I see fire
The little girl was crying muffled sobs into Avery's shoulder, something about not wanting to leave her mother, but being scared so she called her dad.
Her dad.
Dell was a Dad, she placed the child gently into the back seat and slipped in beside her, she never would have thought. "It's okay." Avery whispered, brushing the hair gently from the little girls face, knowing how scared she must be. Avery swallowed the lump in her throat, thinking about how she didn't want to end up like Heather. That if and when she ever had kids, she wouldn't let them down as she had been.
Avery's head snapped around and she saw the girls mother run from the house and immediately pulled Dells jacked from the front seat and wrapped it around the child, "Stay here, okay. Your Dad will be here in a minute." She promised as she got out of the car locking it behind her.
"You!" Heather hissed as she flung herself in Avery's direction but Dell caught a hold of her by the waist. "You're trying to take my daughter away from me, you bitch."
"I just don't think a kid should be raised in a crack house. It fucks them up." Avery countered seeming mildly amused.
"Avery, get in the car." Dell instructed as he attempted to restrain Heather.
"Betsy!" Heather screamed, "Betsy!"
But Avery was standing in front of the window blocking the child's sight. That didn't mean that the tiny, "Mommy, I'm sorry. Mommy! I'm so sorry!" didn't break her heart into a million pieces.
Once again, Heather locked onto Avery. "Let. Me. Go." She struggled against Dell.
"Yes Dell, let her go." Avery smirked and Dell gave her a hard look to tell her to stop the taunting.
After the day she had had, Avery was itching for a fight.
"I'm taking her until you get clean." Dell told Heather.
"No! No! You can't take her away from me! You can't!" she screamed.
"I can, or DCFS can" Dell told her coldly.
"No!" the woman wailed as she dropped down to her knees crying hysterically. "NO!" she roared, "She's all I have! She's all I have!"
Dell tried to pull her to her feet but she recoiled from his touch, "Don't touch me." She hyperventilated.
Avery frowned, suddenly feeling sorry for the woman, as she approached the crumpled figure on the ground and knelt down beside her, "No one wants to take your daughter away but you have to get clean, for her."
Heather's eyes flashed angrily and she lunged at Avery, her fist colliding with her eye as she knocked her to the ground.
Avery fought the urge to fight back, she knew she could kick the woman's ass, especially in the state Heather was in.
Instead she caught another fist aimed at her rib cage and wrapped her arms around her, "It's going to be okay." She held her there as Heather collapsed into a hysterically fit of sobs, and Avery looked up at Dell before turning back to Heather and whispering into her hair. "You're going to be okay."
Dell had gotten Betsy to bed when he looked at Avery, "How is it?" he gently took the ice pack off her face to inspect her bruised and swollen eye.
"I've had worse." Avery smiled at him but he only frowned and pressed the ice pack back onto her eye, causing her to wince slightly. "How's Betsy?"
"She's scared." Dell admitted, "She doesn't understand what's going on with her Mom." Dell flopped back onto the couch, and sighed, "What am I going to do?"
Avery gave him a sympathetic pat on the arm, "You are going to take care of that little girl because she needs you."
Dell nodded, "I know. I know. I just…" he ran his hands through his hair in frustration, "How can she do this to her own daughter? To me?"
"Maybe she can't help it." Avery offered quietly.
Dell seemed to take this in with a sigh, "I'll have to find a babysitter and buy her clothes and figure out her school schedule. She had dance on Friday afternoons."
"I can take care of her during the day."
Dell gave her a disbelieving look.
"What?" Avery questioned, "I've got nothing but time." Still he looked skeptical.
"Avery, don't take this the wrong way, because I like you, and I appreciate what you did for me tonight. But you go looking for trouble because it's all you've ever known." Dell told her.
Avery contemplated his statement, "I'll do better." She promised, "For Betsy." And she meant it, she didn't want to end up like Heather, not when there were people out there who might actually care.
Avery knew she was in trouble as she walked around the side of the house, hoping she could slip in the back and that Addison would be none the wiser.
Unfortunately, she had no such luck.
"A polite house guest would have called to say they weren't coming home." Addison replied without looking up from her paperwork as she sat at the patio table.
"Good thing I'm not polite. I thought I was doing you a favour staying out, not interfering with you and your boy in blue." Avery countered.
Addison finally looked up over her glasses, "Where the hell have you been!" she demanded, her heart skipping a beat when she caught sight of Avery's black eye, and before she knew what she was doing she closed the distance between the two of them.
Avery took a step back, "It's not what you think."
"Let me see." Addison moved towards the girl and grazed her thumb over the bruise.
"Yep, it's a black eye." Avery confirmed sarcastically when she was caught off guard being wrapped in a tight hug.
"I thought I'd lost you." Addison mumbled into her hair.
"I'm not that easy to get rid of." Avery replied as Addison released her, knowing not to push her too far.
Addison sighed as she indicated for the girl to go inside and sit down as she retrieved a bag of frozen peas from the freezer.
"It's nothing really." Avery turned her head away from the ice pack.
