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ladyjanellyShit, meet Fan.
Thanks to Embroiderama for the beta and the bunny.
========
Jared doesn’t come home.
He sleeps with Jensen and wakes up when the alarm wakes him up and goes to work even though his eyes are dark around and his feet slide on the floor like they’re too heavy to lift right. He goes to work and Jensen goes back to sleep and when he wakes up again Jared isn’t home. So Jensen waits and the sun comes up all the way and he eats breakfast and drinks a bottle of water and Jared isn’t home.
The clinic isn’t far and he knows the directions Jared drives and he doesn’t want to be home and alone when Mackenzie comes to see them. He puts another bottle of water in his backpack and some aspirin and a pack of band-aids. He walks to the clinic and Jared’s car is there but he watches through the windows and Jared isn’t.
The people inside that work there look too awake. The moves of their hands are too big and too sharp. Agitated. Jensen wants to know what they know but he never spoke to them before and he doesn’t know if they’ll understand him. Jared says Jensen can go there if he has trouble but he doesn’t have trouble. Jared does.
For fixing trouble Jensen doesn’t know anybody better than Jeff and he walks for the places Jeff goes. The shelters and the kitchens and the bridge and there is no Jeff either.
A yellow car stops beside him as he walks to the next place Jeff might be and he shies away without looking at it.
“Davis!” a girl-voice calls and he doesn’t want it to be Mackenzie but it is. He hears steps running up and turns towards the brick of the building beside him and puts his head against the warm and rough and closes his eyes and doesn’t know what to do without Jared.
“Davis?” Mackenzie says again and another female voice says, “Mac, hush.”
A hand touches his shoulder like a whisper and the lady says, “Jensen? Are you all right?”
He looks at her and wants to drive her away but he wants his Jared more. “Everybody flew away the rabbit hole dream of being not.”
“Shhh,” the older lady says. Older than him. Older than Jeff. Not so old as Whiskey Dan is or Hettie was. “Jared is fine. He can’t come to you right now but he told us to take you somewhere safe while we wait for him. Would that be all right with you? Can you do that for him?”
Jensen looks from Mackenzie to the lady and neither has lies in their eyes. “To wait. For Jared.”
The lady smiles like an angel and holds out her hand for him to take. “I’m Donna Carr. It’s nice to meet you, Jensen.”
============
Jeff watches from the alley as Jared’s led out of the clinic by a uniformed officer and detective big-jaw who had been so hard-up for a witness placing a ‘tall young guy’ at the scene. Didn’t take the asshole long to find someone willing to swear they’d seen Jared.
Jeff figures his timing must have been off on when he beat the guy. No clock and waiting in the dark he’d started too late maybe. After Jared had left work. No alibi and that’s all Jeff’s fault.
Jared looks shell-shocked as they lead him to the squad car. How the cops can believe he’d hurt anybody, even someone as evil as the rat poison guy, is beyond Jeff’s understanding. Just as the officer is helping Jared duck down into the car Jared’s eyes meet Jeff’s. He mouths something that Jeff can’t catch, and then flicks his head in the direction of the apartment building he lives in.
Jensen. Shit. If they’re arresting Jared they’ll be searching his home too. Looking for blood-stained clothes or something belonging to the vic. They’ll be at his door with a search warrant and there’s no way Jensen can deal with that. He’ll freak and they’ll have him in a mental ward in an hour. As much as Jeff wants to keep Jared out of custody he figures Jared can handle it a lot easier than Jensen can.
Jeff hunches his shoulders and shuffles down the sidewalk. As soon as he’s out of sight of the cops he breaks into a ground-eating jog. The five miles to Jared’s place make his chest burn and his legs ache and he berates himself for being so out of shape.
The police beat him there. A CSI team’s Blazer and another squad car are already in the parking lot. He waits because he knows he’ll be more together if he talks to them outside than in but when they come down Jensen isn’t with them.
