Continuing from the last chapter. x
Jay hears a whistle almost as soon as he sets foot in the bar and rolls his eyes.
"Damn, who are you and what did you do Ryan? Give us a twirl, honey."
Jay lifts his middle finger but grins as Marcie comes from round the bar and toward him, "Now you got the designer facial hair and you look so much younger. Your eyes look real tired but still you look younger already Ryan, and these clothes they ain't perfect but they're better. Wouldn't throw you out of bed."
"Don't make promises you're not prepared to keep Marcie," Jay teases, and she laughs as she walks away back around the other side of the bar, placing her hands either side of one of the taps.
"Ever worked one of these?"
Jay nods, "Yeah. Like I said before, I worked some bars before I joined the Rangers."
"Well good, unlock the doors and we'll see what today brings," she pauses and with a grin adds, "newbie."
A few hours later filled with nothing except small talk, exchanging numbers as 'That's what co-workers do, sweetie and oh my gosh, is that really your cell it's all smashed up?' and the one thing that's struck Jay about this bar since he began life as Ryan Foster is how quiet it is. That and how expensive it must be to run. It barely justifies Marcie's role besides Barnet, never mind Ryan's.
"Is the bar always this quiet?" Jay asks as Marcie glances at her cell.
She looks up distractedly, "Not always. Not so long ago, this place was crazy busy, but I doubt it'll ever get so busy again."
"Oh?"
"Eddie was such a draw," Marcie smiles fondly, more present for a moment, "Funny, smart, nothing seemed to bother him till suddenly it did and then, anyway." Marcie straightens, appearing to shake herself from that train of thought, and gives Jay a weak smile, then she holds the cell up, "I have to call someone."
Before Jay can stop her, she walks away through the door Barnet had been standing against in previous days and that she'd waved a cursory hand towards earlier.
Jay looks around the bar, ready to follow Marcie under the auspices of looking for more stock to add to the shelves around him but Terry's leaning against the bar so with a lingering look toward the door, he walks over to the older man, "'nother bottle man?"
Ten minutes later and there's still no sign of her. None of the few people sitting around look ready to move so Jay locks the register and then clipping the keys on his belt, he follows the direction she'd left in.
As soon as he shuts the door behind him, he sees a door open on the left that he opens, a sizable room with bottles piled high and two lockers in the corner, a chair and small table in front of them and a small TV on top of a cabinet shoved against the wall.
He checks the ceiling and each corner for any sign of cameras, any sign of surveillance, and if there is any, it's hidden. Jay pulls out his cell quickly and takes a picture.
Jay closes the door and then sees the sign for the bathroom, a unisex staff one on the right that's unoccupied and then just ahead of the fire door there's a sign pointing downwards and another door with a sign saying 'Cellar' and Jay's just about to open it when he hears a voice beyond the partially opened fire door beyond which he can see a sliver of light.
"I need some now. Just Oxy. Just enough for the next week. Come on, you know I'm good for it. Please. Yes, today I got someone working here so I can make it out, please."
Marcie's silent for a few seconds before Jay hears her laugh. Relief obvious and audible.
"Thank you. Yeah, forty-five minutes."
Jay hears her footsteps and quickly walks back through the door to the bar, picking up a towel and wiping down the bar as Marcie joins him, rubbing at her neck.
"All ok?" Jay asks.
Her smile is so forced, "Couldn't be better, Ryan, couldn't be better."
Over the following forty minutes, she rebuffs every attempt at conversation Jay makes. Marcie checks her cell over and over instead. Several ideas run through Jay's mind. Two end up being prominent. The first, call Voight, have someone pick her up and try to get more information from her and hope she calls him somewhere along the way but what if she doesn't and Barnet comes through for her?
He settles on the second idea. Casts his eye around the bar that's emptied from Terry in his usual place and another guy who's a regular who drinks his root beer quietly. Eyes everywhere.
When Jay's eyes settle on Marcie, it's with the newly gained knowledge that at the least she's a habitual user. Likely an addict. It's easier to understand even though the signs aren't obvious. She does well to hide when she's on them, Jay thinks. The notebook makes more sense now because of memory problems. The slow reactions and familiar sound of glass breaking and her apologetic, 'whoops' too.
