Hi, so here is another chapter. I apologise for the lateness of this but revision is still ongoing and there is still going to be a gap between this chapter and the next one but I should be able to get back to normal.

Disclaimer-Nothing in this chapter is mine.

This entire chapter was a massive emotional uploading and I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. To day this is one of the better episodes of Chicago PD that I have ever watched so I did enjoy writing this chapter.

Please read and review and let me know what you think.

There has been some jumping around the episodes and so there is a gap. Next chapter will follow this one but it might be a bit shorter than others.

Bridget

Chapter 21-Terminal Leave

An incident at Chicago Med sees Hank and Bridget on a collision course with the most painful memories of their lives. Bridget is utterly confused and then heartbroken and then conflicted again. Hank in his desperation asks his daughter to do something she has never contemplated doing—that might cause a rift between them that cannot be easily fixed and Kevin finds himself in a big brother role that he really wasn't sure that he wanted. Some jumping between episodes.

The funny thing (or the not so funny thing depending on how you looked at it) was that she had not seen it coming. Neither had her father and in the days afterwards she had clung to that with all that she had. Neither one of them had seen this coming and that was something. But when it had come it had come with a bang and at a point in her life when Bridget had gotten used to it. The pain had gone, the harshness of it had not lessoned over time but the initial gut wrenching pain had disappeared a long time ago.

For her Dad she suspected that it was not the same thing. For him she suspected (more so after his year in prison) that there were days when the pain was so fresh it felt like it had all happened yesterday. She never spoke to Justin about it. She could never even try to speak to Erin about it either.

Her mother was something tangible some days but on others was as solid as a puff of smoke. Bridget had seen what her mother had become at the end, wasted away from the Chemo and the drugs and the disease that she had battled time and time again. At the end she had gotten sick of the damn thing and she had refused to go to that Doctor's office. She didn't need to see that needle wrapped around her mother's arm like some sort of snake. She didn't need to see the smile dim and the eyes go blank and keep her head down when her Dad came back from the hospital and Justin had to make them breakfast and Erin did her hair.

There was a pause where she stood there taking all of those memories in as she stood in the middle of her living room. Al…the closest that she had to an Uncle of sorts and certainly the closest thing her Dad had to a brother. He had been the one who had knocked on the door as Bridget had kicked off her boots free from school for a gloriously long week, he had been the one who had told her what his case was about and what it entailed and what it would mean and he was the one who right now was watching her with an expression that told Bridget he was quite prepared for rage and fury, for tears and shouting and pain because he had seen it all before.

It had been Al that night with her Dad, it had been her on her own on the step and Erin and Justin together, but she remembered watching as Al took her father outside after he had broken the news to them saying that he needed a walk.

Certain things she knew she would remember forever.

She forced herself to take a deep breath and crossed the length of the downstairs room from the kitchen back to Al twice before she felt like she was under control of her emotions at least to hear the rest of the story.

"Go on" she said through slightly gritted teeth. Her hands were on her hips but it wasn't the picture of a woman in control. Her fingers were gripping into the flesh at the side of her hips and she trying to stop herself crying out and she forced herself to confirm even to herself that she was not going to cry. There was a pause and then she turned to Al again.

"The Doctor…Reybold? I don't remember him"

Al shot her a look that told her that he had known that. She had been seven at the time and therefore the names and the faces had blurred together. She could hardly remember something as insignificant as the Doctor when her memories had been centred on trying to remember her Mom's smile and what her arms had felt like when they had wrapped around Bridget in a hug.

Those things had been the important things that she remembered.

"He's the last one…he was the last one"

Bridget didn't dignify that with a response and Al didn't press her for one. Somethings neither one of them wanted to speak about ever again. That last Doctor's appointment was one of them.

"So he's err…he's been feeding women chemo despite the fact they've not had cancer?" she said feeling sick to her stomach over the whole sordid affair. Al nodded his mouth twisting a little. Bridget nodded a little feeling horribly sick.

There was a pause where she stood there. She opened her mouth to ask what she was suddenly desperate to know and then she clamped it shut again—somethings needed to remain unsaid. She was not going to say what she was thinking—thinking about it was too painful, if she was right in this moment casting a thought on it was beyond anything she had ever imagined.

"What do you want me to do?" she asked finally.

