Author's Note: So sorry! Work's been crazy, and then I took a post-work vacation, and in the midst of all this I rewatched the end of season two and got nostalgic for the pre-angst days and wrote a whole other fic, and now its sequel is busting around my brain and demanding my attention. If you're looking for some Nathan/Audrey fluff to hold you over that bypasses all the nonsense of season three, check out "I Think I Know Why the Dog Howls at the Moon." I'm quite fond of it, and would love to know what you think.
And yeah, it will have a sequel, because I've already written most of it. But reviews might motivate me to shirk the rest of my life and spend more time writing.
Duke had never been the kind of man who enjoyed routine, but there was something soothing about the restaurant and its many cycles. Inventory, open, close. Taco Tuesdays. Karaoke Thursdays. He hated payroll – doing the math and writing the checks – but the more often he did it the more he realized he appreciated the stability it represented – a stability he'd never had before in all his life.
He'd been taking fewer and fewer smuggling jobs in the months before the Hunter. He'd told himself he wanted to be nearby in case Audrey needed him.
Maybe some part of him had been stricken by Julia Carr's biting words, his little pigtailed shadow all grown up and denouncing him for being a criminal.
Or maybe it was the desire to prove Nathan wrong. To show him he could be a better man than his father.
Since returning from the Barn Duke had only taken the Cape Rouge out on a brief fishing excursion to clear his head.
All his contacts thought he'd flown the coup, he told himself as he wiped down the bar on a Wednesday night. It'd be tricky wading back into the game, and with Haven such a powder keg it was better to stay close. Nathan might deny it, but he and Audrey need another pair of hands for whatever was going down.
Besides, it took a lot of elbow grease to get the Grey Gull back up and running, so it made sense he'd want to stick around and make sure everything progressed smoothly.
What confused the hell out of him was the crazier Haven got, the less compelled he felt to leave.
He'd always enjoyed playing bartender, though, because it gave him a chance to be witty and flirt with girls for tips and survey the whole place and appreciate that for the first time in his life he had something good that was unquestionably, legally his.
Business had been solid since the reopening, and he was mixing a piña coloda when one of his waitresses called for his attention.
"Hey boss. You want us to be on the lookout for anything suspicious, right?"
He flashed the girl a grin, but he was already peering past her, looking for anyone burly and dangerous. "What have you got for me?"
"There's a man sitting alone in the corner of the restaurant. He's been here the past couple of nights. Never orders anything but a water, and he sticks around until we close the place down."
Nathan had warned him that reopening the Gull made him a target, but he'd ignored the advice. He really hoped this wasn't how the Guard offed him, because it would be mortifying to die proving Nathan right. "He doesn't have a tattoo on his arm, does he?"
"I haven't noticed one."
"Great. Care to point him out?"
Duke came around the bar for a better look, and Marcy pointed to the loner in the corner. Duke immediately relaxed when he recognized the near-familiar scowl.
"That's my new tenant, actually. Next time he comes in here and asks for a water give him a jack and coke on the house. And can you get Joel to cover the bar? I have to talk to him about rent."
He grabbed a bottle of scotch and two tumblers and made his way over the James, who was staring into his glass of water as if it was something a hell of a lot stronger. "You know, I'm not an expert on etiquette in the 1980's, but in 2012 when someone hangs out in a bar, they're supposed to order drinks."
James jerked, and when his eyes met Duke's his scowl deepened. "I'll go then."
"I wasn't saying you should leave. I was saying you should drink." Duke set the glasses on the table and poured two measures of scotch, pushing one toward James while grabbing the other and settling himself in the chair across from the brooding man.
"I'm not paying for that."
"Course not. Gift from your friendly landlord."
"I don't need your charity," he snarled.
Duke downed his shot to keep from saying something he'd regret, Audrey's plea to look out for the kid running through his mind. He didn't look much like Nathan most of the time, but it was uncanny how he seemed to be channeling him now. The trick would be to ignore the way he was acting like Nathan and treat him as if he was Audrey. Having one Wuornos as a fair weather enemy was quite enough, not to mention Audrey's wrath if he made her kid's life any harder than it already was.
"You think Audrey ever paid for anything around here?" Duke poured himself a second shot, and dumped a little more liquor into James' glass. "Food. Drinks. Coffee. Advice. There are a lot of perks to living at the Gull. Might as well enjoy them."
It was really a shame Audrey hadn't had a daughter, Duke mused as his charm fell flat.
"Seriously. If you don't start drinking I'm going to keep talking."
That got James to down the shot pretty quickly. "Ouch. That hurt." But Duke flashed him a smile and poured him another drink. James cradled the glass, brow furrowed.
Duke knew firsthand how Audrey couldn't stand silence. After he'd found out about the Hunter they'd spent a lot of nights together on her balcony, and even when she'd say she just wanted company it wasn't long before she was rambling about leads or theories or therapy sessions with Claire. But Duke didn't think something like that was genetic, and James hadn't spent enough time with Audrey to pick up her habits. Even if he had, Duke wasn't his confidant. James didn't trust him or even like him – and a few years ago Duke would have quickly given this up as a lost cause. But now it was more than the thrill of the challenge keeping him focused.
