Chapter 11 - What's Wrong?

I know it's so wrong but I'm so far gone

Don't need you to tell me I'm so cynical

Quit being so over-skeptical

Don't need a metaphor for you to know I'm miserable - Pvris

Harm's POV

I've never driven these streets so fast and hardly ever ran as many red lights as I did. I can't help her if I kill myself in the process but, the sound of Mac's voice was enough to make a chill run down my spine. I knew something was off before Sadik was involved but after that solitary visit to the hospital whatever was happening to her grew exponentially. We spoke once, maybe twice each time she repeated the same words that did nothing to calm me: "I'm fine."

Fine wouldn't have a woman facing the unknown without taking precaution. Fine would offer me some sort of conversation where our talk wasn't cut short and she didn't try to get me off the line as soon as possible. Fine wasn't a person who shot and killed a terrorist in her own home and had to spend half a week in a hotel in order for Webb's cronies to clean up the mess. Fine would afford me at least one other visit after I spent four days in the hospital worried sick. Fine meant she would answer one of my damned messages, seventeen to be exact where I knew my desperation grew exponentially.

She wasn't fine. She was far from being fine and every single client I've had that dealt with PTSD often did with a cost, some deadlier than others. And that is what terrifies me the most, the unthinkable notion that Mac would hurt herself. Oh God, I don't want to think of that, I can't when she is one of the strangest persons I know.

You've seen her fall. My brain suggests and never shuts down that thought only produces the images of a drunken woman hurling hurtful insults at me.

I didn't expect to find her apartment so dark, not a sliver of light coming from anywhere. Mac wasn't fond of the darkness, it reminded her of too many nights hiding from her father in black safety of her bedroom closet. She always kept some light on, even when she slept the complete absence of light was a cause for anxiety.

"Mac?" If the darkness wasn't enough to concern me, her open door added to my fear when she didn't immediately answer. "Mac?"

My own anxiety begins to rise until I catch the tiniest of movements that forces my eyes to focus on her sofa and the figure sitting on one end. I flick on her lamp, hear Mac wince when the light hits her eyes and that's when I see her, really see her.

Her legs are curled up against her chest, her head is buried between them. She's either wearing clothes that are far too big for her or the pounds have unnecessarily come off her lithe form. She seems so fragile as even the barest of touches could break her.

I've seen her hurt before both physically and emotionally. I've been on the receiving end of her ire but this...This is not her. Not my Marine who has always been far stronger than I could ever be.

There's the oddest of smells, something of a citrus combined with sweet formaldehyde that lingers just enough to be noticed. I suspect Clay's piece of shit team didn't do a good enough job of airing out the place. Hell, I would have ripped apart the carpet not left a whitening stain where that fucking son-of-a-bitch probably died.

The trace of blood was gone, I'll give them credit for that but a certain staleness also hung in the air and I wonder how the hell Mac has lived in this place for the last few days.

The last thing I smell is alcohol, that noxious odor it gives off once it tries on fabric. I spot the reason for that smell in an expensive bottle of vodka in her hands. No...No Mac.

I feel the stinging of my eyes and brush back the tears before they fall. Her first foray off the wagon was brief and somewhat my fault for not staying with her. This time I'm scared for her especially if the tumble left so many scars she couldn't ever heal.

"D-did you..dr-drink?" I stammer out and my breath catches when she shakes her head and extends the nearly full bottle towards me.

"I wanted to. I poured some...I couldn't."

"Is there more?"

"No."

I pull it out of her grasp and hurry to the kitchen to dump the damned thing down the sink. I'm determined more than ever to help her and not stop even if she hates me later. "You need to get out of here. I'm getting you out of here."

She didn't argue and as I bent down to help her up, Mac's arms wrapped around me. "Help me."

"I will."

I let her into my apartment and suddenly I'm at a loss. A litigator who can normally sway a jury with nothing to say. Truthfully, I've been at a loss since she wordlessly left her place and climbed into my SUV. We didn't talk on the ride over just sat in silence with the only sound of tires gripping the road.

I had questions, of course. Hundreds that I expected answers to but knew not to ask. "Mac...wha-"

But as she stands in the center of my apartment with her shoulders slumped, her hand tightly gripping a gym bag and her eyes fixated on some spot on the ground, all I want is to touch her.

I want to touch her, to hold her and slay every single one of those demons until there is nothing left to haunt her.

I want her to be mine again, to share the simple pleasure of just being in each other's company without interruptions. I want to love her and I want to be loved by her in return. I want her back, the jarhead I fell for, my best friend who would traipse to the ends of the Earth just to protect me from myself.

