Buried Emotions
Disclaimer - no.
Fingers are better. I was lifting a heavy metal case at work and my finger got caught. Ouch. Thanks. My mother was also in the hospital for almost a week. Her chemo is, well, not going so well. Prayers are still welcome.
Chapter Twenty
Daria and Jean burst through the back and front doors, respectively, calling out "FBI" and "Police" (also respectively) in sync as if they had been working together for years.
Jackson Mitchell whirled around, reaching for where he had left his gun on the table – only to be shocked that it wasn't there. Had Kyle taken it?
"ON YOUR KNEES!" Daria roared in fury.
Even as Mitchell complied, glaring at Daria – having recognized her from New York – Jean began a rapid search of the house. The sheriff returned and pressed her gun against Mitchell's head.
"Where is your brother?" she hissed.
"More importantly, where's our brother?" John asked from the doorway.
"What part of stay put didn't you get?" Daria sighed.
"You didn't actually tell us to stay put," Virgil pointed out, trying to be reasonable.
"It was implied!" Jean snapped in frustration.
John shrugged before stepping up to Mitchell.
"You aren't a murderer," the blonde stated. "Jason said you said you were sorry for slapping him and you wouldn't let the mean guy hurt him. Alan – he's…Please. Where is he?"
"I want a deal," Mitchell said quickly.
"What can you offer us?" Daria asked. "We know you are guilty. We have both you and your brother dead to rights."
"Kyle – let Kyle go," Mitchell said hastily. "It's not his fault. I at least had a decent father. His parents abused the kid his whole life."
"Private schools and designer clothes?" Daria scoffed. "Yeah, a hard knock life."
"There's more than one way to abuse a person," Mitchell said. "Emotional, psychological…they can hurt as much as physical. They denied the kid any love, any respect…I begged our mother to let him come live with me. She said it wouldn't look right. So I tried to get the money, money so I could leave the country with Kyle, get him somewhere safe."
"Is that why you tried to sell the software?" John asked, referencing the high security software the man had tried to barter when working for Tracy Enterprises.
"It was my work," Mitchell cried. "I deserved it. Jeff Tracy didn't need the money. But no – he says it was too risky in the wrong hands and sold it for next to nothing to the government."
"Your brother is a multiple murderer," Jean shook her head. "I can promise to try and take him alive but I can't let him walk away. Besides, where could he go?"
Mitchell kept his eyes on John. "Same deal. Your father wires the money to my bank and your brother flies Kyle out of the country. And once they're in the air, I give you Alan."
John wavered, before looking at Jean in desperation.
"Are you sure Alan isn't in the house?" he asked, a quiver in his voice.
Jean shook her head even as she pulled Mitchell to his feet.
"No. And John, we can't."
"Jeannie, we're talking about Alan," Virgil cried. "The kid whose diapers you changed, who you helped learn to ride a bike."
"I can't," Jean said again, more firmly. "I can't let a killer escape. I've read his psych profile. Kyle Westcott is a cold blood sociopath."
"Then Alan Tracy is going to die," Mitchell snapped. "He's b- he's hidden. In a box. With only enough oxygen until morning. And you will have killed him, Sheriff."
Kyle Westcott slammed on the breaks, his food falling from the seat beside him and spilling on the ground. The clearly marked Sheriff's vehicle, with another SUV, this one black, were pulled off the side of the road, close to their "temporary home".
"Damn it," Kyle snarled. Somehow, some way, they had been found. It must have been the Tracys, damn their souls. They had all that technology on their side.
Driving into a field, Kyle slipped out of the truck and grabbed the spade he had been using earlier – the same one he had used to not only bury Alan Tracy alive but had also used the kill Paddy Vernon.
Cutting across the field, Kyle ignored anything but the goal in his mind – he was going to get to Alan Tracy before the law could save him.
The only way the Tracys were getting their baby boy back was as a dead body.
Gordon pulled up near the garage of the old groundkeeper's house…what the heck was the family's name? For the life of the redhead, he couldn't recall as he climbed out of his rental car.
Walking softly up to the open door, Gordon froze when he heard John's voice. Making a "shushing" motion to Julie, Gordon crept closer until he could hear more clearly.
"Your father wires the money to my bank and your brother flies Kyle out of the country. And once they're in the air, I give you Alan."
John's voice sounded shaken. "Are you sure Alan isn't in the house?"
"No. And John, we can't." Gordon could hear the sincere regret in Jean's voice.
"Jeannie, we're talking about Alan - The kid whose diapers you changed, who you helped learn to ride a bike." It broke Gordon's heart to hear Virgil – strong, dependable Virgil – sound so broken.
"I can't. I can't let a killer escape. I've read his psych profile. Kyle Westcott is a cold blood sociopath." The regret was still there but the cold steel that was such a part of the Sheriff was also present.
"Then Alan Tracy is going to die. He's b- he's hidden. In a box. With only enough oxygen until morning. And you will have killed him, Sheriff."
Gordon ignored the small gasp that escaped Julie at Mitchell's statement. And the angry retorts from his brothers made sure no one inside the house heard her. The words spoken by Alan's kidnapper rolled around in his head…and more importantly, what he hadn't said.
"He's b – He's hidden."
"Boxed up?" Gordon murmured. "No. He said after that Al's in a box. Baricaded? But where?" Looking up when Julie gasped again, Gordon followed her line of vision.
"Gordon?" Julie whispered. "Did I just see someone there? In the cemetery?"
Gordon stared at Julie in shock. He knew he could see Tomo but in the years since Alan's honorary big brother had died, Gordon was the only one who had ever seen the specter. Yet Julie was looking at exactly where the spirit stood.
"B – Oh, God, no!" Gordon gasped, running towards the graveyard. He now knew what Jackson Mitchell had almost let slip.
