Trigger Warning: Stalking behaviour.

Hardy

The next day is Friday, the last day of half-term, and Hardy makes Tom spend it driving around to look at possible schools for Daisy. It's not like they have a choice, Hardy tells him, since Miller's at the police station and Daisy needs to go with him to inspect the schools and tell the administrators what classes she was taking in Sandbrook.

Tom doesn't want to go, and they have their first real row since Hardy met him. In the end, Hardy takes a deep breath, scowls and firmly shoos a still-resistant Tom, a disinterested Daisy, and a rambunctious Fred-the only one who seems happy to be doing anything at all-into the car and heads to the first school. He drives in brooding silence and wonders how the hell he managed to go from being always alone to shepherding three children…while alone.

He's not impressed with the decor of the first school, although the head teacher seems friendly enough. The offered classes are similar to what Daisy is already taking, and there's no issue with taking a tour of the school to inspect the classrooms. At the end, Hardy shakes the lady's hand, and tells her he'll let her know his decision by noon.

As they're driving to their next appointment, he glances at Daisy and says, "What did you think?"

Her only answer is a shrug as she stares out the side window.

He glances in the rear view mirror at Tom. "What about you, Tom?"

Tom jumps and gives him a wide-eyed stare. "What about me what?"

"What did you think of the school?"

He frowns. "I dunno. It's a school."

"Yes, but what did you think of it? Was the furniture all right? Do the classrooms seem big enough? What did you think about the head teacher?" Daisy turns and gives him an incredulous look. "You, too, Daisy," he says. "You're the one who's going to be spending your days there. Do you think it'll be a good fit?"

"The rooms are too small," Tom blurts out.

"That's a problem, is it?" Hardy asks.

"Well, yah," Tom says with all the contempt a thirteen-year-old feels for an adult long out of the classroom. "You'll feel cramped, Daiz, trust me."

Daisy rolls her eyes, then nods. "He's right, the rooms are too small, and that head teacher didn't look at me even once."

Hardy considers their words in silence then nods. "Awright. Well, let's hope the others are better. Thanks, darlin'." He glances again at Tom. "You, too, Tom."

Tom ducks his head and looks out the window.

The other two schools are better, and Hardy takes them for lunch where, after some spirited debate, they decide on the second school. It's close to the flat and he can easily change the route he takes to work to drop Daisy off in the morning, and best of all, Daisy can start on Monday.

Hardy's relieved to have it all settled, and even more relieved because Tom's anger has cooled, Daisy is out of her funk, and Fred is still smiling happily. His luck holds because they even manage to have something edible on the table by the time Miller returns from the station, although she's down-hearted because whatever is tugging at her about the case is still eluding her.

As they're washing up and with the kids safely banished to the living room, Hardy says, "Well, I appreciate your help this week, Miller-or is that being too nice to you?"

She rolls her eyes as she dries dishes. "I haven't been that much help, though. I can't figure out what we're missing."

"A suspect?"

She smacks him with the towel. "How can we not have a single person of interest?"

He shakes his head. "He's smart. And careful." He stops, frowning. "Very careful. He can't be cruising too much."

"Or he's just not unusual when he is cruising."

He shakes his head.

They continue working, the only sound the clinking of dishes, then Miller says thoughtfully, "I think it's the distances involved that are really bothering me. What's he doing, moving along the coast like that? Is he a lorry driver?"

"Travelling salesman?"

"Cop?"

Hardy shakes his head at that. "He'd have a partner."

"Who says he doesn't?"

He stops and turns to stare at her. Her own eyes are as wide as his.

"Two of them?" he says.

"It would explain a lot. Like how he can so easily transport-" Miller stops and looks over her shoulder towards the living room, suddenly remembering there are children potentially within earshot.

He's suddenly struck by the line of her cheek, the shape of her nose, and how young and pretty she looks with her hair loose and curling wildly around her face. He abruptly averts his gaze before she catches him staring and goes back to washing dishes.

"Two would explain a lot," he says as he puts a dish on the drying rack then pauses. "But that makes it even more unbelievable that nobody has seen anything."

She turns back to him and gives him a thoughtful look. "But we haven't asked the women about two blokes, have we?"

"Well, we will now."

Hardy and Daisy walk Miller and the boys out to the car the next day to see them off. Miller invites Daisy to visit, but just rolls her eyes at Daisy's question about whether her dad is included in the invitation or not.

