End of Innocence
Chapter 14
Cabin, Cimarron, December 2013
Her cell phone buzzed several more times while Reese watched it.
When it stopped, he'd waited to see if there'd be a voicemail left by the caller. A soft beep announced it on her phone. Reese looked up to the hallway. He could still hear water running in the bathroom.
Picked up her phone and swiped the screen. He remembered seeing her enter her code during an unguarded moment, and he tapped in the number.
There'd been a string of calls from 'F' starting the night of the shooting on the street corner. And then, by two days later, virtually none. Reese knew they'd brought him back to the Library Office by then, where Shaw had made the hospital room to work on him.
Any real hospital would've known right away that he'd been shot – and they'd have called in the NYPD to investigate. One thing would've lead to another. It wasn't safe for any of them until HR had been dismantled out of the departments. They'd had to work on him there, in the Library Office.
He scrolled through the rest of her calls. A couple from Root. But nothing more from 'F' until this one. Reese stared at the entry on the screen.
He lifted his thumb and hovered over it. Finch. Should he listen in?
Reese touched the screen and moved the phone to his ear:
"Miss Shaw, I'm calling to check on your status. It's been a while since we've had any contact, and as it's my responsibility to keep you safe, I wanted to reach out to you with an update. We've had some recent intel regarding a possible threat to the entire Team, Miss Shaw. It's important that we speak more about this. Please call me when you've received this message."
A frown formed on his face. Reese ended the playback and reset the phone before laying it down on the table. Then he turned back to the stove to finish cooking their breakfast.
When Shaw walked down the hall, she was wrapped in a towel, with another one swept around her hair on top. She looked for her luggage case and threw the strap over a damp shoulder. She glanced his way and saw him stirring the eggs.
"Ready for breakfast?" he called, over his shoulder.
"Be right back," she said, and disappeared down the hall toward the bedroom.
Reese dropped a cover over the eggs and moved the pan off the heat. Gave the home fries another stir, and then poured coffee for the two of them.
She'd come back by then, dressed, but with her hair still wrapped in a towel. He sat the coffee in front of her at the table, and then went back to dish out the food. Scrambled eggs, slices of ham, home fries. Limped back to the table with two plates, and then lowered himself to a chair. Felt like something biting his side, and his face showed the pain.
"One of the pain pills?"
"I'll be okay," he said, and settled himself on the chair.
She stared at him with her cool, dark eyes. Pale, but without the flush of fever, and the glassy eyes were gone, too. Just the dark circles underneath. Fever was down, then, and he seemed a little steadier on his feet today. She was sure he felt worse on the inside but was putting up a good front for now.
They both dug in, and a silence followed while they ate. Shaw noticed her phone and reached for it. Swiped the screen and Reese watched a frown form on her face. She thumbed the screen, stared a moment, then shut it off and laid it down on the table again. Went back to her meal, stabbing a forkful of eggs.
"So – what'd Finch have to say?"
Reese sipped his coffee. He stared over the top in the air.
"Should listen," he said. Shaw kept eating and Reese could see a question forming.
"You goin' back?" She tipped her eyes up to watch his face.
He didn't answer. And she could see the struggle behind his eyes.
All the books had said it could take a while after the sudden death of someone close – maybe he wasn't ready yet.
She thought about it. Reese was a study in contrasts as far as she was concerned: almost surgical in his ability to apply the right kind of pressure on a perp – she'd watched him do it. But then this other side. Left himself wide open like that. Why? What was the point? Didn't make any sense to her to leave himself vulnerable.
He'd had something with Carter. She'd known it. And it'd ripped him up inside when she died in his arms.
Another moment came to her – her own memory – Cole, lying in her arms. He'd stepped between her and the door when the shots came through. If she'd had a feeling, would it have been the same as Reese?
Couldn't know.
Just like she didn't know how all this was gonna work out.
She'd followed her gut, and she'd done what she could do. Now, it was up to him.
Reese had to decide on his own.
Like she'd always said: a smart man would've walked away.