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Title: Take Your Time to Catch Your Breath (and Choose Your Moment)
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Gen, Diana/Christie
Warnings: Violence, hurt/comfort
Spoilers: Minor for 3x16 “Judgment Day”
Word count: ~7800
Beta: by fantastic mam711. And all remaining errors are mine.
A/N: Written for whitecollar h/c Whump-a-Palooza challenge.
Title from lyrics of “Slide” by Dido
Summary: This weekend wasn't going according to plan. Not at all.
Sunday is Clinton’s favorite day of the week, well, usually. Especially if he doesn’t have van duty and can spend the morning at the gym, hitting off his frustrations on a punching bag. After a few hours he is absolutely ready to spend the rest of his day just relaxing.
The phone in his pocket started ringing exactly at the wrong moment: he'd just put the key into the lock, and his other hand was full with his gym bag and mail. He should have emptied his mailbox yesterday, but it had been beyond his powers just then. Quickly opening the door, he fished his phone out of his pocket, setting the gym bag by the door, and putting the mail on the counter.
“Yeah?” he answered, a little bit distracted, trying to sort spam from normal mail.
“Jones, have you seen Diana today?” Peter’s voice was laced with worry.
“Peter? Diana, no. Why would I?” Paying a little bit more attention to the phone now than to the papers in his hands, he still moved them around; he suddenly felt a sharp pain in his finger. A damn paper cut.
“Have you talked to her at all since yesterday?”
“No. What’s happening?” Clinton’s curiosity just piqued a notch.
“Christie called me. Diana is not answering her phone and is also not at home. No one seem to have seen her since yesterday morning when she left the office and went home.”
“Did she arrive home?”
“Yes, and that’s it. Christie is worried. I’m worried.”
“You want to go to the office with me and try to find her?” Jones offered without a second thought. Peter is suspended so he actually can’t coordinate the search, but Jones can get him in. Besides, if he doesn’t do it, Peter, just like Neal, knows how to get things going his way. Badge or no badge.
He can almost see Peter grin when he answered, “Yes, please, and call Rice. I think she might be a big help.”
“What about Hughes?”
“He is not answering, I left him a voicemail.”
“You didn’t tell him you’re going to look by yourself, did you?”
“Nope, I told him I’m gonna call you and Rice, and then if neither you answered I would start looking by myself.”
Jones snorted; that was a response he usually expected from Caffrey, not Burke.
“Okay, I’ll meet you in the lobby ...” He considered logistics: shower, change, quick grab of something to eat, traffic. “... in half an hour.”
“Thank you, Clinton.”
Twenty minutes later, with a sandwich and bottle of water in hand, freshly showered, and in casual but clean clothes Jones was shutting his door closed.
The bathroom was only few steps away from the basement she was being kept in. But far enough away for her to note the layout of the house. And it is a house, a small suburban one-story house. On her right was the entrance to kitchen, where Jeremy was standing by the side door, on her left a longer corridor with three pairs of doors, and window at the end. There must be a connection between the kitchen and the living room but she couldn't see it. She was pushed into the bathroom and the door closed with a snap.
“Don’t take too long or I will get you out of there,” were the last words she heard before the door closed.
The room was big enough for a shower, toilet and small sink, and—she noticed with a smile—a window. Unfortunately it was small enough to allow air in but not allow her to escape. Nevertheless she used the occasion to look around; outside was a lone alley that didn’t seem to help at all in figuring out where she actually was. She used the toilet, and fumbled around for anything that could help her run.
A knock on the door stopped her just as she finished and turned the faucet on to wash her hands.
“You have one more minute!”
She froze, her eyes locked on the mirror and her own face. Battered and bruised, with dried blood and an already-visible shiner on left cheek. Her hair was in absolute disarray; she slowly moved her hands to smooth it over, when she found the hairpins she'd forgotten about. Quickly she washed her face, rearranged her hair, and hid the pins on the back of her pants. She was rearranging her blouse when the door opened and Jeremy dragged her out.
“Come, you've wasted enough of our time already.” She was pushed forward, and fumbled a little, hoping that he wouldn't find the pins. Dave was waiting for them downstairs, his gaze locked on the window, his eyes unseeing.
She was back in the chair and her arms were again cuffed behind her back. Jeremy was roughly pulling on her bad arm which made her moan with pain. Behind her Jeremy smiled a shark smile; he'd just found another way to make her scream.
Dave doesn’t even move his eyes from the window when he started speaking again. “Now, where is Halden? When were you supposed to meet him?”
Jeremy’s hand pushed hard on her bad shoulder and she screamed.
“You see, I’m a very patient man, but my buddy Jeremy is eager to get out of here. He’s not a fan of New York, and your little accident already delayed our plans for a day.”
“And whose fault is that...?” She couldn't stop herself.
