Part 3

"So why'd you help him?" Megan asked from her perch on the interrogation table.

Colby just stood in the background, looking menacing. David watched the monitors in the control room with his hands laced across his belly. Don couldn't be here for this, but he'd done his part already. All the team needed to know now was just how much of an accomplice Chandler Yates had in Lyndsey Fuller, and they wanted to interrogate her today before they headed out to visit Don at UCLA.

Fuller looked miserably at the table. "I just let him stay at my house. That's it, that's all I did."

"Were you two sleeping together?" Megan asked calmly.

There was a pause while Lyndsey stared at her. "Look at me," she said at last. "Do I look like his type?"

Lyndsey didn't look like anyone's type, especially not after spending last night in a holding cell with minimal opportunities to wash up this morning. Megan forcefully derailed her train of thought from that unkind track and brought herself back to the business at hand.

"Just answer the question, Miss Fuller."

She scoffed. "No, all right? No. He's just a friend."

"… Who you allowed to stay at your house."

"I've been staying with my mom," the other woman explained. "She had a stroke about a month and a half ago, and home care is so damn expensive. My sister takes days and I've been taking nights, so I figured as long as I wasn't home, I'd let him sleep at my place. I mean, come on! He had nowhere to go! Finding a job was really tough for him, and his mom wouldn't help him out."

"Yeah, I bet he was really hard up," Colby said sarcastically.

"Did you know that he had a beach house in Santa Monica, Lyndsey?" Megan asked. "Right near the bar? And a trust fund?" She had her answer in Lyndsey's wide eyes. "This guy wasn't always hard up for money. He was playing you."

Fuller seemed to crumple at this information. "He said I was the best friend he ever had," she murmured in a low, choked voice. "He asked me to help him. He called me and told me to meet his mom and get some money from her. I was supposed to get back to my house and give him the money, and he said he'd give me some of it to help care for my mom."

"Why?" Megan pressed. "Why did he make you get the money?"

"Because he was afraid. He said he was scared to see his mother. He figured she was pretty angry with him, and that was why she cut him off in the first place. So I went to get the money. And then you guys showed up."

"And you had no idea the real reason he was afraid to come out into the open? No idea what was transpiring in your house when you weren't home at night? Come on."

"I work days at the bar, and nights I was at my mom's," Lyndsey said, looking at the table's veneer and sounding exhausted. "There are lots of people who can confirm that. I moved most of my stuff to my mom's place – clothes, books, everything. I haven't been home for nearly six weeks. And yes, I believed him about why he was afraid." She sniffed then, and her eyes wouldn't move from the table. "I didn't know he killed anybody. He was nice to me. And besides, he's dead. What the hell do you want from me?" she asked finally and started to cry, pulling a crumpled packet of tissues from her pocket. One of them ripped free and she blew her nose, looking rather embarrassed to be falling apart in the interrogation room.

That was when Megan really looked at Lyndsey Fuller. She took in the messy hair, the pouchy eyes, the fat hanging in all the wrong places … here was a woman with no time to take care of herself. She was burning the candle at both ends, trying to live her own life while managing the life of another, lured by sweet words and hampered by her own exhaustion-damaged judgment, fooled into doing something helpful for a man who had turned out to be a serial killer. She was lucky to have escaped this mess alive.

"What do you think I can give you?" she sobbed.

Closure, Megan thought. You're giving me closure. Because Don shot the bastard who did this, and there's no way you were a knowing accomplice. It's all over. She turned and looked at Colby, and realized he was thinking the same thing. He nodded.

"Look after your mother, Miss Fuller," Megan said. "You're free to go."

It took Lyndsey a moment to realize she was being spoken to. "W-What?"

"Come on, let's go," Colby said, coming forward to help her up. "Someone will call you a cab. Just don't leave town or anything."

Don woke up from the repeated taps on his shoulder and blinked. He was in the passenger seat of Charlie's little blue Prius, where he'd dozed off just as they'd left the hospital, staring at surroundings he didn't understand.

He was tired. Dad had left pretty soon after he'd woken up (he'd made some excuse about "getting ready") so it was just him and Charlie for a little while. It was actually kind of peaceful, with the exception of the playful teasing and the not-so-playful accusation that he had changed the ringtone on Charlie's cell phone, which he vehemently denied but found hilarious nevertheless. It was kind of fun just to laugh like an idiot with no witnesses and watch his little brother get his "Sherlock Holmes" on. Charlie was pacing around, muttering to himself about the clever trap he was going to set to catch the perpetrator if they tried it again.

