Author's Notes: I'm still a little woozy from all the squeeing I did on Wednesday. Totally awesome episode and a slam-dunk start for the season. My little world still doesn't mention the shooting, although I'm not saying it didn't happen.
Extra Special Thanks to afrozenheart412 and laurzz. Reading your reviews is like an awesome dessert after a really great meal. Satisfying, sweet and just a little addictive. You keep me going.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Full headers and disclaimer in Chapter 1
Title: A Father's Heart, Chapter 10 (completed 09/25/2009)
Chapter Rating: T
Word Count: 2,734
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Danny walked sleepily out of the bedroom. After a quick trip to the bathroom, he glanced into the nursery. He wasn't surprised to find it empty. Lindsay usually fed the baby as soon as she woke up, then put her in the play gym in the kitchen while she fixed breakfast for the adults. The smell of coffee told him the morning routine was right on track. Not that he expected this morning to be routine.
Making his way into the kitchen, he found Lindsay emptying the dishwasher from the night before. Giving her a quick one-armed hug, he kissed her temple.
"Mornin' Beautiful. How'd you sleep?"
"Like a log, apparently. I didn't even get up for Lucy last night. Did you feed her?"
Confused, Danny thought for a minute. Could he have woken up and fed Lucy and simply not remember it? He didn't think so.
"No, I didn't wake up. You didn't wake up either?"
Lindsay stopped stacking plates. "No. I didn't hear her at all. I figured you must have woken up before she started crying."
"No." Danny glanced over at the play gym where Lucy was happily kicking at the zoo animal mobile that was Flack's baby gift to them. At the time, Flack joked that it was in homage to her parents' first "date". That was when Flack still knew how to make a joke.
When Danny began to pace around the small kitchen, Lindsay imagined he was tackling this little mystery the same way he worked on a problem with a case - in motion. Danny rarely seemed able to stay still for long. Although he could sit still and quiet for hours if Lucy was sleeping in his arms. It was one of the great contradictions that she never ceased to marvel at in Danny, the father.
She watched him, imagining that she could almost see the gears turning as he tried to solve the silly puzzle of Lucy's nightly feeding. She was still amazed, sometimes, at how terrific a father he was. For that matter, how terrific a husband he was. A lot of men would have insisted she was overreacting - on several counts - last night. Danny not only didn't try to make light of her fears, he admitted to sharing them. Later, when she confessed her resolve to have no more children while the threat of Tanglewood hung over them, again, he didn't try to reason with her or talk her out of it. He simply reassured her, promising to resolve the threat, by whatever means necessary.
A year ago, she'd never have believed it. Now, she found she depended on it.
Suddenly, she realized that Danny asked her a question while she was contemplating his wonderfulness. She chuckled nervously. "I'm sorry, Danny. You were saying?"
"You still sleepin' Montana? I asked if you knew how many bottles of breast milk were in the fridge last night. If one's missin', then maybe I fed Lucy in my sleep last night, and just don't remember wakin' up."
Lindsay walked to the fridge and opened it. She counted aloud, "One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. There were eight bottles last night and there are eight bottles now. If you woke up and don't remember, you also didn't feed her. That is, unless you've suddenly developed capabilities beyond the typical adult human male."
"Wiseass!" Danny stopped pacing and picked Lucy up out of the play gym. "Whaddya say, baby girl? Did nobody feed you last night? You okay, Lucykins?"
"You know, Danny, it's just possible she simply slept through the night. It's not unheard of for a baby her age to do that once in awhile, although it's too soon to think we can get used to it. She was pretty hungry this morning, but she didn't seem upset and she hasn't been fussy at all. So I wouldn't worry about it. Call it a blessing. After last night, we both needed a good night's sleep and for once, our prayers were answered."
"Yea, yea. I guess. I guess Mommy knows best, huh, Lucy." Danny set the baby back down in the gym and went to finish emptying the dishwasher. "Linds, why don't you sit down and eat your breakfast. I'll finish here and then I'm gonna take a shower and get dressed. I can give Lucy a bath and get her dressed while you shower, okay? Flack's supposed to be here in about 45 minutes, so we don't got much time."
"Sounds like a plan, Dan the Man."
"Ouch! Do me a favor Linds? Do not ever utter that phrase again!"
