CHAPTER FOUR
Faith closed her eyes and allowed the warmth of the water to ease the soreness in her muscles. Of all of life's simple pleasures, warm water was easily the most rewarding. That was something that most Americans wouldn't understand unless they had fought overseas.
She laughed as she recalled an exchange with one of her comrades in Afghanistan. Staff Sergeant Decker was the company heartthrob, and even Faith hadn't been immune to his charms. Of course, they had only slept together the one time, and it hadn't worked out very well, but for a moment, Faith allowed the boyish and arrogant Sergeant to know her better than most got to.
This particular exchange took place a few months before their ill-fated tryst. The company had rotated back to Germany for a few weeks of leave, and Decker and Faith had enjoyed their first warm shower in months.
Not together. That was too bad, Faith thought. If they had showered together, then Decker might have had a chance to finish what he didn't start until later.
Anyway, Faith and Decker had met downstairs to join the rest of their squad for dinner, and Faith had giggled at the beatific smile on Decker's face.
"Did one of the concierge girls join you in the shower or what?" she asked.
He grinned at her. "No, don't worry. I'm still saving myself for you. I'm smiling because the only thing better than a nice pair of tits is a nice, warm shower."
Faith couldn't agree more. It was only with reluctance that she shut the water off and left the shower, wrapping herself in a towel.
Briefly, anyway. Turk waited for her outside the shower, and he had other plans.
"Turk!" Faith cried as he snatched the towel from where it hung at her waist, leaving her naked except for the towel wrapped in her hair. She glared at him but then laughed. "Well, that broken tooth isn't causing you any problems at all, is it?" she asked. She was already dry anyway, and only wrapped the towel around herself out of habit.
She walked to the big dog and crouched down, cradling his head in her arms. "You're all better, aren't you?"
He whimpered in response and nuzzled her. "Hey," she said, "you keep that up, and David is going to get jealous."
She winced as the lighthearted moment disappeared with thoughts of David. She had no idea if he'd be jealous at all anymore. Part of her wasn't even sure how she'd feel about things if he was jealous. Obviously he wouldn't be jealous of Turk, but if she showed up with another man to Turk's next appointment, a part of her wondered if David might not simply be relieved. A part of her felt that she might be relieved to simply dispense with the thought of romance at all. The part of her that felt capable of love seemed to have died when Trammell cut her. Now all she was left with was the memory of the love she once had for Michael and a love for David that she was increasingly beginning to feel was simply acting out a wish that she was someone she wasn't.
You feel guilty, so you attach yourself to a knight in shining armor so he can tell you that you're wonderful and beautiful and perfect, just like every little girl wants to hear.
Faith rose, smiled sadly at Turk, and made her way to her dresser. She pulled on her bra and panties and then headed to the closet. "Turk," she said softly as she pulled her shirt over her shoulders, "you can't keep pretending like what happened with West didn't happen." She buttoned up the shirt. "Because it happened." She sighed and retrieved a jacket from the closet. "You might not want to talk about it, but I want you to know that if you ever do feel like it, I'm here for you."
She slipped on the jacket and fastened the buttons before turning to face him. The sadness haunted her gaze as she took in his form, so strong and...
And normal.
The dog was just normal. He was the same Turk he always was. He looked at her with gentle, loving eyes. Happy eyes. Eyes that bore no hint of the scars that West must have left him. She thought of the haunted look he wore when she first met him after the original Donkey Killer had nearly killed them both. It had taken him weeks to even begin to recover. This time, only a week later, he seemed completely fine.
"It's okay," Faith said softly. "I understand." That was a lie, but it was all she could think of to say. She stepped forward and reached out a hand to gently pet his head and neck. His soft fur felt reassuring against her fingers as they closed around it gently.
She stood and glanced in the mirror and then froze. She wore her white blouse and her dark blue slacks. She wore her dark blue jacket as well. She'd dressed for work. She almost undressed, but the automatic, habitual way she'd gone about getting ready felt reassuring.
"We need to get back to work, boy," she said. She looked at herself in the mirror for a moment. She didn't look traumatized. She looked normal. The Boss would tell her she wasn't ready. The Boss would recount all of the reasons she needed more time. He would try to reassure her while adamantly refusing to allow her to go after Dr. West. He would do all of those things, but there was no way he could deny that she appeared ready.
