Chapter 4 – Family Ties: We learn Joss' secret and meet some old friends

"Well, well, well, the Prodigal Daughter returns. What brings you here, Jossy?"

The Auto Shop teacher entered the one part of Machine High that she had studiously avoided for the last year.

The Humanities Building.

Joss looked down at the woman blocking her path.

"I need to see Mr. Burton, Antonia."

Antonia wasn't a large dog, but you could sense the power under her sleek dark fur and a jagged scar across her muzzle let you know that she wasn't afraid to take on all comers. Her eyes gleamed sardonically as she looked Joss up and down. "Mr. Burton? Antonia? Why so formal, Joc-e-lyn, it's not as though we're strangers."

When Joss had told Finch and Bear that she had met elite dogs like Bear when she was an interrogator, she wasn't being entirely truthful. She'd known Antonia since she was a child. They'd been raised like sisters, but Joss had taken one road, while Antonia had chosen another.

"Would you prefer that I call him by his real name, Toni? Prefer that everyone know who, and what he really is? That the 'kind and gentle' English teacher Charlie Burton is really notorious mobster Carl Elias?"

"Girls, please. It's much too pleasant an evening to waste it bickering." Elias stepped into the hallway. "Antonia."

The dog nodded, and stepped aside.

"It's lovely to see you, Jocelyn," he said, as they entered his classroom. A gentle breeze from the open windows wafted through the air, and soft music was playing. Colorful platters with meats, cheeses and fresh fruit were on the table, along with a bottle of wine. Candles were lit and a small bouquet of flowers highlighted the simple yet elegant setting. "You're just in time for a late dinner."

"I'm not staying, Elias."

"You can have a glass of wine, surely, Jocelyn. Indulge your father, please."

"I am not your daughter!" Joss hissed.

"No, but your parents entrusted you to me, before they left on that fateful trip to the Arctic, and I raised you like you were my own."

Highly respected teachers, Joss' parents had disappeared when she was a baby during an expedition retracing the steps of the Perry expedition to the North Pole.*

Joss' laugh was short and bitter. "They didn't know that you'd teach me how to lie, how to steal, how to be a criminal!"

"I also took you and Antonia around the world during summer vacations. You speak over a dozen languages, know Cicero's speeches by heart, stood on the same mountaintops from where Shaka commanded his armies. And yes," his voice rang with pride, "you were an incredible student in all things, Jocelyn. You boosted your first car when you were eighteen months old, and judging by your attire tonight, you continue to utilize the skills you claim to despise."

His eyes flashed and for a moment, Joss saw the man that few people knew was behind the placid persona, the man that they saw only in their last agonizing moments. "You are my daughter, Jocelyn, whether you choose to accept it or not!"

Out of the corner of her eye, Joss saw Antonia slip into the space. Those on campus saw her as an indulgence, a companion for an older and highly respected teacher, but Joss knew that Antonia was a deadly enforcer and at the sound of Elias' raised voice, had instinctively come in to protect him.

He raised his hands, defusing the tension in the room. "I don't wish to spoil this occasion with a pointless argument. Please, sit down, Jocelyn. Join me."

Joss took a seat, memories of other evenings like this flooding her mind, nights of love and laughter and learning. It had all been a game to her as a child, and Elias, and the men who worked for him, men she considered her uncles, had delighted in her progress.

And while she had accused Elias of teaching her to lie, Joss knew that she had done a good job on that all by herself, ignoring what her father really was, until she came home unexpectedly on a bright summer day after she had graduated from college and saw one of those uncles, dead, in the living room, Antonia rolling his body up in an area rug like a cannoli, while Elias methodically wiped a blade clean.

Joss slipped back out, went to a recruiting station and joined the Army that day. Withdrawing just enough money from her savings account to make her adoptive father think that she was going on a little shopping spree, but not too much to raise his suspicions, Joss stole a car and left town, using everything she had learned to evade Elias' men until she reported to boot camp.

The Army, the police academy, getting her law degree at night, taking down as many criminals as she could, Joss did whatever she could to distance herself from her past, but it haunted her, knowing that part of the reason she was so good at catching criminals was because she had been raised by one.

Elias kept his distance, but Joss could feel his presence at key moments in her life, like the day she graduated from the academy and occasionally Joss would glimpse Antonia's sleek silhouette on a rooftop, or in a dark alley, watching her, and she knew that her childhood companion was reporting back to him.

Three years ago, after being honored for taking down a massive car theft ring while investigating a homicide, Alonzo Quinn had recruited her to come to Machine High, and with the urging of her former partner, Lionel Fusco, who had joined the staff a year earlier, Joss accepted. She was tired of feeling like a criminal while she was chasing criminals.

For two years, Machine High was a haven to her, but then a year ago, it was announced that a retiree from the city's school system had agreed to become the head of the Humanities Department.

Charlie Burton.

Joss sipped the wine – as expected, it was wonderful. "What do you know about Alonzo Quinn?"

"That he is highly respected, serves on a number of corporate and charitable boards and is the founder of Machine High. Not a whiff of scandal or even a rumor about him, despite all his years in the public eye. He is above reproach and has never received as much as a parking ticket his entire life." Elias' eyes twinkled with amusement; while he was not as well known as Quinn, he could have been talking about his alter ego, Charlie Burton. "But as you know, Jocelyn, where there are no secrets…"

"There are only those undiscovered."

