Hi, so here is another chapter and the first of Season 3! I hope you enjoy this chapter and I will hopefully bring you the next one sooner rather than later.
This chapter does deal with PTSD, guns and drug use so if that TRIGGERS you in anyway then please skip this chapter.
Disclaimer-Nothing here is mine just the character of Bridget.
Please Read and Review.
What Lies Buried
Chapter 18-Swimming With The Sharks
In which Erin is spiralling, Jay is kidnapped, Bridget is not okay and Hank is just doing his best to keep his ragtag family (and his unit) together. Some time gap.
April 2016
Time moves on as it always does and Hank knew that first hand. It seemed it had been ages since a baby had been sixteen and then seventeen and then waking up after being stabbed and left to die.
And then it was Christmas.
Bridget had still been in the hospital for both Christmas and the New Year and she had not been very pleased about it. Jay had not been kidding when he had said this was her favourite time of the year but considering she was still so weak she was unable to get out of bed and the fact that she was sleeping more than fifteen hours a day there was nothing really that could be done about it.
But it was still perfect because even though she was in the hospital, even though she was still half asleep and even though the day was confined to visiting hours it was still perfect to walk into the room to see her sitting up and smiling (although the colour of milk) and to here her say in that shy way…
"Hey Dad"
He would say, "Hey Bridge" and that would be the end of it but it set something inside of him on fire with pleasure. It was just the little things and now it seemed as if the little things were coming together.
He didn't even have to worry about what Yates had done. Bridget seemed to know. She had certainly known Nadia was dead. She had watched him that second day with dark eyes and had said as much. And then she had looked Jay dead in the eyes and told him that she had not been raped by Greg Yates. He had taken her underwear but he had not raped her.
Jay had muttered something about getting a cup of coffee and had not come back for half an hour and when he had his eyes were very red. He had wanted to go to but she had grabbed his hand and he did not have the heart to let go. He didn't think he would ever have the heart to let go. Bridget had gone back to sleep at that point and he had still been holding her hand when Jay had come back in. Neither one of them had mentioned how utterly afraid they had been that she was going to wake up and tell them something different.
And neither one of them thought she was lying.
That had been Christmas and New Year. By end of January she was getting out of bed and being able to walk around the hospital. She was still very week on her legs like a baby horse but she was able to walk and then come the middle of February she was home.
Well back at Jay's anyway.
It worked out he knew. It was her home, it was where she felt safe. Will was there too most of the time and it was good to have a doctor who could check in regularly but it didn't mean that it wasn't like he was ripping his own heart out leaving that first night.
Didn't help that everything else was falling apart.
Okay so that wasn't completely accurate. Justin was good, when Hank had told him what had happened he had hit the roof and had threatened to go AWOL and murder Greg Yates in his prison cell but he had calmed himself down in the end. He and Olive and Daniel were going to come down towards the summer months and when he had told Bridget that she had seemed genuinely interested in meeting them which could only be a good sign seeing as the last time his son and daughter had been in the same city his daughter had ran to New York.
But Erin…Erin had hit rock bottom and done it in that wonderful way that only Erin could do. Even when she had been fifteen and spiralling she had never been this good. Hank didn't have to keep watch to know that the drugs were back and the booze and the bringing home strange men and not remembering their names never mind weather or not she had slept with them. He knew that Bunny had gotten her hooks in deep and that it was a combination of Nadia, Bridget and Yates that had sent her spiralling. Nadia was dead. Bridget was alive and Erin had loved both of them as if they were her sisters. Indeed it was hard even now to look across at the desk where nine times out of ten he had seen the three of them together giggling more than working and realise that one of them was gone and the other two were broken into pieces.
Because he knew…he knew Bridget. She was part of him and he knew when she was coping and when she wasn't. He went round there after work most nights just to see her and though she was on the couch most times wincing every time she shifted and yet still smiling at him in a way she hadn't done in months he could see the way her body seemed to tense whenever the door was opened or shut a bit to loudly or when the lights went out or whenever someone knocked on the door and she didn't know immediately who it was. She clearly wasn't sleeping and when he had mentioned going back to work with the Intelligence Unit or even just simply going and seeing Nadia's memorial stone she had shook so violently that the glass of water she had been holding in her hand had ended up all over the floor.
