Reading Time: 148 Minutes

Title: The Burden of Decisions
Series: The Weight of Actions
Series Order: 1
Author: Bythia
Fandom: 9-1-1
Genre: Episode Related, Family
Relationship(s): Evan “Buck” Buckley/Eddie Diaz, Evan “Buck” Buckley/Taylor Kelly
Content Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Discussion of Canon Domestic Violence, Discussion of Post-Partum Depression, not Chimney friendly
Author Note: This story was mostly finished before 5B aired, and except for a name I didn’t include any additional information we got with 5B. But because canon brought it up: there is no cheating involved despite the two parings tagged. Besides my artist and my beta reader, I would also like to thank AngelNDarkness for her help in figuring out some of the legal procedures and consequences discussed in the story.
Beta: starlitenite
Word Count: 106,000
Summary: When Chimney shows up at Buck’s apartment, he doesn’t notice Taylor standing at the top of the stairs and witnessing the argument and the punch. Her decision on how to handle the situation after Chimney left changes the course for all of them.
Artist: Twigen

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Chapter 09

“Probie?” Buck called out, a bit exasperated that Ravi seemed to have vanished when Buck had only turned around for a moment. He hurried up the stairs to the loft, the chainsaw nearly forgotten in his hands. He had told Ravi to wait for him when they had left the locker room together after cleaning up from their last call, but when Buck had returned from the storage room Ravi had vanished.

“What are you up to now, Buck?” Hen asked, putting her book down in her lap.

The usual light teasing in her voice had taken on a harsher edge for the entirety of this shift, aimed not just at Buck but also at Eddie who was partnered with her for the day. Buck tried to ignore her, tried to not let their personal differences about Chimney affect their work environment.

“Have you seen Ravi?” Buck asked.

Hen’s gaze dropped to the chainsaw. “You after his head or something? What has he done now to anger you?”

Buck rolled his eyes. “I’ll take that as a no. Thanks for the help.”

He walked past her and ignored whatever she muttered under her breath. Buck wasn’t used to this kind of passive-aggressive behavior from her, and he hoped she would get a grip on herself soon. Hen had always been the calm one on their shift, the person who mediated whenever there was a fight, and it hurt that she wasn’t able to be impartial this time as well.

Just as Buck reached the kitchen, Ravi stood up from behind the island, holding a bag of nut mix and chewing. He froze wide-eyed when he saw Buck approaching.

Buck raised his brows. “You’ll regret that snack when Bobby serves dinner and you aren’t as hungry as you wish you could be to savor his meal.” He raised the chainsaw. “You know how to take this apart?”

Ravi shook his head, hurriedly swallowing. “No.”

“Then we have a date in the workshop. Bring your nuts with you.”

Ravi nodded and followed Buck down the stairs. “How often are we called to accidents with chainsaws?”

“Often enough that you need to get a handle on your stomach and that we are required to know how to take them apart without having to even think about it,” Buck said. “Everyone is required to train in how to take apart a chainsaw twice a year. I’m surprised you hadn’t learned that with B shift yet. It also wouldn’t be a bad idea to know how to use it safely during rescues.”

Ravi sighed. “I’m sure you already figured out that there were a couple of problems with my training on B shift.”

“Yeah. You’ve been a probie for almost a year, and I haven’t heard anything about it ending soon. Is that the reason you changed shifts? Was there a problem with B shift?”

Ravi shrugged and sat down on the stool beside the workbench. “Partly. Although, it’s not the fault of any single person. When I started Johanson was responsible for my training, and that started out really well.”

Buck frowned and put the chainsaw down. “Johanson transferred to the Chief’s office and a desk job eight months ago after she learned about her pregnancy. Who took over for her?”

“No one?” Ravi shrugged and stared down at the floor. “It was just a lot of chaos in those eight months, you know? Captain Reynolds promised to sort it out, but then she was on medical leave herself. Munoz took over for her during that time, and I asked him twice, but he never assigned anyone. I hesitated to ask again when Reynolds came back, especially since everyone had started to take over a little bit of my training at times. And I did as much reading as I could in my own time. And then the sniper came around and everything was chaos again. It just somehow slipped all of our minds, and I haven’t learned even half of what I should have learned.”

Buck made a face. He suddenly had a much better idea why Ravi had asked him for advice and training during the blackout, and why Ravi hadn’t found the time to read the emergency protocol even once despite being a firefighter for almost a year. “Something like that shouldn’t happen; I’m sorry you had that much bad luck.”

“So, taking apart the chainsaw?” Ravi asked.

Buck grinned. “In most cases, what we need to do on a scene is to separate the blade from the engine. We never remove the blade from the wound, but it’s a lot easier to stabilize the blade and to transport the patient if it’s just the blade we have to deal with.”

Ravi nodded slowly. “Don’t ever remove any objects from a wound, keep the blood in the patient, keep the blood flowing. Everything else can be taken care of in the hospital. But the patient has to be alive for the doctors there to be able to repair anything and they need their blood to stay alive.”

“Exactly!” Buck agreed. “Taking apart a chainsaw stuck in a patient is a two-person job. One will stabilize the blade in the wound so that we don’t cause more damage, and the other removes the blade from the motor block. Though it’s usually not so clear cut. During our call out earlier, Bobby stabilized the saw while I was loosening the screws, and then I took over holding the blade in place while Bobby removed the rest. But before we train to take it apart when it’s stuck somewhere, you’ll learn how to take it apart on your own.”

Ravi eyed the chainsaw skeptically. “I’ve never even used one.”

“Lucky you,” Buck muttered. “These things are dangerous to handle, and most of the accidents with them we are called out to occurred because some homeowner bought one and never even let anyone explain to them how they work or what safety measures they should take. The first step is to make sure the safety is on before you start on the screws. You don’t want to make the injury worse by accidentally starting the damn thing again.”

Buck turned the saw to show Ravi the lever for the safety. “This one is a training tool, by the way. It doesn’t work, so there is no risk of you hurting yourself as long as you are careful handling the blade, and even that isn’t as sharp as they usually come. These things are designed for people to change the blade regularly, so the screws for that are easily accessible.”

While talking, Buck loosened the screws and pulled the blade out, only to reattach it again right away. “It’s a little bit harder when the blade is stuck for some reason. We can’t use brute force because that would endanger the patient. So in that case, we have to take the casing of the motor apart.”

Ravi nodded along while Buck continued to explain how to disassemble the chainsaw as clearly as possible. Buck put it back together again and instructed Ravi through taking it apart on his own twice.

“How often is the blade stuck?” Ravi asked while he was working on disassembling the saw for the first time without any instructions from Buck.

“Often enough,” Buck shrugged. “I mean, I don’t know any exact number, but from my own experience, every fourth time or so. Was that call out earlier really the grossest thing you’ve seen so far?”

Ravi grinned sheepishly. “I don’t know. Not really. I just have a hard time handling big amounts of blood sometimes. I’ve been able to push through it in the past. Don’t know why I couldn’t today.”

“I hope you aren’t planning to become a paramedic, then,” Buck said, watching Ravi’s handling of the saw carefully.

Ravi laughed. “No, I’m really not. I’m thinking about engineer, eventually. But first I have to get through my probationary period, right? I’ve put all other plans to the side for now.”

“You already have good instincts,” Buck said. “You did really good on our last call, spotting that chemical fire. Next time though, explain right away what you see. Don’t wait for someone else to ask you about it. In a fire, every second counts.”

Technically, Buck hadn’t been supposed to be in that fire with the others because he was on restricted duty. But Bobby hadn’t thought about that when he had assigned the tasks, and Buck had chosen not to mention it himself, glad to be there with the rest of his team to have their backs. The fracture had barely been visible on the second x-ray the hospital had taken the Friday before, and Buck had decided that was enough to make going into a fire no more dangerous than it usually was. Bobby had quietly scolded him after they had returned to the firehouse, and apologized in the same breath for not remembering to order Buck to stay behind.

Ravi ducked his head and put the tools down with the saw completely taken apart. “I’ll remember that.”

“Good. Put the saw back together and take it apart again. You’ll repeat that until you don’t hesitate to think about it anymore. Only then will we train to take it apart while it’s stuck in a patient. And don’t worry, our training patient will be a log, so no blood there.”

“Looking back, I’m surprised you didn’t notice the reaction of the chemicals during the fire,” Ravi said as he followed Buck’s instructions.

Buck chuckled. “I did, approximately two seconds before you did. I decided to give you twenty seconds or so to catch on as well. Couldn’t have given you more time than that without endangering us, and you didn’t disappoint.”

Ravi paused and looked up at him. “Oh.”

Buck shrugged. “I didn’t learn by being told how to spot something like that. I learned by seeing it for myself.”

Ravi smiled. “That’s part of the reason why I asked for A shift, you know? You were great letting me tag along and teaching me during the blackout. Everyone else was just fed up if I asked questions by day two at the latest.”

“Were you made to leave B shift, or were you offered the transfer?” Buck asked with a frown.

“It was an offer,” Ravi said. “Captains Reynolds, Nash, and Meyer asked for a meeting after the blackout. Reynolds apologized for not making sure I got the training I needed, and we talked for a while about how to move forward. They had all three noticed that you had taken me under your wing during the blackout, but I guess Bobby told you that, right? I asked for A shift and for you to continue my training.”

Buck stared at Ravi at a loss for words. Bobby hadn’t talked with him about anything, and Buck had just fallen back into the dynamic he had established with Ravi during the blackout. He enjoyed training Ravi, but he hadn’t seen it as an official task before now.

“I’m glad I left such a good impression,” Buck said eventually. “I had several people tell me I was too harsh with you during the blackout.”

Ravi made a face. “The same people who were mocking you for being obsessed with the clipboard and being power-hungry? I think being stuck together for days brought out a couple of ugly sides in the people around here.”

Buck shrugged. “There’s a reason people don’t like the sight of me with a clipboard. It brings up bad memories for some, I guess. I was a fire marshal for some time when I wasn’t cleared for active duty, and I was responsible for an evaluation of this station as well. I pointed out a couple of things that someone who wasn’t familiar with the people here wouldn’t have noticed, and it was followed by something else dumb I did.”

“Pointing out problems that have to be resolved is dumb?” Ravi asked with raised eyebrows.

