A/N: Okay, I'm glad that I said "tentatively titled" when referring to this chapter, because I mixed up chapters 15 and 16 in my head. Chapter 16 is the one that's called "Over", and as I said before, that will hopefully be up by Monday.
This chapter is for my fellow MS shippers! By the way, my CBS station preempted the April 28 episode because the stupid president needed to give a press conference and heaven forbid we push back the news -- what happened?
P.S. Now that everyone knows who's behind it, I'd like to apologize to my friend Katie Davidson, for using her name to make one of my characters a psychopath. Katie D is one of the nicest people in the world, and definitely not a psychopath, and in the event that she ever reads this, I don't want her to think that I think about her like that. But she did give me permission to use her name should I ever get a book or screenplay published, and thinking up names for characters is not my strong point.
"It was an accident," Molly said, still struggling against her restraints. "It was an accident, and you know it."
"Yes, yes, I know," Kate said, sounding bored and feigning a yawn. "Stumbling around drunk and blah, blah, blah." She shook her head, rolling her eyes. "God, you'd think a genius would be able to come up with a better cover story than that."
Molly's eyes were fire. Danny half expected his ropes to burst into flame. "It's not a cover story, Katherine," said Molly, "and you know it isn't." She looked at Danny, and her eyes softened immediately. "I don't even remember why we were here," she said, to him, as though she needed to convince him that she was telling the truth. She really needn't bother. He would never believe the psychopath that had him tied up over her. "I don't remember anything about that night. And then five days later I woke up in the hospital, and I haven't had a drink since."
She'd mentioned the fire, back at the church, and he suddenly realized why churches meant so much to her. It wasn't just acknowledging some higher power that she should have died and didn't. She was attempting to atone for accidentally incinerating a house of God. Presumably. There was no way he'd ever know for certain – unless he asked her, of course. And he could never hold something like that against her, because he'd done many things he wasn't proud of while drunk.
"Perfect Molly," Kate said, and Danny winced at the coldness of her voice. Bitter much? he thought. "Everyone loves Molly. Burns down a church and gets off scot-free."
"Scot-free?" Molly asked. "You call four months in juvie, two hundred hours of community service, and a five thousand dollar fine scot-free?" She dug her heels into the floor and pushed her chair back, towards a pile of rubble. "That one stupid mistake almost cost me my entire damn future, and you're acting like all I got was a reprimand."
Kate lifted one shoulder in a shrug. "Well, you pled diminished capacity. And your parents were rich. So the jury took it easy on you."
"You never answered my question," Molly said, sliding her chair back another couple of inches. Danny leaned to the side, trying to get a look at the pile of rubble, wondering what in the hell Molly was trying to accomplish. "Why are you doing this?"
"You stole my life," Kate said, as if it were the most obvious answer in the world, and everyone should have arrived at that conclusion ages ago.
Molly looked, if possible, more confused than ever as she tilted her chair onto its back legs. "In what way did I steal your life?"
Kate sputtered incoherently for a few moments, not seeming to notice what Molly was doing. Danny raised his eyebrows. What was Molly doing? It looked as though she was trying to grab something from the pile of rubble. "Okay," Kate said, "so maybe you didn't really steal my life, but you got the life that I should have gotten. Perfect parents, perfect job, perfect everything."
Molly's chair dropped back onto all four legs with a bang. "My parents are dead, my job isn't all that much of a picnic, and my life basically sucks. What do I have that you could possibly want?"
Kate screamed in frustration and stormed over to Molly, grabbing a fistful of her hair and yanking her head back so forcibly that Danny's neck got sore. "Every one of my boyfriends has liked you better than me. They don't say it, but I know it. I know lust when I see it, and the way they looked at you…" She trailed off, then let go of Molly's hair. "When I met Steve, I thought it was different. But you got to him, too."
There were tears in Molly's eyes, but whether it was from the pain or the situation, Danny had no idea. "I don't know what you're talking about," Molly said.
"Don't lie to me!" Kate wandered away, momentarily out of Danny's line of sight, and returned with a gun that Danny recognized as his own. "I know he was cheating on me!"
Molly stared at the gun with wide eyes and followed its every movement as Kate gestured frantically. "If he was cheating, it wasn't with me."
Kate pressed the barrel of the gun directly between Molly's eyes. "Don't lie to me."
Molly was breathing heavily now, obviously trying to stay calm, and with Kate's attention diverted, Danny renewed his attempts to loosen the ropes binding him to the chair. If anything, he had to get free so he could help Molly – Kate was obviously unhinged and wasn't going to listen to reason, and Danny was afraid that she would actually pull that trigger. He'd just found Molly, and he wasn't about to lose her. Not like this. He deserved the chance to screw things up with her irrevocably.
"This may surprise you," Molly said, in a voice of forced calm, "but this isn't the first time there's been a gun to my head."