He walks. Looking for Jensen. Thinking about how to get Jared out of jail and back where he belongs. He asks around and Carlos saw Jensen getting into a cab with two women. Neither one he’d seen before. Jeff doesn’t know if they’re social workers or what but Jensen's beyond his reach for the time being.
Jared could find out though. Where he’s been taken. What’s happened. And even if Jeff hadn’t been the one to do the crime he’d still be tempted to take the fall. For both of them. He has to turn himself in. Has to make sure Jared doesn’t lose everything for his mistake.
He’ll need some courage for that. For facing a cell and a lock and the walls of an eight by eight closing in around him. Couple shots worth or maybe a small bottle. He goes to the people he knows. People he’s never asked for a penny. The girl at the lunch line and Gertie at the shelter. A dollar here, two there. A shining bottle of amber liquid and it burns going down worse than he remembers.
He’s staggering when he gets to the police station. His head three sizes too large and his feet numb and distant from his body. He pulls himself hand over hand up the rail in front and leans heavily on the counter. He stares through the plexiglass at the clerk and takes a deep breath.
“I need t’ turn myself in.”
========
As much as she’d wanted to shelter her mother from the pain and uncertainty of Davis’ condition, Mackenzie is glad to have the older woman at her side when she returns to the broken down apartment he and Jared live in. Their mom doesn’t put up with nonsense and she’ll take control. Take care of Davis and straighten things out with Jared. Donna Carr is a woman who gets what she wants and the determined way she walks up the four flights of stairs does her daughter proud.
They step off the landing and Jared’s door is open. A police officer stands there beside it.
“Here?” Donna asks and Mackenzie nods.
And Donna strides up to the officer like he’s the interloper. “What’s going on here and where’s my son?”
Mackenzie half-listens to the interrogation as she peeks in through the open door. The apartment has been turned upside down. Davis’ accumulated junk is strewn across the floor. The cushions are off of the couch and all the kitchen cabinets have been emptied. She might not exactly like Jared but nobody deserves to have their home trashed like this.
“Mackenzie,” her mother calls, “We’re finished here.” And the two women walk back out the way they came in.
“Jared’s been arrested, apparently.” Donna does not look pleased. “Nobody has seen Davis and there’s no record of someone else living here.”
They step back into the bright spring sunshine and walk across the parking lot to the cab. Mackenzie’s phone rings with an unknown number and she answers it.
“Mackenzie? It’s Jared.” He sounds tense. Scared. “I’ve been arrested. I didn’t do it. I swear to god I didn’t do it. You’ve got to get Jensen. Pick him up and take him somewhere. They have a warrant to search the apartment. He can’t end up in a mental institution, do you understand me? He doesn’t deserve that. He doesn’t need it. Please.” Like she wouldn’t take care of her own brother.
“Jared, he’s not there,” she says. “The police haven’t seen him.”
Jared swears under his breath and Donna reaches for the phone.
“This is Davis’ mother,” she says with the voice of authority. “Where the hell is my son?”
Mackenzie almost feels bad for Jared right then.
Her mother nods to the phone. “Mmhmm. Yes. We’ll look there. Right.” There’s another pause and when she speaks next her voice is gentler. “And where are you? Jared, listen to me very carefully. I’ll have Davis’ lawyer there for you within the hour. Don’t speak to anyone. Don’t explain anything. Don’t tell your side of the story. Do you understand me? Good. We’ll see you very soon.”
They get into the cab and Mac gives the driver directions to just drive around the area and crisscross as much as possible. The car pulls away from the curb and Donna starts making calls.
“Why are you helping him?” Mackenzie asks between calls. She watches out the windows of the cab. Looking for Davis.
“He’s important to my son,” Donna answers and watches out her own side of the car. “If he helped Davis then we owe him our gratitude.” Her voice sinks to a tone Mackenzie hasn’t heard since she first started dating. “And if he hurt my child, any help I give him now can be undone with a phone call.”