This time she was sure she passed out from pain. When the world was back to normal colors instead of black, Jeremy was gone and Dave was looking at her with amusement.
“Well, still feisty after all this time. Do you really have a death wish, Miss Brown?” There was something other than amusement in his eyes; this time she stopped herself before saying the first thing that came to her mind.
Do you? Jeremy would kill her without a second through, but Dave seemed to be the man calling the shots, and it seemed that he was ready to do just that. She had to think of something.
“We met after your meeting and agreed on the details. We were supposed to meet on Monday again.” There it was, a flicker of attention. “I might know someone that knows where Halden is....” Ah, yes, that was the right answer.
“Who?!”
And she knew that if she gave up a name, any name at all, she was dead.
“I don’t know his name, but I do know where to find him. I can bring you there.” Now she gambled. Anything to either get out of the house or to be left alone.
There was appreciation in his look now; he knew what she was playing at. But he didn’t know if she was telling the truth or not. He nodded a little. “I have to think about it.”
When he left, her arms and hands were numb. Diana was not so sure that she would be able to pick the lock now.
“Well, if that works I’ll owe you a bottle of fine wine, Caffrey,” she murmured quietly, while she extracted the pin from her pants and start fumbling in the lock. Neal’s words, when he was teaching them to open the cuffs quickly, were quite strong in her mind. Pull up, feel the edging, a little bit down and then up and right. After three attempts, in less than two minutes, she could feel the lock give.
It took them three hours to piece the puzzle together. Well, part of that was taken by Peter and Jones finding and getting Rice to agree that she and her department would help. Before she came they obtained a list of possible directions in which Diana could have gone, a statement from Christie, and a green light from Hughes for Peter to join the search. Not that anything could have kept him away.
They found Diana’s phone, broken and with torn earphones, under a car parked only two blocks away from her apartment. There were no traffic cameras around, no business that needed security cameras, and no witnesses. They knew she hadn't arrived at the market that was her most probable goal, according to Christie, and the camera one block away showed her walking in this direction. They had two more blocks that could be the crime scene, and no possible new leads.
“Excuse me....” A tentative voice behind Rice's back got their attention.
“Yes, ma’am?” Rice was taking point in talking with all the people that were around. There stood a young woman, with light brown hair, thick red glasses, in a stretched washed t-shirt, white shorts and red sneakers. A messenger bag over her shoulder had the NYU emblem on the top.
“Are you looking into the accident that happened yesterday?” the woman asked, shrinking slightly under Rice's scrutiny.
“Yes, do you know anything about it? Anything that could help us?” Peter jumped in, eager for answers, ignoring Rice's raised eyebrow at the ignored protocol.
“Sure, I should have it on my camera. Everything is upstairs.” She indicated a nearby brownstone with her chin.
“And how come you have photos of the accident?” Rice asked, suspicious.
The girl blushed. “I.... Homework....” She stuttered; taking a deep breath, she tried again. “It was a homework assignment in time-lapse photography. I left my camera set up yesterday and it was supposed to be going for 24 hours. I can give you a copy of everything that was captured.”
“Jones, you go with the lady and get the evidence. We have to move fast.”
The photos were not ideal—with the focus set to capture everything, the details were smudged or simply not sharp enough for high zoom. They watched in morbid fascination as the events unfolded before their eyes. Diana walking on the sidewalk, then crossing the street and being hit by the SUV. They winced in sync the moment of the hit. Then they observed a driver and passenger getting out, gesticulating and finally taking Diana with them and putting her in the car. The plate was not fully visible, only half of it. But the color, brand and model helped finding the rest. It must have been their lucky day: there were only two cars with that set of common elements, one belonging to a family in Brooklyn that had taken the car for a trip outside the city and weren't back yet. The other belonged to one Jeremy Campbell, one of the suspects in a recent mortgage fraud case.
When Jones connected the dots and showed them the data they sat in silence for almost a minute. Shocked that someone who'd managed to defraud people out of over three and a half million in mortgages would be so stupid as to drive someone over with their own car.
It took about an hour to gather the tracking evidence of where the car had driven after the accident. The address was in the suburbs, one of the houses on which the fake mortgage had been taken. The SWAT team they borrowed from NYPD was already on site when they arrived, setting up silently and observing the situation.
There was movement in the house, someone standing by the side door, probably in the kitchen, someone moving around. Closing doors, water running, then silence, and again movement. They couldn't get much more from the directional mic, but it was enough to confirm there were at least two people inside.
Now there was one last question to be answered. Was Diana in there too?
She had no idea how long she'd have before the bad guys were back, and little to no power to search her not-so-little prison cell. Diana decided, instead of hiding, to stay on the chair, with her hands behind her, armed with part of an old armchair.
