Chapter Text
“Knock, knock.”
Nolan stands at the doorway as Celina curiously peeks from behind, both idling from the other end as they wait in the hallway before Genny motions them to come in.
“How are you feeling?” he asks them.
“Fine.”
“We’ve been better.”
They respond in unison as Genny shoots him a deadpan stare.
“We made it out of there!” he protests at her reaction.
“You’re waiting for a CT scan,” she shoots back.
“Because no one seemed to believe me when I said I was fine.”
“You ended up with stitches!”
“Butterfly stitches, that’s not even a stitch!”
“You’re impossible!”
“I’m impossible? Are you guys hearing this?!” he asks the pair of officers.
Celina hands shoot up as she shakes her head, refusing to provide an actual response or take a side (smart, boot); while Nolan ends up taking the wrong side because of course he would.
“Better safe than sorry,” he offers.
Tim rolls his eyes, knowing he should have known better than to ask either of them for an opinion … which inadvertently proves Genny’s point (not that he’ll admit it) because if he was in his right mind, he would have known better than to ask for their two cents.
“This is pointless,” he grumbles, “and a waste of money! I’m fine. It’s just a concussion, nothing new. I’ve dealt with worse.”
“Like spinal surgery?” she rebuttals as Tim immediately regrets his answer.
“Sounds like they should get you into some frequent flyer program,” Angela quips as she appears by the door next to Nyla with Grey following behind. “Y’know, tenth visit’s free or something like that.”
He glares at his best friend as the trio steps inside while they all reconfigure to fit in the small room. Nolan and Celina step to stand beside Genny’s chair at the side of the bed as Grey stands across from them while Angela and Nyla stay at the foot of his bed.
“You’re not funny.”
“No,” Nyla disagrees, “she’s hilarious.”
Laughter fills the air as Tim sulks in response, crossing his arms against his chest as he makes his annoyance to their teasing dramatically obvious.
“No but in all seriousness, we’re glad you’re okay,” Angela adds after a moment once the laughter dies down, “you really had us worried.”
“Thanks,” Tim mumbles, feeling a little guilty at the annoyance despite standing firm in his belief of not needing to get further checked out. He’d rather be out knocking down doors and chasing leads after everything they went through to catch the guys instead of being bound to a hospital bed.
“How are you feeling?” she asks as the first four smirk at the question.
Angela’s gaze shifts toward them for a moment skeptically before she looks back at Tim.
“I’m fine.”
She turns toward Genny with an arched brow.
“The doctor said he has a concussion. They want to rule out any internal bleeding before discharging him and he’s been whining about it this entire time.”
“I have not!”
Both women turn to him.
He huffs in response before they turn back to one another.
“Don’t you have two kids to go pick up?” he deflects.
“Don’t change the subject,” she scolds him, taking a beat before worryingly adding, “yes.”
“Ready whenever you are,” Nolan jumps in.
She nods, “Thanks again for giving me a ride.”
“Don’t mention it,” he smiles.
“Are you sure it’s okay for me to leave you?” she turns back to Tim concerned, “I can tell them to head home with Blake and pick them up later.”
“No. Go,” he encourages her, “it’s been enough of a day as it is, you should be with them. I’ll be fine. Promise.”
Genny’s skeptical gaze locks onto Tim as he stares back at her trying to reassure her with a pointed look.
“Don’t worry,” Angela eases her with a pat on the shoulder, “we’ll make sure he gets home in one piece – we promise to call you with any updates. Although it might just be to complain about how stubborn your brother is.”
“I’m afraid I won’t be much help there,” Genny laughs, “he doesn't like to listen to me either.”
“We know,” Angela smirks as she turns to him, her smiling turning a little more suspicious as he catches the flicker of mischief in her eyes. “Lucky for us, there’s someone who he does actually listen to who should be arriving soon.”
Lucy.
No one verbally acknowledges it but the amused grins they all seem to share speaks for them.
“Good to know he’s in good hands,” Genny answers after a second. “We’ll head over to your place once I get the boys, okay? Listen to what the doctor has to say and stop arguing with everyone else,” she reminds him.
