DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN CSI:NY OR ANY OF ITS CHARACTERS. I DO HOWEVER OWN SAMANTHA FLACK AND THE FLACK TWINS AND ANY OTHER CHARACTER NOT BELONGING TO THE CSI FRANCHISE.

A/N: THANKS TO EVERYONE ADDING ME TO ALERTS AND FAVS!


Unexpected answers

"This world will never be
What I expected
And if I don't belong
Who would've guessed it
I will not leave alone
Everything that I own
To make you feel like
It's not too late
It's never too late
Even if I say "It'll be alright"
Still I hear you say
You want to end your life
Now and again we try to
Just stay alive
Maybe we'll turn it all around
'Cause it's not too late
It's never too late."
-Never Too Late, Three Days Grace


Three hours after processing the crime scene at Jordan Gates' apartment, Mac Taylor found himself stepping onto the elevator at the crime lab and hitting the button for the basement. Letting out a weary, frustrated sigh, he leaned against the back wall and pinched the bridge of his nose between his forefinger and thumb. Hours into the investigation, no solid leads had been formed and no potential suspects were being considered. Surveillance tapes of all entrances and exits at the apartment building had failed to shed any light on their killer.

The camera on the main door had showed a man, in a heavy black winter coat and a black wool cap on his head, entering the building an hour and a half before neighbours had heard the fighting coming from Jordan's apartment. Because of the weather, the security guard scheduled to be at the front desk at that time had called in sick that day, and while waiting on a replacement, the desk had been unmanned and visitors had been allowed to come and go without signing in. The doorman, who may have been the only person who could have possibly come in contact with the perp as he entered the building, had been away from the front doors hailing a cab for another resident. Upon the suspect's exit, the doorman had been on his half an hour lunch break. And while the neighbours recognized the voice coming from Jordan's apartment, no one had a name of a description to give. People around there apparently minded their own business and didn't get caught up in the drama of other tenants. And even if they did, the consensus around the building was that the less they were involved with the police, the better. There was nothing for Mac to go on. Nothing but a set of circumstances all contriving against each other and leading him and his investigators to an apparent dead end.

The technician handling the AV lab during Adam's vacation had been unable to get a usable image off of the surveillance tapes. The perp had kept his chin to his chest while coming and going and there'd been nothing substantial off of the reflection they'd been able to pull off of the glass windows in the front lobby. The perp had been smart. And apparently had not been frazzled by killing an innocent, single mother. There was nothing in his body language that had suggested he was distraught by what he had done. He carried himself with confidence and appeared calm, cool and collected.

Mac on the other hand, felt anything but. On the outside he appeared his normal self. Driven, determined and in complete control. Inside he was irritated, frustrated and sickened by what had been done to Jordan. And thrown for a complete loop over the discovery of a child who may have been the offspring of someone that Mac was extremely close to. At that point, he had no clue if Don Flack was the father of Hunter Aaron Gates. The five week old baby was still under the watch of Child Protective Services at Angel of Mercy hospital and would remain there until next of kin was located and they were able to take the child or paternity could be established. By law, if Flack was proved to be the baby's father and Jordan had no family to contest, he would be given custody of a child he never even knew existed. If he wanted that child, that was. Mac was making no moves to contact Flack about had happened. He was relying on Hawkes, who remained at Jordan's apartment, scouring for any clues as to who the child's father was, to come up with some information that would either prove, or refute the questions in their minds.

His main concern, aside from finding Jordan's killer, was getting to the bottom of who that innocent child belonged to. He would have to, regardless of what Hawkes did, or didn't find, eventually make his way to the Flack house in Ridgewood, Queens and break the news of Jordan's death and the discovery of the baby before either Flack or Samantha stumbled upon the story on the evening news or in the next day's paper. With the question of paternity in the air, and the dates coinciding to when Flack had broken off his affair with Jordan, Mac also knew that getting a DNA sample from the detective was essential to securing a future for Jordan's son. He highly doubted, if it was proved to be his, that Flack would turn his back on the baby. Flack was a loving and attentive father. Despite his arrogant swagger and his sarcastic, surly personality, he had a heart of gold and possessed compassion and understanding and a humanity that knew no bounds. It was a side of him that not many people were fortunate enough to see, but one Mac knew would never allow Flack to forsake his own child.

