Summary: Hardy and Miller solved the Sandbrook case and it's all over. Only life has a funny way of getting in the way while you're making other plans.
Disclaimer: I don't own Broadchurch, Alec Hardy or Ellie Miller. I'm just taking them out to play. I'm going to spin them round and turn them upside down, and then return them, safe and sound although maybe a little dizzy, to their rightful owners (ITV, David Tennant and Olivia Colman, respectively). No infringement is intended.
A/N: For the record, Empty Spaces is my official series 3 head!canon...but this little plot bunny seems like it's a fun take on what's next for our intrepid (albeit miserably tortured) duo. I hope you enjoy. :)
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Hardy catches the train to Sandbrook and books into a rather seedy hotel on the outskirts of town. Definitely not the one he and Miller stayed at; he didn't think he could deal with the memories of the awkward night they shared a room, especially now they've said good-bye and he's closed the book on Broadchurch and Sandbrook and Ellie Miller.
Or she closed it.
Well.
Doesn't matter.
He settles in, texts Daisy and Tess to let them know he's in town but he plans to rest the next day. His incision is sore and even if he has way more energy than before his surgery, the events of the last two days are catching up to him.
He gets ready for bed, eyes drooping, both from the pain pill he's taken and just from the sheer...relief? Is that what it is?
No, what he's feeling is too blank for relief. It's just...
Finished.
All of it. His marriage, possibly his career, the Sandbrook case, the Latimer trial, Broadchurch.
Miller.
He blinks sleepy eyes as he crawls beneath the covers and yawns.
It's all finished, and tomorrow is a new day.
*/*/*/*/*
He sleeps through it. Almost dreamlessly.
He doesn't dream of drowning, at least, and when he sees Pippa, she's the beautiful, laughing child she'd been rather than what she'd become, thanks to Lee and Claire and the river.
He wakes only long enough to use the loo, take another pain pill-the last—and then sprawl on the bed in a way he hasn't done since he was a child. Diagonally, long legs and arms stretched out as far as the bed and his still-tender incision allows and hurtles back into sleep, as relaxed as a cat beneath the comforter.
He feels slightly guilty when he wakes the next morning, but it's the most rested he's felt since the girls went missing. Emotionally, he's still curiously blank as he gets up, brushes his teeth, showers and dresses. He knots his tie, combs his hair, then stares at his face in the mirror, wondering what he should do next.
His stomach rumbles.
Food would be a good place to start, he thinks with a rueful twist to his mouth and leaves the bathroom.
He picks up his wallet and phone, pulls on a suit jacket, slips into his coat and steps out the door-
-into a barrage of sudden shouts and flashing cameras and what looks like every fucking reporter in the British Isles surging towards him. He reacts instinctively, ducking back into his room and slamming the door. He hurriedly locks it and steps away, eyes wide, mouth hanging open as the reporters hammer on the door and call his name and half-garbled questions.
For a moment he thinks he must still be sleeping because he has no idea how they found him or why.
He pulls out his phone although he's not really sure who he should call and his mouth opens even farther when he sees the sheer number of missed calls and text messages showing on the screen. He looks helplessly from the phone to where the reporters are still yelling for him and makes a rapid-fire decision.
He glances round the room and hurriedly hides or grabs anything that's too personal for any enterprising reporter who might worm their way into the room, then marches firmly to the door, flings it open and roars for quiet.
The suddenness of it shocks the pack of reporters into silence and even the photographers pause from taking pictures as they blink at him.
"I'm assuming this is about the Gillespie/Newberry case?" he growls.
A mistake, as it only sets them off again.
"Yes!"
"Is it true-"
"When did-"
"How long-"
"-Claire Ripley-"
"-Ricky-"
"-Ashworth-"
He raises his voice and says, "I will not be making any statements directly to the press. The case is the responsibility of the South Mercia Constabulary and all communication will be through their official representative."
"Is it true you were hiding Claire Ripley in some sort of do-it-yourself witness protection program?" someone shouts and everyone continues yelling questions over each other as the cameras flash and whir.
He pushes his way through the crowd, hiding a wince as his incision pulls a little, and stoically ignores everyone as he flags down a cab and gets inside with a sigh of relief.
As they drive to the police station, he scrolls through his phone calls-unknowns, Daisy, Tess, and-his heart leaps-Miller. He checks his text messages and sees four are from her:
{{call me}}
{{CALL ME}}
{{stop ignoring me you little shit and CALL ME!}}
{{!}}
Daisy's text is a bit more loving, asking if he was all right and to call or text her as soon as he can. Tess' is just a simple {{call}}.
He sends a quick text to Daisy, telling he's fine and he'll call her later.
Then he calls Miller.
"Finally!" she snaps when she answers.
