Kim let herself into her apartment, it was already dark out, not that it was ridiculously late, it was just a shitty cold winter day in Chicago. She could hear Zoey talking to someone on the phone and it didn't sound like a particularly pleasant conversation. She was in her room with the door ajar and Kim tried not to listen but curiosity got the better of her, whether it was curiosity or perhaps her cop brain it didn't really matter.
"Oh hi." Kim smiled uneasily as Zoey came out and Kim beckoned Zoey towards her and gave her a hug and rubbed her back lightly. "How are you today?"
Zoey smiled a little as she stepped back. It was nice to get some affection. "I'm okay."
"Adam is on his way, he just had to go home and get a change of clothes, and then we are going to all sit down and talk about this. He's going to pick up dinner on the way."
"Okay." She nodded quietly. Zoey was dreading it, so far it had been calm but only an idiot would think that was going to continue. She was pre-programmed for shit fight, that had been her life for as long as she could remember. They were always fighting over her, her mom trying to keep her 'safe' and her dad insisting that she was being smothered.
"Who were you talking to? Your Dad, Mom?" Kim couldn't help herself, she had to know.
"Yeah, that was Dad. He's pretty worried, he didn't know I was here."
"And?" Kim laid her hands on the bench to steady herself. Zoey was so non-plussed about it now, but the conversation had sounded anything but calm. She was a little annoyed that obviously Zoey had lied when she told her that her parents knew where she was, but that was the least of her problems now.
"And nothing, said he'd send me money if I needed it." She reached for her bottle of water and took a drink.
"Is that all?"
"Yep. Told me I had to deal with it if I wanted to come home again." Zoey sighed. "I guess his idea of dealing with it is getting rid of it."
"And where do you sit with that?"
"I don't know." She looked at Kim sadly. "I don't know what to think? Would you do it?"
Kim sucked in a deep breath. "Maybe, if I was sixteen and on my own, maybe I would. I was never in that position though, so I don't know." She tried not to give too much away and if she was sixteen it would have been a totally different decision to the one she made just a few months ago.
Zoey looked at her phone as it rang and her finger hovered as she glanced quickly at Kim. "You can get that if you want." Kim nodded at her. Adam was still a little way off and Kim wanted to grab a shower before he arrived anyway to wash off the grime of the day. While it was below freezing out and you layered up, when you had to chase people on foot you soon got hot and sweaty. It was also a good way to put a full stop on the work part of life and start the living part of life.
Also it was obvious that Zoey didn't want her to overhear that conversation. Despite her assertion that she didn't want to talk to anyone, she spent a lot of time clutching her phone waiting for it to ring or buzz with a message.
Kim disappeared into her bedroom but left the door ajar. It wasn't just that she wanted to listen, there was just something in the pit of her stomach that unsettled her. She just had a feeling that something was going to go sideways and she didn't want to be caught off guard again.
She enjoyed the hot shower and stayed in a little longer than usual until Adam stuck his head through the door and told her that he had arrived with dinner. He leant on the doorframe as Kim turned the faucets off and reached for her towel. "Where's Zoey? Is she okay?"
"In her room talking to someone."
"Calmly or…"
"Seems so. Why?" He appreciated the view and that Kim was completely comfortable with him being there watching. There was no awkwardness between them, there never had been. It was always something that surprised them, the ease of being around each other, even when they weren't really together.
"She was having a not quite calm conversation when I got home. Said it was Jordan."
"She told her Dad?"
"Yep. He's offered to send her some money to deal with it." Kim hung up the towel and started to get dressed. "Then she can come home."
"Nice." He stepped back and let Kim pass. "Never thought I'd say this but your family isn't as nice as mine."
"You know what, I agree." Kim stopped and stood on tip-toes to kiss his cheek. "Not sure if she's told Nicole yet."
"Maybe that's who she's talking to now? Maybe Nicole is being… a mother and like rational?" He followed her out of bedroom.
"Shush." She slapped his hand away as he tried to grab her ass. They promised themselves that they would be completely professional at work and they'd give Voight no reason to split them up but as soon as Adam had the chance to be close to Kim and touch her and appreciate her he rarely let the moment pass. They'd wasted far too much time already.
Zoey was waiting for them in the kitchen, she had started getting the plates out ready for dinner. "You can't help yourself can you?" she grinned at Adam as he whined that Kim had hurt him.
"Nope." He winked and grabbed one of the bags of take-out and started putting them on the plates.
It wasn't until they finished eating and cleaning away the dishes that Kim told Zoey it was time to sit down with them and talk about what was going on. "Firstly, Adam and I are here to support you no matter what happens or what you decide to do. That's not in question, not in the slightest. Okay?"
"Okay."
"What did your Dad say?"
"He ranted and raved and told me that if I wanted to come home I needed to get rid of it." Zoey wasn't exactly overflowing with affection as she talked about her Dad. "I am stupid apparently."
"You are not stupid." Adam told her quite empathically.
"No? Not according to him. Anyway, it's got nothing to do with him."
"What do you want to do?" Kim asked the most pressing question. Time was ticking, she was three months along and the longer the pregnancy went the more complicated it became.
"I don't want it but I can't like get rid of it. That feels wrong, so I thought I could have it and you and Adam could look after it and maybe when I am older we can tell it the truth and I could….like take it back." Suddenly it hit Kim that Zoey had no idea the magnitude of all this. She was immature, physically and mentally. Kim had also fooled herself into believing that she was older than she was and had her head screwed on slightly right.
