Coming Home

Terry made her way into observation where Caleb was already staring through the one-way mirror.

"We pulled her in on drug related charges. Found coke on the kitchen counter, though she's not high," he said, filling her in. Terry nodded, looking the woman over.

"What do we know?"

Caleb flipped open the folder in front of him. "Alexis Dannacher, 39, older sister to Raymond Dannacher and says she hasn't seen him in two weeks."

Terry nodded as she continued to look at the woman. "Why is she lying?"

"Huh?"

"How can you say she's lying? What's the evidence?" To Terry, the woman seemed anxious, yes, but she wasn't ready to write that up to nervousness of being caught in a lie.

"You can see it."

Terry raised an eyebrow but didn't respond. Instead she made her way into the room.

"Miss Dannacher, Agent Lake," she introduced, sitting across the table from her. Alexis' brown eyes widened.

"They weren't my drugs! It wasn't my coke! I don't know…"

Terry held up a hand with a gentle smile. "I don't care about the drugs right now, Miss Dannacher."

"Alexis. My last name reminds me of my brother."

This caught Terry's attention. "You're not a fan of his?"

Alexis started playing with her hands. "Ray got screwed up a few years back, moved in with the wrong crowd. He'd just been fired from his job and he dropped out of high school. I stopped trying to clean him up."

Terry nodded, filing this all away to jot down later. "Was he ever into any crimes?"

"I know about his arrests for kidnapping, but he didn't do it. As screwed up as he is, Ray really couldn't hurt anyone."

Terry found this news unbelievable. "Alexis, I need you to think about the last time you saw your brother. It's important."

"Two weeks ago."

"What did he say? Can you remember?"

"He told me he was going away for a while with a few of his friends. I begged him not to go, if only because I didn't want to see him hurt."

"Can you remember where he said he was going?"

Alexis shook her head. "Only that he'd have to lay low for a while so I shouldn't call him or contact him in anyway." She shrugged. "It wasn't as if we were the closest of siblings and he always called me. I have a family, Agent Lake, I don't need them getting mixed up in all that."

"You didn't change your name?"

Alexis smiled sarcastically. "I never said I was married."

Terry nodded in understanding. "Have you been in contact with your brother since he left?"

Alexis was silent for a few moments, for all intents and purposes thinking. Terry knew of better actors though and saw right through. She was debating on whether or not to tell the truth.

"He called. About 4 days ago saying he was going to send Amanda and I some money."

"Did he?"

"Yeah, twenty-five thousand each. Deposited it directly into our accounts, well, Amanda's education fund, though I don't know how. Ray's never been that bright."

"Did any of his friends, any of them, excel in computers?"

She thought about it for a few moments. "Not that I know of. One had a brother that could hack into anything, I think."

"You wouldn't know the name of that brother, would you?"

"Adam Kay," she answered. Terry jotted the name down to run through the system.

"Thanks, Alexis. You're free to go. Let us know if you hear from him, please," Terry said, presenting the other woman with her card.

"Thanks." Terry made her way back into the observation room where Caleb was.

"You didn't call her on her lie," he stated. Terry shrugged.

"She wasn't lying. She seriously doesn't think her brother could do anything harmful, regardless of his past record. She sees him as the perfect little brother, the one that all older sisters wish they had. To her, he can do no wrong." They were silent for a minute, looking into the empty room.

"I'm going to run down Adam Kay, see how he ties in," he said suddenly, breaking the silence.

"Great. I'm going to see if they got an address for the computer. Make sure to cross reference any addresses…"

"With the companies that sell large amounts of coolants," he finished. "I heard Amita."

Terry smiled. "Thanks, Haynsworth. I'm glad you're on this one."

"You too, Lake. Don't work yourself too hard. I'll call you if we find something important."

As promised, Terry went along with Don to his father's house for dinner.

"Terry! This is a pleasant surprise," Alan Eppes explained when she preceded Don into the living room.

"I couldn't miss a home cooked meal," Terry responded with a genuine smile.

"Well, give me a minute to set the extra place," he told her, already moving to get the required setting.

