Chapter 2
Emma's morning does not start well.
She wakes up alone in Shalimar's room, which isn't a bad place to start the day but she'd have preferred it if Shalimar had still been in there with her. Emma's only been fantasizing about waking up in Shalimar's embrace for the last several weeks, so accidentally passing out in Shalimar's bed only to miss out on the chance to have that fantasy fulfilled?
Emma is mentally kicking herself all the way back into her own bedroom. But a shower and change of clothes later finds Emma back out of her room and on the search for Shalimar so that they can, in turn, go looking for Donna.
Except when Emma drops in on Adam to see if he knows where Shalimar went, it turns out Shalimar had already left to find Donna all on her own. Despite agreeing to take Emma with her last night.
"She must have forgotten we'd agreed I'd go with her," Emma said, feeling a sinking sensation in her stomach.
Adam gave her a sympathetic look. "Well, Donna wasn't at her apartment anyway. How about you go round up the guys and head over to the bar from last night. I'll send the coordinates once you're in flight. Maybe if you three can find Donna's date from last night, Donna will still be with him."
"Here's hoping," Emma chirped with a brightness she did not feel.
The guys are sparring when Emma finds them a few minutes later. Well, less sparring and more play fighting really. And Jesse is in a flirty mood which is... interesting. Because the flirtiness isn't directed at Emma, it just makes her a little giddy - which is annoying when it mixes with the uncertain feeling that she may have made things uncomfortable with Shalimar somehow. Sometimes when flirtiness is directed at her, it makes Emma all flirty back. Even if she's not genuinely interested in the other person.
She'd nearly had sex a few times because someone else's want for her was so overwhelming that she struggled to untangle their emotions from her own. It was difficult for her to set boundaries in her own head, to keep other people's feelings from leaking in and becoming her feelings. She was getting better at it, though, now that she wasn't pretending to be a normal, baseline human.
The genetic closet wasn't the only one she'd come out of in the last few years, however, though she hadn't really discussed her queerness with her new friends yet. But given the attraction she could sense Jesse felt towards Brennan, it seemed that Emma wasn't the only one who'd be celebrating pride month come June.
"Hey boys, you two ready to go on a field trip?" she called teasingly.
Brennan dropped the electricity in his hands and Jesse went fully tangible. "Where we headed?" they chorused, exchanging amused glances.
"That bar Shalimar met Donna at last night," Emma told them. "Donna wasn't at her apartment when Shal got there. So while she's looking for leads at the apartment, we're headed to check out Donna's last known location."
"Give us a minute to get changed and we'll meet you in the hanger," Brennan promised.
"Maybe take a few minutes so you can shower too," she teased, laughing when Jesse gave her a mock-affronted look.
Once at the club, the guys stayed outside to chat with the bouncer while Emma went inside to talk to enquire about the bartender. It was too early for the club to actually be open yet, but for a pretty smile with an empath's brain behind it... doors opened anyway.
The bartender from the night before was already there - the club was a bar from 1 to 6 and then 'transformed' into a dance club afterwards. He'd been subbing for a friend the night before, so luck was on Emma's side that his usual hours were earlier. Emma gets an impression of the guy they're looking for from the bartender. Not exactly a face, but she'd recognize the guy if they found him now.
The bouncer, however, wasn't the once from the night before which meant the guys had gotten nowhere by the time Emma came back out. They're leaning awfully close together and it makes Emma wonder... Brennan's emotions can be harder to read than Jesse's, for all that Emma had connected to Brennan near instantly when they first met. Brennan's used to playing his cards close to his chest; it makes his mind more guarded. But there's affection written his eyes as he gazes at Jesse that he can't quite hide.
She hopes that, if there really is something between them, they'll have more luck than she's having. Crushing on a straight woman. Emma's heart ought to know better than that by now.
"He gave us the address of the guy who was here last night," Jesse said, putting a little distance between himself and Brennan as Emma walked up. "It's not far from here."
"Lead the way," Emma replied, cheerfully following along as they headed off. It's a lovely day and... and she wishes she was walking along with Shalimar.
In the bright sunlight, Shalimar's hair seemed to turn to molten gold and her eyes always glittered with joy and laughter. And the way she walked, with a gliding grace and self-confidence that Emma had never seen before... it was always an experience to walk behind her and watch the sway of her hips.
Emma sighed forlornly, earning a look of concern from the guys.
