Chapter 18: The Father

The weak liquid sputtering out of the machine looked more like muddy water than coffee. The warmth brought some semblance of comfort at least, even if it tasted like cleaning fluid. This was her third — or was it fourth? — cup. Aware of the front desk deputy's eyes on her, Joe took the cup and trudged back to her chair without any detours. She wondered who was being interrogated now.

Not Derek, that's for sure. Somehow he and Peter's body had disappeared before the choppers could land and get control of the situation. Joe had not noticed this until afterwards. An all-points bulletin was issued for Derek statewide. No one even knew about the late Peter Hale. How could they? She wondered if Derek had buried him like he had done with Laura. She wondered where Derek was. She wondered if he was okay.

Kate Argent remained in critical, but stable condition at the hospital. By chance — or experience — one of the helicopters had a trauma surgeon onboard. He praised Joe for her effort in keeping Kate alive, even if they had to pry Joe's fingers apart to make her let go off the woman when they reached the hospital. As much as she scrubbed, Kate's blood still stained her hands. She wondered if Kate remembered what she had said to her. She wondered what would happen when she woke up.

Kate Argent alive and Jimmy Carter dead. It was not fair.

Joe thumped her head back against the wall. She knew some things about being bullied in high school. For some, it never left them. She tried to avoid thinking about how she had ridiculed him in her mind, thinking him a pathetic loser who lived his whole life in an online echo chamber. A conspiratorist who spewed supernatural theories that turned out to be at least partially true. Or sort of true. Whatever truth was. Joe had no idea what to believe anymore. It didn't change the fact that Jimmy had gone from high school to college, never felt like he was taken seriously, not even by Peter Hale...

Eyes burning, she closed them and the tears slipped almost unnoticeably down her face and away.

A door opened down the hall and voices filtered out. She sat back up, huddled inside her father's jacket. The Sheriff, some nameless agents and Chris Argent exited the interrogation room. They shook hands.

You know how many cops we have on our payroll?

Kate's mocking tone inside her head made her scowl when Chris Argent passed her with a solitary nod as the only acknowledgement. They were separated after the FBI showed up in the woods. As Chris Argent was the only one holding a gun at that point, they'd descended upon him first, probably giving Derek time to slip away. After that, everything was a blur. Riding the helicopter to the hospital, barely aware of the ear muffs placed over her head as she refused to let go of Kate, as if the woman would slip away if she let go, only to reappear in her nightmares later. The quiet car ride to the Sheriff's station. The five hour long interview with the Sheriff and the agents, trying to navigate a story completely devoid of anything...unnatural.

At least Joe had some experience there.

Aunt Mel was here somewhere, or had been at least. All the high school kids had the right to their legal guardian present for any interrogations. Somehow Stiles had showed up to the house too, towing the captain of the lacrosse team with him. She didn't know anything else, they hadn't been allowed to see each other.

"Here you go," said her dad who had approached with an unseemly stealth for such a big man. He handed her a paper cup from the nearby coffee shop. "The machine stuff tastes like piss."

"Thanks," she mumbled and accepted it without looking at him. She scowled at the cup when her dad took the chair next to her, adjusting his dress pants so he could stretch out his legs.

"That's it? No sarcasm?" he demanded in that familiar east coast accent. "I left myself wide open here, Josie."

"It's Joe. And fine, I suppose you'd know what piss tastes like."

He laughed gruffly and the sound grated on the last of her nerves. "There she is." Special Agent Delgado, her one and only parent, fell silent at her lack of response. Usually, they would be knee deep in a screaming match by now. "How you holdin' up, kid?"

Ignoring his question, she nodded towards the cluster of agents and the Sheriff who were still talking down the hall. "Why aren't you handling the interviews?"

"Well, there's a little thing called conflict of interest," her dad pointed out. "With my daughter and nephew as first-hand witnesses...I gotta tread careful so the case doesn't get thrown out on a technicality."

"You have her confession on tape!" Joe turned in her chair to fully look at her dad for the first time. His hair had thinned out a bit, but he had kept his crew cut and shaven face as she remembered it. In bad lighting, he could almost pass for Caucasian. Apparently, he had been handsome once. Or so he claimed.

