Found Out by InSilva
Summary: Companion piece to "Finding Out". The aftermath of Danny's row with Rusty from Danny's pov.
Disclaimer: Danny, Rusty and Tess are not mine nor will they ever be.
Danny watches the door shut and his hand immediately reaches out after him. He pulls it back again. This is your decision, he reminds himself, and you know this was always the most likely outcome. It doesn't stop him looking at the door, willing it to open again. After a while, he realises it's staying shut and he sighs.
Tess is fast asleep when he goes into the bedroom and he watches her for a little while, thick hair spread over the pillow, long-lashed eyes tight shut. For a moment or two, he wonders what life without her would have been. He wonders, not for the first time, how he would have felt if Rusty had been the one to meet someone. He wonders.
Lying in bed, he stares at the ceiling and goes over the evening in his head. He hadn't wanted him to find out that way, but then he really hadn't wanted Rusty to find out ever. He knows he was fooling himself with that, though: secrets between them never last.
He thinks about Rusty's face…Rusty is the best actor he knows but Rusty can never hide from him. Part of him stood and watched the hurt and disbelief oozing out of Rusty, aching to reach out and explain in full and take the pain away. The logical part, the part with the strategy, the part with the plan made him shut up and get on with it because Rusty would argue even more fiercely than he was doing already and Danny knows he might be tempted. Make that would be tempted. Make that would definitely yield.
Is it worth it? He thinks back to what Rusty had once said: time will tell.
And he hadn't been lying in what he'd said to Rusty. Not completely. It was certainly true that the need to work was burning through him fiercely.
Rusty had been right way back when, when he'd said the con was in their blood; it was what they were…what they are…what defines them. He'd tried, God knows he'd tried, to bite back on his instincts, to keep his thoughts on the straight and narrow. Tess's influence had worked for a while but it had been up against nature, and that was a battle that was only going to end one way.
So, to work again, to think and to imagine and to act: the liberation was thrilling and scary and addictive. And about the same time he'd made his decision to fall off the wagon, he'd also found out he couldn't involve Rusty.
It had been an offhand conversation that he'd had with a name that Bobby had mentioned in passing. Someone with a link in to someone on the inside. Someone with some knowledge. Danny had thought it worth following up.
"You got to be careful, you know," they'd said. "I heard your name mentioned a couple of times or more at least."
"In what context?"
And the man had quoted five jobs straight off that he and Rusty had been responsible for. His blood had chilled but he'd continued stirring his coffee and he'd kept his tone light.
"So what are they saying?"
A shrug. "Well, they haven't got anything concrete. It's mostly suspicion and speculation."
He'd relaxed and then the man had said something which made him tighten up all over again.
"They know you have a partner."
He'd taken himself off to the park and sat and looked at the lake while he thought options. He could carry on as he was. He could fight the itch like reformed smokers fought the nicotine craving that was always there. Thing was, Rusty would still look at him as he did every time he saw him, waiting for him to acknowledge what they both knew.
Looking back at Rusty would not help. Rusty was like a cigarette with "give in to me" written all over it. Danny knew because he'd been resisting Rusty for months and his willpower was weakening.
So, option two: surrender to Rusty. His heart sang at the thought of talking a job through with Rusty, of dreaming up a masterpiece and having Rusty help paint in the actuals. The anticipated kick was immense. And maybe they'd be lucky – their luck had always held and that had probably been because of Rusty not in spite of him.
Still "they know you have a partner" reverberated and his mind fast-forwarded to what would happen if they got caught. Going to prison…more than that, Rusty going to prison…he shook his head. This was why he always worked on the long-term view; to keep them both safe.
Did that mean he was never going to work with Rusty again? Now, that was something he couldn't contemplate. Never say never, he told himself, just wait until the heat's died down.
That left option three. Going it alone. Danny shivered at that. He didn't even know for sure that he could do it in the first place, let alone hide it from Rusty. Funny how that seemed worse than hiding it from Tess.
Going it alone had its upsides, though. It meant he could do what he was born to do. It kept Rusty safe. It meant that he could sit in the same room with Rusty and Tess and have them in the same compartment of his life. And as long as he was careful, Tess need never know and he could delay Rusty finding out. Maybe, by the time he discovered the truth, Danny would be able to work with him again. There'd be angry words but Rusty would forgive him; Danny would make it so he had to forgive him.
And his choice was made.
Right now, he's thinking it's the wrong choice.
Every morning he looks at Tess and hides his deceit with a smile.
Every morning, he clamps down on the urge to pick up the phone and talk to Rusty. It is one of the hardest things he has ever had to do. A hundred times a day, he thinks of something he can say to him alone or a joke only they would share or he starts a thought and expects it to be finished aloud.
He doesn't enjoy planning the job as much as he imagined. He can't use the contacts he normally would. The people he has got in touch with are eager but not proven. Talking to them, he hears what they think he wants to hear. And there is no one at his shoulder to tell it like it is.