"Something wrong," Brennan asked.
"Not really. Just... you ever get a hopeless crush on someone you know doesn't like you the same way?" Emma shrugged and added, "that's me right now."
"Not one of us?" Jesse asked, sounding somewhere between alarmed and concerned.
"No, no, don't worry. You two flirting with each other isn't breaking my heart," she teased, just to see them blush and splutter. She forged on before they could say anything. "I have much more luck than that when I crush on guys. But when it's a woman, I always wind up pining over someone unavailable for one reason or another."
"Shalimar," Brennan filled in. "Tough luck, Emma. Good taste, though."
"Fellow bi!" Jesse said with a grin, slinging his arm around Emma's shoulder. "I must help cheer you up."
Emma giggled and leaned against him as they kept walking down the street.
"You're bi?" Brennan grinned and batted his eyes mock flirtatiously. "Well so am I. I guess we queer folk really do flock together. What about Shalimar and Adam?" He slung his own arm around Emma's shoulder's too, teasingly caressing Jesse's arm as he did so.
Ugh, boys. Flirting while she was literally standing right there in between them. Too bad she wasn't hung up on them instead; maybe she could have angled for her first polyamorous relationship. Instead she was trying not to let her brain segue from thoughts about the arms around her shoulders to Shalimar's arms and the gorgeous look of her muscled biceps when her arms flexed...
"Adam's queer. But last I asked, he didn't really have a specific label," Jesse told them, blushing. "Shalimar, however, is our token straight ally."
"Good to know." Brennan gestured to an apartment building ahead of them. "And we've arrived. Just in time," he said, breaking away to go buzz the intercom.
A few minutes later and the bouncer they were looking for had come down to join. He didn't remember much about the car in question, telling them the same thing he'd told Shalimar the night before. The car was a black Beamer. A little prodding from Emma's empathic abilities had them both seeing flickers of images from the car in question as it drove away with Donna in the passenger seat. He'd seen the license plate at the time, but hadn't really registered as important in the dark of the night. Donna had been leaving willingly and, quite clearly, sober.
But the point was that he saw it.
Sounding a little dazed, the man said, "QRS-592," while Emma mouthed along with him. He shook his head, coming back to himself. "The license plate number was QRS-592. That help any?"
"Immensely," Emma promised him, grinning. "Thank you so much."
"No problem. Good luck finding your friend," he replied, heading back inside the apartment complex.
"Now to see what Adam can find for us," Jesse said, touching his ring to activate his comm-link. "Good work, Emma."
Adam sends them to Hartwell Brokerage where the car's owner apparently worked. And, judging by the parking ticket under the windshield wiper, where the guy was racking up parking tickets with his carelessness. Once they confirmed the car was there, they headed inside and Brennan charmed the woman at the lobby desk into calling down Jack Hartwell himself.
Jesse flickered with well concealed jealousy. If Emma weren't an empath, she'd have never even guessed.
Hartwell's kind of a dick when he arrives. He looks over Emma with appraisal and lust that makes her prickle with disgust, his eyes landing on her breasts instead of her face. Brennan shifted in front of her, small bits of electricity snapping along his fingers for a moment.
"So, what can I do for you three?" Jack smiled, a shark's smile. It must have been what Donna liked about him, because everything else about him is rather repugnant from what Emma can tell.
"We're here about Donna Morse," Jesse told him.
"Yeah? What about her?" When Brennan and Jesse just glared at him, Jack quailed a little bit. Panicking a little he said, "I didn't do anything to her. That bitch attacked me. We were going to be headed back to my place and she just freaked out. So if she's accusing me of..."
"We're not accusing you of anything. But she never came home last night, so if we were going to accuse you of something..." Brennan trailed off a touch menacingly, eyes narrowed.
"He's telling the truth," Emma interrupted before all the male posturing and testosterone got too overwhelming. "He's not hiding anything either." She can feel his worried honesty. He's concerned for Donna despite how much she'd freaked him out the night before. Though he's still mostly disappointed that he didn't get laid.
"Thanks for nothing," Jesse told the guy and they headed outside to regroup.
"Looks like our leads just ran dry. We'll have to keep checking in on her apartment until she shows up again," Emma observed once they were back out in the sunlight.
"Let's head back to base for now," Brennan grumbled, tossing a little electrical charge at Jack's Beamer as they passed it and smirking as it set the alarm blaring behind them.