The worry was how it would affect Flack's personal life. The revelation of the affair had hit Samantha hard and nearly destroyed their marriage. She had admirably forgiven her husband for his indiscretion and took him back for the sake of their children. She loved him and supported him with every decision he ever made. She was able to put Jordan Gates behind them and get on with her life. They had two beautiful, wonderful little girls together and had always wanted to adopt a baby. But Mac was unsure how the young woman would accept a child that her husband had father with the 'other woman'. If she was able to find it in her heart to push her feelings of disgust and hatred for Jordan aside in order to care for a baby that was conceived during a difficult, heartbreaking time within her own marriage.

Nothing is ever cut and dry, Mac thought and rubbed at his eyes. While a child was always a blessing, the circumstances surrounding his conception were anything but pleasant. And the surfacing of a secret, illegitimate love child would certainly throw a serious monkey wrench into Flack and Sam's relationship.

Or would it?

Did they know? Was it possible that both Flack and Sam knew about Jordan's son? Mac couldn't imagine that Flack would be aware that he'd fathered a child with the woman and keep such a thing from his wife. Since the affair, they'd made an 'honesty is the best policy' rule for their marriage. Even if the truth hurt, Sam and Flack were speaking it. There was no way that Flack would have kept the existence of a son away from his wife. Was it possible that they both were aware of Jordan's pregnancy and baby Hunter's birth? That it was something they kept out of the limelight and away from the people that were closest to them? Was Hawkes going to find something at Jordan's apparent to support that? A signed birth certificate? Evidence that Flack was paying child support? Something that suggested that what appeared to be a mortal shock and massive secret was anything but?

You're getting way too ahead of yourself, Mac scolded his tormented brain. There's no proof that Flack is that child's father.

And there's no proof that he isn't either.


Mac sighed as the elevator reached its destination . There was a large chime and a delay of thirty seconds before the doors parted and he stepped out into the long, narrow and brightly lit hallway that would take him to the Medical Examiners Office. Too many hours worked mixed in with the hustle and bustle of the holidays had left Mac tired and irritable. As did Sinclair and Inspector Whitmore's decision that to cut lab costs, Samantha Flack pay the price by losing her job. It still ate at Mac that he had had the responsibility of delivering the bad news. Both Sinclair and Whitmore had punked out, as Danny had so eloquently put it when he'd found out about Sam's firing and had called Mac to vent his frustration and disgust over it.

And now the realization that they were losing Flack as well had hit Mac hard. He had never expected that Flack would hand in his resignation and go after a job with the Hackensack PD. When Sinclair had told him, Mac had been initially stunned, then lobbed a volley of accusations and insults at the for once startled and silent Chief of Detectives. It was Sinclair's fault that they were losing two valuable employees. To cut costs, Mac had been more then willing to sacrifice three lab techs in order to keep Samantha on the payroll. Keeping Samantha there meant keeping Flack. Plain and simple. The crime lab and the NYPD in general could not afford to lose both. And Mac had told Sinclair that if he cared at all about employee morale and the success of the lab, he'd take him up on the offer of getting rid of technicians, reinstate Samantha and go begging on his hands and knees asking Flack to stay.

The only response Mac had gotten from Sinclair was the sound of a dial tone as the Chief promptly hung up on him.

Mac Taylor had a lot on his plate. He was still perturbed about having to cut loose a member of his highly efficient and tight knit team, he had had to find out about Flack's resignation by Sinclair, and he was running the second best Crime Lab in the country on a skeleton staff. Stella's detectives and techs that he had borrowed were more then capable of handling themselves. In their own lab. In his lab they were grossly inefficient and insubordinate. So he had taken it upon himself and made the tough decision of calling Danny back from his mini vacation in Lake Placid. The CSI hadn't come right out and said it, but Mac had been able to tell by the younger's man tone of voice and the way he sighed and said, "A'right…we're on our way back" that Danny had been less then impressed about returning early to work.