"What?" Kim gasped. Adam felt the air shoot out of her and did briefly wonder if she was going to take another breath.
"I just thought…"
"Well you thought wrong." Adam snapped. Kim looked at him sharply and Zoey seemed a little shocked. "Come on, this isn't a game Zoey, or a doll you can just stick in a box when you don't want to play with it anymore. It's a baby, a child, a human life."
"I know." She snapped back at him. "What else am I supposed to do?"
"Maybe you can grow up and realise that actions have consequences and this is one of them."
"Adam, shut up." Kim barked at him and he held up his hands in defeat and sat back. He was waiting for her to say yes to taking the baby when she turned back to Zoey. "That's not an option Zoey. You have three choices. You take responsibility and raise your baby, you put the baby up for adoption or you abort the pregnancy. That's it." Kim was steely and her words lacked any skerrick of affection, they were cold and brutal and then she softened. "And we will support you whatever you chose to do."
He was more than a little surprised, some part of him was waiting for Kim to offer to take the baby to feel whole again. To replace the one they lost, it had ignited her maternal instincts and it was still flickering in the back of her mind. At the beginning she wasn't sure she was ready and in reality, at the time she wasn't but as the weeks passed her desire to be a mom grew with the tiny baby inside her. While the baby was gone, that fire had been lit.
"I can't."
Kim put her hand on Adam's knee when she felt like he was about to speak again. "What do you want to happen then? Close your eyes and blink and suddenly it will all go away?" Adam could hear the pain in Kim's voice because she had told him that that was what it felt like some days, that she blinked and it was over.
"What about the father?" Adam tried to keep his voice calm and steer the subject in a slightly less painful direction for them. "What do you think he would want to do?"
"He wants me to take a test, make sure it's his."
"You've spoken to him?" Kim was a surprised. Yesterday she insisted that she wasn't even going to tell him.
"Yes." She added quietly. "He is not very happy, thinks it's my fault."
"Quite the charmer you chose." Adam muttered under his breath.
"He's not ready to be a Dad." That hurt Adam, he wasn't exactly ready to be a Dad when it happened but he quickly realised he wanted that more than anything. He wanted to be a Dad and it was still a hole in his heart that he never got to meet his child.
"Perhaps he should've worn a condom then." Kim was starting to get seriously annoyed with Adam's snide remarks and was close to telling him to leave. At least he hadn't dropped in that he knew about Hawk yet, they had agreed that had to come from Zoey.
"About Hawk?" Kim started carefully. "What will his parents say?"
Zoey shrugged and stared at her hands as she twisted them in her lap. "Zoey?" Kim bobbed her head so that she could see Zoey's face. She couldn't avoid them and their questions forever. This had gone on long enough. They had let her be, made her feel at home, now it was time to fess up.
"I don't know. I never met them, they are in Florida."
"Okay." Kim made it clear she wasn't satisfied with Zoey's answers. "And?"
"He's a little older." She whispered quietly.
"How much older?" Adam jumped in. He knew damn well how old he was. He was pretty sure he knew more about this guy than Zoey did. He may have had a clean skin but not everyone around him did. The company he kept wasn't top notch and he knew he was from Florida and his parents weren't fine upstanding citizens either. They weren't bad in the illegal sense of the word but they weren't exactly contributing members of society. Rednecks sprung to mind when he trawled through their online history. The family tree seem like it was more of a wreath than an actual tree. Ambition wasn't high on their list of priorities, unless owning guns and trucks could be classified as ambition.
"He's twenty-five."
Adam touched Kim lightly on the back and glanced at her from the corner of his eye. She was steadfast and resolute, she was a beast, an incredibly strong woman, and christ almighty he loved her. He knew that all he needed to do was let her know he was right there beside her.
Kim hissed between her teeth, it surprised even herself how angry she was to hear Zoey admit it. "You do realise this is illegal Zoey, this is illegal."
"What?"
"Statutory Rape Zoey." Adam added, she really didn't have a clue what she was doing. "Hawk, or whatever his actual name is, is breaking the law. You are under the age of consent. He is almost ten years older than you."
"No, I told him I was 18. It's not his fault." Zoey cried angrily, she wanted to get up and flee but Adam's hard stare had her rooted to the spot. "No. You can't do this. I trusted you."
Kim stood up and walked into the kitchen to pour another glass of water to steady herself. "You've got no idea the position you are putting us in Zoey." She started quietly. "We are cops, this is against the law."
"I trusted you." She wailed like a child and it was startling for both of them. As much as you wanted to believe that she understood what was going on Zoey was a child and the adult world she'd crashed into was suddenly unrelenting and confronting and she was crumbling like a sandcastle at high tide.
"Zoey." Kim started carefully. "You can trust us, we are not going to leave you in the lurch, I promise you we will be right here for you but you've got to understand that this is a tough position you've put us in as well."
She sat down next to Zoey and slipped her arm around her shoulder and pulled her closer. "I love you so much Zoey and I am so glad you came here, to me. Do you understand? We want you here and we are always going to be here for you, always."
"Yes." She sobbed.
"It's not a free for all though, there are rules, there are consequences and you need to make some decisions and so do we." She nodded towards Adam. "Let's leave it at that right now."
"I love you Tia." Zoey held onto Kim for dear life and Kim looked up at Adam. The tears in his eyes and pain written all over his face crushed her very soul.