AUTHOR'S NOTE: Once again, sorry that this has been so long in coming! I hope that you think that it's been worth the wait! Thank you to everyone who has R&R-ed – it is greatly appreciated. I just hope that you enjoy reading it as much as I have done writing it!
DISCLAIMER: I still don't own anything other than what comes floating out of my own head!
Sam drifted in and out of sleep, in and out of consciousness and in and out of reality. Her nightmares mingled with the present until the two were indistinguishable. She'd never imagined that it might all end like this; she'd never imagined that that her death might be so alone.
Meanwhile, Martin drummed his fingers impatiently against the dashboard. Night was beginning to triumph over day and he couldn't help but wonder 'what if.' What if he had worked late that night now over a week past? What if he had called Sam that evening as he had thought of doing? What if…?
'You couldn't have stopped this,' spoke Danny gently, knowing exactly what he was thinking. Martin smiled wearily, 'Yeah, I know.' It was times like these that meant that the two of them knew each other so well, hours of seemingly pointless surveillance. But this time, the surveillance didn't quite seem so pointless, this time they were fighting for more than a person whom they would never known was missing if they weren't in their specific line of work.
'C'mon, he's moving,' Danny spoke, starting up the engine as he did so. 'Let's see if he leads us to Sam.'
It took Jack all of five hundred metres worth of walking to realise that he was being followed. Years of experience of following people himself and knowing the people who seemed to be following you certainly helped. He sighed, he knew what was happening - it didn't take a genius to work it out. They thought that he had taken Sam. Thinking about it, he could see why and he was sure that he would think exactly the same thing in their position.
His mind worked at a frantic pace, the thoughts remarkably clear amidst the inner turmoil. What should have been a difficult decision turned out to be incredibly easy and he soon found his feet turning and striding purposefully back to the bull-pen. With every step he cursed himself a little more, the regrets of the past days burning up inside.
His arrival at the bull-pen was greeted with surprise. Unsurprising really, as he had left only a matter of minutes before and now knew himself to be the main suspect in a case close to the hearts of everyone involved. He stood in the centre of the room simply watching everyone's reactions and counting the seconds before Danny and Martin would arrive back, acting as though nothing had happened.
Within minutes the door behind him creaked open and the two entered appearing, on the surface, calm and collected but in reality as confused as everyone else. Jack turned to them, pointing in the direction of his office and then glanced towards Vivian, making sure that she got the message.
All obediently followed him, their hearts racing with fear and confusion. They stumbled into his office where they stood together, as if for protection. Jack paced the floor, his hands clammy with fear. 'I know what you're thinking' he began, his voice shaky yet authoritative. 'You think that I took Sam.' Vivian looked at Martin who in turn shared a glance with Danny. Surely this wasn't another dead end, another mess up?
'I didn't,' continued Jack. 'But I do know where she is. Well, kind of.'
The room was filled with an expectant silence. What on earth was going on?
Jack continued, knowing deep down that he was doing the right thing. He couldn't cope with the lies, the deception and the guilt any longer. 'Sam was heavily involved in the Simon Marshall case. You all know the one - except it was slightly deeper than any of us thought. I got a call from Washington nearly two weeks ago now, telling me that Mr Marshall was involved in some business in Iraq to do with the re-building and contracts and stuff. Basically I was told to stay out of it and that it wasn't our business anymore. In fact, I think the words were something more along the lines of 'Malone, if you know what's good for you, you and your team will forget that this ever happened. This is way above you, and believe me, you want to stay out of it. This is politics and you already have some unimpressed people that the investigation has even got this far. It ends now. If I hear that you've gone any further into this investigation after this phone-call or that the name Simon Marshall has been so much as mentioned, then believe me, it's your head that will be on the block.'
'So where does Sam fit into all this?' Martin questioned, his face illustrating his obvious confusion.
'As I ended the investigation late that afternoon, Sam was already on her way to Simon Marshall's house to speak to his wife. No-one's seen her since then.'
It was all that Vivian could do to hold a raging Martin back. 'WHY THE HELL ARE YOU ONLY TELLING US THIS NOW? YOU'VE KNOWN WHERE SAM IS AND NOT TOLD US? I THOUGHT SHE WAS YOUR FRIEND. I THOUGHT WE WERE YOUR FRIENDS…
Every word hit Jack like a punch to the stomach. He'd been expecting it and knew himself that he quite probably deserved every word that came his way but that did not make it easier.
Trying to calm down his colleague but at the same time justify his own actions, Jack spoke, attempting to convey his mixed emotions in just a few words. 'She is my friend, you are my friends and please don't think that I haven't been doing anything to help Sam. All the meetings, all the phone calls, they've all been me trying to get those damn bureaucrats in Washington to see sense. We can't do anything more than that at the moment. This is big money we're talking about here and the government needs it all to work out. I want to do more, of course I do, but for now we've just got to sit tight and see what happens.'
Martin kicked a table leg near where he was standing, trying not to let his simmering anger and frustration boil over. He was equally as surprised as the others when it was Danny who spoke up.
'We've been sitting tight for over a week now. This isn't about the government anymore. This isn't about following orders from on-high. I say that we get Sam out of there and deal with the consequences after that. We have no idea what Sam is going through, but I for sure don't want to wait to find out. We can end this now, we can help our friend. To hell with these bureaucrats, we've got loyalties that run far deeper than them. Would you really be able to sleep at night if anything were to happen to Sam now?'
Danny knew that he had struck a chord when the room fell silent, each person wrestling with their own conscience but knowing that he was right. True, they would probably all lose their jobs over this but that was definitely a better scenario than Sam losing her life, right? The only problem was how to achieve such a rescue.
Meanwhile, in a rare period of prolonged consciousness, Sam couldn't help but hear a conversation from what, she figured, could only be the room next door to hers. She recognised the voices and for an instant was filled with hope. They had found her! There were government officials next door surely negotiating her release. Man, they had taken their time. She was therefore surprised to find herself in the same situation just a few hours later with those next door having left and said their goodnights as though nothing had ever happened.