“Genny, you don’t have to do that,” he protests.
“What did she literally just say, Bradford?” Nyla scolds him.
Tim glares at her before turning back to his sister. “I’m serious. I’m fine. Go spend time with your kids, they need you.”
“So do you,” she shoots back, “and you shouldn’t go home to an empty house.”
“She’s right you know,” Grey quips.
“Fine,” Tim huffs before adding, “thank you.”
“Any time, big brother,” she smiles as she leans in for a quick hug, carefully leaning into the uninjured side of his face, “I love you.”
“Me too,” he answers.
“Aww,” Angela coos, “he has a heart after all.”
“Shut up,” he grumbles at her.
Angela smirks as Genny just smiles, saying goodbye to everyone else before Grey instructs Nolan and Celina on what to do after they drop the three off at Tim’s, and they all head out.
“So where are we?” Tim asks almost immediately after Genny, Nolan, and Celina leave.
“Garza and his team remained at the scene along with SWAT and Metro while patrol and the detectives ended up here taking statements. Almost everyone has been discharged except for you and a few other hostages,” Grey loops him in.
“What about the robbers?” he asks.
“Dead,” Nyla answers.
“What?”’
“They blew themselves up,” Angela explains.
“What? How? That’s not possible, those were trained professionals. These guys knew what they were doing.”
Angela shrugs, “Morgue’s working through an assortment of body parts.”
“Our working theory is that the C4 was part of their exit strategy, the bus was part of the ruse to throw us off. Seems like the bank was built on top of the old subway tunnel and they were trying to use it to get out without getting caught, which could have worked if they hadn’t triggered the explosion before they were able to take cover,” Grey adds.
Which would make sense if they’d been dealing with a bunch of amateurs but Tim knows they were anything but. There’s still something missing.
There’s a sudden knock at the door that pulls him from exploring that train of thought any further as the one person who’d been missing finally arrives.
Relief washes over him as Lucy stands in the middle of the doorway, his pulse speeding as he can’t help but smile softly at her.
“Hi,” she greets him shyly.
“Hi.”
For a second everyone else disappears as he takes her in. There’s so much he wants to say to her, he needs to say to her, while still having no idea where to start. Fortunately, or maybe unfortunately for him, the spell is broken once Grey speaks up.
“Glad you were able to finally join us, Officer Chen.”
“Thank you, sir,” she nods, taking it as her cue to step inside as she ends up next to Tim’s bedside, across to where the other three stand.
“How was the debrief with the Hostage Team?”
“As well as could be expected,” she answers with a wry smile, “although once Captain Fitzpatrick was done scolding me, she said she’d be keeping an eye on me for when promotions come.”
“As she should,” Tim smiles, unable to hide how proud he is.
“He’s right,” Nyla agrees as Grey nods.
“None of what you did today was easy and you held your own. At least until you threatened to storm in there and shoot him,” Angela adds with a teasing lilt.
Lucy cheeks flush as her gaze drops to the floor with a terse nod while Tim turns to glare at his best friend and she responds with a wink.
“You did good today, Chen,” Grey jumps in.
“Enjoy the win,” Angela says to her in a more sincere tone.
“We got lucky. Things could have ended very differently,” Nyla points out.
The room grows quiet as they sit with this uncomfortable truth. There were so many moments where something could have easily gone wrong. By some miracle luck seemed to be on their side today.
“So where does this leave us?” he asks.
“With more questions than answers,” Lucy sighs, “are you looped in yet?”
Tim shoots a glance toward the three at the other side of his bed before looking back at her, “Just that the robbers are dead.”
She nods, “Everyone keeps insisting that it’s an open and shut case …”
“You don’t agree?” Grey asks.
“No. It doesn’t make sense. They wouldn’t have made a mistake like that.”
“That’s exactly what Tim said,” Angela and Nyla point out in unison.
“So you both think there’s more to it?”
They nod.
“Say more.”