"I know, I know," her dad said calmingly, only infuriating her further. "And Chris Argent collaborated your story, at least to the point where he lost consciousness." Joe tried to not let her relief show. "The high school kids are all over the place, as expected, it's a hell of a thing watching a woman slit her own throat."

That had been her story. Kate Argent, in an attempt to get the last surviving Hale, had been pushed up in a corner and tried to kill herself when the truth was exposed. She was taking the fall for the Hale house fire and the police were looking into her connection with the other murders. As far as motives went, tying off loose ends was at least a believable one. When she woke up, it could get tricky. The Argents probably could afford a pretty decent attorney. It sounded like Chris had been on her side though. She wondered what Allison had said when accompanied by her strict looking mother into the interrogation room. She wondered what Scott said, the only person a worse liar than herself.

"Sheriff's a bit miffed. He already had a secret witness placing Kate Argent at the Hale house fire," her dad whispered conspiratorially. "He's working to keep the case indoors. Small-town cops hate when we snatch the glory out of their hands."

Speak of the devil, and he shall appear. Sheriff Stilinski came up to them and nodded to Joe's dad. "Rob, got a minute?"

"Sure," her dad said and got up from the chair with more effort than she thought he needed. Maybe he really was getting old or he'd pulled a muscle when tackling Chris Argent to the ground. "I'll be right back, kid. Drink ya coffee."

She only drank it because she needed the energy. Not because he asked her to. It was an oatmilk cappucino and she glared at it. God, she was getting predictable. Joe watched the Sheriff and her dad talk. Her hands shook. Had Kate woken up? Had she told her own version of what happened? Had Joe's desperate lie been exposed already?

Her dad returned thoughtfully after a brief conversation with the Sheriff and slumped back in the chair. She glowered at him — wasn't he supposed to be working? Making sure Kate got what she deserved?

"Derek Hale just turned himself in," her dad said conversationally and Joe choked on her coffee. Like a true single father, he absentmindedly slapped her on the back to dislodge the liquid. "Looks like you've saved an innocent man from conviction. Proud of ya, kid."

"Son of a bitch!" Joe swore as the impact from his hand had shifted around her broken rib. "Dad!"

"Sorry, sorry, I forgot!" Her father sounded genuinly distressed as he took her coffee cup so she could bend forward in agonizing pain, wheezing through her gritted teeth. "Jesus Christ, I'm sorry, Jos- Joe."

A medic had checked Joe out earlier. Broken rib, split lip, bruises and scratches — nothing that wouldn't heal on its own. Apart from Kate, Joe was the only one sporting any injuries. All the werewolves were fully healed or gone by the time the feds flew in.

She could not believe she unironically used the word werewolf in relations to actual people.

She could not believe Scott was an actual werewolf. Whatever an actual werewolf was.

"So, what happens now?" she asked instead of adressing her own treacherous mind.

"Now we get you back home. We interro-" her dad raised his voice, already noticing her expression, "-interview Derek Hale. We wait for Kate to wake back up, interrogate her. DA takes out their charges, it goes to court in a couple of years, justice is served. Fourteen counts of murder, kidnapping, assaults sounds like the death penalty to me."

He mistook her expression for something else. "Not that you did wrong keeping her alive, kid. The trial will bring out the remaining truth, if there is one."

Joe swallowed thickly. It did not sound like a promising prospect. She should have let Kate die. She should have told the truth. What even was the truth? Her brows furrowed as her lips moved without speaking.

"It should be fifteen."

"What's that?"

"Fifteen murders. Eight in the fire, then seven this year." Joe counted on her fingers, not trusting her own mind at the moment. "Laura Hale, bus driver, video store, janitor, two arsonists and Jimmy Carter."

Her father furrowed his powerful brows. "Who's Jimmy Carter?"

"The ot-" She stopped herself from saying the other body, as they would never have found Peter Hale in the first place and it seemed too complicated to let them know about all that. "The body at the house. My-" friend "-age, dark hair and a beard..." Judging by her dad's expression, he had no idea what she was talking about.