"For God's sake," he growls, "I haven't even been gone for forty-eight hours!"
"Well, where the bloody hell have you been?"
"Sleeping! I've had two years of sleepless nights to catch up on, not to mention pacemaker surgery five days ago! I needed some sleep!"
"Well, while you've been getting your beauty sleep, all hell's broken loose! Have you seen the news?"
"No, but I was ambushed by a ravening pack of reporters on my doorstep, so I'm assuming the Sandbrook case is the story of the day."
"Ha! More like the story of the decade! They've been following me everywhere I go and I don't know which is worse: the fact they want me to tell them every detail about how we solved the case, or the fact they can't seem to wait to bring up the fact that while I solved Sandbrook, I'm also the reason Joe was acquitted!"
He sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. "They'll get tired of it soon enough, the bloody vultures. There'll be a new story for them to pick at tomorrow."
"Ha!"
There's a short pause, then Miller says, in a very different tone of voice, "Was it this bad the first time round? When the pendant was stolen, I mean?"
He presses his lips together as he tilts his head back, blinking rapidly, struggling against the memories of those days immediately after the news broke and the trial fell apart.
"Hardy?" she prompts when it seems like he's not going to speak again.
"I can't really say right now," he says slowly, "I haven't seen the stories yet this time round. The last time...well, 'relentless' is one way to describe it. They needed somebody to blame, and they needed somebody to pay. Once I quit my job and left town, they were...appeased. Most of them, anyway." He doesn't have to say the name Karen White for Miller to know who he's talking about. "In a way, I guess they felt like they'd gotten some small measure of justice.
"I don't know what's driving this frenzy, but it'll all be over in a few days once everyone finishes patting themselves on the back about knowing it was Ashworth all along, and gets over the shock about Ricky and Claire."
Miller snorts. "Well, if they start to follow my boys, they'll have a completely different story to tell."
He can't stop the smile that spreads across his face at that. "Should I warn them?"
"Na, why give them a head start?"
He's still smiling as they disconnect and his taxi pulls up in front of his old police station, where another crowd of reporters is gathered.
"Take me round back," he says but it's too late. He's been spotted and the crowd is already rushing the car.
He scowls as he pays the driver then opens the door and silently pushes his way through the crush and into the station.
Tess just shakes her head and takes him to see the Chief Superintendent.
*/*/*/*/*
"Interviews?" Hardy says, his mouth curling up with disgust. "You want me to grant interviews?"
"Yes, interviews," CS Rebecca Cranston says, leaning back in her chair and giving him a stern, angry look. "As many as we tell you to do. You ran this investigation on your own, Hardy, you're just lucky we're going to run any interference for you at all."
"We solved the thing," he growls, "what more do you want?"
She throws up her hands. "Some kind of official sanction for your bloody off-the-cuff undercover whatever-the-hell-you-were-running! You had no police authority to do anything in relation to this case, let alone with Claire bloody Ripley! And now you've dropped us in it with a vengeance and without warning. All we can do is hope everything's going to hold up in court. If things fall apart because of you this time, you'd better never step foot in this town again and especially not in my bloody station under my bloody watch! You want to get back on my good side? You'll do all the interviews we tell you to do, play nice with everyone we tell you to play nice with, do everything exactly as I tell you to do it, and maybe-maybe-we'll see about getting you back on the force here. Depending on how the public reacts to all this-this-" she shakes her head and throws her hands up in disgust.
Hardy presses his lips tight against the words he wants to say, swallows then growls, "Fine."
She glares and shakes her head. "I never took you as somebody who'd fly in the face of protocol like this, Hardy."
He sits unmoving, no expression on his face although his eyes darken with memories.
"Nobody else wanted to touch the case," he says more calmly than he feels, "too dangerous for their careers." He lifts his lip in a contemptuous sneer on the last word. "I didn't have a career to lose anymore and I wasn't about to let whoever killed those girls get away with it."
"Don't give me your self-righteous bullshit, Hardy," Rebecca snaps. "You would have felt exactly the same if you hadn't been the one to fuck up."
He looks back at her in silence.
"Go to Communications," she says with a disgusted roll of her eyes. "Ask for Isabella Nugent. She's going to be your public relations liaison with all the media outlets who are clamoring for a piece of you. I don't want to see hide nor hair of you until this all dies down. We'll decide what we're going to do with you then. Now go."
He wavers, struck with a sudden pang of homesickness for his little blue shack, those overwhelming orange cliffs, the ocean waves, and Miller in her eye-burning orange anorak.
But he's a long way from Broadchurch and if he wants to regain his life here and have the chance to be a larger part of his daughter's life...
He tilts his head in agreement and leaves without another word.
*/*/*/*/*