Chapter 17 – Unexpected News
Tuesday Night, June 1, 2004

Martin hailed a cab and rushed to Samantha's apartment. He called her on the way to let her know that he was coming and to be careful about who she buzzed in the building. He didn't want to alarm her, but didn't know if he would be there in time.

Finally, the cab stopped at the apartment and the cabbie was happy to let Martin off, the man had been the most impatient customer he'd ever had. Martin raced to the intercom and restrained himself from repeatedly pressing the buzzer. Each moment that passed while he waited for her to answer, his mind was envisioning all of the horrible things that may have happened to prevent her from coming to it. Next to Martin, another resident had used his key to access the building and held the door for Martin, he accepted gratefully, but wondered how many others had been let in without being identified.

He skipped the elevator as he had the other night and raced up the flights of stairs. He arrived at her door out of breath and yelled, "Sam, Sam, it's me, let me in." Samantha immediately opened the door, she had just answered the intercom and had been greeted by silence. She tensed, thinking that Martin had used the shortened version of her name again to convey urgency.

Upon the door opening, Martin barraged her with questions, "Are you OK? Is there anyone here? Has anyone tried to get in? Why didn't you answer the buzz?"

Finally, she was able to interrupt the string of questions enough to let him know that she was alright, that no one had tried to come by and see her. She was confused and didn't know why Martin was acting so strangely, so protectively.

Martin paused for a second and noticed that Samantha was staring at him as if he had lost his mind. He reminded himself that Samantha didn't know the whole story, that she didn't realize why he had come so abruptly to her apartment. He made himself calm down, calm down for her sake. He reached out to touch her arm, comfortingly, "I'm sorry, I guess I'm overreacting."

"Overreacting to what?" Samantha asked, still puzzled.

"It's just, well, that Mariouchi guy posted bail this afternoon and I wanted to make sure he didn't come after you." Martin had grabbed onto her other arm too and holding her at arms length looking into eyes. He told himself that he was trying to reassure her, that all was okay, but he knew that he was also trying to draw strength from her.

Samantha felt the tension in Martin's hands and felt that the trembling wasn't just from the run up the stairs. She still didn't understand though, how could Mariouchi come after her, he didn't even know who she was, much less where she lived. She figured that Martin really was overreacting and she lead him to the couch. "You need to sit down, Martin, you're trembling. Let me get you something to drink."

"I'll come with you," he responded as he practically leapt off the couch. He knew he needed to calm down, but the thought of Samantha being alone, even in her own kitchen with him in the living room made him react.

"Martin," she said, and then louder, "Martin." Finally his head jerked toward the sound of her voice. "I'm just going into the kitchen, I'll be gone for a second, I'll be okay."

He allowed her to leave his side, but he watched her until she disappeared behind the kitchen wall and then he called out, "Samantha?"

"Yes," she responded.

"Oh, nothing, just checking." Samantha couldn't believe that he was 'checking' on her although he had just seen her enter the kitchen. She had to know what had spooked him, but his actions were really scaring her. She stared at the pantry wondering if there was someone hiding in it, although she knew that no one could have gotten in. Still the fear was there. She grabbed the pantry door and whipped it open. "See," she told herself, "nothing to worry about, no boogie monsters in my closet."

She brought Martin's water to him in the living room and sat on a chair facing the couch. The water nearly spilled when she passed it too him, his hand was shaking and he quickly set the water down. She had to know what was wrong. "Martin, talk to me, tell me what is worrying you so much. You said that you were scared that Mariouchi would come after me, but he doesn't know who I am. How could he find me?"

Martin scooted to the edge of the couch and took both of Samantha's hands in his and he began. "Remember during the op., we had just started and it looked like the guys weren't going to show. Remember that Jack offered you a chance to get out, to stop the op. I know you remember because you were furious with him."

Samantha forced herself to remember the incident, she had been upset with Jack for not believing in her abilities. Martin continued, "And then, after the guys … well after they got you. I kept telling the team to go in, to take them down without waiting for your signal. Well, you didn't have all of the information."

"Didn't have all of the information? What do you mean? We had just finished the pre-briefing, what was kept from me?" Samantha was a bit irked that she had been the undercover officer, but was obviously not on a need-to-know basis.

"Nothing was kept from you at the pre-brief, it was information we discovered during the operation, we didn't have the time to tell you about it." Martin was trying to ease into revealing the frightening information.

"Well, the op has been done for days now, why hasn't anyone …"

Martin cut her off, "we had hoped that you'd never need to know. But with Mariouchi being out of jail, it can't be helped." Martin squeezed her hands tighter as if to brace her for the statement he was going to make. "You see, Samantha, while you were running through the park and we were following in the woods we found an … an empty grave."

"You found what? How did you know it was a grave? It could have been hole, probably dug by some animal." Samantha tried to process the information, wondering why they had immediately thought it was a grave.

"It was a grave, Samantha. We know it was because traced in the dirt above it were the letters RIP, you know for Rest in Peace." Martin paused to allow Samantha to understand that they had really found a grave.

She spoke, "OK, so some kid dug a grave in the park and marked it like he'd seen in the movies. We didn't even know that these kids were killers until they'd attacked me. You and Jack were pleading with me to end the op earlier than that. Besides even if they had dug a grave, that doesn't mean they'd know where to find me now, they still didn't know who I was." As she spoke the words, Martin was shaking his head slightly as if he were negating the calm rational words she was speaking. Her confidence was shaking and she added, "they still didn't know who I am, right?"

Martin heard the question in her voice and knew that she wanted him to respond quickly in the affirmative, but he couldn't do that, he hadn't finished telling her everything that was written at the grave. "Samantha, underneath the letters was more writing. It said, 'SA Spade'. You know for Special Agent Samantha Spade. As soon as we saw it we knew what they were planning, murder was a lot more than we had predicted when we started the op. The whole team wanted to get you out of there because somehow these cretins had found out who you were and they intended to kill you."

Samantha had gone white upon hearing that her name was on the grave. Her mind went blank, but she vaguely felt Martin hands holding hers, squeezing them tightly. Martin kept talking, "So when I found out that the leader had made bail, I, I had to find you. I mean we just assumed that none of them would be able to raise that kind of money and we hadn't even told you that you could be in danger. If something had happened before I got here, I, I don't know what I'd do. I'm sorry, I'm sorry we didn't tell you, you deserved to know, but it's so awful, we didn't want you to know."

Samantha wasn't fully comprehending Martin's words, she kept flashing back to that morning in the park. She tried to envision the space in the trees that could have been her final resting place. In her mind she saw the terror on Martin's face when he read the words marking her grave, she heard his voice pleading with the team to end the op., to get her to safety. She had acted defiantly and was upset with Martin for not believing in her abilities. Finally, she no longer heard Martin's voice, he'd stopped talking and was staring at her. He pulled her out of the chair and next to him on the couch. He wrapped his arms around her and let the news sink in. Although he was attentive to Samantha he kept his guard up. He didn't know if Mariouchi had Samantha's address, but he wasn't taking any chances tonight.

TBC