"We want to get…well…your Dad wants to get Reybold on murder"

"Murder? How—" She wanted to ask how the hell that was going to work but then Bridget remembered that this was her father they were talking about. Things were personal with him—this was her mother and his wife—personal was not really the right word for how this one was going to make him feel.

Quite frankly she was kinda surprised that the Doctor wasn't buried in a shallow grave at the docks already and she knew that promises or no promises, if he got off from whatever charge was thrown at him she would not give a cent for his life in the aftermath.

That thought made her feel sick as well.

"Go on" she said finally even though all she wanted was to scream at Al to stop talking and go away and give Bridget a chance to process this.

Al paused for a second and then from somewhere deep down inside him he found the courage to look Bridget in the eye and ask her the one thing she had been dreading since the start of this conversation.

"Did you ever see him do anything dangerous? Ever see him with a needle that looked funny? Ever see him with a patient…I know you were young Bridget but he's been doing this for a long time and I need to know…because I think you might have to testify if Hank gets his way on this"

"He wont make me testify" she said finally ignoring his question.

"He will if he thinks this is the only way to get this bastard" Al said quietly. "He's half possessed here Bridget, It's like…well it's like how it was then, he's quiet and dangerous and Erin's all fired up and the squad doesn't know what to say or do. Getting him on murder's not going to be easy and…and I know you think he wont ask you to lie or speak about that time but I'm telling you now some DA will and it will be with his blessing. I don't think he's seeing anything but putting this bastard behind bars"

Bridget took in what Al was telling her. Her father was at his most dangerous right now and there was nothing she could do to stop it, hell she might be caught up in the crossfire and then everything that she and he had worked through since he had come out of prison was shot to shit.

"I need to think about it" she said finally.

Al took that as his cue to leave and mercifully didn't press for more.

They were all sat in stony silence the occasional tapping of keyboards breaking the moment when Erin who had been staring at the opposite wall with an intensity that could have killed someone said into the open space.

"We need to get someone who saw Reybold stick a needle in someone and not know if it was chemo right?"

"Yeah" Jay said back forcing the silence to break and shooting a look at the closed door of his boss.

"What about Bridget?"

The room sharpened somewhat.

"I don't think that's a good idea" Kevin said rather tactfully. Jay shot a look at Adam and knew they were both thinking the same thing. Never mind a good idea that was suicide right now from both their bosses perspective and never mind what Bridget would do to them.

"Erin" Jay said when It appeared nobody else was going to speak. "I don't think asking Bridget to relive the worst day of her life is something she's gonna want to do. I mean how old was she? Seven, eight? I mean she must have been kept away from the worst of it and if she's put on the stand…"

He trailed off catching Adam's eye and both of them acknowledging what an angry and hurt Bridget would do to their case if forced to concede enough. Voight on the stand was bad enough and Erin had a bad enough temper to make the whole thing worse.

"She was eleven" Erin said finally. "And I bet she saw more than she's let on. I was bad…Justin was worse…Bridget didn't let it faze her in the slightest"

Jay opened his mouth to protest what he knew to be an untruth. Will had not let it faze him—or at least what Jay had seen and only now did Jay know how untrue that was. Bridget he knew was probably just a hell of a lot stronger than anyone in her family knew or gave her credit for.

Erin didn't say anything else but instead turned to stare back at the wall. Jay who had a sneaking suspicion about what that meant suddenly felt compelled to speak up even if it was just to avoid any conversation that took him back to his mother who he remembered had died of cancer.

If he had been in the situation Voight was in…

It didn't even bare thinking about.

It was like someone had died again. There was a silence strained at the dinner table. His daughter looked like she had aged ten years in the last day and she didn't look at him at all. He had told her about the deal that the DA had given Reybold and she had nodded as if it was something that she had been expecting and then she had sat down and prodded at her meal clearly thinking hard about something else…anything else or trying to not think about the dead woman in the room.

He was also trying not to go down that route but the idea that Erin had planted in his brain was struggling to detach itself. Hank wasn't sure however if he really wanted to bring it up. For Bridget and for himself.

"Do you want Justin to know? About this case?" Bridget asked her tone still detached and her eyes on the wall.

"No" Hank said. If Justin ever got wind of this he would go AWOL in a heartbeat. Hank doesn't need that on top of everything else as well.

"Bridget" he asks finally. "I need to ask you something"

Bridget turned to him and her expression was almost identical to that look Camille had given him when she had finally put together the pieces over the ninety grand that was currently resting behind the wall in his safe.

