First off, Review responses!
Dana, Thank you. The idea for this fic actually came from something totally different (it won't be dealt with for a while...I plan on making this a small series of fics crosses fingers). I hope you like this update as well :)
Spee, You should feel important, lol. And, yes, I stole your idea...whatcha gonna do, cry about it:p
fireinu, Thank you.
Myra, I know you like it. Thanks for the review :)
Luna, Thank you. I hope you've enjoyed the rest of the fic so far :)
junkfoodmonkey2004, Thank you so much! I fixed it up as per your suggestion :D
Phew! I'll have to start doing that more often :) Thanks again guys :)
Here's where the updates may become less frequent because everything to this point was written a while back. I'm in the middle of writing the next update, though, so hopefully that won't take more than a few days. crosses fingers again
Anyway, on to the fic!
R&R!
When they arrived back at the beach house an hour later, Nicole got out of the 'Vette before Face could even turn off the engine, and slammed the car door a little too hard. "Sorry," she muttered, reaching a shakey hand up to rub tiredly at her eyes.
Face walked up beside her and put an arm around her shoulders, smiling sympathetically. "It's okay."
She smirked up at him and muttered, "I suppose any damage that did would be nothing compared to the bullet holes, anyway."
"Exactly," he agreed as he lead her up the stairs. They reached the door and he held it open for her, keeping a hand at the small of her back as she walked through to where Hannibal and BA were waiting in the livingroom.
Hannibal looked up from where he sat as soon as the door opened, concern in his eyes. "How'd it go?"
Out of the corner of her eye Nicole saw Face start to reply, but she beat him to it. "Found Campbell and Gladwin," she muttered a little too quickly as she dropped heavily into a chair.
Just then Murdock wandered into the room, drying his hands on a small towel. He stopped short when he saw Nicole. "What happened?"
She smiled humourlessly at him. "Found them."
"Not that it matters anymore," Face, standing behind her, added. "They've probably packed up and gone somewhere else by now."
"Campbell doesn't care," she muttered quietly. "He wants us to know where he is...wants us to come after him..."
Hannibal stood up and walked over to Face, stopping just inches away from the man. "What exactly happened, Lieutenant?" Obviously he wasn't very pleased with the situation, but he was doing his best to keep his cool.
"We, uh, we found the hotel Campbell was staying at," Face began nervously.
"And?" the Colonel prompted.
"And we went in to verify it," Nicole put in, standing up. She switched immediately from exhausted to annoyed. "Campbell sent a pair goons down to the lobby to bring us up to his lovely penthouse suite. We escaped."
"Wait a minute," Murdock interrupted. "Campbell..."
"...decided it would be fun to have a little chat?" Nicole finished for him with an irritated smile. "Oh yeah." She turned back to Hannibal and continued. "The point is, Campbell is arrogant. He doesn't care that we know where he is - hell, we barely got out as it is! He wants us to come after him! Campbell doesn't see the five of us as a threat, and I doubt Tobin will either when he hears about what happened! I have a feeling they would love the glory of killing you four, and I get the impression - from when he flat out said it earlier - that he wouldn't mind having me as his guest again either!" By this time she was shouting angrily and gesturing wildly with her hands as she spoke.
Every pair of eyes in the room was on Nicole as she brought a hand up to rub at the back of her neck and took a deep breath. "Look," she started quietly. "Whatever our next move is, it'll have to be very well planned, well thought out.
Hannibal stepped closer to her and put a hand on her shoulder. "It will be," he assured her gently. "But it's late, and we could all use some sleep."
BA stood up and softly growled, "don't you worry, mamma--we'll get the suckas."
She nodded, hesitating a moment before awkwardly stepping forward to hug her father. "Thank you," she said quietly as she rested her head on his shoulder.
Nicole sat on one of the long, white plastic chairs on the deck, staring out over the ocean. Her father had insisted she sleep at the beach house, and had even offered her his room, saying he would sleep on the couch. In the end they had compromised--she had agreed to stay with them, but only if she were the one sleeping on the couch. Somehow she didn't think she would be sleeping much anyway, and taking a room while someone who was actually tired slept on the couch seemed like a waste to her.
The events of the day kept replaying in her mind: meeting her father, hiring him to help her put away her mother's killers, hearing Campbell's voice again, having to actually see him in the flesh. It was almost too much for her to handle. All of that coupled with the fact that she hadn't really slept since her mother had been killed was really starting to wear her out.
"Can't sleep?"
Nicole jumped and looked to her right, where Murdock was standing and looking down at her with concern. She sat up straight and crossed her legs, leaving plenty of room on the end of the chair for him to sit down.
"Didn't mean to startle you," he muttered apologetically as he sat.
"It's okay," she said in a whisper as she looked down at her hands and began fiddling with the ring on her finger.