I want to beg for forgiveness, to confess that while I may have been with other women, it was always her I wanted by my side. My sweet siren, the reason I would happily wreck my emotional ship on her shore.

My hand reaches out and I stop myself. This isn't about me and my wants. It's about her and while Mac continues to stare at nothing, I walk to the kitchen rambling sentence I don't really understand.

"You can take my bedroom, I got the couch. You need to sleep...err rest. There's clean towels on the rack above the toilet and if you need something to wear you...well, you brought clothes so, of course you wouldn't need something to wear but umm… say you did grab anything out of the drawers and…"

I keep talking, pointing out parts of my apartment she is more than familiar with. Once upon a time it was common for her to come over, to help set the table, to know where I kept my glasses, utensils and the occasional bags of chips and cookies I kept around only for her.

It was normal for us to share a pizza, to sit in a companionable silence while we went over cases. I miss that simplicity sometimes but, more often than not I miss those chances I never took to tell her how I feel.

Instead I waited for the biggest snafu in Clayton Webb's history to profess my love for her. I was the desperate one that night and she was just as eager to end our dance. The moment of pleasure in her arms, the feel of the sweet lock of her body clutching mine and I unraveled. She completed me, filled in the dark spots and breathed life back into my weary soul.

I loved her so much that the words fell from my lips over and over until she believed me. But, she never said it back. Not once. Those looks she would give me, the ones I had been secretly (and miserably) ignoring for years had vanished.

I didn't notice the change. I was too self absorbed and happy that I finally got the girl to see the landslide. "Mac?"

She's still standing there, her body ramrod straight and her face is as impassive as I've ever seen it. "Mac?" I say her name again as gently as possible and then repeat it a little louder but neither gets a response until I speak her given name "Sarah."

It makes her jump and I curse myself for the zillionth time when it comes to my actions around her. At least she turns to me and that blank expression turns confused as if she didn't know how she got here. Oh Mac. "The shower takes a few minutes to get warm." I explain and almost pull the duffle out of her grasp which she tries to take away. I don't relent on this simply clasp a hand around her wrist and gently pull her towards my bedroom. "Relax, you're safe here."

She had been showering for a while and I forced down every barbaric, male instinct to stomp in there and demand explanations. Rushing her would be a grave idea. I can't just fix her because she needs to be willing to accept help. I just want my Marine back, even if we're just friends.

When she finally comes out to the kitchen she looks much better. Her hair is slicked back, her skin has a pinkish hue. She smells insanely good like ginger and lavender and I wonder how long that scent would linger on my sheets.

The shorts she wears stop at midthigh and her t-shirt is a gift from when she first bought her Vette; a well worn Chevy tee that looked very comfy. She hops up on one of the barstools, tugs at the hem of her shorts and then stares at the cup of tea I've slid to her. Earl Grey, her favorite, with an added squeeze of lime. "What am I doing here?"

"You don't remember?"

She shakes her head and frowns. "No. The last few days they've been a blur." Mac takes a sip and sighs but it isn't a content type and that makes me sad.

"You asked me to help… I decided staying in your place was not a good idea for now… The smell-"

"-is awful, I know... But, it is better now, at first...Clay's people cleaned up the mess. My mess." She takes a sip and sighs and then proceeds to run a finger over the rim, slow and meticulous. "It was one helluva mess."

She sighs and holds the cup with one hand, staring into it as if it held some sort of answer. The irrational and impulsive side of me wants to come around, grab her by the shoulders and shake her out of whatever funk she's living in.

I want to chastise her for not getting help sooner. I want to yell at her for buying that bottle of vodka in the first place. Instead I take a sip of the tea and let the warm liquid calm those thoughts.

"It was a lot of blood… a lot." She says quietly and then takes another sip as if needing the liquid courage to speak to me. "I've...You know I've seen death before, I've killed before but this was a lot of blood."

"You did what you had to do, Mac. Sadik was-"

"Don't say his name!" Her outburst makes me jump and I nearly spill the tea all over myself when her voice echoes in the stillness of my apartment. "Don't say it...I don't want to hea his name ever again."

"Okay...Okay, never again." I vow and wonder if my question will stop whatever purging she needed to get out. After a few breaths she's composed again, her finger back to the rim running slow circles around as if the action is calming to her. "Do you need anything? I can make you something to eat, anything you want."

She shakes her head and swallows hard as if the concept of food could make her nauseous. It's a rarity for her not to accept a meal from me and once we started dating - or whatever it was - I had begun to stock up on items she liked because I enjoyed making her smile. That too had begun to dwindle and had I caught on sooner, I may have been able to get her help, to pick apart whatever darkness had taken over.