Her dad pointed over his shoulder with his thumb towards his colleagues. "I can go check with Noah and the others, but...I'm pretty sure there wasn't any body found at the house."

Joe shook her head and let her dad lead her out of the police station. She had to have mentioned him during the interview to the Sheriff. Right? He had been dead, without a doubt, no life left in those open empty eyes. Derek must have taken his body too, maybe concerned the bite marks would be too hard to explain away. Derek. The new Alpha, whatever that meant.

Hugs were exchanged all around at the McCall-household. Aunt Melissa practically somersaulted off the couch when Joe and her dad got home and crushed Joe's rib again. Did Derek feel that? She then moved onto her brother while Joe clung to Scott. Judging by the cups of cocoa and cookies on the table, Aunt Mel had conducted her own interrogation/debriefing with Scott, hoping the added sugar would make him feel better.

"Are you okay?" Scott whispered in her ear while Aunt Mel and Joe's dad talked quickly and erratically in Spanish. Scott made sure not to squeeze too hard.

"I should be asking you that," Joe whispered back, both smiling and crying at the same time. Scott murmured something about that he was, all things considering, okay. He looked fine, but she supposed someone who healed himself always would look fine. Like Derek, after twenty-four hours of torture.

"How you doin', champ?" her dad asked and did the weird man-hug-shoulder-pat thing with Scott.

"I'm okay, Uncle Rob," Scott said with a laugh. "As confirmed by my mom, the nurse, several times now."

"Come on, Mel, let's give the kids some time to talk," Joe's dad said and lead his sister out to the kitchen, despite her protests. He winked at Joe and Scott over his shoulder. "You got any beer in the house?"

"Derek turned himself in," Joe said and they both slumped down in the couch. Lethargic, Joe just stared straight ahead. That was the extent of consideration Derek Hale was getting in her mind at the moment. "Dad said they didn't find Jimmy's body at the scene. Did you see if Derek..."

"No, the lights were..." Scott trailed off and Joe understood. The floodlights from the helicopters must have blinded him. Not to mention, Scott had grabbed Allison when the feds went after Chris. Joe remembered Allison screaming, wanting to come with Kate to the hospital, and Joe felt her insides grow rotten at the thought of taking that spot.

"He must have, right?" Scott murmured and Joe nodded in agreement. He must have. There had been nothing left in those eyes. Not even a glimmer of life. Too much blood hitting the floor, Peter had been more thorough when killing him than Kate. Scott turned in the couch to look at her. "Joe, are you okay? Hey, shhh."

Joe, full on bawling silently in the couch, shook her head. Through quiet hiccups, she managed to choke out: "I'm not. I'm not okay. I'm so sorry, Scott!"

Scott kept on shushing her, probably concerned with their parents coming back, and he hugged her tightly against him. Strong. Stronger than she'd remember. Stronger than her. Tears ran freely down her face, layering onto his shirt. "It's okay, Joe, I don't know how, but it's gonna be okay."

"I was so stupid, I'm sorry, I should have believed you when you tried to tell me, but it was all so-"

"To be fair, I didn't do a good job of telling you stu-" Scott snapped his mouth shut. Not because of her, but because of the two squabbling Delgado-siblings exiting the kitchen again. Joe wiped her face hurriedly, daring Scott to say anything about the momentary weakness, and accepted Aunt Mel's offer of cocoa and declined her dad's offer of a beer.

The talk centered around Scott's lacrosse achievements, a sport her dad never fully understood, but supported on the general basis of being a sport. Joe gave monosyllabic answers whenever her dad tried to ask her anything. Studies were fine. Professors were fine. She was fine.

Cocoa finished, she excused herself from the happy family reunion to go take a shower. The bruises made her look like a psychedelic attempt at a human. Her rib cage was swollen and she winced out of her bra, inch by inch. Did Derek feel that? Her face was like a purple beef cake, bottom lip at least three times its normal size. Only consolation was that Kate had looked worse, even before Peter-

"Get a grip," she muttered to herself, leaning over the sink, letting her matted hair fall in front of her face. Every time she closed her eyes, the blood hit her again as the claw ripped open Kate's throat. The desperate look, the last-ditch attempt at an apology to save Allison. Peter had to be as manipulative as Kate herself, preying on the weak spots, using Allison for what she meant to Kate.

