Chapter Three
A/N:Hey again everybody! So here it is, chapter three as promised! I'm hoping that everybody likes it, and if you do please let me know. It's a bit rushed, but I have a babysitting gig tonight so I thought I'd do it rather than leave you all waiting another day!
Special thanks to Elphena Lewis and afrozenheart412 who gave me the ideas for the conversations in this chapter. Note to wolfeylady- your idea will crop up soon!
Thanks to the following lovely reviewers: csiwendy07, twilighttay, Elphena Lewis, wolfeylady, Messer4ever, BlueEyedAuthor, DantanaMM, afrozenheart412 and CSINYtwins1412 . As always, your support is greatly appreciated!
Disclaimer: see last chapter
Love as always,
Ciara
x x x
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The cold water flowed into a steady whirlpool before disappearing down the drain.
Don's shaking hands scooped the water up clumsily, pressing the liquid to his face, which felt like it was burning. He loosened the knot on his tie, retching as his fingers brushed against the dark stain of Danny's dried-in blood. He couldn't breathe; the walls and the whispers of his colleagues were pressing in on all sides.
"How could he?" Stella's horrified whisper as he stood on the other side of the door.
"Poor Lindsay." The bleak muttered words of Adam. "She didn't need to hear that."
"He's hurting."
Mac's words were the worst. They told Don just how selfish he was being. Hurting? How could he be hurting? A young woman might lose her husband. A little girl might never know her father. A family might be torn apart.
How could he be hurting when Lindsay and Lucy were faced with this very real possibility?
He felt sick with himself. Physically sick. Oh, he could argue that Danny was his best friend. He could say they were close. That it hurt to see him so weak. Maybe that was true. But a large part of it, Don knew, was that he didn't want to go through the pain of losing someone else so soon after Jess. That he didn't want to watch all over again as somebody he cared about slipped away in front of his very eyes.
Don leaned against the rim of the wash hand basin and closed his eyes, willing the horror to somehow go away, for Danny to somehow defy the odds and wake up. For everything to be OK.
"Flack?"
His eyes sprang open and he stared into the depths of the mirror. Staring back at him was Adam Ross, a slight frown creasing his brow and his arms hugging himself as though to hold him together through the disaster. A flash of white tooth was just visible as he nibbled on his lower lip.
"You should be with the others." Don's voice was a flat monotone.
"You should be with your best friend," Adam retorted immediately, glaring at him uncharacteristically. As the others broke around him, the ones he looked up to like Mac and Stella, Adam seemed to be holding it together for them. He sat there in the wheelchair, panting slightly from the exertion of wheeling it so fast, looking thoroughly disappointed in the man facing him. Don's resolve broke.
"I'm sorry," he sighed. "I shouldn't have said what I did, it was-"
"Realistic." The word sounded so sad, so desolate as it tripped from Adam's lips. "You were being realistic. And I totally get that man, but everybody can't do it. You can't expect us to stop seeing him as Danny and start seeing him as a vegetable."
"No, I-I didn't mean-" His own cold words echoed viciously in his ears, taunting him unrelentingly.
"I know, dude. But when something like this happens, you gotta do what you can to get through the crap that is your day. For some of us, it's being optimistic. And for you, maybe it's this. Maybe it's distancing yourself, running away from-"
"I'm not running away!" Don yelped. "I'm not. I want to be there for Danny and Lindsay and Lucy, it's just- I can't do it. First Jess, now Danny. The love of my life just died in my arms, Adam, and I can't see my best friend- my brother, go the same way. I don't want to stand there and watch it. I-I can't." The words exploded from him, leaving him choking for air and sanity.
Adam stared wordlessly at him for one long moment, then said simply, "I get it. Just try to keep the premonitions of death to yourself. Lindsay's got bat ears, and she won't take kindly to it."
A strangled half-laugh burst hysterically from Don's unwilling lips. "Anything for a quiet life."
"If you want to get away, I'll make up some excuse for you."
"Thanks kid. Remind me not to tease you the next time we're working a case together."
"You don't know how long I've been praying for you to say those words."
Under cover of the pleasantries, a look of deep understanding passed between the two. For a moment, Don felt better. Then he remembered Danny lying in that bed. Anger boiled feverishly in the pit of his stomach. Like lava about to erupt from a volcano.