"I look ready because I am ready," she said adamantly. She could sense rather than see Turk tense up at the adamance of her voice and, sure enough, felt him brush against her leg a moment later. She reached a hand down and scratched between his ears without taking her eyes from her face in the mirror. "We're ready, Boy," she said, "aren't we? Wanna go catch a bad guy?"
***
The Boss stared at Faith with all the warmth of Antarctic bedrock. Faith had known him long enough to know that he truly did feel sorry for her, and the fact that she wasn't in a federal prison for her repeated and flagrant disregard for his instructions was as good a sign as any that he bore some affection for her.
But he was about as far from happy with her as she was from the dark side of Neptune.
"Would it be worth my time to remind you that you're suspended?" he asked, "or should I consider the lack of news regarding you to mean that you've just gotten better at hiding your illegal behavior?"
Though expected, his words stung her deeply. She pressed her lips tightly together to keep the hurt from her gaze and said, "I have been resting and recuperating from my injuries, as ordered."
"And now you're here, even though I told you that you were suspended indefinitely."
"Well, it's been nine weeks," she said, "I wanted to ask you if you would consider lifting the suspension."
"And I would do that because…?"
Faith tried to think of a reason that would make sense, but after all that had happened, she couldn't think of one. So she decided to go with the truth.
"Because I need this," she said, "because I've been stuck doing nothing for nine weeks, and all I've been able to think about is getting back to work."
"That's not true," the Boss said. "Try again."
Faith bristled, but then, he had no reason to trust her anymore, did he? Realizing that cut her even more deeply.
And while what she had said was the truth, it wasn't the whole truth.
"No," she admitted, "not all of it."
"No is also my answer," the Boss replied. "Go home, Bold."
"Boss, I have twice found Dr. West when no one else was able to. Not the New York Office, not the Marshals, not Desrouleaux and Chavez, no one. Only me. I am the right choice for this case. You know it."
"What I know, Bold, is that you twice chose to pursue West without backup."
Faith pursed her lips. The second time, she had called for backup. She didn't say anything, though. She didn't want Michael to get in trouble for not alerting the Boss to her intentions.
"All you had to do was pick up the damned phone," he continued, "and West would be in custody. We would have given you the credit for the case, and you'd go back to being the Bureau's favorite little star. Now, you're the Bureau's biggest headache."
"Sir, I can—"
"I beg you not to finish that sentence," he said, though his tone suggested more of a command than a plea. "At this point, I no longer care if you understand that no means no. I'm just going to take steps to prevent you from being capable of ignoring me."
A chill ran down Faith's spine. "What do you mean?"
"I'm transferring you, Bold. I don't know where yet, or when, but it will be somewhere you can't jump the fence and go chasing squirrels anymore, and it will be as soon as possible. You are on suspension until that happens, and we are watching your apartment and tapping your phone, so we'll know if you try to do anything else like this. We're going to let you keep Turk. He's being officially retired from field duty—meritoriously, since we can't hold him accountable for the flagrant misbehavior of his handler. That's my parting gift to you, Bold, in gratitude for eight years of flawless service and two years of continuing to capture killers in spite of spending your free time making it almost impossible to catch the most prolific killer of them all."
Faith took the news better than she expected to. Probably because she did expect the news. The Boss had warned her enough.
But she couldn't allow it. It wasn't right. Even considering her mistakes, it wasn't right to essentially fire her like this.
"Sir, I would like to formally protest both this suspension and the pending reassignment," she said, "I would also like to protest Turk's forced retirement. As you can see, he is perfectly fine."
Turk barked firmly in agreement.
"If you're serious about Turk, I'll have a review board examine him. If they find him fit for duty, he'll be assigned another handler and get to work through his last year of eligible field work."
Faith frowned. "That's not what I meant."
"I don't give a single shit what you meant, Bold. Which brings me to the first point. Denied and denied. You're suspended until further notice, notice you'll receive when I've determined whether you'll go to records or to training or to custodial work or to spit shining shoes for actual field agents."
"You misunderstand me, sir," Faith said, keeping her voice even. "I'm not formally protesting to you. I will be formally protesting to the Internal Affairs Division."
The Boss actually laughed at that. It was the first time she had ever heard him laugh. It wasn't a pleasant sound. "There are easier ways to go to prison, Bold," he said. "Just let me press charges against you, and we'll expedite the case and have you locked away by the end of the month."
"You're absolutely right," Faith said. "I will not only have my protest denied, I will most likely be discharged and then charged with obstruction of justice, interfering with a federal investigation, and a dozen other minor charges. I'll be convicted, and I'll go to prison, probably for a long time."