Murdock gestured toward the ring and asked, "nervous habit?"
"Something like that." She stopped playing with the ring and looked up at him again. "What are you doing up?"
"Same thing as you are, I'd expect," he replied with a slight grimace as he looked at her. "BA once said that I got all the demons in the world chasin' after me in my sleep."
Nicole smiled sadly and mumbled, "not an easy thing to deal with."
"No. It isn't," he admitted. He shook his head as though trying to clear it, then looked up at her. "How're you holding up?"
"I, uh, I don't know," she answered hesitantly. "Haven't actually had the nightmares in a while. Guess with all that's happened in the last few days..." The wetness she suddenly felt on her cheeks made her realize she must have started crying at some point, so she reached a hand up to wipe at the tears and laughed a little. "I haven't cried in years."
Murdock reached out and took her hand, squeezing it reassuringly. "Been a tough few days for you," he muttered.
"I suppose it has," she confessed. "Gotta admit, I really wasn't expecting Campbell to be involved in all this." She leaned forward and rested her forehead on Murdock's shoulder, letting the tears fall quietly.
"You wanna talk about what happened?" he asked softly, putting his arm around her.
With a quiet sniffle she turned to rest the side of her head on his shoulder so that her words wouldn't be muffled by the material of his robe. "It was so hard not to just...let go. You know what I mean? But I couldn't. When he...when he started...started ogling me Lieutenant Peck tried to stop him, but...I mean, we were outnumbered..." After she adjusted herself so she was seated sideways, she continued. "One of Campbell's men pinned him down...then Campbell started coming toward me... Figured we weren't getting out by overpowering them...so when he got close, I grabbed him..." She smirked. "I'll never forget the look on his face..."
"I'll bet," he mumbled, a slight smile tugging at his lips.
Her smile disappeared and another tear rolled down her cheek, soaking into Murdock's robe. "The look in his eyes when he..."
"I know," he muttered, pulling her a little closer. "I can't just make it all go away - I wish I could - but what I can do is promise you that we're gonna get Campbell. And when we do, he's gonna regret he ever even laid eyes on you."
"That's got to be the cheesiest thing I've ever heard," Nicole chuckled. Still smiling, she wrapped her arms around his middle and pulled herself a little closer. "Thanks." After a few minutes of silence, she spoke up again. "Wanna talk about why you're awake?"
The Captain took in a deep breath and released it shakily. "That, uh...that could take some time, sweetheart."
Casting a glance through the sliding glass doors into the livingroom, she saw that it was one o'clock in the morning. "We've got at least another five or six hours til anyone else gets up, and, I don't know about you, but I'm not getting back to sleep anytime soon."
"You sure?"
With a smile, Nicole stood up and offered him her hand. "Let's go put on a pot of coffee." He hesitated a moment, then returned her smile and took her hand as he stood up, following her into the kitchen.
Early the next morning Hannibal awoke and headed for the kitchen for a cup of coffee and some breakfast. When he opened the bedroom door and went into the livingroom he found Murdock sitting on the couch passed out, his head tossed back, and he was snoring--loudly.
Beside Murdock, Nicole was wide awake and watching TV. She looked up at him when he entered the room, and smiled uncertainly. Returning the smile he continued on his way to the kitchen, and she followed.
"The man had six cups of black coffee, and he's out like a light," she muttered quietly as she entered the room.
"Won't surprise you so much when you get to know him," Hannibal muttered as he poured the water into the coffee maker.
Nicole stepped farther into the room and took a seat at the kitchen table. "Got to know him pretty well last night. Must have been talking for about four and a half hours."
He bent down and pulled a frying pan out of the drawer, then went to the fridge for some eggs. "You get any sleep at all, kid?"
"Half an hour, forty-five minutes," she replied with a shrug. "You ever gonna stop calling me 'kid'?"
The Colonel half turned to look at her and grinned.
"Fine," she muttered, a small smile tugging at the corners of her lips.
"You hungry?" he asked as he began cracking the eggs.
"If you're going to scramble some of those eggs, I am." Getting up from her seat, she crossed the room to stand near her father. "Want some help?"
"You know how to cook bacon?" he asked without looking at her.
His daughter smirked up at him and replied, "throw some strips of dead pig in a frying pan, try not to burn 'em."
A grin slowly came across his face--she reminded him so much of Linda. "You have you mom's sense of humour," he observed quietly.
Nicole's grin quickly faded as she bent down to retrieve a frying pan. "I miss her," she whispered. "You know, yesterday Campbell mentioned that I was supposed to be in the house when it blew. He was right. But at the last minute I..." She paused and shook her head. "I should have been there."
He reached out and put a hand on her shoulder, causing her to look up at him. "You couldn't have done anything, kid," he said in what he hoped was a reassuring manner. "If you'd been there, you'd have been caught in the blast too."