“We know the robbery was as much of a distraction as the ask for the bus was. They needed to create a hostage situation to buy themselves enough time to do whatever it is they were after. Then the bus getting stuck in traffic ended up giving them even more time to plan their escape. Every threat was a bluff. If they had really planned to shoot someone, they would’ve. Shepherd kept making demands and spewing out threats but it was all a bluff to keep everyone in check. Not once did he sound nervous or afraid like they were cornered despite being completely surrounded. He was cocky and arrogant, he knew we’d never be able to catch up to them; they were always three steps ahead of us.”
“But then something didn’t go as planned.”
“Exactly,” she agrees. “How is it that everything was executed perfectly except for their exit strategy? They knew better than to screw up something like that.”
“Which leaves us with the million dollar question of what was so special about that safety deposit box and why did the explosion go off prematurely,” Tim adds.
“I think we need to solve one mystery first before moving onto the next,” Nyla points out.
“Agreed,” Grey nods.
“Do we have any updates with the safety deposit box?”
“Nothing helpful,” Angela sighs, “SFPD tried to deliver the death notification but no one was home. They talked to a neighbor who said he hadn’t been home in weeks. Said he does a lot of business overseas and it’s possible he might not be in the country.”
“We’ve called the son in law but keep getting his voicemail. We have Aaron at the station trying to track down any potential business associate that could help us get in touch with him but nothing so far,” Nyla explains.
“Wait, back up,” Tim stops them before they dive deeper into the discussion, “who?”
“We looked into the safety deposit box number you gave us – which, thank you by the way,” Angela grins, “it led us to identifying its owner, a retired couple from Arlington Heights.”
Nyla pulls up her phone to show him different pictures of what they’ve been able to build out and make sense of so far. “Maryanne and Edgar Flores,” she swipes through both their driver’s license pictures, “except Edgar died five years ago and security footage shows an unidentified man accessing the safety deposit box twice a month along with Maryanne.” She plays a few short clips for him which show the mystery man accessing the box. “Once we figured that out, we sent Nolan and Celina to bring Maryanne down to the station for questioning which was when they stumbled onto a murder.”
“Murder?” he asks.
“Maryanne had been killed. A single shot to the chest.”
“Which only adds to our list of mysteries,” Lucy softly teases.
“Any leads there?” he asks.
“Only that whatever’s in that box might be the reason she was killed.”
“Which has been practically impossible,” Nyla groans, “she had a daughter, Nora, who died a year ago alongside her two kids. Her only next of kin is Nora’s widow who we can’t reach.” She swipes through their pictures to continue to show him as she explains.
His eyes widen in disbelief, “That’s the son-in-law?” He already knows the answer despite the need to double check.
“Yeah. Josiah Hargrove, forty-seven, moved to San Francisco after the passing of his wife and kids.”
He doesn’t answer, instead he takes the phone from Nyla. “Lucy,” he says as he shows her the screen.
“No,” she responds, “that’s not – that’s the son-in-law?”
“Yes,” Angela answers looking at both of them confused, “what’s with the twenty questions?”
“Guys, that’s the hostage I brought out. That’s Robert DiLaurent.”
“What?!” Now it’s all three of them that look at the pair with a bewildered expression.
“Oh, god,” Angela starts to make a call before anyone else is able to respond. “Hello, yes, this is Detective Angela Lopez, LAPD. I’m calling to check in on a patient, he was brought in from the bank robbery. Robert DiLaurent.” The woman on the other end answers but not loud enough for him to make out what she’s saying, just that it seems to be a long winded explanation. “What? When did that happen? Okay. Thank you.”
All eyes turn to Angela who mutters an “hijo de puta” under her breath. “He left almost immediately after being brought in. They had just placed him into a room when an incoming trauma pulled the nurse doing his intake away. She stepped away for only a minute but when she came back, he was gone.”
“The missing piece,” Lucy whispers.
“Robert – Joshiah, he was behind the entire thing,” Tim reflects, “he orchestrated the entire thing.”
“Ready Mr. Bradford?” Two technicians stand at the door, cutting the discovery short. He’s ready to argue and ask for them to come back in order to continue working the case before Lucy beats him to it.