======
Being arrested is by far the most frightening experience of Jared’s life. They pick him up at the tail end of his shift at the clinic. He’s in shock as the warrant for his arrest is explained and the cuffs are fastened around his wrists in front of his boss and co-workers and patients. They read him his rights like on television and it’s surreal to hear those words in real life. Officer Hanson watches him like he’s going to enjoy the taste of Jared’s liver and Jared doesn’t even know who it is he’s supposed to have beaten up.
“There’s some--some mistake,” he says as they take him out of the car but nobody listens. He thinks of Jensen at home alone and it just adds despair to his fear. They take his fingerprints and his picture and put him in a room with three chairs and a table.
A long time passes. He’s not sure how long but it seems like forever. He knows from TV that the mirror along the wall must be a window from the other side.
“Hello?” He asks his own reflection. “I just need to make a phone call.”
He can think of only one person who has a phone that can help Jensen now. She might take him away. Jared may never see him again but he’ll know Jensen is safe and loved and cared for which is more than he can hope for if Jensen ends up in police custody or in a mental hospital.
He talks to the glass and paces the room. The cuffs chafe and he needs to take a piss. He knows they’re letting him work himself up. Anticipation doing more to get through his defenses than questions would at this point. He knows it and still he can’t stop himself from getting more and more worried.
When the door opens and Hanson steps in it almost comes as a relief.
“So,” the big man smirks, “You just had to take the law into your own hands.”
And somehow seeing that smug grin turns all the fear and worry Jared had into pure stubborn anger.
“I want my phone call,” he says. He feels himself center down and in. Fuck this guy. He can wait. He can trust whoever is on the other side of the mirror to keep him from getting hit. He can outlast Hanson until he gets his call and that’s all there is to it.
“Lemme guess. You found the guy. Figured the law wasn’t going to make things happen your way so you beat him up. Am I right? You know what? I can almost respect that. Giving the bastard what he deserves.”
Jared has no clue what the hell he’s talking about but to say so would be contrary to his master plan. “I want my phone call,” he repeats. Slower this time.
Hanson blusters and bangs his palms on the table. He yells in Jared’s face and tries sweet-talking him. Another cop comes in and tries to cajole a confession out of him. And if they had enough evidence why would they even need that?
“I want my phone call,” he tells the new cop, meeting his dark eyes without flinching. “I want my phone call and I want it now.”
Hanson makes a disgusted noise but they bring him a phone and get Mackenzie’s number off of his for him.
Jared can’t remember having a more nerve-wracking phone call in his life. Jensen missing. Mrs. Carr promising him a lawyer. He isn’t sure he believes her but he has nothing to lose at this point. He tells Hanson he’s not talking until his attorney gets there and he’s put into a holding cell with five guys--one of whom he stitched up after a knife fight. He never thought of himself as a man with friends in low places but he feels safer in the cell than he had in the interview room.
He has no way to tell what time it is but a while later the door at the end of the hall opens and Hanson escorts a sharp-dressed little man up to the bars.
“Mr. Padalecki?” he asks and Jared steps up.
“That’s me.”
“Edgar Marshall,” the other man says by way of introduction. He never smiles even when he says, “The District Attorney has reconsidered the prosecution of this case and you are released on your own recognizance until such time as they have some definitive evidence against you.”
Jared rocks back on his heels. “That--I can go?”
Hanson unlocks the door. “I’ll be watching you,” he threatens low and dark.
“And I’ll be very pleased to handle the suit for police harassment,” says Edgar and Jared thinks that sharp glint in his eye is as close to a smile as he’ll ever get.
Jared feels underdressed next to his lawyer but he guesses everybody does when they come out of jail.
“Mrs. Carr has asked me to inform you that her son has been located and awaits your company. If you would like to share a car my driver can drop you at her hotel on the way to my residence.”
Jared blinks and puzzles that out. “Uh, sure. If it’s no problem.”