The team stopped by around one o'clock to tell him that the case was over. Lyndsey Fuller had only been Yates's pawn. And while she now had a file with the FBI for her trouble, at least Yates hadn't had the chance to take the money from her and then possibly snap and kill her, too. Don nodded solemnly.

"We'll need your report on the shooting when you have the energy. They're giving you two days off, right?" Megan asked.

"Yeah, except they're counting today as one of them," Don said.

"Lame," Colby muttered. David nodded.

Megan smiled. "All right, so we'll see you on Friday. Take it easy, yeah?" she said, patting his knee through the blankets. She looked very pleased to see him sitting up and alert, as did the others.

"Will do." Don smiled.

Hands were shaken all around, and they left.

Lunch was delivered. The tiny bowl of soup was basically edible, even though it was way too salty, but he couldn't bring himself to eat the green-flavored Jello (not lime-flavored, green-flavored). Charlie was getting himself something from the cafeteria, so Don pushed the green goop around on the plate to make an artful design. He had to keep his right arm straight for the IV; doing it left-handed made it a hell of a challenge, but he pressed on and just completed a wobbly airplane when Charlie came back.

The plate was immediately snorted at, shoved aside, and replaced by some edible contraband, courtesy of his surprisingly devious younger brother – two of those Sara Lee "bagels" that didn't really qualify as such, a little tub of cream cheese, and two plastic packets of strawberry jam, along with a knife and some napkins. Charlie had brought it all up from the cafeteria in the pockets of his hoodie. He dumped his haul on the little rolling table that hovered over Don's lap, and without a word spread cream cheese on one bagel and the jam on the other.

"Have I told you lately you're a genius?" Don said, watching him work.

Charlie just grinned, flopped into the visitor's chair, and tore into his sandwich. Don made short work of the bagels and drank some water. A few minutes later, Charlie was licking mayonnaise off his fingers and staring off into space. Don was eyeing the gelatin like a suspect who hadn't showered, wondering what to do with it. He certainly wasn't going to eat it. But Charlie, who had apparently decided to go all the way with this accomplice thing, saw the problem, scooped it up with the spoon and plopped it into his empty sandwich wrapper. He tucked that into a brown paper bag, and then buried it deeply in the room's trash can, the one marked with the biohazard sign. Don laughed.

Since he now had food in him and could think a little straighter, it suddenly dawned on him that Charlie probably had classes to teach. He asked him about it, but his brother just waved him off. He'd cancelled class today, Larry was covering for him tomorrow, and all he had on Friday were office hours, which he could cancel too if necessary.

"Students generally tend to e-mail with questions anyway," he explained, pouring a little of Don's water onto his mustard-stained hands and wringing them to get rid of the stickiness off his fingers. "Besides, finals aren't for two weeks. They haven't even begun to panic yet."

A bit later he had a short, wobbly walk to the bathroom down the hall. Charlie was at his heels there and back. And then Dr. Huang came in with his tox screen results at around 2:30. He was good to go. The IV came out, the site got bandaged, and finally the heart monitor was powered down and the leads came off.

"Hey, you match," Charlie said, laughing.

Don frowned in puzzlement at this statement and then noticed that he had a little inch-high ace wrap around each elbow, with gauze pressed into the crook. One was from the IV and the other was from the blood draw. Both were the same color as the Jello. He sighed, but barely had a moment to reflect on this before some clothes landed in his lap: underwear, socks, a white shirt, a blue windbreaker, and a pair of black track pants. Charlie was setting a pair of old tennis shoes on the floor and zipping up a small travel bag. He clapped his brother gently on the shoulder.

"Okay, go ahead and get dressed. I'll be out in the hall."

Don relished the two minutes of complete privacy that followed. He managed to dress himself and wriggle into his old shoes, and when he got off the bed he found that he was actually pretty steady and much less dizzy, a welcome improvement from just a few hours ago. When he got to the door and opened it, Charlie looked up from where he was leaning on the opposite wall. A nurse was waiting next to him with a wheelchair. Don pulled up short, instantly suspicious.

