Disclaimer: I don't own anything. This chapter title comes from the song "Hold on to What You Believe" by Mumford and Sons.
"Alright. Tell me what's going on."
Finn looked up from the tablet on his lap. He had been trying to distract himself with scores from the recent NBA games, but apparently it hadn't been working. Rachel had known that something was up, and she had immediately picked up on it.
Even so, Finn was caught off guard by his wife's statement. "What?"
Rachel planted her hands on his hips and gave him a pointed look. "You've been acting weird ever since you got home. Finn, something is bothering you and you need to talk to me about it."
Finn released a sigh. Right before he had left the police department, they had found the symbol of the Howard brothers in a nearby alleyway. They were getting closer and they were trying to psych out Finn, Puck, Blaine, Will, and the rest of their department. And with the break-in at Rachel's dressing room, Finn knew that he had to tell Rachel what was going on (although it made him feel better that Puck and Blaine hadn't told their significant others yet, either).
It had been two week since the opening of Rachel's show. There was no time like the present, he guessed.
"You know how we've been working the Howard case?"
Rachel pursed her lips and nodded her head. The Howard brothers were all beyond dangerous, and Rachel hated that Finn was so close to this case. But he was good at his job and she had to have faith that he was going to be just fine.
Given the look on Finn's face, however, Rachel had a feeling she wasn't going to like whatever Finn was going to say.
Finn dragged his hand through his hair. "There have been some new… developments."
"Developments," Rachel repeated. "What kind of developments?"
"They're pissed about how we arrested one of them. And since then, they've been targeting us."
Rachel's stomach swooped and she swallowed hard. "Explain," she demanded. Those words terrified her a little bit, and the carefully masked look on Finn's face wasn't helping matters. Even when he was trying to remain expressionless, Rachel could still read him like a book.
Finn reached for Rachel's hand. He always felt better whenever he was even near her, and that feeling was a million times stronger when he was actually touching her. Wrapping his long fingers around her tiny palm, he said, "A few weeks ago, a body was found near our department. There was a list of names attached to the body. Our names."
Rachel went pale, and her fingers clenched around Finn's. She sucked in a deep breath through her nose and tried to calm her suddenly rapid heartbeat. "A few weeks ago?" she finally managed.
Finn nodded his head slowly. "They're targeting us. Me, Puck, Blaine…" Finn's gaze grew dark and a vein in his jaw throbbed. "You were on the list."
Rachel froze and she cut her eyes towards Finn. She was terrified enough for her husband and their good friends and family as it was, but hearing her name added to the list of targets completely baffled her. "What? Why on earth would I be on any list they created?"
Finn took a deep breath. "Rach, I can't let them hurt you," he said instead. He reached for her other hand, holding on to it tightly. "I won't."
Rachel didn't say anything. Instead, Finn was surprised to see recognition flash in her wide doe eyes. Her brow furrowed thoughtfully, and a beat of silence passed as she absorbed the information Finn had just shared with her.
"Uh-oh," she finally said.
"Uh-oh?" Finn repeated. "What is uh-oh?"
Rachel grew sheepish and shifted back and forth. "Well… I've received a few letters…"
"Letters?" Finn pulled Rachel closer to him and tucked his fingers under her chin, tilting her head up towards his. There was an odd ringing in his ears at the thought of the Howard brothers contacting Rachel already. "What letters? Rachel, tell me what's going on."
Extracting one hand from Finn's grip, Rachel reached for her purse and revealed the newest letter she had received. She hesitated just slightly before handing it over to Finn. Rachel knew that Finn had a tendency to hit first and ask questions later. If Rachel had shown him those letters when she had first received them, he would have torn apart New York City to find whoever had sent them. Finn didn't need that kind of stress right now.
Finn took the letter and tore it open. His eyes scanned the contents—it was the usual "I'm watching you" letter with the threatening undertones. Finn's jaw tightened the more he read, and then he set the letter aside.
"How many more have you received?" he asked in a carefully calm and measured voice.
"Three in the last three weeks," Rachel admitted. Seeing the vein in her husband's jaw throb, Rachel added, "I didn't want to stress you out. You had enough going on with this case, and I didn't want to…" Rachel trailed off, knowing that it was a lame excuse. She should have told Finn the second she had gotten the first note.
Finn exhaled a long, slow breath and shook his head. "I should have told you when Will first told us what was going on."
"And I should have told you about the notes," Rachel added. She grabbed onto Finn's hands again, holding them tightly. Having him there and solid right next to her made her feel as if everything was going to work out, even if things were looking a little dark at the moment.
Finn shrugged his shoulders. Frankly, he was a little annoyed that Rachel hadn't taken those threatening notes seriously. But he also knew that without the knowledge about the Howard brothers, she hadn't quite understood the seriousness of the situation. It was in the past now, however. Now that both Finn and Rachel were on the same page, they knew what to look for.
To Rachel's relief, Finn pulled her forward and onto his lap. He wrapped his arms around her and pressed his lips to her temple. Rachel closed her eyes and relished the feeling of being completely safe and loved.
"You were being followed and you were getting letters?" Santana lightly hit the back of Rachel's head with an open palm. "And you just now decided to share this information? Are you insane?"
Rachel scowled at Santana and rubbed the back of her head. "I am not," she said petulantly. Seeing the incredulous look that Santana and Blaine shared, Rachel continued, "It's not as if any of us hadn't heard some threats from the people that you've arrested before. I just figured that's all the letters were."
"They took them down to forensics," Blaine said. "Hopefully we'll be able to lift some prints from them. I mean, it's pretty obvious where the notes come from. But it will only build up more evidence against the Howard brothers."