They walk out through the front lobby and a slurred and familiar voice catches his attention. Jeff leans against the front desk arguing with the sergeant on duty. “Turn myself in,” he’s saying. “Did it. He deserved it.”
“Go sleep it off somewhere else,” the haggard officer tells him. “We got better things to do with our budget than give three hots and a cot to your type. Go on. Go bug somebody else.”
And Jared grabs his arm and forces a smile. “Come on Jeff. Let’s get you out of these nice people’s way.” He’s still wearing his scrubs so he gives an apologetic shrug to the face of authority and hustles Jeff out the front door.
Jeff stumbles and clings to Jared’s arm and Jared hates to see the strong man in this condition. “Lost him,” Jeff mumbles. “Thought you could get him back.”
“It’s okay,” Jared says. “Come on, Jeff. One foot in front of the other.” And with the lawyer looking on with distain they exit the building.
A big black car sits by the curb and a smartly dressed driver opens the door for him. Jared wants nothing in the world more than to go straight to Jensen but Jeff is at that fucked-up level of drunkenness where he shouldn’t be allowed to walk across the street by himself. Living like he does it’s too risky that someone he’s stood against could find him for revenge or one of the people he tries to protect would roll him for his shoes.
“Hey,” Jared calls, “Mister Marshall. Can you give me the address of that hotel? I gotta get Jeff somewhere quiet before I go there.”
The man looks perplexed by the situation but he writes out the address on the back of his business card and passes it over along with a crisp hundred dollar bill. “For your cab fare,” he says and Jared can’t imagine thinking so little of a hundred dollars that he’d give it away without at least asking first if it was needed. On the other hand he’s in his scrubs without even a pocket to his name so the cash is more than welcome.
“Thanks,” he says and he walks away with Jeff. It takes a while to get a cab with an inebriated man hanging off his shoulder but one stops with the on-duty light on and Jared may or may not step in front of some guy with a briefcase to drag Jeff inside.
It takes time. It all takes time and Jared feels his patience fraying away like the knees of a ragged old pair of jeans. He needs to get to Jensen but he has to find Jeff a place first. The Watt Street shelter doesn’t have a bed but the guy in charge there knows Jeff and says he can sleep it off in a chair in the back office. Jared thinks that might be a seriously bad idea but he can’t come up with anything better. He just makes sure to tell the guy to have the doors open and a visible way out when Jeff sobers up.
Finding a cab is easier once Jared walks a few blocks to a higher tax bracket.
Mr. Maxwell and his big black car had been a little much. The hotel Jared’s dropped off in front of is even more intimidating. Not some new luxury high-rise, this one is old elegance. Old money. Jared tries to straighten the scrubs he’s still wearing as he goes up to the front desk.
“I’m here to see Mrs. Carr?”
The clerk treats him like he’s invisible as she makes a call on a sleek black phone. “Room 308,” she says when she’s done then gestures towards the elevators.
Jared stops being intimidated by the building and all he can think of is Jensen. How he’s here with strangers who call themselves family and how much they need each other. He knocks on the door and doesn’t see Mackenzie as she opens it. Jensen is his entire world and Jared sees him rushing across the room.
Jensen wraps him in a hug that makes his ribs creak with the tightness of it.
“Why why why?” Jensen whispers against Jared’s neck. “Why gone where? No more. No going Jared. No going.”
And all Jared can do is stroke Jensen's hair and hold him just as tight and murmur nonsensical reassurances to him.
“I’m sorry,” Jared whispers. “I’m sorry. I didn’t want to go. I didn’t. The police made me. They took me.”
“Were you strong?” Jensen asks. “Did you be not scared?”
Jared swallows hard. “I was really scared at first but then I thought about you and how brave you had been and they let me go again.”
They stand together rocking slow and soft. Jensen clings like his life depends on it and Jared can’t find a reason to not do the same. He can imagine how this looks to Jensen's sister. His mother. And fuck it all. He loves Jensen. He loves him enough to fight for him if that’s what they want and he’s not gonna pretend otherwise.
