Chapter 18
11:37 p.m.
The truth was he didn't have time to let the reality of what had just transpired register in his mind. It had taken the last remaining shreds of energy left in him to come off as what he hoped was cool and collected. Shit. Cool and collected? He closed his eyes, wincing as he replayed the barely five minute conversation in his mind. Cool had translated into arrogant and collected into indifference. Jesus, he was a dick.
But, come on, given the circumstances... what more could you want?
The day couldn't have been worse. In a series of unsuccessful cases and ever more weakening government funding, yet another dead end. Another waste of money the state couldn't afford to lose left him with very little faith in the security of his position.
The only way the average son of a bitch could swallow it all without suffocating yourself was to keep it all at the surface. At work, shut it down from the inside. Leave it behind you when you get the hell home. Work is the last place you let yourself loose even for an instant. In the field, they call it the second's difference between a bullet to the head or to the shoulder. Behind a desk, it meant losing your job and your career. Jack never could differentiate between the two.
The instant he heard her voice, he knew he was fucked. Sure enough, less than five minutes had allowed the most promising lead they'd had in days to go cold and provoked Fitzgerald the Senior to another crusade against the 'mismanagement of one of the most vital departments in the FBI.'
He took the heat, at least made some sort of effort to let it glance off of him without any confrontation, but didn't stick around to watch the fallout.
And as difficult as it was, he left the bottle of bourbon he'd picked up in the trunk of his car.
She'd opened him up, caught him unawares—she always had—and just that briefest hesitation left him just as vulnerable as he'd been nearly a decade before. It wasn't just his fucking job. Undressing himself in his unkempt studio apartment, all the aches and pains—old battle wounds and new—suddenly seized control of his body. His knee killed, back throbbed, and sobriety was a burden.
Jack dropped himself down on the side of his bed, groaning and letting his head fall to his chest. His eyes lifted and caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror.
He grunted. "No fuckin' way," he mumbled to himself for no particular reason.
Having nothing to offer and wanting nothing from her, as he suddenly realized that he was, gave him unexpected peace and so he slept.
12:29 a.m.
Samantha plus a decade. Jack grunted. God, it probably looked horrible on her. Ten years with Martin Fitzgerald, as a Fitzgerald housewife who wasn't. The inner turmoil has to just read on her face. Creams and hair dye.
Oh, Jack, whatever has been wearing down on you so apparently these past ten long years?
I've been protecting the people from themselves. My appearance is nothing to the knowledge of their security. But what about you? I hear you've joined a book club. Well, that must be just a bitch to plan for all those weeks in advance, not knowing who'll RSVP and when...
I bet the kid looks just like him, the little fucker.
He rolled over on his side, settling against the cheap Sears air mattress. Not a flipping thing for him to lose any sleep for.
3:09 a.m.
Jack woke up with a start, sweating and out of breath.
He shook his head and wiped his forehead. "Hardly, hardly..." He repeated this to himself over and over and didn't know why.
7:40 a.m.
Four and a half hours later, Samantha Fitzgerald's plane landed an hour and ten minutes early into LaGuardia. She wore an off-the-shoulder overnight bag and a frown which emphasized the strain in her features. Jack was no where to be found.