Title: Assaulted! Series – Part twenty-five
Author: lilacs_roses
Type: Numb3rs
Characters: Colby Granger, Don Eppes, Ian Edgerton, Tim King, etc.
Pairings: Surprise pairing/s
Beta this section: Munchkinofdoom/Hanna
Genre: AU; crime-drama; hurt/comfort; episode related; romance/ust
Rating: NC17
Warnings: non-con/sexual assault/rape; slash
Spoilers: Mole, Janus List, Trust Metric, whole 'spy' storyline
Summary: Colby's raped in the seventh floor men's room of the FBI. How does the team take it and, more importantly, what happens - to the perpetrator, to the victim and to those close to him?
Feedback: Again, please keep the reviews/comments coming because they really help me stay motivated :) Thanks. This thing is getting so complex, I feel like I'm floundering!
AN: Thanks to Munchkinofdoom and Hanna for the beta :)
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Alan was in the midst of setting another tray of sandwiches down when Ian's phone rang. The others gathered around the dining room table didn't pause in their conversations until he cussed and asked the caller where they were.
Everyone froze though when he yelled Don's name, and when he activated the speaker for his phone, they all understood the agent's concern.
As Alan realized what was happening, it felt like his heart stopped. His eldest son was in a car accident in progress…. He heard Don cuss vehemently, something Alan had rarely heard from him, and then there was the sound of crunching metal, shattering glass and… probably the airbags… and then all was silent except for what could be the crackling of fire….
He barely registered Edgerton's shouted 'Eppes,' the others around the table starting to move, before everything came to a stand-still when a groan came over the speaker.
The relief Alan felt over that shook him to his very core. Barely able to continue standing, his joy at knowing his son was alive at least, Alan leaned on the table. The respite was very short-lived, however, as another man's voice joined the one-sided conversation.
"Jesus Christ, Don. Colby gets into an accident and starts this whole damn investigation and then I come after you and bam!... you do the same thing, except you do it before I get to have my fun."
"King." Don's voice was music to Alan's ears but the tension around the dining room table had gone up several notches and the expressions on those gathered around him weren't good. Nikki had already grabbed her phone, calling dispatch for emergency services to locate the crash and render assistance; David was doing the same, getting the FBI and LAPD to put an APB on the man his son had named.
However, none of that registered any further than peripherally for Alan, as he was concentrating on what was happening with his son.
And what the man, King, said, everything he said, chilled Alan to the bone.
"Come on, Don, get outta the car."
"I'm not going… anywhere with you." Don sounded almost breathless. Maybe he'd cracked a rib or… Alan tried not to think of anything.
"Well, you're gonna have to because the car's on fire." Alan wasn't the only one who took a noisy breath.
Don stayed silent but Alan couldn't stand any longer and commandeered the closest chair. He waved off the hands that tried to aid him, completely focused on the conversation they were all prisoners of.
"You know, I should probably just kill you right here and now; I'm sure it'd be the most sensible thing to do, even if it meant that I wouldn't have all the fun like I'd planned."
"But, I suppose, there's always Colby. True, he wouldn't offer any resistance, but that would just make it easier to use him."
"I did tell him I'd be back."
A pause; Don, again, not saying a word.
"And then, of course, while I know he'd be hard to take down, once I got him drugged and bound up, Edgerton would certainly be worth it; a really great prize."
Alan, as well as everyone else at the table, tensed but very carefully refused to look at the man mentioned, although the eldest Eppes was aware of the surprise that the other agents unwillingly broadcasted with their body language.
Silence, except for what they knew now to be flames somewhere within the car Don was in, followed the statement.
"Get outta the car, Don."
It appeared that his son wasn't going to acknowledge the man, as they heard King continue, his voice dropping dangerously.
"Maybe I need to make this a bit more personal, seeing's how threatening the two guys you're most interested in isn't getting any reaction."
Alan and Charlie were the only ones to look at Agent Edgerton, finding the man's facial expression a blank frozen mask, but focusing back on the cell phone when there was the sound of movement and Don gasped in pain.
"How about I go grab your brother? He definitely isn't my type and he certainly wouldn't put up much of a fight but… with you dead, either by my hands or just letting you burn here, he's the next best thing for a little revenge. And then I'll go after Colby and Ian."
Alan, as well as a couple of the others gathered, looked to Charlie, who had turned pale before then flushing with anger at being dismissed so easily.
After a short pause, there was the sound of movement.
"You aren't gonna make this easy are you, Eppes." It wasn't a question. Whatever Don had done had obviously not set well with King as they could all hear the… satisfaction?... that colored the comment.
More sounds of movement and then a pained gasp from Don.
Then there was more crackling before complete static for just a second and then the line went dead.
There was stunned silence for only a moment before the room was filled with people moving and talking. Alan didn't even try and figure out what was being said or who was going where or doing what; all he could think of was that his eldest son had just been in a car accident and then kidnapped by the same person who'd not only sexually assaulted one of Don's own agents, but hundreds of police officers and over a dozen other FBI personnel.
A tense silence finally registered with Alan and he looked up to find David and Ian glaring at each other.
Alan had heard about Agent Edgerton but he'd been willing to give the man the benefit of the doubt. In all that time, while he'd certainly discerned the restrained power and… threat… that lay within one of the Bureau's most valued agents, he hadn't actually seen anything, really.
But now, Alan, still at the table, was witnessing at least a portion of that power, first hand.
He'd come to know Don's team relatively well in the years that had followed his son returning to Los Angeles, and he had never seen David so rattled, not even with regards to Colby's triple agent business. However, the man who had, apparently, been assigned by Don just that morning to watch after him and Charlie, was radiating danger, aggression and somehow banked the seething rage that Alan could all but see, had David trembling by the time Ian turned and stomped out to the backyard.
