It's been so nice to write this story again. Despite all the bitter angst, it feels like summer to me – because that's when I get a chance to write it! I want to thank Loozy, Loopey-Laura, rozzy, anmodo, and jewelbaby for reviews! We hit 200! ;D You guys rule!

(x)

After Jack left for the NYPD, Samantha situated herself at a worktable across from Vivian. She stared down at a computer ream of paper. Her brown eyes glazed over as she tapped her pen, unaware of the quiet rhythm thumping from her desktop.

Vivian didn't raise her eyes, just her eyebrows. "Something on your mind?"

"Yeah, you could say that."

Vivian tilted her head, as if to say 'fair enough.' "Care to share?"

"Alright," Samantha said. Whether she intended it or not, attitude saturated her tone. "What the hell kind of investigation are we running here?"

Huh, Vivian thought. So we aren't going to sugarcoat the obvious. Not that Samantha normally did. Good thing, too. As far as work was concerned, it was one of her best qualities. "Are we talking about Martin, Jack, or Danny?"

"Right now?" She lifted the packet of papers. "Danny."

Vivian sucked in an anxious breath. They'd been spending a lot of time with those phone numbers, more than Vivian had ever personally desired. Though the numbers weren't telling on Jordan's fabled boyfriend, they'd shared other secrets along the way – mostly about Danny Taylor.

Samantha started to count on her fingers. "Let's start from the beginning. A year ago, Danny personally sets Jordan and Jason up at St. Luke's orphanage. He gets so involved that he calls the orphanage non-stop – at least once a day. Sometimes as early as …" She used her pen to scroll down the paper until she found the line she was looking for, and then she circled it. "Two a.m. Most likely to Jordan Coliandri, and if not to Jordan, to Sr. Rachel – who helps raise the children there."

Vivian had her own perceptions of the phone records, but she kept them to herself. Samantha was on a roll now. She was willing to ride it out. Samantha was working up to something. Vivian just hoped it wasn't a breakdown.

Samantha released the papers, and they hit against the table with a crisp slap. She continued to count on her fingers. "He gets so wrapped up in them personally that he starts volunteering there on weekends and some weekdays, and it doesn't stop there. According to Jack, Danny picked Jordan up at all hours of the night, no matter what section of New York she was in, most likely when she was done dropping off Bryce's care packages."

Samantha held up three fingers now. "When Jordan gets picked up for drug trafficking, Danny can't handle it. He goes Margaritaville, tops out at the bar. Then, nursing a hangover from the night before, he finds out that Jordan and Jason are both missing, comes in today and … and … he goes postal. He uses Bryce as his own personal punching bag and takes off."

Vivian silently held her chin in her hand. Samantha listed the facts in baldly simple terms, but no matter how detached they tried to be – at the end of the day they were all a team. No matter how necessary it was to the case, speaking about Danny's involvement felt like a breach of privacy, or worse, like betrayal.

Samantha appeared too riled up to share in Vivian's sentiments. She threw open her arms. "How did this happen?"

"Which part?" Vivian asked.

"Any of it."

"Well, let's take Bryce Layman. Danny didn't find that interrogation room by himself," Vivian reminded her. "He had help with that one."

"Yeah. Which brings me to my next point. Martin," Samantha said. She got up from the table. "He walked into the NYPD like he was mounting a hostile takeover."

Vivian spoke softly and slowly, like a teacher speaking to a student who is a little bit slower than the others. "Martin just got done finding the body of a police officer. He snapped. It happens."

"No." Samantha shook her head again. "He didn't snap. He knew exactly what he was doing."

"Oh, c'mon, Sam," Vivian drawled out. "Nobody knows that but Martin."

Samantha put emphasis on each word. "He thought about it." Though Vivian didn't like to admit it, her words held clout. Samantha had gotten to know Martin well over the past few months, better perhaps than she'd planned. She knew how he thought, and right now, it gave her authority. "He knew what he was doing. He knew what would happen, and he didn't care. He broke the rules anyway, and damn the consequences."

Vivian leveled her stare at Samantha. "And where do you think he learned that trick?"

(x)

At the mention of his family and his past all in the same breath, the hot temper drained from Danny's features. His face went ashen. "What are you talking about?"