Audrey didn't need him anymore – not the way she had, anyway, when he'd usurped the role of best friend because Nathan was being a jackass. Truth be told he'd always known it would be temporary. If Audrey didn't disappear then she and Nathan would eventually get their act together. Even Nathan couldn't screw up the way Audrey looked at him – though damn, he'd really tried. Duke had resigned himself to that since the night in Colorado. He'd done all the right things, been charming and supportive and there, and even his superior kissing skills hadn't been enough to sever her connection to Nathan.
He'd always found her loyalty kind of sexy, anyway. And it said a lot about the strength of their friendship that they really were okay after she put the brakes on anything romantic. There hadn't been a whole lot of time for awkwardness, with Nathan being dead and the Bolt Gun Killer running amok and the clock ticking down to the arrival of the world's most temporally complicated barn.
But now she and Nathan were shacking up and it was the cop she turned to when she needed advice or a shoulder to cry on. Aside from missing her, Duke still wanted to help. And if the help she needed was making sure her moody son didn't drown in despair or do anything rash, then he wasn't going to give up.
So he waited. And drank. And waited some more.
"It's too quiet upstairs," James finally admitted after he'd downed a couple of shots. "I've been coming down here because of the noise."
Audrey had never once complained to him that her apartment was too quiet. It might have been heartbreaking if their lives weren't already all kinds of tragic.
Duke took another drink, figuring he'd need it before this conversation was over. "Look, I'm not going to pretend to know what you're going through. I don't think anyone does – unless Arla had some relative who married some poor smuck – which come to think of it probably has happened, because history has a tendency to repeat with anything Trouble related. I knew a couple of people Arla killed – and so did Nathan and Audrey, so they're not going to want to talk to you about this."
'That's fine," James interrupted.
"No it isn't. But here's the thing. I was married once too. Evidence Ryan." He swirled the liquid in his glass. He'd never talked to anyone about Evi. He wasn't exactly sure what was driving him now. Perhaps he had drunk too much.
"With a name like that, I should have known she was trouble. Actually, I did. I met her in Barbados running a con. We were young, stupid, high on the thrill of it. I don't know if I really loved her. I thought I did at the time. But it certainly wasn't mushy, star-crossed love like your parents. We were just two people who seemed to want the same things in life."
He could still picture her wild curls and devilish smile – the gleam she'd get in her eyes when he suggested something dangerous – but not so much the lines of her face or the shape of her nose. Somehow the idea of Evi had always been more alluring than the woman herself.
"It was fun, for awhile. Evi and I, we had this game we played. We were always trying to one-up each other. So one day she double crosses me and leaves me behind, and I know she's expecting me to come find her. But I got a call from a friend back in Haven that weird stuff was going down. And I knew the Troubles were back."
He could still remember the chill that had run down his spine at Ian's description of the way the skin had melted right off Mrs. O'Malley. He hadn't thought about the Troubles in years – had half convinced himself they were just stories, like the tales the islanders would tell about ghosts and men who cut out children's hearts and gave them to the devil. But before Ian had even finished he'd felt the trap clamp around his ankle, and all the escape routes he'd spent years chasing vanish like smoke behind a retreating ferry.
"So here's the thing. My father was a bastard. Never any doubt about that. And he seemed to know I was going to get the hell out of town as soon as I could. But before he died he made me promise that I'd come back to Haven when the Troubles did. And for some reason, even though I hated him, I knew I had to keep this promise. I'd been a kid the last time the Troubles were here, but I remembered some pretty crazy shit. I didn't want Evi mixed up in that, so I went back to Haven without her."
How he wished that was the end of the story. That she could remain an anecdote from his reckless youth that he'd pull out one night when he wanted to shock Nathan and Audrey. "Did I ever tell you about my wife?" he'd ask nonchalantly, and he'd laugh at the way they gaped at him. The memories were all tainted now. It had seemed somehow shameful, when she'd showed up and he'd never mentioned her, and he could never tell them how he got married half naked on a beach under the full moon because all three of them would think of him locked in that cell, covered in her blood.
What a damned waste.
He took another drink to steady himself and glanced up to see James watching him intently. At least it was working.
"I didn't see her for three years, and then she just showed up in Haven. I tried to keep my distance – but she always had a way of reeling me in. Then one day I grab her phone to take a photo of Nathan making a fool of himself – and there's a message from the Rev. This guy was a big creep, but he kept hinting he knew information about my father. Turns out she was working for him. Got your father demoted, and God knows what else. And when I confront her about it the whole police station gets locked down. Some killer disease Trouble. She tells me she did it all for me. That Reverend Driscoll told her I was special and important. And then she busts out of the station demanding answers, and takes a bullet to the chest."