"Ok" she said finally.

"You remember Doctor Reybold?"

"I already told Al that I didn't"

Hank acknowledged that Al had warned his daughter before he'd had a chance. If it had been Meredith then he supposed he would have told Lexi.

"The DA thinks that if someone saw him inject someone with chemo then the case could move to manslaughter."

"Please tell me—"Bridget cut across him her voice shaking with rage. "That this is not where you bring up Mom. Because if you think that I am going to sit back and watch you lie about that for a conviction…"

"They don't want me on the stand" Hank said quietly.

"Erin then—"

"No not Erin, I'm not asking Erin"

Bridget stared at him and her expression was so dreadful Hank had to look away from her.

"You cannot be serious" she said flatly. "You told me that night I could come and talk to you when I was ready. I' m not ready now, not even anywhere near ready to deal with that night and what it cost me and now you want me to go on the stand and lie about it? You want me to lie? For what a conviction?"

"So you never saw Reybold inject your mother or any other woman with Chemo?" he asked. Bridget stared at him her mouth open slightly and Hank pressed his advantage hating himself for it all the while.

"Do you remember after the funeral?" she asked.

Hank blinked. Of everything that he had been expecting to say after that it was not bringing up a memory that was so raw he didn't even try to think about it. He did remember it however, he did remember driving them all home, Erin, Justin, Bridget and pushing Al away. Erin and Justin in their room and he not going up there because he had known that all three of them were hitting the booze that night and that knowing Erin there was a chance that there was something (cocaine if he remembered Erin's preference back then) upstairs as well. Bridget however had been the one who he had ignored and then found asleep in his wife's closet when he drunkenly opened it.

He had found his daughter tucked up amongst his wife's coat her head resting on another coat and tear tracks on her face. She had still been in her black dress and her shoes were neatly stacked next to her mother's black Jimmy Choo's that he had bought Camille and she had complained that she had, had nowhere to go that would be good enough to wear them. He had tucked her into bed and then passed out somewhere between the chair in Bridget's room and the bed and had been more ashamed of himself than he could say—especially considering that he had thrown up somewhere during the night in his seven year old's toilet listening to her sleep, Erin crying and Justin's music that never seemed to stop playing.

"I remember" he said finally.

Bridget shot him a look.

"No you don't" she said flatly. "But I do. I remember waking up in Mom's closet and you tucking me into bed. You asked as I was getting changed if I wanted to talk about anything, you asked me that a lot even before she died and I always kept saying no. And I'm still saying no Dad. I don't want to talk about Mom"

Hank felt his teeth ache with a combination of grief and rage. He didn't remember this (at least not the funeral bit) but he did acknowledge that it was something that he would say.

"Bridge" he said finally. "Do you think I want to drag this up again? Do you think I want to sit there and ask you this? I don't sweetheart I don't. But I am asking you. I'm asking you to help me but this man behind bars."

"By lying?"

"I…Bridge if I thought I could do this myself then I would. But the reality is I don't think anyone is going to want me on that stand not even our own side. Anything I say, anything Erin says and this shark he has defending him will rise and defect and their easiest method to defect is you."

Bridget didn't flicker. Had the situation not been as serious as it was now Hank would have been proud. The problem was he didn't feel proud—he felt sick and tired and drained.

"I will not do it" she said simply. "You said I didn't have to talk about it until I was ready. And I'm not. I hope one day I will be but right now I don't even want to think about it"

She stood up and walked away then and Hank, left at the dining room table acknowledged that she had not flat out denied that she had saw Reybold and she had not admitted it either.

He was completely unsurprised to see Bridget Voight outside the courtroom. She was dressed in a pair of old blue jeans and a red jumper and she had the look of a woman who a bitter combination of utterly defeated and utterly determined. It was a strange and yet beautiful combination and he couldn't help but admire her for it.

Kevin had turned up like the rest of the squad. Voight was taking the stand and he was going to talk about the most painful memory of his life and Kevin like the rest of his team would not let their boss go through it alone.

"Hey" he said sliding next to Bridget.

Bridget stared at him and Kevin was reminded suddenly that she was a young girl only a couple of years older than Vanessa and yet she seemed so much older. If there was anything that Kevin could do in this world or in the next then he was going to ensure that his baby sister never looked like that.

