Chapter 10 – Of Fathers, Sons, Smartmouths, Bullets, Friends, Detectives and Ensuing Chaos. Oh, and of blood.

Something angry, furious, which had been lying coiled up and dormant inside of Henry for twenty years now, reared up as he saw Lorenzo Delgado come striding into the room. His first reaction was to strangle the man, then beat him into a bloody pulp until all the anger and terror he had ever been feeling because of that man had vanished.

But Henry couldn't move from the spot. He remained standing rooted just where he was, staring at the mafia boss with a gaze that was colder than ice.

Delgado senior, however, didn't even pay any mind to the two Spencer men. He had his eyes on his son, who seemed to have shrunk a couple of inches since his father had come into the room.

"Pop? What are you doing here?"

"What I am doing here, Ricardo? The question is what you are doing here. I couldn't believe my ears when Marco came to me just now and told me what you were doing. Have you gone out of your mind?"

"But Marco is my man!", Ricky spluttered.

Delgado cut him off with an angry gesture of his hand. "You don't have any men, Ricardo! I let you play gangster because it keeps you occupied. But you're not clever enough to pull off the most simple things, so of course I have people watching out for what you're doing! Do you honestly think I want my life's work go to waste because you can't think things through? And now I want an explanation for why you kidnapped those two, and it better be a good one. Not to mention fast!"

"He…he just couldn't stay out of it, pop. You warned him off that he should stay out of the investigation, but that woman cop came to his office and gave him information. I wanted to help you out on this one. That the old man was there wasn't planned!"

"Jules just brought me a smoothie. A damned smoothie, nothing more!"

But the two Delgado men weren't even listening. Lorenzo watched his son with a disappointed sigh.

"You wanted to help me out by kidnapping a police consultant? And a retired cop? That's hilarious, Ricardo! And on top of that you bring them here? To a place that can be tied back to you immediately? Didn't you ever listen when I tried to tell you something? Of all the stupid, hare-brained things you've come up with over the past years, this has to be the most stupid of them all!"

"Now where have I heard those words before?", Shawn mumbled, and once more Henry jabbed his elbow into his ribs.

Delgado still paid no mind to them, he was towering above his son, finger pointed angrily at his chest. "Now we've got to get rid of them, and we need to make sure nobody connects that to us. Wonderful job, really! Trust me that you won't be doing anything in my business for a very long time. You've just shot the little trust you've earned yourself straight to hell, Ricardo!"

"Oh, but I don't think he wants the crumbs you're feeding him, anyway", Shawn said, louder this time. Slowly, Delgado turned around to face Shawn.

"What do you mean by that?"

"Shawn, what are you doing?", Henry hissed, but Shawn gestured for him to be silent. For as long as he managed to keep those two occupied with each other, he and his father were relatively safe. He needed to buy them time until, hopefully, the police found them.

"I get the feeling that your son is more interested in opening up his own branch of business, sir."

Delgado's gaze swivelled from Shawn back to his son and returned to Shawn. "You have all but ten seconds to elaborate that, Spencer. I wouldn't waste any of it."

Slowly, so that the move wouldn't seem threatening, Shawn brought his fingers up to his temple again. "Berger was working for you. With his job in the marina, it was the perfect decoy. You were employing people to take out their boats south, into international waters. There they met with some of your South American business partners, and drugs were loaded onto the private boats. When those came back from their fishing trips, your faithful marina worker unloaded the drugs under the cover of the night, and dropped them off to one of your men. But Berger didn't know everything. He didn't know that you knew exactly just how many kilograms of drugs were supposed to arrive with each shipment. After all, you're a businessman. You need to have everything under control, don't you? But Berger didn't know. He thought he could rip you off. But I'm sensing something else…"

Shawn closed his eyes tightly and drew a couple of deep breaths. When he opened his eyes again, he abruptly turned his gaze on Ricky, and was inwardly laughing when he saw that the younger Delgado in fact jumped a little under his gaze.