"No" she said shaking her had head and burrowing backwards into the couch as if he was the enemy. "No I don't want to go back there, not yet I just…I just don't Dad please don't make me…I…"
"Alright" he had soothed because she was one step away from working her way into a full blown panic attack.
"Alright Bridge you don't have to do anything that you don't want to do okay? I'm not gonna make you come back. Just breathe"
She had calmed herself down eventually but it had been enough for all four of them (because Mouse was also there these days bemoaning Jay's Netflix choices—when Hank had casually mentioned he didn't even have one Mouse had almost fallen off the chair in shock) to share concerned looks.
Between him, Jay and Will there had sprung up this thing between them the focus of it being this girl on the couch. Jay may have had a point. They were some kind of family now and they just had to figure out where they were in it. But Hank was not going to tell Jay he was right because whenever he tried to do it Jay would always casually ask if Erin really had quit or if her badge was still in his desk (it was).
Jay had told him that she was getting better at sleeping and Will had assured him that the wound was healing wonderfully. She would have a killer scar that stretched across her stomach and made him feel sick just looking at it but she would live…
And she was calling him Dad.
The first time she did it in front of Al (Meredith had been a God send when it came to helping Bridget in and out of the shower because God knows it was too awkward for any of them to do it), Al had looked at him with a raised eyebrow and he had grinned back. It was so utterly pathetic that this got him excited but it did. He felt like a little kid again whenever she did it. If she came back to his house and had dinner with her brother and him he feared he might actually combust.
He couldn't save Erin. He wanted to but he knew from experience that the only person who could save Erin was Erin. She had to hit her rock bottom and then cut the cancer that was Bunny Fletcher out of her life. She had done it when she was fifteen, when she was twenty one and now and yet the woman still kept coming back. If he wasn't so sure it would backfire he'd just plant a kilo of coke in her car and get her arrested but when he had voiced that plan once before his wife had shot him a look that told him just how utterly stupid it was.
He couldn't save Erin from herself. If he could he would have. Bridget on the other hand he thought that if she had just got back to work…got back to the place where it had all started then perhaps she could work through the panic that was drowning her.
Fortunately (or unfortunately depending on how you looked at it) he didn't have to wait long because of course on the day where they really did need all hands on deck Jay had gotten kidnapped and was now being tortured through a very effective livestream.
"You should call Erin" Al said quietly after something that had once been a plan had been created out of nothing and with no time to spare.
"No"
"Hank don't dig your heels in the sand. Not with this. Burgess is too inexperienced for a drop like this and Erin knows Jay's playbook. Call her. Even if she gives her badge back at the end of the day she still needs to remember what it feels like to be a cop before she does."
"Al I am not calling Erin."
"Fine I will. You go and get your daughter"
"Alvin"
"No listen to me" Al said shutting the door to the office. "Stop acting like a parent for a second and act like a cop. Erin is the best person to go in there. She is the only person in this moment Jay Is going to trust with his life because she is his partner. And Jay is already in pretty bad shape so at some point Bridget is going to find out why. She's not stupid and it's going to ruin all the trust you and her have. Also…she's already been the target of one lunatic trying to get a rise out of you do you really her to try and dodge death a second time?"
"She's not—"
"Hank. These guys are smart. If they broke Jay's cover that fast they are going to realise that if he doesn't talk getting his sister will. He takes one look at Bridget, if you take one look at Bridget you will both talk like songbirds"
"Songbirds really?"
"Look me in the eye and tell me that I am wrong"
He wasn't. Damn it he wasn't. But the thought of…"
And he wanted to go. He wanted to be the one to tell her but at the same time he was the commanding officer and he couldn't just up and leave his team with no warning especially not after a morning like today"
"Alright, ask Erin. Keep Burgess on standby just in case—"
He opened his office door.
"Mouse"
Mouse came over his jaw set so tightly it looked like he was going to break. This was not Mouse the street kid looking at him. This was Mouse the soldier.