"Erin wants me to lie"

Kevin paused. The truth was Erin did want Bridget to lie. And he could see why. He couldn't deny that she had a reason for it but he couldn't blame Bridget for looking horrified at the same time. There was a pause where they stood there in complete silence. Kevin eventually spoke.

"What are you going to do?" he asked finally.

Bridget shrugged.

"Erin has a mom." She said quietly. There was nothing more that she could say to that and there was nothing more that he could say. Bunny Fletcher might be a right piece of work and that was saying something, but he had to admit that he could see where Bridget was coming from. Good or bad or terrible—weather you wanted them or not, weather or not you valued someone else more—you only had one Mom. And Bunny Fletcher despite her faults (and they were many) was still alive, and was still Erin's biological mother. Which was more than what Bridget had.

At that moment the doors to the courtroom opened and the Defence Attorney came out. She took one look at Bridget sat there and Bridget turned to stare at her for a second before she let out a hollow laugh and dropped her hands into her head. Kevin stood up trying to stand between the two of them but he knew there was no point. It was the easiest thing to do really wasn't it? Once Voight had gone on the stand the easiest thing to contradict him was his daughter and Kevin couldn't do a damn thing to stop the woman holding out that blue paper.

Bridget took it and read it with a detached expression. "They want me on the stand" was all she said standing up and reaching for her jacket.

"What are you going to do?" Kevin asked.

Bridget shrugged and walked away before Kevin could tell her that the ADA would want to talk to her, or that her father was coming out of the courtroom and someone would have to tell him that his daughter was the one person who could sink this case for him and probably get both Voight or herself arrested in the process.

"Bridget?" she turned around to see Jay watching her. "Court's back in session" he said almost apologetically. "And they want you"

She had been sat on the bench outside watching the people go by and as she stood up she was aware that Jay was watching her. He flashed her a small smile.

"Not going to tell me what to do?" she challenged.

"If I thought it would make any difference—I lost—" he began as if the memory was painful to him. Bridget cut across him. She didn't want to hear anyone's sob stories today of all days.

"I don't want to hear it" she said. "At least you've got more sense than the rest of them"

Jay gave her a small smile.

Hank was watching her from the gallery. She was still tall, still holding herself upright as she had done at the funeral and she still sat down with that little sweep like she had done at the church. Bridget was watching Reybold with an expression he couldn't name. As if she was deciding something.

"Miss Voight, we've heard testimony from your father that your mother was in Doctor Reybold's care at the end of her life. My condolences by the way. Were you ever in his office?"

That was an easy one. Hank had took her there when she had wanted to be with her Mom many times. He had gone to work and come back and found them in the big chair, needles wrapped around his wife like snakes while she and his daughter were doing homework or reading together and Camille had looked at Bridget as if trying to drink in every inch of her.

"Yes I was in his office"

"You saw him administer drugs?"

"Yes"

Again that was probably true.

"Your father has provided testimony that he saw Doctor Reybold administer an chemo drug that your mother didn't need, do you know this to be true?"

Fuck.

Bridget did something he didn't expect.

She ran a hand through her hair and leaned back on her chair her eyes closed. From where he was sitting Hank could see her expression. Her dark hair tumbling over her shoulders, the smudge of eyeliner and the exhausted expression on her face. She was reliving it he knew, she was reliving this moment, that moment—all of the pain and the heartbreak.

She looked decades older in that moment and Hank wondered if he should have pushed her to talk about it more.

She had been fine the voice in his head reminded him.

And she had been fine. She had gotten up after the funeral and had gone to school the day after. She had taken over cooking seamlessly badgering Meredith to teach her how to cook and Meredith had thinking it was the easiest thing she could do. She had become closer to Lexi—at a time when Erin and Justin had both been going off the rails and he was in the midst of his own grief Bridget had cleaned up after them all—at the age of eleven she had cooked for them and had (and he was more ashamed of this than he wanted to admit) cleaned him up after a bad night. She had never mentioned the increase of scotch bottles or the blood or the bruises but he had known that there were nights where she had slept on the couch wondering if he was coming home.

The final straw as far as that was concerned was when he had been called in by her teacher who had told him in no uncertain terms that Bridget had been falling asleep in classes and that something had to be done.

Al nudged him then pulling him out of his memories and he realised that the judge was now forcing Bridget to answer. Hank hoped above everything else that his daughter was not going to get out of this by getting herself a contempt citation because that was the last thing anyone including her needed.

