Thanks for all the reviews so far. This chapter is a bit emotionally harrowing. It deals with their first conversation about what happened so is heavy on the dialogue. It also addresses more from Lindsay's past and the reason why she knew about Rikki.
The pounding in his head pulled him from sleep. Groaning as he turned away from the sunlight peeking through the gaps in the blinds, he blinked as his eyes focused on his surroundings. The room was as familiar as his own, but it wasn't his own.
"Fuck!" he cursed, what the hell was he doing in Lindsay's bed?
He dragged himself up on his forearms, seeing the empty spot beside him, no indentation on the pillow to indicate he'd been anything but alone. He fell back against the bed and covered his eyes with his arm. He supposed it was too much to expect that they'd had some sort of passionate reconciliation the night before. That would have been so much more than he deserved.
Minutes later he once again dragged his body up from the bed, noting that he was still in the clothes he'd been wearing for the past few days. He winced as he caught the whiff of stale sweat and booze that was no doubt emanating from his pores as well as coming from his clothes. He knew that the smell coming from him wasn't the only reason Lindsay had vacated her own bed. Jeez, he wouldn't have wanted to sleep with him either given any choice in the matter.
Stumbling to his feet he waited for the room to right itself before weaving towards the living room, stopping in the doorway when he saw her sprawled face down on her own couch. He couldn't help the smile that curved his lips, she'd always looked so damned adorable asleep. For one so small she sure took up a lot of room, something that had often caused him to wake in the middle of the night moments before he would have ended up on the floor. Vying for sleeping space had become yet another competition for the two of them, something else that had caused no end of teasing and banter.
The moment of fond reminiscing over, he felt the sudden cold memory of guilt engulf him. It was as if someone had showered him with icy water as he was forced to recall her words of only a few hours before. 'I know'.
888888
Lindsay groaned as she stretched her aching muscles. She may be small but her couch was smaller. She lifted her head and brushed her hair from her face, blinking as she tried to focus. Rolling onto her back she squinted at the large clock hanging above the entrance to her tiny kitchen. It was only 6 AM and her day off, but she knew she'd never get back to sleep. A sudden movement out of the corner of her eye had her sitting bolt upright.
"Sorry."
She stared at him. He was sitting on the floor, his back against the wall, just staring at her. She pulled the comforter more securely across her body as she struggled for something to say. His hair was still wet from the shower and he was dressed in clean clothes.
The first time he'd stayed over he'd brought clean clothes, just as she had when she stayed at his. She almost smiled as she recalled how she'd only ever worn easily laundered clothes to his, laundry wasn't his strong suit and the unspoken agreement between them was that they'd each launder the other's clothes from the night before, that way they'd always have a clean outfit for the morning the next time they stayed. He'd obviously found his clothes from weeks before still folded neatly in her closet.
"I'll get you some coffee," he muttered before hauling himself off the floor and making his way to the kitchen.
Lindsay untangled herself from the comforter and went into her bedroom, noting with surprise how he'd stripped the bed and remade it with fresh sheets. She refused to allow herself to dwell on his consideration, instead angrily pulling clothes from her closet before heading for the shower.
Danny flinched as he heard the bathroom door slam. Not that he blamed her. He sighed as he went about making coffee and toast for when she emerged from her shower. He knew he was damned lucky to even be in her apartment. He wasn't sure he could have been so gracious had their positions been reversed.
888888
Lindsay found him sitting at her table, nursing a cup of coffee in his hands, the place opposite him set with breakfast for her. She slipped into the seat and tried to ignore the memories of previous breakfasts shared. She stared down at the toast and coffee not knowing what to say.
"How ya doing?" he asked softly.
Her head snapped up and she frowned at him, still unable to speak.
"I know this is awkward," he went on to say, "I know you probably don't want me here."
She just shrugged and lifted the coffee cup to her lips, taking a sip but keeping her eyes on him.