Her plan was simple: knock the two out as soon as they came back. Get the gun she'd seen in Jeremy’s hand, and if possible close them both in the basement. Call for help. And maybe her team was right outside waiting to storm in and take the matter in hand.
She snorted; right, if they were they probably would've entered already.
The next few minutes were full of anxiety; on one hand she wanted them to come down right away so she could get away, on the other she needed a few more minutes to gather her strength. In the end it was somewhere in the middle.
She almost sighed in happiness when she saw Jeremy coming down first, the gun tucked in the waistband of his jeans. He stood in the exact right spot that she'd found ideal to strike. Dave took the last step on the stairs and then Diana launched forward. She used all her strength to coordinate three moves at once; her head slightly bent targeting Jeremy's chin, her right leg bent and raised with knee hitting his groin, and her left arm—the only one she could use—armed with the wooden chair part hitting Dave and then the back of Jeremy’s head.
They all stumbled; she screamed when she grabbed the gun with her right hand, the pain not important in that one moment. Jeremy and Dave fell on the floor in heaps of crossed limbs and curses. It seemed her kick was still powerful as Jeremy curled in, shielding his stomach, his eyes bulging out and tears on his cheeks.
Diana was halfway up the stairs, gun in left hand, when Dave caught up with her. He grabbed her foot; she lost her balance and landed on the stairs on her good side, thank god. Her arm was twisted painfully but the gun, still firmly in her hand, was pointed directly at her attacker.
“Don’t move or I will shoot!” she warned, but he ignored her, raising his leg to take another step.
The shot sounded awfully loud. Their screams mixed together, hers because the recoil of the gun in such a position was more painful than normal, his because his knee was now a bloody mass.
“Sonuvabitch!”
Outside, as soon as the shot was fired, a bunch of cops and FBI agents moved forward on all entrances.
Diana didn't wait, just scrambled up, put the gun into her own waistband and ran toward the kitchen exit.
Stumbling on the threshold she pushed the screen door with her only good hand and landed face down on the stairs. The sound of weapons being cocked, several weapons, was a welcome one. She lifted her head a little, just enough to see Jones and Peter pushing their way forward in the sea of SWAT members.
“Why does a girl always have to make the first move?” she complained, closing her eyes. Finally safe.
“We didn’t want to piss you off by getting in your way,” Jones answered, while the SWAT team swarmed inside to arrest the kidnappers.
Peter tried to help her up, but she just gave one short “No.” He just sat beside her, draping his jacket around her arms.
“I want a stretcher, and lots of drugs, and three days off....” she mumbled before closing her eyes and losing consciousness.
When she woke up again, it was to the smell of antiseptic and the beeping of a heart monitor, and wonderfully painless. The first thing she noticed was Christie sitting on the side of her bed, holding her hand and looking at her with amusement in her eyes.
"What?" she rasped.
Christie grinned and gave her some water. "Is that the first thing you want to say to me after being missing for over a day? And unconscious for another?"
Diana smiled sheepishly. "Hi, darling...." Her smile changed into a cheeky one. "What's got you so amused?"
Christie laughed, grabbing her hand again and raising it to touch her cheek.
"You know how you talk in your sleep sometimes, when you're very tired?" Humor twinkled in her eyes.
Diana let her eyes close, embarrassed; oh, yes, she knew....
Christie continued without waiting for her answer. "Should I be worried about Neal?"
Diana's eyes, or rather that one not-swollen one, opened with a touch of alarm in her gaze. "Caffrey? What are you talking about? No, absolutely, he’s not even around....” She stopped for a moment; Christie was grinning. “What did I say?"
"Let me quote: ‘and buy for Neal his favorite wine’...." Christie was obviously amused by the situation.
Diana smiled slightly but after a moment she squeezed Christie’s hand with a more sober expression. “I’m sorry.”
Christie’s brow raised. “What are you sorry for, love?”
“For worrying you.…”
“Di....” Her girlfriend sighed, then with calculation in her eyes she stood up and went to Diana’s right side. “Scoot over.” Sitting at the head of the bed, Christie gently helped Diana to move a little to make space for her. Then she sat, as comfortable as possible while avoiding all cables and call buttons, and cradled Diana in her arms, allowing her to lay her head on her breast.
“Di, I always slightly worry when you go to work. You’re an FBI agent; it’s unavoidable....”
“But—” Diana tried to add her two cents.
“No buts, we talked about it.” That closed Diana’s mouth; they did talk about it. “And to make you and me feel better you will not leave my sight for a whole week.”
“Are those doctor's orders?” Diana murmured, suddenly tired again.
“Absolutely.” Christie kissed Diana’s head, resting her cheek against her hair and listening to her calm breathing. She was happy to have Diana back, happy to have her alive, even if the worry would be there every time Diana left the house.
The End
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Date: 2012-06-14 08:08 am (UTC)Thank you!
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