A/N: Back with the highly requested follow-up chapter! There's a lot of back and forth in POV's this time...that may continue into the next chapter, I'm not 100% sure yet though. Oh, and the lyrics that are mentioned towards the end of the chapter are from a song called "Hold On" by Chord Overstreet. It was actually used in a fan video for Upstead called: "Don't Leave Me [7x12]." I think it was by itsJohanna on YT – in case you wanna look that up haha. Hope you guys enjoy this chapter & I apologize once again for the delay. Thanks for reading regardless!
Jay wasn't a super religious person. Sure, he and his brother Will, were raised Irish Catholic as kids, but he didn't know if he believed in that stuff much anymore. Considering his life had worked out the way it did. But, he reasoned, if he believed in Hell, this would be it. And if the devil was real, it had taken the form of Garrett Reynolds. He couldn't have hated a person more if he wanted to. Of course, at the present moment in time, the pain in his shoulder was taking priority over his anger towards the person who put the bullet there.
He shifted his weight, really not understanding why his hands had to be zip tied. He wasn't going anywhere. Not like he could even if he wanted to. Garrett had managed to shuffle him from the motel, to whatever undisclosed location he was in now. He just wished he knew where. He was still unconscious when they arrived. He had only just come to a few minutes ago. He blinked, trying to clear the haze from his vision.
He was in some sort of room, he assumed a basement with how drafty it was. He was surrounded by concrete, so he figured that even if he had the energy to scream, no one would hear him. He let out a breath, hating the feeling of a weight being in his chest. Course, he knew what part of that was. The fact that he didn't know what happened to Hailey. If she was okay. And he hated not knowing. He also hated the fact that she didn't know what happened to him either. Did she think I was dead? His mind reluctantly entertained that thought, but he had to push it away when the door swung open. Oh good, the devil himself had arrived. This would be...interesting to say the least.
Hailey hadn't moved from her chair in hours. She kept combing through security footage, witness statements, anything and everything she could get her hands on to explain what went down at that motel. She refused to believe he was really gone. She just couldn't. She sighed, rubbing her eyes for the umpteenth time. It hadn't even been 24 hours since the incident, and yet, to her it felt like the longest day of her life. Although now, she remembered as she looked outside, it was nighttime.
"Hey, you sure you don't wanna come to Chatham with me and Rebecca?" Cara asked, getting her purse from her deep desk drawer.
"I'm good here," Hailey said, not looking away from the papers in front of her.
"Alright," Cara sighed, standing up and heading out for the night. Hailey looked up for a brief second as she left, wishing she could just flip a switch and be normal again. But, until she had answers, nothing would ever be normal for her again.
She about jumped out of her skin when she felt a couple hands on her shoulders. "You okay?"
"Jesus, Garrett, you scared me half to death!" She admonished, spinning around in her chair to look at him. "What're you still doing here? Go home." She hoped she sounded less demanding than she felt. She really wasn't in the mood to make nice with him right now.
"I just wanted to see how you were," he asked.
She shrugged, glancing his way briefly. "I don't know."
"Hailey," he tried, placing his hand back on her shoulder. "I did everything I could. Booth's rage was just...too much."
She nodded, although she didn't fully understand what he meant. She hadn't even seen any autopsy photos from the scene, but from how Garrett described Jay's wounds, maybe that was for the best. A bullet at point blank range was intense and gruesome. She didn't want to remember Jay like that. She managed a grimace in his direction, hoping he'd take the hint to just leave her be. She could feel the tears coming on again, and she wanted to be alone for the next breakdown.
He did, not saying another word as he bounded off. Once she was sure he was gone, she let the tears fall. She cried out her frustrations, her sadness, her fear. All of it. She just couldn't believe that the one person who could make her feel better, was the same one who wasn't around to do so anymore.
She had managed to pull herself together a few minutes later, when the weirdest thought crossed her mind. She realized she hadn't seen Garrett since the incident, except for that time just a little bit ago. Where had he been? Curious, she walked over to his desk. He was the most disorganized person she'd ever met, so his desk always looked like a tornado had touched down.
She rifled through a few papers, and was about to open his desk cabinet when she felt the harsh pull of her forearm. "What the hell are you doing?"
"Sorry," she replied sheepishly. "Just wanted to know if you had your IRT written up. Anderson wants it ASAP, he just texted," she lied, not turning to look at him. He still hadn't let go of her arm, but she wrenched it away before finally facing forward. She raised her brows, waiting for him to respond.
"It's here," he said, moving around her and going through the mass of paper. He shoved it in her direction with haste, before he opened his desk drawer for his keys. "Forgot these." He left in a huff before she had a chance to respond. What the hell was that about?
Hailey decided she'd better go home too, although she knew she wouldn't be able to much of anything besides think of the last horrible day. She missed him terribly, and she wished more than anything there was some way for him to know that. She looked up, his name a mere whisper on her lips before she grabbed her jacket and headed into the night.
