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Ianto knew it was coming and when the Sheriff's skiff bumped against the pier he was sitting on he simply rose and reached for the guide rope.
"Sheriff Hastie" Ianto said amicably.
"They want to talk to her, are kinda insistent" Hastie said without preamble knowing this man didn't want pleasantries which was fine by him. Hastie liked plain talk.
"She is due home from the base with Jack this avo. We can come in about four?" Ianto asked, canting his head, "Coffee?"
"Nah, gotta head back to tell them" Hastie sighed as he pushed off and as Ianto watched him leave he had that unsettling feeling that something had just happened that was not fortuitous but no matter how he played back the conversation he could not find what had worried him.
He went inside and made sure Mainframe was up and running, nothing to be seen and he scolded himself for being weirded out about nothing.
The jeep roared up the drive with both father and daughter looking pleased with themselves as they clambered out only to have Ianto meet them with a look of doom as he explained what had happened while they were away and Kara climbed back into the driver's seat.
"I need a shower" Jack said as he kissed Ianto and agreed to stay home with Sydney as Ianto slid into the passenger seat and then held on for grim life as his daughter sped like the maniac her father's daughter was towards the Sherriff's department and the waiting interrogation he didn't want.
Kara went in first as Ianto folded to read a magazine without much real interest. He was covertly watching the woman behind the desk, the man who kept walking in and out of other offices looking covertly at Ianto and then at a man who was supposedly working at a desk but his phone call seemed endless and mostly hushed whispers that had Ianto wondering who he was speaking with.
Ianto removed his cell phone and called mainframe, giving the correct covert messages to have her check the phones. He felt stupid asking her to tap the phone for the local sheriff's department but so damned curious to see why he felt the need. He was not surprised when her polite reply was that it was both an unlisted phone and definitely in the upper region behind the mangroves where they suspected the boy had come from.
Ianto pondered this as Kara emerged and he stepped towards the door to the office as a click of a phone hitting it's cradle had him looking back at the man who made a motion with his hand and Ianto was told that he was not required to give a statement at this time.
Ianto didn't like it one bit.
Something was up, something was definitely off and he wanted to get home but there was the problem of a possible tail and he…. Oh gods. Hastie.
Ianto fumbled for his phone and called the cottage but got no answer, then calling mainframe for the same result. Why was she not answering? Was she busy?
"Tad?"
"Step on it love, drive like I am not in the vehicle" Ianto snarled as he started to run a diagnostic on Mainframe, "We were a diversion, they wanted us out of the house for some reason."
"But Dad didn't come" she frowned.
"Yeah"
Kara sped up the drive and the gravel spat from the tyres into the garden but she knew Ianto would not be scolding her as he leapt from the passenger seat and headed towards the house only to hesitate and cant his head, his eyes scanning.
"Kara, stay in the vehicle" Ianto demanded "Weapon up."
She nodded and then called out softly, "Tad? Sydney is OK, right?"
Ianto didn't answer, heading around the house as he took in the open screen door and the swipe of blood on the knob that meant someone entered already injured. The body was checked and stepped over as Ianto moved past a bullet riddled dead man whose look of surprise as mirrored by that of a dead Captain who lay in the flowers by the back door. He was naked, obviously had been in the shower when Mainframe has alerted to incoming visitors of the uninvited kind.
So. They had come, met Jack, fired on one another, Jack felled one, took a hit, injured another….one? Two?
Ianto straightened Jack's head to help the severed neck as the blast had severed most of it and he knew Jack was gonna be pissed if he came back with a crick in his neck. Ianto stood and then saw a little splotch of something under the deck and his heart was in his thoat as he approached to look down at the puppy with dread.
Then a little head raised to look up at him with fear and he could have wept with relief as he saw that the little one was just terrified, not injured and he motioned for him to stay in the dirt, hoping he understood as Ianto crept up the back steps to the side door, his heart thumping with adrenaline, anger and that little thrill of a hunt.
Those inside might be armed, dangerous and killers but they were woefully underestimating the one coming for them.
Ianto was immortal after all.
And pissed as all hell.