Kate laughed again, and Danny couldn't help but notice that this one sounded a little more maniacal than the others. "Right, because you're in the CIA. The CIA! Were you ever going to tell me? Or am I not important enough to know?"
Danny craned to look over his shoulder, searching for something – anything – that could remove his restraints. But there wasn't anything nearby, and he wasn't sure if he could sneak over to the nearest pile of rubble to look without attracting Kate's attention.
"I was trying to protect you," Molly said, but her statement was interrupted with another bout of crazed laughter from Kate.
"Bullshit! If you were lying about your job, what else are you lying about?"
Kate cocked the gun, and Danny looked up. But Molly seemed remarkably composed for someone who had a gun pointed at her head. She blinked dolefully, then jumped – still tied to the chair, using her feet to push off. When she landed, the bar between the chair's legs broke in half, freeing her feet. She kicked Kate in the stomach, and when Kate stumbled backwards, she kicked the gun out of her hands.
That's when Danny saw what Molly had been doing earlier. She'd managed to procure a particularly ragged piece of glass from the pile of rubble and had been hacking at the ropes binding her wrists together. She tossed the remains of the ropes aside and rushed to free Danny.
But Kate had regained her balance and recovered the gun. She ran over and punched Molly in the face. Molly staggered away, dropping the piece of glass in the process – just out of Danny's reach. He tried to get closer, the way Molly had done, but he wasn't able to move very far.
Meanwhile, Molly and Kate continued to have it out. Kate leveled the gun at Molly's face, but Molly again sent it flying away with a well-aimed tornado kick. When Kate ran at her, arms swinging, Molly ducked down and did a sweeping kick that knocked Kate flat on her back. As Kate got to her feet, Molly did a back handspring and got clear.
"Why does everyone like you better than me?" Kate asked, sounding very much like a whiny teenager.
Molly gave an exaggerated shrug. "I don't know. Because you're psychotic?"
Kate lunged, swinging her fist at Molly's face. But Molly ducked and landed a right jab in Kate's abdomen. Kate brought her arms together from elbow to wrist and thumped Molly hard in the back with her elbows. "I am not psychotic!"
Molly went into a handstand, catching Kate's head between her thighs, then pushed herself off, bringing them both to the floor, with Molly straddling Kate. "You orchestrated your own kidnapping because you think I'm sleeping with your boyfriend." She slammed the heel of her hand into Kate's nose. "That's psychotic."
Kate surged forward and bit Molly's arm. Molly screamed in pain and rolled off Kate, quickly getting to her feet and getting out of range. Kate spit onto the floor and stood. "It isn't just about Steve."
Molly rubbed her arm where Kate had bitten her. "Enlighten me."
The girls circled each other, and Kate shook her head. "Miss High and Mighty, thinks she's better than everyone. Better than me. You're not better than me!"
Molly rolled her eyes. "I don't think I'm better than anyone!"
Kate screamed and ran at Molly, who nailed her right in the jaw with a left hook. Kate fell back, rubbing her jaw gingerly. She waited a few moments, probably hoping to catch Molly off guard, and then attacked again. But Molly was ready, and flipped Kate over her head. Kate landed several feet away, unfortunately close to Molly's discarded gun. Kate groped for it.
Danny saw, and he immediately stopped his efforts to grab the piece of glass. He saw Kate finally close her fingers around the gun and aim it at Molly.
"Molly! Look out!"
Molly didn't bother to look to see what he was talking about. She dove behind a pew and took cover just as Kate swung the gun around to fire.
Martin's first instinct was to jump over the police tape and race inside the church, but he knew that it wouldn't accomplish anything. Still, he bounced up and down on the balls of his feet, anxious to do something. He didn't like feeling helpless, and the CIA wasn't helping matters any. They didn't seem to want to do anything that might jeopardize Molly's safety, seemingly completely forgetting that there was an FBI agent in there, too.
Sam found him seconds later, gripping his arm so tightly that she cut off the circulation to his hand. "I need to talk to you," she said, her voice a harsh whisper.
He looked at her in shock. Her priorities were really all out of whack, if she wanted to have a conversation about their relationship while Danny was being held hostage by some crazed gunman. "Can it wait?"
She shook her head forcefully. "I don't want to wait any more."
He raised an eyebrow, totally and utterly confused. What the hell was she talking about? He hoped she wasn't going to break things off completely, because that was the sort of thing that could wait. "Um, okay. What do you want to talk about?"
She took his face in her hands and stretched up on her toes until their lips met. He was momentarily surprised, and on instinct started to pull away, but with a sigh of satisfaction, she sank into the kiss, and his arms immediately went around her, pulling her closer. He barely had time to enjoy it before she broke this kiss, pulling away and smiling shyly at him.
Martin licked his lips eagerly. "You know," he said, "I'm the kind of guy who needs to be told stuff more than once."