"Depends on how grumpy he is when he's there," she says. "That does remind me, though, Hardy. You really are invited to visit Broadchurch. Beth said she'd like to see you again. To thank you."

Hardy's face scrunches into puzzled distaste. "Thank me? For what? Letting Joe get off?" He gives Tom an apologetic look. Tom shrugs and looks away.

"I think that had more to do with me than you," Miller says drily.

"More like the defense team, actually," Hardy mutters.

Miller grimaces and sighs. "Beth would appreciate it, I think. But don't wear a suit, yah? Bad memories and all that."

"Fine," he growls.

He shakes Tom's hand, ruffles Fred's hair and tries to ignore a stab of loneliness as Miller envelops Daisy in a warm hug then gives him a cheerful good-bye and a nod as she gets in the car.

He slings an arm around Daisy's shoulders and slightly lifts his hand in farewell as Miller drives away. They both sigh as the car travels out of sight and he looks down at his daughter.

"Well, darlin', it looks like it's just you and me."

"Yah."

"Are you sure about this?"

She looks up at him, a too serious look on such a young face. "Not really," she says then smiles. "You need an awful lot of looking after, but we'll figure things out, yah?"

He presses a kiss to the top of her head. "Yah." He turns her around and they stroll back to his building. "You will have to forgive your mother eventually," he says.

"Don't start," she sighs.

To his surprised relief, they quickly settle into a routine. By the second week, they're working smoothly, with Hardy getting up first, showering, and then making breakfast while Daisy grumbles and shuffles to the loo, then dresses. He drops her at school on his way to the station. She has strict orders to let him know if she's going somewhere other than the flat after school, and he makes an effort to get home at an early enough hour to eat dinner with her or to at least spend some time together before she goes to bed.

She's fifteen, almost sixteen, and he sits her down one evening during the first week and talks honestly to her about his job, that he can't always come home on time and there will be occasions when he'll be leaving her on her own for days at a time. He doesn't like it, but he doesn't know anyone in Stonebridge he trusts to stay with her. Once she's made friends, and he's comfortable with them, then she'll have more options.

She rolls her eyes and tells him she's been living with two coppers all her life and she gets it.

He warns her that if she causes any trouble, he'll know about it.

She mutters something about doing her best to keep him out of trouble but it's a lost cause.

That makes him hug her, and she squirms out of his grip with a sarcastic 'soppy' and goes to her room to do homework.

He makes a conscious effort, though, and calls when he's going to be later than usual. She rewards him with trying to cook, some days more successfully than others. He brings cookbooks home for her and tastes everything she puts in front of him, even if they end up getting take-out afterwards. She promises not to set the smoke detector off anymore after the maintenance lady gives her a stern talking to. He can't help but chuckle at the story although Daisy's mouth is downturned for the rest of the evening. He puts Daisy's name on the lease the next day, so the building managers know the flat isn't always empty when he's away.

During what he's already calling—at least to himself-his regular Saturday check-in with Miller, she tells him she's impressed with how well they're doing. He grumbles and mutters, but secretly enjoys the warmth that spreads through him at her words.

At the end of the second week, he's pleased when Daisy tells him she's been invited out to the cinema the next afternoon—a Saturday-with a group of kids from her school. He's not so pleased when she tells him the group includes boys. But she's fifteen, almost sixteen, in a new place, and she needs friends her age and a life of her own. He reluctantly gives her permission to go and silently wonders if he needs to give her a crash course in self-defense.

He worries too much and he knows it. But he looks at the pictures of those nine murdered young women every day, and he still sees Pippa in his dreams.

Ellie

Two and a half weeks after her impromptu working holiday in Stonebridge, Ellie's phone rings. She sees Hardy's name and her heart sinks because it isn't Saturday, and if he's calling now, it's because they've found another body.

She's right, except the body's in Sandbrook.

She in Stonebridge in four hours, and by midnight, she and Hardy and Sal Edwards are in Sandbrook, checking in to the same little motel Ellie remembers so well from when they were chasing after Lee and Claire and Ricky.

At least there are more rooms at the inn this time. She makes a little joke about how grateful she is for that, since three people in the bed would be even weirder than before. That earns her an appalled look from Hardy and a confused one from Sal and a very silent trek to their adjoining rooms.