"Bridget needs to be told. And she needs to come here. If they think that Jay isn't going to budge—I need you to get her here and tell her I—just break it to her as gently as you can and then drag her here if you have to"
"Nah don't worry Sarge I'll get her here. I've still got a few of her secrets she doesn't want out"
That was…no…some other time.
Bridget was asleep. She was so achingly, breathtakingly, wonderfully asleep. It was odd, sleep used to be the best thing that she could do. She loved it, the whole ritual of going to bed and snuggling down under warm covers and that gradual waking up in the morning where you hung on the edge of sleep and waking. Dreams and reality.
And since Yates she couldn't do it.
He was there.
She could see him, feel him, his hands cold on the inside of her legs as he ripped her panties off, she hear Nadia scream and then she could see him, the cold blue of his eyes staring down at her and she always woke up at that point gasping, heaving, crying…
Or sometimes screaming.
That had been few and far between when the first time she had screamed Yates name Jay had kicked down the door gun in hand and Will had come in with 9-1-1 already dialled. Now that Will had moved out it was just her and Jay but it had gotten worse.
And when Jay was on night shift…
She couldn't sleep.
It got to the point where it was either sleeping pills (which Will would never issue to her without her jumping through a significant series of hoops—and that was before Hank found out) or just waiting until her body was so exhausted it knocked itself out but it didn't change the fact that whenever she was left alone in the apartment she was triple checking the locks and taking Jay's off duty weapon out of the safe and keeping it beside her bed fully loaded with the safety on.
Which considering how tired she was, was a really stupid thing to do.
But she couldn't help herself.
And she couldn't sleep.
She had never really thought much about Jay's gun before. She had been eleven when he had gotten them both the one he took to work and the off duty one. He had shown her them but with Pat she had grown up around guns. She knew how to use them, hold them, load them and be responsible with them. She knew what to do, she was a cop's sister, and now a cop's daughter and yet she was taking the gun and keeping it next to her in case by some minor miracle Greg Yates was there when she woke up.
She was not okay.
She didn't know much but she knew that.
It was just typical. She had finally managed to bury all the grief that came with the parent reveal, she had gotten on the same page when it came to Camille and Mary and then this had come along and she couldn't breathe most of the time. It was like she was choking on air and to be honest sometimes she thought it would have been easier if she had never woken up because at least in that dream world Greg Yates had never become a thing.
But she had managed to fall asleep and she was in a good place until the banging started. She shot up at once and her hand was on her gun, well…Jay's gun and she was at her front door before she realised that she was still in the same leggings and crop top as the night before and that she was sure the scar was on show.
He was here…Yates were here…he had come back to finish her off.
There was another knock and she swallowed feeling a bubble of hysteria rise in her. Even if she got to the phone she wouldn't be able to call anyone in time. Yates would make sure of that...
And then…
"Bridgey it's Mousey. Look through the peephole it's me okay"
Mouse.
She took a breath and then peered through the peephole. Sure enough there was Mouse.
Oh God it was just Mouse.
It was just Mouse.
She slid back downwards her face to the door breathing in heavily. Her knee was aching, her side was aching and her heart was racing.
Putting the gun down on the side table she opened the door. Mouse could infer what he wanted to she wasn't in the mood.
"Hey Mouse" she said opening the door.
"Bridgey"
She knew he had clocked the gun on the side of the table but Mouse being Mouse carefully didn't say anything.
"Bridget Hank sent me, we've…we've got a really big problem"
It taken some convincing.
Actually it had taken a lot of convincing and even then Mouse had not been satisfied until he had pulled up in the garage bit of Intelligence. Bridget had been adamant she was not going in the front and Mouse who had just spent the last forty minutes arguing with her and dodging calls and texts from Voight who apparently was not impressed it was taking so long (seriously the kid was half him for crying out loud what he had expected it to be…easy?) had not been in the mood to debate it with her.
She slid out of the car and winced. She had changed into cleaner leggings and a cleaner top and the second she had gone Mouse had took Jay's gun pulled the bullets out and hid them both back in the safe. Seriously when this was over he was going to have to have a talk with the man about changing his lock combination because even Mouse knew the day of his first deployment was a really, really easily recognisable date for the sister who had seen him go off to war and who had seen him come back.