"Berger wasn't clever enough on his own. He wasn't daring enough on his own. There was somebody who was taking initiative. Somebody who was deeply dissatisfied with his current situation of employment."

Delgado followed Shawn's gaze, and the look he gave his son could have frozen hell over. "What did you have to do with Berger?", he asked in a tight voice.

Ricky swallowed. "Nothing! Nothing at all! He's lying, pop. He's just making this up to play us against each other."

"Oh, but you're doing all that on your own", Shawn continued. "You were angry that your father didn't trust you enough to give you more responsibilities in his…business. So you decided to show him that you could do just as well as he could. You told Berger to cut off a certain amount of each drug delivery and arranged drop offs between Berger and yourself. I'm getting…wait, what's that? March 11th, May 27th, July 1st. But there were others, other dates before that. You stashed away a nice amount of the drugs and wanted to sell them off at a higher price than your father was getting from his own deals, to show him that trusting you with that branch of his business would be profitable for him. But you just didn't count on your Dad realising that drugs went missing, did you? Only, your father didn't know that you were involved. He thought that Berger was trying to rip him off, that's why he killed him. And you got scared. If Daddy dearest ever found out that you were the one behind the mystery of the vanishing drugs, all you'd be responsible for in the future would be kissing your father's ass in an attempt to get back in his good graces."

Lorenzo Delgado turned back to his son. "Where is the cocaine, Ricardo?"

"I don't know what he's talking about, Pop! He's crazy, he's making that stuff up!"

"I see bears!", Shawn yelled. "Winnie the Poh, Yogi Bear, I'm getting bears. And stuffing. Stuffed turkey, stuffed faces, stuffed bears – teddy bears!" He stumbled over towards the cardboard boxes in the corner and blindly reached into the topmost box, pulling out a teddy bear with a blue ribbon tied around its neck.

"Little Ricky hid the cocaine away in those teddy bears to sell them later on. But suddenly Berger was dead, and he knew he needed to get rid of the evidence against himself, no matter whether he got a good price for it or not. He showed the cocaine to a customer not too long ago. Yesterday? This morning? There's a bear which has been ripped open in this box, I'd say the customer took whatever was inside with him for testing the merchandise. What's that?" Shawn put one of the teddy bears up to his ear and pretended to listen. "Your tummy aches? I'm sorry, my little furry friend, I'm afraid I'll have to do a little impromptu surgery then" And he ripped open the bear's fur. Pulling out the stuffing, his fingers closed around a small plastic bag which he tossed wildly through the room as if it had burned his fingers.

A frown on his face, Delgado senior picked up the little baggie and inspected it. Then, very slowly, he turned towards his son. "Ricardo? Do you have an explanation for this?"

Little Ricky was breathing heavily, sweat standing out on his face. "I…I don't…I mean, he's…this is ridiculous, pop!"

"Is it now", Delgado murmured, eerily calm.

Shawn slowly stepped away from the cardboard boxes and took a few steps back towards his father. "Ricky heard that you had told me to stay off the case. Which, just for the record, I did. I'll repeat it if necessary. But Ricky was getting worried that this whole thing might still blow up in his face, and he didn't want that. So he staked out my office, to see what I was up to. And he talked to O'Leary again. Now, I know that you had already done that, Mr. Delgado sr., because it was O'Leary who told you about my involvement in the first place. But you were convinced that O'Leary didn't know anything about the drugs Berger was shipping for you, so you decided to leave him alone. It would have been too bothersome if O'Leary turned up dead as well and the police started investigating the murders as connected. They might have just found something pointing towards you. Which you didn't know they already had found amongst Berger's things, because your son was stupid enough to call Berger from a cell phone that was connected to another case in which the name Delgado showed up."

The look Delgado gave his son at those words was pure venom. But Shawn wasn't finished yet, he was on a roll.