The shower did not help, but at least she looked better. All the dirt and blood from her body clogged the drain, and she grimaced when she had to clean the filter to get the water to go down. Her wet tendrils of hair clumped together, forming corkscrews around her face when she wiped the condensation off the mirror to apply some ointment to her lip. It stung briefly. Did Derek feel that?

Brown eyes stared back at her. Same as Scott, as Aunt Mel, as her dad. Her skin was darker though, probably from her mom's side. Not that she knew for sure. Could just be it skipped a few generations, if her ancestors were more true to their Argentinian blood.

Wondering how she could politely tell her dad to take off again, without ruining Aunt Mel and Scott's reasonably happy mood, she trudged downstairs in a fresh set of pajamas. The mood seemed everything but happy, all three of them sitting in the couch with untouched drinks.

"What's going on?" Joe asked thickly — her dad still held his cell phone in hand.

"The hospital called."

No. No way. Impossible. Joe knew what was coming even before Aunt Mel rose to embrace her.

"Kate Argent is dead."

"Woman tied to six year-old arson case behind Beacon Hills murders?" Joe read aloud from the newspaper headline the following morning. A scowling candid of Kate Argent was next to the article. Instead of being tried and convicted of at least eight murders, the case would be dropped. Posthumous trials were extremely rare, usually only in cases to acquit someone else. At least the article meant everyone learned the truth about Kate Argent. If not the whole world, at least everyone who read the Beacon Post.

She choked on her coffee when she saw who wrote the article. James Carter.

Joe called the Beacon Post immediately, but Kim Wu said the whole story had been waiting in her inbox when she got in that morning. It delivered the inside scoop, but nothing supernatural or unsupported by the police, so she printed it. She was looking for Jimmy herself, trying to find where to send his check.

There was a chance Jimmy had the story ready on his laptop and had set an automatic e-mail in case he never made it back. He was the kind of guy to do stuff like that. The article did list Kate Argent as dead, which only happened last night, so either he knew of Peter's plan in advance or...

Or he was out there somewhere, working.

"You sure you're okay to drive?" Scott asked for the hundreth time as they made their way to Jimmy's apartment. "I mean, I can drive if you want."

"I'm fine, Scott," Joe muttered once more. Somehow, after Kate's death, it seemed less believable every time she said it. Nothing made sense anymore. Nothing mattered. They reached the laundromat and buzzed all the buttons on the door, a trick that still worked, even if someone turned on the speaker to yell at them.

"So creepy to think that he was working for Peter this whole time," Scott said when they went up the stairs. "I can't believe you didn't tell me that you saw the Alpha outside your window."

Joe and Scott had sat up all night after their respective parent went to bed. Well, Aunt Melissa went to bed, and Joe's dad went back to his government-funded hotel room. It was the easiest way to avoid arguments.

"How was I supposed to know you guys were color coded?" Joe muttered, referring to the red eyes she had seen that one night. Red eyes that Derek now possessed. "And don't get me started on all the stuff you didn't tell me."

The Argents hunting him, almost shapeshifting on the lacrosse field, the weird urges to kill his friends at the Alpha's bidding...it pained her to think about. According to Scott, he would have killed someone if Derek had not interfered. That scared her more than she wanted to admit. Scott, her gentle and kind cousin, a slave to an uncontrollable bloodthirst. Even if Derek had been helping him — with control, not steroids as it turned out — Derek did not exactly seem like a patient teacher.

"I tried, remember," Scott pointed out and she stuck out her tongue at his back. She refused to apologize for that. What sane person would fall over themself to believe their cousin to be a mythic monster just because he was acting shady? They reached the door with all the locks. "Is this it?"