Buck chuckled. “That’s not what I meant. But it is generally uncomfortable for everyone involved.”

Ravi shook his head. “They shouldn’t have mocked you for doing your job. And I know all three Captains recognized that you did a stellar job at keeping up with as much of the paperwork as possible in the blackout.”

“They all three made sure to thank me at the end of that shift from hell,” Buck said with a grin. “Didn’t expect that, but it was a nice gesture. And it mostly made up for being called a power czar.”

“I’m glad you agreed to take on my training,” Ravi said.

“Of course,” Buck nodded. “Though don’t run away next time when I ask you to wait for me.”

“I was hungry!” Ravi complained. “I lost my breakfast if you forgot.”

Buck grinned. “I did try to forget that part. I think Bobby has planned tacos for dinner, so that’s something you can look forward to. Keep going with the saw for a while. I think you have a good enough handle on that to try without my supervision, though.”

Ravi nodded as Buck stood and left the workshop area to search for Bobby. He didn’t mind taking over Ravi’s training, but it would have been nice to be informed about it officially. There seemed to have been a lot of problems with Ravi’s probationary period in B shift, and Buck wouldn’t let that continue here if he could help it.

Buck found Bobby in the gym area, just finishing his workout. “Hey, can we talk?”

Bobby frowned. “Sure. What can I help you with?”

“It’s about Ravi,” Buck began.

Bobby’s eyes grew wide and he interrupted Buck with a groan. “Oh damn, right. We got interrupted about that this morning. Let’s take this to my office, shall we?”

Buck raised his eyebrows in surprise, but nodded and followed Bobby silently. He vaguely remembered that Bobby had asked to talk to him in the morning and that they had agreed to meet after breakfast, but then their first call had come in just as they had cleared the table. Buck had forgotten all about that as well; otherwise, he would have asked Bobby about it at some point. In his office, Bobby gestured Buck to the couch beside the door and sat down beside Buck.

“I wanted to talk to you about this earlier, and then I forgot about it after we were called out for the first time.” Bobby rubbed a hand over his neck. “Partly because you just took over teaching Ravi again without me having to say anything.”

“Ravi said there were some problems on B shift,” Buck said.

Bobby nodded. “We dropped the ball with him. And apparently, I’m just continuing the bad habit. I’m sorry I didn’t take you aside properly to discuss if you even want to take on training Ravi.”

“I’m happy to do it,” Buck assured. “I just would have preferred to learn that from you instead of Ravi. Especially since Ravi thinks I was already told.”

“Why did you have Ravi tag along with you during the blackout?” Bobby asked.

Buck shrugged. “Because he asked me. I was apparently one of very few who knew the emergency protocol without having to look details up. And Ravi hadn’t read anything about it at all yet. That’s at least what he told me, though he did know some things. The whole power bank thing only came up because he asked me about it, otherwise, I wouldn’t have thought about the regs for that either, I guess. He’s eager to learn, even if that does sometimes distract him from what is the most important thing at the moment. Speaking of, have we found out how to repair the gurney yet?”

Bobby laughed. “No. We are using the substitute gurney right now, and Hen put in a request to the Chief’s office to send someone to take a look at it. I’ve put it down in the report as Ravi accidentally pushing some buttons when he pulled it out of the ambulance.”

Buck rolled his eyes. “If he could just remember what he pushed. Would be nice to know what to avoid in the future. But maybe the person coming around to fix it can explain what happened.”

“Yeah.”

“So, training a probie.” Buck blew out a breath. “That’s a new one for me.”

“You don’t have to if you don’t want to,” Bobby said.

“No, like I said, I’m happy to do it,” Buck assured him. “Where do I find out what I have to teach him, though? And what’s the time limit here?”

“A probationary period can last up to three years,” Bobby said. “That shouldn’t be our goal, though. It’s not Ravi’s fault he’s behind in his training, and Reynolds and I both would like to see him earn his shield as soon as possible.”

Buck nodded slowly. “When Eddie told me Ravi had joined our shift permanently, I thought that was because we are a man short with Chimney on FMLA leave.”

Bobby shook his head. “That had nothing to do with Chimney. We have had an open spot for nearly a year now since Carter went to B shift to replace Johanson, but with the situation what it was, the department tried to have as few new people on shifts as possible. There wasn’t anyone available who could take that place permanently, and it wasn’t a spot that needed to be filled urgently. It became a little bit more urgent with Chimney being gone and you on medical leave. We’ll get a semi-permanent replacement for Chimney next shift.”

Buck frowned. “Semi-permanent?”

“Chimney took eight weeks of FMLA leave after the blackout, so we were always scheduled to get Jonah Greenway for the next five weeks, and longer if Chimney took more leave. Greenway’s been a firefighter with the LAFD for several years, but he only just finished his paramedic training and needs a little more on-the-job experience, and we want to give Hen the chance to supervise that training.”

Buck inhaled slowly. “And will this Jonah stay with us, now that Chimney will probably not be allowed to return?”

“Maybe.” Bobby lowered his gaze. “There is nothing you need to feel guilty about in this situation.”

Buck made a face. “That’s easier said than done, Bobby.”

“I know.” Bobby patted his shoulder. “I’ll just have to remind you until you understand it.”

“Has the department already made a decision?”

Bobby shook his head. “No. You’ll be informed as soon as they do. They won’t make a decision until they have talked to Chimney, and so far, no one has been able to reach him. He has ignored my calls as well as the ones from HR.” He huffed. “But his outgoing voicemail message won’t do him any favors.”

Buck frowned. “I haven’t tried to call him in … eight days, I think. Yeah, Sunday last week is right, I think. There wasn’t anything offensive last time I got his voicemail.”

“I’m not sure I should tell you.”

“I can just call him and listen to it myself,” Buck suggested with raised brows, even though he didn’t have much interest in doing that.

Bobby sighed and rolled his eyes. “He added on an ’Except if it’s Buck. In that case, stop calling me!’ in a very telling tone. So, everyone who has tried to reach him from HR is very aware that he is still angry at you and not shying away from letting the whole world know about it.”

“Great,” Buck muttered. “Have you asked Hen to let him know he needs to call HR? The longer he doesn’t respond to them, the worse it will get.”

“Yes. And she told me she wouldn’t burden Chimney with this bullshit when he has to concentrate on Maddie and his daughter.”

“She still thinks I made that up, huh?” Buck shook his head. It would explain her ongoing hostility, but that didn’t mean it hurt any less. “You said if I transferred to another station that you were sure Eddie would follow me. Don’t you think Hen will follow Chimney as well?”

“No,” Bobby shook his head. “For one, Hen’s plans limit her time with the department, and everyone knows that. I’ve given her several allowances to be able to handle medical school and work at the same time, and she wouldn’t get that at a new station. And secondly, I know she will come around eventually.”

“It’s the first time that I’ve seen Hen not be able to keep her personal opinions about someone away from the job. And right now it’s more aimed against Eddie than me because he is the one partnered with her.”

Bobby nodded. “I’ll talk to her after shift. And if it doesn’t get better, I’ll have to think about consequences.”

Buck made a face. “Let’s hope it won’t come to that.”

“Yes,” Bobby agreed. “But we came here to talk about Ravi. I have a handbook about the requirements for a probationary firefighter to earn their shield somewhere around here. I’ll find it for you by end of shift. But what you can do already is to talk to him about his goals.”

“Yeah, good idea,” Buck nodded. “And thank you. I won’t disappoint you, or Ravi for that matter.”

Bobby grinned. “I know. I have complete faith in you. But still, reach out if you need help with anything or if something isn’t clear. And I don’t mean just with this task, but with anything.”

“I will,” Buck promised. “Do you need help with dinner?”

“I think I’ll task Hen to help me in the kitchen today. Maybe I’ll be able to talk some sense into her.”

Buck chuckled. “Okay, good idea. And I’ll see if I can take Ravi aside for another conversation.”

Bobby stood with him when Buck prepared to leave. “Again, I’m sorry I forgot to tell you about Ravi. I’m proud of you that you stepped into this vacant spot without even thinking about it.”

Buck grinned and shrugged. “Really, Ravi did most of the work with that himself. Like I said, he is eager to learn, and he asks for help. I really don’t know how the chaos on B shift could be created, but I guess it’s not my place to figure that out.”

“It’s not,” Bobby agreed as they left his office. “Reynolds will take care of analyzing where the problems were and how to prevent something like that from happening again.”

Buck nodded and returned to the workshop while Bobby headed towards the locker room. Ravi wasn’t there anymore, and he wasn’t in the storage room either, though at least the training chainsaw and the toolkit were put away neatly. Buck sighed and turned on his heels, resigning himself to searching for his probie again.

He froze mid-step when he was hit by the realization that Ravi really was his probie, that there was another firefighter now whom he had much more responsibility for than they usually all had for each other. Buck swallowed and straightened his shoulders as he continued to walk, suddenly feeling overwhelmed. There was no backing away from this now though, and despite the sudden uneasiness about the magnitude of the task he had taken on, he wouldn’t want to back out either.

At the top of the stairs, he nearly ran into Eddie. “Hey, have you seen Ravi?”

“Can’t you just leave that guy alone for a minute?” Hen groused from her spot on the couch.

“And maybe you can just keep your nose out of things you have no idea about,” Buck bit back, suddenly fed up with her.

“You have been harassing Ravi the whole shift,” Hen accused. “Give him some room to breathe!”

“Like you are giving Eddie room to breathe?” Buck asked. “It’s hardly his job to stock the ambulance, especially all on his own. And yet you have been sitting up here reading your book and leaving Eddie alone with that task.”

“Hey, Buck, it’s not worth it.” Eddie grabbed his wrist in a soft hold. “Let’s look for Ravi and…”

“That’s hardly the same,” Hen interrupted with an angry frown.

“Of course it’s not,” Buck agreed readily. “Because I’m teaching Ravi, after he asked me to. You are just taking your bad mood out on Eddie.”

“That’s enough,” Bobby’s stern voice cut through the tension just as Hen stood, arms crossed over her chest. “Hen, you are in the kitchen with me. Buck, I thought you wanted to have a talk with Ravi?”

Buck sighed. “Yeah. He seems to have a knack for vanishing.”