Buried.
The sons of a bitch had buried his little brother.
John and Virgil, following Daria's instructions, began a meticulous search of the house. Alan was somewhere nearby – the brothers just knew it, while the law enforcement training of Jean and Daria left them with the same gut instincts.
Jean Landman stood over Jackson Mitchell, glaring at the man even as she picked up a poker from the fireplace.
"Don't you care that kid could die?" Mitchell snapped.
"Like Johnny and Virg were saying," Jean said as she swung lightly with the poker. "Known the kid since the Tracys brought him home from the hospital. Helped change his diapers and teach him how to ride a bike. And if he dies, so do you."
"Doesn't that go against your oath of office?" the criminal smirked.
Jean's Marine Steel showed in every inch of her as she stood over Mitchell. "He dies, you and your brother both die. And I can make it look good. The Marines made sure of that."
"Marines?" Mitchell murmured. "Hey – Batter Bates, right? You pissed off a lot of people when you became a Jarhead instead of turning pro for baseball."
Jean's answer was to swing the poker straight at Mitchell's head, stopping the downward swing just before contact was made.
"I broke a man's jaw when I was thirteen. That was a few decades ago. My swing is just as powerful as when I was offered a major-league contract. All I have to do is say you were resisting arrest."
"Are you threatening me?" Mitchell blustered.
Jean's smile was feral. "I don't make threats. I make vows on my Daddy's grave. That boy better be alive when we find him – and we will find him – or you and your brother are dead men walking. Comprende, dumb ass?"
Suddenly Jackson Mitchell began to have severe doubts as to him and Kyle getting out of this alive.
Gordon ran through the graveyard, pausing when he reached the dead center.
Julie gasped as she ran forward, almost running into Gordon's back when he suddenly stopped.
"Gordon," she breathed heavily. "Did…who was that?"
Gordon continued his visual exam of the graveyard even as he answered. "Tomo Wattamee," he absently said as he tried to adjust his eyes to the darkness. The sliver of moonlight showing from behind the clouds offered little aid. As cemeteries go, this was fairly small, but the farmers of Bailey had been burying their dead here for almost two hundred years. Where could they start?
Julie's eyes went wide. "Gordon, isn't he, um, well…"
"Dead? Yeah. But he loves to annoy the hell of me and is as protective of Alan as any of us."
"Gordon?" Julie asked as her eyes began to adjust to the limited light. "Why do you think Alan is here? There are no buildings, no crypts."
Gordon turned to Julie with impatience. "Mitchell. He started to say Alan was "b-", then he said hidden. I think he buried Alan."
"He has had Alan for hours!" Julie said with a devastated cry.
"I don't think Mitchell is a killer," Gordon said absently, pausing in front of an angel statue, thinking it looked familiar. "He would have done something…not sure what…"
Julie was about to ask another question as Gordon trailed off before he suddenly spoke again.
"Wait," Gordon said snapped. "Hear that?"
Kneeling next to the statue, Gordon froze when the moon suddenly came out from behind the clouds. Written on the base of the statue were the words "LUCILLE ELIZABETH KEITH TRACY – BELOVED WIFE AND MOTHER IN LIFE – OUR ANGEL FOREVER" followed by the dates of his mother's birth and death.
"Look!" Julie said in excitement at a small tube in the freshly dug earth next to Lucy's grave.
See a spade propped up against another gravestone, Gordon began to quickly dig, hoping he wasn't disturbing the last resting place of a former neighbor.
Julie looked around desperately, spotting a smaller shovel – dropped by the late Patrick Vernon – and reached for it. Seeing a pool of blood near it, Julie swallowed the bile in her throat, praying it wasn't Alan's…
No one could bleed that much and live.
Joining Gordon's effort, the pair quickly had the less than two feet of dirt dug out in no time. Reaching down, Gordon pulled the case open and froze in shock.
Alan – his baby brother and best friend – lay there, pale and not breathing.
Kyle Westcott could see a woman standing over his brother through the living room window. He recognized the sheriff of Bailey by now…There was no way to save Jack right now.
And soon, there would be no way to save Alan.
Seeing Gordon, frozen in shock, Julie quickly leapt into action. Pulling Alan out from the metal box he had been laying in, Julie lay him flat and began rescue breathing.
"Please, mon ami," Julie begged between breaths. "S'il vous plaît, j'ai besoin de mon ami, je vous veux comme un frère. S'il vous plaît, vous ne pouvez pas mourir. Il serait mal à votre famille trop."*
Julie's rapid, ragged French startled Gordon and he took over for the crying young woman, breathing life back into his baby brother.
When Alan gave a weak cough, Gordon nearly cried in relief.
"Allie?" Gordon whispered in a husky voice. "C'mon Sprout, open those baby blues and talk to me."
"D-D…" Alan gasped. "Don't c-call me Sprout."
Gordon laughed through his tears as he pulled Alan into his arms and held him close before laying the kid back down. Shucking off the light jacket he had been wearing, he covered his brother who was now shaking in shock.
Looking at his girlfriend, Gordon smiled through his tears. "Julie – can you go get John and Virgil from the house? We need to get Alan to the hospital."
"Or not," Kyle said coldly as he approached the trio. The escaped killer threw down the shovel he had been carrying and pulled out his gun.
"Step aside Red," Kyle sneered. "Or Daddy Tracy will be mourning two sons." Raising the weapon, he smirked as he seemed to think about it.
"Then again, maybe that's not such a bad idea."
*Please, I need my friend, I want you as a brother. Please, you cannot die. It would hurt your family too much.
A/N - See? All better. Alan is out of the box...
Alan - Yeah - out of the frying pan, into the fire.
CC - Nope. No fire. Maybe next time.
Alan (sighs) - Help...