"Little Ricky freaked about the fact that O'Leary might know something. He freaked because he was worried that given enough pressure, he'd just tell you about your son's involvement in the drug deals. Or maybe O'Leary guessed that something was up with so many strange people asking questions about Berger's death. Did he call you, Ricky? He'd better not, because if he did, there's a direct trail leading from him to you. Every prosecutor's dream." He turned back to the older Delgado. "But no matter what freaked your son out so bad, Little Ricky decided to do what he thought a good mob-boss would do in that situation – he killed O'Leary. Shot him in the park, probably tried to make it look like a burglary."

Delgado turned towards his son, his face a mask of ire. "Is that true, Ricardo? Are you really that stupid?"

Shawn laughed. "Oh yes, he is. Probably even more stupid than you think. My guess is that he wasn't clever enough to wipe his traces, so I'm fairly sure the police will find something that connects him to O'Leary's death. Tell me, Ricky, did you use a brand new gun? Did you think to wipe everything down? Did you wipe your footprints? I heard it was raining during the night, and those footprints can really be a pain in the ass. Much better criminals than you have been convicted because of a footprint."

"Shut up!", Ricardo yelled. "Just shut the fuck up, you know nothing!"

"Oh, but I think I do. It's not that difficult to work all this out, it's not as if a mastermind genius was at work here. A second grader could have figured out your little scheme. It was only a matter of time before your father would have figured it out, too. But killing O'Leary wasn't your last mistake, was it? No, when your stakeout reported that Detective O'Hara came by my office earlier today, you freaked out again. Even though she was just bringing me a friggin' smoothie. But you figured that I was still a threat to you, that I was still involved in the case and if I figured out what was going on, it would only be a matter of time until your father found out, as well. And that thought made you nearly crap your pants, so you send two of your goons over to take me. You couldn't kill me in the office, because that would have made the police look into this whole affair so much more closely. Besides, you wanted to find out what I knew, and probably you thought that kidnapping was exactly what a real mobster would do in this situation! And again, you hadn't thought this thing through. My father was in the office with me, and your goons simply took both of us. And now you've got the whole of the SBPD looking for a missing ex-cop and a missing police consultant because your goons left me enough time to trash the office and make my partner suspicious. And you're sitting here, crapping your pants because now Daddy has found out everything you've been doing behind his back, and because you were so damn stupid to leave a trail of evidence all over the place! Just enjoy your last few hours of breathing fresh air, because for the next couple of years, all your air will be filtered through bars!"

Ricky's expression was one of pure, unadulterated terror, and with each of Shawn's words he seemed to have popped another drop of sweat.

"Shut up!"

"It's a little too late for that now, isn't it?", Shawn said cockily. A little too cockily.

With a speed that belied his size, Ricardo's hand reached underneath his jacket. Henry saw the movement, but before he could do as much as turn towards Shawn, Ricky had pulled his gun and pointed it at Shawn. The shot rang out hollowly, echoing off the bare walls, and to Henry it seemed as if the world stopped spinning for a moment.

No!

Henry didn't even know whether he had shouted the word out loud.

The impact of the bullet threw Shawn off balance, and as if in slow motion Henry watched his son wave back and to the side.

Then he heard his son's scream, and time started again.

Ricky just stood there, gun still pointed at Shawn, yelling "I told you to shut up!", but Henry didn't even hear him. Shawn collapsed to the floor, hand coming up to press against his chest, and Henry fell to his knees beside his son without even noticing that he had hurried to his side.

Blood was already pouring out from under Shawn's hand, and without thinking Henry shrugged out of the Hawaiian shirt he wore over his t-shirt, bunched it up and pulled Shawn's hand away from the wound. As he pressed the fabric tightly against the wound, Shawn screamed again and tried to move away from the hand.

"Easy, son. I know it hurts, but I need to stem the bleeding."

"Hurts", Shawn breathed out, eyes screwed tightly shut.

"I know, kid. I know. I'm sorry."

In fact, Henry didn't know just how much it hurt to get shot. He had been shot at numerous times during his time as a cop, but he had never been shot. Right now, he'd gladly change that if it meant that his son remained unharmed.

With his one hand still pressing the shirt tightly against his son's left side, Henry felt beneath the shoulder with his other hand.

