Guys, I have not forgotten about the Downfall of Jo but this story just came to me one morning and I hope you like it.
It was around 4 am and Henry was in this half-awake but half asleep haze when his cellphone on his nightstand near his bed started to vibrate.
Henry let out a groan and then wiped his face with his hand and then grabbed the phone to see who was texting him at this late hour.
Henry saw it was his favorite detective, the lovely Jo Martinez and the text simply stated "Hey, Are you up?"
Before Henry answered the text he thought back to when the beautiful detective bought him the cell phone as a Christmas present on the first year of working together.
He remembered telling her as he opened the box that revealed the cell phone that this is not necessary and she should take it back.
Then came Jo's response as his memory remembered it " First Henry: It's for your safety, second it's easier to me to get hold of you if you are not in the office or at home and lastly Abe wants you stop using the house phone for work things she said as she smiled.
Then Henry remembered she grabbed the phone and got the phone running and he said to her " What are you doing?" Looking at Jo fooling with the phone.
Jo looked up from the phone and smiled at Henry and said " I'm putting my number in your phone and putting it on your speed dial. So there will be no problems of you reaching me."
Henry remembers they were in the morgue when all this was happening and for some reason her telling him that made the morgue heat up a bit and made his face go red.
Jo saw it and did not say anything but slipped him a sly smile when she gave him back the phone.
Henry also remembered Lucas seeing Henry's new phone and him grabbing and putting his number in it which he did not really want because he knew Lucas would text him non-stop about rubbish things. Which the Assistant M.E. does frequently.
Then he remembered Lucas taking pictures or what Jo and Lucas called it "Selfies" with his phone. Lucas took one "selfie" of three of them with Henry on the left looking confused and angry, Jo in the middle smiling and arm around Henry ( which Henry had to bite his tongue not to react to the feeling of Jo's touch) and Lucas making a silly face and stretched one of hands behind Henry's head to make bunny ears.
The best part well to Henry was when he was so done with this "selfie" thing and was about walk away but Jo pulled him right in again and she made him had fun with her when they both held their badges up and again Jo had her arm around him and he was barely holding on with her scent and her touch. But she got him to lighten up and take some pictures with just the two of them and she cropped one of them and put it as her icon picture whatever she called or texted him. He asked Jo to put the one of them holding their badges up as his main picture and she did it happily for him. No, it was not like him to do something like that but that woman made him free and showed he could be serious but also have some fun.
Henry remembered the days and weeks after he would purposely forget the cell phone because he felt like he still did not need it and Jo on the way to a crime scene or wherever they were going would make a pit stop to his home for him to pick it up. Jo would come in the store with him and make sure he grabbed his cell phone.
Lucas and Jo would teach him how to text, look things up on the internet with the phone, the different apps he could use and just the ins and outs of how to use it. He was not an expert by no means of using the cell phone but he knew to do basic things now.
As Henry brought himself back to the present, he could not help but smile to think about all those things but the smile did not last as he thought what happened after that.
The Doc looked at the text from Jo again and decided to reply and texted back " Yes, unfortunately."
Then he got lost in his thoughts again….his thoughts about Jo and the two and half years he know her.
This year and half had to be the hardest for him because he told her his secret that he was immortal which she took rather well but she was mad that he did not trust her enough to tell him even though she had opened up to him about her late husband. It took some time but he did regain her trust again and showed her that he did trust her more than anyone or anything in this world.
Telling his immortality to her was easier to do then what the one case they were on this year did to him and impacted his relationship with Jo.
It was in late summer when they picked this case up where a psychopath who had killed multiple people already was on the loose and what got them involved was this suspect had badly tortured a kid in the 11th precinct district which got them on the case. Henry sighed to himself thinking about how the kid had died at the hospital about three days later from his injuries. That had set him off because he only could think of the parents who lost their child to this heartless man and if that was Abe when he little he would do everything to take this guy down and he did exactly that for this kid.
Jo told him that they had to be careful and could not be sloppy and could not do anything reckless because it could ruin the case against the suspect. But at that point, Jo was talking to a wall, he was planning to get this guy without Jo unfortunately. Henry at an certain point pulled the connections together and unlike the other times where he played word foreplay with his beautiful detective….he decided not to tell her and go out one night and follow the suspect by himself.
As far he knew when he was following the suspect in a seedy part of town that he was alone but he was not. Just like Henry, Jo connected the dots about the suspect on where he usually goes to prey and develop a game plan for a new victim. She had followed Henry because she knew he was going to mess up the investigation and could get in a bad spot with his immortality thing.