Other signs she hides better, or maybe Jay just hasn't picked up on them yet.
When she makes her excuses just before Jay accepts them without argument, he waits less than a minute before he decides, hurries over to the guy who's not Terry and tells him he won't be long and to monitor the bar.
The guy nods, and Jay rushes away, following Marcie outside. He can see her with a man almost half her age, he thinks. It's already happened, Jay figures as she nods at the man and turns walking back toward Jay. Stopping dead when she sees him, her shoulders slumping before she draws level and faces him.
"You're spying on me, Ryan?"
Jay ignores her question. "How long you been using, Marcie?"
She shrugs.
"Does Barnet know?"
Crucially she doesn't say no. Instead, she lightly touches his arm.
"Not now, Ryan, later."
She walks inside before Jay can stop her having to trust she'll be honest.
Jay locks the door, pulls down the grille and turns to see Marcie place 2 glasses on one table and pours from a bottle of Glenfiddich into each one.
He walks to the table, pulls a chair back as she does the same and sits down watching her.
"2 or just over 2 years, Ryan. That's how long. Clearing out my son's place when he died and found them. Took them home with me and you know Brian was so troubled unless he took them at first anyway and I needed to take some pain away too."
"Brian? As in Brian's place?" Jay asks, making the connection.
Marcie nods.
"Yeah. Mr Price and Peter. They've been so good to me. Suddenly one day they changed the name. You know, Brian was never the same when he came home. He tried to make a living. Tried to rebuild. He was never physically hurt over there. Mentally, though."
"Came home from where?" Jay prompts gently.
"Iraq. He was a Marine. All he ever wanted to be."
"If he wasn't hurt how did he wind up on Oxy?"
"A running injury. Hurt his knee." Marcie replies.
"Was it an overdose that killed him?"
"I think so, I'm not sure. Mr Price took care of it. Took care of everything. The funeral, everything. Said I wouldn't want to remember him as a corpse so they id'd his body. They were incredible. They kept me on despite me not even wanting to be alive. Gave me fresh life."
The wheels in Jay's brain turn faster, "They know you take Oxy, Marcie?"
"They offered rehab at first. I said no, too old and too tired to fight. Sometimes I don't need the dealer because they take care of it."
Marcie really doesn't see it, Jay thinks. Doesn't get that they're controlling her. He has to bite his tongue. Just add it to the list.
"It's never too late to try a program, Marcie."
"Maybe not for someone your age, Ryan, but for me it's okay, it's better this way. I don't have nightmares like I used to. Brian used to have nightmares. About the kids he'd see, the aftermath of bombings. The people he killed. Same as you I imagine?"
Jay doesn't react, and Marcie doesn't push him.
"You know the one thing is Brian no matter how low he was and he got real low, he always promised me as long as I was around, he would be too. No promises for after I was gone which I understood, but while I was here, he was adamant he wouldn't go. I believed him, but maybe Mr Price knew him better."
"Mr Price?" Jay asks, "The guy who ID'd his body?".
"Yeah, the guy who runs this place or owns it at least. Eddie couldn't stand him, come to think of it few people could or can," Marcie runs her fingers along the edge of the table and looks up and around them, "This place changed somewhere along the line, and not necessarily for the better, it was better, happier when it was the Cross."
"What do you think happened to Eddie?"
She sends him a pitying look, "Oh not just Eddie, try David and Craig. Try Anthony, although maybe he really did just leave," she shakes herself then, "Anyways, I'm not paid to think. I take my tablets and I just wait out my days, making enough so I can one day move on or hopefully not exist at all."
There's a hopelessness to her tone that goes beyond the addiction. That goes beyond the effects of it. Perhaps it's fear, perhaps it's something else.
She stands up and looks at the clock on the wall, "We should go and I've said way too much, we gotta be up and back here by 12 tomorrow."
Jay stands up too, taking the bottle and glasses from her, "Why don't you take a day tomorrow? You've been running this bar single handed for all these months Marcie, I'll take care of it."