"Mr. Eppes, its fine. I'm sure I can remember where everything is. The two of you can behave yourselves for a few minutes, can't you?" Her last sentence was directed mainly at Don, who hadn't spoken a word since they'd left his apartment. He rolled his eyes at her, well aware of her teasing tone. Terry only grinned, adding an extra spring to her step as she made her way to the kitchen. Even with the clink of the dishes and silverware she tried her best to keep an ear on the conversation, but Alan Eppes knew his son too well.

"You haven't been around."

Terry could almost see Don nodding his head, not meeting his father's gaze.

"Don, I don't blame you for Charlie's disappearance, or for lack of progress in the case. Agent Haynsworth has been able to keep me up to date until this point."

"I know, Dad."

"It's not the reason you haven't been by?" The shocked tone of Alan's voice surprised Terry and she paused where she was setting her plate down. She'd never known the perceptive man to jump to conclusions, especially about his sons. There were things that he knew about Don that Terry didn't and she respected that. The fact that Don knew he wasn't blamed for Charlie's disappearance – which shocked her too – and Alan's automatic assumption that it was the reason Don didn't stop by amazed her.

"Of course not."

There was a pause. Terry made sure to clink some of the silverware as she set them down, whether Don knew she was eavesdropping or not.

"This is Charlie's house, Dad."

Terry closed her eyes and settled her hands to brace her body against the table. Some of Charlie's math things had been distributed over the living room table. Only now did it register to Terry. Before they could get any deeper into the inner workings of Don's twisted logic – not only had she tried to go there before and returned a little worse for wear but she knew he wasn't a fan of the prying – she returned to the living room, taking a seat beside Don.

"How have you been, Mr. Eppes?" Her question held a double meaning, as most did these days.

"Physically, I'm fine. Emotionally…" He didn't have to finish the sentence. It was going to be hard for all of them. The longer Charlie was away the harder it was going to be to continue to believe he was alive. Terry swallowed and closed her eyes, preparing herself to lie to a family she adored.

"I'm sure the team is doing all they can," she said delicately. Suddenly, Don slammed his fist down on the coffee table and stood.

"Well it's not good enough."

Terry watched in shock as he stormed out to the backyard. Alan didn't look as surprised and just sighed, standing to go after his son. Terry, however, held up a hand. "It's fine, Mr. Eppes. He's been snappy all week. I'm used to it."

"It doesn't give him the right to do it."

"No, but it's his stress relief," she answered calmly, wondering why she, of all people, was in the process of running interference with the two men, especially since they were going through virtually the same thing. "I understand where he's coming from."

"You do? I mean, of course I understand but..."

"Not from personal experience, but it would be hard. I'm starting to feel this one myself," she assured him. They sat in silence for a few minutes, watching Don, hands on his hips, looking into the sky. Finally, Alan shook his head with a heavy sigh.

"I'm going to finish dinner." Terry smiled slightly as he left. She knew both of them were having a hard time with Charlie's disappearance, andDon tended to be a little bit more hard-headed and confrontational. Seeing as Terry was pretty sure neither of the men had actually gone through a loss of their own, and Don wasn't constantly home, it wasn't surprising Alan was not totally sure how to deal with his son. Terry, however, had seen all the changes Don had gone through since the Academy. Of course, the fact that she was a profiler and worked to get inside his head -- whether he wanted her to or not -- certainly came in handy. She waited until she couldn't see Alan before making her way outdoors to confront Don.

"What was that all about?"

Her voice startled him out of his wishing. He grunted.

"Hey, I'm not here to nag," she promised, stepping in front of him. "I'm not that stupid."

"Doesn't matter."

"It matters to me. Talk to me, Don."

"Why? You came on business."

Terry took a deep breath. "I didn't have to." That got his attention pretty fast.

"What?"

"I didn't have to come, Don. I requested to come."

"You… Why?"

"David called me last week," she began, her voice sounding conversational instead of explanatory.

"And?"

Terry shrugged noncommittally. "You did a remarkable job tearing apart the office single-handedly. No one knew how to deal with you."

He glared and Terry knew it wasn't actually aimed at her. "And you did?"

"You forget we dated, Don, we planned. I know more of your deep dark secrets than you think."