Alan swallowed. He was forced to admit that he, himself, was slightly shaky from just watching the encounter. This troubled him deeply.
Still sitting, unwilling to try and walk anywhere else, Alan's mind whirled as he tried to come to grips with all that had happened within the last several minutes. While he didn't have the mind to get involved in whatever Charlie and the rest of Don's team was doing while David stood in the living area, tense, talking on his cell phone, Alan's mind apparently had no trouble going back over bits of things that he'd recently heard.
"But, I suppose, there's always Colby. True, he wouldn't offer any resistance, but that would just make it easier to use him."
"I did tell him I'd be back."
While Alan didn't know much about the investigation, he'd seen Colby in the hospital, he'd heard his son talk about some aspects of the case and that Colby had been drugged… and that he wasn't the only victim. How could someone, particularly in law enforcement, perpetuate such crimes – especially against their own?
"And then, of course, while I know he'd be hard to take down, once I got him drugged and bound up, Edgerton would certainly be worth it; a really great prize."
Alan couldn't even fathom the image that his brain conjured. After seeing Edgerton with David, the elder Eppes couldn't imagine the man being taken down by anything short of death or serious injury. But given this man King's threat of going after a comatose Colby….
"Maybe I need to make this a bit more personal, seeing's how threatening the two guys you're most interested in isn't getting any reaction."
And then there was the matter of Don's obvious attraction to Colby… and Agent Ian Edgerton.
He knew that Ian had stayed at the house this morning instead of going back to LA. However, Alan had thought that, with Charlie and him downstairs, Edgerton had napped in Charlie's room. Looking back on the rush of the morning, Alan supposed that some of the redness around his son's and Ian's faces could have been due to… his mind shied away from the imagery his thoughts came up with.
And then his heart stuttered.
"How about I go grab your brother? He definitely isn't my type and he certainly wouldn't put up much of a fight but… with you dead, either by my hands or just letting you burn here, he's the next best thing for a little revenge. And then I'll go after Colby and Ian."
To have that monster holding his eldest son captive and then to contemplate Charlie in the man's hands as well was enough to give him a bout of nausea that he had to fight not to give in to. While he knew Don was incredibly strong willed and stubborn, his youngest son was much more… fragile, not only in his mind but his body as well. Charlie was an academic, for crying out loud. He wasn't suited for such….
Alan didn't allow his mind to go further down that path and concentrated on the confrontation he'd witnessed between David and Ian.
"… I know that Don's gonna want someone he trusts, personally, watching out for his family…. Someone Don would prefer watching after his dad and brother, someone who's completely qualified to take down King if he decides to come after them."
"… I don't know what King meant when he said what he said and I don't want to know…. Don's always put everyone else before himself and with Colby being a part of the team and in a coma, I can understand that angle but…." Alan recalled David shaking his head, clearly unable or unwilling to process the images that his own mind must have conjured up, as if he too was thinking along the lines Alan was trying not to.
"All I know right now is that if anything happens to Alan or Charlie, especially after pointing it out to you, Don would never be able to live with himself."
Alan knew that that was true. Don would never be able to live with himself if the monster that had kidnapped Don somehow got to Charlie or him.
David had trailed off, whether because the comment didn't need to be finished or because of Ian's expression.
"Damnit, David! This is what I do for a living!"
Alan had shivered as the man continued – his voice going deadly calm and becoming colder.
"It doesn't matter what King said or why he used me or Colby against Don like he did, the situation is still the same: Don has been kidnapped by the man responsible for hundreds of sexual assaults on law enforcement officers and agents and he could be the guy who also murdered two of them. King is a fully trained SWAT member, the leader of said team, and he's going to be harder to track and take down than the average bad guy. You need me out there."
The elder Eppes' breath had stopped in his lungs. They suspected King of also being the… the man… who'd killed those two police officers?
David and Ian had moved a little ways away but Alan had still been able to hear what had been said.
"… But until they're found, we, all of us including Don, need to know that, if that bastard decides to follow through on his threat, Alan and Charlie have the best available to protect them."
Out of the corner of his eye, Alan caught sight of the tall, dark haired sniper as he re-entered the Craftsman. Agent Edgerton seemed exceedingly calm as he looked to David, who nodded and then took a deep breath. Apparently the agent had pulled himself together, better than Alan at the moment anyhow, and that seemed to have made David relax as well.
Alan snorted inwardly, unable to blame his eldest son's second-in-command's reaction. If Edgerton was still as wound up as he'd been before he returned, Alan didn't think he would have been able to hold it together as well as he was doing right now.
Then he watched as the forbidding man, because that's exactly how Alan saw him now, began going through the house, their home, like… Alan shook his head, unable to come up with the right word or phrase to finish that thought. Edgerton stalked over every inch of the house, garage and the grounds; finding every nook and cranny that existed.
Heck, if Alan didn't know that they didn't have any mice, he would have suspected the agent of naming all of the rodents. And then shooting all of them so they didn't provide a problem later on.
Alan tried to see what his son noticed about the man who was, right this moment, distressing him alarmingly. He was beginning to wish that he'd never welcomed the man into his home and that his son, his sons, had no connection to him at all.
Apparently, Don trusted this frightening individual more than most. He also appeared to be somewhat… attracted to the man.
Alan ran a hand over his face, shaking his head.
Taking a breath, he made to shift to his feet, making sure his legs would hold him steadily before moving towards the kitchen.
He needed a drink.