“I’ll help you search,” Eddie said as he started to drag him down the stairs again. “He isn’t up here.”

Buck gritted his teeth so much that his jaw hurt, but it was all he could do not to turn around and continue the argument with Hen. He knew this was neither the time nor the place to air personal grievances.

“What’s her problem?” Buck spat. “And for fucks sake, I’m not harassing Ravi. Her comment earlier about me wanting his head was so out of line. As if she couldn’t recognize our training chainsaw! And as if it’s any surprise I’d bring that up after our call earlier!”

“It’s not about you at all, we both know that,” Eddie said as he pushed Buck behind the stairs where they would have a little bit of privacy. “It’s about Chimney and the bullshit he told her. We know he is calling her daily, and she is letting herself be influenced by his insanity.”

“Because of course he is the only one affected by Maddie leaving!”

“Hey.” Eddie pulled him into a tight hug. “Chimney is the only one who thinks that. I don’t think even Hen really believes that.”

“She sure is acting like it,” Buck muttered, leaning his head against Eddie’s shoulder.

“She has been exhausting today,” Eddie agreed. “And I understand why you reached the end of your rope. I’ve been close to that point myself for a couple of hours .”

“What do you bet neither Chimney nor Hen will tell me if Chimney finds her?” Buck murmured. “I hate not knowing where Maddie is, and I hate that Chimney has cut me out the same way now. I had hoped Hen would keep me up to date, at least until she brought up that bullshit story Chimney told her.”

“Have you tried calling Maddie again?” Eddie asked.

Buck nodded. “Often enough now that her mailbox can’t take any more messages. I also texted her and wrote her a couple of emails. It’s not enough, but I don’t know what else to do. I mean, even if I took off like Chimney did, I wouldn’t even have a place to start looking for her.”

“And it’s good that you know that because I wouldn’t let you just leave. And I know Taylor would be right beside me holding you back,” Eddie said.

“Have I mentioned that you two banding together is a little bit scary?” Buck chuckled.

“I think you mentioned that yesterday, yeah,” Eddie laughed.

“I’m sorry Hen is making you suffer for the bad mood she’s in because of me.”

Eddie huffed. “No, don’t be. And I can bear that kind of attitude for a shift, especially if it means you are able to keep out of her way most of the time. We’ll have the new paramedic here for the next shift, and that means you and me are partners again.”

Buck sighed. “That might not always be true, though.” He took a step back from Eddie and watched him, biting his lip. “I’ll have to partner with Ravi at least part of the time. Because as of today, I’m responsible for finishing his training.”

Eddie frowned. “Is that something you wanted to do?”

Buck grinned. “I mean, I wasn’t asked, except by Ravi of course, but I’m happy about it. I’m honored to have been given this responsibility, and most of the time it’s really fun teaching him.”

“When he isn’t making our gurney do things it’s not supposed to do, you mean?”

Buck laughed. “Yeah, when he isn’t doing those things. We’ll never let him forget that, right?”

“Never,” Eddie agreed.

Chapter 10

Taylor was lying on her side when Buck came out of the bathroom, her hands folded under her head and watching him. It was the first night Buck was spending at his own home since Chimney had punched him. Taylor had initially come over so that they could talk, and somehow that had evolved into her staying the night.

“I’m really glad we’re okay,” Taylor murmured.

Buck smiled. “Yeah, me too. I’m still not happy with you just going to the police, but I do understand why you did it. And you were probably right.”

Taylor smiled sadly. “I’m sorry the backlash you have to deal with is this whole big chaos, but yeah, I think I was right as well.”

Buck huffed as he settled down on his side of the bed. “The worst backlash is still to come when Chimney learns about it.”

“But you aren’t alone in any of this,” Taylor said. “Eddie and I will be on your side the whole time. And speaking of Eddie, do you have any plans to do something about that?”

Buck frowned. “Do something about what?”

Taylor snorted. “Oh, come on, Buck. Don’t play dumb. I did tell him, by the way, that I won’t be in his way and that I’m happy to step aside for him.”

Buck turned to her, not sure if he was horrified or amused. “You did what?”

“The two of you have been dancing around this for way too long,” Taylor said. “I’m just trying to help out a little. And Eddie wouldn’t ever think about asking you out as long as he thought this thing between us was something serious. So I told him that it’s not, that I have no interest in having a romantic relationship, and that I’ve only been a distraction for you anyway.”

“You aren’t ‘only’ anything,” Buck said, lowering his gaze. “What did Eddie say?”

Taylor laughed. “I don’t think he knew what to do with it. If he asks you, be as open about me as you need to be. I don’t care how much he learns about how you helped me figure myself out.”

Buck sighed. It wasn’t the first time Taylor had tried to prod him in Eddie’s direction since he had broken up with Ana, and Buck didn’t know what to think about it. Eddie being single didn’t have to mean anything, and he had become quite comfortable dealing with being in love with his best friend all on his own in the months since Eddie had been shot.

“I really think you should give a relationship with Eddie a chance,” Taylor said.

“I’m not sure I want that,” Buck muttered uncomfortably. What Eddie and he had was good, comfortable, and he didn’t want to rock that boat.

Taylor chuckled. “You are so in love with him, sometimes it’s painful to watch. And I tell you that love is reciprocated.”

Buck rolled his eyes. “You can’t know that. I…”

The ringing of his phone interrupted Buck and he frowned as he saw that there was no caller ID, but he still answered it after a moment. His breath caught in his throat as he heard Maddie’s voice for the first time in more than two weeks and he was barely able to concentrate on the much too short conversation. It became clear very quickly that she hadn’t listened to a single one of his voicemails when she asked about Chimney, and she didn’t leave him a chance to ask anything about her when she hurriedly hung up on him.

Buck stared at his phone even though he knew Maddie wouldn’t call again, at least not this evening. He wished she hadn’t ended the phone call so abruptly, that she would have taken a little more time to talk to him, but he felt a weight lifted from his chest he hadn’t even been aware of anymore. He still didn’t know how she was exactly or what was going on with her, but aside from sounding sad, she had sounded alright.

“Hey.” Taylor’s hand rubbing over his back ripped him out of his thoughts. “You alright?”

Buck shook his head. “Yeah. Mostly. I mean … It was good to hear her voice.”

“You said you knew where she is before you zoned out there.”

Buck nodded. “I heard bells in the background, and I’m pretty sure I recognized them from the one time I visited Maddie in Boston when she and Doug went to school there. It’s a very distinct chime.”

“Boston?” Taylor asked. “What would Maddie be doing in Boston?”

“I don’t know,” Buck shrugged. “But I know I heard the bells of the Old North Church, and she hurried to hang up as soon as it started, so I assume she knew or at least suspected I would recognize it.”

Taylor grabbed her notebook and opened it. “That same chime could easily be played in other places as well, though. But it’s still a lead.”

Buck rubbed his thumb over his phone. “She sounded so exhausted and sad. Chimney sent her a video from Utah because Jee started to crawl. I hate that she is missing these milestones in her daughter’s life.”

“But she is missing them because she is convinced it’s protecting Jee-Yun, isn’t she?” Taylor whispered. She rubbed one hand over Buck’s back but was mostly focused on her notebook.

“If I at least knew she was getting help for herself,” Buck muttered desperately.

He bit his lip with a frown, but after a moment of hesitation, he opened his messages and the chat with Chimney. He couldn’t go out and search for Maddie, and he didn’t feel it was the right thing for him to do anyway, but Chimney was already searching for her, so there shouldn’t be any harm to let him know that Maddie had called again. Maybe it could at least soothe his worries a little bit, even if Buck wasn’t sure he should relay his suspicions about her whereabouts, and in the end only sent ‘Maddie called again’.

“See, there is a replica of that church in Burbank, basically right around the corner from here,” Taylor said. “That makes a lot more sense than Boston, don’t you think?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised if Maddie still had friends in Boston,” Buck said. “Maybe she went to one of them.”

“Possible, but…” Taylor looked up when Buck’s phone started to ring. “Is that Maddie again?”

“Chimney,” Buck muttered surprised. He hadn’t expected to get any reaction from Chimney, especially not that he would call him. “I texted him that Maddie had called.”

“What? Why?” Taylor asked appalled. “Okay, no, we can discuss that later. Put that call on speaker and give me a moment to start recording.”

Buck turned to her with a frown. “Recording?”

“He already lied to Hen about what happened last time he was here,” Taylor reminded him grimly. “I’m not giving him a chance to twist any exchange he has with you so that the narrative suits himself. Okay, I’m ready.”

Buck hesitated, feeling numb at Taylor’s explanation. He flinched when his phone stopped ringing, but it started again right away, and this time he didn’t hesitate to take the call. “Hey, Chim.”

“What took you so long?” Chimney snapped. “What did Maddie say? When did she call you?”

“Just a couple of minutes ago,” Buck said hesitantly. “Chim, listen, there are some things we need to talk about.”

“The only thing we need to talk about is what you know about Maddie!”

Buck sighed. “I don’t really know anything. She called because you sent her a video of Jee crawling and wanted to know why you were in Utah. But of course I couldn’t tell her anything about that, could I?”

“Yeah, and that’s your own fault, but at least you seem to be able to learn from your mistakes. She has to have told you something,” Chimney insisted.

“She didn’t,” Buck said. “Listen, some things have happened since you left…”

“I don’t care,” Chimney interrupted him. “Why did you even text me if you don’t even have a hint about where Maddie could be?”

“That she called me is a good sign in and of itself, isn’t it? She sounded sad and tired, but okay overall.”

“She won’t be okay until I have found her!”

Buck flinched, feeling uncomfortable about those words in a way he couldn’t explain.

“Do you know anything or not?” Chimney asked. “If not, we can just end this unpleasant conversation.”

Buck closed his eyes. “I heard bells in the background, and I think I recognized them. But I can’t make much sense out of it.”

“What bells, Buck?” Chimney asked.

“I think it was the bells of the Old North Church in Boston,” Buck said. “I remember the chime from when I visited her there. But…”

“Why would she be in Boston?” Chimney asked.

“I have no idea. Maybe she still has friends there from her time at nursing school. But maybe she isn’t in Boston at all because…”

“If you are sending me to Boston for nothing, you’ll regret it, Buckley,” Chimney said before he hung up.