"I shot him…"

"I know...Webb told me."

"He didn't tell you everything. I shot him...not once or twice but I shot him...I emptied the goddamned magazine until all I heard was the hammer hitting the pin...I think I kept shooting after that too, I ah...I don't remember."

"How did he get into your apartment?"

When she looks up at me her eyes are wide and scared, her body shakes a little and then she falls back into the same trance. "He was waiting for me. After I left the hospital, he was waiting...I didn't think he'd come for me so soon... I wasn't prepared for that. Neither was Webb...a neighbor heard the gunshots and...well."

The bastard had snuck into her apartment twice that she knew of, maybe more times and I know how badly that kind of violation feels. I had my own break ins from my own personal madman - Clark Palmer. I shudder to think of him and how far he could have gotten. By the same token, I am jealous that my partner killed her tormentor while mine sits in a jail cell probably plotting another form of revenge.

"He wanted me to make him tea like a good subservient woman would….He said...he called me a whore."

I feel my fists roll into tight balls, my short fingernails dig into the skin of my palm so hard I know I broke skin. What kills me the most is to see her head cast downwards as if she believed the label he'd given her. By the way she thoughtfully bites her lower lip, I know she does. It's the same term Joe MacKenzie had used to designate the young woman trying to get out from under his thumb. I hate her father for that and although Mac might have forgiven him, I can't. And I hope Sadik Fahd rots in hell as well. "You're not a who-. You're not that and you never will be."

"Aren't I? Did you forget that night a few weeks ago between us at the motel?"

I can't because, although the bruises have faded, my hands still burn when I remember how they wrapped around her delicate throat. It still makes me sick and it's a kind of shame I can't shake. "I can't forget that."

"Then he was right."

"Mac…"

"No, he was right. Not in regards to sex but, my life...He was trying to free me from this and parts of it began to make sense…. He fucked with my head, he got into my head and I agreed. I was everything he told me I was, a woman in a man's uniform, a whore that pimped myself...He was right." She takes a long sip of the tea and winces when the now, tepid liquid slips down her throat.

"He was targeting a nightclub in Georgetown. Trying to use that to manipulate me." Her blank gaze makes me realize she's thinking of that night and that sick bastard. "He wanted me. He wanted my body, my mind, my soul. He wanted to possess me because we both had Iranian blood. He tried to use my grandmother against me. God, Harm, he knew everything about me. Even about...about us - you and me. I told him you died at the hospital because I was afraid that he'd try again and that you'd-"

The tears she's held back finally fall in a slow cascade down her cheek. She tries to cover her face and keep the impassive facade but when a sob breaks free, I can't stop myself from going to her.

For the second time this night she clings to me, her arms wrapping around my waist when my own envelopes her. I hold her to me as tight as possible and let her ride out this storm without question, without judgement. After several minutes I feel her push away only slightly.

"I hated you for a while, you know? But I didn't want you to die."

"I'm alive. A little battered but, I'm alive and so are you."

"Am I? I feel like I'm slipping away and I can't stop the skid." She finally slips out of the bar stool and begins pacing the apartment, the fsce having slipped back in place. "He was gonna kill innocent kids to have me and I would have let him. I was going to let him do whatever he wanted with me if only he'd stop. He gave me a niqab and headdress...ordered me to strip."

The bastard was going to convert her by stripping everything that made up Mac's identity and conform her to his. I could imagine her resisting Sadik for a while but, would he have broken her down eventually? Or would her Marine spirit force a fight from her so severe it ended with him taking her life? "He let his guard down when I stood in front of him wearing only my underwear. The bastard placed the pistol on my coffee table and I knew that was my only chance. Kill or be killed."

That's when she dove for the gun as he leered at her half-naked body. They wrestled a few lunches to the stomach leaving her breathless but her knowledge in hand to hand combat was far superior. Somehow she was able to twist the weapon in his hand, to point it at his gut while pulling the trigger over and over until he stopped moving

"I was covered in his blood.. he was...on top of me." She pushed him off of her, Mac said. And then delivered the final blow - a shot to the head.

"He was dead. He was dead when I pointed the gun at the back of his head and shot off two more rounds." She raised her arm while curling her fingers to mimic a gun. "He's dead...I'm free but…I'm not."

"Yes, you are. You're free."

When she turns to me I see the darkness in her eyes, the pain so visceral it was frightening. I see her body start to sway, her legs buckling and somehow I am able to catch her before she falls.