"Are you okay?" she asked eventually.
He just shrugged, much in the same way she had done a moment before.
"I just want to talk to you," he whispered, "That's all I've wanted for weeks."
"I know," she replied, "I just . . . . ., It's hard."
"Yeah, I'm sorry."
"Stop!" she snapped, "Just stop saying you're sorry, please. It really doesn't help."
"What would help?"
"Honestly? I don't know," she replied, "I guess I just want to understand why. I want to know where we went wrong."
"We didn't go wrong Linds. I went wrong."
"It's not as simple as that Danny," she said after a long pause, "It's never just about one person. We were in a relationship and you shut me out, slept with someone else . . ."
He flinched at her words as silence once again engulfed them. He closed his eyes briefly before once again looking at her, head bent as she studied the table in front of her.
"How. . .," he began before clearing his throat, "How did you know?"
She let out a bitter laugh as her eyes lifted to his. "You think I haven't been cheated on before?" she asked incredulously, "Trust me, experience teaches you to spot the signs Danny."
He felt the guilt constrict his chest. "I didn't know."
"Of course you didn't fucking know," she yelled, suddenly standing up and knocking her chair over backwards, "what does it matter anyway? You think if you'd have known you wouldn't have done it?"
"Linds," he whispered, tears springing to his eyes as he followed her across the living room, "I'm so . . ."
"Don't!" she spat, "I told you not to say that again."
She sat heavily on the couch, her head sinking into her hands. Danny just stood watching her, not knowing what to say.
"You know," she said eventually, "I knew you were spending a lot of time with her, but I trusted you. I thought you just needed a few days, that eventually you'd come back to me. When you didn't I knew what would happen if it hadn't already. I tried to get through to you, let you know that I was there, let you know with the little things. Leaving the notes, your favourite take out on your desk. Do you have any idea how much it hurt every time I walked into our office and saw the take out untouched but thrown in the trash, the post it notes still sitting on your desk exactly where I'd left them? You gave me nothing Danny, nothing."
"I know," he whispered brokenly.
She watched as he sank to the floor, his back against the wall in the exact position she'd found him when she'd woken.
She laughed. Not that it was funny, but she couldn't seem to stop.
"You know what the real kicker was?" she asked once she caught her breath and regained her composure.
He shook his head.
"When I called and asked you to lunch," she said, "that was when I really knew. You see I'd heard all those excuses before. I actually thought if I came right out with it, if I actually told you I needed you, that I wanted to spend time with you that you'd never say no. You may not have wanted to, but I didn't think you'd outright say no. Not that you did. You just gave me every excuse that you could think of. You see Danny, I'd heard it all before. Except that time it was more along the lines of 'I've got to study for my exams, I've got to visit my grandmother, and I've got to attend my cousin's birthday party.'"
She took a long, shaky breath. Danny remained silent, knowing she hadn't finished, knowing that he owed it to her to hear her out.
"Steve was the reason it took me so long to give into you. There were so many things about you that reminded me of him. He was the cool guy, the one everyone wanted to be with but for some reason he wanted to be with me. He was my first real boyfriend. Like with you we'd only been together a few months when things went from wonderful to sour practically overnight. I'd slept with him the first time the week before then suddenly he pulled away from me. He gave me all the excuses. When I finally tracked him down you know what he said to me?"
Her eyes were piercing through every nerve of his being. He could only shake his head numbly.
"Don't make such a big deal out of it," she said scathingly, "sound familiar Danny?"
"Oh god," he whispered, the true comprehension of what he'd done to her suddenly hitting him.
Not only had he betrayed her trust in the worst way possible, he'd completely disregarded her feelings. He hadn't had the guts to fess up and had just turned it around to suit him, to make it easier on him.
