Heller looks at Jack as if he is waiting for an answer.
"I don't want her to know I'm here...not yet...I don't want her to see me like this," Jack insists.
Heller nods and goes down the hall to tend to Audrey, carrying a plate of french toast. Jack goes back into his room and closes the door, fighting to get his emotions in check.
Heller walks into Audrey's room and sees her thrashing around, mumbling to herself and looking terrified.
"Audie, sweetie, it's alright. You're safe now," he reassures her as he sits down on the bed next to her.
"Dad?" she asks softly. Heller smiles, relieved.
"Yeah, it's me, sweetheart. I'm right here. You're safe now...you were just having a bad dream."
She stares around for a minute and then stares at her father, trying to make sense of everything and figure out what's real and what was a dream. After a minute, her eyes tear up and her expression changes.
"Get away from me!" she orders.
Heller recoils, surprised but not completely shocked. "Audie, calm down. I'm not going to hurt you," he promises.
She just shakes her head and pushes away his hand when he tries to hold hers. He gets up quickly to show his daughter that he will respect her wishes.
"Alright, I'm going to give you your space. I know you were angry with me when you left, and I guess it was wishful thinking to hope that you wouldn't still be angry. I don't blame you if you don't want to see me. I just hope you'll talk to me again when you're ready. There's french toast for you if you're hungry," he says as he leaves, motioning to the plate on her nightstand.
He leaves the room, looking back at her with a heartbroken expression, then goes down the hall and knocks on Jack's door.
"Come in," Jack yells, the tears having subsided by now. "How's Audrey?" he asks when Heller comes in.
Heller sighs. "It's hard to say. She knows who I am now but she won't let me near her."
"I don't understand...did the Chinese tell her you abandoned her?"
"That may be part of it, but it's not all of it."
"What do you mean?"
Heller sighs, then sits down in the desk chair. "Sit down, Jack," he says heavily. Jack sits down on the bed.
Heller takes a deep breath and then continues. "The truth is, Audrey and I weren't on the best of terms before she left for China. She was angry at me for not doing more to find you, and then we got into a huge argument before she left. I was desperate to talk her out of going because I knew it would be dangerous, and I couldn't just sit by and watch her put her life in danger. So I tried everything to talk her out of it, including trying to convince her that you wouldn't want her."
Jack looks crushed.
"It was a terrible thing to do but I just wanted to protect her."
"What did you say to her?" Jack asks, on the verge of tears. Heller sighs.
"I told her to think about what you would say if you found out she'd been whoring herself for information for the last year," he admits.
"I...I don't understand," Jack says, his heart starting to race as he prays that it's not what he thinks it is.
"Before she found out you were in China, she had a number of theories as to where you were. She began getting in touch with contacts she had at DOD and beyond, using back channels to try to find out what happened to you. She was determined to get information from whereever she could get it no matter what she had to do to get it. I don't know who if anyone she got involved with but rumors fly pretty fast in a town like Washington, and the way she reacted told me that I hit a nerve. She told me that she hated me and she never wanted to see me again and I don't blame her...I was foolish to think that time would have changed her mind."
Jack looks away, struggling to process.
"Listen, Jack, I don't blame you if you're angry at me, but I beg you, do not get angry at Audrey. Whatever she did she did because she loves you, and she was willing to do anything to get you back even if it meant compromising her dignity and putting herself in danger."
Jack wipes his eyes and struggles to keep from breaking down again. "I'm not angry at Audrey...I'm just angry. I can't stand the thought of what she had to go through before China, and the thought of what they put her through makes me sick to my stomach. You were right before...everything she's suffered is my fault."
"No it's not, Jack. I blamed you last night because I was too ashamed to take responsibility for my failings as a father. You're not the one who failed to protect her. You're not the one who sat back and did nothing while she was tortured in a Chinese prison."
"I don't understand...you knew she was alive?"
"No, of course not. But I should have known. I never should have believed what I was told...I should have asked more questions and insisted on an investigation."
"Sir, the Chinese went to great lengths to make it look like she was dead...I doubt there's anything you could have done."
"Maybe. But if I had only pushed harder for the government to get you out of China before I left office, she never would have had to go over there in the first place. You were right with what you said last night, Jack. I didn't try as hard as I could have. And it's not because I didn't care about you, or because I was worried about my political career. Hell, I would have sacrificed my career in a heartbeat if I could have made my daughter happy by getting you home safely. But I couldn't bring myself to use my political and military resources to try to find you because I was so afraid that they were going to find out that you were dead. I knew that as long as your fate was unknown Audrey still had a reason to hope...if I found out you were dead it would shatter that hope. And she hung onto that hope, and she never stopped looking. By the time she found out you were in China, I only had a month left in office, and I knew there wasn't much a lame duck president could do diplomatically. So I tried hiring a covert team to try to extract you off the books...unfortunately, the Chinese got wind of it and made them a better offer."
"You're the one who sent those men?" Jack asks. Heller nods. "There are only a handful of people in the world who know that and I need you to keep it that way," he says sternly.
Jack nods. "Of course."
"Listen, Jack, I know Audrey, and I know that I can't force her to talk to me until she's ready, if she's ever ready. And I don't expect you to do my bidding for me, but I am asking you to decide now if you're up for taking care of her. I need you to make sure that you still feel the same way about her after what I just told you, and if you do, you need to make sure she knows that. She needs someone she can trust, and right now I can't be that person. So I need to know if I can count on you to take care of her and help her get through this."
Jack contemplates for a moment, weighing everything Heller has said to him over the past 12 hours. Finally, he looks up and nods slowly. "Yes, sir," he says.
Heller looks relieved and grateful. "I'm going to make arrangements for someone to come help you with her, because with the state she's in it's too much for any one person. I'm going to give you a credit card that I want you to use for whatever the two of you need. And if you would be so kind as to let me know how she's doing every now and then...and make sure she knows how much I love her," Heller says, tears beginning to fall. "Just take good care of her, Jack. Please take good care of her."
"Wait," Jack says as Heller turns to go. "Let me see if I can talk to her...before you go let me try to get her to talk to you."
"I don't want you to push her, Jack. If my presence is going to upset her then she's better off without me. I just want to know that she'll be taken care of."
"She will be, sir, but she needs you as much as she needs me. We just have to give her a little time. Please, just let me see if I can get through to her."
"Alright, I'll wait here. But don't push her...as much as I would like her to forgive me, my top priority is for her to be happy and to feel safe. I don't want you to do anything or say anything that will jeopardize her trust, do you understand?"
"Yes, sir," Jack promises. Heller nods gratefully, watching with a heavy look as Jack goes down the hall to Audrey's bedroom.