It wasn't supposed to end like this – not at all.
It was a mortgage fraud case for goodness' sake.
But it was a mortgage fraud case linked to a Columbian drug ring. And that drug ring had just kidnapped the White Collar Division's top asset on the job – their top asset and his sister.
Neal had brought them the asset, Joel Lewis, after meeting his younger sister at an art opening a few weeks before. She worked in marketing, Joel worked as a tax auditor. He could spot mortgage fraud a mile away. And they needed that. They just didn't need him sitting in a basement somewhere getting his head bashed in.
The phone call came at six in the morning, startling Peter as he nursed his first cup of coffee over his files. A computer generated voice insisted the Columbian cartel would kill their captives in twenty-four hours, unless the FBI dropped all charges – for mortgage fraud and otherwise. The call had been long enough to triangulate, but only just. And it would be quite a task to penetrate the fortified warehouse where the call originated.
Bea didn't like waiting. Grocery store lines made her blood pressure go up, let alone sitting in a dark room, feeling her brother's unconscious body pressed up against hers, anticipating the next set of questions and the next set of blows.
So far they'd only hurt Joel – which was certainly bad enough. But she couldn't get their captor's parting words out of her head.
"You're awfully hard to break," he'd sneered, "wonder if you'll protect your baby sister better than yourself?"
As much as Bea dreaded the torment she was sure to face she knew it would be better this way, better if she died. Little Mia couldn't loose another parent – not with her mom dead and Joel's new girlfriend off in the Peace Corps. Not when all she had was her brilliant, crazy overachiever of a father.
She just wanted to get the memories out of her head. She just wanted to stop thinking about it – about how they'd tied her to a chair and hit her, harder than seemed like it could have been possible, about how she'd felt a rib break, not just the pain but the actual cracking in the bone, about how terribly it hurt when the flame had danced along the skin on her wrist…about how Joel had just stared, crying, sobbing, and apologizing to her…but never answering any of their captor's questions, never providing either of them any chance at relief.
Everything on her entire body felt wrong. She was bruised and cut and burnt and battered. She was starting to hit stages of pain tolerance she didn't know existed. She was hitting a crisis point – her body and mind were going to give up on her soon. And she wasn't even the one with information to reveal.
But soon she realized that the pain wasn't what felt wrong. What felt wrong was the body next to her. What felt wrong was that Joel had stopped breathing.
Bea didn't know where she found the energy to sit up, to shift her brother's motionless body onto his back, to check for breathing, to feel for a pulse. His heart still beat, a timid, weak, fragile pulse coming only every few seconds. But he wasn't breathing. Not even a trace. Acting on instinct, perfectly aware that she had no medical training, Bea unbuttoned his shirt then stopped when she saw what was underneath.
She knew her own skin was dappled with bruising and that in places it had split, sending out rivulets of blood. But her own injuries looked like nothing compared to this. Sometime, probably when she was unconscious from the pain and the shock, their captors had taken a flame not to Joel's wrists, but to his chest. There was blood everywhere and Bea couldn't sort out what to do…how to fix it…especially not as she felt his pulse slowing and fluttering under her fingers…especially not as she felt him slipping away.
Somewhere in her memory was advice to treat burns with smooth fabric, not a towel. So she pulled off her blouse and laid it over the injuries. Then, desperate, searching for comfort where she knew she couldn't find any, she just lay down next to him, held his hand, closed her eyes, and prayed at least one of them made it out alive.
The door banged open and Bea couldn't help but wince. Every inch of her body hurt and the noise did nothing to ease the throbbing in her head. Their captors – she wouldn't think of Joel as gone yet, not until she was absolutely certain – took one look at her prone brother then grabbed her by one wrist and dragged her to her feet.
"Are you really dead?" their captor mused aloud, nudging Joel's body with a heavily booted toe, "Or just playing? Trying to get us to give up?"
Bea just stood there, waited, her limbs and head heavy as she tried to stay upright on her own, not rely on the sadist holding her wrist.
"Let's see if you'll wake up for little sister," their captor growled, then one of the guards pulled a crowbar from his waistband and hit Bea across the ribs, sending her to her knees in spite of the grip on her wrist, making her scream no matter how hard she tried to keep quiet.
"Guess not."
It was Jones who found them.
The warehouse wasn't as fortified as the FBI had initially thought – just a prison, not a core holding for the entire cartel. Which was good, and bad. It was good because it made Beatrice and Joel easier to rescue; it was bad because it meant Beatrice and Joel wouldn't be able to go back to their normal lives – at least not until the cartel was disbanded.
Gun drawn, the young agent pushed open the once-heavily-barred door to a plain, blue shipping container – with no evidence of its living cargo but a few holes drilled in one wall for air. The sight that greeted him confirmed all their worst fears. Joel lay on his back, unmoving, his skin an alarming shade of gray and his chest smeared with an unimaginable amount of blood.
Beatrice sat beside him, her knees curled into her chest, her forehead resting against her legs, her arms wrapped around her ribs, her slim frame shaking with sobs.
Jones holstered his weapon and knelt down beside them. He checked Joel's pulse first, confirmed his suspicions, then gently lay a hand on Beatrice's back.
"Beatrice," he said quietly, her head rose, her wide green eyes met his, "we're gonna take care of this. It's gonna be okay. You're safe now."
She didn't reply. Her expression didn't change, but with one hand she gestured at her brother as he lay.
"Bea, I hate to say it, but I think he's dead," Jones replied.
"I know," Bea replied, then the tears came again and she pushed away from him, letting her head fall back against the hard, metal wall, rejecting Jones any time he tried to help.