If Hailey were there with Jay, he'd tell her how much he missed her. How much he loved her, and how much he needed her in his life. But since she wasn't, and he couldn't, he talked to the sky, which he could see through the tiny barred window above the door. "Hails, I'm okay. I'm coming back to you, whatever it takes."
He remembered how he promised he'd have her back, and now he couldn't be there for her when she needed him most...hell, he was the cause of her pain right now. And he hated that most of all. "I'm sorry, Hailey." That was the last whisper he got in before he was met with Garrett's smug face in the doorway again. He had simply come back to check on him the first time, a mere 5 second stare down. Now, he actually spoke to Jay, in a tone so calm it sounded suspicious.
"On your feet, Halstead."
Not wanting to argue, Jay did as he was told and stood up. He narrowed his eyes at Garrett, not sure what the hell the whole plan was. Why take him? Was he that threatened by his knowledge of what was essentially money laundering? Maybe, Jay thought, as he took in the slight wideness of Garrett's eyes.
"Okay, so what now Garrett? What is the point of all this?"
"The point is, you're not going to ruin the thing I've worked so hard to build. I had everything down to a science, it was all set in stone, until you had to play hero..."
"Watch yourself," Jay warned, knowing very well what was going to be said next.
A silence was cut through by a knee jabbed into his side, and since he couldn't move his hands, it sent him down to his knees instead. He sucked in a breath, feeling like the wind had been knocked out of him. He glared at Garrett, who got in his face once again. Unlike the bar fight from what seemed like forever ago, Jay didn't have the upper hand this time.
"You wanna try a different approach there?"
"I could ask you the same thing," he challenged.
"Let me rephrase it then, because I'm not asking you." Garrett replied, and Jay could see how gravely serious he was. So, as much as it pained him to have to take orders from the worst person to walk the earth, he bit his tongue for the remainder of the conversation.
"This is exactly what I mean," he began again. "You and your self-righteous attitude. Damn, no wonder you and Hailey got along so well. The two of you...always gotta do the right thing."
"What the hell is the matter with that?"
"Nothing...if you're fine with being boring. Me? I was sick of playing by everyone else's rules. Everything was going great, like I said. Till Hailey fucked it up...or rather, didn't get f–"
He didn't finish his second expletive, as Jay spat in his face. A couple knocks to his head made him never want to try that again though.
"And you wonder why you're here like this. Man, this shit is tiring." Garrett shook his head, as if he couldn't believe he was wasting more of his breath talking to Jay. He stood up, leaving Jay in silence once again.
For once, Jay welcomed the quiet. He simply sank back into the ground, wishing it would swallow him whole. Instead, his mind floated away to the one place he knew he'd be happiest: her. And it stayed there until his eyes finally succumbed to sleep.
Hailey was never one to like cheesy popular songs, but she couldn't help but remember on her drive home how Jay was drumming his fingers to the beat of one after a night out. She remembered asking him what he was humming along to, and he told her.
Let me take your hand, I'll make it right
I swear to love you all my life
She listened to the lyrics and allowed herself to cry, as it really did encompass her feelings towards Jay at the moment. She did still need him; she did still want him. She needed him to come back. But, she tried to remind herself, he wasn't coming back. He was never coming back, and that thought was the one that utterly killed her.
Because she didn't know how she was supposed to go on without him. Loving and fighting, accusing, denying, I can't imagine a world with you gone…
She thanked God that she had made it back to her actual home, as she couldn't bear the thought of going back to their UC apartment. Not yet. She pulled into a parking spot, and turned off the car. She shivered, her bones felt chilled. But she knew it was her heart that had grown numb. Because she didn't want to feel anymore. It was getting to be too much.
She tried to take in some air, but even her breath was shaky. She held out her hands, finding them to be the same. She felt her face scrunch up, in that way it only did when she was crying silently. She felt the tightness in her chest, like her body was trying to squeeze the life out of her heart. She couldn't blame it…she felt like the life had been drained from her body the moment she heard Jay was dead.
She was momentarily brought out of her emotional rollercoaster by the sound of her phone. It was a text. From Garrett, of all people. She rolled her eyes, not even bothering to look at it. She simply turned her phone off, wishing it was as easy to do the same to her mind, as its thoughts were all about Jay.
She just wished she could've said goodbye. Even if it wasn't the prettiest, most poignant confession of feelings, she just wished she could've at least had that chance. But no, because the world was apparently too cruel to let her have closure.
She sighed, shivering once again, this time because of the falling temperature of the night air. She really should get inside. She popped open the door, slowly walking up to her house, which looked so strange to her after not being in it for 2 weeks now. Yeah, she reminded herself, that's not the only thing that feels strange right now.