"Does your face hurt a little bit?" Georgie continued, having noticed Devon's slightly swollen cheek and jaw line.

Devon gave her a small nod.

"Does your back hurt?" Georgie asked him, gently feeling his back and around the boy's ribs.

But as careful as her touch was, Devon melted into half-cries and shrunk against Mac. Mac felt his throat catch at the boy's obvious pain, and he placed his hand protectively around Devon's head and held him close. "Shhh, Devon, it's okay. It's okay," he murmured in the boy's ear.

From the end of the hallway by the second bedroom where Jo had reemerged unnoticed by Mac, she paused and just watched him. She had seen how he was around the few kids involved in the cases they'd worked together over the last couple years as well as around her own when she'd convinced him to join them for pizza a couple times, and she'd been impressed with his intrinsic, keen and gentle understanding. But seeing him in his rolled up shirt sleeves holding and comforting the scared, hurt little boy in his arms, there was both such a depth of softness and strength to him that was so much more than what she had previously seen.

The medic carefully pulled up Devon's t-shirt, and Mac saw her lips set as she took in the angry bruises and welts on the boy's back and ribs. "Do you have a hospital preference for him?" she asked Mac.

Mac shook his head, "Just the closest children's hospital."

Georgie nodded. "Are you going to be riding with him?"

Mac hesitated. He wanted to. How much he wanted to and why once again shook him. It wasn't just that the boy was a victim, or the only potential witness. He could easily hand Devon over to the medics and send Jo, who with kids of her own would be the "logical" choice.

But he didn't want to do that either.

He found himself trying to explain it by the fact that he had already established a level of trust with the child and that sending anyone else could reduce Devon to complete silence at best, and based on how scared the boy still was, quite probably completely re-traumatize him.

But while there was an element of truth to all the reasons he tried to convince himself with, he knew they weren't really the case. He felt a burgeoning personal attachment to the boy that quite frankly almost scared him.

Jo, seeing Mac hesitate at the medic's question and practically reading the internal dialogue she could guess was cascading through his head, she stepped forward. "Mac, go," she told him, pressing the clean change of clothes that she had finally found for Devon into his hand. Relief filled his eyes that she had made the decision for him.

"You're sure?" Mac double-checked, a twinge of guilt about being so ready to leave to leave the crime scene niggling at him as well.

"Yes," said Jo firmly, "Go. I'll call Adam to help me finish processing and I'll be over in a little bit to catch up."

Mac nodded. He looked down at Devon, "You want to go for a ride in an ambulance?" he asked him.

"It's got some pretty cool stuff in it," Georgie told the little boy.

He peered out at her for minute before nodding his head.

Mac followed the medics down the stairs as he carried Devon to the ambulance, carefully holding the boy's head firmly against his chest so the child wouldn't see his mother lying dead in the living room as they passed.

"Don?" he said, pausing in the front doorway before leaving.

Flack came over.

Mac spoke very quietly, but his voice was nothing but deadly and his eyes flashed with a potential danger that Flack had only seen on very few occasions, "I want this motherfucking bastard in custody by tonight."