Sacrifices, Mac thought, as he pushed his way into the morgue. This job, and life, are full of them.

Sid glanced up from the clipboard in his hands as Mac, shrugging into a navy blue lab coat, stepped into his humble abode. Before the ME, stretched out on cold, stainless steel slab, a stark white sheet pulled to the shoulders, lay the naked body of Jordan Gates. The stitches of the trademark Y incision made in order to perform an autopsy, just peeking out from above the edge of the sheet laid so gently over the body.

When Jordan's body had arrived at the office, Sid had been given direct orders, from both Mac and the Deputy Inspector that her autopsy had to be placed on the top of his list of priorities. Like the lab itself, Sid had also been grossly understaffed and struggling to keep up with things on his own. Assistants and techs had calling in sick since the wee hours of the morning. All to hung over from their New Years Eve celebrations to care about the job. He had managed to rouse Marty Pino out of a vodka and rye induced slumber, but it would be at least another hour until the young ME would come strolling into the building.

So in the meantime, Sid had shoved all of his other work to the side and concentrated on Jordan Gates. And struggling in vain to avoid the gossip that was beginning to filter down to the morgue.

"She's all ready and waiting for you," Sid announced, as Mac journeyed towards him. "I just finished up about a half an hour ago."

"I appreciate you getting right on this," Mac responded, as he stepped up alongside of the autopsy table. All blood and gore had long disappeared. Leaving Jordan Gates with a slight smile on her face and her dirty blond hair fanned out on the stainless steel below her.

"Direct orders from the people on high," Sid commented. "Within the NYPD of course."

Mac gave a small smile. Jordan's death had hit him hard. He had never had or felt that much of a connection with the woman, but he couldn't help but wonder about what could have been had he only been a little more forthcoming with his true feelings. If he'd just stopped worrying so much about the job and concentrated on the living people in his life. Given things a chance to mature and come into fruition. And now there he stood alongside of that autopsy table, his hands shoved in the pockets of his lab coat and his mouth set in a grim line as he stared down at the empty, lifeless shell before him.

"You knew Ms Gates, am I correct?" Sid asked, attempting to break the silence that had fallen upon the room.

Mac nodded and cleared his throat noisily. "We were…acquaintances. Years ago. She was having problems with her ex husband and I was asked to take care of it. Jordan and I met up again during the hunt for Suspect X. It was her assistant that Suspect X had kidnapped and forced to undergo extensive plastic surgery in order to make her resemble Suspect X so that she could fake her own death and allude capture."

"Katie Mann," Sid recalled. "I remember the case as if it were yesterday. It was the first time in my career where I've had to actually deconstruct someone's face. It was definitely a new one for me."

"In the end, thanks in part to your excellent work, we were able to correctly identify Katie Mann, contact Jordan and essentially capture Suspect X," Mac said. "It was a shame that her capture ended in her dead as opposed to alive but…"

"'Tis the nature of the beast," Sid concluded. "And Ms Gates…"

"The last time I saw Jordan was there days after Reid has been released from the hospital," Mac told him. "I was just leaving my apartment to head over to see him at his parents' place and I ran into Jordan on the street as she was on her way to pay me an unexpected visit. We went for coffee at a little diner up the street, talked for about an hour. And then she told me she was leaving town. Going to care for her ailing mother. I kissed her cheek, embraced her, wished her well. Then we both went our separate ways and continued on with our lives. About a year and a half ago, I caught wind that she had moved back into town and had started up her own business. Web design and small business consulting if I do remember correctly. But this afternoon was the first time I'd seen her in about eight and a half years."

"It's a shame how we fall out of contact with people," Sid said with a sigh. "I had an uncle that I was extremely close to as a child and well into my teenage years. He was my mother's youngest brother. Youngest child out of thirteen, actually. He and I were very close in age. And appearance. So similar in fact that we could pass for brothers. I remember one time, I was still under age but he leant me his I.D. and the two of us…"

Mac arched his eyebrows and stared pointedly at the man across from him. "Is there a point somewhere here, Sid?" he asked.

