Author's Note: Full Author's note can be found in the
previous chapter Just a quick note before I start. I changed the
rating because of language issues. That's it...carry on!
Chapter 4 – Act of Fate
Sue stood in the hall of the F.B.I federal building and looked at the names all lined up symmetrically on the wall. These were the names of the fallen brothers and sisters that have died in the service of duty. She stared intently at the one that she was most familiar with. One that she had memorized and agonized over. Jack Hudson.
"Jack…" she whispered to no one in particular.
Next to her, Levi whimpered and Sue smiled down at her constant companion. "I know…I miss him too. An unbelievable amount." She looked up as a figure approached her and forced herself to smile.
Eric stood next to her and looked at the names. "Are you okay?"
"I don't know. I guess. I mean…I always knew he was dead. I thought I had come to terms with it and that I'd be okay with living the rest of my life not knowing who killed him. But now…now it just seems more real. That somebody actually did this and it actually happened." Sue said tearily.
"He was a good agent. But wherever he is now I'm sure he's at peace…and he wouldn't want you to be so sad." Eric said softly.
Sue sniffed. "I know…I know. I hate this feeling inside of me, Eric. I hate the fact that I don't even know who did it and I already hate him and know there's no way I can bring myself to love him. I know God wants me to forgive but it's hard…it's so hard that he took him away from us…away from me." Sue sobbed.
Eric placed his hands comfortingly on her shoulders and looked at her. "We will bring him to justice, I promise. That's the only thing we can do…it might not be enough but I promise whoever did this will be punished. The rest we'll have to leave up to God."
Sue nodded and began to sob for all her heart's worth as Eric pulled her into a hug.
Sue and Eric entered back into the bullpen and Lucy approached her, giving her a hug. "Are you okay hon?" She asked with concern.
Sue nodded. "I will be. I think we just need to focus on finding out who this guy is and bringing him to justice."
Lucy nodded and gave her friend another reassuring squeeze on the shoulder.
D bustled into the office and gathered the crew around. "All right everybody, I know that this case has a certain personal level attached to it but it can't hinder our investigation. This is not a witch hunt or a vendetta, this is an open federal investigation. We have to continue pursuing leads on Boon's murder as well as Jack Hudson's murder. Find out whatever you can and that's all. Understood?" The group sat there tensely before acknowledging D's request. "Good, Bobby, can I see you for a minute?"
Bobby followed D out of the office and was escorted into the conference room where their supervisor and several other important figures sat expectantly. "Agent Manning, take a seat please."
Bobby looked at D curiously and then took a seat at the end of the table. The man at the other end cleared his throat and spoke up. "As I've come to understand, you guys have recently discovered a new revelation in the death of Agent Jack Hudson."
"That's right." Bobby answered.
"And it has also come to our understanding that before Jack was sent to Hartbridge that he made a request to allow only you to know about his whereabouts."
"Yes…that's correct."
"We've decided that to avoid any uncertain run-ins to send you to Hartbridge to talk to Sylvia Shaun." D explained.
"At the same time we must stress that you do not make any contact with Jack Hudson while you are there. His security is still very volatile and if anybody were to link the two of you together, we may have to relocate him once again." Somebody else replied.
"But this has to do with Jack now. The same assassin who killed Boon tried to kill Jack." Bobby protested.
"We'll walk down that road when we come to it," D said. "When we have enough evidence we'll charge the man but even then it would only be for attempted murder."
"If we can do so without Agent Hudson's testimony then that would be ideal. There's no need to unnecessarily risk his security." The supervisor explained.
"Do you understand these conditions, Agent Manning?"
Bobby took in a deep breath. "Yes, of course."
Bobby and D exited the conference room and D stopped him brashly. "What the hell did you think you were playing at?" he demanded.
"What are you talking about?"
"You knew he was alive." D retorted.
"What the hell do you think I could have done, D? This was Jack's life that was at risk." Bobby argued.
"How long were you planning on lying to us?" D asked.
Bobby sighed. "I don't know D. I might have snapped some day and just told everybody. And you know what? There hasn't been a day that's gone by where I haven't wished he hadn't told me so don't you start riding on your high horse just yet." Bobby spat back and walked off back to the bullpen.
Jack stood outside the café and for once in his life he was actually nervous. He had found his courage and called Sylvia to ask her out to coffee. He didn't know whether or not he was afraid that she would say no or that she would say yes. Things would have been a lot less complicated if she just said no and demanded he never speak to her again. But then again, he wouldn't have wanted that either. The truth was he didn't know if he was ready to date, if he was even over Sue yet. However, Jack Hudson was always the realistic type. He knew that there was no way he'd have any chance with Sue. Not now, not even when he was still Jack Hudson.
"Hey!" Sylvia's voice brought him out of his trance and he didn't even have enough time to be nervous.
"Hey! You made it. Good." He laughed nervously.
Sylvia smiled. "Well, I was never one to refuse coffee." She beamed and they walked into the small café and placed their orders before sitting down by a cozy booth right by the window.
"So…uh listen Sylv, before we do anything I just thought I should be…honest with you." Jack stuttered.
"Sure…what's the matter?"
Jack cleared his throat. "Well…listen. It's not that I don't like you. I think you're an amazing woman and I don't even know why you even agreed to come have coffee with me today. And I think this friend thing is working out really well between us and maybe there's a chance for something more. It's just that…I don't really want to lead you on or give you any false expectations. The truth is I'm a train wreck when it comes to these types of things so I hope you're not expecting anything too…spectacular."
