Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters or ideas from The Killing. It's all just way too much fun.

Spoilers: Season 2, episode 11

DAY 24

Holder is only in that coffee shop for a few minutes, but when he returns, Linden is no longer asleep in the car where he left her. He has a half a second of panic – he has grown very protective of his partner of late, especially after seeing her so vulnerable in the psych ward – before he sees her, a short distance away, down by the water. She's smoking and staring out into the distance.

"Hey. You should eat something," he says as he approaches her, handing her a paper bag. Without a word she takes out a doughnut, which she bites into hurriedly. "Yeah, they had you drugged up pretty good. You were all docile and glassy eyed like my Aunt Doris."

"It doesn't make sense," Linden says, ignoring Holder's small talk.

"What?" asks Holder, not sure what she's talking about.

Linden has just woken up and hasn't fully recovered from the drugs they'd fed her in the psych ward, but her mind is already back on the case. "Why would the mayor torpedo his own waterfront project? You've got Ames and Chief Jackson at the casino. We know what they were meeting about now, the break in at the waterfront. So what was the mayor doing there? We gotta get that keycard. Let's go."

Holder is taken aback. Even for Linden, this is crazy. "Whoa, Linden. Did they erase your mind while you were in that nuthouse? Remember what happened last time you went to the casino? Kuloms don't mess around." Linden shows no signs of having heard him. She just walks back towards the car.

Obviously Linden must be starting to feel like her old self again, Holder thinks, because she's already frustrating the hell out of me. "Hold UP," he calls to her, scrambling to follow her back to the car. "Look, I know you wanna nail the guy. I feel that. Believe me, but…"

Linden opens the car door. "Talk while you drive?"

Typical Linden, unable to let the case go for one goddamn second, Holder thinks to himself as they get in the car. "I'm just saying, you've been sleeping inside your car, you just got out of that place… maybe, I dunno, you wanna take a nap. Shower. Rest a little." He's trying to reason with her, but as usual, she's being impossible. Why can't she see what she does to herself? he wonders.

"So now it's you, too." It's an accusation, and there's a note of hurt in her voice, like she assumes that he's betrayed her the same way she thinks that everyone else always does.

"What?" asks Holder, taken aback. He can't believe when she's accusing him of. After everything? Really, Linden?

Linden turns to look at him and they stare at each other intently, almost at a stand-off.

"Come on!" Holder isn't going to let her think that, because it's not true. Of course he has her back!

"They gotta pay," Linden replies simply. That's what it all comes down to for her in this case.

"I know. We ain't getting back in that casino without a federal warrant." Holder's trying his best to get Linden to see reason.

"Then I guess we'd better get one," Linden replies, as if it's as easy as just filling out paperwork.

It's going to be another long day, Holder thinks to himself.

Holder

She's impossible! I've never met anyone so hard-headed, so single-minded, so frustratingly stubborn in my life. Sure, I can be stubborn too, but I like to think of myself as a reasonable person… sometimes I don't have any idea how to get her to see reason. This would be one of those times.

I get that she wants justice. I do too. But she's impossible. There are limits, and she just refuses to acknowledge them. Refuses to admit that she can't solve the case by sheer willpower alone. That there are rules and ways that things have to be done and she just ignores it all and runs headfirst into danger, with no back-up plan. And I admire that about her but damn, at the same time it's beyond frustrating.

She doesn't understand that she won't be any good to anyone else if she's not also looking out for herself. So the only thing I can do about that is try to look after her… but I can't save her from herself. Not every time, anyway.

Linden

Why do no one understand?

They don't get it. This is important. Rosie Larsen's murderer being brought to justice is important. You can't just kill a child and go about your business. And no one else cares. A politician is involved, so everyone just looks the other way, and no one cares. Why am I the only one who sees how wrong this is?

Even Holder looks at me like I'm crazy sometimes. As if me taking a shower is more important than solving this case. Nothing is more important that solving this case! How can I rest when I know that there's more I can do? It's more than my job.

It's the only thing I'm good at.

…

The sun was going down, and it was time to regroup. Gwen had answered their questions about the night of the murder and the cancelled meeting with Eutanis, though she had been evasive and unhelpful, if not completely uncooperative. Neither Linden nor Holder could remember exactly when they'd last eaten, and Holder took that as a sign.

"C'mon Linden, let's go back to my place for a bit and regroup," Holder said as they wearily got back into the car for the five hundredth time that day. Linden arched her eyebrow and smiled questioningly at him. Holder rolled his eyes at her. "Oh, now you've got jokes, huh? Yes, I just said 'Let's go back to my place.' Dammit, let me finish! I've got leftover pizza in the fridge so we can eat and talk shop, like I know you like to, and figure out our next move."

"Hey, I didn't say a thing," Linden replied, trying, but failing, to keep a straight face. "Sounds good to me."

They entered Holder's apartment and Holder closed the door behind them, dropped his keys on an end table and headed for the kitchen. "Make yourself at home, Linden," he called as he walked away. Linden stood in the open area in front of the door and noticed that it looked almost exactly as it had the time she and Jack had arrived unexpectedly in the middle of the night. She hadn't taken in as many of the details that time, having been so worried about being watched. Looking around now, she noticed that the place was very "Holder" – neat but not immaculate, homey but not cluttered – comfortable. She thought back to that night that she had called Holder from the hallway, asking if he was home before knocking on his door. How she had been so scared for her safety, and for Jack's.

Jack.

The son that she had shipped off to Chicago, to a father who could be a parent to him. Unlike her. She stopped in her tracks and took a deep breath. Then another. Her feet were suddenly rooted to the spot where she stood, and she felt like she could fall over from the weight of everything pressing down on her. There was nothing within reach that she could hold for support, so she closed her eyes and concentrated on remaining upright. More deep breaths, she told herself.

"You want coffee?" Holder called from the kitchen. Linden's eyes snapped open and she returned to reality, suddenly able to move again.

"Yeah, thanks," she called. She watched him through the cut out area in the wall between the kitchen and the living room, moving around, pressing buttons and clinking dishes. Wandering over to his "knowledge corner," she ran her fingers along the spines of the books there, pulling them out at random to look at them. Some of them were new, and some had been there the last time she been there, like the book about Monarch Butterflies. That book had led her to Pt. Eubik, outside the casino… which had led to…

Linden shook her head to forcibly dislodge the image of Holder laying against the tree, covered in blood and possibly dead. She didn't need to go there. He was fine. She glanced in the direction of the kitchen as if to reassure herself one more time that so many of those decisions that she had made earlier in the case had not led to any permanent harm. She pushed the Monarch Butterfly book back in amongst the others and walked back towards the couch and sat down, suddenly aware of how tired she was.

A few minutes later, Holder emerged from the kitchen carrying two mugs of coffee and two plates, each holding two pieces of pizza. She smiled, realizing for the first time that day that she was hungry, and accepted both the coffee and a plate. "Were you a waiter in a past life? That was pretty impressive," she asked, referring to the fact that he had carried all of the dishes at once.

"Nah, I'm just an impressive guy," he said, settling himself on one of the barstools nearby. Linden rolled her eyes at him, as usual.

"OK, so…" she began between bites of pizza, and they were back to talking about the case, all thoughts of not being able to take care of Jack, Holder lying unconscious in the woods and all the other things that she wanted desperately to forget, once again left behind for the moment. That was just where she liked those thoughts, and all the others like them.