"Just that as I got older and pursued my schooling, my uncle and I began to drift apart. He moved upstate and while we attempted to keep in contact through phone calls, Christmas and birthday cards and such. We eventually lost touch with each other all together. Years later, just after I started as an ME, one of my techs brought in a John Doe found frozen to death on a bench in Central Park. A transient. Well once we cleaned him up and cut his hair and shaved his beard, low and behold, it was my uncle. Once the initial shock wore off, all the what if's set in. What if I'd kept in touch with him? What if I had set aside my busy life to check in on him from time to time?" Sid sighed heavily. "I've never quite gotten over that," he admitted.

Mac nodded slowly, slightly uncomfortable witnessing the display of emotion on Sid's face and the tears that sparkled in the ME's eyes.

"It's just a shame that you and Ms. Gates couldn't have seen each other again under better circumstances," Sid commented, gathering his composure. "You never heard from her during the whole incident with Detective Flack?"

Mac felt himself bristle slightly. While Flack's affair was common knowledge, the topic got under Mac's skin quickly when brought up. "Detective Flack's business with Jordan was just that. His business. I know what happened between them and the truth behind the rumours that went around here. And that Samantha and the girls stayed with you and your wife during some of the harder days."

"They stayed with us for nearly two months," Sid said. "It was a treat having them there. Kellan and Kallison are just pure joy. They're just the most adorable, precious and angelic souls I've even met. Having them and their mother in my home was wonderful. The girls are the closest I have to grandchildren of my own. And I just couldn't believe that Detective Flack did what he did. They always seemed like they were so much in love. That they had such a great life together."

"It was a classic example of how the grass is definitely not always greener on the other side," Mac concluded.

"I had something a little more nasty and profanity laced to say about what he did, but I'll keep it to myself."

"Go idea," Mac agreed.

"Shall I?" Sid asked, nodding down at the body.

"By all means…"

"Let's start off with COD, shall we?"

Sitting his clipboard down on the empty table behind him, Sid pulled a pair of latex gloves from the pocket of his scrubs and snapped them onto his hands and then turned back to the body laying between him and Mac.

"Cause of death is straightforward and simple," he said, as he laid a finger under Jordan Gates' chin and tilted her face towards the ceiling in order to display the perfect impressions of human hands on the woman's slender, pale throat. "Asphyxiation due to manual strangulation. The killer used his bare hands. And applied enough strength to completely collapse her trachea and crush her larynx. Now as you can see, our perpetrator had extremely large hands and used enough pressure to leave completely intact impressions of his fingers and thumbs. I took a photo of the bruises and sent them upstairs to the lab for measurements to be taken. I also sent some blood to toxicology and analyzed the stomach contents. Nothing out of the ordinary."

"What is this void here?" Mac inquired, pointing towards a break in the bruising on the right side of Jordan's neck.

"My best, and only guess, was that our killer was wearing a ring. According to a measurement I took of the void, the ring measured an inch and a quarter. Which is actually quite thick for a ring. Placement of the hands indicate he was most likely kneeling over her as he strangled her. Making it his left hand on the right side of her throat, and therefore making that…"

"A wedding band," Mac concluded.

Sid nodded.

"Any signs of sexual assault?" Mac asked.

"Negative. But upon internal examination, I was able to determine by size and shape of the uterus that she gave birth no more than five weeks ago. Now I collected trace from underneath her fingernails and from her hair line."

"Her hair line?" Mac asked, a frown on his face as he accepted two cardboard DNA swab cartons and the autopsy report from the ME.

"At first blush, I'd say it's saliva mixed with what appears to be nicotine. Or to be more precise, chewing tobacco."

Mac tapped the cartons in the palm of his hand as he ran through the initial crime scene in his mind. Position of the body, any evidence on and around it. "Hawkes found a small gravitational blood drop to the right of Jordan's head. There was a distinct brown discoloration to it."

"I think I may be able to explain why your perp may have been bleeding," Sid said, and prying open Jordan's jaw, peeled down her bottom lip. "Both front teeth are cracked. It's quite possible that she fought back against her assailant. Perhaps she bit him or scratched him hard enough to draw blood. Which would explain the blood drop Sheldon found."

