A/N well geez NBC, way to screw with my plans :P seeing how I have no control over their release schedule, I suppose I have to change mine. New plan, starting with today's update, new chapters will drop every other day (ending with an epilogue on May 7).
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He had lost her.
Jane can tell the minute she steps over the rise, second on the scene.
The kidnapper is dead too, Weller had clearly shot him in the head. And Kurt has the little girl cradled in his arms but she can tell that he's sobbing, absolutely shattered.
She stands on top of the hill, looking down at the devastating scene, frozen in her tracks. Now that the danger has been eliminated she doesn't have to go rushing in, can leave Weller alone with his heartbreak.
He had been half a disaster the entire case, clearly not sleeping or eating or doing anything but obsessing about finding the missing little girl. It had been hard to see him struggle so badly, especially because things between them had been so strained of late. Jane felt like she'd been trying to make amends, apologize for her past deeds. But Weller had put up a stone wall, clearly wanted to keep her at a distance.
Of course it hurt. Looking at him every day and knowing that he let the CIA have her without letting her say anything. She had loved him so fucking much. But as soon as she wasn't his missing girl none of it had mattered at all.
Yet the worst part is that it's all her own fault, both in this life and her past one. She'd come up with the whole thing, tried to fix it and of course fucked it up royally, lied to him, betrayed them all.
So this gaping chasm between them is made of her deception, his well-deserved mistrust. And standing looking at him, Jane is certain that she's the last person Weller would want to see at the moment.
But backup is still a few minutes away and she should at least verify that both the suspect and the abducted child are dead. It makes her stomach clench realizing that Kurt hadn't spoken on comms yet, was clearly so distressed he couldn't even call it in.
Jane walks down the hill towards Weller, stopping to check the kidnapper for a pulse before turning her eyes to the heartbreaking scene before her.
The little girl is definitely dead, already rigid and blue in Weller's arms. And just as she thought, Kurt is hunched over and crying inconsolably; looks so lost she can't help but want to bundle him up in her own arms.
She's never seen him like this. Even at his most vulnerable with her, Weller had been rock solid. Sometimes he'd been a contradiction with his stoic sensitivity but he'd always been Kurt Weller, Special Agent.
Right now he's Kurt Weller, broken boy who believes he failed his best friend. And despite all the distance between them lately she can't help but come right up to him, put her hand between his shoulders.
She can feel his chest heaving under her hand as he gasps out tearful breaths. God, she thinks. No one else can make her feel things the way he does.
Jane takes it as a good sign that he doesn't push her away, but then again Weller doesn't appear able to do anything but sob into his own shirt at the moment. Which is just so unlike him she doesn't know what to do.
But she knows she has to do something. Back up is about to show up and CSU will be right behind them. Weller wouldn't want anyone to see him this far gone; she's surprised he's even let her get this close.
As if on cue, he sucks in a deep skittering breath and lets it go slowly before turning just slightly towards her.
"I'm sorry," he mutters. "Just give me a minute. I'm a fucking mess."
"Do you want me to give you some space?" Jane asks, tentatively.
She expects him to say yes, to jump at her offer. But Weller doesn't answer right away, which tells her all she needs to know.
Jane wraps one arm around Kurt's shuddering shoulders, puts her other hand on his chest. He's still got the little girl in his own arms, cradled as if she were just sleeping. And now that she's close enough, Jane can hear that he's repeatedly muttering an apology to the girl, telling her how sorry he is that he didn't get there in time to save her.
It's all she can do to keep her own tears at bay. Jane knows there's nothing she can say to fix the problem but she finds that soothing words come spilling out of her mouth anyways. Over and over she tells him that he did everything he could, that no one else could have done anything more.
She's still saying the same words when she finally sees Zapata and Reade come running over the hill, then pull to a stop at the scene before them.
"Backup's here," she says softly to Weller, wondering if he's been hearing any of her words at all. "I'm going to take care of everything, okay?"
Kurt takes a few deep breaths, his ribs moving against her hand. She can feel him settle a bit as he tries to pull himself under control.
"Okay," he says. "Thank you."
"Can you put her down?" Jane asks gently, hating having to do it. But she wants to get Kurt away from the scene and he can't bring the little girl with him.
Weller nods, then apologizes to the girl another few times before setting her on the ground and standing up. He stays there for another minute just staring down at her with his arms hanging beside him tautly, his hands clenched into fists.
Then finally he wipes away the last of his tears, and turns from the scene, stalks away into the nearby woods.
Jane waves at Zapata and Reade, indicating that they can move in to deal with the scene and then follows Kurt into the trees.
She's again not entirely sure that he's going to want company, especially hers. He'd been so distraught earlier it hadn't exactly seemed like he made the choice to let her in. He just hadn't had any defence systems to fend her off, had been completely lost to his sorrow. But she can't just leave him alone, not when he's hurting that badly.
She finds him just a few metres into the woods, still watching the scene as the first CSU team crests the hill. He's no longer crying but Weller still looks devastated as he turns his eyes to her.
"Sorry," he mutters. "I shouldn't have…"
He doesn't complete the sentence but Jane can hear the end in her own head. I shouldn't have let you see who I am inside. I shouldn't have shown my need.
Oh Kurt, she thinks. She's crushed for him; for her soft, broken-hearted special agent. It doesn't matter that he's been so cold and angry with her, that the distance between them has been a gaping abyss.
"Do you want to be alone?" she asks, still unsure about how close he'll let her get.
He doesn't reply to her question, just looks up at her blankly.
"I should have saved her," he mutters, absolutely forlorn.
"Weller, you did everything you could," Jane replies. She's already repeated the phrase to him over and over but she's sure he hasn't actually heard them. He's so certain that he screwed up, that there was something else he could have done.
But she's seen him work over twenty hours a day for three days running, despite everyone on the team trying to make him go home and sleep. And they hadn't lost the little girl because he wasn't sharp; it was his keen mind that picked apart the clue that ultimately led them to the kidnapper. He'd just been too late, the girl already lost to the psychotic urges of the predator who'd taken her.
So she knows for a fact that no one could have done more for that girl, that her kidnapper would likely still be on the loose and preying on other kids if Weller hadn't found his hideout. He had done as well as anyone could have. And yet he's standing there, completely shattered.
Jane realizes that words aren't going to get her anywhere, that Weller isn't emotionally able to hear them at the moment. He's stuck in a place made of guilt, the same place he's been since he was a child himself.
So she does the only thing she can think of, wraps him up in her arms and holds him as tightly as possible.
Weller is stiff at first and his hands stay by his sides for a few long seconds before he reaches around her and crushes her to him, burying his face into the crook of her neck.
Jane's surprised at first but her body responds immediately, gathering him in and rubbing his back as his breath hitches.
"I should have saved her," he says again and again.
"She was just a little girl."