"Maybe..." she trailed off.
Obviously she was determined to blame herself, so Hannibal decided on a different track. "What would you have done, kid?" he asked simply as he flipped his omelette.
"I..." she started.
Anyone could have seen that she didn't have an answer. "Had you been at that safe house, you wouldn't be here now," he said seriously. Then he went back to his omelette and hurriedly added, "and, uh, of course, then there'd be nobody to lock up these scumbags."
With a frustrated sigh she went to the fridge and pulled out the bacon, then went back to the stove and turned on the burner.
Hannibal could see that deep down she probably realized she couldn't have helped Linda, but, given the circumstances, he could understand her frustration. "Why don't you sit down and let me cook the breakfast?" he offered.
Nicole smiled up at him wryly, and muttered, "I think I can handle frying some bacon..."
It wasn't that he didn't think she could handle cooking breakfast, but he thought she could probably stand to sit down. Nonetheless he decided not to push it, though he had to ask one last time. "You sure?"
"Yeah," she assured him with a smirk.
Nodding, he turned back to his frying pan and removed his omelette, then cracked a few more eggs and began scrambling them.
"So, what should I call you?" she asked suddenly without looking up from the bacon.
That was a good question. While he didn't want to push her away per se, he didn't quite feel ready to pull her closer either. "I don't know, kid," he admitted. "Don't really feel like a 'dad,' you see?"
"Whether you feel like it or not, it's a little late for second thoughts," she said quietly, still refusing to look up at him.
"I didn't exactly get a first thought," he retorted quickly. Immediately, though, he regretted it. From the look on her face, the remark had obviously struck a nerve with her, but the flaring temper he had seen earlier didn't show this time.
Neither one spoke again until they sat down at the table and started eating. "Look, kid," Hannibal began. "It's...it's been thirty years since I last saw Linda, thirty years you've been around and I haven't known."
"Thirty-four," she corrected him before he could continue. "It's been closer to thirty-four years since you last saw mom, and I'll be thirty-three this year."
Thirty-three. He had a daughter that was thirty-three. When did he get to be that old? "When's your birthday?" he asked quietly.
"August nineteenth," she muttered.
"Less than two months from now," he mumbled thoughtfully.
Nicole smiled a little, and shook her head. "Yeah. Look, I don't expect this to...we're not going to have an overnight relationship. I know that. And it's not really anyone's fault." With a sigh she put down her fork and looked up at him, an apprehensive look in her eyes. "It'd be nice to at least try, though, don't you think?"
For a moment Hannibal sat silently, regarding his daughter, then remarked, "don't really beat around the bush, do ya, kid?"
"Not easily sidetracked either," she countered with a smirk.
The Colonel chuckled a little at his daughter's reply. "It's not gonna be easy," he told her soberly.
She lowered her eyes and quietly agreed, "I know. Hell, I don't even live around here, and I'm barely ever home; my job keeps me pretty...busy."
"That's another thing," Hannibal began. "How are your bosses going to feel about you hanging around with fugitives?"
"You say that like it's unusual for me to hang out with them," she chuckled as she finished off her eggs. "Trust me, you're not on their most wanted list right now." Getting up from the table, she crossed the room and put her dishes in the sink, then went to the fridge for a glass of juice. "Not to mention that if they really wanted you, they'd have you by now."
Before Hannibal could reply, a loud racket in the livingroom interrupted him.
BA came barging into the kitchen, growling at Murdock, who entered the kitchen a moment later fully dressed, about having a glass of milk. He went straight to the cupboards and pulled out a glass, then to the fridge.
The Captain grinned apologetically at both Hannibal and Nicole as he took a seat at the table; obviously he had tried to stop BA from entering the kitchen and interrupting their talk.
"BA, would you keep it down a little," a dishevelled Face complained as he entered the room. "Some of us are trying to sleep."
From the corner of his eye, Hannibal noticed Nicole bite back a laugh at the Lieutenant's abnormally messy appearance. "Glad you could join us, Lieutenant," he remarked with a grin. He was on the Jazz. "Have a seat!"
Face groaned as he took a seat at the table, and muttered, "it's 6:30 in the morning, Hannibal. Can't it wait another hour or so?"
"Why? We're all up now," he reasoned.
Again Face groaned. His glance happened to cross Murdock's shoes and he wrinkled his brow in confusion. "Murdock, why did you mark your shoes with a yellow highlighter?"
"Haven't lost them near so much since I did it," he remarked with a goofy grin. If he heard BA growling, he showed no sign of it. "So, what's the plan, Colonel?"
Hannibal opened his mouth to reply, but Nicole beat him to it. "We're not going to get Tate, not now. He's too careful. And I'm more concerned with Campbell and Gladwin right now. And they're expecting us."
"Then let's not disappoint them," Hannibal muttered dangerously.