Sam smiled and shook her head. She pressed her lips against his lightly, barely a brush and not nearly the kind of kiss he wanted. "I love you," she said, so quietly that he almost thought he'd misheard her.
"What?" he asked, just to be sure.
"I love you," she said. "And I've been an idiot, trying to hide it. I don't want to hide it any more."
He couldn't help but smile. In fact, at that moment, he didn't think he was capable of anything other than grinning like an idiot – and it was totally uncalled for, since one of his closest friends was probably fighting for his life – but he couldn't really care less. Because Sam loved him, had kissed him in public, and was admitting her feelings for him in front of witnesses – and Jack – and that was all he needed.
Molly crawled along the floor until she reached Danny. She picked up the piece of glass and started working on the ropes around his ankles. But Kate was storming around the sanctuary, and Molly abandoned the glass and raced to take cover once more. Before leaving, though, she'd placed the glass in Danny's hands so he could work on his own restraints. She also promised to keep Kate occupied and dropped a lingering kiss on his lips before disappearing into a different part of the church.
Danny set to work cutting the ropes around his wrist and listening to the pursuit. He couldn't see anything from where he was, but he could hear Kate taunting Molly, searching her out. Molly managed to remain hidden, but Danny was terrified that she wouldn't be able to stay out of sight much longer. There were only so many places she could hide, after all.
"Molly," Kate said, her voice echoing off the walls. "Come out, come out, wherever you are."
Kate appeared from behind a pile of rubble off to his left, and he jumped, startled, and accidentally dropped the piece of glass. She must have heard the clink it made when it hit the ground, because she walked over to him, shaking her head.
"Shame, shame," she said. She bent over and picked up the shard, holding it up to get a good look at it. "Trying to escape, are we? Like your girlfriend?"
It didn't seem like a good time to argue that Molly wasn't his girlfriend. And it was never a good idea to argue with a crazy person holding a gun. So he just sat there, yanking his wrists apart, hoping that he'd cut enough of the rope to do some good.
Kate grinned maliciously. "I know what I can do to make Molly come out and play," she said, and she pressed the barrel of her gun directly between Danny's eyes.
Jack tried to focus on the task at hand – getting Danny out of that church. But he couldn't quite tear his eyes away from the sight before him. Sam and Martin, locked in a, for lack of a better adjective, hot kiss, seemingly dead to the rest of the world. She was standing on the tips of her toes, and he had his arms wrapped around her waist, and Jack was positive they were going to suffocate if they didn't come up for air soon.
Knowing about the relationship and actually seeing it were completely different things. He'd been upset, but he could have handled the two of them together as long as he never saw them actually together. And now that he'd seen it…well, he was looking forward to hitting a few bars on the way home.
"This isn't right," David said.
Jack shook his head and turned to look at the CIA supervisor, who was staring at the church as though hoping that it would collapse and solve all their problems. "What was your first clue?" he asked.
David rolled his eyes and glared at him. "We haven't received any kind of a phone call. We have no way to negotiate or check on the status of our people." He slammed his hands down on the hood of the car he'd been using for a desk. "This is not how things are done in America!"
Danny had never had a gun to his head before. The steel was ice cold, and it was sure to leave a bruise where it was touching Danny's skin. But, at the moment, he didn't care, because he could die in a matter of seconds, and things like having a bruise didn't seem all that important.
"Oh, Molly!" Kate said in a singsong voice. "Come out, or I'll shoot your boyfriend!"
The sound of a throat being cleared made both Danny and Kate turn. It was Molly. She stood off to the side, leveling Danny's gun directly at Kate's head. "You don't want to do that," said Molly, taking a step closer.
"Yes, I do," said Kate. "I want you to suffer. You always blame yourself for everything that goes wrong. Perfect Molly, with the weight of the world on her shoulders. Let's see how much it hurts when someone's death is actually your fault."
Molly took another step closer, and Danny was amazed to see how steady her hands were. "I'm not kidding, Kate. I will shoot."
Kate snorted. "You're not going to shoot me. You don't have the stones."
Molly cocked the gun and said, "Try me."
"But I'm your best friend," Kate said, her voice mocking. "You can't live without me."
Molly didn't respond, and Danny saw her lower her arm slightly, which was obviously just what Kate had been waiting for. She pressed the gun against Danny's head even harder and cocked it. Danny closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
This was it. This was the end. He thought of all the things he wouldn't get to do, all the places he'd never get to see, all the things he'd never get to experience. He remembered all the thoughtless, stupid things he'd done while he was drunk, and he wished he could've gotten to spend more time with Rafi now that his brother was out of jail, and he wished he could've gotten to know his nephew, Nicky. He thought of his parents, and how he'd at least get to see them again, if there was such a place as Heaven and such a thing as God. But mostly he thought of how he wished he'd said something to Molly after they were together, so he wouldn't die with her thinking he was a complete jackass.
He was in the middle of that last thought when the gun went off.