"And he punched her or struck her hard enough to crack her teeth," Mac concluded.

"While I don't have any evidence to support that theory, maybe Sheldon will find something that will," Sid said, as he pulled his glasses apart and let them drop onto his chest.

"And hopefully these…" Mac held up the cartons containing the DNA swabs. "…will lead us to our killer. Good work, Sid. And thanks again for making this your top priority."

The ME nodded and picked up the edge of the white draped over Jordan's body and gently tugged it upwards until it covered the woman completely. He waved to off his techs over, silently ordering them to place the body in one of the coolers as Mac prepared to head out of the morgue. Sid bit his lip as he watched the detective depart. Unsure if he should pursue the nagging question in his mind, or simply ignore the rumours and let the matter rest.

He sighed heavily as curiosity got the better of him.

"Mac.." Sid hurried through the morgue and joined the crime lab boss where he paused in the doorway. "I heard that the baby was found at the scene."

Mac nodded. "A little boy. There was an afghan in his nursery embroidered with the name Hunter."

"Beautiful name," Sid observed. "And is he okay or…"

"As far as we know he's fine. He's being held at Angel of Mercy Hospital and he's in the care and custody of Child Protective Services."

"It would be shame if he became a ward of the state at such a young age."

"It would," Mac agreed. "But Jordan had no family. And her ex husband is just that. Her ex. He's currently in Rikers doing two years for hiring Suspect X to kill Jordan. So if paternity of the baby can't be established, I'm afraid that he'll belong to the system until either a foster home or an adoptive family can be found."

Sid nodded slowly. "Forgive me for speaking so boldly about it. I know that it's none of my business and I should just keep my nose out if it. But when I do the math…" he sighed. "Do you think that Detective Flack is the father?"

"I think it's a strong possibility," Mac admitted. "But without actual proof…"

"There's no sense in speculating," Sid finished.

"Whatever happens, I'm sure it will work out for the best," Mac said, then held up the cartons and the autopsy reported as he breezed out of the morgue. "Thanks, Sid!" he called, and disappeared down the hallway.

"Let's just hope that it's the best for everyone involved," Sid said aloud. "And not just a complete nightmare for some."


After dropping off the swabs at the DNA lad and demanding that the already beleaguered tech stop what she was going and attend to his samples immediately, Mac retreated behind the closed door of his office. Glass walls provided zero privacy but enabled him to keep a protective, watchful eye on his employees and anyone coming and going from his lab. Slipping into the chair at his desk, he stretched his legs out and placed his hands behind his head. Leaning back in his chair, he closed his eyes and drew slow, deep breaths into his lungs. Taking a few moments to get control of the runaway train of thoughts and questions steam rolling through his mind.

A loud knock at his office door snapped Mac back into reality and he opened his eyes and glanced at the door. Where an anxious looking Kendall Novak, a case folder in her hand, waited to be given permission to enter.

Mac waved her inside. "Yes, Kendall?" he asked politely, as the young woman breezed into the room and stood before his desk.

"I took it upon myself to analyze still photographs I was able to create off of the images of the perpetrator captured by the building's security cameras," she began. "While I wasn't able to clean the image up any further, I was able to come up with a small description based on what I could see."

"Which is?"

"I was able to determine that our perp had short, dark hair. There was a moment, as he was leaving, when he reached up with his left hand to adjust his wool cap. When he did that, he actually pushed it up slightly and I was able to see the hair at the base of his skull. I also noticed that he wore a wedding ring. It was thicker then most and either platinum or white gold."

"A lot of men in this city have short dark hair and wear platinum or white gold wedding rings," Mac reminded her. "That doesn't get us any further on identifying him."

"I agree. But I was also able to determine his height based on measurements of objects around him. Such as the distance between the top of his head and the bottom of the front door frame as he entered the building. Now he was slightly slouched, but our perp is between five foot eleven and six foot three based on the length of both his arms and legs and his torso. I also estimated his weight somewhere between a hundred and eighty and two hundred and ten pounds."