Henry was doing well for a while and the suspect never knew he was following him until he tripped on a bottle….which revealed him to the suspect and instead running away the suspect was running in Henry's direction. Before he knew it he heard the suspect trading gunfire with someone and the next thing he knew as he got up the suspect was limping from a gunshot wound. Before he went to see who was the other shooter, he went to the suspect and slugged him into next Monday and made sure he was out cold. The next thing he did was to call Jo and when he heard her ringtone not the far away, Henry became worried and anxious as he walked to her.
Jo was laying down on the ground with blood coming from her waist but Henry could see she also got shot near her heart and her shoulder. Henry panicking quickly checked to see if she still had a pulse and he was going white seeing the woman he loved but not had told his feelings to her dying in his arms. She barely had a pulse and Henry quickly called 911 and tried to stop the bleeding with his dress shirt that he took off.
Just looking at Jo lifeless body made Henry's eyes filled with tears that he tried not let come down and he just whispered somberly " Please Jo, Don't Leave me."
Henry just thinking back to that made his heart hurt so much, just thinking he might of lost one of the people he trusted most with his life and how he put her in that position.
Meanwhile the other person in the text, Jo was surprised that Henry answered the text at all.
Just like Henry she could not really sleep and so she wondered if her immortal man was up.
But she was surprised at the text back because for months now, he has ignored all her texts, stop working with her and when she tries to just to say hi….he acts like he never saw her.
She even tried to go down to his office when he was alone in the morgue to just to talk but he would make every excuse in the book and shoo her away.
Jo knew he blamed himself for her almost dying but the one thing she did not understand is that when she was in the hospital recovering that he seemed to accept when she told him that it was not his fault that it happen.
She was in the hospital about a month a half with the injuries she had ….one bullet missed heart by a centimeter, one hit her the shoulder and hurt but was ok and the other bullet hit in the waist and did not do much damage to any of her organs.
Jo swore in that month and half that her and Henry just felt closer and were ready to take the next step because he was so open with her and just was there for her. Of course the two of them flirt game was stronger than ever as well. The sexual tension between them would light up a room and the eye sex that they exchanged a lot would make a room feel like a sauna.
Jo would be lying to herself if she never thought about her and Henry doing the wild thing in the hospital but they never even kissed and throughout the month and half the flirty banter alone warranted a kiss but it just never happened.
Jo knew Henry now for two and half years and she thought they were ready after a year and then when he told her about his immortality …..She thought they would make the next step in their relationship but no they did not.
She was frustrated because she loved Henry and wanted him in her life forever but she did start to wonder over the months of him acting like ass maybe that he did not feel that fire for her anymore.
The one thing she always wondered was this his plan to play with her emotions and lead her to think there was something happening between them and then when she went back to work, just abruptly end everything. Jo never imagined Henry would end their relationship like this but she also thought maybe because she was too caught up in the fantasy of them being together.
Jo saw the text that Henry sent indicating he was up and so she a text saying "You want to meet at the Beez Bakery?"
Beez Bakery was not that far from really where either one of them lived, plus it was some place open and fast to get to around 4 in the morning.
She got a text back from him a minute later saying "Sure, meet you there."
Jo knew she would tell Henry how she felt and basically give him an ultimatum about their relationship, as that she could not do this anymore and would just have to let him go.
Both of them got up, took a shower and went on their way to meet each other at the bakery.
Jo arrived at the bakery first and ordered a chocolate glazed donut and medium coffee and sat down at the table near the store window and just waiting for Henry.
About 5 minutes later, Jo saw her immortal doc opening the door at the bakery, Henry was wearing black dress pants ( that Jo thought showed his assets really well) and his usually vest that was black and blue dress shirt and an black tie. Before she realized she was staring at him, he was already sitting at the opposite side of the table facing her. Jo start blushing at the thought what this man does to her but then regain her composure to focus on what she wanted to talk about.
Henry chuckled to himself as he saw Jo just staring at him but he could not help admire her beauty as well, her dark brown eyes, the blue dress shirt he could tell fit her just right even though her light blue jacket was covering most of it and well those black dress slacks she filled them out well.
Then he was just staring at her lips and just yes all things he wanted so bad but then Jo interrupted his so suddenly lusty thoughts about her when she snapped her fingers and said " Henrrrrrrrrry you with me?"
Henry just shook his head and his cheeks went red and said " Sorry, Yes."
Jo smiled but that did not still make up for the hurt of what he did to her for months but she did not get into right away because they had a lot catching up to do. The last time Jo had talked to Henry was in early November and it was now early spring.