The Boss's glare deepened. "And you're about to tell me why I don't want that to happen." It wasn't a question.
"Yes," she agreed, "because it will torpedo your own career."
"I torpedoed my career a long time ago, Bold," he replied.
"But you didn't torpedo your agents' careers," she answered. "You might never have a chance at Deputy Director, but you've built a solid reputation as one of the best SACs in the country. Agents compete for a chance to work for you because working for you all but guarantees an upward career track. That will change entirely when they learn that you allowed your best agent to operate as a vigilante."
"You are utterly insane, Bold," the Boss said softly. "You're completely off the rails."
Faith ignored the interruption. "There goes Desrouleaux's chance at investigative instruction at the Academy. Chavez can take the short train to being a jaded lifetime junior field agent. Michael will never make supervisor, and SAC will be something he carries his lunch in. Or, you can reinstate me, we can catch West—together this time. If you don't believe that I mean that, I can show you plenty of scars that will prove I do."
"Get out of my office," he said, "and pray to God, I don't have you arrested for trying to blackmail me. You don't want to be transferred? Fine. You're fired, effective immediately."
"Okay," she said, "my first phone call will be to the Philadelphia Sun. "
He stared silently at her, his eyes as black as the void. "To be clear, Special Agent Bold, you're threatening to take the entire ship down with you if I make you walk the plank. That about sum it up?"
"Yes," she said.
Faith's stomach twisted inside her. Bile rose in her mouth, and she clenched her jaw to keep from retching.
Never in ten years as an agent had she ever considered anything like what she was doing now. Never in ten years as an investigator had she ever thought she would be sitting across from her SAC, threatening to blackmail him if he didn't give her what she wanted.
You're a parasite. West had said. You're a weak, selfish, insecure, terrified little bug .
Bile rose in her stomach again, and she gripped her knees until her knuckles turned white.
The Boss stared at her for a long while, standing stock still, his eyes boring unblinkingly into her. When he finally spoke, the tenderness in his voice surprised her. "Faith, please. Listen to yourself. Is this who you want to be? This transfer is for your own good. I'm angry with you, and that colors the way I've presented it, but the right thing to do for you right now is to pull you away from fieldwork. You're broken, Faith. This is the only way I know to save you. You've been a great field agent. Hell, you've been by far the best agent I've ever worked with. You deserve to ride off into the sunset. You deserve a chance to recover at least a little of what you've lost. Please give yourself that chance."
Once more, there was a long silence. Finally, Faith said, "This is the only thing I can be. Until West is brought to justice, I can't stop thinking about him. I can't stop hunting him. I can't stop searching. You can have whatever opinion you want about me as an agent and as a person, but I will never forgive myself if I let him get away again."
"It's not your call, Faith."
"Dammit, I…" she paused, lip trembling, and took a moment to compose herself. "I let him go, Boss."
"You didn't let him go, Bold, you tried to capture him and failed."
"No," she said, "Not the last two times. I mean… I mean, Gordon asked me to help look into the Copycat Killer case."
"He asked you to look into the case, not take over without the Bureau's blessing."
"I was going to say no," she said.
His eyes widened in surprise. "Really?"
"Really. He asked me to look into it, and I was going to say no because I didn't think it would be good for my mental health to say yes. And while I was struggling with my decision, he killed again. Then I accepted the task, and while I was busy just looking through the file, as ordered, he killed Gordon. I let him go. I did what you ordered me to do, and now two more people are dead, one of them our friend and colleague. And…" she hesitated to reveal this. Up to now, she had kept the details of her interactions with West to herself.
But she had to get through to him. Her threat was valid and very real, but it was also a bluff. She wouldn't gain anything by following through, so she needed him to relent before the Boss called the bluff.
So, she said, "When West was fighting me, he told me that he was focused on me because he wanted to do what Trammell couldn't do. He wanted to break me. He's been fixated on me ever since because his end goal is to destroy me and prove that he's better than me. If I back off, then he'll escalate. He'll start going after Michael. He'll go after Michael's wife and my… boyfriend." Her stomach twisted again when she realized she had nearly said ex-boyfriend.
"When that doesn't work, he'll grow more flagrant. A lot of people are going to start dying, Boss. A lot faster and very badly."