Fr. Jorge faced Danny in the small rectory. "I am talking about your brother and your parents."

Danny's back went as stiff as a rail. His voice was hard – final. "No. They've got nothing to do with this."

The priest leaned forward, closer to Danny. "You have gone too long, hijo." His voice grew harder in time with Danny's. "The more you push them away, the more they will haunt you."

Danny's words came out flat and emotionless. "My parents are dead."

"And your brother?"

"He may as well be."

Fr. Jorge frowned. "Rafael is alive-"

"Don't mention their names."

Fr. Jorge kept his composure. "Why not?"

Danny's glare came back. It started out cold, but then grew hotter as he began to speak. "All you know are their names. You don't know who they are."

"Whoever they are," he said softly. "I feel sorry for them."

Danny sneered. "If only you knew them, padre, you wouldn't waste your sympathy."

"It is not my sympathy they need."

Danny tried get rid of the sharp emotions brewing just beneath his surface, like a person who fears he or she is losing their mind will block out phantom voices. The dead were dead, he told himself. When a person saw dead bodies as often as Danny did, he understood just how useless the dead were. Danny let none of the emotion he was feeling slip into his voice. "They need nothing," he said dismissively. "They're God's problem. Not mine."

For the first time since Danny had known him, Fr. Jorge looked upon him with not understanding, not compassion, not even anger – but disappointment. "They are your own flesh and blood, Danny."

"No, that's where you're wrong, padre. They were a last name, and now they're not even that."

Fr. Jorge shook his head. "The way you speak of them is wrong."

"Who are you, padre?" Danny demanded. "Huh? You think you know my family because I mentioned them once or twice in confession?"

Fr. Jorge stood his ground. "It's been more than once or twice."

(x)

Samantha stared at Vivian from her position beside the disappearance timeline, still not sure whether she heard Vivian correctly. "Wait a minute. How is this Jack's fault?" she demanded.

Vivian put up her hands. "Take it any way you want, Samantha. All I'm saying is that with the way Jack's run this place in the past year and a half… I'm not surprised."

"Martin did this of his own volition."

Vivian tilted her head in that questioning way she so often did. "Are you so sure of that?"

Samantha's eyes squinted. Without a word, she asked Vivian to spell out exactly what she meant by that.

She obliged. "My point is that we don't know what was going through Jack's head when he sent Martin to the NYPD, and we don't know what was going through Martin's when he gave Danny his interrogation slot. We can't. But none of that matters. It was Danny who went into that room."

Samantha still refused to back down. "Danny's gone off the deep end. We knew that would happen. It was Martin who put him in the express lane."

"They made mistakes, like we all have. That's not what's important-"

"Danny's mistakes I can understand, Viv. But Martin has the outside perspective that Danny doesn't. He just chose not to use it."

Vivian pinned Samantha with her frown. "You act like you're so removed from all this." Samantha looked up to find Vivian staring straight at her. "You know exactly why Martin put him in an interrogation room with Bryce Layman. He did it for the same reason you went out to get Danny after his night at the bar, and for the same reason Jack took this case."

"Yes," Samantha loudly agreed. "We care about him, but that doesn't mean Martin or Danny had the right to physically assault a suspect."

Vivian's thick New York accent became thicker as she answered Samantha back. "Martin thought he was doing Danny a favor by sending him in there."

"Yeah, and because of that, Danny almost killed Bryce Layman."

Vivian spoke again before Samantha could. "Danny has been traumatized. Those kids were like family to him-"

Samantha interrupted her to make a point. "Our families have been involved before, and it's never gotten to be this bad."

"That's because the things that have to do with Danny's family are coming out now in this case," Vivian told her. "Whatever happened to him, to his parents, to his brother is so painful that he can't even talk about it." Vivian pointed to the pictures of the children staring back from the disappearance timeline. "Whatever happened to him, these kids remind him of it. Just like Clare Metcalf, just like half the troubled teens that come through here."

Vivian turned back to face Samantha. "You talk about getting over-involved and breaking boundaries… but Danny didn't get drawn into this case out of romance or personal gain or revenge or any other of a million wrong reasons. When Danny's out there, he's not just saving Jordan and Jason. He's saving himself."