So Jo tried to see what he was up to all these months without her and Henry never said much.
She tried to see what cases did he worked….same reaction…a few words but not much detail.
Jo tried to ask him how was his holidays?...The only response was " It was fine."
Then Jo asked about Abe?...The same short response " He's fine."
Jo could see he had his wall up and this was going nowhere, she was tired of playing games and finally was going just lay it all out the line for him. If he did any this short response crap she was going walk out of the bakery and him for good out of her life.
" Henry, look at me." Jo said in a serious tone.
Henry was not giving her much eye contact during her questions but when he heard the serious tone in her voice, he took a deep breath and did what she asked.
" I will always care about you Henry, but I cannot play these games anymore. I'm tired of it. The way you have treated me these past months make me even wonder if you feel the same anymore." Jo said with hurt and little anger in her voice.
Jo continued " When I was in hospital I had hope for us…. I .. I thought we were moving into the next step into a relationship but I guess it was all a game to you…play with my heart and then just abruptly leave."
" Henry I know part of this façade you are doing is because you still blame yourself for me almost dying, was it stupid of what you did?...Yes. Do I blame you?...No." Jo said with tears developing in her eyes
" If you want me out of your life, Henry. Just tell me and I can give you that. I will leave you alone and never contact you again." Jo said with hurt clearly in her voice and the tears that she was holding back as one of them fell on her cheek.
Henry hung his head low in shame as he thought of the hurt that he brought her all these months.
" Damn" was his first thought and she was right he did blame himself for her almost dying last summer and he thought it was better for him to remove himself from anything with her so he could never hurt again.
But obviously that did not work. He hurt more by acting like an asshole then what any bullet could do to her.
Henry thought to himself about the months in the hospital with her and well his original plan was to see how she was doing and just be the jerk but she pulled him in ….like how she always did. That is why he decided to wait after she was discharged from the hospital and went back to work because he was having a great time too and knew it would be hard. It was hard for him, Jo was right it did feel like they were stepping into a new territory in their relationship and it killed him to just abruptly ending it.
The hurt in his heart when he heard Jo say she thought he did not care for her the way she did for him, he loved Jo and he knew Jo loved him and that scared him.
Jo was his light on his darkest days, she always knew how to reach him and bring him back somehow but what he was doing to her lately …she never had the opportunity.
Henry looked at up at her and Jo noticed was intently focused on him, waiting for what he was going to say.
Henry without taking his eyes off her but his hand on top of hers that were on the table and said softly while his hand caressed hers " I'm So Sorry, Jo."
" I…..III"Henry stumbled out as kept looking at her and his hand with left her hand and went to her face and gently wiped the tears off and he pulled his face closer. Now both of their foreheads were touching as he looked at her lips and gave her want they both wanted for so long…..a sweet kiss that lasted a couple minutes.
Then Henry ended it and shook his head and said " I'm sorry Jo for that."
Jo gave a flirty grin and said " Don't be."
Henry flashed a sly grin back and thought now she knows I want her in my life.
Jo grabbed Henry's hand and laced it with hers and said "But don't think this will solve all your problems but I do see you feel the same way as I do."
Henry still had her hand laced with his and shook his head and said " I do."
" Henry I can't help you if you won't talk to me, my love. You did in the hospital but if you want this to work, we have to talk to each other." Jo said as she realized she " my love" and her face went red.
Henry smiled at the my love comment and said " Yes, I understand, you are absolutely right. I want us to work and make it and I know we can."
" So how forever sound?" She said half-jokingly.
" Sounds Good." Henry said as he smiled with their fingers still laced.
" Oh by the way, Henry. Don't think I hadn't thought of sending you to the river over thousands times over all these months." Jo said half serious tone with a smile on her face.
" Oh…" Henry said as his body got the chills.
Then they went on to talk about anything or everything they could think of what each other has missed over all these months that they have not talked to each other.
About two hours later, they decided it was enough time spent at the bakery but before they got up from the table, Jo said to Henry " God, I missed you."
Henry put his hand on her cheek and said " I missed you too."
Before he let go of her cheek he pulled her in for another kiss.
Jo ended the kiss and said with a smile" Let's Go, Henry."
They walked out of the bakery and just walked the street, hand in hand and smiling like people in love.
Then Henry looked at Jo in a flirty but somewhat serious way said " Was this a date?"
Jo smiled back and said " Sure."
As they were walking down the street, Jo's cell phone rang it was Reece telling her about a case.
Then as Jo hung up the phone and told Henry about the case and it hit her that yes they definitely had things to work out but that they were in this together and that's all she wanted.