"Ready to get out of here?" Charlie asked, sounding a little tired.

"Definitely. I don't need that, do I?"

"Hospital policy," the nurse said in a flat, no-nonsense tone. "Have a seat."

Don looked at Charlie. His younger brother seemed defeated, as though he'd just had an argument with the nurse about this and lost. Don didn't say a word. If Charlie hadn't been able to win a verbal argument against this woman, then he might as well forget it. He sat. The nurse kicked up the brakes and they were on their way.

"I got all your paperwork taken care of," Charlie said from where he walked on the left, and handed him a black baseball cap. "I'll give you a ride home."

"Hey, thanks, Charlie."

"Don't worry about it."

When they got to the lobby and almost to the doors, Don saw that the Prius had been pulled around. He got out of the chair, walked with Charlie to the car, and dropped into the passenger seat with a slight grunt. They took off and he fell asleep, imagining that they would soon arrive at his apartment building, where he would kretz up the three flights of stairs, stagger into his place, and fall into bed.

Instead, they seemed to be in the driveway of the Craftsman house in Pasadena.

"Okay, we're here," Charlie said, putting the car in park.

"Charlie, I thought you said you were taking me home," Don replied, confused.

"I did."

"Not your home … my home. My apartment."

Charlie looked a little pensive, and then quoted the doctor. "You sustained a head injury. For the first twenty four hours after release, you can't be alone." He reached into the back seat and snagged the little paper bag from the pharmacy. Don had been dead asleep when he'd run in to pick up the prescription ointment. "Besides, you really think Dad's in the mood to climb all those stairs in your building?"

Don groaned and scrubbed at his eyes, almost catching the lip of his baseball cap. It covered up most of the small band-aids on the back of his head. Damn it, he had a good argument against staying at Charlie's house … somewhere. It was hiding out in his fuzzy head, wily and elusive. And he was so sleepy.

"Come on, don't fight me on this. Just stay."

Don sighed.

"You should at least have dinner and stay the night."

"Charlie…"

"Please?"

The request was quiet and honest. Don looked askance at his younger brother's innocent, subtly pleading expression.

He muttered some unsavory words under his breath, all of them born of frustration. One day, he swore to himself, one day he would figure out a way to resist that look. He opened his car door with a resigned sigh.

Alan looked out the window at the two of them and smiled a little. Charlie sure knew when and how to play his "I'm the baby, gotta love me" card. He was at just the right angle to catch Charlie's sly smirk of triumph.

When the two brothers made their way into the house, Don trailing Charlie, Alan came out of the kitchen, wiping his hands on a dish rag. Don only had a moment to take in the living room couch, his frequent late-night crash spot. It was mercifully free of pillows and blankets. He nodded at his father.

"I figured you'd prefer the guest bedroom," Alan said simply, and smiled. "Bed beats couch, after all."

"No kidding," Don replied, smiling back.

Charlie's hand was soon on his back and gently pushing him towards the stairs. Together they shuffled up to the second floor, and Charlie stayed at his side all the way down the hall to the guest room.

It had been Don's as a child. The room no longer had his stuff in it, but it had been made up to go with the rest of the house. The maroon comforter went well with the masculine wood furniture and warm lighting. The bed wasn't even turned down. It was homey and comfortable, but it was clear that nobody was about to fuss over him. Perfect. Don sat down on the edge of the bed, feeling exhausted and unable to figure out why. He hadn't done all that much today. He gingerly took off his baseball cap and set it on the night stand. Peeled off his windbreaker. Handed it to Charlie.

"You're tired," Charlie observed. He checked his watch. "Look, it's almost four. Why don't you have a nap, and I'll wake you for dinner? We'll eat around six."

A nap and dinner. That sounded amazingly good. Don looked down at his feet. A nap would require him stretching out on the bed, which would require taking his tennis shoes off. But taking his tennis shoes off would require energy, and he wasn't sure where that energy would come from. And then he saw Charlie looking at his shoes, and Charlie realizing, and Charlie moving to help him, and it magically appeared.

He brought one foot up over the opposite knee and pulled off one shoe, then the other, letting them fall to the floor with a clatter. He even managed to get his legs up on the bed and maneuver his lightly throbbing head onto the comforter-covered pillow. He lay still for a moment, feeling a tad smug. He had managed pretty well on his own, and he figured Charlie would hang up his windbreaker somewhere and take off. He closed his eyes.