"Hey"
Oh good the boss was here. Mouse busied himself with the phone attached to the car. He was pretty sure he had taken Adam's police car which meant that the phone would need updating anyway because Adam liked to ignore the little icons until started sending warnings daily.
"Hey" Bridget said. Even her voice sounded tired. "Mouse told me about Jay? Your…your gonna find him right?"
Christ she sounded small. He had never thought of Bridget as someone who could sound so small. She was usually so put together, so warm, so full of life and yet now she sounded small and looked frail and tiny. She looked like he had been when he had gotten back. Just so utterly exhausted that you craved sleep with every fibre in your being and yet when you slept all you wanted was to stay awake because the nightmares were so vivid it made you feel sick.
Mouse buried his head in the car so he could remain hidden. He liked Voight, he was kinda cool for a boss and he did not want to see the look on his face when he got a look at his daughter in the midst of some PTSD flashback from hell.
"Yeah we are gonna get him back Bridget. We've already got a plan. Erin's up there and—"
"Erin?"
"Yeah Erin and—"
"Does she even wanna see me?"
"Why would she not wanna see you?"
Mouse got it just at the same time Voight did. Christ he was going to kill something, maybe Yates…how hard was it to find a bent prison guard if he threatened to ruin his credit score?
"Oh no…no Bridget she doesn't care about that. It doesn't matter…"
"Dad she's gone on a full bender for four months cause I am alive and Nadia isn't"
"Yeah well…she's stopped that now. And she's in this to get Jay back. Look…I just…I…"
"I know Mouse explained it. I just…can I go I just go and sleep I need to get some sleep I need…can I just go into your office and get some sleep?"
"Yeah sure"
Mouse sighed exiting the car only when he was sure the private moment was over. Voight was still standing there that look on his face that Mouse didn't want to interpret because it was too private.
"It's PTSD you know. Nothing you can do about it"
Voight turned to stare at him. Clearly he had not realised Mouse was still there.
"I know…and I know this hasn't helped but…if she's back here and she can see where she worked and where Nadia died and…"
"Sarge listen I don't wanna get in the way of Bridget's healing cause I love that girl like she's my own sister. Hell the amount of times she's called me when it got bad with Jay—she's not—It might help her being back here I admit but there are other things on her mind to and—she—she was armed when she opened the door this morning, Jay's off duty weapon. I mean she covered it pretty well but my guess is she's sleeping with it next to her when she's left alone and…and someone needs to know that"
Yeah that was lame.
Christ why did he have to ramble when he was nervous?
Voight looked at him again with that look and then nodded. He was up the stairs then too and Mouse nodded and reminded himself sternly that they still had to rescue Jay and they were going to need tech support.
She didn't sleep.
She didn't sleep.
Of course she didn't sleep.
She stared upwards at the ceiling for a long moment and then she pulled her boots back on and wincing went down the stairs.
If anyone noticed her limp down the stairs they didn't say anything but she felt the eyes on her all the same. Well…one set of eyes on her anyway.
Nadia's stone was smooth and untouched. It still had not been weathered down by rain or snow or sleet or anything else which considering the fact that it had been put up before winter in Chicago was a miracle.
She stared at it for a second and then her hands in her hoodie pocket she turned around and walked down the pavement into the car park.
She had not really known what she had expected. It had been four months all. What had she expected? That Hank had framed the blood with tape and a big sign that said my daughter and her friend were stabbed/brutally raped and left to die kind of thing?
Seriously what had Bridget been expecting?
She stared down at the pavement and breathed in and out. It had been easier to stare at the pavement than it was to see her desk. To see Nadia's desk. To see Erin who had given her a small smile. She had not lied to Hank, she was utterly terrified that Erin would hate her. The three of them had been the like a little trio within Intelligence and she had not realised until it was gone how much she had missed that. She had not been one who made friends easily. And yet they had both been her friends. And it had felt like she had lost them.
She wiped her fingers under her eyes again and stared down on the pavement and breathed in and out. Her head was mess and it was pounding and—
"You okay?" said a voice behind her and she saw out of the corner of her eye Trudy step forwards so that she was next to her and more to the point blocking her profile from view when it came to the cops that were shooting her wired looks considering…well…considering the fact that she was standing in the middle of the car park staring at a bit of gravel.