“He’s ready.”
Which unfortunately for him, she’s the only one he can’t bring himself to argue with. At least not today, not after everything she had to deal with because he was bored at the bank and decided to give her a call.
“This won’t take long,” one of them assures him, likely sensing the tension etched onto his face.
“We’ll be right here when you get back,” Lucy promises and somehow that makes it better.
True to her word, they’re all still there once Tim’s wheeled back into his room. Lucy and Grey sit next to each other in the set against the wall as Nyla and Angela stand near the door. They all look worse for wear than when he left them no more than fifteen minutes ago.
“What?” he asks once the technicians leave.
“Aaron called with an update,” Angela starts.
“Okay …”
“Turns out your fake hostage works for a company that supplies military contracts to special operation teams around the world. He’d been sent on an assignment at the beginning of the month that had him traveling across Europe but according to his boss, he came back two weeks early and went out unexpectedly; said it was a family emergency.”
“Except they’re all dead,” Grey adds.
“No,” Tim pushes back, simmering on new information, “I don’t think they are. Right before he faked the panic attack, he mentioned he had a family to get back to – he didn’t say anything about a wife but he said he had two kids. Lucas and Piper, eight and five. He talked about them like they were still alive.”
“That’s–” Nyla trails off as she clicks through her phone, swiping through a few things before zooming in. “Tim’s right,” she agrees as she twists her hand to show them the screen, “the police report shows Lucas as six and Piper as four.”
“They’re still alive and he knows it,” Tim assures.
“How is that possible?” Grey asks, puzzled.
“They never recovered any of their bodies.”
“Nyla, have Aaron–”
“Already on it, sir,” she interrupts, “I just texted him to pull any file related to Nora Hargrove. He’s sending them to all of us now.”
A domino of dings fill the room as one phone goes off after another with the files Aaron sent their way. Lucy leans over to hover beside Tim to have him see off of her screen as they all take a moment to go through what was just sent to them.
“Oh my god,” Lucy whispers.
“The system failed her,” Tim mutters, “every single report shows signs of domestic abuse and no one did anything.”
“This last one,” Angela starts, “five months before the accident, she finally reported the abuse only to be the one who ended up in handcuffs.”
“That bastard had her terrified enough to lie time and time again – a fall down the stairs, cut while washing the dishes, accidentally slamming the car door on herself. Every time he hurt her, she claimed it was an accident. Everyone knew; there’s calls from the neighbors, a social worker from the kid’s school, even a few “misdials” from their own home but he had the money and connections to make it all go away.” Nyla points out.
“They were never going to escape him so she disappeared instead.”
“She had to walk away from everything and everyone in order to do that,” Lucy frowns as that heartbreaking train of thought seems to lead her to something else, “but she couldn’t. Not everyone.”
“Maryanne,” Tim finishes for her.
She nods, “The safety deposit box, Maryanne’s murder, Hargrove inserting himself into the robbery as a hostage … it all connects back to Nora.”
“That’s how they communicated with each other,” Tim begins to explain, remembering what he’d seen as the robbers went through the safety deposit box, “I saw them going through that box, all it had were letters and photos. It didn’t make sense at the time but if they couldn’t say goodbye to each other and they couldn’t risk meeting up then this would have been the perfect alternative.”
“An extra secure mailbox,” Lucy quips.
“Except Hargrove found out.”
Nyla nods, “Josiah must have suspected that they faked their deaths and knew Maryanne would be the key to lead him to them. He must have tailed her and realized that the mystery man she kept meeting with twice a month was a middle man who brought him here.”
“So then what happened?” Grey asks.
“Hargrove had to have found out about the box and he killed Maryanne for the key,” Angela suggests.
“You don’t think the mystery man would have kept it?” he asks.
“No,” she answers, “it was the only physical item she could hold onto that aside from the letters and photos that made Nora and her grandkids feel close, she would have been the one to hold onto it.”
“Which brings us to the bank robbery,” Angela adds as they begin to bridge one answered mystery to another, “Maryanne took the box number to her grave, there’s no way in hell she would have told him what box it was which meant he couldn’t just walk into the bank and ask to test them all out.”