So it surprised him a little when the quilt landed on him. It tickled his chin and pooled all over him, covering him completely. He straightened his feet under the soft material and made mountains. And then another surprise: an arm lifted him up a little and an extra pillow was stuffed behind him. It eased the pressure at the back of his head right away. Okay, this was acceptable. Nice, even. Still …

"Hey," he managed. "Charlie, knock it off. You don't need to do that."

"Shut up, Don," Charlie said.

It was the tenderest rendition of that sentence he'd ever heard. Footsteps retreated, and the lights flicked off.

"… Ahem."

Don opened his eyes and looked up. "Mom?"

Margaret Eppes was sitting on the side of his bed, smiling. "Hi, honey," she said.

"Wha… What are you are you doing here?" Don asked.

Margaret sighed a little. "Well, I asked your father to give my love to you, but he forgot. It's not his fault; he's tired. So I figured, you want something done right, do it yourself."

Don smiled. Seeing his mother here was a mixed bag. She'd always been a funny, witty person to talk to. Of course, there was the slight problem with her being dead, and all the crap that came with it. His smile faded.

"Wait a minute. You talked to Dad?" Then he remembered the dream his brother had described. "And Charlie?"

"Mm hm. I really didn't want to bother you, but since you're available now, I decided I'd come by." She ruffled his hair, and put a hand on his forehead. "How are you feeling, Donnie? And no law-enforcement euphemisms. You can't fool a lawyer with those."

So Don was honest. "Really tired. They won't let me back to work until Friday, my head hurts, and I'm getting hungry. But other than that …"

"You're okay?"

"I think so, yeah." He looked at her. "How are Dad and Charlie? They didn't freak out when they found out what happened to me, did they?"

His mother raised an eyebrow. "They worried a little bit. Not that they weren't entitled. But as soon as they realized this was all going to turn out fine, they got a grip. Your father's done well. Made too much food and cleaned the house a little obsessively, perhaps, but that's not such a bad thing. And Charlie … God, he was a paperwork machine at the hospital. He made sure you got out of UCLA with no hang-ups, and got you home safe." She adjusting the quilt a little and tucking it around his shoulders.

Don let her. "I'm proud of them," he said.

"I am too. And you. I'm proud of you. Just…" Margaret rolled her eyes. "I know this is probably pointless advice considering what you do for a living, but try to stay out of trouble, would you? At least just try?"

Don smiled. "I'll do my best."

"I know," she said, cupping his face. "You always do."

She was getting a little fainter. "Well, thanks for stopping by," Don said quietly.

"Thanks for having me," she replied, and kissed his forehead. "I love you."

"Love you too," he murmured, feeling himself sinking back into the great black whatever, that place he'd left to be with his mother for a little while. He yawned.

"Oh, and Don?" his mother said. She was fading fast, but her voice was a strong as ever.

"Yeah?"

"Wake up immediately when Charlie comes to get you for dinner. No monkeying around. You play possum and it'll really scare him, and he doesn't need more stress. Am I clear?"

"Crystal."

"All right, then." He felt her fingertips on his eyelids, pulling them down.

"Don?"

"Whuh? Mom?"

A small, slightly nervous laugh. "No Don, it's Charlie. Dinner's on. Come on man, get up."

Don mumbled something unintelligible and opened his eyes, letting them adjust to the light in the room. His belly growled fiercely, and he brought a hand up to rub it. A glance around the room located Charlie, who was sitting on the end of the bed, bouncing slightly.

"You know, you look better already," he said. "I think that nap did you a lot of good."

You have no idea, Don thought. Helet Charlie help him up, threw the quilt off and swung his legs over the side of the bed, only to find a pair of house slippers sitting where his tennis shoes had been. He snapped his eyes toward his brother, prepared to get angry.

"Your shoes are over there," Charlie said, correctly interpreting the glare and pointing to the opposite corner of the room. "I just figured you wouldn't be going running tonight."

And Don deflated. Oh. "True," he said, slipping his feet into the slippers and standing slowly.

The two of them went out the door, side by side, and they slowly took the stairs.

"Hey, that smells good. What's for dinner?"