No exit wound. Probably a low calibre bullet, or the bullet got stuck in Shawn's shoulder blade. Henry quickly assessed the situation. On the one hand, it was good news that there was no exit wound. Exit wounds were what caused the most damage, not the little holes through which the bullets entered a body. Entry wounds didn't bleed as excessively as TV made you believe. But Shawn's wound was bleeding, and badly. That meant the bullet hat hit a bigger blood vessel. It hadn't hit the heart, though, otherwise Shawn would be dead by now. Ricky's aim had fortunately been a little too high. But still, Shawn needed to get to a hospital, as soon as possible. He was losing too much blood for Henry's liking, and if that bullet was still lodged somewhere in Shawn's body then it could still cause damage. Not to mention the risk of infection, but that was the thing farthest from Henry's mind right now.

Henry pressed the makeshift compress down a little tighter.

"It's all right, Shawn. You're going to be fine."

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Gus believed he was slowly going insane. Normally, while waiting, time seemed to pass as slowly as treacle. Right now, it seemed to be running. Every minute that Shawn and Henry were not found meant that they were in greater danger, and Gus didn't have the feeling that they were getting any closer to finding them.

Not that Lassiter and Juliet were going lengths to keep him in the loop. He could understand that, they had plenty to do without giving Gus updates in ten minutes intervals, but still. Not knowing what was going on was slowly driving him mad.

Nervously, he paced up and down the corridor. Juliet had been busy going through property listings for Delgado and his firms for the past twenty minutes, and Lassiter had been going through everything the forensics had already reported so far. But so far, they had nothing. And for as long as they didn't even have the slightest reason aside form a gut feeling to believe that it was Delgado who held Shawn and Henry, there was no probable cause. No way for them to just go ahead and search Delgado's properties for them. Not that they would have known where to start searching, anyway.

But wait. Wait, wait, wait. Brain flash.

Everybody had always said Delgado senior was too clever to allow evidence tying him to the crimes he committed. But they had also said that junior wasn't exactly his father's son when it came to intelligence. So what if it wasn't the father, but the son who was behind the kidnapping?

Gus hurried over towards Juliet's desk.

"Juliet, do you have all the property listings for Delgado?"

Juliet looked up at Gus with a surprised frown. "Yes, I do. But they don't help us any, Gus, it's just too many of them."

"Are there any properties listed under the son's name?"

"Yes, I think there are. Wait a second. Here, there's a beach house. Or rather, a villa. Probably registered under the son for tax reasons. But there was something else, wait a moment. Why are you asking?"

Gus bit his lip. "Because I'm not so sure that the father is behind all this. The last time he wanted to take Shawn, he waited until he was on a deserted road out of town, and it was only by coincidence that his bike was found as quickly as it was. And now he drives his van up to the office in broad daylight and kidnaps two people, in hopes that nobody will notice? It sounds weird, doesn't it? And haven't you all said that the son is a lot less clever than the father is? I was just thinking, maybe he's behind all this."

Juliet still shifted through the papers she had printed out. "Even if there is another property listed under his name, it still won't be enough for either a warrant or probable cause. Ah, here it is. An industrial complex is also listed under Ricardo's name. Fourth Street on the corner of Baker."

"Did you say Fourth and Baker?", Lassiter's voice interrupted them.

"Yes, why?"

With unusual excitement, Lassiter shifted through the papers on his own desk. "I've been going through the O'Leary case while I was waiting for forensics to call. There was something on his phone record. Ah, here it is. O'Leary called a phone registered with Red Bell Phone Company the day before his murder. Twice. The phone isn't registered under a name, but under a company. Palomino Enterprises. I'm running it through the computer right now. The address in the phone registration is Fourth and Baker."

Juliet took her mouse and called up a city map on her computer. "There is only one complex on that corner, it has to be the same building." A smile broke out on her face.

"That means that O'Leary called a company working on Ricardo Delgado's property only hours prior to his death."