Thanks to Embroiderama for the beta and the bunny.
========
Jared doesn’t come home.
He sleeps with Jensen and wakes up when the alarm wakes him up and goes to work even though his eyes are dark around and his feet slide on the floor like they’re too heavy to lift right. He goes to work and Jensen goes back to sleep and when he wakes up again Jared isn’t home. So Jensen waits and the sun comes up all the way and he eats breakfast and drinks a bottle of water and Jared isn’t home.
The clinic isn’t far and he knows the directions Jared drives and he doesn’t want to be home and alone when Mackenzie comes to see them. He puts another bottle of water in his backpack and some aspirin and a pack of band-aids. He walks to the clinic and Jared’s car is there but he watches through the windows and Jared isn’t.
The people inside that work there look too awake. The moves of their hands are too big and too sharp. Agitated. Jensen wants to know what they know but he never spoke to them before and he doesn’t know if they’ll understand him. Jared says Jensen can go there if he has trouble but he doesn’t have trouble. Jared does.
For fixing trouble Jensen doesn’t know anybody better than Jeff and he walks for the places Jeff goes. The shelters and the kitchens and the bridge and there is no Jeff either.
A yellow car stops beside him as he walks to the next place Jeff might be and he shies away without looking at it.
“Davis!” a girl-voice calls and he doesn’t want it to be Mackenzie but it is. He hears steps running up and turns towards the brick of the building beside him and puts his head against the warm and rough and closes his eyes and doesn’t know what to do without Jared.
“Davis?” Mackenzie says again and another female voice says, “Mac, hush.”
A hand touches his shoulder like a whisper and the lady says, “Jensen? Are you all right?”
He looks at her and wants to drive her away but he wants his Jared more. “Everybody flew away the rabbit hole dream of being not.”
“Shhh,” the older lady says. Older than him. Older than Jeff. Not so old as Whiskey Dan is or Hettie was. “Jared is fine. He can’t come to you right now but he told us to take you somewhere safe while we wait for him. Would that be all right with you? Can you do that for him?”
Jensen looks from Mackenzie to the lady and neither has lies in their eyes. “To wait. For Jared.”
The lady smiles like an angel and holds out her hand for him to take. “I’m Donna Carr. It’s nice to meet you, Jensen.”
============
Jeff watches from the alley as Jared’s led out of the clinic by a uniformed officer and detective big-jaw who had been so hard-up for a witness placing a ‘tall young guy’ at the scene. Didn’t take the asshole long to find someone willing to swear they’d seen Jared.
Jeff figures his timing must have been off on when he beat the guy. No clock and waiting in the dark he’d started too late maybe. After Jared had left work. No alibi and that’s all Jeff’s fault.
Jared looks shell-shocked as they lead him to the squad car. How the cops can believe he’d hurt anybody, even someone as evil as the rat poison guy, is beyond Jeff’s understanding. Just as the officer is helping Jared duck down into the car Jared’s eyes meet Jeff’s. He mouths something that Jeff can’t catch, and then flicks his head in the direction of the apartment building he lives in.
Jensen. Shit. If they’re arresting Jared they’ll be searching his home too. Looking for blood-stained clothes or something belonging to the vic. They’ll be at his door with a search warrant and there’s no way Jensen can deal with that. He’ll freak and they’ll have him in a mental ward in an hour. As much as Jeff wants to keep Jared out of custody he figures Jared can handle it a lot easier than Jensen can.
Jeff hunches his shoulders and shuffles down the sidewalk. As soon as he’s out of sight of the cops he breaks into a ground-eating jog. The five miles to Jared’s place make his chest burn and his legs ache and he berates himself for being so out of shape.
The police beat him there. A CSI team’s Blazer and another squad car are already in the parking lot. He waits because he knows he’ll be more together if he talks to them outside than in but when they come down Jensen isn’t with them.