The Boss sighed and slumped back in his chair. "Jesus H. Christ the Third," he said, chuckling bitterly. "You two are just the perfect couple, aren't you?"
Once more, his words wounded Faith, but she was used to being wounded by now and barely even flinched. "He seems to think so. Boss, I acknowledge that my actions were wrong and that much of this situation we find ourselves in is my doing. But a lot of it isn't. A lot of it has to do with West's obsession with beating the agent that Trammell couldn't beat."
"So why isn't he going after Prince? Prince killed Trammell, who, sorry to remind you, had pretty badly beaten you when you went after him."
"I'm not sure," she admitted. "Maybe it's because I found Trammell, so he sees me as more of a challenge than Michael." The Boss's lips curled up in disgust, and she said, "I'm not being arrogant, Boss, I'm just offering my opinion as a detective."
"Next, you're going to tell me that he's attracted to you," the Boss said.
"No," she replied. "He's not. I don't think he's sexually attracted to anyone. I think it's as simple as he said it is. He just wants to prove he can break me mentally and emotionally."
"So wouldn't that mean he'll retire? You leave field work and go fly a desk in Quantico, he rests on his laurels and until we break his door down—and we will find him eventually—he grins at your picture and thinks ‘what a good boy I am for breaking agent superstar.' Sorry to be an asshole, Bold, but that sounds like a fair trade to me."
"That's not what he'll do," she said, "He doesn't want to win. He wants to play the game. Oh, he wants to win eventually, but not yet. He wants me to suffer more first. That's why he didn't stop the first time I walked away."
The Boss frowned. Faith could tell that he saw her point and hated that he did.
"That's why he killed Gordon," she said, the realization dawning on her. "That's why he left me that note. He was angry at me for walking away from the case, and he made it personal so that I would have to keep hunting him. Boss, it's all about me. It always has been."
"Somehow, I'm not surprised to hear you say that," he replied.
The insult was half-hearted this time, and Faith knew that the Boss was close to giving in. He was seeing things from her side, possibly for the first time.
She pressed her advantage. "You need me on this case because you need him to know that I haven't given up. You need him to know that I'm still fighting, or he'll come out of hiding in the worst way possible just to get my attention."
He averted his eyes and frowned as he considered her words. She continued to press. "If you transfer me, I have to protest it through every channel I can, if for no reason other than to delay the day when West learns that I'm out of his life and decides to end other lives until I come back in. Please. Don't do this."
A third long silence settled over them. It ended when the Boss leaned back in his chair and shook his head. "I don't know what's worse, Bold. The thought that you might care so little about your colleagues that you'd use them as bargaining chips in a bid to save your own career or the thought that you intrigue a serial killer so much you have to have a career just to keep him from murdering people. All right. Here's what we're going to do. We're going to release a statement welcoming you back to the department and explaining briefly that you returned from a leave after nearly apprehending the Copycat Killer. That should keep your name in his mind for now. You, however, are going to be nowhere near that case. You are going to be in this office filing paperwork and restocking office supplies."
Turk barked in protest, and Faith interrupted. "Boss, I need to be in the field. Please. I can't be cooped up anymore. Even if you don't want me looking for West, put me on something. Anything."
"So you can be out of my sight and free to hunt West again?"
"Michael can keep an eye on me."
"Michael doesn't want anything to do with you."
Those words bit straight through Faith's emotional defenses. She leaned back in her chair, shoulders slumping, jaw going slack. He had assured her that he would only get a new partner while she was on leave. It occurred to her now that he was hoping that her leave wouldn't end, that his temporary partner could be his permanent one.
"He asked for a new partner?" she asked tonelessly.
"He assumed he would be getting one," the Boss said. "At the time, I assumed the same thing. So I asked him how he felt about it. I won't tell you exactly what he said. That's his business. I will tell you that if you want any chance at all at being in the field, you need to convince Prince to come with you. Otherwise, I will chain you to a damned desk personally and bolt that desk to the foundation of this building. Clear?"
Faith managed a soft, "clear."
"Good. Now get out of my office."
Faith felt numb. She stood and saluted the Boss, a gesture he didn't return, and left the office. She made it outside and slumped onto a bench. Turk sat next to her and rested his head on her lap.
She looked down at him, expecting his usual sympathetic gaze. What she got instead was a look of pure steel. Turk barked firmly, not a comforting bark but a bark that said feel sorry for yourself later. We have a job to do.
She smiled down at him. "I love you, Turk. You know that?"