"That's not even the worst of it," she said, shuddering as she relived the whole experience, "eventually he told me that we weren't even really together that he'd only been dating me as a bet. A group of guys had a wager going to see who could bag the weird girl, the one whose friends were killed, the one nobody wanted to be with because deep down they speculated that because the police had never found the guy that did it, maybe she'd actually killed them herself."
By now she had tears streaming down her face, she'd curled her legs beneath her, hugging her body in the only comfort she'd been able to rely on. Lindsay Monroe didn't trust easily, she'd learned the hard way to rely on herself and herself alone. That was until Danny Messer came along.
"Was I just a bet to you Danny? Is that all I was to you?" she asked brokenly between sobs, despair etched on her face.
"No!" he said, quickly standing and moving towards her, "Oh god no Linds, please don't think that."
"I don't mean a real bet, I know you didn't have a wager with Flack or anything. But all I can think of is that you had one with yourself, like I was a challenge or something. At least until a bigger challenge came along. Who better than the grieving mother of the boy whose death you feel responsible for?" she bit out harshly.
Danny sank onto the couch next to her, desperately wanting to reach for her but not knowing how. The harsh reminder of Ruben's death ripped through every part of him, but nothing hit him harder than knowing how much he'd hurt Lindsay Monroe.
"It wasn't like that," he whispered hoarsely, "I promise you it wasn't like that."
"Then what was it like?" she asked, her tears still silently coursing down her cheeks, "I have to know, make me understand Danny."
"I couldn't help her, I couldn't think of anything to do to help her," he muttered, his eyes fixed firmly on the floor in front of him. "I just felt so fucking guilty, it was all my fault. That little boy had everything to live for and she trusted me with him."
"So you fucked her pain away?" Lindsay asked.
"It was all I had to give," he admitted.
"Except you didn't have it to give," she responded, unable to keep the bitterness from her tone, "that was something that was mine, it was supposed to be just mine."
"I know."
"Did you think of me at all?" she asked, swiping at her eyes, her tears slowing as the pain momentarily subsided.
He hesitated before finally lifting his gaze to hers. "No," he admitted.
She nodded. That was something she understood only too well, after all it had been the only way she'd been able to shut him out of her life; by forgetting his existence beyond the fact that he was a work colleague.
"At first I just kept thinking I'd do what I could for her, help her to get to a place where she would be okay. I knew I couldn't balance that with being with you."
"So you intentionally pulled away from me?" she asked.
"Yes," he whispered, "You made me happy, I couldn't deal with that."
The harsh laugh that emitted from her throat was tinged with disbelief.
"That's the first time I've been rejected because I make someone happy."
He sighed heavily. "Eventually it became easier to forget that there had been anything between us. I was used to seeing you at work when we weren't together. That was the one place where I could hold it together, the one place where I could forget it all and pretend that everything was normal, as long as I forgot about you, as long as I just saw you as someone I worked with."
"How many times?" she asked.
"Twice," he replied, not even thinking about pretending not to understand the question. They'd gone beyond that. The only thing left between them was honesty, it was the only worthwhile thing they had left to share, his actions had seen to that.
"How did it happen?"
He wanted to protest, he wanted to refuse to tell her. Surely she didn't really want to know. But she did, and he understood that. He also understood that he needed to tell her, he needed her to understand.
"We'd been spending a lot of time together, just talking. After she'd taken my gun I got scared, scared that she'd do something foolish and I just couldn't take that. I didn't want to be responsible for anyone else getting hurt. So I just spent every available moment with her. Mostly she came over to mine, to get away from her apartment. We'd have dinner, a bottle of wine. And we talked, mostly about Ruben. It seemed to make things easier, I thought it would help. Then she turned up, the night Stella's apartment caught fire. It was after 3 and she was crying. She'd had a nightmare so I just held her but she wouldn't stop crying. She kept saying over and over how much she missed him, how much she wanted him back."
He paused, taking a deep breath, his gaze once again glancing towards her, seeing her still hugging her arms around her body, waiting for the final blow to come. He knew he had to be the one to deal that blow, because really it had already been delivered.