He walks. Looking for Jensen. Thinking about how to get Jared out of jail and back where he belongs. He asks around and Carlos saw Jensen getting into a cab with two women. Neither one he’d seen before. Jeff doesn’t know if they’re social workers or what but Jensen's beyond his reach for the time being.
Jared could find out though. Where he’s been taken. What’s happened. And even if Jeff hadn’t been the one to do the crime he’d still be tempted to take the fall. For both of them. He has to turn himself in. Has to make sure Jared doesn’t lose everything for his mistake.
He’ll need some courage for that. For facing a cell and a lock and the walls of an eight by eight closing in around him. Couple shots worth or maybe a small bottle. He goes to the people he knows. People he’s never asked for a penny. The girl at the lunch line and Gertie at the shelter. A dollar here, two there. A shining bottle of amber liquid and it burns going down worse than he remembers.
He’s staggering when he gets to the police station. His head three sizes too large and his feet numb and distant from his body. He pulls himself hand over hand up the rail in front and leans heavily on the counter. He stares through the plexiglass at the clerk and takes a deep breath.
“I need t’ turn myself in.”
========
As much as she’d wanted to shelter her mother from the pain and uncertainty of Davis’ condition, Mackenzie is glad to have the older woman at her side when she returns to the broken down apartment he and Jared live in. Their mom doesn’t put up with nonsense and she’ll take control. Take care of Davis and straighten things out with Jared. Donna Carr is a woman who gets what she wants and the determined way she walks up the four flights of stairs does her daughter proud.
They step off the landing and Jared’s door is open. A police officer stands there beside it.
“Here?” Donna asks and Mackenzie nods.
And Donna strides up to the officer like he’s the interloper. “What’s going on here and where’s my son?”
Mackenzie half-listens to the interrogation as she peeks in through the open door. The apartment has been turned upside down. Davis’ accumulated junk is strewn across the floor. The cushions are off of the couch and all the kitchen cabinets have been emptied. She might not exactly like Jared but nobody deserves to have their home trashed like this.
“Mackenzie,” her mother calls, “We’re finished here.” And the two women walk back out the way they came in.
“Jared’s been arrested, apparently.” Donna does not look pleased. “Nobody has seen Davis and there’s no record of someone else living here.”
They step back into the bright spring sunshine and walk across the parking lot to the cab. Mackenzie’s phone rings with an unknown number and she answers it.
“Mackenzie? It’s Jared.” He sounds tense. Scared. “I’ve been arrested. I didn’t do it. I swear to god I didn’t do it. You’ve got to get Jensen. Pick him up and take him somewhere. They have a warrant to search the apartment. He can’t end up in a mental institution, do you understand me? He doesn’t deserve that. He doesn’t need it. Please.” Like she wouldn’t take care of her own brother.
“Jared, he’s not there,” she says. “The police haven’t seen him.”
Jared swears under his breath and Donna reaches for the phone.
“This is Davis’ mother,” she says with the voice of authority. “Where the hell is my son?”
Mackenzie almost feels bad for Jared right then.
Her mother nods to the phone. “Mmhmm. Yes. We’ll look there. Right.” There’s another pause and when she speaks next her voice is gentler. “And where are you? Jared, listen to me very carefully. I’ll have Davis’ lawyer there for you within the hour. Don’t speak to anyone. Don’t explain anything. Don’t tell your side of the story. Do you understand me? Good. We’ll see you very soon.”
They get into the cab and Mac gives the driver directions to just drive around the area and crisscross as much as possible. The car pulls away from the curb and Donna starts making calls.
“Why are you helping him?” Mackenzie asks between calls. She watches out the windows of the cab. Looking for Davis.
“He’s important to my son,” Donna answers and watches out her own side of the car. “If he helped Davis then we owe him our gratitude.” Her voice sinks to a tone Mackenzie hasn’t heard since she first started dating. “And if he hurt my child, any help I give him now can be undone with a phone call.”