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"Flack?"
Don looked up from his perusal of the incident report from the bar shooting. Several slim files sat on his desk in front of a framed copy of Jess's academy photo. The suspects. Thus far, Don had nothing to go on apart from his instincts. He had thumbed through those files countless times in the last few days, but to no avail. He picked one up again, hoping something would show itself tying the asshole to the shooting. He felt so useless just sitting here, doing absolutely nothing, while those bastards roamed free.
"Flack?" the other officer repeated, waving a hand in front of his face.
"Sorry," he sighed apologetically. "What is it, Barker?"
"Taylor wants to see you over at the crime lab. Right now. Said it was important."
"Oh, alright then. Thanks Barker."
Mystified, Don grabbed his takeout coffee and headed over to the lab. He knocked on Mac's office door and entered warily, wondering what would have caused Mac to call him. The head of the crime lab was sitting at his desk, waiting. He looked older than Don had ever seen him; greyer, more tired, more defeated.
"Sit down, Don," he sighed, leaning back in his chair. Don did so.
"How's Danny?" Don asked, almost dreading the answer.
"Much the same. Lindsay's been given extended paid leave to keep vigil. Stella's with them now, trying to force Lindsay to eat. I'm going to relieve her after my shift. You sure you won't come?"
Don shook his head silently, staring in stony silence at the floor.
"Fair enough," Mac continued. He heaved another sigh and looked Don in the eye for the first time. "Don, I think you should take some personal time, a couple of weeks to get it togeth-"
"No." Don didn't shout, but he might as well have. Mac flinched visibly at the sound of his cold voice. "I'd prefer not to, thanks."
"I know, but-"
"Mac, work is all I have right now. I just want to do everything in my power to get the assholes who are responsible for hurting Danny brought to justice. It's all that's keeping me going."
"I understand," said Mac gently. "But that's why I think you should take some time off. You're too emotionally involved in this case Don. I can't trust that you'll be able to control yourself if we do find out who did it. I can't trust that you won't jeopardise the integrity of my lab because you're grieving."
"I won't! I can do it Mac, I swear. Nothing will happen."
"That's what you told me when we went looking for the guys who killed Jess," Mac pressed, putting a hand on Don's arm. Don threw it off. "You said you just needed to be there when we took them in, and yet the man responsible for Jess's death ended up on a slab with a bullet in his chest. Explain that."
Don opened his mouth and closed it again. He couldn't explain it away. He had shot that guy without even blinking. He hadn't even felt bad when he'd done it.
"I managed to get you off on that one," said Mac quietly. "The guys upstairs accepted that he was a possible threat to your safety, even though we both know he wasn't. I won't be able to get you off the hook again, Don."
"What if I don't care?" Don exploded, thumping his fist against the wood. His coffee overturned, staining several pages of computer printouts. He glared at Mac with eyes clouded with fury. Mac sat up straight in his chair, a terrible expression on his face.
"Then I'll write a letter to Sinclair recommending your immediate suspension. I can guarantee it'd be a long one. Six months at least. And then back to driving a desk for the foreseeable future."
"You wouldn't," gasped Don.
"I would. If it's what it takes to make you see sense, I'll do it in a heartbeat. I'm not saying I'd like it one little bit, but if it needs doing I'll have no qualms."
Don stared into Mac's face. It didn't betray one hint of a bluff. He was deadly serious. He would have Don taken off the force for God knows how long, and then what? He would sit uselessly at home month after month while the killers roamed free. Surely a couple of weeks wasn't too big a sacrifice if it meant he could get back to tracking them down soon.
He stood up and snatched the dripping paper cup, firing it into the trashcan with more force than was absolutely necessary. He stopped in the doorway, looking back at Mac, who hadn't moved a muscle.
"Fine," he grunted grudgingly. "Two weeks. But what I do with those two weeks is my business. Don't contact me unless something happens with Danny. Or unless you get those assholes."
And with that, he was gone in a crash of doors and a whirl of suit jacket, leaving an unsettled Mac in his wake.
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A/N #2: As usual, please review. And I welcome all ideas, however small. Thanks for reading!