"Go on," she said, nodding in encouragement, knowing she needed to hear it as much as it needed to be said.
"I kissed her," he whispered, "it was the only thing I could think of, the only way I could get her to stop crying. I didn't even think about it, I just went with it and when she responded, when she stopped crying it was the first time in weeks that my own pain went away."
"You said it happened twice," she said, unable to keep the broken tone out of her voice or the tears from once again spilling down her cheeks.
He looked at her, forcing himself to see the pain she was in, forcing himself to continue.
"The next morning . . . ."
"She was there when I called?" Lindsay asked, her voice muffled by her tears.
"Yes," he admitted.
"You didn't feel guilty?"
"I wouldn't let myself feel guilty, not then," he said, "I just wanted the pain to stop again, when I was talking to you it came back and somehow it made sense that being with her like that stopped the pain, for both of us."
Lindsay curled even tighter into herself if that was possible. She hated what she was hearing but somehow having him finally admit the truth, finally be honest with her was cathartic in its own way.
"Why did you stop if it helped you both? You said it only happened twice, why not more?"
"Because after that every time I looked at her I only saw you, I only saw the pain in your eyes. It stopped helping."
"But you still spent time with her?"
"Not really," he said softly, "I saw her every day, just to check on her but we were so busy with the cabbie killer that I was mostly only home to sleep."
"And she was okay with that? She didn't want more?"
Danny stretched his legs out in front of him and contemplated for a moment, wanting to choose his words carefully.
"Don't hold back Danny," Lindsay whispered.
"She was under no illusion about us," he said on a rush of exhaled air, "She knew it was wrong even before I did. She didn't start this, I started it. I made the first move, I made the second move. She would have gone home and that would have been it. It was me who insisted she stayed, it was me who wanted to take the pain away. She saw right through me and I think she was happy to keep her distance. After that all of our conversations were held out in the hall."
Lindsay let his words sink in, the truth that her boyfriend had initiated the relationship with the other woman. She fought down the bile that rose in her throat.
"Where is she now?"
"She moved, went to stay with her sister in LA."
"You saw her before she left?"
He nodded. "She came to see me, told me she was moving."
"So you knew nothing else was going to happen when she told you that?"
"No, it wasn't like that," he said, his eyes locking with hers, holding her gaze.
Lindsay wanted to look away but something in his eyes held her.
"I told her that what we did was wrong, that it shouldn't have happened, that she'd been right when she said it wasn't a healthy thing for us to do. I understood that then, I understood that while it helped for a while ultimately it made everything worse."
Lindsay stared at her hands clasped firmly together against her knees as she tried to process everything he'd told her. Eventually she looked up to see him staring at her.
"You should go," she said.
"Linds, I . . ."
"I want you to go."
Danny battled with his own emotions, the desperate need to feel close to her. But he knew he had no right, he knew he had to do as she asked.
"Okay," he nodded as stood shakily to his feet.
Lindsay's eyes glanced at the clock. She was surprised to find they'd been talking for hours.
"Where do we go from here?" he asked softly.
"I honestly don't know," she shrugged, "I just need time to process."
"I don't want this to be over," Danny said, not caring that his tone was pleading.
"I just need some time," she insisted, "I don't really know what's going to happen but we'll talk, just give me some time."
He nodded, his hand reaching out to brush the hair from her face before his fingers trailed to brush against her tear stained cheek. "I never meant to hurt you."
"I know," she sighed.
And she did know. That was the one thing she was clear on. No matter what he'd done she'd just been the bystander that had gotten in the way. In some ways it made her feel better, in others it just hurt like hell.
She watched as he walked to the door, hesitating a moment before speaking one more time.
"I wanted forever with you Montana."
His words were simple, perfect even. Better than any declaration of feelings that in her mind would be contradicted by his recent actions. As he walked out of her door she gave into a fresh bout of tears.