Chapter 4 - Reunion

John braced himself as he entered the house. He had dreamed of this moment so many times since he'd first been told Jessica was dead. He had thought that he would throw his arms around her hug the breath out of her. That was then. Now he was tentative, afraid to see her. He heard voices in the living room and he walked to the room. He finally caught sight of Jessica for the first time in over twelve years and he hesitated in the doorway.

When Jessica saw him standing in the doorway, she didn't hesitate at all. She leaped up and ran to him, throwing her arms around him. John's arms went around her, pulling her close and he hugged her back. Briefly, it was as if the years since he had last seen her fell away and they had never been apart.

After a few minutes, John leaned back and looked down at Jessica. "You look just the same," he said softly with a tender smile on his face. She smiled back her eyes dancing, "So do you" she said, running her fingers through his hair. She cupped her hand behind his head and pulled him down for a kiss. John held her tight and relaxed into the kiss like Mexico had just been yesterday.

Joss, watching the scene made a soft, hurt sound and slipped from the room unobserved. Her worst fears had come true.

Fusco and Finch looked at each other helplessly.

John gently pushed back from Jessica and looked around the room. Jessica, suddenly remembering that they were not alone in the room, looked a bit embarrassed.

"Where's Joss? I thought you said she was here," John asked.

Fusco gave him a dirty look, "I guess she's not one for reunions; I'll go find her." Fusco stomped out of the room.

Finch excused himself as well. "You have a lot to talk about. I'll be in my study."

When they were alone, Reese looked down at Jessica. "We need to talk, Jessie. Your life is in danger."

Jessica bit her lip, "I know. Someone shot at us as we left the clinic."

"Do you know who would want to kill you?"

Jessica took a shaky breath, "Someone has been stalking me for months. But he has never been violent before now."

"Who?" John's eyes grew cold and his face grew hard. Jessica was startled; she had never him like that. She drew back from him a little, her eyes wide.

She drew another shaky breath, "I don't know. I've been getting phone calls. First when they started it was just hang ups, so I thought it was kids goofing around. Then there was heavy breathing and then it progressed to some creepy voice saying 'Hello, Jessica'. I changed my number but the calls kept coming. I started getting emails and texts and notes on my car…" Jessica's voice choked off in a sob and she placed her hand over her mouth. She was plainly scared and had been for some time.

"Is that why you stayed in hiding after Peter died?"

"No, they never caught the person who killed Peter, so I thought I would be safer if I stayed in hiding. We were so deep in debt that there was nothing to go back to anyway."

John bowed his head a bit at the irony of that. He would confess to her later, right now he needed her to trust him.

Jessica misinterpreted the look on John's face and said, "It's OK, John, I've built a good life. I love my job and I have some good friends."

"Have you been seeing anyone? Is there anyone you should notify that you are going away for a while? We are going to have to keep you in safe houses until we get to the bottom of this."

Jessica shook her head, "No. I haven't dated since I left Peter, my track record with men has been pretty pathetic. You talked to Susan and the clinic knows already. So, everyone who needs to know, knows."

"Do you have any idea who the stalker is? Coworker? Patient at the clinic?"

"No one at work has been creepy or weird towards me. Couple of the patients have asked me out here and there, but they all seemed to understand when I told them that we were not allowed to date patients.

"Honestly John since this whole thing started, I've thought about it a lot, trying to figure out who it is but I can't." Jessica looked like she was going to cry. John decided to change the subject and ask a question he'd been wondering about since he discovered that she was alive.

"Jess, why didn't you let your mother know you were alive?" he asked. He remembered her as being very close to her mother and he had been quite surprised that Jessica let her mother think she was dead all this time.

Jessica's face twisted into a cold, hard mask of hate at the mention of her mother. "My mother? The woman who told me that you were no good because you were in the military and I was better off with Peter? She knew that Peter was hurting me, she knew, dammit and still she encouraged me to stay with him! 'He's a good provider', she said. 'Just stop making him mad' she said.

"John, can you imagine knowing someone was abusing your child and encouraging them to STAY? She didn't care about me, just how things looked to her friends and her priest," Jessica said bitterly.

"Jess, I'm sorry, I had no idea…" John had no idea what to say. No wonder she had called him, an ex-boyfriend she hadn't seen or spoken to in over four years, for help . She must have felt so alone and scared.

"Did you ever hear of a guy by the name of Nathan Ingram? Billionaire, made his money in computers?"

John was briefly startled by the question, then he remembered finding Jessica's picture in the safe in the library, and suddenly a lot of things clicked. "Yes, I've heard of him."

"Several months before I called you, he visited me when Peter was out of town on business. he told me he knew what Peter was doing to me. He offered to give me money, to pay for a divorce from Peter, to set me free. My own mother talked me out of it! A complete stranger was more worried about my welfare than my own mother!"

Jessica's face twisted in ugly hateful mask, "So I cut her out of my life. She'd rather see me dead than divorced, well then she got her wish."

John had never seen this side of her before. During their short time together, he had not seen her angry or upset until the very end when he told her he had to go back to the military. He couldn't help it; he reached out and took her in his arms while Jessica cried against his chest.


Fusco hunted all over the large estate for Joss. His heart broke for his partner; he knew how much John meant to her and how hard it had been for Joss to let someone in. He knew from experience how she kept the world at arms' length and how reluctant she was to let people get close to her. Fusco desperately hoped he would never have to sit there and watch the person he loved make out with someone else like Joss just had to do. For a brief moment he considered kneecapping John for hurting her.