"Yup, can you hear anything?" asked Joe, still a bit iffy on what exactly Scott could do now. Glowing eyes, sure. Partial shapeshifting akin to what Derek had looked like the other night, okay. Strength, speed, enhanced senses...it did not seem like an exact science. A genetic mutation, maybe? Hormonal imbalance? Excess adrenaline?

Scott put his normal, not pointy at all, ear to the door and listened. "No, it's quiet."

"Okay, hold on, I think I'll be able to pick the locks," Joe said and fished around in her backpack for the lockpicking kit. Another gift from her father, could you believe it, though she did not remember how old she had been. Around twelve, maybe.

"No need, it's open."

Scott proved his words by swinging open the door to Jimmy Carter's apartment. That door had never been unlocked as far as Joe knew. They stepped through and Joe's insides turned to ice.

Stripped completely bare. No furniture, no artwork, nothing at all. Leaving Scott standing by the entrance, she ran into the other rooms, but they were all as barren as the living room and kitchen. The only thing indicating anyone had ever been here was the marks after all the locks on Jimmy's door — they were missing too.

"Scott, you did see Jimmy, right? I didn't just imagine his whole existence or something?" Joe asked, twirling around and trying to see anything that he had left behind.

"I dunno, you were kinda stressed," Scott joked, but backtracked at her expression. "No, Joe, I saw him! Hard to avoid when he was trying to shoot your head off."

Joe nodded in agreement to that. Things had turned since just last night. Now Kate Argent was dead and Jimmy Carter presumably alive.

"Have you seen Derek, by the way?" She tried to keep her voice neutral. "Thought he'd show up by now just to say 'I told you so' about Jimmy."

"No, didn't Uncle Rob say he turned himself in?"

"Yeah, and then he said his name's cleared. Released from custody, exonorated and all." She bit her lip in thought. Did Derek feel that? "He probably left town..." She caught sight of her own reflection in the window and frowned. And how do we feel about that, Miss Delgado? Should she care?

Scott shrugged. "Maybe." He toured the apartment, sniffing his nose until he caught Joe's weirded out expression. "Can't smell anything. It's almost...chemically clean."

"Sterile," Joe agreed. "He's not here. And his parents haven't heard from him in months." She'd called them the other day, but they had no idea what she was talking about. It did not seem like they had too much contact with their son. "Okay, so, if Peter bit Jimmy-"

Scott looked up from the fridge he had opened to check the contents. It was empty. "If?"

"Did you see it? Like for certain? I was dump tackled by Derek and only saw the blood..." Joe rubbed the bridge of her nose, the image of blood splatter and Jimmy's dead eyes flashing in and out. She jumped at Scott's hand on her shoulder and peered up at his worried frown. "I'm okay, just...did you actually see Peter bite Jimmy?"

He kept his hand on her shoulder, but mulled the question over. "No. It all went by really fast. But the bite's the only thing that makes sense. If you're sure he was...gone after, the only way he could have survived would have been through the bite healing itself."

Joe sighed. Scott's theory made sense, as much as anything else that didn't. Were they supposed to heal beyond death? What decided the healing factor rate? Why were they healing at all? Why did she feel Derek's pain? Why did he feel hers? Nothing made sense. Just because you can't explain it, doesn't make it magic...

"So, all things point towards Jimmy being bit, healed and possibly deranged." She wandered into the part of the living room where the conspiracy-map used to hang, her steps echoing in the empty room. The still healing rib throbbed against her side. Did Derek feel that? "How worried should we be?"

"At least Jimmy knows what he's dealing with, from what you told me." Scott put both hands behind his head while thinking. "I would never have realized if it hadn't been for Stiles."

Joe pursed her lips. "So...Jimmy probably knows the full extent of his newfound powers better than anyone?"

They looked at each other with tight frowns. Scott nodded slowly. "We should probably be a little worried."

She turned back to the empty wall, where she thought she had helped Jimmy move along his research, in reality just feeding back info that he already knew through Peter. Shuddering from both anger and repulsion, she hugged herself and tried to figure out Jimmy's next move. She still had a hard time picturing him as a threat. Even in those split seconds she realized he had the shotgun aimed at her, she felt more sorry for him than scared.

