Audrey knew that she had to let him get some rest. They'd been on the road for the past ten hours, and even though he'd been asleep on the back seats most of the time, the travel wasn't making him any better.
They had gone south first, to Portland, where they had found a bank again to get some money from his numbered account. And then they had followed Columbia River, leading them inland, all the way to the Oregon/Idaho state border.
She took the keys to their motel room and went back to the car, where he was already waiting for her, wearing some clothes that she'd bought for him along the route. She was glad that it was dark now. She wouldn't want the man on the counter to see Jack's face.
Slowly, she approached him, giving him a small kiss. "23", she said, "It's the room up there." She gave him another kiss, careful, not to hurt him. She didn't dare touch his black and swollen cheek.
She grabbed the bag with their few things from the passenger seat and they slowly made their way upstairs.
"Give me that" Jack took the heavy bag out of her hands.
"You sure?" She couldn't hide that she was worried about his condition.
"It won't kill me.", he reassured her, and gave her another kiss.
They went upstairs in silence. She unlocked their room in silence. They went in and he put the bag down, closing the door behind him, keeping her from switching on the light.
Without any words, he just hugged her and held her cose.
"Jack?", she whispered his name into the dark. As an answer, he just held her tight.
"There are a thousand things which I'd like to tell you", he began, "but I can't find any words."
He felt safe in the dark. She couldn't see how he looked like, she couldn't see the damages that his life had brought him. Sometimes, he was afraid that she'd only have to look at him to be reminded of everything bad in their lives.
She could almost read his mind.
Wordlessly, she pulled him along, over to the bed.
He saw it in the dark, how she pulled off her blouse. His eyes followed the beautiful contours of her body, only lit by a dim shadow.
She lay down on the bed, stretching out her hand towards him. "Come here."
Slowly he leant down to her, not sure what she was up to.
Her eyes hat that certain glance that was such a magical spell on him.
He found himself on his hands and knees, leaning over her to kiss her. After touching her lips with his, he pulled away again, looking into her eyes. His aching body was telling him not to go down that road. Not now. He just couldn't.
Understandingly, she ran her hand softly through his hair. "I just wanted you to remember how this feels like", she said, tentatively rising up to kiss him once again, "I missed you"
He kissed her mouth. Her cheek. The spot just beneath her ear, and then he let his lips brush over her throat , down to her chest. "I never forgot how this felt like", he tonelessly said, kissing her skin. This was what had kept him alive all the time. The though of returning to this place, just once more in his life.
She could feel his lips, and his breath.
A few minutes later, he felt his arms and knees giving in. He fell asleep resting his head on her chest, hearing her heartbeat.
She pulled the blanket over him, to keep him warm. And at some point, she fell asleep, too, even though she couldn't get enough of seeing him lie in her arms.
Teddy found herself sitting in a small, concrete room. CTU Seattle, she was told. Her hands were cuffed to the uncomfortable metal chair which she was sitting on. They had brought her here, five hours ago. And Owen was here as well, she had heard.
She hated herself for having let it come that far.
Was it too late to tell Heller the truth? About her and Jack, that she had known him, that he hadn't really abducted her the night before? The truth about Audrey, that she hadn't been kidnapped by the Chinese but had given herself up voluntarily, to trick him into agreeing to that exchange?
The longer she thought about it, the clearer it got to her, that the truth would make her situation even worse than continuing to lie.
She hated herself for the decision that she'd made on that evening, a week ago, when Jack had come to her on the parking lot, asking for help. She should have let him rot there. She should have left him out in the cold, without any medical attention. Time would have solved all the problems that she had now.
As she looked at herself in the mirror on the other side of the room, she just knew that she would have always made the decision in the way she'd made it. She couldn't leave somebody to die. She always helped.
She always paid the bill for helping them.
They had questioned her two times up to now. About how it could have happened that Audrey was gone. They were precise and thorough. They had taken a blood test to confirm that it had really been a tranquilizer shot, how she had passed out in Audrey's room.
She just hoped that they wouldn't use a polygraph on her. She could keep her secrets, she could hide the truth forever, if she wanted to, because she knew that it was best for her to hide it. But the polygraph would probably open open her up like a book.
As the door opened, she jerked.
Two men came in, and Heller himself.
He told them to uncuff her. And then they left.
She was alone in the room, alone with him.
Simply that frightened her to the bone.
"Dr. Altman", he began, "Captain", calling her by her rank that she'd had in the army. He sat down on the other chair, opposite her. "I am sorry that my men questioned you. But we had to get sure about your role in her disappearing." It hurt him to speak of Audrey like that.
"What role?", she breathed, massaging her wrists. "I already told them anything they wanted to know."
"I know.", he said, and put a file down on the table, sliding it over to her. "Read this."
Her hands were shaking, as she opened up the brown folder. It was Owen's statement. Reading through the lines, she almost turned pale. He had seen her enter the closed evacuated part of the hospital. He had followed her, trying to make sure she'd be okay. He had found her and Jack, after he had taken her hostage again, threatening her with a scalpel. He had tried to shoot at him, until some foreign agents had appeared, almost killing him before Jack had taken them down. Jack had cuffed him up and had taken her with him, away from the hospital.
Shocked, she looked up into Heller's face. "I wasn't there", she shook her head.
"I know", he said again, taking the file back. "You were lying unconsciously in Audrey's room while she was impersonating you to free this man." He took a deep breath and had a look at the file again. "And I have a big problem now, Dr. Altman."
"Which one?", she stammered.
"This man, who had assaulted you two days ago, is a rogue agent on the run from the Chinese government. He is still out there and they are still out there, trying to bring him down.", he sighed. He would be perfectly okay with this, if Audrey wasn't involved in it, too. "If you confirm the testimony of Major Hunt, I would be perfectly fine with this."
She couldn't say a word. Was he trying to convince her to give a false statement?
"Bauer took you hostage and released you after he had successfully fled the hospital. Major Hunt is a hero, by the way- he tried to save from all this.", he spoke.
"That's not the way how it happened…", Teddy stammered.
"Yes, I know." Heller stood up, and started to circle her. "If the Chinese government finds out that my daughter is accompanying him, they will not spare her life to catch him. They will use this to find him. They will use her as a bait, or any of her friends, her familiy…", he sighed, "I cannot change it any more that she ran off with him, based on probably some irrational romantic decision. But I can stop her from being targeted. Nodobdy will ever know that she went away with Bauer."
He finally stopped circling her, looking directly into her eyes.
"I…", she stammered, "… how should I ever look into Owen's eyes again, making him believe that he saved my life and I wasn't even there?"
Heller knew that he had to persuade her somehow. "You earn 240 thousand Dollars a year, Dr. Altman. That's not much, compared to what you could earn with your qualifications."
She shuddered. Why the hell did he know about her paychecks? She was once more reminded of how much she hated having something to do with intelligence matters.
"I heard of that you contacted a regional office here in Seattle, two weeks ago, inquiring about re-enlisting", he continued. "I can offer you a position at MEDCOM. ON 12 paygrade."
Was he really offering to pay her for her false testimony?
ON 12 paygrade was worth at least 330 grad per year.
"Think about it, Captain Altman", he put on a little smile, "There aren't gonna be that many officers there who I'd owe", he added, leaving the rest up to her. ON 12 was probably not the end. There could be more.
"I'll be back in a while." He left her alone, thinking. And he left Owen's testimony there, too, hoping that she'd use the time to get acquainted with the details of her newly discovered 'past'.
.
.
Damnit, I really have to finish this now... should be writing my master thesis and not that stuff... but I can't fight it...