"No"
"Figured you wouldn't be. Bit of a jarring first day back wasn't it?"
She didn't know what to say to that. It had been a bit of a horrendous first day back and she was still not even sure if she wanted to come back.
"I came out to tell you…they got Jay. Intelligence I mean."
She whirled around. Her hair which was longer now nearly hit her in the eye and she winced brushing it out of her face.
"Is he alright"
"He's pretty banged up" Trudy said as if she was choosing each and every word carefully. "He…I wont lie to you kid they banged him up real good. He's going to be in hospital overnight at least. You gonna be okay on your own?"
"Fine" Bridget said though it was far from fine and Trudy knew it. To be fair to her though she didn't call her out for being a complete and utter liar.
"Hank ever tell you I was shot in the line of duty?"
"No" she said truthfully.
"It was around the time that you were born…well just after. The department…they stuck me behind a desk. And I thought…I thought I couldn't do it. It was humiliating and I was still shaking at the thought of a gun never mind actually holding one. But it gets better, I promise you Bridget it does get better. And one day you wont be afraid anymore."
"Are you not afraid?"
"Not of him, not of being shot. I mean you know in this job it's a possibility but if you go out of the door thinking it's your last patrol your dead anyway."
"Do you ever…do you ever still see him?"
"Ah" Trudy said as if that was the answer to everything. "You still see Yates then?"
Bridget didn't do anything. She didn't speak. She didn't want to so much as breathe, whenever that name was mentioned. Trudy however just looking at her seemed to understand.
"Sometimes I saw him, and it was a hard hole to crawl out of but I had people around me who helped me. Your Dad was…fantastic, and Camille too, and Al. They knew I was struggling and they were there when I asked for help."
"I take Jay's gun when he's not there and sleep with it next to my bed because I see him when I sleep" Bridget said finally.
"Yeah well I'd stop that. Seriously do you want a list of how many shooting accidents in the home happen weekly?"
She smiled and then stopped. It was the first time she had smiled since…
Huh.
"If you're scared of him, even in prison, even in New York then from his cell he's won. Because he's destroyed you. The best way to stick two fingers up at a man like Greg Yates is to carry on living your life. Because guys like that…they want to get under your skin and into your head so strongly, so deeply that there is nothing left and then even if you don't kill them they are destroyed"
"I think he did"
Trudy grabbed her by the shoulders and spun her around so that they were face to face.
"No he didn't" she said sternly. "Because you're here. Because you have people who will do anything to make sure that you stay here. All you have to do as hard as it sounds, is ask for help. And I know it sounds hard but you' d be amazed at how strong a person…how strong a woman you can be once you utter the words that you need help"
She was not going to cry. She was not.
"Why was it me that he left alive and not…Nadia?"
She had asked her mother that question as well but she had not gotten the answer she wanted.
"I don't know. The only person who does Is Greg Yates and before you get any idea's in your head he is never going to tell you and Hank and Jay will shut down the city before they let you jet off to New York and ask him."
"I never said—"
"You didn't have too, I've had a relationship with your parents and brother that has lasted over twenty years you think I don't know when a Voight is thinking about doing something really, really stupid? Also I know Jay and that red-headed brother of yours. Also…kinda obvious when they are going to do something stupid"
"I still don't—"
"He might have left you alive to send a message to Chicago PD. He might have gotten sloppy. He have been planning to kill you both and something spooked him or maybe you just got medical attention in time. I don't know and you don't know and the point is, is that you might never know. But If you let that question keep you awake at night then he's killed you anyway. Now it's still very cold out here so can we go inside? I have hot chocolate and I sent Roman and Burgess out to get cake"
"You know you can't use them as your personal delivery boys?"
"Ah it's chocolate fudge cake. The children like to watch Mommy cut it up and then hang around for the cut offs, believe me for two cops who claim poverty there'll be a cheesecake being shared between them tonight"
She laughed. It was the first time she had felt something…anything other than terror.
It was the first time Bridget thought she could.
