II
Jay's body moved almost like it was on autopilot as he began to ascend the front steps to District 21. His legs felt like they were made of lead and his footfalls fell heavy against the wooden stairs. The coffee that he held in his right hand was the only reason his eyes continued to stay open. The hour was still early, and his body had yet to come to life.
The station was already buzzing. The area by the front desk, under the reign of Sergeant Platt, was filled with bodies. Patrolmen who had just gotten back to the station in time for shift change were leaning against the desk as they waited for their turn to debrief Platt. Their weight was supported solely by the desk, and their blank stares and rosy cheeks told stories of a long night out on the cold streets of the city. Jay didn't envy them one bit. His days on patrol was something he had happily put behind himself. He did not miss breaking up fights in bars or standing at the scene of an accident in the snow as firemen and EMT's worked to get people out of their cars.
He made his way through the sea of bodies in uniform and began to climb the next set of stairs that led up to the bullpen on the second floor. Ruzek and Atwater were walking right behind him. The two officers were engaged in a lively discussion about their latest escaped at Molly's the other night. It appeared that Atwater's date had not gone according to plan. And he blamed Ruzek for the miserable experience.
"I told you that she was friendly!" Adam exclaimed.
"You didn't say that she was crazy?!" Kevin countered. "Not only was she trying to cop a feel under the table all night, but I have been dodging her calls for three days straight. She's been calling non-stop since we left Molly's.
"At least she called you! Your last date didn't."
"Yeah? Well, this was absolutely the last time I let you set me up with someone. Considering your track record, I'd be better off taking dating advice from Al."
A belly-laugh that shook his entire body escaped Jay's lips. The idea of the closed off detective giving anyone relationship advice was ludicrous to him. Alvin Olinsky was the kind of man who saw and heard everything without being seen or heard himself. He rarely spoke or displayed any kind of emotion. Jay couldn't imagine that someone who never revealed anything personal and who has lived in his garage for years while his wife stayed in the house would be capable of giving sound advice on romance. For Kevin to prefer his advice over Adam's said a lot.
"What are you laughing at, Halstead?! You, if anyone, haven't got any room to speak." Adam nudged him from behind to retaliated on his laughter.
"Yeah!" Kevin agreed. "When was the last time you went out on a date? Or even got laid?"
It was true, he conceded. He had not been out on a dater or gotten laid for quite some time. Hailey was still deep undercover and since her brief visit to their home a couple of months ago after Lonnie Rodiger's murder, they had only managed to meet up twice. The last time he saw her was more than two months ago. But despite Hailey's absence, he was willing to bet that has had more of a healthy relationship with her than Adam and Kevin have managed during their entire lives combined.
"That's right. I can't recall you ever seeing someone during my time in Intelligence."
"Neither has Kevin?! And need I remind you Ruzek that just a few months ago you were engaged to a woman who wasn't Kim?" Jay climbed the last few steps to reach the top of the stairs and immediately set his sights on his desk on the other side of the room. "Pathetic."
Apart from the three of them, Antonio was the only one present in the bullpen. He was already seated at his desk and immersed in his work upon their arrival. Files were spread all over the surface of the desk in front of him.
Their Sergeant had also arrived, but he was holed up in his office. This in of itself didn't shock Jay. Voight was often the first one to arrive in the morning and the last person to leave at the end of the day. What did strike Jay as odd, and caused him to take a second look, was the closed door. Voight only ever closed the door when he had an important discussion or ripping into someone. He wasn't alone in his office this morning. A man wearing a dark suit stood in front of Voight's desk, facing the seated Sergeant. Something about the man appeared familiar, but as Jay couldn't see his face, he couldn't place him.
"Who's pathetic?" Antonio questioned and looked up from his files.
"Halstead's love life."
"Really? Do tell."
"Seriously?! Give it a rest will you!" he quickly interrupted them before the conversation had time to go any further. He had no interest in discussing his love life with the members of the team. There was a reason that he had yet to tell them about Hailey, even after working together for more than eight months. None of them were quick to open up, and his team had yet to give him a reason to do so. "Who's that with Voight?"
Antonio turned to face him and smirked at him without saying a word. His smirk told Jay that he knew what he was attempting to do, and that he was in half a mind about letting him get away with it or not. But he eventually caved.
"The man showed up thirty minutes ago, asking to speak to Voight. Not very friendly. Now you know what I know."
Antonio turned back to his work and Jay pushed the issue to the back of his mind and did the same. He powered up his computer, and while it came to life, he began to rifle through the stack of papers that resided on the corner of his desk.
One by one the remaining members arrived in the bullpen and soon they were all seated at their desks and tapping away at their computers. They weren't currently working on any active cases as they had closed their latest one a few days ago. So, today's work consisted of ging through open cases and following up on the substance of tips from their CIs. It was tedious and time-consuming work that he did not enjoy one bit. One could see it as a reprieve from kicking in doors and chasing down suspects block after block, but to Jay it was as close to torture one could get. He thrived on the adrenaline. He hated to sit around and twiddle the thumbs of his idle hands.
His partner, Erin, sat at the desk opposite his and looked just as bored as him. She glanced up from her work when she felt his eyes on her and gave him a small smile underlined with understanding. None of the members of the Intelligence unit were any good at sitting still and doing nothing.