======
Being arrested is by far the most frightening experience of Jared’s life. They pick him up at the tail end of his shift at the clinic. He’s in shock as the warrant for his arrest is explained and the cuffs are fastened around his wrists in front of his boss and co-workers and patients. They read him his rights like on television and it’s surreal to hear those words in real life. Officer Hanson watches him like he’s going to enjoy the taste of Jared’s liver and Jared doesn’t even know who it is he’s supposed to have beaten up.
“There’s some--some mistake,” he says as they take him out of the car but nobody listens. He thinks of Jensen at home alone and it just adds despair to his fear. They take his fingerprints and his picture and put him in a room with three chairs and a table.
A long time passes. He’s not sure how long but it seems like forever. He knows from TV that the mirror along the wall must be a window from the other side.
“Hello?” He asks his own reflection. “I just need to make a phone call.”
He can think of only one person who has a phone that can help Jensen now. She might take him away. Jared may never see him again but he’ll know Jensen is safe and loved and cared for which is more than he can hope for if Jensen ends up in police custody or in a mental hospital.
He talks to the glass and paces the room. The cuffs chafe and he needs to take a piss. He knows they’re letting him work himself up. Anticipation doing more to get through his defenses than questions would at this point. He knows it and still he can’t stop himself from getting more and more worried.
When the door opens and Hanson steps in it almost comes as a relief.
“So,” the big man smirks, “You just had to take the law into your own hands.”
And somehow seeing that smug grin turns all the fear and worry Jared had into pure stubborn anger.
“I want my phone call,” he says. He feels himself center down and in. Fuck this guy. He can wait. He can trust whoever is on the other side of the mirror to keep him from getting hit. He can outlast Hanson until he gets his call and that’s all there is to it.
“Lemme guess. You found the guy. Figured the law wasn’t going to make things happen your way so you beat him up. Am I right? You know what? I can almost respect that. Giving the bastard what he deserves.”
Jared has no clue what the hell he’s talking about but to say so would be contrary to his master plan. “I want my phone call,” he repeats. Slower this time.
Hanson blusters and bangs his palms on the table. He yells in Jared’s face and tries sweet-talking him. Another cop comes in and tries to cajole a confession out of him. And if they had enough evidence why would they even need that?
“I want my phone call,” he tells the new cop, meeting his dark eyes without flinching. “I want my phone call and I want it now.”
Hanson makes a disgusted noise but they bring him a phone and get Mackenzie’s number off of his for him.
Jared can’t remember having a more nerve-wracking phone call in his life. Jensen missing. Mrs. Carr promising him a lawyer. He isn’t sure he believes her but he has nothing to lose at this point. He tells Hanson he’s not talking until his attorney gets there and he’s put into a holding cell with five guys--one of whom he stitched up after a knife fight. He never thought of himself as a man with friends in low places but he feels safer in the cell than he had in the interview room.
He has no way to tell what time it is but a while later the door at the end of the hall opens and Hanson escorts a sharp-dressed little man up to the bars.
“Mr. Padalecki?” he asks and Jared steps up.
“That’s me.”
“Edgar Marshall,” the other man says by way of introduction. He never smiles even when he says, “The District Attorney has reconsidered the prosecution of this case and you are released on your own recognizance until such time as they have some definitive evidence against you.”
Jared rocks back on his heels. “That--I can go?”
Hanson unlocks the door. “I’ll be watching you,” he threatens low and dark.
“And I’ll be very pleased to handle the suit for police harassment,” says Edgar and Jared thinks that sharp glint in his eye is as close to a smile as he’ll ever get.
Jared feels underdressed next to his lawyer but he guesses everybody does when they come out of jail.
“Mrs. Carr has asked me to inform you that her son has been located and awaits your company. If you would like to share a car my driver can drop you at her hotel on the way to my residence.”
Jared blinks and puzzles that out. “Uh, sure. If it’s no problem.”
