Spoiler Alert: Spoilers for Seasons 2 & 3, up to and including "Silent Night".

A/N: Thanks as always to the people who review – I am amazed by the time you offer me. Every comment asks me to think more seriously about what I am doing, and makes the story better than I could have done on my own.

Disclaimer: No infringement of copyright is intended. All characters originated with CSI:NY; all song lyrics are from The Beatles.

It's A Long Journey Home

Chapter 38: Suddenly I See You

I was alone, I took a ride

I didn't know what I would find there

Another road where maybe I

Could see another kind of mind there

There was silence in the big ranch kitchen when Danny's voice stopped. He looked down at his hands again for a minute, then stood up and cleared his plate, putting it carefully into the sink. He didn't have the courage to look at Lindsay's parents again, so he stayed over by the sink, looking out the window at the dogs running after each other. In the distance, he could see fields and horses, with no other buildings in sight for miles. This is what his Montana had given up for a crowded, dirty, noisy city. What was he going to do if she decided she couldn't leave it again?

He didn't see Diane and Ted share one of those looks that only people who have spent years interpreting each other do. He didn't see Diane wipe tears from her eyes, or see an odd expression – half relieved, half pained – cross Ted's face.

The kitchen was silent for some minutes; then Diane pushed her chair away from the table and started clearing the rest of the dishes, moving up beside Danny at the sink. Danny tensed as he heard Ted stand up as well, clearing his throat as he did, and turned around slowly to face whatever was coming at him, steeled for a fist in the face.

"Look, son, I don't know if you two are going to be able to work out whatever has you tied up in knots. I do know my daughter, though. Once she decides what she wants, nothing gets in her way. Whatever happens, I stand with her." Ted looked Danny in the eye, and seemed satisfied by whatever he saw there.

"I wouldn't expect anything else, sir."

"Good. Then let's get on with getting her out of that deathtrap hospital and figuring out how to keep her safe for good, okay?"

A little stunned, Danny nodded as Ted walked out the back door, whistling for the dogs as he went to pack the truck with some of the supplies he and the boys had been collecting for Lindsay's hideout.

Danny leaned back against the counter, his breathing nearly back to normal. He lost it completely when Diane turned to him and hugged him hard.

"You two will work it out, Danny. I promise."

He couldn't help it. His arms went around her and he held on. He'd kept it all together: in front of Lindsay, in front of her brothers, in front of all the members of his New York team. He lost it now, a hot gush of tears running down his cheeks unchecked.

Diane held him, whispering soft comforting words until the emotion that had overwhelmed him was spent. Mother of three sons, she knew the right moment to step away and let him take control back. She plunged her hands back into the sink, and nodded towards the drawer in which the dishtowels were kept. "Grab a cloth and dry these dishes for me. Tell me what the plan is."

Danny turned away from her, pushing his glasses up to wipe his eyes with the backs of his hands, then doing as he was told and finding a cloth to dry the dishes. Within moments, he found himself stacking dry dishes on the counter and explaining to Diane the plan he had worked out with John and Dr. Chris, with input from a determined Lindsay whenever she could get a word in edge-wise.

"Do you think it will work?" Diane's voice was quiet.

"It has to," Danny's was determined. "We have to get her out of there. Too many people in and out, no way to control access, too many ways things to go wrong. Once we're out of the way, John and my guys in New York can concentrate on clearing up the original case, find out who the second shooter was. I'm hoping that will tell us for sure who is after her now."

Diane wiped down the counters once more, rinsed the sink out, and started putting away the dishes Danny had dried and stacked beside the sink. She said over her shoulder as she reached up to put away the dishes, "You think you know who it was, don't you?"

Danny hesitated before answering her. When she turned and glared at him, he had to laugh; Lindsay looked just like that when he questioned her reasoning or judgments. He decided to go roundabout on this one. "How close is Lindsay to John McKim?"