Mac nodded slowly as he considered the information Kendall was pouring onto him. The realization striking home that the one person he truly believed was innocent, was in fact the first person on his list of suspects. A history with the victim, possible motive. A match to both the description and the wedding ring in question. It certainly didn't look good. And it made Mac feel physically ill.

"Is there anything else you'd like me to do with the tapes?" Kendall asked. "Maybe try and see if there's any possible way to get a better image or…"

"We've worked those tapes to death," Mac replied. "No sense beating a dead horse. The victim's clothes are still in lay out waiting to be processed. If you don't mind…"

"I'm on it," Kendall told him, and handed her boss the folder in her hand.

"And Kendall…" he called to her as she made to leave.

She paused, her fingers curling around the handle of the door.

"You're taking the CSI exam in two days aren't you?" Mac asked.

She nodded.

"Good luck," he told her, giving a soft, reassuring smile. "I'll be more than happy to hand you your badge and your gun and welcome you onto the team."

She smiled brightly. "Thank you, sir," she said, and slipped out of the office.

Mac sighed heavily and dropped Kendall's report alongside of the one that Sid had given him earlier. He contemplated his next move. Whether it was smarter to wait for Hawkes in hopes that the man had found something, anything that implicated Flack, or someone else, as the father of the child, or if he should just take matters into his own hands and make the journey to Queens to deliver the news. Picking up the receiver of the phone that rested on his desk, he placed it between his shoulder and ear and began dialling the familiar number. His forefinger stopping before pressing the last digit as his eyes fell on the framed photograph that sat next to his computer.

A group shot off all the teams' kids that had been taken the previous summer in Mac's backyard. It had been the fourth of July and the first time God had been gracious enough to allow the families to actually come together as one large, happy unit. While the teenagers knelt behind them, the smaller children were all bunched together, sitting on a stripped blanket Kelli had laid on the grass. Their arms wrapped around each other as they beamed brightly, some sporting toothless smiles. As usual., Amanda Messer was right in the mix with Kellan and Kallison Flack. The two smaller girls sitting alongside of her, the three of them with their arms tightly wrapped around each other's necks. The girls were family. Sisters as opposed to honorary cousins. Together, the team had managed to create eleven unique and beautiful lives. Although in the picture there were only ten. Lindsay had still been painfully pregnant with Makenna and only three weeks from her scheduled due date.

Mac smiled at the memories the photograph instilled in him and promptly hung up the phone. Kallison and Kellan's father deserved better then a phonecall made to him based on nothing but theory, rumours and circumstantial evidence. He would bide his time. Wait for the answers, and hopefully the truth, to come to him.


Another knock came to his door and relief, and anxiety, surged through him at the sight of Doctor Sheldon Hawkes, snow still clinging to the shoulders of his winter jacket as he stood in the hallway, tightly clutching a manila folder.

Mac quickly waved him in, and was on his feet and in front of his desk before Hawkes managed to get within a foot of him.

"Tell me you found something," Mac nearly pleaded.

"Answers," Hawkes responded. "And I'm not sure if they're good ones or not."

Mac didn't like the sound of that.

Hawkes opened the folder and pulled out a piece of paper. The creases across it indicating it had been folded at one point in time. "I found this tucked into a baby's memory book on the book self in the nursery. It's a statement of live birth that Jordan Gates filled out before she was discharged from Women's and Children's on December fifth. Two days following her son's delivery. I wanted to make sure that it wasn't a fake, so I called the city clerk's office and they verified that every piece of information on her matches what was on the form that Jordan submitted to them. It lists everything from the date and time, his birth weight and length, the delivering physician. The father's name…"

Mac's eyebrows shot up.

"And signature," Hawkes added, as he held the paper out to his boss. "And I don't know if you're going to like whose name and signature they belong to."

"A signature would only be present if the father was aware of the birth. Which means he had to have been aware of the pregnancy."

Hawkes nodded in agreement.

