A/N: Well, this delay I couldn't help, since I was down for the count. Every once in a while I get something so nasty that I almost feel badly about what I put the poor characters who fall under my pen. Almost. The only good news is that it should be smooth sailing from now on.

Chapter 16

"What a dump." Colby wrinkled his nose at the lingering smells of cooking and stale beer and sweat and a few other things he chose not to think too hard about. "You'd think contract killing would pay better."

"I think the problem is more likely with the references." David jiggled the key the Super had provided, fighting it into the lock. "The nicer places tend to be a little sensitive when you list your previous landlord as 'State Pen'."

Megan held up the printouts in her hand, squinting in the dim lighting of the hallway. "Want me to try the key? I feel like we could be knifed right here in this hallway. And we're armed."

"Chances are these folks would just step over the bodies too…almost got it…" The key turned reluctantly in the lock and David pushed the door inward.

"Too bad," Colby said philosophically, lifting his gun. "I was kind of looking forward to breaking it down. Sure we shouldn't have somebody on the fire escape in case?"

Megan drew her gun on the other side of the door while David felt for the light switch. "That fire escape wouldn't hold me, never mind this guy - file says he's about 265 pounds. And that's the only other egress, according to the Super. Watch out for closets, though. This guy's MO is to punch first, ask questions later."

"Mickey Soames?" David called. He hit the light switch and the room barely illuminated with cloudy, yellow light. "FBI!" He moved slowly into the middle of the room, turning this way and that. "You think the hall looks bad?" he tossed over his shoulder as Megan closed in behind him. "Wait until you see this." He focused on a room across the way and inclined his head toward it. Megan nodded and moved to another doorway just past it. David kicked the door in, yelling "FBI!" Silence greeted him. Megan met his eyes and shrugged.

David entered the room, gun balanced in front of him.

Megan mirrored him in the smaller room. Bathroom. Almost more of an alcove than a room, really. She twitched back a mildewed shower curtain hiding a tub that took up most of the scant space and checked behind the door. "Nothing in the bathroom," she called, grimacing fastidiously. "Except a lot of mold."

She returned to the main room and stood in the doorway David had disappeared through. "How about you, David? Whoa - " She stopped short on the threshold.

David glanced up from a makeshift desk in the corner. "It's clear - of people, anyway." He had holstered his gun and was busy pulling on gloves. "We need a forensics team in here to collect evidence."

"Great," Megan reached for her phone and selected a speed dial button, calling over her shoulder, "All clear in here, Colby. But you might want to see this - " An FBI dispatch operator responded to her ring, and she spoke while picking her way around stacks of papers, skirting a foul-smelling mattress covered with rumpled sheets. "This is Special Agent Reeves, I need a forensic team at our last reported location and a BOLO on one Mickey Soames - "

By the time she had finished her report, Colby was standing in the doorway behind her. He gave a low whistle. "Wow. Jackpot."

"Yeah - " Megan crouched by a stack of bound volumes. "Lookee here - yearbooks…" She picked one up and leafed through it. "Right year…with a page missing in the D/E section." David was booting up the small computer sitting in a litter of paper on a rickety table. "We'll let forensics take the whole thing," she instructed, watching him. "Who knows what's buried on there, out of sight?"

Colby was rifling through a stack of printouts. "These are digital photos of Don - recent ones. Like - this week. Dated and everything." He picked up the sheets lying in the printer tray and stopped. His voice sounded gruff when he finally ground out, "Maybe you'd better have a look at this."

Megan unbent her knees and shifted until she could see over his shoulder, then snatched the sheet off the top of the pile. "Did anyone have any idea where Soames is? Because I think we'd better find him - fast."

David glanced up. "Super hadn't seen him since yesterday, but said that wasn't unusual. Had no idea where he goes - didn't show any steady employment on his application - what you got?"

"One more memento for Don. But this one's homemade." Megan held up the sheet of paper so he could take it in. "An obituary."

000

Probably…Don struggled to pry his eyes open. The lids shivered, but didn't part. Probably…there were better forms of stalling…the kind that left you alive when help showed up…Soames was…what was it the shrinks called it? Oh, yeah - volatile. Poor impulse control. Though this whole routine seemed pretty darned calculated… He would have laughed, if he could have scraped together the energy. Impulse, calculated…one way or another, he was pretty much screwed. He could sense the shifting of large boots near his head. And one way or another, he was damned if he was going down easy.

He struggled to roll onto one side and push himself up, his hands like dead weights behind him, his shoulders screaming at the fixed strain. Something wet and sticky coated the back of his neck, gluing the remains of his t-shirt to him. He tried not to think too much about what it was or how long it had been there…focus on what you can do, don't panic about what you can't. He felt the wall behind him and pushed back into it, trying to support himself, managed to lift himself a careful inch off the floor.