Buck lowered the phone and stared at it. “Because there is at least one replica,” he ended the sentence he had begun and sighed. “That did not go well, did it?”

“Could have gone better,” Taylor agreed. “Though, I’m not surprised about Chimney’s behavior. He could have at least let you finish your sentence.”

“Yeah, not with the mood he is in right now,” Buck muttered. “And now of course it will be my fault if Maddie is in Burbank not Boston, because I didn’t tell him about the replica there.” He turned to Taylor and frowned when he saw the program on her notebook still running. “Wait, are you still recording?”

“Oh, sorry.” Taylor hurriedly stopped the program. “So, what are we doing now?”

“How do we find out if Maddie is in Boston or in Burbank?” Buck asked with a frown.

“Good old research,” Taylor said. “We also need to find out if any other churches play the same chime. Though maybe not tonight. You have a shift tomorrow and it’s already late. You need to sleep and concentrate on your work tomorrow. Let me do some research, and maybe when your shift is over the day after tomorrow, we can talk about what I could find out.”

“You have to work yourself,” Buck protested weakly.

Taylor closed her notebook and put it on the bedside table before turning back to Buck. “I’m sure I’ll be able to convince my boss we should do a piece about PPD. That gives me all the reason to investigate clinics in Burbank and maybe even nationwide, like say, in Boston.” She carded her fingers through his hair and leaned against him. “Let me take care of this. I have better resources than you anyway.”

Buck turned around and hugged her tightly. “Why doesn’t she trust me enough to at least tell me where she is?”

Taylor sighed. “I think her head is pretty messed up at the moment. How someone reacts when they are in mental distress doesn’t necessarily reflect on any relationships they have, Buck. Don’t take this onto yourself. She is stuck in her own head, and I’d bet that at least half the things she has convinced herself of don’t make sense to anyone else.”

Buck sighed deeply.

“I know this sucks,” Taylor murmured. “But we do have a lead now. That’s more than we had half an hour ago. And we know she is reading the emails she gets. I think that is a good sign as well. It means she hasn’t cut everything out of her life.”

“You think it means she’ll come back?” Buck asked.

Taylor kissed his temple. “You said yourself that she has always come back into your life eventually. Is there any reason why you should have changed your mind about that in the last few weeks?”

Buck chuckled sadly. “Only my own desperation, I guess.”

Taylor hummed. “I thought so. Let’s say we find out where Maddie is, will you go to speak with her then?”

Buck was silent for a long time, pondering that question. His first impulse was to say ‘yes, of course’ because there was nothing he wanted more than to see Maddie for himself, hug her, and tell her that they would get through this, together. He wanted to make sure she knew she wasn’t alone. But he knew that would violate what she had asked of him and Chimney, and he couldn’t ignore the boundaries she had set.

“No,” Buck whispered finally. “She asked to be left alone. As long as she is someplace safe, I’ll leave her alone. I just need to know where she is.”

“That also means you won’t text Chimney again, right?” Taylor huffed. “I’m not sure why you texted him earlier, but you don’t owe him anything.”

“He is as worried about Maddie as I am,” Buck said.

Taylor shook her head and tightened her arms around him. “I’m not so sure of that. Some of the things Chimney has said have a very … possessive and controlling tone to it. She won’t be okay until he finds her? I saw you cringe over that sentence—I know you are aware that there is something very unhealthy resonating in Chimney’s behavior.”

“I hoped I’d imagined that,” Buck muttered.

“You didn’t,” Taylor said. “And it’s just one more point on an ever-growing list. Maybe it will be good if Boston turns out to be the wrong lead. I’m not comfortable with the thought of Chimney finding Maddie and pushing his expectations onto her about how she should handle her mental health.”

“Me neither,” Buck agreed. It hurt to think that way about his friend, but he had started to wonder just days after Maddie had left how big Chimney’s role had been in her making that drastic decision.

***

Taylor settled into the chair in the waiting area, smiling to herself. Her little trip had already borne all the success she could have hoped for, but that didn’t mean she planned to abandon the research for the news report she had proposed to her boss a little more than three weeks ago. She hadn’t told Buck that she had started using her connections to research PPD and hopefully get a lead on places where Maddie could have gone to get help just days after Maddie had left. She didn’t want to raise his hopes as long as her research hadn’t led to any information about Maddie.

With a list of places that treated PPD in LA county already available, it had taken only an hour to find a connection to the chime Buck had heard during his phone call with Maddie. There was still the mystery of why Buck had heard the bells since it was eleven at night when Maddie had called, and Taylor didn’t know why she’d be out by a clocktower that late, but if Maddie had been in Boston, it would have been even more of a mystery to hear bells there at two in the morning, so Taylor had ignored the inconsistency and had still driven to the hospital in Burbank she was sitting in now. It wasn’t exactly close to the replica of the Old North Church, but they had their own little bell tower that was playing the same chime that Buck had heard.

“Ms. Kelly?”

Taylor stood, smiling widely at the woman in the open office door. “It’s nice to meet you, Dr. Sosa. And thank you for taking the time to talk to me on such short notice.”

Sosa nodded. “Come in, please.”

Taylor followed the invitation and sat down on the chair in front of the desk while Sosa closed the door behind her. Taylor suspected this wasn’t a place where Sosa met with her patients, with the only chairs on either side of the desk and the bookcases filled with medical books. The whole room looked like work and research, not like an invitation to relax and open up.

“I was surprised when I heard about your visit and the reason for it,” Sosa said as she settled in her chair. “I have seen you a couple of times on the news, and I wouldn’t have expected you to be interested in a report about women’s mental health.”

Taylor hoped her smile wasn’t wavering. “I’m not at a place yet in my career where I can choose my assignments myself. In most cases, my boss tells me what kind of report he wants to see from me. The report about PPD I’m working on right now is actually the first one I chose for myself without having stumbled into a situation that made me just the right person to do the report.”

That was all true, of course, but Sosa’s reproach wasn’t too far off, either. Without Maddie’s situation, or more precisely Buck’s own struggle with that situation, she would have never thought about dedicating her time to anyone’s mental health. She thought of mental health as a deeply personal matter that no one should have to disclose to others, and had detested in the past when her family had pressured her to share her experiences in therapy with them. It had always depended so much on who she had spoken to what their reactions would be to the things she had learned about herself in therapy.

Sosa frowned. “I don’t understand.”

Taylor chuckled. “There have been some reports I did because I asked for them, but I was only granted the lead on them because I was already in the middle of the situation. The first time that happened was after my helicopter crashed and I followed that up with a report about the fire station that had rescued my pilot and me. I already knew the firefighters and had an in with them, so there was no discussion about giving someone else that report. That’s how my job works—you take every opportunity you get to advance until you have made a name of yourself.”

Sosa folded her hands on the desk. “And what kind of opportunity is this report?”

“The opportunity where I will owe my boss a huge favor somewhere down the line for giving me free rein for once.” Taylor sighed and wet her lips. “It’s a personal situation that made me aware of PPD, and especially the problem of people not having enough information about it, people not being aware enough of the problem. My boyfriend’s sister gave birth little more than seven months ago, and we suspect she is suffering from PPD.”

Sosa raised her brows. “Suspect?”

Taylor nodded. “She pulled away from her brother, and her partner allowed and, more importantly, supported that behavior. We don’t know if she has even seen a therapist since the birth. She left a couple of weeks ago, stating that her daughter was safer without her after an accident during the blackout when she was alone with her daughter for five days while her partner worked non-stop. He and my boyfriend are firefighters, you see, and the emergency protocol stated they had to stay at their station until the situation was resolved.”

Sosa frowned and pursed her lips.

“Don’t worry,” Taylor chuckled. “I guess the story is vaguely familiar? I don’t need or even expect any confirmation from you about any of your patients. I am here to research for a report, not to ask about your patients. Maddie asked that we not search for her, so we won’t contact her and will wait for her to reach out to us. But it is a relief to know that she is in a safe place and not alone struggling by herself somewhere.”

Sosa shook her head, but there was a small smile playing around her lips. “I have no idea what or who you are talking about. May I ask why you chose our institution to begin your research?”

“This isn’t the start of my research,” Taylor corrected with a grin. “You aren’t the first doctor I’ve spoken to. It’s not even the first time I asked about an interview here, but I assume my email either got lost or tossed out without anyone deeming it necessary to tell me no. But I did choose to try my luck here today because late yesterday night, during a very unexpected phone call, my boyfriend heard a chime in the background that he recognized as the bells from the Old North Church in Boston.”

Sosa stared at her with an unmoving face, but after a moment she inclined her head. “We had a little mishap with the computer controlling our bell tower last night.”

Taylor nodded. She hadn’t needed that confirmation anymore—earlier she had seen Maddie with a group of other women in the clinic’s small park when a nurse had brought her to Sosa’s office. Taylor had made sure that Maddie didn’t see her, but she had managed to take a picture of Maddie unnoticed by the nurse so that Buck would know for sure his sister was here. She hadn’t expected to be this relieved herself about finding out where Maddie was, but it had become a lot easier to breathe since she had seen her.

“I know from my own experience how … shameful it can feel to admit mental struggles and talk about what you need,” Taylor continued. “And I have been wondering if Maddie would have reached out for help, or if any of us would have been able to offer the right kind of help to her, if we all had known more about PPD from the very beginning. How people react to learning that someone has mental health issues is so often dependent on how much they know about mental health in general, but also the specific problem as well.”

Taylor sighed and dropped her gaze. “We already missed the critical moment for Maddie. My boyfriend and I, and several of our friends, will be there for her when she feels ready to come back of course, but the important part of seeking out professional help she already did all on her own. And I know her brother will not only be relieved but also proud of her for that. But maybe getting a report out there about PPD will help other women and their families to not let it come to the point Maddie reached. Maybe others will have to suffer less if I manage to put a little spotlight on PPD.”

“That does sound more sensible than I had expected from you,” Sosa said. “How do you envision this news report of yours will look in the end?”

Taylor looked up again with a smile. “That’s why I’m here. I know what to do to reach people in general, of course, but I think I would need years of research and probably a medical or psychology degree by myself to determine what kind of information is important to make public so that those affected can get an idea that this is maybe what they or their loved ones are struggling with. What’s the best way to present that fathers can suffer from PPD as well? How do we make sure that parents know where to go to get help? I hope to find at least one person among your colleagues, but preferably a few more, to help determine all these things.”

