*Sorry to disappoint. This is being rewritten but it should be a quick rewrite. I got off track and I liked my old plan better.
If there was anyone who walked the straight and narrow path, it was Aaron Hotchner. That was perhaps why he was glad he was no longer the BAU unit chief. He wasn't going to get caught in the cross-hairs of Alvez twisting a marshall's arm to get a witness protection location. Perhaps he should have been more alarmed at how easy it was to find Jack Vaughn at the local grocery store parking lot of Beloit, Wisconsin. But, he supposed, it was just like old times. His old team had done their share of skirting the law: the Ian Doyle case leapt to the front of his mind. It was no wonder that agents were supposed to stay away from cases to which they had a personal connection. He could only hope that this wouldn't come back to bite Reid.
That wasn't an option.
He poured a little more ketchup on his eggs - Jack was a bad influence - and leaned back in his diner booth and looked out the window. Normally, he would never pick a window seat, but then that would have defeated this whole purpose.
The man had aged, more than Hotch would have expected. The fight was gone out of Jack Vaughn's slumped shoulder and slow gait, his hands twitching near his jacket pocket, where Hotch was sure a firearm was concealed. He was suddenly glad he'd chosen to wear a kevlar vest beneath his casual clothes.
The annoying little door bell announced Jack's entrance as he stopped at Hotchner's booth, leaning up against it as he would a crutch. Maybe it was meant to appear to look intimidating. There was certainly no hint of camaraderie in those exhausted eyes. "Agent Hotchner. What is your team's fascination with me these days? You can't actually think you got away with tailing me for the last three days. You know what kind of attention that can bring?"
Hotch swallowed his food, and pursed his lips, sitting face to face with the man who sent him the most uneasy signals. It went against everything in his brain to treat a killer as a victim. That case had left a knot in his stomach every time he thought about it. Like George Foyet, a deal with the devil had let him walk free for far too long. It was time to right that wrong. "Mr. Adams." His greet was curt and to the point - many points.
Jack Vaughn made no effort to correct him, but he also didn't look worried. Bored, maybe... "So that son a bitch marshall gave you my real name, too, did he?"
Hotch shook his head. "I didn't talk to him. No, this is something we found while investigating your daughters after what they did to my agent." Retired or not, he'd always have a place in his heart and his brain for protecting his team. "
"You mean the kid who was snooping around in my computer and coloring in maps?"
"Can I get you anything, sir?"
The waitress had appeared before Jack had even glanced at the menu. "Just coffee, thank you."
So he didn't deny the daughters, plural. "I mean the one who bravely entered that bathroom without back-up to save your daughter."
"She didn't need saving, I had it under control."
"You call murder as 'having it under control'?"
"You call it murder, I call it self-defense. Tomato, Tomato."
"Your little family kept popping up all over our files. Your daughter Lindsey - or should I say Katelyn Adams - and her older half sister, Catherine Adams."
Whatever Jack had been expecting, that certainly was not it."Kitty?" His eyes were pulled to Cat's photo almost as if it were magnetized. A small smile tugged at the corner of his lips.
"What happened, Jack?" Hotch's uncharacteristically soft voice broke through the reverie. "Why didn't you go back for her when you got out?"
Jack shook his head, turned the photo upside down. "The mob life is no place for a little girl. She was better off with her grandmother."
"Until her grandmother died of a stroke, which landed her in foster care."
The mirad of emotions that passed over Jack's face as he began to realize what that implied, did not go unnoticed by Hotch. Had he really not known? Had he really thought that Catherine had had an idyllic childhood with a doting grandmother?
"Why do you care? I thought we were here to talk about Lindsey."
"Well it seems that Lindsey isn't the only one of your daughters with a vendetta against my agent."
"Occupational hazard, I'd say. What's that got to do with me?"
"You see, we know that Lindsey set up Agent Reid for five felony counts. Three for murder, two for rape. One charge has been dropped, the others are pending trial."
Jack's eyes bugged out of his head. "Looks like she's got him good. I don't think -"
"-that's the way to repay the kindness of coming to her rescue." Hotch finished for him.
"Look, Agent Hotchner, I'm a father first. I'm not going to accuse my child, that's your job. So, if that's what this is about, then I'm out."
"Actually, it's not Agent. Just Mr. Hotchner."
Before Jack could make an ill-placed retirement joke, another man approached their table, blocking the exit.
"Agent Mills, Milwaukee Field Office." He quickly flashed the appropriate badge, only to reach for a set of shiny handcuffs as more agents appeared, blocking each and every exit. "Daniel Adams, you are under arrest for -"
"You can't arrest me! I have immunity!"
"For being an accomplice to the McCrelin brothers, yes. This, however, is for the murder of Ryan Philips." He pulled Daniel's arms behind his back. "While you exercise your right to remain silent, might I suggest reconsidering the plea offer which will be presented to your lawyer. If you can not afford a lawyer, one will be appointed -"
Hotch stood by his truck, reveling in the sight of Jack being escorted to the Beloit Patrol Car.
Mills shut the door and walked back over to Hotch, one hand on the door as Hotch made a move to close it. "You sure, you don't want to join us for old time's sake?"
Hotch shook his head. "I have to get back to my son, maybe in a few days."
"You mean once he realizes that WitSec isn't going to stick their neck out for him like they did last time."
"That's the idea."
"Justice at last. Well, see you then. Drive safe."
"You too." Hotch gave a small wave to Mills, then flipped on his blinker and turned the other way. Justice was still a long way off, but perhaps he could relax just long enough to take the scene route this one time.