"That’s why they needed to stage the bank robbery – which confirms our working theory of it being a diversion for something else – he was trying to find Nora and the kids,” Nyla frowns.
“And he did,” Lucy answers with a nervous gaze, “those letters and pictures are going to lead him straight to them. There’s no way he’s not headed to them right now and we know what he’s going to do once he finds them.”
Kill Nora and take the kids. No one says it but the panicked expression between the group confirms how they share the same thought.
“We need to find the middle man,” Tim points out, “Hargrove might have the letters and pictures but whoever was accessing the box has to know where they’re hiding.”
“Do we have anything that might help narrow down who this is?” asks Grey.
Angela heads over to the whiteboard, taking a picture of what the nurse had written down before erasing it and writing down ‘Latino, 60’s, male’. “Aside from passing as Maryanne’s late husband, what else do we know or can rule out?”
“It couldn’t have been someone close to them,” Lucy points out.
“Which rules out neighbors, friends, co-workers,” Angela agrees as she writes ‘stranger?’ below the description.
“But it also had to be someone they felt they could trust,” adds Nyla.
Angela nods as she erases what she’d just written and rewrites it as ‘trustworthy “stranger”’.
“Is it possible one of them made payments to this man?”
She adds a dollar sign under the second line.
“Despite what happened, they really were careful so if they were paying someone, it would have been in cash. They wouldn’t have risked leaving a paper trail knowing Hargrove could use it as a way to track them down,” Tim says.
“Which leaves us looking for a needle in a haystack,” Nyla huffs frustrated.
“Not exactly,” Lucy objects, “I remember looking through files the feds pulled in between the calls with Shepherd. One of them was a deep dive on Nora. There was a bank statement that stood out; a few months before their supposed deaths, she started making monthly donations to the church that held their funeral services.”
“Who better to trust than a priest?”
“Do you remember what church?”
“Our Lady of Guadalupe.”
“Wait,” Angela does a double take, “that’s Damian’s church.” She exchanges a glance with Nyla before turning to Grey.
“Do you think he’ll help us figure out what priest we need to speak to?”
“Absolutely.”
“Go,” he instructs the detectives, “I’ll loop Garza, Fitzpatrick, and Pine in. We’ll have everyone ready to move once you have the address.”
The women rush out as Angela places out another call. Tim manages to hear her say her brother’s name as the call connects before he loses sight of both of them.
“I need to go make some calls,” Grey explains as he points toward Lucy, “you, stay with him. Angela promised Genny that someone would be here to keep an eye on him and I don’t trust he won’t try to leave before he’s actually discharged.”
“Sir,” Tim protests as Lucy chuckles softly.
“Bradford, I have enough on my plate without you trying to run back on shift. Take the time off and have Chen drive you home once they give you the all clear,” he commands, “Chen, call his sister with any updates, she’ll be waiting for him at his house. Clock out once you drop him off. It’s been a day. We’ll let you know what happens but for now, we have more than enough people on this.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Thank you.”
“We’ll find them,” he reassures them before stepping out and disappearing into the hallway.
Suddenly, for the first time in what seems like forever, it’s just him and Lucy. Which is exactly what he’d wished for while being trapped inside of the bank and yet, the sudden heaviness that fills the room leaves him at a loss for the right words.
It doesn’t feel like the time or place to bring any of it up but then he’d promise himself to come clean if he’d gotten the chance to do so; and he will, when the time is right. Confessing his feelings, the complexity of everything that’s plagued him since that day in her living room isn’t something for him to reveal in such a stale room under harsh fluorescent lights. He doesn’t want to risk being interrupted, not when there’s so much he needs to say.
So he saves that conversation in his back pocket as he steals a tentative glance at her. He’s not surprised to find her staring right back at him with a similar look of relief and gratitude.
“Hey, Lucy?”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks.”
“For what? Doing my job.”
His gaze grows softer as he takes her in, a beat passing between them before he answers. He shakes his head with a smile, “For saving my life.”