For the first time since well days or even longer in reality he imagines, perhaps weeks or months, there's a hopeful flicker in her eyes.
"Really?"
"Really, just do me a favor and think about programs?"
She gives him a reluctant nod, "It's a pipe dream honey, I can't afford to go."
"You let me worry about that."
"I thought you were broke?"
"I have a little put by for a rainy day Marcie, for important things," as she opens her mouth to protest, Jay holds a hand up, "I know what you're about to say but don't."
The glint in her eyes now he suspects is moisture. Her voice trembles as she speaks.
"Aren't you full of surprises Ryan, you remind me of Eddie and particularly my Brian," she smiles warmly but then sobers, "Ok, I'll think about it, properly. You do me a favor too though Ryan, you be careful around here. Real careful."
"Deal," Jay promises.
That night Jay stares at the ceiling thinking of Marcie in between the aborted patterns of sleep, disturbed sleep filled with broken bodies, burning flesh and a child's body with blood pouring from the holes in her body.
Jay's already waiting for Hailey when she brings the car to a stop and pulls the keys out of the ignition, getting out, reaching for the coffee cups and offering a smile which Jay returns with a small laugh as he picks up one of the two cups from the bonnet of his car and offers it to her.
"So are we both that predictable or is this kinda cute?" Hailey jokes, laughing lightly at the expression on Jay's face before changing the subject quickly, gesturing to Jay's face with her free hand as they exchange cups and Jay places his on the bonnet of the Focus.
"You look a little less wild than last time, Halstead."
"Apparently my brother was right and the facial hair was a little too wild for even a bar like Brian's place." Jay replies with a grin.
"Yeah it suits you, the fresh look I mean."
Jay's eyebrows raise slightly before his expression alters, turning to all business in a second.
"Anything?"
Hailey ducks into the car and pulls out a file which she hands to Jay, explaining what they've learned already in the brief time since the events of yesterday.
"Marcie Townsend. Fifty-seven years old. Divorced when Brian was 4 years old. No priors, nothing," Jay doesn't look surprised and Hailey continues, "Brian Townsend: died 2015 at thirty-three years old, served in Iraq as a Marine and was medically discharged the year after he came home. Arrested for misdemeanor possession several times, here's the kicker he had an expensive lawyer each time. Never sentenced or fined. Someone paid for that lawyer as Brian didn't have a solid job the whole time after he came back from Iraq."
"So someone bailed him out each time?"
Hailey slips at the coffee Jay handed her and nods, leaning against the truck. "Any ideas on who it could be?"
Jay doesn't reply immediately, his attention on the papers in the file as he flicks through the rest of it, looking up only once he's done with the initial perusal, "We got anything on Price? Ex-marine too, right?"
Hailey nods, "We'll let you know."
"How about Brian's autopsy?"
"Already on it. Burgess and Dawson should be there by now. You think it's connected?"
"2015, Townsend died. Barnet released that year from County. Price, ex-marines and they railroaded Marcie into not even seeing her son one last time, that's not a coincidence."
"Yeah," Halley agrees, "We'll let you know the moment we got something. You think Marcie Townsend is solid?"
Jay frowns, "I want to say yes. I think she knows something is bad there, but she's too scared to confront it. Barnet has her thinking he's got her best interests at heart while he gets her ever more dependent on Oxy. She told me to be careful, but solid? No."
Hailey nods, accepting and agreeing with Jay's assessment.
"How about you? You holding up?"
Jay eyes her hesitantly before he shrugs as though it's the most obvious answer, "I'm good."
"Did you hear they had a memorial for the little girl? For Morgan."
Jay's eyes give away more than his calm, "Oh?"
"Since I figured you would have wanted to be there or at least nearby. I was instead."
Hailey can see the way Jay swallows, uncertainty and something else unreadable in the way he looks at her.
"You did that?" He says eventually and just for a moment Hailey thinks he's angry.
The uncertainty is replaced though with a ghost of a grateful smile which Hailey returns more certain, more warm, nothing other than reassurance she hopes. "What did I say, Jay? You're my partner. I will always have your back."
"They see you?"