They walk out through the front lobby and a slurred and familiar voice catches his attention. Jeff leans against the front desk arguing with the sergeant on duty. “Turn myself in,” he’s saying. “Did it. He deserved it.”
“Go sleep it off somewhere else,” the haggard officer tells him. “We got better things to do with our budget than give three hots and a cot to your type. Go on. Go bug somebody else.”
And Jared grabs his arm and forces a smile. “Come on Jeff. Let’s get you out of these nice people’s way.” He’s still wearing his scrubs so he gives an apologetic shrug to the face of authority and hustles Jeff out the front door.
Jeff stumbles and clings to Jared’s arm and Jared hates to see the strong man in this condition. “Lost him,” Jeff mumbles. “Thought you could get him back.”
“It’s okay,” Jared says. “Come on, Jeff. One foot in front of the other.” And with the lawyer looking on with distain they exit the building.
A big black car sits by the curb and a smartly dressed driver opens the door for him. Jared wants nothing in the world more than to go straight to Jensen but Jeff is at that fucked-up level of drunkenness where he shouldn’t be allowed to walk across the street by himself. Living like he does it’s too risky that someone he’s stood against could find him for revenge or one of the people he tries to protect would roll him for his shoes.
“Hey,” Jared calls, “Mister Marshall. Can you give me the address of that hotel? I gotta get Jeff somewhere quiet before I go there.”
The man looks perplexed by the situation but he writes out the address on the back of his business card and passes it over along with a crisp hundred dollar bill. “For your cab fare,” he says and Jared can’t imagine thinking so little of a hundred dollars that he’d give it away without at least asking first if it was needed. On the other hand he’s in his scrubs without even a pocket to his name so the cash is more than welcome.
“Thanks,” he says and he walks away with Jeff. It takes a while to get a cab with an inebriated man hanging off his shoulder but one stops with the on-duty light on and Jared may or may not step in front of some guy with a briefcase to drag Jeff inside.
It takes time. It all takes time and Jared feels his patience fraying away like the knees of a ragged old pair of jeans. He needs to get to Jensen but he has to find Jeff a place first. The Watt Street shelter doesn’t have a bed but the guy in charge there knows Jeff and says he can sleep it off in a chair in the back office. Jared thinks that might be a seriously bad idea but he can’t come up with anything better. He just makes sure to tell the guy to have the doors open and a visible way out when Jeff sobers up.
Finding a cab is easier once Jared walks a few blocks to a higher tax bracket.
Mr. Maxwell and his big black car had been a little much. The hotel Jared’s dropped off in front of is even more intimidating. Not some new luxury high-rise, this one is old elegance. Old money. Jared tries to straighten the scrubs he’s still wearing as he goes up to the front desk.
“I’m here to see Mrs. Carr?”
The clerk treats him like he’s invisible as she makes a call on a sleek black phone. “Room 308,” she says when she’s done then gestures towards the elevators.
Jared stops being intimidated by the building and all he can think of is Jensen. How he’s here with strangers who call themselves family and how much they need each other. He knocks on the door and doesn’t see Mackenzie as she opens it. Jensen is his entire world and Jared sees him rushing across the room.
Jensen wraps him in a hug that makes his ribs creak with the tightness of it.
“Why why why?” Jensen whispers against Jared’s neck. “Why gone where? No more. No going Jared. No going.”
And all Jared can do is stroke Jensen's hair and hold him just as tight and murmur nonsensical reassurances to him.
“I’m sorry,” Jared whispers. “I’m sorry. I didn’t want to go. I didn’t. The police made me. They took me.”
“Were you strong?” Jensen asks. “Did you be not scared?”
Jared swallows hard. “I was really scared at first but then I thought about you and how brave you had been and they let me go again.”
They stand together rocking slow and soft. Jensen clings like his life depends on it and Jared can’t find a reason to not do the same. He can imagine how this looks to Jensen's sister. His mother. And fuck it all. He loves Jensen. He loves him enough to fight for him if that’s what they want and he’s not gonna pretend otherwise.