Something beeped on Lassiter's computer. He turned back towards the monitor and clicked his mouse a couple of times. "Not merely a company working on Ricardo Delgado's property. Palomino Enterprises is a sub-Enterprise of R&D Ltd., the dummy construction company Lorenzo established to keep his son occupied."

He turned away from the monitor. "That's enough for me. O'Hara, get me as many officers ready as you can, I'm going to tell the Chief."

At that moment, the phone on Lassiter's desk rang. The head detective as he snatched the phone off its cradle before the second ring. Juliet got up from her chair.

"I'll tell the chief. She needs to call a judge about that warrant. That connection should be enough."

As Juliet hurried off, Gus turned back to Lassiter. The head detective was listening intently to what the person on the other end was saying.

"You're 100 sure about this?" Again, he waited while the other person spoke. "All right. Thank you."

Lassiter hung up the phone, looking dazed for a moment.

"O'Hara went to tell the chief", Gus felt the need to supply. Lassiter merely nodded as an answer, and a little disconcertedly Gus noticed that the detective was checking his sidearm.

"You're going there now?"

Lassiter nodded. "Yes. As quickly as possible."

He got up from his chair at the same time that Juliet and Chief Vick came hurrying out of the Chief's office. "I'll have that warrant ready before you even arrive at the building, detective. I want at least five units there, and I'm going to send an ambulance with you, just in case. Silent approach, no lights, no sirens. If Shawn and Henry are truly there, we don't want to spook Delgado off."

Lassiter nodded. "Forensics just called. They matched the bullet found in the Psych office to the bullet that killed O'Leary. They ran the test twice. There's no doubt about it."

Vick nodded. "Good. That's more than enough for the warrant, even against a Delgado. Go now, quickly."

Both Lassiter and O'Hara hurried out of the station without any further prompting. Gus made move to follow, but Vick held him back by his arm.

"No, Mr. Guster."

"But…"

"I said no. This takedown will be dangerous enough for both Spencers as it is. I will not let another civilian get involved in it."

Gus made move to protest, but Vick cut him off. "I am going to call for that warrant now, inform the ambulance to get on standby position nearby, and then I am going there myself. You may come along with me in my car, but you will stay in the car until I explicitly tell you that you can get out. Do I make myself clear?"

Gus nodded immediately. "Yes, whatever you say."

"Good." And not taking her eyes off Gus, as if she was afraid he'd run down to his car the moment she turned her back, Vick picked up the phone and called the judge.

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He couldn't stop the bleeding. It was a horrible realisation for Henry. As much as he pressed down on the wound, and he was already pressing so hard that the pain for Shawn had to be excruciating, but the bleeding simply didn't stop. Already the shirt he was using as a compress was soaked, and Shawn wouldn't hold out much longer without medical help.

He didn't even know how much time had passed since the shot, it had been too long, but obviously not long enough for the two Delgados to turn their attention away from their fighting and back to Henry and Shawn.

As much as Henry tried to focus on Shawn, and Shawn alone, he couldn't help but hear the two men fighting in the background.

"Just how incredibly stupid are you, Ricardo? Just how dumb? You've just shot somebody right in your own warehouse. Do you know what an effort it will be to clean this mess again so that there won't be any trace left?"

"Why couldn't he keep his fucking mouth shut, then nothing would have happened!"

"Did you use a new gun?"

"Pop, I…"

"Did you use a new gun?", Lorenzo Delgado yelled on top of his voice. "Don't tell me you've been stupid enough to use a gun that could be on file somewhere!"

"Nobody is ever going to find him to dig out the bullet, Pop. I promise. And I'll wipe down the gun and get rid of it."

The two men were yelling so loud at each other that Henry at first nearly missed his son's whispered words. Carefully, he bent closer.

"What was that, Shawn?"

"Need…gun."
"Yes, we could use a gun right now, Shawn. But we have a fat chance of getting to one."

Shawn shook his head slightly eyes screwed shut tightly against the pain. After a long moment and a few very deep breaths, he opened his eyes and looked at his father.

"No. Need his…gun. Proof."

"Shawn, he just said he's wiped it down."