Erin had just left when there was a knock at the door.
Bridget.
"I heard he's…banged up" she said quietly coming in and sitting down.
"He's gonna make it. You want me to take you to Med?"
"Nah…Will's with him, last thing he needs when he's out on drugs is people crowding his room. Besides Will spoke to me, he's out for the night"
"Ok"
"I…I went and saw it. You know…where it happened. It was stupid really because I thought that…I don't know that there would be something there that proved what happened. And Trudy she followed me out and we had this talk and she told me about the time she was shot and how she came back"
"Okay"
Well that was a story that could go either way.
"What happened to the guy that shot her?"
Ah.
"Well he—"
"Oh" she said seeing his expression. "Never mind"
"Bridget do you want to—"
"I want to come back" she said cutting across him. "I want to be me and I want to come back and do…well…whatever it is I do. I was good at it. I enjoyed it. I enjoyed watching you all work and I won't let him take that from me."
"Okay"
"And I know Mouse told you about Jay's gun"
She caught his expression and rolled her eyes. "I know Mouse. I knew he was going to tell someone about it. He wasn't…you know…subtle even before he stopped taking drugs"
"Yeah he told me. You were…you were just using it for protection weren't you?"
"Yeah what else would I—oh—oh no Dad I wasn't gonna blow my brains out don't worry"
"Yeah well It's my job to worry about you"
"Not been making it easy have I?"
"Teenagers never do"
She laughed at that one and it took him a second to realise that it had been a long four months since he had heard Bridget laugh.
"I see him when I sleep" she said finally. "I can hear him. I can feel him and I can see him and he never leaves me alone and all want to do is just sleep and I can't because he is just there"
Yeah and he couldn't just sit there anymore listening to this.
Instead he came round and sat next to her his hand sliding around her shoulders like he had done in New York and this time she leaned her head against his shoulders as if all the fight had gone out of her and that could not stand. Because this was Bridget and this was his daughter and this was Camille's daughter and she was not going to sit her and cry over Greg Yates. He had already seen one of his daughters disintegrate over that monster and he was not going to watch a second.
"He's in prison now. And trust me he will never see the light of day. He can't get to you or to anyone else. But if you let him get inside of your head then he's destroyed you"
"Yeah I know. And I know I've been acting like I am ok but…but I'm not"
"I know and your acting sucks by the way. Jay and I saw through it before you left the hospital"
"Well damn" she sighed rather theatrically. "There goes that career plan"
"Funny"
She gave another small smile.
"I err…I needed to tell you that I was sorry"
"For what?"
"For what I said that day. For that thing with Olivia Benson and Will and…you were right it did stop you from doing your job and If I'd have just let you cleared Will then maybe you would have found him quicker and maybe Nadia would be alive and—" she cut herself off abruptly and she turned her head her teeth clamping down on her lip as she struggled to get herself under control.
Oh hell no. He was not letting her go there.
"No."
"Dad I—"
"No. Bridget listen to me just…just listen. That was not your fault. You didn't rape and kill Nadia, you didn't stab yourself. None of this is your fault and if you ever listen to anything from me ever again I want it to be this. Greg Yates is responsible for all of this. The blame is on his shoulders and nobody else's. You didn't…you didn't delay him. You didn't make it easier for him. You just stood up for your big brother. And I got that. Besides you are talking to the guy that raised Justin, believe me some of the stuff he used to say…made you look tame. And it doesn't matter"
"How does it not matter?"
Jesus was she serious?
"Bridget I thought you were dead."
"But what does—"
"I thought you were dead. Yates told Erin that he knew who you were and then Jay and I…you weren't here, you didn't go home, we couldn't track you. I didn't know if he had you if you' d just gone home, we knew that Nadia was missing and then your phone pinged outside my house and then we found you and—"
It was hard for him to put into words just what it had been like. Opening the door to that trunk and seeing her there crumpled like a little doll. For a second that had stretched on so endlessly he had thought she was dead and even now he was still not one hundred percent sure that this wasn't some bizzarro dream that could rapidly turn into a nightmare.
And then the waiting game had begun.
He had felt fear a hundred times on the job but that one...