"Hopefully he's somewhere in the big city trying to impress girls," Joe tried to joke and then coughed at the awkwardness. Rib twinged. Did Derek fee- stop, Joe. Just stop. "He's not here anyway. Come on, I'll drive you to the hospital."

Of course, even in death, Peter Hale caused havoc. The last thing Peter Hale had done before trying to finish his kill list, was attack a girl in Scott's class. The one that Stiles had a crush on. Motive unclear, but probably to blackmail Stiles into tracking Scott's cell phone to Derek's location. Which did not make sense, really, because Jimmy could have told Peter that. It was the only case still open too, the timeline unfortunately did not add up for it to be pinned on Kate. All the other murders were. It was awful to think about, but Kate's death had been convenient. Almost too convenient. Joe rolled her eyes at herself. Now who was the one with the conspiracy theories?

Stiles' Jeep was already in the parking lot, but the amount of leaves on the hood revealed it had been here for a while. Joe indicated she would wait in the car, not a big fan of hospitals. Only exception was dropping off meals for Aunt Mel and even then she tried to avoid the intensive care unit.

She left the car running just for the heat, pressed play on whatever CD was already in and sat back watching people come and go. Police car a few spots over, probably keeping watch over the attacked school girl. Joe felt bad for thinking the police would come in handy if the girl turned on them — Scott and Stiles were trying to determine whether she was bit or just wounded. She had been Allison's friend too, the way Scott explained it. Poor, poor Allison. Hopefully the Argents could use what they saved on attorney fees to pay for Allison's therapy.

Family sucks sometimes, Joe thought, and that was the last coherent one she had before her eyes slipped shut. She jolted awake again when the passenger car door slammed.

"Hey, how'd it—" She froze at what she thought was Scott turned out to be Chris Argent. Her lip raised. "Get out."

"I'm just here to talk." Chris held both hands up, the universal signal for being unarmed. "Thirty seconds, and I'm gone."

Joe already had her phone out, finger poised over the speed dial. "Clock's ticking."

Chris sighed and she saw deep furrows around his eyes. "I never got the chance to thank you. For what you did."

"I didn't do it for-"

"You stopped Kate from killing Scott," Chris clarified, holding up a flat palm to still her protest. "And you tried to save Kate, even though she probably did not deserve it. I can't take responsibility for my sister's actions, but..."

Joe raised an eyebrow. "But?"

"She wasn't always like this. That. Bitter, jaded or however you wanna call it. It's what I fear the most for—" He stopped himself, taking a slow calming breath, before continuing. "I'm just glad that Allison got to see that there's still a thing called mercy in this world. That's all."

"I won't show any more mercy if you go after Scott again," Joe said before she could think. Chris seemed to consider this and nodded. Joe relented a bit. "But I am sorry about your loss. I believe you when you say she wasn't always like...that."

"We're not all monsters," Chris said as he opened the door to get out. "We go by a Code." He stopped in the open door and added: "Kate's funeral's on Thursday. I won't expect you, but you won't be turned away."

Surprise! Jimmy's not dead? Joe's right, nothing is as it seems.

I'm getting so nervous posting chapters now because I feel I have put the bar high for myself. Sorry for the lack of Derek, as judging by the reviews, you guys are really ready for him and Joe to do more than run around having awkward interactions. Joe is coming around to the idea of werewolves though, so there's at least hope.

I am so floored by the responses to the last chapter. Without spoiling, I can say that things are gonna diverge from the original plot on a few points. Neither Kate nor the FBI's involvement is forgotten, just because Joe thinks it is.

Also, Guest-reviewer who left this:

"...Derek finally lets her know what she is to him lol... I can see Joe trying to resist being like "well thats not fair, that takes my choice away, I refuse" and Derek slowly breaking down her resistance as he basically seduces her since he may have no other way for her to accept him in the start as her mate"

Legit tempted to change the summary to this ;) You guys are really nailing Joe's personality! Thank you so much for reading, and I know this is a teaser, but next chapter is my favorite I've written so far so I'll probably post it pretty soon because I'm so excited. Haha, much love!