Rachel nodded her head before she combed her fingers through her hair. She had been sitting in the police department for over an hour now. Following breakfast that morning, Finn had insisted that they bring the letters Rachel had received over to Will and the rest of the team. Rachel had described how she had received each letter and had also discussed each time she thought she had been followed.
Will came into the room then with a file folder in his hands. They contained the letters and the written reports of what Rachel had experienced thus far. His face was grim as he nodded at Puck, Blaine, and Finn, confirming what they all already knew: this was all because of the Howard brothers.
Will extracted a photograph from the folder and handed it to Rachel. "Here are the Howard brothers, Rachel. Keep an eye out for them. I doubt they would actually show themselves, but you never know."
Rachel took the picture and studied it intently. The pictures were all mug shots with the three brothers lined up next to each other: Blake, Rocco, and Tanner Howard. The more she looked, the more Rachel couldn't shake the feeling that they were all familiar to her somehow.
"They look familiar," Rachel admitted as she handed the picture back to Will. She winced when she saw Finn's face darken even further. Hoping to distract him at least a little bit, Rachel asked, "Have Quinn or Blaine received any of those letters?"
Puck glared at the file folder. They were dragging everyone in his family into this, and he didn't like it one bit. "Quinn got one this morning," he said. "The prints on hers matched the ones on yours."
"Kurt hasn't found any… yet," Blaine said. "But I'm sure we won't have to wait long. It looks like their making the rounds."
That vein was throbbing in Finn's jaw again. He was still stuck on one tiny detail. "They look familiar?" he repeated.
"They do," Rachel said with an affirmative nod. She thought hard, sifting through her memories in the hopes that the answer would just magically come to her. But she was too wound up to remember, and she exhaled slowly through her nose in an effort to calm herself down. "But I just can't remember where."
Will put a comforting hand on Rachel's shoulder and squeezed. "Don't worry about it," he said. "For now, we'll make sure that there's an officer parked outside of your apartment building every night. And you have Finn with you, too."
Rachel smiled in her husband's direction and saw his shoulder relax just the slightest bit. "I know," she said quietly. Finn would never let anything happen to her—of that, she was certain.
As always, Santana tried to diffuse the situation. She clapped her hands together and pointed towards the door. "Well, Berry-Hudson, do you want to get going?"
Finn whipped around to face his co-worker. "Get going where?" he asked sharply. He wasn't aware that Rachel had plans to go anywhere. But from the perplexed look on Rachel's face, she didn't really know about those plans, either.
Santana rolled her eyes. "Calm down, Hulk. I called Quinn and Tina a little while ago. She's going to meet us at the café right down the street and we're all going to have lunch. I'll be there the entire time, so you and Puck can quit it with the macho man routine. We'll be fine. Besides, you guys have work to do."
Finn cut his eyes towards Rachel, and she nodded her head. Lunch with her best friends sounded pretty good right about now. She needed to de-stress a little, and Finn needed to focus on his work with the case. Seeing that Finn still looked a little skeptical, Rachel stood up and reached for his hand.
"We'll be fine," she assured him. "And besides, we'll be right down the street."
Finn sighed and then tugged Rachel out of the meeting room and into an empty hallway. He barely spared a second to make sure that no one was there before he pinned Rachel against the wall and pressed his lips to hers for a hot, demanding kiss. Rachel clutched at the material of his dress shirt, her world spinning upside down at the feeling of Finn's body all around her.
When Finn broke the kiss, he pressed his forehead to hers. Rachel was too dazed to even open her eyes, but she did hear Finn when he spoke.
"I need you to be safe," he whispered against her lips. "If anything happened to you, I would…" He trailed off, unable to finish the sentence. He knew that his job was dangerous, but he hadn't imagined that anything like this would happen. Now more than ever, he needed to find the Howard brothers and end this.
Rachel forced her eyes to open and found that Finn's had been closed as well. She lifted her small hand and touched his cheek, her fingers stroking against the shadow of stubble. "I know," she breathed. She knew because she felt the exact same way.
Finn kissed his wife again before he stepped away from Rachel. She smiled brightly at him, and he couldn't help but grin back at her in return. When Rachel looked at him like that, he knew that everything was going to turn out just fine.
For the third time that night, Rachel's phone buzzed in her purse. She checked the screen and saw that it was her papa calling her once again. She supposed that after the third time, she couldn't really ignore it. He hadn't left a message so she knew it wasn't any kind of emergency—he was probably just excited about some television program he was watching.
"I'm sorry," she said to Santana, Quinn, and Tina. "I'm going to step outside and take this call. This is the third time my papa has called me."
Santana pointed a threatening finger at Rachel. "Stay close," she ordered. "Finn will kick my ass if I let anything happen to you."
Rachel rolled her eyes. "Everyone just needs to relax," she grumbled. She knew a little bit of self-defense; she had grown up in New York City, after all. Plus, they were just down the street from the police station. She would only be stepping outside for a few minutes, so she doubted that there was anything to really worry about.
Rachel already had the phone pressed to her ear as she stepped outside. She tapped her fingers against her arm, annoyed when it rang four times and her papa didn't pick up. "You just had your phone on you when you called me two minutes ago…" she mumbled under her breath.
When the call went straight to voicemail, Rachel turned to go back into the café. She was surprised, however, when someone grabbed onto her arm and yanked hard.
Before the scream of shock could even escape her lips, a hand was slapped over her mouth and a bag was thrown over her head.
Don't hate me!