'Where did you go?' Hondo repeated the question watching the slow uneasy steps Street was making up the corridor followed by the rest of the team. Street didn't say anything. They hadn't gone anywhere after here. His eyes were on Hondo as he reached the end of the corridor. All he had to do was turn his eyes to the recess. Slowly he lowered his eyes and turned. She was gone.

The team stood looking at the recess, each of them sizing up the amount of blood staining it. Street was at a loss. This was where he had left her.

'She was here,' he stated. Panic was very slowly beginning to rise in him. Where had she gone? Who moved her? Part of him even wished she had moved herself; or he had dreamt the whole thing. He would take being crazy to see her walking through the door, her pissed off face asking them what they were doing wasting their time looking at a puddle of blood.

'I want a sweep of the building done now,' Hondo spoke to his team organising them before radioing down to make sure that the other officers on scene were securing the perimeter.

The building was empty, the gang was long gone. There was no sign of them, and no sign of Chris. They seemed to have disappeared into thin air. There was no leads, no witnesses; nothing, not even a blood smear.

Black Betty roared as Luca changed gears aggressively. The rest of the team were slumped in the back. Silence surrounded them, their heads were down, eyes focusing on the floor. No one wanted to glimpse the empty seat beside them. Street would have given anything to have her beside him, brushing against his side, something he had completely taken for granted until now. His hand reached across into Chris's seat. Unconsciously he held his breath as his hand came into contact with the cold fabric.

Street was unaware of where he was going once they reached base. Everyone unloaded from the truck and he followed them walking with no destination in mind. He was replaying checking her pulse, holding her close, her unmoving body. Those three little words he had whispered to her, wishing he had had the courage to tell her sooner.

'Hondo,' Jessica greeted them in the ops room.

'Why would they take her?' the question fell out of Luca's mouth before anymore words could be exchanged.

'Leverage or a trade,' Hicks appeared in the doorway. 'We haven't heard anything yet.'

'We've got the CSI's at the scene collecting evidence. They are going to let us know as soon as they find something,' Jessica tried to sound upbeat, she just prayed that the young officer was still alive, maybe Street had got it wrong.

'We have to find them,' Deac spoke out, he was going to make these thugs pay for what they had done. They had already taken Victoria's godmother from her, there was no way they were going to walk around free after that.

'We will find them,' Hondo turned and spoke to his team. He hated to see them like this. 'We will get her back.'

Street wasn't listening to anything going on around him. His eyes had fallen on the picture of Chris pulled up on one of the scenes. She had become one of their victims. The sight of her picture up there was so wrong. The wall was for victims or perpetrators, not for Chris.

He hadn't realised that he had walked out of the ops room till he found himself staring at her locker. He was still covered in her blood. He dashed into the toilet just in time to throw up in it. He sat at the foot of the toilet, back against the side of the stool his blood covered arms resting on his knees. The blood was mostly dry now, flaking away in places. He needed to get it off him. The urge to fuck the rules and jump in the shower was strong. He couldn't continue staring down at himself and only having her blood to look at. He had no idea how long he was going to have to wait for someone to come and take pictures and collect his clothes, but it had already been too long.

The man who eventually showed up was kind, but talked too much. Street remembered him rabbiting on about being over worked and how terrible the traffic had been to get across town at rush hour. Street complied with the photos and stripped off his clothes depositing them into the labelled paper bags, never once uttering a word to the guy. And then he was gone, leaving Street in his boxers in the middle of the locker room. He dropped his boxers to the floor and made his way to the showers.

The tears started again before he had managed to turn the water on. The shower had always been his place to release his feelings. When he was in those foster homes he knew they wouldn't hear him over the running water. He watched the water running red, swirling down the plug hole. His tears mixed with the water as he scrubbed the blood from his arms and hands. He honestly didn't know how he was going to carry on. He couldn't even bring himself to get out of the shower once he was clean. Instead he stood letting the hot water hit his body his mind filled with memories of Chris.

Then one of the memories stood out to him. They were at the gun range. It was the first time he was sure, hands down, that SWAT was his family. She had given him that. She had asked him to leave his letter to her. He had spent hours writing to her since that night. Not just one letter but a whole handful. Whenever he had had a partially bad day or he had been scared to death that something had happened to her. He had just written it down, sealed the letter and left it hidden in the back of his locker for her.

This thought is what pushed him to leave the shower. He pulled a towel around himself and made his way towards her locker. Just because he had written to her doesn't mean that she had written to him. But he had to know. He threw open her locker door his heart actually hurt as her scent wafted out from her clothes. At the back, on the top shelf, he saw three white envelopes all sitting next to each other. He reached in praying that at least one of these letters would be addressed to him.

The first one was addressed to her aunt and uncle. He flipped it to the back of the pile looking at the writing on the front of the next envelope. It was to Victoria, her god daughter. He flipped it to the back joining the one to her aunt and uncle; and then there in front of him was the last letter. He studied her handwriting watching it loop in black writing across the white background. 'Street' it read.

He stood staring at it for a while. The reality of reading this letter meant admitting that she was gone. But he wanted to know what she had written. What were her last words to him? Placing the other two letters back in place he held the one left just for him. One that showed he meant as much to her as he did to him.

Street,

We had a conversation yesterday where I asked you to leave your letter to me, I thought it was only fair to return the favour. I pray that I never have to read your letter, the thought of losing you fills me with dread. You're important to me. I don't think you realise how much. Going into this job everyday with my best friend at my side, knowing you've got my six, what more could I ask for. If you're reading this then I guess I'm no longer with you. I don't want you to be sad, or angry. I want you to get out there, live and love and remember SWAT are your family, don't push them away.

Have a great life Street, have a great one for me x

This letter was nothing like the heart felt letters he had written to her over the years, yet he could hear her in every word. This letter was so her. She had written it before their kiss. Before all their feelings for each other had bubbled to the surface. He could almost feel her denying her feeling for him one last time. He read it again. Sighing at her words, 'fair to return the favour.' Even back then this letter was more than returning the favour. She was stubborn, even in death.