Joss, Elias and Antonia shared a look of understanding.

"He's going to rob Machine High." Joss relayed the conversation between Quinn and Simmons and her encounter with the two men in the hallway. "Samaritan Industries just donated tens of millions of dollars for the new library and –"

Elias' nodded. "As a privately funded institution, Machine High doesn't have the oversight and controls that a public school would. How its finances are administrated have always been a closely guarded secret. The money could be long gone before anyone really noticed. It's –"

Antonia's tail thumped loudly on the floor, "Too good to pass up. I'd do it." Her eyes slid towards Joss. "Hypothetically, of course."

Joss shook her head, while Elias' eyes glinted. "And you believe that his illness is contrived, Jocelyn?"

The Auto Shop teacher shrugged. "He supposedly collapsed at home, had no visitors and the clothes he wore today were new - easy to get a larger size. The man I heard talking to Simmons in that office was as healthy as…" her voice trailed off.

Antonia's muzzle twitched. "A horse?"

The humans' lips quirked, but neither one said anything.

Elias sipped his wine thoughtfully. "The makings of a modern day tragedy. His life's work destroyed by scandal and financial mismanagement, reeling from the death of his godson, his reputation in ruins, emotionally and physically weakened – no one would question Quinn disappearing and then a report of his 'death' in obscurity."

"Meanwhile he's living it up in some tropical paradise, while the rest of us are left holding the bag, literally," Joss finished.

The mobster leaned back in his chair. "Why have you come to see us, Jocelyn? Surely there are others, your contacts in law enforcement - " they ignored Antonia's low growl " – you could have shared this information with." Elias tilted his head at her. "More importantly, I understand that you received an offer from Fitzhugh Quinnell's** New Technologies Department."

Joss folded her arms. "That's confidential. I'm not going to ask how you found that out."

Elias chuckled, "No, it's probably better," Antonia winked at her, "if you didn't, but as I said, you could share this information with the proper authorities, perform your civic duty, leave with your conscience clear."

Joss shook her head. "I can't do that."

"You left the military, the police force." His smile faded as his eyes flashed again, the unspoken words hanging in the air, as he leaned forward. "Leaving is what you're good at, Jocelyn."

Joss didn't flinch. "Going through the proper channels will take too long. They're going to move now, while Machine High is in the news." She leaned forward, her voice low and even. "Quinn and Simmons might be crooks, but the kids, the faculty and staff…this place is special, Elias…Machine High, is special. You know it's special."

The room was very still. Joss realized that the music had stopped and Antonia's tail wasn't beating against the classroom floor.

After a long moment, Elias nodded. "Tell me what you've discovered."

"I searched Simmons' office tonight – turns out, he's a chocoholic - got every candy bar known to man."

Antonia let out a sharp bark. "All the chocolate in the world couldn't mellow out that sourpuss, even though…he's…kinda hot…" her ears twitched, "if you're into humans."

Elias raised an eyebrow as Joss showed him a photo on her phone. "Bar None*** - I haven't seen that brand in years."

"'Tame the chocolate beasty'", Antonia mused. "That would be right up Simmons' alley."

"They don't make 'em here anymore, but they still manufacture them in Mexico. The color of the wrapper is different from when they were made here, which made me look at them a little more closely." Joss brought up the next photo, which showed the back of two candy bars, and then a close up of the lot numbers. "Check out the last six digits of the lot numbers."

"Yes…I can see that they're just a little bit different than the other numbers, as though they were altered."

"I need you to –" Joss paused. She took a deep breath, then looked Elias squarely in the eye. "Please – can you check these out for me? Whatever Quinn's got planned, I know they're the key. With your connections, you can find out if money has changed hands, enough that people have noticed. Even someone like Quinn is going to need help to skip town."

Elias slowly nodded. "I'll see to it."

"Thank you." She sent the photos to his device.

As Joss slipped her phone in her pocket, Elias tilted his head at her again. "Just in case you were wondering, Jocelyn, I did not hear about the New Technologies offer from your friend, Mr. Reese."

Joss felt her face grow hot as she struggled not to react. John was the only person she had discussed the offer with, during their car chats.

Elias knowing about the offer was one thing; knowing that she taken John into her confidence was another.

"I suspect that our Cafeteria Lady is rather good at keeping secrets, Jocelyn." The mobster's eyes gleamed softly. "Something you might want to keep in mind."

Joss stood. They were not going to have this conversation. "Good night, Elias." She nodded to Antonia.

"Good night, Jocelyn. We'll be in touch."

She turned to leave, then turned back. "Thanks…again."

As Joss walked out the door, Elias whispered softly. "Anytime, Jossy, anytime."

*TPH has noted that her ancestor, Matthew Henson, a member of the Perry expedition, was the first person to reach the North Pole.

**The school is where Finch sent the young girl Gen at the end of the S3 episode, Razgovor.

***Bar None candy bars had the slogan, "tame the chocolate beasty". They stopped making them in the US in the late 1990s, even though I have read that they were re-introduced in the States recently. The US version had a brown wrapper, while in Mexico, it's bright blue.

Next: Some pop psychology.