Lindsay grabbed a plate of buttered toast and bacon and swatted Danny on the behind as she made her way to the living room for a few minutes of quality time with the morning news.
"I'll be sure to remember how much it bothers you, Danny," she called wickedly as she plopped down on the sofa and munched her breakfast.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Danny finished putting the remaining dishes away then took a quick shower. Thinking it wouldn't hurt to make a good impression on Child and Family Services, he selected a nice pair of slacks, a tailored shirt and sport jacket.
These days he rarely wore nice clothes. Work was usually jeans. He wore his good clothes occasionally, when he and Lindsay took Lucy to church. After Lucy's baptism, they started going to church every few weeks or so, when their bizarre work schedules allowed it. Neither had been much for religion before Lucy came along. A Sunday morning off was a time to sleep in and be lazy. But sleeping in was a thing of the past with a newborn. And they both agreed that having some kind of religious foundation was probably a good idea for a child. For right now, they attended mass at the Catholic Church a few blocks away. They were both familiar and comfortable with it, but they agreed that, if religion was going to play a role in the raising of their children, they would need to investigate others to settle on one that best represented the moral values they wanted to instill. Although Danny was leaning to sticking with the Catholic church, if only because it meant they could send Lucy to a nice, girls only convent school.
Danny debated on a tie, but decided against it. It was his day off, after all. One could take this first impression thing too far. Taking one last look in the mirror, he went out to let Lindsay know it was her turn.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Standing swathed in an enormous apron, Danny held his daughter securely with one arm while he gently washed her with the other. His brilliant morning schedule failed to account for the fact that bathing Lucy generally involved the bather getting wet. Thus, it was usually better to finish the baby bath before getting dressed oneself. After one episode that required him to completely re-dress himself before going to work, Danny managed to swipe one of the new aprons Sid ordered for Autopsy. He had to promise Lindsay that it had never actually been used. It did the job quite well, at least for now. Lucy was still barely able to slap at the water and kick her feet a bit. Danny had plans to procure a couple of CSI coveralls so that when she became more active in the bath, mommy and daddy could be truly protected from head to toe.
He was just wrapping her in a thick, warm towel when there was a knock on the door. Bringing one corner of the towel up to cover her head, he rested her against his shoulder and went to answer the knock.
"Yea, who is it?" he yelled.
"Hey, Danno. It's me, Flack. Lemme in."
Danny quickly undid the locks and opened the door. "C'mon in, Flack. You're kinda early. You want some coffee or something? Lindsay's still gettin' dressed."
Flack walked in the door, took one look at Danny in his OCME apron, the swaddled baby in his arms and began to laugh. He started to say something, choked and started laughing again. The more he tried to stop, the harder he laughed.
"C'mon, Flack, it ain't that funny!"
Bent over, Flack wheezed and tried to catch his breath. "I'm sorry, Danny. I can't decide if I should ask you if Sid knows you stole one of his aprons, or if Linds knows what you're using to bathe her daughter!"
Danny closed and locked the door, then watched as Flack went into the kitchen and helped himself to coffee, chuckling the entire way.
"Well, I'm glad this is such a source of amusement for you, wiseguy!" Actually, he was. It had been a long time since Flack laughed like that. Danny was happy to see it. He wasn't foolish enough to think that one good laugh meant the man was back to his old self. But at least it meant there was hope. The old Flack was still there, and with time, maybe he would learn to live again.
Danny quickly went back to the nursery to get Lucy dressed and ready. When he returned, Flack was relaxing in the living room, watching the news and sipping coffee. But there was a tense set to his back that belied his casual posture. Danny put Lucy in her play gym and joined him.
"So, Flack. How come you're here so early? We got almost 30 minutes before we gotta leave."
Flack sat up straight and set his coffee on the table. Reaching for the remote, he turned off the tv. All trace of his earlier amusement was gone.
"Mac told me a little something about this, Danny, but I wanted to find out from you. What's this all about? You get some girl pregnant, she dies, and now you're going to meet a son you didn't know about? And the Tanglewood Boys are mixed up in it somehow? I swear, Danny, I find out you cheated on Lindsay again, you won't need to worry about Tanglewood!"
"Wait a sec, wait a sec, Flack. Don't go jumpin' to conclusions. Melinda is a girl I knew in high school, Flack. She was murdered a few days ago. Her son is three years old. His birth certificate says I'm his father, but I'm not. And I have no idea why she would say I was. The Tanglewood Boys have regrouped and somehow they know about this kid, and Mac thinks they killed Melinda to get to him. Because they think he's my kid."