Sylvia smiled a small smile. "What was her name?"
Jack was caught off-guard. "Uh…what?"
"What was her name? The girl who made you into such a train wreck cause I'm guessing it's got to come from somewhere."
Jack smiled sadly and sighed. "Sue. Her name was Sue. She was a beautiful and amazing woman…completely independent and strong and from the moment I first talked to her I was caught in." He explained, somewhat surprised at his own honesty.
"So what happened then?"
Jack sighed. "We worked together and our company had a strict policy about these types of things so…we couldn't have any form of relationship. It was hard…being so close to her and seeing her go out with other people and not even being able to tell her what I feel. To this day I don't even think she knows," he looked up at Sylvia who merely smiled softly. "I'm sorry…this is probably not exactly the conversation you had in mind when you agreed to come today."
Sylvia shook her head. "No, I appreciate your honesty. It's best to be upfront at first instead of tip-toeing around our past until it comes back to bite us in the butt at the most inconvenient times. Honesty from a man is something I'm not entirely used to."
"Am I sensing some train-wreckage on your side as well?" Jack asked.
Sylvia took a sip of her coffee and laughed. "Oh no, that's a third or fourth date conversation."
"Is there going to be a third or fourth date?" Jack asked.
Sylvia smiled. "Only if you want."
Bobby paced around the lobby impatiently as he waited for Sylvia Shaun to return. The doorman suggested that he maybe sit down and the Boston FBI officers told him maybe they should come back later. Still, Bobby was resolute in finding her and talking to her now, just to get it over with. He looked up when he heard a pair of voices laughing and the shock was visible on his face when he saw who the male accompanying the young woman was.
"There…that's Sylvia Shaun now." The doorman explained.
Sylvia stopped and looked to the officers curiously and turned to the doorman. "Marcus? What's going on?" she asked.
Jack tried his best not to react to seeing his best friend standing right there and Bobby tried his best to ignore Jack's presence. Bobby turned to Sylvia and showed her his badge. "Ms. Shaun? Could we ask you a couple of questions?"
Jack looked at her with concern. "What's going on? What's this about?" He asked somewhat defensively.
"Nothing serious. We were just looking for witnesses for a hit-and-run that happened the other day." Bobby said without looking at Jack.
"Oh…uhm…sure. What would you like to know?" Sylvia asked.
"Actually, we'd like to talk to you in private if that's possible." One of the officers explained.
"Sure, of course," She turned to Jack and smiled. "Thanks for coffee. I guess I'll see you around then."
Jack returned the smile and gave her hand a light squeeze. He turned around and gave a lingering look at Bobby before heading out the door of the complex.
The other officers sat down on the couch while Sylvia gave them each a glass of water. Bobby leaned against the wall, extremely uneasy by Sylvia's presence. She sat down on the couch across from the other officers.
"What did you guys want to ask me? I don't really remember seeing anything." Sylvia said.
One of the officers cleared his throat. "Actually we wanted to ask you some questions about Dylan Boon."
Sylvia froze and all of the emotion drained from her face. She took a long sip of her drink and nodded. "All right."
"We understand you guys were in a relationship a couple of years ago."
Sylvia nodded. "It was over 10 years ago. I was really young."
"When was the last time you spoke to him?"
"When I left town for school…8 or so years ago." She replied.
"Are you aware he's dead?" Bobby asked.
Sylvia shook her head but her face still remained emotionless. "No."
One of the officers handed her the picture of the necklace. "Does this look familiar?"
Sylvia nodded. "Yes. He gave it to be for my 16th birthday."
"He was strangled with it after he was shot," Bobby explained. "Any idea how it might have gotten there?"
Sylvia looked at Bobby straight in the eye. "I don't know. I gave back everything he gave to me when I left."
"Really?" Bobby said pacing around. "That's a lot of expensive things to give up for a single girl trying to make her way through school."
"I didn't want any reminders of that life. I needed a clean break."
The officers looked at one another and then up at Bobby expectantly. Bobby sat down straight across from Sylvia and looked her straight in the eye. "He's dead, Sylvia. And from the looks of it, it's personal. And word on the street is that you had a bit of a problem with the big boss Boon was working for."
"You're saying I hired someone to kill him?" Sylvia asked.
"Can you convince us otherwise? Taking money from them to go to medical school, it's not looking too good on you." Bobby countered.
"What? You think I took money from Sam when I wanted to get away from that environment? I paid for medical school from a trust fund my biological father set up for me when I was a baby." Sylvia explained.
Bobby looked at Sylvia, the look of frustration evident on his face. "Where were you June 29th?"
"For the whole day? Or would you like to be more specific."
"The whole day." Bobby challenged.
"I worked the whole day at the hospital from a 38 hour shift and then I came home with my good friends Ben and Jerry. That's usually how my day goes." She answered.
"Today seemed to be a good exception though. Who was that gentlemen you were with?" Bobby pressed.
Sylvia raised a brow. "He's a friend. Trevor, if you must know."
"And what does he do?"
"He's a banker. What does that have to do with anything?" Sylvia answered impatiently.
The other officers looked at Bobby then stood up. "Nothing, we're just seeing who we might have to talk to. Thank you for your time Ms. Shaun."