Sosa watched her with raised brows.

“I know that’s not a conversation done in half an hour,” Taylor continued. “This is a long-term project, not only for me but also for whoever decides to help me in the end. I don’t expect any commitment right now. I just would like to know if you are interested at all in helping me.”

Sosa nodded slowly. “Let’s talk a little more in detail about the questions you started to list there before I make a decision.”

Taylor nodded and opened her messenger bag to pull out the proposal she had drafted for her boss to get this project approved. Those documents had nearly doubled in size since then once Taylor had begun her research, but she hoped they would give enough of an overview to get Sosa interested, or at least interested enough to reach out to colleagues who would maybe be amenable to help Taylor if Sosa didn’t want to do it herself.

When Taylor had asked about an impromptu appointment with Dr. Sosa at the reception, the nurse there had told her that the doctor would only have twenty minutes for her. In the end, it was nearly an hour after she had arrived before she left. She was hopeful that she at least had a foot in the door, even though Sosa had been very vague in her answer. They had agreed to a follow-up meeting at least, and Sosa had brought up several concerns but also ideas that Taylor would need to think about until then.

Taylor had just reached her car when her phone rang, showing the caller ID of her cameraman. “Already missing me, Paul?”

Paul laughed. “Always, Tay. How is your research going?”

“I actually had a huge success today,” Taylor replied grinning as she sat down in her car.

Paul huffed. “I hope that’s true for you because here you’re missing a really hot story. Which is why I’m calling. Your firefighter boyfriend is with the 118, isn’t he?”

Taylor closed her eyes and inhaled slowly. “Yes. What did they do now?”

“They found trouble again,” Paul said amused. “The kind of trouble we’ll be heavily restricted about in the things we’ll be able to report. And I thought I should warn you even if I don’t know yet how much will actually end up in the news. Two firefighters with the 118, Diaz and Buckley, have been taken hostage by two escaped convicts.”

Taylor’s heart stopped for a moment. “You have got to be kidding me. How the hell did that happen and how do you even know about it?”

“I’ve been part of the crew reporting about the prison riot,” Paul said. “The riot is under control now, though I have no idea what miracle the firefighters pulled there, and I’m pretty sure we won’t be able to disclose it to the public even if we find out what happened. At least for the next couple of years. We’re still trying to get as much footage and information as we can.”

Taylor exhaled slowly, praying for patience. “Okay. What about Diaz and Buckley?”

“I’m not sure,” Paul said. “Apparently two of the inmates injured two of the guards, then stole their uniforms and posed as them when Buckley and Diaz left in an ambulance thinking they were bringing one of the prisoners to the hospital, when their patient was actually one of the injured guards.”

“So, they have three hostages and not just two?”

Paul sighed. “Chances are high that the guard is already dead.”

Taylor made a face. If only for Buck’s sake she hoped that wasn’t the case. Losing a patient because someone else had kept them from helping him would hit Buck hard and haunt him for months if not years.

“Why Buckley and Diaz, though?” Taylor asked. “Neither of them is a paramedic.” And Buck shouldn’t even have been anywhere near a prison riot while he was still on light duty. He should have been man behind for such a call, and Taylor swore she would have words with Captain Nash about this if she got a chance.

Paul huffed. “See, that’s more information than I had so far! Buckley was waiting outside with the ambulance and the truck when Diaz and another firefighter came out with the patient. We even got that recorded. The other firefighter went back inside when the two supposed guards approached, probably because there wouldn’t have been enough room for all five of them in the ambulance? Or maybe because it was determined that the third one would be needed here more?”

“How long ago was this?” Taylor asked.

“An hour since they drove off in the ambulance,” Paul said. “Twenty minutes since the captain here informed dispatch that two of their own had been abducted. Maybe you can come here and help us with information gathering?”

Taylor laughed humorlessly. “No. Even if I wanted to cross that line, I’m not going to get involved in the coverage of the abduction of my boyfriend and his best friend. Do you know if there has been any communication with them at all?”

“Oh fuck,” Paul muttered. “I couldn’t remember the name of your boyfriend.”

“Yeah, doesn’t matter.”

“And no, as far as we know there has been no communication, either with the escapees nor with the two missing firefighters.”

“Could you keep me updated?” Taylor asked.

“Yes, of course,” Paul agreed readily. “I’m sorry about being this insensitive with how I told you.”

“Don’t worry,” Taylor muttered. “Listen, I need to go. Thanks for calling me.”

“No problem. I’ll text you when I learn something new.”

Taylor hung up after a short goodbye and let her head drop against the steering wheel. This was the downside of being friends with firefighters, and especially this bunch. Sometime after Eddie had been shot, when Buck had slowly learned to breathe freely again after weeks of caring for his friend, they had had a silly little conversation about undertaking a statistical analysis about all the improbable things the 118 got involved in and how much more often those things happened to them than to other fire stations in LA.

“I’ll kill you myself if you get hurt because of this bullshit, Buck,” Taylor whispered. At least the information she had found out about Maddie would be able to cheer Buck up when he got out of this situation. And he would get out of it. Taylor wouldn’t allow herself to consider anything other than that.

She took a deep breath as she sat up straight again and dialed a number she hadn’t thought to ever need. Buck had given it to her for emergencies, and maybe it had been naive to not take his worry seriously.

“Hello?”

“Carla, this is Taylor.”

There was a moment of silence, before Carla said, “I didn’t even know you had my number.”

“Buck gave it to me a while ago,” Taylor explained. “Are you alone? Or is Christopher with you?”

“I’m outside the practice of his PT therapist right now, waiting for his appointment here to finish,” Carla said slowly. “What happened?”

“Right, PT,” Taylor murmured. “It’s Wednesday, so Chris has PT.”

Carla chuckled. “I’m surprised you know his schedule.”

“If I want to know when I’m able to spend time with Buck, I need to know the Diazes’ schedule. They are practically inseparable.”

“I’m glad to know that Buck found someone who is aware of and accepting of that fact in his life,” Carla said, and Taylor thought she heard a jab against Ana in that sentence. “But I assume you aren’t calling me for idle chitchat. What happened?”

Taylor sighed. “I’m sure I’m missing a lot of information since what I do know is only second-hand anyway. But I wanted to warn you that you need to keep Chris away from the news. Buck and Eddie are currently missing, abducted by two escaped convicts in their ambulance.”

Carla sucked in a breath.

“I’m not sure what exactly is happening,” Taylor continued. “I was warned by a colleague, who I guess also hoped to get a little bit of information out of me. He’ll keep me updated, and I’ll keep you updated in turn. I just didn’t want Chris to find out about this by watching the news. I’d prefer that if he found out about it, it’s because Eddie and Buck are telling him about it once they’re home safe.”

“I know they’ll both be very grateful for your worry about Christopher,” Carla said quietly. “Text me any news, please?”

“Yeah, of course. Are you staying the night with Chris?”

“That is the plan, yes. If there is no news once Chris is in bed, I’ll contact Eddie’s aunt and grandmother to make further plans.

Taylor closed her eyes with a sigh. “I really hope it won’t take that long to find those two idiots.”

Carla chuckled. “I recommend you get used to it. They’re both prone to end up in these kinds of situations. Being their friend comes with the requirement to deal with it.”

“I’m starting to see that,” Taylor muttered.

Chapter 11

“They did it!” Buck grabbed Eddie’s shoulder as he stepped behind him. “Athena and Chief Meynard managed to have the governor reduce Mitchell’s sentence, and they are starting to prepare the surgery right now.”

Eddie exhaled, and all the tension of the last day seemed to evaporate. “That’s good.”

He blinked, only recognizing now that he had stopped in front of a random picture in the hallway on his way back from Nolan’s mother to the waiting area with the rest of his team. He didn’t remember how long he had stood here, his thoughts circling around the events of the last few hours and his conversation with Mitchell.

“You want to sit down with us?” Buck asked. “We’ve all been taken off duty and I guess we’ll wait here and see how it goes with the surgery.”

Eddie turned with a nod. The rest of their team had arrived just shortly after Mitchell had killed himself, but Eddie had been too preoccupied to really notice them. He didn’t even know what had happened to them in the prison after he had left them behind yet. “How is your head? What did the doctor say about it?”

Buck shrugged. “Just a scratch, don’t worry.”

Eddie frowned and cupped Buck’s cheek with one hand and the back of his head with the other so that he could turn his head to get a better look at the wound that was only barely covered by a band-aid. “Did you tell them you had significant head trauma not even three weeks ago?”

“I’m fine, Eds,” Buck muttered. “I was more concerned about what was happening to you. When I heard the shot, I thought at first…” He trailed off with a sigh, grabbing Eddie’s shirt with one hand.

“It was never his intent to shoot anyone but himself. And he needed me alive and healthy to make sure I’d keep my promise. So, I take it that you didn’t tell anyone you are on light duty to prevent another blow to the head?” Eddie clenched his teeth, wondering why he had expected anything else. “Did they check you for a concussion at least?”

Buck sighed. “What are the chances that you will let this go?”

Eddie glared at him silently.

“No, they didn’t check for a concussion,” Buck muttered after a moment, rolling his eyes. “They cleaned the cut and put the band-aid on it. But I feel fine.”

“And how much of that is the adrenalin still rushing through you? Let’s find a nurse or a doctor to take another look at you. I still have to be cleared as well.”

Buck frowned, taking half a step back and assessing Eddie with a critical look. “You said you weren’t hurt.”

“And I’m not,” Eddie assured. “Doesn’t mean the department won’t want to see an official report about that. And I guess the police will want to have both our medical reports from tonight as evidence.”

Eddie put a hand on Buck’s shoulder and pushed him back in the direction of the ER. Aside from Buck, no one had asked about how he was before now or even taken a second look at him, but Eddie knew how easy it was sometimes to forget to check in with your fellow first responders when there was as much chaos as there had been after Mitchell shot himself. Eddie had been glad to just be overlooked for the moment because he had needed to concentrate on convincing everyone to prepare for the transplant, but he wasn’t happy that Buck, who had a visible injury to his head, had been overlooked as well.