Fusco found Joss sitting in a gazebo quite a ways from the main house. She had her head in her hands and although Fusco did not approach her quietly, she did not look up as he walked up to her.

"Joss…," he started to say.

She didn't lift her head from her hands, "Lionel, don't. There is nothing you can say to make me feel better so don't even try."

Fusco made a sour face and settled down on the bench next to her. "I could just let the guy shoot her next time."

Joss snorted. Finally she looked up at him and the look on her face broke his heart. "You were right, Lionel, you and Harold. I shouldn't have come. I thought I could do this. I thought could put my feelings aside and do my job..." her voice choked off in a sob. Fusco patted her shoulder, and she continued, "But watching them together, I can't, I just can't. Did you see the way they kissed? The look on his face when he looked at her?"

Fusco slipped an arm around her shoulders, "Joss, she kissed him, not the other way around. I've seen him with you, there is no comparison. Don't do this to yourself."

Joss just buried her head in her hands and didn't say anything else, while Fusco just held her.


Reese knocked on the door to Finch's study and entered. Bear leaped up from his bed next to Harold's desk and ran to greet him. John smiled and stooped down to pet the dog.

Finch turned stiffly in his chair to look at John, "How is Jessica doing?"

Reese began pacing the room. "About as well as could be expected. This is an awful lot for her to take in. She's not used to getting shot at, unlike the rest of us."

"I can imagine that seeing you again after all these years has been a shock for her. And for you."

Reese looked away, "I won't deny this has been tough."

"Not as tough as it has been for Jocelyn."

Reese fixed Finch with a glare, "Why did you let her come?"

Finch met Reese's glare with a raised eyebrow, "John, you can't stop her when she wants to do something, what makes you think I can?"

Reese had to smile at the truth in that question.

"John, you could not expect her to sit at home and leave you alone with your formerly dead lover, could you? Think about how she feels about this."

John began to pace the room, "I can't afford to think about that right now Finch. I have to keep my head in the game or Jessica could wind up dead. We all do."

Finch gave John a penetrating look, "I know that John, and somehow I don't think Jocelyn will be the problem."

Reese stopped and glared at Finch, "I'd thought I had put Jessica behind me, that I was going move forward and make a life with Joss. But the way Jessica kissed me a few minutes ago…" John's voice trailed off.

Finch felt a bit sick at that. "So I guess Jocelyn is just that person you settled for because you thought Jessica was dead."

Reese stared at Finch with the hard cold eyes of a killer, "I love Joss, Harold," Reese said in that deadly low voice.

"Glad to hear it John," Finch said calmly. "But those were not my words. Jocelyn said them to me this morning after you left for New Rochelle. I don't think it's true, but she does. You will have to tread very carefully if you don't want to lose her. Right now she is convinced that she is only your second choice."

John looked away, "I'm sorry, Harold. I don't know what has come over me." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small velvet box and laid it in front of Finch. Finch picked it up and opened it gingerly, like it was about to explode. A large diamond attached to a gold band with a vine pattern carved into it sparkled back at him.

"Is this an engagement ring? You were going to ask Jocelyn to marry you?" Finch said slowly.

"I ordered that ring a few months ago. It's custom made. The vine pattern on the band matches the tattoo on her waist. I had the wedding bands made too. I just picked it up yesterday from the jewelers."

"When were you going to ask her?"

"As soon as we caught a break between numbers."

"And now?" Finch was almost afraid to hear the answer.

"I don't know, Finch, I just don't know. Seeing Jessica again, wondering what could have been. Wondering if I could go back..."

"I have doubts that you can go back John."

"So do I, Finch. I'm not even sure I would want to if I could. But I don't know." John looked confused, Finch could not remember the last time he saw John look confused.

"I have to go find Joss." John said abruptly and he left the room.

Finch sadly watched him go. He could understand John's feelings to certain extent. Finch had often wondered about his road not taken, about what his life would be like now if he had not let Grace go after the bombing. He had often fantasized about being happily married to her, living in Italy or France. He knew why John was confused, why discovering that Jessica was alive and that he might have a second chance with her was throwing his normally large and in charge friend for such loop. He understood completely.

But Finch also knew that there was a reason the road not taken had not been taken in the first place. Lurking behind all of Finch's lovely fantasies about life with Grace was the realization that if things had been different he would always be looking over his shoulder; that he could run, but he could never be completely free of the Machine. He knew that even if he had married Grace, he could never forget the Irrelevant List. He knew that if Grace were here now, her life would be in mortal danger just by sitting next to him. And Finch simply could not live with that.

As for John, Finch knew that if he'd quit the Army he would not have been happy. There would have been no way a man like Reese could have sat on the sidelines while his friends were fighting and dying overseas. Finch had been working with Reese for some time now and he knew John well enough to know that he could not have watched the war on TV from his living room, no matter how much he loved the woman sitting next to him on the couch.

Jessica would have dragged John back to that small town they'd come from, but Finch had a feeling no small town could contain John Reese for long. He was meant for bigger things and the picket fence life would have slowly killed him. During the Wyler case, John had nearly gone out of his mind in the quiet suburbs and he had only been there for three days. He couldn't live the quiet life, and from what Finch had seen of Jessica, the only life she was suited for was the quiet life. Finch could only hope that John could see that, too.