Chapter Text
“Nathan?!”
At the sound of Allison’s voice, the new director of Global Dynamics turned from where he’d been giving orders to Fargo. The moment of truth.
“Allison! I probably should have called, shouldn’t I?” Peripherally he noticed a blonde woman standing behind Allison, but his attention was almost entirely focused on drinking in the form of his wife. She looked as stunning as ever. She also seemed irritated.
It was the faint choking noise from the blonde woman that finally drew his concentration away. Slightly tall for a woman, her khaki uniform and star clearly marked her as part of Eureka’s sheriff’s department. He didn’t remember anyone on staff besides Cobb and Lupo before he left, but nevertheless her face was bombarding him with a strong sense of déjà vu. Judging by the stunned look in her blue eyes, he wasn’t the only one.
Luckily, Allison saved him from racking his curiosity for too long.
“This is Jackie Carter, Eureka’s new sheriff.”
Nathan shook her hand a little numbly. Jackie Carter. He remembered her now – from an ill-advised trip to Baja over sixteen years ago. He had been in grad school at the time, and his lab-mates had talked him into the trip. It was the only time he could remember laughing during intercourse without it breaking the mood. The only time, actually, where sex had been diverting in the sense of amusement as well as pleasure.
Well, shit. A former one-night stand moving to town was not what he needed while he was trying to win back his estranged wife. (In other circumstances he might have entertained the thought of a repeat performance, honestly, but Allison and Kevin were his family and he wasn’t willing to give up those dreams without a fight. It was why he had returned to Eureka after all.)
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Despite his better judgement, Nathan found himself scanning through the files for one Jacqueline Carter later that day. Beneath her personal records (married, divorced, teenage daughter), he sought out her service records. He had a faint memory of her mentioning the Police Academy on that night sixteen years ago, and according to her file she must have been just shy of graduating at the time. After a few years with the L.A.P.D., she then spent over a decade with the U.S. Marshals. Those classified files which he was able to access contained a wealth of information about her past experience and skillset. If she were anyone else, he would simply nod to himself that the new sheriff seemed relatively qualified for the position and leave it at that. Unfortunately, she was not anyone else and he was still uncomfortable with this blast from the past occurring concurrently with his attempts to reconcile with Allison.
He scanned through the files again, with the itchy feeling that he was missing something. At least Carter had been content to remain professional and not make a scene. He hoped that they could both simply continue to ignore that moment of recognition and pretend none of any of it had ever happened. With that decided, Nathan closed all the files and forcibly turned his mind back to catching up on everything he’d missed during the last year.
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Nathan was working late in his office a few days later when he heard someone knocking on his door. Having finally resolved the whole Walter Perkins situation safely, he had hoped to continue reacquainting himself with all of G.D.’s current projects.
When Sheriff Carter entered and closed the door behind her, he sighed irritably. Apparently, his wish for silence was not going to be accommodated for long. This was corroborated as she immediately launched into asking about his memories of that night.
“Yes, I remember it.” He cut her off brusquely, not wanting to reminisce about that night so many years ago.
“Yeah, good. I mean, okay, maybe not, and I’m sorry for making things awkward or difficult or whatever, especially with Allison, but you’ll probably figure it out sooner or later, if you haven’t already, and really I should be the one to tell you...”
The blonde woman was fidgeting nervously, and he simply did not want to deal with whatever this was. Allison was still stonewalling him, and he didn’t need another complication in the form of a babbling sheriff.
“Is there a point you are intending to make? I’m a busy man and I have work to do.” He felt a little guilty when she actually flinched at his response, but not enough to regret hurrying the conversation along.
“I have a daughter.”
Nathan just stared at her blankly; it’s not like that wasn’t common knowledge. He’d seen it listed in her personnel file right below her former marriage and divorce, and he’d caught a glimpse of mother and daughter together in town a few times.
“A fifteen-year-old daughter.” Pause. “Your daughter.”
His… Nathan wasn’t sure his brain had ever just stopped before. Thoughts raced through his head and simultaneously crashed to a dead halt. Sixteen years ago… Daughter… Holy shit… Baja…Shitshitshitshit.
It was fortunate that Carter was giving him the chance to digest the information, because he wasn’t sure he’d have heard anything if she’d continued at that moment. He had a million questions, but the most pressing one escaped first. “What makes you think she’s mine?”
He thought she might be insulted, but she just smiled self-consciously. “Well, you were the only person it could have been time-wise, but it’s not like I’ve really ever been able to check. Especially since I wasn’t able to locate you after I found out, which I’m sorry for by the way.” Rather than dwelling on that point however (he’d lost fifteen years with his daughter), she reached into her pocket and pulled out a plastic baggie with some strands of blonde hair. “From Zoe’s hairbrush. I figured you’d probably want to run your own tests.”
She placed the baggie on his desk, and he simply stared at it but didn’t reach out to pick it up. Carter sighed. “Right, I’ll just let you process everything. You know where to find me if you want to talk.”
The sheriff was almost to the door before he finally managed to convince his brain and mouth to work together again. “Does she know?”
“No.” She looked over her shoulder at him. “Whether or not I ever tell her is up to you. Now, go run your tests.” Then she was gone.
He unclenched his hands from where they’d apparently been gripping the edge of his desk and stared once more at the pale hairs in front of him. He ruminated on Carter’s penultimate words; she had left him an out. He could ignore this and pretend he’d never found out, and nothing would change – but he knew he could never do that. He had a daughter. He'd have to talk to Jackie about child support, college funds, custody arrangements... but he was getting ahead of himself. First, he had to run those tests and be absolutely sure. Maybe then the shock would have worn off enough for him to decide what he was going to do next.
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Later that evening, he regarded the positive DNA match in front of him and felt the curl of hysteria rise up in him again. Jackie had been right though; he should have figured it out immediately. There were so many signs he should have picked up on. Most damning, of course, was her age and birthdate, but there was also the fact that Zoe used her mother’s last name and not the name of Jackie Carter’s ex-husband. Had there been any visual cues he had missed – did she inherit any of his facial features? He’d never looked at Zoe closely enough to notice, and now he was desperately wishing he had. His sole comfort was that he hoped to have many more opportunities in the future.