Before he could call for a nurse in the ER, they were intercepted by Taylor who came out of nowhere, throwing her arms first around Buck in a tight hug and then to Eddie’s great astonishment around him for an equally tight one.

“I can’t believe the trouble the two of you manage to get into!” Taylor whispered as she stepped back, one hand still on Eddie’s arm, the other wrapped around Buck’s wrist. “Are you alright?”

Buck blinked. “What are you doing here?”

Taylor huffed. “A friend who was reporting from the prison called me not too long after it was discovered you were abducted. To warn me, and also to get information, I guess. I spent the last couple of hours waiting anxiously to hear anything about you! I came here as soon as I heard that your kidnappers had taken you here! I can’t believe you let yourself be taken hostage!”

“We are both fine,” Buck said.

“That remains to be seen,” Eddie said darkly. “You need to get your head checked out.”

Taylor pushed herself up on her tiptoes and tugged on Buck’s wrist, who after just a moment of resistance obediently lowered his head. “What did you do?” Taylor cupped the back of Buck’s head with her hand, rubbing the thumb of her other hand gently over the spot under the cut.

“Buck got himself pistol wiped,” Eddie explained. “Because he thought it a good idea to threaten the guys with the guns when they found the picture of Chris in my wallet and threatened him to make us comply.”

Eddie swallowed. He still felt nauseous thinking about that moment: about the threat to his son, about the fact that two criminals knew where he lived. Only one now, with Mitchell dead, but that was bad enough. Eddie sucked in a breath when he remembered that they hadn’t just taken his wallet, they had also taken his keys that he’d only had on his person by accident. Mitchell’s friend didn’t just know where he lived, he also had the keys to his house.

He felt his throat tighten up and a sudden pressure on his chest made it hard to breathe. Eddie had been able to push aside his worry for Christopher because the immediate threat to Buck and his own lives had been so much greater, but now that stupid moment when he had shoved his wallet and keys into his pocket instead of throwing them in his locker when the alarm had sounded came back to haunt him. He shouldn’t have had either of those things with him on any call out so that he wouldn’t damage or lose them, but now he had put his son in danger because of that oversight.

“Eds?” Buck was suddenly holding him by his arms and pushing him down on a chair. “You need to breathe, Eddie! Look at me, come on. Take a deep breath.”

Eddie searched for Buck’s gaze, not quite able to follow the instructions about the breathing. “The other guy…” He swallowed. He didn’t even remember his name. “Mitchell’s friend … where is he?”

“He was taken into custody just moments after we entered the hospital,” Buck said. He cupped Eddie’s neck with a hand, squeezing tightly, and returned his gaze with a worried frown. “He should be on his way back to prison right now.”

“They took my keys,” Eddie muttered, finally sucking in a shaky breath. “They have my keys and my address.”

Taylor gasped for air and sat down in the chair beside him. She took his hand and rubbed her thumb over his wrist.

“Yeah, but Mitchell is dead and Gale is on his way back to prison, where he’ll stay for years to come. Even longer now than he would have spent there originally,” Buck said. “The police have your keys, and you’ll get them back soon.”

Eddie shook his head wide-eyed. “We were alone in the back of the ambulance for a long time with Mitchell. For some of that time, his friend wasn’t even in the ambulance, and we have no idea what he was doing, or why he didn’t drive straight here to the hospital right away.”

“Okay,” Buck nodded slowly. “We’ll get your locks changed and see how to get your security system updated first thing in the morning, okay? A new set of keys will solve that problem in no time.”

“And yours,” Eddie muttered, suddenly feeling all the exhaustion of the day come crashing down on him. “They have your address, too, and your key is on my keyring.”

Buck frowned. “My address?”

“I-I have a note in my wallet with emergency contacts. You’re first on that list. It has your address on it.”

Buck smiled softy. “Okay, then I guess I’ll get my locks changed as well.”

Eddie nodded slowly.

“Just yours and my lock?” Buck asked. “What other keys do you have on that key chain aside from yours and mine?”

“Just those two,” Eddie murmured. “Abuela’s and Pepa’s keys are on an extra set at home. I-I shouldn’t even have had them with me!”

Buck smiled softly. “Why did you, then?”

Eddie shrugged. “The alarm sounded while I was holding them in my hand and … I don’t know why I didn’t put them back in my locker. I closed the locker and only noticed that I had the keys and the wallet still with me when I put on the turnout gear. I didn’t know where else to put them other than the coat.”

“Those things happen,” Buck agreed. “Sometimes we’re surprised by an alarm and forget our routines for a moment. I’m sure that even still happens to Bobby, and he has been a firefighter for decades.”

“Can I help you, sir?”

Eddie flinched away from the nurse who was suddenly standing beside them. He closed his eyes, forcing himself to take a deep breath, even though there was still a lump in his throat making it difficult to get any air into his lungs at all.

“I think Eddie is teetering on the edge of a panic attack,” Buck said, and when Eddie opened his eyes again, Buck had turned his head to look up at the nurse. “He has been struggling with them for a while.”

“They’re the firefighters who were held hostage,” Taylor added.

Buck sighed. “Right. Eddie hasn’t been seen by a doctor at all since that situation got resolved. And I was reminded that I should have probably mentioned earlier when one of your colleagues looked at the cut on my head that I had a concussion less than three weeks ago and am technically on light duty because of a nearly healed hairline fracture in my zygomatic bone.”

“And you just forgot to mention that?” The nurse’s tone was so exasperated that Eddie had to chuckle.

“He tends to do that,” Taylor said, equally exasperated. “Especially if he is worried about his friends, and even more so if it’s this one here. How did you even end up on that call to the prison while on light duty? Shouldn’t you have stayed back at the station?”

“We were sent there right from a previous call,” Buck explained. “And I stayed outside the prison for that very reason. We didn’t expect to get kidnapped by the guys we thought were guards!”

The nurse sighed. “Let me show you to a room to give you some privacy and I’ll send a doctor around right away.”

Eddie only followed her because Buck pulled him up and then Taylor looped her arm through his while they followed the nurse to a room down the hallway that Eddie and Buck had just come back through. It took less than two minutes for two doctors to appear. One of them led Buck to a different room while the other asked Taylor to leave before Eddie had to endure a thorough exam. At the end of it, the utter fear that had taken him over earlier had nearly completely vanished, and he came out of it with a clean bill of health and a recommendation to make an extra appointment with his therapist as soon as possible.

Taylor was leaning against the wall opposite the door when Eddie left the exam room. She looked up from her phone as soon as he opened the door and pushed it into her pocket. “What’s the verdict?”

Eddie shrugged. “I’m good. I’m supposed to see my therapist sooner rather than later, but I have an appointment the day after tomorrow anyway, so that will do. Where is Buck?”

“He’s getting another x-ray of his head,” Taylor sighed. “Just to make sure there is no new damage to the bone. He wasn’t hit in the same place, so everything should be okay, but they want to be sure. Bobby went with him, and I’m pretty sure he won’t allow Buck to leave the station for the next two shifts while he is still on light duty.”

Eddie snorted. “Buck won’t take that without protesting.”

Taylor shrugged. “Your team has gathered in the waiting room by the main entrance to the hospital, if you want to join them?”

Eddie nodded and followed Taylor as she turned and started to walk down the hall. “Are you staying?”

Taylor smiled. “For a little while at least. Have to make sure you and Buck are alright.” She paused and bit her lip. “I … called Carla when I heard about the kidnapping to make sure she would keep Chris away from the news, because I didn’t know how much they would publish. Your names were kept out of the news, but there was footage with your truck in the background, and the 118 was clearly visible. I talked to Carla on my way here, and Chris was already asleep by then. I should let you know, you and Buck owe her breakfast for the shock.”

Eddie laughed, startled. It wasn’t the first time Carla had asked for that kind of compensation for making her worry about one of them. “Okay. I didn’t know you had Carla’s number.” He felt oddly relieved when he knew just a couple of weeks ago it would have felt as if Taylor had overstepped. Eddie wouldn’t have expected her to even remember Christopher in such a situation at all.

“Buck gave it to me,” Taylor shrugged. “For emergencies. But I would have preferred it if I hadn’t needed it! Do you have a shirt you can change into? This one has blood all over your back, in case you missed it.”

Eddie made a face. He had started to forget that, and he wasn’t happy to be reminded of how close Mitchell had been to him when he shot himself. His ears were still ringing, and blood was probably not the only thing ruining his shirt. “I hope the others brought something along.”

He knew there would have been a shirt and even a pair of pants in the ambulance, but he didn’t think the police would let him get them out of there. Their ambulance was a crime scene now, and he doubted they would get it back anytime soon.

“Can I ask why your team seems so set on staying here?” Taylor asked quietly. “I’d have thought you would all want to go home as soon as possible.”

Eddie paused and watched Taylor with a frown.

She turned when she noticed he wasn’t following her anymore and sighed when she met his gaze. “I’m here as your friend, not as a reporter.”

“I offered Mitchell to use your job and your connections to find another solution for his problem,” Eddie said, lowering his gaze. “His last words were that he never wanted anyone else to know.”

Taylor stepped up to him and took his hands. “I understand. You don’t have to tell me anything. But if you do, I promise you, I’ll never use any information you or Buck disclose to me in any of my news reports.”

For a moment Eddie searched her face for any sign of a lie, but then he gave a short nod as he decided to take a leap of faith on her. “Mitchell’s son is in this hospital. He is barely eighteen and waiting for a new heart. One he’s getting right now because for some reason the whole insanity Mitchell started today made me and a couple of my friends want to help him donate his own heart to his son.”

Taylor paled and her grip on his hands tightened. “He broke out knowing he would kill himself at the end of the day?”

Eddie nodded slowly. “Yes. The original plan was for his friend to force the surgery at gunpoint. I have no idea why or how they thought that would ever work, but then again, Mitchell was desperate and there really wasn’t time to come up with a better plan, I guess. His son had only weeks left.” He sighed. “And with a little bit of luck, he’ll have decades now.”

“But he’ll never learn how he got that second chance,” Taylor murmured.