"Uh, something gourmet. Two French dishes, neither of which I can pronounce. Poor Dad, man. He bought all this fancy-shmancy food to make something that would impress the caterer, and instead he's wasting it on us."

"He cancelled a date? Charlie …"

"I couldn't stop him. He says he bought all this highly perishable stuff, and he didn't want anything to go bad. Apparently he called her to cancel while Megan was driving them to the hospital. And hey, we can be just as grateful as any caterer, right?"

"Well, since neither of us has, you know, any idea of what we're about to eat, I'd say our odds of having to look grateful and sneak in some take-out are fifty-fifty."

"Hey, Dad can cook, it's not like he doesn't know what he's doing! … Don, are you all right?"

"M' a little dizzy. I think I just need to get some food in me. … Why is it so dark? It's six, right? Is it going to rain?"

"It's not six o'clock. It's closer to eight."

"EIGHT? I was napping for four hou – Charlie, you said dinner was gonna be early!"

"The hell do you care? You were asleep! And you clearly needed the rest … don't look at me like that!"

"Man, no wonder my stomach sounds like a pissed-off mountain lion," Don grumbled. "Did Dad burn something and start over?"

Charlie made "pff" noise. "I wish. This gourmet thing is way out of control – I'll have to talk to him. He's been cooking all day. Dessert took him like, an hour. It's been chilling in the refrigerator while he made dinner."

Apparently Don had only registered one word in that entire response. "Dessert? A'riiight. Now you're speaking my language. What did he make?"

Charlie sighed. They took the last step and moved slowly to the dining room. The table was set for three, and a basket of biscuits sat next to a dish warmer. "Again. French. Unpronounceable. But judging by the containers in the trash, there's little pie shells and raspberries involved. So how bad can it be?"

"Hey, are you guys coming or what?" Alan shouted, backing out of the swinging door with a steaming soup pot. "It's on the…" He turned around with the vessel and saw Don and Charlie sitting down, both looking amused at his unnecessarily loud voice.

"… Table."

Don couldn't resist. He pretended to clean one ear with a finger. "You say something, Dad?"

Charlie started laughing. Alan tried to look annoyed with his sons, but that meant successfully fighting off a smile and he couldn't do it, even though he was pursing his lips pretty hard. "Smart ass. Here." He put the pot down on the table and handed Don a ladle. "Coq au vin," he announced, and went back into the kitchen for dish number two.

Charlie looked at his brother in confusion. "Well, at least it smells good. That's promising."

Don smiled, and ladled out a serving into a bowl. Big chunks of fragrant vegetables and tender thigh meat slopped in. Unbelievable. Give Dad a refrigerator full of gourmet ingredients and he makes chicken soup. Don topped off his bowl with a ladle-full of the sauce, a heady mixture of red wine and other fragrant things. "This is chicken with wine sauce," he explained to Charlie.

"Seriously?" Charlie asked, looking a little warily at the pot.

Don laughed. "Yeah, man, that's what coq au vin means."

He got a spoonful of the sauce, blew on it, and sipped. For a moment, he was completely still, tasting it. Deciding it was good – foreign but good – he dug in again. Charlie, he then noticed, hadn't moved for the ladle and was watching him like a hawk.

"What's the matter with you? Eat. C'mon. It tastes good."

Charlie, much to his amusement, looked a little embarrassed and accepted a clean bowl. He stood up to ladle himself some dinner. Mid-pour, Don darted a hand under his arm to grab a biscuit from the basket.

"Hey, hey, watch it! This stuff's hot. If you're not careful, I'll spill it on your head," Charlie chided.

"You do that and you'll get a pea in your ear," Don threatened.

"Okay guys, here's the other course," Alan said, coming back in with a platter and setting it on the table. "Salade de frizze avec des fruits de mer," he said proudly, proving that long French phrases and thick New York accents didn't mix.

Don and Charlie stared at the salad. The greens were basically recognizable – it was that fluffy, nearly-white lettuce that looked almost like lace – but very little else was. The frizze was covered in finely chopped vegetables and what Don assumed were different kinds of seafood. The whole thing was coated in some kind of oil and vinegar dressing and smelled … pungent. The brothers looked at each other in dismay as their father found his chair, knowing they'd have to try this too and probably pretend it was good. Oh, well. There were far worse fates. They made no move towards it, and instead continued eating their chicken while Alan served himself.