Almost instantly, there was a swift stirring nearby and the breath exploded from his lungs with a woof. Something splintered in his chest with an audible crack and an eruption of agony engulfed his left side. Struggling to breathe, he felt the floor pressing into his face once more, cool and hard against his battered right eye, the pulse in the lid beating in time with the cleaver splitting the back of his skull. He ground his teeth until his jaw ached to keep from groaning. This was really getting old.

"See, Eppes? This is what it's like to be helpless. This is what it's like when somebody else calls the shots."

He turned his head, cheek flat against the floorboards, opened his mouth to answer and coughed instead, bringing up blood and spittle, the pain the motion triggered in his ribcage almost sending him under. He clenched his jaw harder, squeezing his eyes shut, reaching deep inside for some core of strength. Or, what the heck - stubbornness will do in a pinch. He opened his mouth again, spat more blood. "You know, Soames…" It came out in a wheeze, but he was mildly impressed that he could get anything out at all. "I don't remember this portion of our last meeting."

"Yeah?" He could see Soames' heels rise as he sank into a crouch next to him. "I guess it wasn't. This part of our program is supposed to give you a taste of life in prison. I wouldn't want you to miss out on anything, Eppes."

"Prison." This would be a calculated risk. He wished he could figure how much time had passed, but his sense of time and space was badly fractured - it felt like forever. No way to pace himself - he'd just have to fly blind. "I remember. How is it you ended up there again?" He could sense the tension in the figure next to him, saw the large, meaty hands drop between the jean-clad knees. "Yeah - Shawna. You killed her, huh?"

The hands tightened into fists, then released. "It was an accident. I was just teaching her a lesson."

"Uh huh." Don coughed again, setting fire to his chest, had to take a minute before he could continue. "What - was it she did again?"

The hands twisted, then hung still. "She burned my dinner. I just wanted to remind her. To teach her."

"Right." The floor heaved unexpectedly and Don closed his good eye, hoping to still the slow undulations. A chill of sweat broke out on his upper lip. "Guess you showed her - huh?"

"It was an accident. I miss her," Soames sounded sullen. "I just wanted her to learn."

"Yeah. Sure." Don kept his breathing shallow to avoid aggravating the slow burning in his chest. "Course, she was - what? Hundred twenty pounds?" He paused, chasing an elusive breath. The sweat had spread to his scalp now, coating it. "Not much of a - match. For a guy like you. And me - cuffed." His body felt heavier now, sinking into the resistance of the wooden floor. "So - tell me - you ever beat up on anybody - that has a chance of fighting - back…?"

Soames roar of anger was expected and he steeled himself, biting the inside of his cheeks until they bled. The massive fingers dug bruisingly into his biceps, lifting him, shaking him. He got a wheeling glimpse of the clock - not good news - looked like this would be up to him - and closed his eyes to steady himself. Concentrating every remaining scrap of strength, he kicked out with all his might, felt Soames knee give under the blow and the world tilt dramatically, then fall away all together with a crash. They went down in a heap - him, Soames, and the nightstand, clock and reading material and cell phone flying in every direction. It was the cell phone he tried to keep track of - he couldn't do much with his hands the way they were, but he should be able to hit a speed dial button - all of them, if necessary.

He landed on top of the heap and forced himself to keep moving, to roll off of Soames' form stirring sluggishly under him, choked down a cry as he hit the floor and the bones in his chest grated against each other warningly. Digging his heels into the floor, he pushed himself toward the small phone, groping for it with confined and swollen hands. His tingling fingertips just brushed plastic, just for a second, then, with a jerk that awoke every injury, he was airborne again. His back rammed the wall with such force that the world flickered and dimmed, black at the periphery, the only remaining sensation the iron bar across his throat, pinning and holding him there, blocking his air. He tried to reach the floor with his feet, to relieve the pressure, but Soames held him effortlessly.

"You stupid son of a bitch," he hissed in his ear. "You in some kind of a hurry to die? Just to cheat me? What do you think, will Cooper come to your funeral? Pay his last respects? That's one way to flush him out, huh? So I can pay mine?"

A thin, high, ringing, like keening, in his ears, and part of him wished to God that he could just give in to it - find his way to merciful unconsciousness before the next round. He was teetering on the brink of darkness when he heard the sound, so at first he thought it was in his foggy head. Then he felt Soames stiffen and realized it wasn't.

"What the hell…?" Soames grumbled. "What the hell is that? I cased this place - nobody ever comes here."

No kidding. But with any luck, maybe it's Megan or David or Colby. And a really big gun.

Soames arm loosened on his throat and he sucked in a breath while he could, torturing his chest.

The knock came again, and Soames lowered him, keeping him pinned to the wall with a hand to his chest. They waited. The knock repeated, then a key scraped in the lock and the knob rattled. The knock was louder this time, as though the sound was coming through an open door.

"Don?"

Don felt the heart turn over in his chest.

"Hey, Don, It's me - you home?"

TBC