“Sometimes knowing the truth isn’t the salvation you have convinced yourself it is,” Eddie said, remembering what she had told him about her past. “How would you feel knowing that the only reason you are alive is that the father you never knew, the father your mother hid you from, killed himself to give you his heart? And in the process of that started a prison riot and nearly killed two other men to achieve that?”

Taylor shuddered.

“It will be hard enough to know that someone else had to die at all. I think it will be easier to live with the lie that it was the victim of an accident who donated their organs.”

Taylor sighed. “Probably. Why didn’t he commit suicide in the prison, though, after making sure the people responsible were aware he wanted to donate his organs, specifically his heart? Why go to all this hassle?”

“Because the law forbids anyone on death row from donating their organs,” Eddie explained. “It was a lot of work to make sure the surgery could take place at all today.”

Taylor shook her head. “It could have been all for nothing.”

“But it wasn’t,” Eddie said. “We’ll stay here and wait for news about the surgery, but that will probably take most of the night.”

Taylor nodded. She looped her arm around his and started walking again. “Let’s see if the others have a shirt for you. If not, I can make a detour to Buck’s place. You have a couple of shirts there, right?”

Eddie chuckled. “Yeah.” After a moment he added, “Thank you for watching out for Chris.”

Taylor leaned into his side slightly. “Any time. I knew all along that getting involved with Buck would be a package deal. I mean, there was already no doubt about that back when I first met you. I would have known that hadn’t changed even without witnessing Buck losing his mind after you were shot.” She grinned up at him. “Or even without your jealous glares during the treasure hunt.”

“I had barely known Buck for a couple of months the first time we met,” Eddie protested, opting to ignore her last remark.

Taylor laughed. “Sometimes that doesn’t matter, does it?”

Eddie shrugged, overwhelmed by her behavior and her words in a way he wasn’t prepared to deal with at that moment. He didn’t know what to think about her anymore, or what to expect from her.

When they reached the waiting area, Hen was sitting between Athena and their new paramedic Jonah. Ravi was seated separately from the rest, staring at the floor with a vacant gaze, and he was the one to jump up immediately when Eddie asked about a new shirt, clearly happy to have something to do. When he returned, he followed Eddie to the bathroom and helped him clean up his back, quiet and subdued and barely speaking a word. Ravi chose a place by himself again when they returned to the others, but Eddie felt too exhausted himself to take care of whatever was brewing in their probie.

Eddie sat down beside Taylor, who sat on the other side of the room from Hen, pointedly ignoring Hen’s glares. For most of the day before they had been called to the prison, Hen had been nearly her old self, but she had also ignored Buck for the most part. It should probably be no surprise that she wasn’t able to do the same now with Taylor, who in Hen’s eyes had committed the biggest crime of all against Chimney by going to the police in the first place. Eddie hoped she would be satisfied with just glaring at Taylor and not start any kind of fight.

Nearly half an hour went by which they spent in tired silence before Bobby and Buck returned, announcing that Buck was at full health aside from the cut on his head and that there wasn’t even a single sign of a concussion. Buck chose the seat beside Eddie as soon as the small commotion that followed had died down.

“I told you I was fine,” Buck muttered, poking his elbow in Eddie’s side. “How are you?”

“A little embarrassed about that episode earlier,” Eddie murmured. “But otherwise good.”

Taylor leaned halfway over Eddie and whispered, “I have information that will lighten your mood a lot, I think. The inquiry I went on today was very successful.”

Eddie frowned. “What are you talking about.”

“Did you find her?” Buck whispered back, staring at Taylor wide-eyed.

“Yes.” Taylor grinned. “She’s in a clinic in Burbank. I saw her, but I don’t think she saw me, which is for the best.”

Buck sighed and visibly deflated. He grabbed Eddie’s hand and leaned against him with closed eyes. “Thank god.”

Eddie sucked in a breath as he understood that they were talking about Maddie, and he carefully searched for Hen out of the corner of his eyes, but she was sitting turned away from them now, talking quietly with Jonah. He squeezed Buck’s hand. “How did you even know where to look?”

“She called last night,” Taylor explained quietly. “Buck heard bells in the background that gave us a lead. And there was of course a little bit of luck involved that I saw her there when I went to talk with the doctor leading the PPD program of the clinic about the broadcast I plan to put together. They wouldn’t have confirmed anything about their patients to me.”

“Are you planning to tell Chimney?” Eddie asked.

Buck and Taylor both shook their heads, and Buck said, “No. She asked us not to search for her. I won’t try to contact her either until she reaches out again. I just needed to know she was safe, otherwise, I wouldn’t have tried to find her myself. I don’t mind giving her all the time she needs.”

“Good,” Eddie nodded grimly. From the very beginning he had been unsettled by Chimney’s behavior after Maddie had left, but at first he had just thought Chimney wasn’t able to handle his worry in any kind of healthy way. With everything he had heard from Hen since Chimney had left, Eddie had started to wonder if it was worry at all that was driving Chimney, and he had been prepared to argue against it if Buck thought he should tell Chimney where Maddie was.

“It’s a good clinic,” Taylor said. “And somewhere you usually don’t just get a place at from one day to the next. It wouldn’t surprise me if Maddie had prepared to go there for a while and done a lot of research about it.”

Buck shook his head with a frown. “Chimney didn’t mention that she was planning to go into in-patient therapy. He would have looked there first in that case, wouldn’t he?”

“Maybe she didn’t talk to him about it,” Eddie said.

“Why wouldn’t she?” Buck asked.

Eddie shrugged.

“You can ask her about that when she reaches out to you again,” Taylor said. “Speculating about their relationship won’t do us any good. I think all three of us are too angry with Chimney to give him any benefit of the doubt at the moment.”

Eddie huffed and rolled his eyes.

Buck sighed. “Agreed. I’d prefer not to talk about him for the rest of the night anyway. The day has been exhausting enough without that drama.”

“I’ll have to go soon if I want to get any kind of decent sleep tonight,” Taylor said. She put her hand over Eddie’s and Buck’s, which still lay clenched together on Eddie’s thigh. “I’m glad you are both okay. I’ve been worried sick about you the whole time. I’m not sure if it’s a good idea to leave you alone again.”

Buck chuckled. “We are off duty, so we shouldn’t find any trouble.”

“I’m convinced you can find trouble anywhere,” Taylor said with raised brows.

Eddie huffed. “Don’t lump me in with Buck’s craziness!”

“Traitor,” Buck hissed.

Taylor laughed quietly. “I really don’t know how much difference there is between you two in this regard.”

“Thanks for coming by,” Buck said, smiling. “And thanks for the research. It’s taken a huge weight off my shoulders.”

“Of course,” Taylor smiled and stood. She pressed a kiss against Eddie’s cheek first before kissing Buck and whispering something in his ear while patting their hands which made Buck blush and tightened his fingers around Eddie’s hand. “Take care of yourself and call me sometime in the afternoon, alright?” Taylor turned and left without giving them a chance to say anything.

“What was that about?” Eddie asked confused, holding onto Buck’s hand. He wasn’t willing to let go of it, and he hoped Buck wouldn’t pull away anytime soon.

Buck shrugged, leaning his head against Eddie’s shoulder with closed eyes and yawning. “Who knows. Sometimes Taylor can be really strange, y’know?”

Chapter 12

“Where are your two shadows?” Athena asked as she sat down beside Buck.

Buck sat up with a groan from his position nearly lying down in the uncomfortable hospital chair. “Taylor has to work in the morning, so she went home to get some sleep. And Eddie went on a quest for decent coffee and threatened that he wouldn’t share if I moved in the meantime.”

Athena chuckled. “The three of you were very cozy earlier.”

Buck grinned. “Taylor likes to say being friends with me comes with a package deal of Diazes.”

“Friends?” Athena asked with raised brows.

Buck sighed and rolled his eyes. “Yes, friends.”

Athena hummed. “Didn’t you call her your girlfriend not too long ago? Has that changed in the meantime?”

Buck shrugged. “Fewer questions, fewer people believing I have to explain or defend my relationship choices. I became really tired of that a long time ago.”

Athena sighed and patted his arm.

“We are friends who enjoy having sex with each other,” Buck said, unable to fight against the ingrained urge to explain himself anyway. “It was a lot less hassle with the way the world was when we started this to have a regular partner you know and trust. But there has never been even a hint of romantic interest on either side.”

There had been a little confusion about that right at the start, but he wasn’t about to discuss Taylor’s struggles with her own sexuality and societal pressure with just anyone. They had been able to work through that, and helping Taylor through that, helping her research and understand herself, had provided a much-needed distraction for Buck.

“Because you’re in love with Eddie,” Athena nodded.

Buck choked. Not even Taylor had called him out about it that bluntly.

Athena patted his back and chuckled. “And Taylor is aware of that and trying to meddle?”

Buck rubbed a hand over his head. “Yeah. Because apparently breaking up with Ana has to mean he has suddenly and instantly fallen in love with me.”

Athena laughed. “I think you have the order of things a little confused there.”

Buck frowned in confusion. “What?”

“I’ll leave you to figure that out for yourself,” Athena said. “How is your head, aside from your most recent injury?”

Buck shrugged. “I still have headaches sometimes, but they’ve already gotten better. They should be gone in a couple of weeks. And that little tap today was really nothing. You all need to stop making a fuss about it.”

Athena glared at him for a moment before shaking her head with a sigh. “And have you heard anything from Chimney or Maddie?”

Buck eyed her uniform. “Are you asking as my friend?”

Athena sighed and grabbed his hand. “In this, I’ll always only ask as your friend.”

Buck nodded slowly and blew out a breath. “And as my friend, what would you think about me if I had found out where Maddie was and didn’t intend to tell Chimney?” Belatedly he remembered Hen, but when he looked around he found her sleeping in a chair on the other side of the room. He had no doubt that if Hen heard he had an idea about Maddie’s whereabouts, Chimney would know in a matter of minutes.

“I’d question your sanity if you thought about telling Chimney that in your current situation.”

Buck exhaled with relief and felt the tension in his shoulders vanish. He had felt strongly that he shouldn’t tell Chimney, and after last night’s conversation with him he also didn’t want to tell Chimney what he had found out about Maddie. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t doubting his decision, wasn’t wondering if he was too hard on Chimney. He hadn’t bothered to ask Taylor or Eddie about this because he knew their opinion already, but Athena was a neutral voice in this situation. Her agreement with his decision made him feel much better about it.