The meeting the next morning with Tess and Dave is tense. Ellie's pleased all three are still able to keep it professional, although there's no mistaking Hardy's simmering resentment or the slight sneer underlying Dave's every word to him. Tess is simply insufferably smug as always. Ellie raises a mental eyebrow at Tess and Dave and wonders if it's just their way of protecting themselves from the work they do, just like her overly-cheerful-over-compensation had been hers, and Hardy's gruff, angry exterior is his.

But there's little time to ponder her colleagues' tangled history and she returns her attention to the new case.

Just like with the others, there's pitifully little evidence. Patti Johnson, 26, prostitute, drug addict, last seen on March 2nd at approximately two a.m. working her usual territory on the street. No one noticed what vehicle she got in or when exactly she disappeared.

They inspect where the body was left, an idyllic spot beside the river not far from where Pippa was found.

Through layers of sleep that night, Ellie thinks she hears muffled noises from the adjoining room where Hardy is sleeping, but they're faint and by the time she's awake enough, there's only silence. He looks haggard the next day, and more short-tempered than ever, which considering his usual level of grumpiness is really saying something.

After another morning of no progress, he snarls at Dave, snaps at Tess, then turns to her and Sal with a gruff, "Let's go," and takes them to where Patti was last seen.

The three of them stand on the sidewalk and she and Sal watch as he peers down the street in one direction, then turns and stares in the other.

"What are we doing here?" she asks.

"We've combed through the dump sites," he growls, "but we haven't looked-I mean really looked-at the places these women were last seen." He turns to Sal. "Take pictures."

She scrambles her camera out of her bag, then hesitates. "Anything in particular, sir?"

"The buildings. The nooks and crannies. The people on the street."

"Do you want us to come out here at two in the morning, Hardy? Start taking pics of every punter who cruises by?" Ellie knows she's being sarcastic but she's just as frustrated as he is and he's always been an easy target to use to diffuse her anger.

"Not a bad idea, Miller," he says absently and starts to walk. He looks carefully at everything, sometimes telling Sal to make sure she takes a picture of a particular building or a section of the street from a certain angle, gently guiding her into position if she doesn't quite get it correct.

The street is dingy and dirty, with boarded up windows on tired looking buildings with faded signs advertising long obsolete goods. There are some rare beacons of hope: a couple of tidy little cottages, brightly whitewashed with neatly trimmed hedges, while across the street is something that had once been a pub but was now a church-run shelter offering free counselling. Even with those bright spots, the overall impression is one of despair and exhaustion, and Ellie finds it all enormously disheartening.

They walk the length of the street, then explore the blocks on either side of it. Hardy's still scowling by the time they make their way back to the car, but now he's more thoughtful than angry, and Ellie wonders what's going through his head. Sal watches him with all the fascination of a mouse watching a cat and he makes the effort to smile at her as he takes the camera and scrolls through the pictures. Ellie feels a sharp stab of resentment that he treats Sal far more gently than he had ever treated her.

"We need the same kinds of pictures from each city where the women disappeared," he growls, breaking into her thoughts. "We can share these with the other DIs so they know what we need. Once we get all of them, we can compare them. You never know what wee thing will crack the case." He slides Ellie a sidelong glance. "Like the colour of a floor, right, Miller?"

Ellie slowly smiles. "Right." She gives him a shrewdly assessing look. "What are you thinking?"

He's silent as they get into the car and pull out into the street. Ellie exchanges an exasperated glance with Sal, who just shrugs and goes back to watching him.

"Nobody saw any of the women get into a car," he says so suddenly both women jump. "Maybe it's because they didn't."

They return to Stonebridge and Hardy sends Sal and Webster to take pictures of Tom Avenue. He also gets on the phone with the other DIs, sends them the pictures from Sandbrook as examples, and soon they're getting pictures of each victim's last known location.

"I can't stay," Ellie says regretfully a few hours later as Sal and Webster pore over the photos. "I've left the boys for too long as it is."

He frowns up at her. He looks haggard in this light, she thinks, and he's almost as scruffy as the first time they met. She doesn't think he's shaved since Patti Johnson's body was found. She thinks he probably hasn't really slept, if his sunken, reddened eyes are anything to go by.

She frowns. "You need to go home, too. Sleep. Spend some time with Daisy, find out what she's been up to since you've been gone. With luck, she had a wild party in your flat and has destroyed all that ratty furniture."

His expression doesn't change. "The maintenance company would be there in about thirty seconds if Daisy had a party," he growls. "That crew has eyes and ears everywhere. I'd be more worried about Tom, if I were you."

She smiles, a wide, toothy grin. "He's with Lucy."