"Dad didn't see him inject Mom no" she said flatly.

Hank took a deep breath, ignored the looks of concern his team were showing him and tried to pretend that he hadn't just been punched in the solar plexus.

"So your father was lying?"

God did that woman have to sound so triumphant?

"Yes"

Bridget looked down at her hands then and then when she spoke it was with an expression that could have melted ice.

"I did"

That stopped the woman in her tracts. That stopped the judge in his tracks, certainly it stopped Hank in his tracts.

"You did what?"

"I saw him inject Mom with the chemo she didn't need. I saw it. Dad was lying for me. He didn't want me to relive it all but I saw it. He didn't know I was there because I gone to the bathroom. It had been…well near the end and when I came back I saw it. I didn't tell anyone until the other night when I told Dad"

Ok that was a barefaced lie but…problem was Hank didn't know if the rest of it was. He had gone on the stand to ensure that this animal had gone away for good for the harm he had caused to the innocent woman and the two they were sure he had murdered. But he had never even considered the possibility Camille had been one of the victims because he had…well…he had seen the death certificate. He had demanded an autopsy and he had been the one who had only been able to sleep that night knowing that all along it had been out of his hands.

Now he felt sick.

There were a few more questions and then his daughter was done. They had not pressed for details once they had gotten that damning statement. The defence had asked once why she had not come forwards then but Bridget had pointed out that she had been eleven and most of the medical knowledge had gone over her head.

He had wanted to speak to his daughter but she had not come out of the gallery. A desperate look had Adam standing up and excusing himself but he came back in to whisper that she had gotten into a cab and gone home claiming that she had told him that she didn't want to see the verdict.

Funnily enough the guilty verdict hadn't been as satisfying as he had once believed it could be.

He nodded at Jay who seemed to understand that Erin was his responsibility and then went home after his daughter. She was a creature of habit. He had a feeling that he knew where she had gone too.

He was right she had gone home.

And he had been right to think that like the last time she was sat in the closet.

Somethings had changed. Camille's stuff was gone and Bridget's legs were too long for the door to shut so he could see her. The wine and the glass were an addition as well but Hank sat down next to her and pretended (because she was his daughter after all) that he had not seen the tear tracks that were etched across her face—cold and dry. She had been suffering silently for a long time.

"Guilty?" she asked once.

"Yeah"

She didn't say anything.

"Did you lie?" he asked. He had to know. "Did you lie Bridget because if what you said was true then…" oh god it was unbearable.

"Did you?"

"Yes" he said not even bothering to hide it. "Yes I did. Did you?"

Finally she turned to look at him in the face. It was still that unreadable mask for a second and then just as he was about to demand she tell him she shook her head and he could breathe again.

"Yes. I lied."

He closed his eyes for a second and then opened them again.

"Can I ask you something?"

"Sure"

"Mom…Mom…she did…she did have cancer didn't she? She did…it wasn't some other lunatic poisoning her she did…" it came out in a rush even as it trailed off and Hank realised with a sickening lurch what had really been bothering her that day he had asked her to talk him through the last time she had seen her mother pumped full of drugs.

"Oh god yes. Bridget yes she was sick from the beginning. I was there with her at the first appointment. Reybold was recommended to us by a friend. He was the last doctor but the cancer was real and it was what killed her in the end"

Bridget nodded and then leaned her head on his shoulder. Bridget like Justin had never been the most receptive child. There had been too much hard raising in his house for emotions to be freely expressed. It was not something he indulged in all that often. He had not been surprised when it was clear his children didn't either. But at this moment in time he had no illusion with pulling his daughter close to him and trying to blink away the tears. Hank was not a man to be overcome by a sentimental moment but god knows he missed his wife sometimes like it was yesterday and not six years.

"I miss Mom" was all Bridget said.

"I know kiddo. I miss her too"

"You think we can just sit here for a bit?"

"Yeah. We can sit here for as long as you want"

And each of them locked in their own painful memories over a woman that they had both loved, for a long time that was just what they did.

So there it is. I hope you enjoy this chapter. I will try and update sooner rather than later.

Next Chapter-Bridget, Hank and Erin deal with the fallout of the Reybold case. Erin becomes embroiled in a case where a fourteen year old is raped and Hank worries about his daughter. Shorter chapter.