No good, he saw immediately: Diane dropped her hands to her hips and looked at him in honest confusion.

"They were partners for about six months when Lindsay finished at Montana State and came to work for the BPD. She wanted the street experience, but she moved into the lab pretty quickly. Why?"

"Wasn't he at school with her?" Danny tried to keep his voice casual, but one look at Diane's face told him he had failed.

"He's the same age as our John," she said slowly. "That means they were in the same school for about two years: Jamie was six, John four, and Mick two when Lindsay was born."

"So where was John when the shooting happened?" Danny bit his tongue; the things that were not in the file because "everyone knew that" were enough to make him scream. If McKim was four years older than Lindsay, he was probably out of the picture.

"Which one? Our John was at university, second year Criminology. McKim? I don't know. He left town after they graduated, I know that, disappeared for a few years. When he came back, he joined the BPD. He's been there for, what, eight years now?"

Diane fidgeted with the drying cloth she had taken from Danny to dry her hands. "Do you honestly think it could be John McKim, Danny? I'm pretty sure he wasn't even in town when the first incident happened."

Danny shrugged non-committally. "It has to be someone who has access to the lab, is in on the discussions around the original case. On the other hand, the person after her now may have no connection to the original case."

"Oh, God," Diane collapsed on the nearest chair, her knees just giving out as she put her head in her hands. "I can't stand this."

Danny knelt beside her, offering her comfort now. "It'll be okay. We're going to find him, I promise, and stop him for good this time."

"Do you know how long I've prayed for Justin Forbes to die of his injuries?" Diane's brown eyes, so like Lindsay's, were blurred with memory now. "I knelt in the church and begged God to just let him die. I wrote letters to the governor of the prison, asking him why they were continuing to medically intervene in Forbes' case. I just wanted it all to be over, so Lindsay could go on with her life without looking over her shoulder all the time. And now, I find out someone else has been walking around free all this time. Someone who shot two of those children. Someone who has been living for thirteen years as if it meant nothing, as if taking those lives, destroying poor Mary Sorenson's sanity, breaking up the Collins' marriage – none of that is his responsibility at all."

Danny was holding her hands in his, letting her vent. He could feel her anger like a blazing fire, and he wondered how she managed to hold all this in on a daily basis.

"Diane, I'm sorry for everything you have all gone through. But I promise you that we are going to end this. One way or another, this ordeal is going to end."

Diane Monroe wiped her eyes, and nodded her head. "I believe you. I do. It's just been a part of our life so long. Lindsay has carried this with her every day of her life."

"You all have," Danny thought, but just nodded in answer to her worried look. Out loud, he said, "We're going to help her get over this, okay? Or at least understand what happened."

He thought back to Lindsay's obsession with the mermaid case, actually going to the prison to ask the murderer again what had made him pick his victim. He remembered the haunted look in her eyes when she returned, the reason he had gone to Mac and ratted her out. He had been afraid even then there was something else going on; he wished now he had pushed her further. He might have been able to save both of them some heartache if he had.

Ted walked back into the kitchen. "You better get your stuff together. It'll be 8:00 before we're back in town."

Danny looked down at himself. "I don't have much to get together. I only brought my overnight bag. And Lindsay's case file; we'll need that."

Diane frowned. "You'll need warmer clothing, boots, gloves. I better see what I can find. The boys left some things here…" she bustled out of the room before Danny could point out he'd swim in anything that had fit Mick even as an infant.

He looked uneasily at Ted. He was still waiting for the shotgun to swing his way, and waiting made him nervous.

"Go on, get your stuff. You could have a long wait. Oh, Lindsay asked if you could bring her some books."

"Anything in particular?" Danny asked, as he turned to go back up the stairs.

"No, anything on the shelf in her bedroom, she said. You'll know which room is hers, I'm thinking." Ted's voice was perfectly neutral, but as Danny walked out of the kitchen, his face a little flushed, he could swear he heard a chuckle come from Lindsay's father.