"I rest my case."

Her smile disappears and her eyes pop open wide. "Oh, my God, you're right! What was I thinking?"

He suddenly grins and the way his face lights up with warmth and charm still shocks her and she stares.

"Will you drop by the flat and see Daisy?" he says, his smile leaving as quickly as it appeared and she feels somehow bereft now that it's gone again.

She glances at her watch. "Well, I was hoping for a place to sleep. It's only two and a half hours, but I'm knackered."

He raises an eyebrow. "Daisy's cooking is still unfortunately hit and miss."

"That's what take-out is for," she says breezily.

"Aye, so it is. Come on, then." He rises to his feet and Ellie notices that he seems endlessly tall today as he unfolds from the chair. As she follows him out of the station she wonders where that thought had come from.

The three of them spend a pleasant evening together, and the next morning she watches as a heavy-eyed Hardy shuffles around the kitchen making breakfast while in his pajamas with his still-scruffy face and hair sticking up in spikes. Daisy drags herself into the kitchen, throws herself into her chair with a groan, and Ellie thinks all she's missing is the scruffy face.

The sight of father and daughter communicating in monosyllables and grunts and growls amuses Ellie so much she makes the excuse of packing and thankfully makes it to the bedroom Hardy had given up for her before the laughter escapes.

She's calmer when she returns to the kitchen but the sight of them eating breakfast in morose silence almost sets her off again. She sits at the place set for her and begins to chatter loudly and cheerfully while Daisy and Hardy watch her with identically appalled fascination. This time she can't hide her laughter, while at the same time there's an odd squeeze on her heart. It's a strange mix of happiness for them, and a stab of loneliness that she doesn't understand, except perhaps it's because she's missing her own children.

The thought gets her to her feet. "I better get going," she says. "Sorry, you're on your own with the clearing up this morning."

Hardy and Daisy walk her to the door. Ellie opens her arms and Daisy reluctantly goes into them. As Ellie hugs her, she says, "Don't forget, you're coming to Broadchurch for a visit, yah?"

Daisy nods, then steps back and says, "You're almost as soppy as Dad, you know that?" She sniffs. "See you later," she says and goes to her bedroom.

Ellie turns a wide, amused smile on Hardy. "Soppy? You?"

He rolls his eyes. "Go home, Miller," he growls and she chuckles as he opens the door.

"I'll send you the pictures as soon as I get to the station," he says.

She nods. "I meant what I said to Daisy, you know, about coming to Broadchurch. You can always come, too, I suppose, if you must. Take a break from the case."

He gives her a steady look. "Well, Easter holidays will be here in a couple of weeks," he says. "I probably won't be able to get away, but I can always send Daisy down on her own for a few days. I know you'd take good care of her."

Ellie's surprised at the intensity of the flash of disappointment she feels, but quickly rallies and gives him a determined smile. "Of course. That would be lovely."

Silence descends and she fidgets under his dark, unwavering gaze.

"Well, awright," she says, overly bright, gripping and ungripping the strap of her purse, "I'm off, then. Call me with updates, yah?"

He ducks his head and nods, running a hand through his hair, making it stick up even more.

She smiles and slips out the door.

Hardy

He's a little deflated as he closes the door after Miller. It's something he's getting used to, this emptiness that returns with a vengeance once she leaves or they hang up the phone. He only hopes she has no idea how much he looks forward to seeing and talking to her. She pities him enough, thinks he's socially backwards enough, she doesn't need any more proof of it.

He rubs his hands over his face and scowls, because the fact that he really is socially backwards doesn't help anything. Besides, none of it matters. She's only back in his life because of this case, and she's staying for Daisy, but she doesn't really need him for either of those things. He needs to remember that before he does or says something even more stupid than he has already. He thinks of Becca Fisher in his hotel room and cringes.

His thoughts are thankfully interrupted by the ringing of his phone and he hurries to answer it.

"What?" he growls.

"Somebody tipped off the media," his CS says without preamble. His spare, direct approach is one thing Hardy appreciates about him. "You need to get in here ASAP because you'll be going in front of the cameras about fifteen minutes after that."

As he expected, the media is relentless, and quickly dubs the perpetrator the South Coast Killer. Not the most creative of names, but better than some of the other nicknames they've come up with for serial killers.