"And it didn't matter. It didn't matter then and it doesn't matter now. None of it matters because you are alive"
"It was still bad of me—"
"No"
"Dad seriously let me apologise—"
"No because there is nothing to apologise for. You are alive. Anything else that happened before that I don't care about."
She watched him for a second and then nodded.
"Ok"
"Good. Let's just…new start ok"
"Ok"
"Dad things kinda nice though"
She looked at him in surprise.
"I didn't even think to ask if you were okay with that I just—"
"Okay with it? Jesus I nearly hugged Jay."
She did laugh then. Loudly.
"I am an absolute mess" she said wiping her eyes under her fingers.
"Nah your not. Your just like me"
"Oh God"
He grinned. It was amazing how easy he could do that now.
"So what happens now?"
"With?"
"Well Erin and all that, Jay and…me…"
"Erin's coming back. She's gonna live with me for a bit but tonight she's going to go to rehab. Get herself ten days with it all flushed out of her system and cut that bloody mother out of her life. Jay will come back when he wants to. And the gun thing has to stop."
He expected blowback from her but she just shrugged. She might be better than she was this morning but she was in a work in progress.
That was fine.
He had time.
They had time.
"Bridget."
"What?"
"I don't need a phone call from Jay at one in the morning because you've blown a hole in the wall"
"I said fine"
Yeah but she was seventeen. Hank had learnt the hard way from Justin and Erin that seventeen was still a teenager and a teenager had different interpretations of the word 'fine'.
But that was tomorrow's problem.
When Jay was back on his feet anyway.
"You want me to give you a ride back home?"
"No. I just…I can't sleep alone at the minute. Everytime something moves I think he's back. I think he's escaped and he's wiping out anyone who can put him away. Stupid I know"
"It's not stupid"
"It's humiliating"
"It's not humiliating. Jesus Bridget after everything that's happened you are allowed to not be ok. You are allowed to do stupid things, but that's why you have me and Jay and Justin and the rest of Intelligence. So we can stop you from doing the stupid things"
Bridget opened her mouth to say something and then shut it again. Which was a wise decision because she was so her mother's kid and there was only so much arguing that you could do with Camille before she shut down on you entirely.
"Can I…can I come home with you tonight?"
That shocked him, actually that stunned him and very few things could actually stun him now.
"You want to spend the night at my house?"
She looked at him and then before he could even begin to process how…happy that made him (and it shouldn't have because she was staying with him because she was too scared to stay alone) and that shouldn't make him happy. Indeed it didn't but…
It was his house. It would have been her home.
And it did matter.
"If you don't want me to that's fine, I can crash on Mouse's couch"
"Yeah right."
"Dad—"
"My home is your home okay. Any time you want to spend there is fine with me"
She closed her mouth on whatever she was going to say and then smiled.
"Thanks"
"You want to get some stuff?"
"Yeah. Just some pyjama's and my laptop and…oh I need tea—"
"No need. Got that stuff in my cupboard"
"You have tea?"
"Yeah. Got it when I…when…when I found out. Figured you would come by to yell at me if nothing else. Didn't think you'd end up in a hostage situation"
"Yeah well…I did come to yell at you"
"Thought as much"
She stood up grabbing her jacket and he followed suite. Trudy shot him a very smug look as they went down the stairs and Hank made a mental note to buy her a bottle of that really expensive vodka she liked as soon as possible.
Bridget was standing on the steps. She didn't mention Yates but he knew what she was thinking. Here was where she had met him.
"Dad…what if…what if he does come after me again. I mean…I mean I know that he's in prison but…you know everyone at least dreams of a Shawshank Redemption moment"
Christ.
But he gave her an answer. An honest one anyway.
"Bridget. He's got to get through me before he gets to you"
She eyed him for a second and then nodded.
"Alright" she said finally. "I believe you"
And that, that right there, was easily the best thing that he had heard all day.
And there you are, I hope you enjoyed this chapter and I will do my best to bring you the next one sooner rather than later as I always say.
Next Chapter-Bridget's first day back goes a bit haywire when she is taken hostage by a deranged father who wants to find his daughter leaving the team scrambling to try and find a way out of this mess.