A/N, 6 May 06: Thank you for your patience. My internet crashed, then my computer crashed, and it's been one of the worst weeks at work I've had in the last eight years. Anyway, I got my computer back together, and I uploaded this at the library. I hope to get my internet back in the next few days so that hopefully you won't have to wait as long for the next part. As to similarities between this story and last night's ep, Backscatter, well, call it coincidence, though it was sure interesting to see Nick & Cheryl's take on a vendetta-style story. I wonder why we both chose David to get hurt?

Vendetta
By BeckyS
April 2005-2006

The Eppes family and the characters and situations from the TV show "NUMB3RS"
are the property of the Scotts and the creation of Cheryl Heuton and Nick Falacci.
No infringement is intended, and no profit is being made.

He needed to sleep. Don knew his reactions were off – that David had figured out the bomb before he did, and that Megan had been able to push him aside, were both indicators that he was nowhere near his usual level of competence.

Thank God they would be okay. David would be out longer than Megan – she'd wrenched her left shoulder when she was knocked into the side of the house by the blast, but David had a mild concussion and a broken leg. Neither were bad, the doctors said, but they were keeping him at the hospital overnight. Megan was back at the house, her arm strapped to her body, little pain lines between her eyebrows. Don's next shift of watchdogs had brought boxes of case files with them that were piled next to the dining room table, and once Colby'd assured himself that they were good enough to protect his boss, he'd gone back to the office to file reports.

The yard was a mess, but they could get a landscaper to put it back together. That was the least of his worries. What he had to think about now was how to keep Larry and Amita safe. They'd pulled together like troupers, making and ferrying coffee and sandwiches to the fire department, the police and the FBI's Evidence Response team and were now sitting pale and wide-eyed in the family room, but they had no training – nothing that would help keep them alive. He had to protect them. He hadn't been able to help Charlie, but he'd help his brother's friends.

And then he'd go after the bastard.

"All of you need to go to the safe house," he said abruptly.

As expected, he got a chorus of arguments centering around their need to protect him. Larry and Amita were easy to deal with – they were both frightened and wanted desperately to see Charlie, so he simply overrode them and told them they were going. Megan was a different story.

He took her aside. "Look, I want you to talk to Charlie. See if he remembers anything. You know what kind of information we need from him. You can draw it out of him better than anyone but me, and I'm not going anywhere near him until this is settled. When you get done and Larry and Amita are settled in, see if you can get back here." He waved at her shoulder. "You won't be much good in a fight, but I have Stan and Rob for that, and Colby, too, when he gets back. And it's not what I need you for, anyway." He rubbed at his face.

She tilted her head quizzically.

"Your mind, Reeves. I need your knowledge, your training, your perspective; the way you can figure out what this guy is thinking. I need your insight."

She nodded reluctantly. "All right. I'll go see Charlie. And I'll get what I can from him, but it may not be much. Victims of this kind of trauma often lose their memory of what precipitated it."

"I know." It hurt to think of Charlie's mind not fully functional. "But we have to try."

She rose. "Don, you need to be careful."

"I'm always careful," he shot back.

She shook her head. "There's something not right about this. And I'm not just talking about whatever Merrick is keeping so close. I mean the perp's behavior. He shouldn't have gone after you yet. He had to have known you were here, so why did he try to kill you when his note indicated he wanted to make you suffer first?"

"Yeah, I see what you mean. But I can't just hide while he's out there waiting to go after somebody else I care about."

"Just . . ."

"I know." He grinned, but then he sobered as quickly. "You be careful, too. Don't go near the safe house if you think there's any chance someone might be following you. We keep saying 'the' perp, but there might be more than one. Okay?"

"Yeah."

"And, Megan?"

She stopped on her way out the door.

"Uh . . . try not to tell Dad about the front yard. If he finds out, the perp won't have to kill me – Dad'll beat him to it."

She laughed as she herded Larry and Amita out the door, but she'd gotten the message. The instinct to protect civilians was strong in both of them, particularly civilians they cared about, even from something as simple as a blown-up front yard.

For the first time since he'd seen the pictures of Charlie, he was alone. The two agents were outside along with a couple of LAPD officers, but Don was the only one in the house. Oh, he'd had time by himself last night, but Megan had been downstairs, David and Colby switching off prowling outside, and the simple fact of their caring presence had nearly suffocated him. He needed to be by himself to come to terms with everything that had happened. To 'process' it, as they said in the business. To find his balance again.

The note from the perp had been the first thing he saw when he opened the boxes to start looking for clues. He'd slowly replaced the box lid, eyes stuck on the typed words. They haunted him now as he wandered from room to room. Eppes – first yours, then you. Faxed to the FBI from a computer at an internet café. Paid in cash during the lunch rush. A dead end.

He touched a picture frame here, a book there – the clutter of his family's life that he'd thought was torn irrevocably apart and was now healed. No, not healed. Not yet. And even when he'd found the people responsible, even when they were put in jail for the rest of their lives, when Charlie was home and back to his obsessive math-making, Don knew he'd carry the scars of these terrible twenty-four hours for a long time.

The doorbell rang, and he heard someone call his name.

He checked the peep-hole, recognized Jeff McClintock from his office and opened the door slowly, standing to one side to make it difficult for anyone outside to see him. He didn't believe the perp would hang around, but it was better to be cautious.

"The laptop," said Jeff. "And I know the guy who brought it."

"Thanks. You guys need anything? Coffee? Aspirin?"

The agent shook his head. "Just figure it out, Don. Whoever this is, figure it out so we can get them."

Don took the computer from him. "You can bet on it," he said.

It was odd to hear an FBI man endorse having a family member work a case, but it warmed him. They would keep him away from the action, but everyone knew that the answer was probably in his head, if they could just feed him enough information so he could sift out the right answer.

"Go back to the data." Hadn't Charlie said that? Some advice Larry had given him once?

He set the laptop on the dining room table, went to the kitchen to pour another cup of coffee, and settled in for the long haul.