The night of the job, he showers, feeling the water run over his body, holding his head under the jets and blanking out the thought that this is a mistake.
Emerging, wrapped in a towel, he finds Tess standing in the bedroom, looking down at his phone on the bedside table. He hasn't heard it ring and he hasn't heard her come in. She looks up at him oddly and he finds himself holding his breath.
"You've had a message," she says and for a second he thinks Rusty but her next words kill that hope. "Someone called Evan wants you to know that he will wait for you to call after the job tonight in order to move the goods."
Cursing the amateurs he has had to deal with, he holds her gaze.
"Job, Danny? Goods, Danny?" Her voice is low and dangerous.
Lies come to his lips but he can't voice them.
"I warned you," she says, cold anger suffusing her.
"Tess," he begins.
"No, Danny, no," she shuts him down. "It's not up for discussion."
He thinks of saying "I won't go through with it" but he knows the damage is already done. It isn't until he looks at her eyes that he understands how far the damage goes.
"I knew he'd talk you back in," she says venomously and Danny winces at the injustice of that.
He opens his mouth to deny Rusty's involvement but shuts it again as she picks up her bag and her coat. He moves forward and grabs her arm.
"Don't do this, Tess," he says, throat dry because he's lost one bedrock and the other sure thing is headed for the door.
"You've left me no choice," she snaps and pulls her arm free. "There were conditions, you know that and you've stepped over the line."
"I love you, Tess," he says simply, honestly, desperately.
"Maybe. But, Danny, you don't love me enough." And with that, she's gone.
Numb, he watches the door shut and sits on the edge of the bed and stares after her. It's the second time in six weeks he's stared at a closed door: this time, there's a little less hope that it's going to open again.
Then, he goes straight to the phone and starts punching in Rusty's number. He stops before he dials the last digit and presses the phone to his forehead. If any interested parties take it upon themselves to track his calls, he can't lead them to Rusty.
He calls Saul instead.
"Tess has gone," he says baldly as Saul answers and finds himself telling most but not all. Enough for Saul to work out that he's planning something and Tess has found out.
Saul's advice is two words. "Call Rusty."
It's advice he can't follow.
The job is slick and swift and halfway through he wonders why exactly he's going ahead with it. Isn't it enough that he's lost the things that matter most to him because of it? Isn't that a sign that the job is jinxed?
The following night he attends the gala dinner that Tess has insisted they support. It's organised by her friends and he hopes that she'll be there. She isn't.
When the cops walk in the room, he doesn't know how he's been found out but he knows the game is up.
Waiting for the trial is purgatory. He guesses the news has travelled and he is thinking about its impact. He's hoping no one is going to do anything stupid.
He can't get a message out but Saul manages to get a message in. His brief leans awkwardly across the table to deliver it.
"I've been instructed to tell you that your Hershey's bar is safe."
Danny's face relaxes into a smile for the first time since he's been caught.
The lawyer frowns. "If this is some sort of code about ill-gotten gains-"
"Don't worry," Danny interrupts. "It's all about the chocolate."
In his private moments, he thinks about what's up and coming. He knows he needs to prepare himself. What's comforting him the most is that the authorities think they've identified his partner. Since it is Evan's indiscretion that has led them to this point, Danny is insanely pleased that he is marked out as such and doesn't hurry to correct any assumptions.
The trial has been underway for five days when he is brought in to the courtroom, throws a casual glance around it and immediately knows Rusty is there. He spends the entire session keeping his eyes firmly averted from the second chair on the left at the back because one slip and he'll be unable to tear his gaze away; one slip and they'll both be lost.
All the time he's stood there, he knows Rusty's eyes are on him.
All the time the lawyers are speaking, his thoughts are focused on how he could have handled this better, how he'd hoped Tess would have stood by him and above all, how he wishes Rusty were a million miles from here and safe. Even so, his contradictory heart rejoices that he came.
Outside in the corridor, he sees what's going to happen before it does. He is tense as hell but afterwards reflects that he needn't have worried: Rusty is nothing if not professional. The fall is seamlessly accidental. Of course, he could have reached anywhere to steady himself but Danny is more grateful than Rusty will ever know for the touch on his arm that reassures and the feel of Rusty's hand covering his and dropping the piece of paper into them is electric.
The message itself is comforting, letting him know that channels of communication are back open. To be safe – for Rusty to be safe - he sends a roundabout message back again telling him to stay away. He likes to think that when he's on the outside, the distance he's purposely kept between Rusty and himself will mean they can work together without any unwanted legal interest.
Later, many times later, it is the moment itself that he thinks about. About how they look at each other for a nanosecond and the so many emotions he can read in Rusty's eyes. Pinpointing each is the game he plays to take him out of himself.
If he were asked outright what he hopes for when he's released, he would say a reconciliation with Tess; only to himself will he add seeing and being with Rusty again. The lack of Rusty in his life hurts more than he wants to admit but every bit as much as Danny knew it would.