He glanced up at the sky again. "I've never forgotten about us dating, Terry."

She couldn't stop the blush that stained her cheeks. "Point of the matter is he thought I could do something to make your lives more liveable."

"They weren't before?" Terry smiled indulgently.

"When you're ripping off heads at the office people don't generally grow to like you," she pointed out, as if she was talking to a young child. He cracked a small smile. They looked at each other silently for a few moments.

"I'm glad you're here," he admitted finally. Terry waved a hand dismissively.

"As if I'd do anything else."

Terry walked in the apartment door behind Don. She felt much more exhausted than she'd expected to and all but collapsed onto the couch.

"You just going to sleep like that?" He'd requested numerous times that she take the bed, but each time Terry had refused. She could deal with the stress of the cases. Don's missing brother meant a much less tolerant agent.

"Certainly feels like it. Thanks for letting me come." She felt the couch dip at her knees where her feet were hanging. Gingerly, he picked up her ankles and settled them in his lap, absently toying with the hem of her pant leg, brushing her skin periodically. Terry had to forcibly stomp down the desire seeping into her blood stream.

"I'm sorry about earlier, Terry. I'm not…"

"Actually angry, I know," she finished, her eyes closed and muscles slowly relaxing.

"It's just… He's been gone a month. People are… losing faith."

Her eyes popped open at that. "Are you?"

"I want to believe he's alive, Terry, but statistically…?"

She met his eyes with amusement.

"The two of you are more alike than you think," she said randomly. "Since when do you really care about statistics? And didn't he once say the same thing to you after you got shot?" It got a short reminiscing smile from him. She was glad he could look back with fond memories. Then his eyes glazed over.

"He was at school, teaching class or something. Amita said she went to ask him about something for her new doctorate and he wasn't in his office. She'd checked with Larry and his bike was still in the racks. That's when she knew he was gone. His classroom was a mess of math and paper, she said she hadn't seen Charlie ever that messy, and Charlie's usually a little scatterbrained. That's when we all knew he was gone." Terry absorbed this information to really file through later. Her mind was much to exhausted for any particular picking apart now.

"I remember the first time he came to visit at the Academy. The poor kid was fifteen and scared out of his wits. He was on a break of some sort... I was in the library, studying for some test or another. He walked into the library with Ross Marcel who was the biggest guy in the year totally dwarfed. They stopped at the end of the table and poor Charlie was too terrified of Marcel to even speak up. The big guy had to call me and let me know Charlie was standing there."

Terry smiled. "Mmm. Smart kid, I remember meeting him. We were in the middle of the grounds arguing about the usefulness of forensic profiling about a month before we started dating. Charlie just cleared his throat and asked matter-of-factly if I was your new girlfriend."

Don chuckled at the memory. They divided into their own worlds, remembering the man that was currently nowhere to be found.

"I miss him," Don said suddenly, just as Terry was drifting off to sleep.

"We'll find him. I'm sure with the number of times he's consulted on cases he's learned a few things about keeping himself alive with a kidnapper," she managed to mumble. His hand hadn't stopped its absent caress of her ankle and it was doing remarkable things for her previously tense muscles. His only answer was a hum and Terry found herself drifting off, despite her brave attempts not to. She was asleep before she could stop herself.

Don looked at her, completely asleep and relaxed on his couch and smiled fondly. She was a special woman and he'd only learned that since he'd been separated from her. Terry was right when she said he'd been a pain in the ass to his colleagues and he'd known it at the time, but no one had given him any news on how Charlie's case was going. Honestly, it had grated heavily on his nerves. Terry had been a welcome face.

He knew he could trust her, confide in her, and she wouldn't judge him. She knew he didn't like pity and didn't give him any. She treated him like any normal human where people at the office continually approached him with their condolences, as if Charlie was already dead. Terry had faith that his brother was still alive, and he was glad for the optimism.

He hoped she wasn't going anywhere any time soon.

With Don and Alan, remember that Alan is going though the loss of his son too and probably is not the best person to be giving Don sympathy at this point. Work with me, cuz I'm the author and I'm using creative licencing. So ha.