A/N - First of all, let me say sorry for this delay. I had an asthma attack just after Christmas and ended up in hospital. I was out before my birthday thank goodness but it meant that I was in no position to post anything. I ended up having to stay with my sister (The one who just had the baby) because my parents have dogs, which ran a risk of my asthma flaring again.
So I got to spend five days with my sister, her husband and my niece. Frankly, best asthma attack I have ever had.
Lena is getting so big - at a month old, she is holding her head up and smiling (The mid-wife assured us that is this occurs when she is awake, it's not gas. It's a real smile)
Only that beautiful little smile made this now old bird feel better about the birthday. Heck it made me feel better about the entire damn world. Nothing can be that bad when you get a gummy grin from someone that you love, right?
Anyway, enough proud Aunty babbling - I hope that this is worth the wait. I'll be posting two chapters tonight to make up for the slip and delay's.
So read, enjoy and review
:)
Chapter Seventeen – Show Me The Blood I Bleed
Marion Chessler sat still and silent in the chair. She hadn't said a word since they had gotten into the FBI headquarters. And it pissed Olivia off no end. She wanted words, an explanation as to why Chessler had felt the need to hurt these children. What desperation has pushed her to the point where she threatened a grown man enough to have him kill himself.
"Me or you?"
Olivia tilted her head slightly at Peter.
"Sorry?"
"Do you want to question her or should I?"
"It's up to you."
"I'm going to say you might be better with this one."
"How so?"
"You said you understood. I don't. You might be able to get more answers than me."
"Ok."
Olivia took a deep breath before going into the room. She placed the file on Marion on the table and settled herself into a seat. She studied Marion for a moment before speaking.
"You frightened my daughter when you broke into my home."
Marion remained silent.
"And you assaulted her nanny."
"Is there a point to this?"
"My point is that I wish to understand what is going on in your head. You kidnapped six children, one of whom escaped. Cassie Ann Burton, she can't speak. Well, she can but she can only say one word. But she can still do math. Was that part of the plan?"
"You have no evidence."
"Yes we do. All we need is to find the other children."
Marion smiled again.
"Well, I can't help you with that. I didn't take any children."
Olivia sat back and let the silence fall for a moment while she thought.
"No you didn't. You didn't take children. You took experiments. That's what they were to you, weren't they?"
"Sperm and eggs in a test tube. They were mine to take. Not theirs."
Olivia frowned slightly.
"Yours?"
Marion smiled. That smile was starting to crawl under Olivia's skin.
"You don't see the whole picture, Agent Dunham."
"So tell me."
"Why should I?"
"Because we want to help the other children. Did you hurt them like you did Cassie?"
Marion's smile slipped slightly.
"Cassie was an accident. She fell. I tried to fix her."
"You preformed brain surgery."
"I tried to fix her."
"And the others?"
Marion shook her head, sighing slightly. Olivia fingered the edge of the file, the image of the baby still in her head.
"When did you lose your daughter?"
Marion stiffened, biting her lip. It was a second of emotion that Olivia caught before the mask slipped down again. Marion pursed her lips, her face hard, falling back into silence.
They had no choice, Olivia knew that. But the drive home felt like some sort of defeat. Peter had assured her that it was merely where the information lay and that Astrid still hadn't called in what she had found yet. They needed to get home to make sure that Astrid didn't have anything that they needed. When they arrived home, Etta was fast asleep on Water, who was watching cartoons on TV.
"How has she been?"
"Cranky. The only thing that seemed to cheer her up was a bath, a banana and a very long game of peek-a-boo."
Olivia smiled, pressing a kiss to Etta's cheek, pausing for a moment before pressing one to Walter's as well.
"Thank you for taking care of her."
Walter smiled softly.
"It has been a pleasure. Any luck with your scientist?"
Olivia sighed, sitting on the edge of the sofa.
"Not yet. She lost her daughter though."
"That's a sadness that not many can recover from."
"I know. I can understand on some level but taking other children, causing their parents the same pain that she herself experienced? It's a little lost on me I think."
Walter's voice was soft, his eyes on SpongeBob Square Pants.
"Losing a child leads you to the edge of madness, Olivia."
Olivia sometimes forgot the history of Peter. Perhaps because to her, Peter's history didn't matter. But she saw the pain when Walter sometimes looked at Peter, the wound open again.
"I'm sorry Walter, I didn't mean-"
Walter patted her hand.
"It's ok Olivia. Astrol wanted to speak to you."
"Are you ok with Etta?"
Walter glanced down at Etta's sleeping form, a small smile on his face.
"I can't think of anywhere else I would rather be."
Olivia pecked Walter on the cheek again before heading into the kitchen. Peter had settled himself beside Astrid, coffee already waiting on the table for her.
"Have you seen Angela?"
Astrid nodded slightly.
"She came down earlier, ducked out for a smoke and headed back upstairs. I took her up something to eat and drink before you came home."
"Is she ok?"
"I think so. She's not talking though."
"She blames herself for this mess."
Peter sighed, adding sugar to Olivia's coffee and cream to his own.
"She's as bad as you."
Olivia ignored the comment, taking the coffee before turning her attention to Astrid.
"Walter said you wanted to talk to us?"
"I found more information on Marion."
"What?"
"Marion Chessler was once Marion James."
It took a moment for Olivia to catch on to what Astrid meant.
"As in Wyndell James?"
"Correct. For five years. Then there was an accident and they lost their daughter, getting divorced a little while later."
"We knew about her daughter. When we went to her house, it looked like she was waiting for her to come walking through the door."
"It was a horrible accident. Celeste was just over a year old. She drowned in the bathtub."
Astrid pulled up a shot of the smiling Celeste and Olivia's felt the sadness and concern. Etta's fearlessness of the water sometimes troubled Olivia. If there was water, they would find Etta. A few months ago, an old pipe had burst in the kitchen, making a mess and the equivalent of a paddling pool in their home. Etta thought it was Christmas. She loved nothing better than going into the garden after it had been raining, spending hours slashing in the puddles and covering herself in the muddy water. All this did was remind Olivia how much she needed to watch Etta. All it took was a moment of inattention and that would be it. Game over. Family destroyed.
"Marion went into care for a while after that, all under the name of Marion James. When she got out, she went back to her maiden name and Wyndell got her a job at the lab."
Olivia glanced at Peter, who was searching for cookie in the cupboard.
"Is that why Wyndell James killed himself? Cause he knew what his ex-wife was doing?"
Astrid frowned, shaking her head.
"I don't think that's it."
"Why?"
"Because according to Wyndell James's will, she got everything. I think he still loved her, they just didn't know how to make it work after they lost their daughter."
Peter offered Olivia and Astrid the cookies before taking one for himself.
"It looked as if Wyndell got some help after his daughter's death too. He seemed to pick himself up a little better than Marion did."
"They dealt with it differently."
"But they both ended up in the same place, with the same job. Helping other couples to have the kids that they so desperately wanted."
"That still begs the question, why this? Why take the kids?"
Astrid smiled slightly at Peter.
"My thoughts exactly. So, I looked deeper into the company. With each child born, they would take blood and prints. An insurance policy I guess. But I came across something rather interesting."
"What?"
"Each child had similar DNA to Marion Chessler."
Olivia paused, a cookie halfway to her mouth.
"You mean-"
"Genetically speaking, she was their mother."