The torture didn't last for too long. After a mere twenty minutes Voight emerged from his office and interrupted their focus. The man in the suit followed him out of the room and Jay startled when he realised how he knew him. He was Hailey's superior. But what was he doing here?
"This is Detective Nolan from Narcotics. He has requested out help on a case." Voight started off his introduction and then took a step back to give room for Nolan.
"We have been trying to bring down this major player in the drug trade for years by targeting different members of his network. We've had some success, but we have never been able to get something on the man himself."
Nolan pulled out a photograph of a man in his early thirties from his manilla folder and pinned it to their whiteboard. The man in the photograph was bald on the top of his head and wore all the hair around his jaw as a thick beard instead.
"This is Scott Davies, a mid-level head. He's in charge of one of the organisation's pipelines. We went in undercover by attaching ourselves to him and after a couple of months we had managed to identify other key players and get in contact with the top dog."
Nolan paused and pulled out more pictures from his file to put up on the board. He then continued to explain each player's role. But the more Nolan talked, the less Jay found himself able to concentrate on what was said. With every word his apprehension grew and the knot that had formed in his stomach became harder to ignore. He did not like how familiar it all started to sound.
"Why do you need our help?" asked Antonio.
Nolan looked from one member of the Intelligence unit to the other, an unreadable look on his face. It could have been his imagination playing tricks on him, but it appeared to Jay as if Nolan stayed fixated on him the longest.
"Two officers have been undercover for months and worked their way into the closest circle. We were close to making a bust. Another couple of weeks and we could have closed the case. But the night before yesterday things took a bad turn. Somehow our target found out about a cop in their midst and there was a big commotion." Nolan paused. "We didn't have eyes on them and only found out about it after the fact. Now the target is in the wind, and we can't get in contact with one of the officers. We need your help to smoke him out."
"Who's the target?" asked Erin, eager to get started and see some action.
"This man." Nolan pulled out a final picture from the file that he pinned to the board. "Ronald Booth."
Everything around him came to a complete standstill. Two words was all it took for his whole world to start to crumble beneath his feet. He couldn't breathe. Panic seized a vice-like grip around his heart and squeezed painfully. All he could think about was Hailey. She could be missing. Or worse. Dead. If those people found out that she was police, anything could have happened to her by now.
Hailey was the one good thing he had in his life. He was finally happy and at peace for the first time in his life. The thought of losing her, of losing his safe haven was unbearable. The day he lost her would be the day the entire world would be set on fire. His rage would know no bounds and it would leave a trail of destruction of giant proportions in its wake. Nothing and no one would be safe from his wrath, from his anger at the world.
"Where is she?" His voice was low, but the room was silent, and no one missed the lethal tone to his words. When no one immediately answered he rose from his seat with such force and slammed his hands down on the top of his desk. The sound the palms of his hands made as they connected with the wooden surface was deafening. "Where is she?!"
"Halstead…" Nolan began to speak but struggled to find the right words.
"I'm not asking again!" he growled and almost spit out the words. "Where is she?!"
"She's getting checked out at Lakeshore." Nolan answered. "But she-"
Nothing after that registered with Jay. He grabbed his jacket from the back of his chair and was across the room before anyone had the time to process what had just occurred. He flew through the gate and ignored the person hot on his trail as he stormed out of the station. As he reached his car, he found that it had been Antonio who had followed him, but only ignored him as he jumped into the passenger seat.
On the drive over to the hospital, there wasn't a traffic violation he missed or safety guideline he didn't follow. He swerved his way around the traffic and blew through the redlights and stop signs. He had tunnel vision and the only thing that mattered was getting to the hospital as quickly as possible to set his eyes on Hailey.
"Do you mind telling me what's going on, kid?" Antonio inquired. "Before you kill us by smashing into a lamppost?"
Jay didn't take his eyes of the road to glance in his friend's direction for even a second. And Antonio doubted if he even heard him and asked him again to explain the reason for the scene that had just taken place.
"Twelve months! I've lived alone in our apartment for twelve months because her bosses needed to flex their muscles and didn't have the balls to do it themselves. The only thing they had to do was monitor things, and they couldn't even do that right!" Jay slammed his hand hard against the steering wheel.
"One of the officers… you know them."
Jay sneered. To say that he knew one of them was something of an understatement in his opinion. Hailey hated to leave the bed in the morning, yet she forced herself to get up early on the weekdays to hit the gym. On the weekends, it was another story. One needed to bribe her with coffee or threaten bodily harm for her to even open her eyes. She could eat pizza for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. If someone dared to even look at her coffee, she would kill them with her glare.
Whenever she had time to spare, she would bury her nose in a book. She detested Brussel sprouts and scrounged up her nose in the cutest way whenever she was forced to eat them. Her skin would break out in goosebumps every time he traced his fingers lightly up and down her spine or kissed her in the exact spot where her jaw meets her neck. She was passionate about her teams to say the least. There were times when she had arrived back home with no voice from all the yelling and cheering that she had done during the game.
The things he knew about Hailey could fill a book, or a whole library of books. He knew her every facial expression, pet peeve and quirk, every freckle and birthmark on her body.
"Yeah, I know her." he forced out through gritted teeth and made the final turn at high speed.