A slight smile showed on Shawn's face but immediately turned into a pained grimace. "Not the…gun. He's stupid…'m sure he didn't…wipe his prints off the…bullets."

A small proud smile formed on Henry's face. But right now, collecting proof against Delgado wasn't on top of his priority list. Neither Lorenzo nor Little Ricky planned on keeping them alive to collect any evidence, and if the police weren't already hot on their trail, Shawn wouldn't make it out of this alive, anyway.

Henry pulled down on the compress a little more tightly, but Shawn barely reacted. He probably didn't have the strength left to react with more than a low moan of pain.

"Stop…hurts."

Henry wanted nothing more than comply, but he shook his head. "No chance, kiddo. If I let go now, you'll be dead in a few minutes. And that's not going to happen. Do you hear me? You're going to be fine."

Shawn grimaced. "Don't feel…fine."

"That'll pass. But I need you to stay awake, all right?"

"Can't."

Shawn's breathing as getting more rapid now, and cold sweat had broken out on his face. Worriedly, Henry wiped at it with one hand, but then brought it quickly back down onto the compress.

"You have to, Shawn. Focus. Help is on its way, you only need to hold on a little longer."

"No…can't…breathe. Hurts. Can't…breathe."

Shawn's breaths were getting more and more shallow, and Henry's worry spiked. The gunshot wound was too high to have damaged Shawn's lung directly, but something was impairing his breathing. This was bad.

"No, come on Shawn. You have to breathe! It'll be all right, you only have to focus on breathing now!"

But suddenly there were hands on his shoulders, pulling him away from Shawn. Henry struggled, he didn't want to let go, but before he knew it, Lorenzo Delgado's two goons had pulled him to his feet and were holding him back tightly. Henry continued to struggle, but had no chance of breaking free.

The older Delgado stepped in front of Henry with a wide grin on his face.

"You bastard!", Henry spat at him.

Delgado just shrugged. "He'll be dead soon, anyway. He doesn't need you to hold his hand for that. I warned you that something would happen to your kid if you ever got in my way."

And suddenly Henry's vision turned red. He no longer cared about the two goons holding him, he no longer cared about the fact that the other people had guns and he didn't. He no longer cared about anything except for the fact that his son was lying a few feet away, bleeding to death, and it was all Delgado's fault. And if there was already nothing he could change about Shawn being shot, he'd most certainly not let that bastard keep him away from Shawn right now.

Henry didn't know where the strength came from, but suddenly he was free of the hands holding him. His vision was limited to nothing but the surprised expression on Delgado's face when he realised that Henry was suddenly free, and then there was a fist connecting with Delgado's face and Henry heard the satisfying sound of bone breaking as his fist connected with Delgado's nose with all the strength he could muster.

Blood was pouring out of the crooked mess that only moments before had been Delgado's nose, but Henry didn't care. Not even waiting for Delgado's reaction, Henry turned around and ran over to his son's side.

"Shawn! Shawn, can you hear me?"

Shawn didn't react, and Henry immediately pressed the bunched up shirt tightly against the wound again. Shawn was still bleeding, which mean that his heart was still beating. But judged by the size of the pool of blood on the floor, he wouldn't hold out much longer.

"Shawn! Come on, kiddo, don't do that to me!"

But Shawn was no longer responding, and by now his breathing was so shallow and rapid that it was barely perceptible anymore.

Henry no longer cared about Delgado, or his men, or what they would do to him once they had overcome the commotion of their boss' broken nose. All he cared about right now was that his only child was dying right in front of his eyes and there was not a damn thing he could do to stop it.

But still he kept strong pressure on the wound with one hand while he ran the other through his son's messy and sweat-soaked hair.

"Shawn, can you hear me? You have to hold on, all right? Just a little longer."

No reaction. Henry felt more than he heard somebody step up behind him, and he knew what was about to happen next. But he didn't close his eyes. Instead, he kept his eyes trained firmly on his son's face as the cold metal of the gun barrel was pressed against the back of his head.