Flack leaned back in his chair again. If the kid was three, he was conceived before Messer and Monroe were really an item. At least his friend hadn't been cheating. "What makes you so sure he's not your kid, Messer? I mean let's face it. You and me both know you got around pretty good back in the day. It coulda happened before."
Danny sighed. He really was getting tired of going over this time and again. "I'm not saying it's not possible that I might have another kid out there somewhere, Flack. I'm just saying this one's not mine. He can't be."
"Again, I ask you Danny, how can you be so sure? You remember every last woman you were ever with? You said you were friends with this woman in high school. Maybe she changed and you didn't recognize her."
"Dammit, Flack! It didn't happen and he's not mine!" Danny ran a hand through his hair, he was going to have to tell Flack the whole story. He just hoped his friend believed him. "You remember a little bit after Lindsay came to the lab, I told you she invited me for drinks at a jazz club, and it turns out Mac was playing there?"
Flack nodded, "Yeah, I remember."
"Ok. So that was February first, 2006. Trust me, I remember that date." Danny leaned forward, his elbows on his knees, his hands emphasizing every word. "Melinda's kid was born in late December. He was conceived no earlier than March."
Flack nodded, that much math he could do.
"So, after our first 'date', Montana was all I could think about. You remember I drove you crazy talkin' about her all the time. You even told me once I should just jump her and get her outta my system. What you didn't know…what even I didn't really know…is that I couldn't get her outta my system. I went out with other women, but it never got past that, not after February first. I'd meet a woman for drinks or dinner, and then I went home - alone." Danny looked at his friend, willing him to get the message before Danny had to come right out and say it. But there was no glimmer of understanding in the other man's face. "Flack, with the exception of Rikki Sandoval, the last time I slept with a woman - other than Lindsay - was January 2006. That's why Melinda's kid cannot be my son."
Flack cocked his head. He knew Danny Messer well enough to know when the man was bullshitting, and he didn't think he was. But then he started to do some more math. He remembered vividly visiting his friend in the hospital after his run-in with the Irish Mob. He'd been high as a kite on painkillers and couldn't stop talking. Fortunately, Flack was his only visitor because Danny's favorite subject was embarrassingly detailed, but sickenly sweet accounts of finally making love the night before with Lindsay "Montana" Monroe. It was then that Flack realized that the erstwhile womanizer, Danny Messer, had finally been well and truly ensnared by love. Not once in his account did Danny ever use any slang terms for what happened on his pool table other than "making love", a term Flack had never heard him use before. That was the last time Messer said anything on the subject. No matter how much Don teased him, or how drunk he got, Danny wouldn't say anything about his activities with Lindsay, beyond to say they'd gone to dinner, or out for drinks. Locker room talk between the two became extremely one-sided until Flack started dating Jessica Angell and clammed up himself.
Flack's jaw nearly dropped to the floor. The Irish Mob thing happened over a year after Danny and Lindsay's jazz night at Cozy's. That would mean that Danny Messer - THE Danny Messer - went sixteen months celebate, waiting for Lindsay Monroe.
"I…don't…I…can't…Messer?" Flack squinted at the man sitting across from him, wondering if maybe this was some duplicate Danny Messer sent to mess with his mind. "You mean to tell me you went sixteen months? Sixteen MONTHS? Without?" Flack shook his head. "Messer, you gotta admit buddy, that's a little hard to swallow."
"It's the truth, Flack. I swear on my grandmother. It's the truth. And it's the reason why I know, beyond a doubt, that I am not that boy's father."
"Okay." Flack stood up, his interrogation techniques kicking in unconsciously. "So riddle me this, then. If you're so sure the boy's not yours, then why do you even care? Why arrange this meeting? You can wash your hands of him and the good folks at CFS will see that he's put into foster care. He'll be ok. Why go through all of this?"
Danny looked up. Flack could see the pain and raw fear in his eyes. "Because the Tanglewood Boys aren't after him, Flack. They're after ME. They're after MY family. I can't afford to lose the leads that boy might provide as to who they are and why they're back. I need him so that I can keep Lucy safe, Flack. So that I can keep my family safe."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~