"I stayed out of sight right at the back. It was beautiful, and I wanted you to know. I think you deserve to know no one talked of blame, least of all on you."
Hailey can tell Jay wants to say something. Convey thanks she neither expected nor needed.
"You should go open the bar."
The flicker of what she thinks could be disappointment disappears as quickly as it came and she pushes away from the truck and says quietly but firmly.
"Stay safe Jay."
"Hey Upton."
She pauses, her hand on the door, and looks at Jay.
He smiles, "Thanks."
Hailey watches as he turns away. Head a little higher, load a little lighter, she hopes.
By early evening, Barnet still hasn't shown up. Jay had imagined he would. Already knew what he'd say about Marcie. Well aware that she may have already contacted him and their stories could conflict.
Instead, nothing. He wants the hours to fly by so he can find out what Burgess and Dawson found out at the morgue. The hours crawl by instead though, and quietly he wishes for a sudden influx of people. Maybe even a fight. He gets neither. He reorganizes the drinks in the fridge. Wipes down the bar, but that only eats up an hour.
He thinks about Upton. How he's starting to learn he got her wrong or not wrong, but it's okay to trust her. She's loyal. She's honest. She knows his coffee order, and he knows hers.
The thing she did? The memorial. Jay loves the other people in intelligence. They're as much his family as Will is. More so in some ways, except in blood, than his father could ever be and if he asked. Hell, if he'd known to ask, he knows none of them would have hesitated.
He didn't know though, and he didn't ask. Not sure that even if he had known he'd have asked her. It's too soon. Except Hailey Upton tipped the way of doing things how Jay expects them to occur, or has become accustomed to how they occur, upside down.
It's an unfamiliar feeling or feels unfamiliar because it's been so long since he experienced it. This creeping sense of trust. Of warming to her and appreciating that she doesn't just say the right thing. He's so used to platitudes. She actually does it. Without any expectation of gratitude.
He trusts her when she says she has his back and right now it matters more than he thinks even he can express. It's almost too much to believe when every single shred of evidence Jay has tells him he doesn't deserve it.
It's around 8.30pm when he goes to the stockroom/break room to gather some bottles to replenish the stocks, the door shut behind him when he hears voices from outside the room. Jay tenses and lays the bottles he was holding gently on the floor, steps lightly as he can toward the door, flicking the light switch off and opens it just a fraction.
Enough to see several men. All of them older than him, from what he can tell. He doesn't recognize the first few, though he recognizes the final 2.
Barnet and then the other from the board in the bullpen. James Price. He looks older.
They're deep in conversation and perhaps Jay could've taken pictures, but it's too late now and Jay just observes as they disappear through the door marked for the cellar.
And then it's quiet. The voices fade and Jay closes the door, takes a breath, switches the light back on and deep in thought picks up the bottles, reopens the door, turning off the light again this time with his shoulder and returns to the bar.
By just after 2am, Jay walks the now familiar route back to the apartment.
Barnet was likely never covert during his military service, or perhaps he's deliberately casual.
Jay turns round one block before his apartment and Barnet stops several feet behind him, he's smoking a cigarette.
"Impressive Foster though a couple of blocks later than I thought."
Jay says nothing, just slips his hands into the pockets of his jacket. Barnet smirks, steps closer.
"You're capable. You're smart, but I can tell that Afghanistan changed you. You stay the route you're on without help, you'll die. Eventually. It'll kill you inside. We can help."
"We?"
Barnet's laugh is guttural. His lips curl in barely concealed disdain as he shakes his head.
"Not so fast. Still not done watching you. Just like you weren't done watching us earlier. Tread carefully Foster, we can help you but we can end you too."
Barnet takes a last draw from the cigarette, exhaling out, the plume of smoke reaching Jay as the wind carries it to him and then with a flick of his thumb and index finger Barnet releases the cigarette and it lands in front of Jay's feet
"On the nail. Marksmen, right? Be seeing you, kid."
I hope you didn't mind 2 chapters and the length of each. Once i start I can't stop. If you want more upstead, it's coming. Anyway, i hope you're all well. Do let me know what you think and thanks so much for reading. Take care xx