The most annoying part this time around, other than the fact that he has to spend so much time dealing with bloody reporters rather than working the case, is that he quickly becomes the story, rather than the victims or even the killer. It is, after all, his third high profile case in just under three years, in three different locations. He's either a glory hound or the unluckiest DI in the history of the English police force. Which one he's portrayed as depends on how angry he'd made the reporters in the previous cases, or which ones he's pissed off on this one.

He slaps down the latest paper that rakes over the Sandbrook and Danny Latimer cases again, criticizing his police work and the entire debacle surrounding Sandbrook's stolen evidence that caused that case to collapse the first time around. The article hints that while he later claimed to have taken the blame for one of his Detective Sergeants, it appeared to be a weak and shameful attempt to reclaim his own reputation. Not that it had been stellar before, of course, the paper continues, either professionally or personally, and goes on to once again label him the Worst Cop in Britain.

He drops the paper with a growl and reaches for his tea.

Bloody wankers.

He looks up as Daisy rushes into the kitchen, phone in hand. He puts his tea down and sits up straight when he sees the strange look on her face.

"You need to see this, Dad."

Hardy frowns as he takes the phone and looks at the screen.

""A video?" he says and holds the phone out to her. "I'll watch it later, darlin'."

"No! You'll watch it now!"

His eyes widen at her tone and she bounces a little in frustration.

"For God's sake, Dad! It's you!"

He gives her a blank stare, then starts the video.

It opens on a dark, empty bathroom seen at an angle from above, with the door and sink in the centre of the frame. Music starts as the door opens, the light goes on, and a man walks in to the small room, dressed in a rumpled light blue shirt and dress pants, head bowed, obviously exhausted. Hardy's jaw drops and his eyes widen as he tries to understand what he's seeing.

Because Daisy's right: it is him.

His vision blurs and the room spins in a way he hasn't felt since his surgery. He feels like a million ants are crawling on his skin, and it only gets worse as on screen he undoes his shirt cuffs and, in slow motion synchronized to the beat of the music, he unbuttons his shirt and strips it off, then does the same with the rest of his clothes until he's fully naked. The video goes back to normal speed as he turns and steps into the shower.

Hardy groans a little as the camera angle changes to inside the shower where, still at normal speed, he turns on the shower then moves beneath it, lifting his face to allow the water to cascade over his head and down his body, all of which can be seen in the frame.

He stops the video there and closes his eyes, because the room is spinning too wildly, he doesn't think he's breathed in the last two minutes, and he's abruptly remembered everything he does in the shower and if that's where the video is going, he doesn't want Daisy anywhere nearby when he watches the rest of it.

But the main reason he needed to stop is because the video was made in the bathroom of this fucking flat.

And if there are cameras in the bathroom...

He abruptly stands and pulls Daisy close.

"Grab only what you absolutely need," he murmurs in her ear, "then come with me."

Hardy learns the true meaning of paranoia in the next few hours.

He leaves his phone, because he's not sure if whoever is doing this has somehow put a tracer on it. He makes Daisy do the same. He doesn't take his car because he's not sure if someone has a GPS tracker on it and instead walks them rapidly down the street, his arm wrapped protectively around Daisy's shoulders. Then he remembers the postcard and finds himself watching everyone and everything, wondering if it's him, or her, or those two over there.

He stops and buys them both new, pay-as-you-go cell phones before they go to the police station. He puts Daisy in his office and closes the door, then goes directly to his CS without speaking to anyone. Judging from the way they're looking at him, they already know about it anyway.

His CS is in a rage because whoever posted the video used Hardy's name as the screen name, then sent the links to all the traditional media outlets and posted it to every social media site known to man, woman and child.

It takes some convincing and outraged shouting at a volume he hasn't used since Claire gave him the pendant, but the CS finally believes him and dispatches SOCO to the flat.

His boss then leans back in his chair and glares. "What are you going to do now?" he snaps.

"I going to get my daughter somewhere safe," Hardy snarls, his burr thickened by rage and fear, "then I'm going to come back and find the sick bastard who's murdering those women, and while I'm doing that, I'm going to find the sick bastard who's doing this shit to me." He pauses, then says, "I also need to borrow a car."

The CS digs out his keys. "Where are you going to take her?"

Almost a year after he left, Hardy drives back into Broadchurch.

He still hates it.

He still hates the air and the never-ending sky, the endless ocean and the bloody smiling bloody people, but if Daisy won't go back to her mother-and she's already flatly refused that option-then this is the best he can do.

He pulls up to Miller's house with a scowl.

For now.