So much about Evi had faded, but he remembered that night vividly. The anger, the confusion. Her excuses that didn't make any sense. The desperation in their last encounter. The way he knew the instant she died because the spark left her eyes. His determination to storm out there and avenge her death, because that day seemed as good as any to die. The hollowness he felt looking at her body, which he'd never been able to shake or characterize.
"And I was just so furious. Still am. And I'm not sure if I was mad because she was working for the Rev or because she got herself killed. I guess that probably means I didn't love her, because it wasn't so much that she was gone as how she went, and the fact she left me with more questions than answers. Maybe it was always a lie. Maybe she found me in Barbados because she was supposed to manipulate me in Haven. I'll never know, and sometimes that keeps me up at night."
He'd never admitted such things to anyone. Audrey had tried to get him to talk about Evi once, but he'd shot her down and she'd never tried again. It had felt wrong somehow – like his devotion to Audrey was a betrayal of Evi, and Evi's very existence was a betrayal of Audrey. Damned women, and the way they shook him all up like a martini. Nathan had certainly never tried to broach the subject, though he had left him an expensive bottle of scotch after the funeral.
"It'll always suck, I think. Same thing with Arla. Your parents might try to sugarcoat it, but I'm not gonna. We'll never know what was going on in their heads. This damn town, it can mess people up pretty bad, and often the biggest victims are those left behind."
It was only the alcohol that gave him the courage to look at James. He certainly didn't want any pity from the man whose wife skinned people and stitched their body parts together. Thankfully the kid looked intrigued more than anything.
"Did you ever get the Rev to tell you what he knew?"
"Nah. Audrey shot him for threatening a Troubled girl. But then my father came back as a ghost and told me all about my family legacy. How I was supposed to murder Audrey and it was my duty to kill other Troubled people to purge their bloodlines of their afflictions. Turns out I preferred not knowing any of that."
Life had certainly been simpler when he was content to be a ne'er-do-well drifter. All this legacy sins of the father shit was enough to drive a man to drink. He wasn't sure how Audrey stayed sane throwing past lives on top of all that.
"How do you stand it?"
It was the pleading in James's tone that had Audrey worried, like a frayed bowline close to snapping. No one could blame the kid for doing so.
But no one might be able to patch him either.
"I kept busy. I have my boat, the restaurant. Audrey kept pulling me into her cases. At first I was annoyed about that but she was right – wallowing wasn't doing me any good."
This seemed to agitate him more than Duke expected. "I told them I'd help find an end to the Troubles, but I have no idea how to do that. They don't need me. And just waiting around here, in the place that killed her… Sometimes I think I might go as crazy as she did."
"I'm sure Nate and Audrey are glad you're here. But they're not used to being parents, and they've got a whole lot of baggage to work through from before the Barn."
"I don't need a babysitter."
"I didn't say you did. What did you used to do back in Colorado?"
"I was a carpenter."
Duke considered that a moment. "That's a pretty useful trade. Shouldn't have changed much in the past thirty years. I've got a couple of projects around here I could use some help with."
"I don't want your charity!"
He rolled his eyes and realized that it probably wasn't going to be a member of the Guard that was the death of him – it would be Nathan and Audrey's son. "Calm down. Last I checked honest work wasn't charity. Better than just letting your parents pay your rent. Besides, I'm not convinced Audrey's balls are gonna keep the Guard off our back forever. I'd like to put a safehouse in here – and it's better that's done by someone I trust. Plus I know some folks who wouldn't mind looking the other way if you don't have a license or any bonding, long as the price is good."
"Helping me isn't going to make Audrey leave Nathan you know."
Duke was hurt, but also a little impressed that even half-drunk the youngest (or was it oldest, technically?) Wuornos had such a solid grasp on the situation. He was hurt and lashing out, but he was paying attention. "Wow, not pulling any punches are you, Junior? I know that."
"Then why are you doing this?"
Flippancy was second nature. "I told you. Free advice is part of the lease."
"You're full of shit."
For some reason it amused him to be called out on that for once. "And you're so like both your parents I'm not sure how this town is going to survive."
It took a few moments to formulate an honest answer he was willing to share, but James waited for him. Was it really only loyalty to Audrey that drove him – a loyalty which he knew would never get him anywhere? There were other ways to keep an eye on James besides spilling his guts about his dead wife. A few years ago he'd never put up with his attitude.
Audrey had insisted more than once that he was turning into a good man. Damn if she wasn't right.
"Truth is I could have used someone looking out for me when I was your age." Unwilling to end the night on such a serious note, he flashed James a grin. "Besides, it'll get your old man riled up if we're friendly, and that's always fun."
I know, I know, I've made you wait so long and there isn't even any Nathan and Audrey. Sorry. I meant to tag this onto the last update – but good thing I didn't, or that wouldn't have gotten posted until today.
But check out "I Think I Know Why the Dog Howls at the Moon" if you haven't already for plenty of fluff, and I promise the next update will get back to our favorite couple.
Thanks for sticking with this. I'll try to be better with my updates.