Addison grabbed her chin and yanked it back around so she could press the peas to the bruise, "It's not nothing." She told her a little more forcefully than intended, "Not to me."
Avery took over holding the peas.
"So are you going to tell me what happened?" Addison asked.
"Do I have a choice?" Avery grumbled.
Addison raised her eyebrows.
"I went out with Dell." Avery admitted, "We were hanging out and Betsy called him for help. So we went there and Dell told me to stay in the car, but I couldn't just sit there so I followed him in, and well, we got Betsy out, but Heather took a swing at me."
Addison still looked concerned but allowed herself to breath, "Are you sure, I mean, he didn't hurt you again did he?" she tucked a strand of Avery's hair behind her ear.
"I said he didn't, didn't I?" Avery asked as little perturbed as she pulled away from her grasps. "I'm fine." She insisted as she got up and walked away, leaving Addison wondering if she got her passive aggressive streak from her.
"So you're sure nothing happened?" Kevin interrogated her as they walked home from dinner later that night.
Avery rolled her eyes, "I'm not telling you guys again." She grunted her voice laced with irritation.
Kevin eyed her up, trying to decipher if she was lying or not. "I do this for a living you know." he reminded her.
"You talked to Dell." Avery eyed Addison, "Tell him."
"She's not lying." Addison replied although her eyes told a different story.
"Can we talk about something else?" Avery asked.
"Sure." Kevin agreed after a moment.
"Power, speed, control, who knew how much fun go carting could be." Avery gushed over enthusiastically eager for a subject change.
"Yeah it's better than…" Addison let out a giggle as she moved to kiss Kevin, "Never mind."
"Uh, guys…" Avery's voice changed, Addison and Kevin looked up, "The doors open."
Addison immediately became concerned. "Kevin…" she looked at him.
Kevin released Addison after giving her shoulders a reassuring squeeze and stepped past Avery who Addison pulled back behind her.
Kevin bent down to pull his gun from his boot and held a hand up to them, "Stay put." He whispered.
"Stay here." Addison told Avery as she moved to follow Kevin.
Avery snorted, "When hell freezes over."
Kevin crept quietly into the house, gun drawn, with Addison and Avery on his heels.
"LAPD! Get on the ground!" Kevin yelled.
"Whoa." A guy on the floor raised his hands as a half naked woman leapt off of him.
Addison gasped, "Archer?" before looking away and realizing that Avery had followed them. She immediately covering her daughters eyes. "You don't listen." She grunted.
"Neither do you." Avery replied batting her hand away, "Oh woe, my innocence has been stolen."
"You're dating a cop?" Archer raised an eyebrow.
Kevin dropped his gun slightly, "You know him?"
Addison looked at Kevin, still refusing to look at her brother, "Archer, Kevin and Avery, Kevin, Avery, this is Archer, my brother." Kevin and Avery exchanged a look as Addison raised her hand to Archer, her voice slightly high pitched, "Will you put some clothes on please?"
Archer smirked before nodding, "I went for a swim, I think she's a neighbour so I invited her in to be neighbourly," he explained as he pulled on his pants.
"This is L.A." Addison told him, "No body here is neighbourly."
"She's right." Avery nodded, still mildly amused by the situation as she perched herself on the arm of the couch.
"Well in that case you might want to invest in a new alarm system." Archer replied as he watched the woman gather her clothes clutching a sheet to her chest as she made to leave she glanced at Addison.
"Keep it," Addison told the woman who mouthed a 'thank you' and darted out the patio doors towards the beach.
"Wouldn't be a bad idea." Kevin agreed as he watched the other woman exit through the open doors.
"Then again, you do have your own private cop to keep you safe." Archer teased.
"Oh God." Avery groaned.
Addison ignored her, "It's good to see you, although, perhaps next time you could call?"
"And who's this?" Archer nodded in Avery's direction.
"Yes well" Addison placed a hand on Avery's knee, "You remember Avery."
"I remember a baby a long time ago that you gave up for adoption…"
"That would be me."
"Some black eye you got there kid." Archer noted and Avery nodded.
"So" Kevin eyed Archer, "You in town for long?"
"No, publisher suckered me into attending a dinner launch party. They parade new authors and their books to foreign buyers and agents." He shrugged, "They needed some star power, so, I figured, give me an opportunity to come see you and get drunk."
Addison laughed a little, "Yeah, see Archer used to be a world class neurologist but now he makes a living telling tall tales about his most disturbing patients, but really, he's here to spy on me for Bizzy."
"Bizzy?" Kevin asked as Addison grabbed a bottle of wine and poured it into three glasses, swatting away Avery's hand as she went.
"God forbid she let her children define her identity by letting them call her mother." He raised his glass to Addison before continuing, "She's not happy with you, you left Derek, you left Seattle, and wait till she hears about the return of the illegitimate love child you gave up for adoption." He glanced as Avery and laughed as Addison made to kick him, "No offence."
Avery flashed a fake smile for a second, "None taken," she replied sarcastically.
"She's going to have a field day with this one."