"Well, one out of two ain't bad," Don mumbled to Charlie, just under the clank of silverware.

"Beats most batting averages," Charlie conceded around a mouthful of chicken. "Besides, there's always dessert."

Don nodded. This was true. The three of them ate in silence for a bit, until Alan realized his sons hadn't made a move towards the greens.

"Here, Don, pass me your plate. I'll serve you some salad," he said.

Don, who was kind of hoping his father had somehow forgotten about the salad in the past few minutes, said, "Uh, sure, here you go." He lifted up his bowl and passed his plate over.

Charlie was not feeling quite as courageous. He stood up. "I'll go get the salt and pepper," he said, and got up to walk to the kitchen.

"Salt and pepper?" Alan asked. "Charlie, we got the sha– … huh. How strange. They're not here. All right, yeah, please, go get the shakers." Then he sensed something was amiss, and looked shiftily at his younger son. "This wouldn't be a ploy to get out of trying the salad, would it?"

"No," Charlie said, looking a little guilty. He escaped into the kitchen.

Don snorted. "Hey Dad, ask him about the mysterious prankster at the FBI who changed the ringer on his cell phone," he said, loud enough so his brother could hear him. "He'll be back and ranting in five seconds."

Charlie was clattering stuff in the kitchen, presumably looking for the salt and pepper shakers. His voice floated out through the swinging door.

"No I won't. Besides, I'm fairly sure it was you!"

Alan smiled. So did Don.

"Charlie, for the last time, it wasn't me!" Don called, trying to sound exasperated. He quickly lowered his voice and muttered to his father, "It was totally me." He called out again: "It must have been Colby!" Alan was shaking with silent laughter.

"Oh, yeah? What makes you say that?" Charlie asked, coming back through with the shakers and setting them on the table. Fortunately his attention was focused on Don. Alan got himself under control just in time.

"Because Megan's too busy, David's too nice, and I don't play practical jokes. They're a waste of everybody's time," Don said, allowing Alan to snatch up Charlie's plate and serve him an intimidating heap of the frizze dish.

"I have a team to lead. I can't get caught up in nonsense like that," Don finished, sounding every inch the authority figure. Sorry, Colby. I'll make it up to you somehow. "Eat your salad."

Charlie glared at him. "You first."

The salad was a disaster but the chicken was a hit, and dessert was a grand slam. Alan brought out three baked tart shells on a plate, each nearly overflowing with rich, raspberry-flavored custard, spiked with blackcurrant liqueur (bavarois au cassis et aux framboises). The completed tarts had been topped with powdered sugar and mint. The presentation was jaw-dropping.

It eased the "coercion" along. Halfway through dinner, Don had informed his family that he planned to leave the next day around noon. He was very grateful for the food and the bed, but he knew they both had things to do, all their protests to the contrary, and he didn't want to put anybody out. By the time the tarts had disappeared, however, Alan had convinced him to stay at the house for his remaining day of mandatory R and R.

So he slept in, ate well, rested up, and went back to work on Friday, looking and feeling much better. His team greeted him happily. He still wasn't cleared for field duty, but that would be coming soon.

Saturday was a bit of a wash. He spent it at his apartment, taking care of some basic housecleaning crap and finishing paperwork. But Sunday was much better. At his father and Charlie's invitation, he stopped by the house to watch an afternoon ballgame and ended up staying for dinner.

At eight o'clock, Don had sort of lost track of everybody. He was alone at the dinner table with a beer, going through his report on the shooting and trying to remember what happened, closing his eyes and moving his hand around to place bullets he only half-remembered firing. The kitchen door swung open.

Don looked up just Charlie stumbled through it, a little surprised to see him. Charlie was bleary-eyed, and looked … a bit like he'd seen a ghost, actually. Without reservation he walked over and put a hand on his brother's shoulder, as though confirming Don was real and whole.

"Hey," he said quietly.

THE END

I wanted to end this so that everybody could enjoy it, whether they were doing The Experiment or not.

If you're not experimenting, this is the end of the story. Yay!

If you are, then please ignore everything after the words "staying for dinner" (that would be the last two paragraphs), go back to your recording of "Hot Shot," and watch the end of the episode. I'd be very curious to see who tries this and what they think.

Thanks for reading and commenting!

Kiki :o)