Mac took the item and scanned the document with his eyes. His hands tightening around the piece of paper, crinkling and threatening to tear the paper. Although he had told himself to expect that moment, his chest still tightened and his stomach still knotted.

"Flack knew that Jordan Gates was pregnant with his baby," he said. "He knew and signed the statement of live birth."

"That's not all," Hawkes told him and pointed to another piece of paper in his folder. "I checked Jordan's financial records. There was a statement in the bedroom and last month there was a cheque for four hundred dollars deposited into the bank. Beside it, Jordan had written her son's name. I called her bank and questioned them about the check. They told me it was a personal check written from a joint account at another institution. I called that bank and they confirmed to me that the account belongs to Donald and Samantha Flack."

"They both knew," Mac concluded. "They were aware that Jordan was having his baby and Flack manned up and did the right thing by signing the statement of live birth and agreeing to pay child support."

"A joint account though," Hawkes sounded, and looked disgusted. "So not only does she forgive him and take him back for his indiscretion, she also has to literally pay for his mistakes?"

"That's their business, Sheldon," Mac told him, his tone scolding. "What they do with their personal life is nothing to do with us. Which is probably why none of us knew he even had a child with Jordan. I can see them wanting to keep something like that from all of us."

"And now we're all finding out about it in a big way," Hawkes sighed. "You know what this means, Mac? Now that there's proof that this baby is Flack's and seeing as Jordan had no family that can care for the baby, he has a legal right to that child."

Mac nodded.

"You honestly don't think he'd turn his back on it do you?" Hawkes asked. "I mean, it's a human life that he helped create. Surely he wouldn't just let the state take over and let the baby become a victim of the system."

"Flack's not like that," Mac nearly snapped at the other man. Quickly and without hesitation, defending the detective. "He wouldn't just walk away and let the baby, his son, go without. He'll man up. He'll take responsibility. Because that's the way he is. And for you to suggest otherwise…"

"I know what kind of man Flack is. Professionally at least. I thought I knew what kind of man he was outside of the job too. Until he cheated on his wife and carried on a three month affair with someone."

Mac had no response to that. "Did you call Danny like I asked?" he inquired.

Hawkes nodded.

"And?" the older man pressed.

"And he said with the weather the way it is, he'll be lucky if he's back in the city before nine. But he's making a valiant effort on getting here sooner."

"What did you tell him?"

"Exactly what you said to. I told him about Jordan's death and the baby that was found and Flack's then possible connection to the child."

"What did Danny say?" Mac asked, as he tossed the paper from Hawkes onto his desk before snagging his coat from the back of his chair.

"It was a mixture of English and Italian," Hawkes replied. "I couldn't make much out of it. But I do know it involved expletives. In both languages. And lots of them."

"I want you to get to work helping Kendall with Jordan's clothes," Mac instructed as he yanked on his jacket. "I'm going to head to Queens and talk to Flack. Get a DNA sample."

"A DNA sample?" Hawkes looked perplexed. "His name is on the statement of live birth. He pays support."

"Anyone who watches Maury Povich, and trust me, Kelli, Samantha and Lindsay watch a hell of a lot of it, knows that even if you have signed the certificate and you've paid support, there's still a chance that you're not the father. If Jordan was so willing to carry on an affair with a married man who already had children, there's a strong possibility that Flack wasn't the only man she was with. Especially when she never even gave the baby his father's last name."

"Flack could have easily told her he didn't want her son having his name. And if we're after DNA, why don't we just go to the hospital, swab the baby and compare it to Flack's internal control sample?" Hawkes asked.

"Because Flack deserves better than that," Mac told him as he hurried for the door. "He deserves to be treated with far more respect. Going behind his back…you should know by now that we don't do things that way. We're a family. What affects one of us, affects us all. And both Flack and Samantha…" he sighed heavily. "They both deserve so much more then what you're willing to give them."

"Mac…I…"

"Just get to work," he ordered and turning on his heel, quickly and purposefully strode from his office.

Hawkes sighed as he watched his boss go.

It wasn't always easy picking sides.

But Doctor Sheldon Hawkes knew this time which one he was on.

And he was firmly, and permently, seating himself there.


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