“Do you know where Maddie is?” Athena asked quietly.

Buck nodded, rubbing his free hand over his thigh. “Taylor found her earlier today. She’s in a clinic getting treatment. In Burbank. She isn’t even that far away.”

Athena cocked her head. “How did you know to look there for her? And did Taylor speak with her?”

Buck shook his head. “Maddie shouldn’t even know that Taylor saw her. She called me last night. Wanted to ask about a video Chimney had sent her with Jee crawling and wanted to know why he was in Utah. We didn’t really talk much before she hung up again.”

“But you recognized something during the call,” Athena said.

“Bells in the background,” Buck murmured. “I think that’s what made her hang up so soon because she feared I would recognize them. And I did recognize the chime, though without Taylor I’d have probably not thought about anything but Boston. It’s the same tune the bells in the Old North Church in Boston play.”

Athena raised her brows. “And that was enough for Taylor to find Maddie in a couple of hours?”

Buck smiled. “What can I say, she is good at her job. And she made it her job to find Maddie for me, which is … overwhelming. I’m not used to anyone … I mean…”

“I know,” Athena said with a sad smile. “You are usually the one who takes care of everyone around you. We all learned how good you are at avoiding letting others take care of you, and how bad you are at accepting help, after your leg. Maybe there is something to Taylor Kelly that isn’t so bad after all.”

“She is a good friend,” Buck murmured. “I don’t know how I would have dealt with Eddie being shot without her.”

“It’s good that you know where Maddie is now,” Athena said. “And I think it’s the right choice not to contact Chimney. And don’t tell Hen where Maddie is; I’m still trying to find out what’s gotten into her. She’s let herself be much too affected by Chimney’s anger. And that all seems aimed at you, which I don’t understand.”

Buck bit his lip. “That’s not … exactly new? I mean, when I started, they were all hard on me, you included. And I made a couple of pretty big mistakes, so I know I deserved some of it. Other things, not so much. Chimney used to be the most caustic, and he was the one who took the longest to warm up to me. Though, to be honest, I didn’t like him much outside of work either. I think we rubbed each other the wrong way a lot and … that was only pushed aside when Maddie showed up.”

“Really?” Athena asked surprised.

Buck shrugged. “That’s what it feels like looking back now. I … I’ve been wondering a lot since Chimney left why he is so angry at me. If he is really angry at Maddie but directing it at me, or if it’s been there for some time and I just didn’t notice. Or maybe it’s a mix of both. But it makes me uncomfortable either way and afraid for Maddie. Which isn’t something I want to contemplate even for a moment about someone I thought was my friend.”

“Emotions are running very high, for you and Chimney both,” Athena cautioned. “Maybe you are right and something that has been there all along just came to light. But maybe it’s something completely different. Either way, as long as Chimney is off on his road trip you won’t have any chance to find out what it really is.”

Buck huffed. “I hate waiting. I hate not knowing what to do to fix this.”

“You can’t do anything to fix this,” Athena said. “The ball for that is in Chimney’s court. You’ll have to wait, and decide what kind of outcome you can and want to accept.”

“He’ll just become angrier when he learns about the charges.” Buck sighed. “I tried to tell him about that last night when we talked, but he wouldn’t stop to listen to me. The only time he let me finish my sentences was when I talked about Maddie’s phone call, and like the idiot I am, I just let him dictate the course of that conversation.”

Athena straightened in her chair and turned to Buck. “You talked to Chimney?”

Buck blinked, startled. “Uhm, yeah. I texted him that Maddie had called, and it didn’t even take him a minute to call me back, despite it being the middle of the night. I tried to tell him he needed to talk to the police here, but he cut me off. And I tried to tell him that there is a replica of the Old North Church in Burbank, but he hung up on me as soon as I had mentioned Boston. I guess he is on his way to Boston now. And of course, he’ll blame me when he learns that Maddie is nowhere near there.”

“Why would Maddie have gone to Boston?”

Buck shrugged. “Right? It has to be full of memories of Doug. And I mean, sure, there will be good memories in Boston from that time as well.” He shook his head. “The only two good memories of Doug that I have are from Boston, and I’m still trying to come to terms with the fact that I have any good memories of him at all. Back then she was happy with him, but that’s still all tainted by the horror he became later. And I’m not sure it was all that perfect, even if she was happy. But I heard those bells, and Boston was the first thing I thought of.”

“You said he hung up on you,” Athena said. “It’s on him that he didn’t get all the information you had.”

“You know men can suffer from PPD as well, right?” Buck sighed. “I wonder if that’s the case with Chimney.”

“Maybe. That would be an explanation, but not an excuse for his actions.” She put a hand against Buck’s cheek and turned his head until their gazes met. “Let’s say Chimney comes back and accepts the consequences of his actions, apologizes to you for the punch and his behavior since then in general. Have you thought about what you would want your relationship with Chimney to be like in the future?”

Buck took a deep breath. “No. I-I really don’t think it will happen that way, ‘Thena. And it depends a lot on what Maddie does, right? She loves him, she has a child with him. I think for some time she was really happy with him, probably for the first time in her life since Daniel got sick.”

“She is also very protective of you,” Athena said. “Too much so at times.”

Buck shook his head and bit his lip. “She deserves to finally be happy. Why did something like this have to happen to her again?”

Athena eyed him silently for a long time before she nodded. “Just think about my question, okay? At some point, you’ll have to make a decision if or how Chimney can earn your forgiveness.”

Buck swallowed and blinked back the tears suddenly burning in his eyes. He had spent the last couple of weeks trying not to think too much about what would happen when Chimney and Maddie eventually returned. The whole situation had been stuck in limbo since Chimney had left as well, but that had changed now.

When Buck had kept his promise to Maddie to not tell Chimney about her initial phone call, it hadn’t felt like taking a side in any kind of conflict. He had supported his sister, as he had always done as much as she had let him, and tried to be there for Chimney as well. But now he knew he was taking a side. Buck was making a very precise decision not to tell Chimney what he had found out about Maddie despite knowing how desperate he was to find her. He was still supporting his sister, but now it also felt as if he was actively working against Chimney, and that sent a chill down his back. He didn’t trust Chimney to accept Maddie’s boundaries if he knew where she was.

“Bobby and I have your back,” Athena said. “Let’s hope this situation doesn’t get any uglier than it already has, but regardless of what happens, Bobby and I are on your side. As are Eddie and Taylor.”

Buck impulsively pulled her into a hug. “I know. And I’m grateful for all of your support.”

“Just don’t forget it,” Athena said, patting his back. “And at least this time we know not to let you push us away.”

Buck chuckled. “I won’t.”

Athena rubbed a hand over his back, but after a moment she pulled away from his hug and looked at him gravely. “I’d like to advise you not to talk with Chimney again on your own until the legal proceedings you are both involved in have been resolved.”

“Taylor made me record the phone call,” Buck said with a frown.

“Good,” Athena nodded. “But still, please don’t seek out contact with him again for the time being and ignore him if he calls or texts you. I know you want to mend fences with him, but right now I believe the best thing you can do for yourself, for your own sanity, is to ignore him.”

Buck nodded slowly. The tone in which Chimney had chosen to talk to him the previous night still stung, so he could easily see where Athena was coming from. The compulsion to keep Chimney in the loop about any new information that had overcome him after Maddie’s phone call had vanished for the moment, but he would remember to let Eddie or Taylor talk him out of it if it ever returned.

***

Buck sighed and closed the door behind the man who’d come around to change the locks on his door. The morning wasn’t even half over, but after only a couple of very short and restless naps overnight in the hospital, he had reached the point where it became increasingly difficult to push through his exhaustion. It had been mostly Eddie’s anxiety that had stopped him from crashing.

Around seven in the morning, Nolan’s mother had reported that her son’s surgery had been a success so far and that he was in recovery. With that hopeful news, they had all finally left the hospital, and Buck had accompanied Eddie home where they had arrived just in time to help with Christopher’s morning routine and to hug him tightly before Carla had taken him to school. Seeing Christopher had been exactly the thing they had needed to calm them down, and Buck wished they could have just gone to sleep after that.

He had promised Eddie that they would change their locks, though, and it had quickly become clear that Eddie wouldn’t be able to relax until that had been taken care of. So they had spent over an hour searching for a locksmith who would come out to both Eddie’s house and Buck’s apartment and change their locks right away, and had spent more money on it than Buck felt comfortable with. But when Buck turned to Eddie after closing the door of his apartment, his shoulders weren’t hunched over anymore, his arms weren’t crossed over his chest anymore, and his hands weren’t as tightly fisted as before.

“Thank you,” Eddie muttered, staring at a point beside Buck. “I don’t know why this was bothering me so much.”

Buck smiled. “It’s no problem at all, really.”

“Abuela demanded we come over and have dinner with her later,” Eddie said. Isabel had called him just as they had arrived at Buck’s apartment and Eddie had gone out on the balcony to talk to his grandmother. “She saw our truck on the news report about the abduction and wasn’t amused at all that we didn’t call her right away last night.”

“I’m not surprised. Will you go to her right away after you pick Chris up from school?”

Eddie raised his brows. “You were included in my we. She’s expecting you as well, no excuses allowed.”

Buck laughed. “Alright. As if I would ever say no to your Abuela’s cooking. You want a beer?”

“As tempting as it is to get drunk after yesterday, we shouldn’t in the middle of the day. And we have to get Chris from school in four hours. We should probably try to get some sleep.”

Buck sighed and stopped halfway to the fridge. “Right, being responsible adults, and all that. Although, I’m contemplating just powering through the day and crashing in the evening. I’m not sure if three hours of sleep will do any good or only make it worse.”

Eddie made a face. “That’s never something I could do without everyone around me regretting it.”

Buck grinned. He had seen Eddie overly tired in the past a couple of times, but he had always found it more amusing than annoying to watch Eddie tear into everyone who dared talk to him. “Feel free to use my bed. I’ll just stay down here and find something to occupy myself with. I’ll wake you up so we’re on time for Chris’ school.”

Eddie turned his head to look at the stairs, but then he shook his head and sat down at the kitchen table. “Or maybe we should talk about what’s been going on between us.”

Buck swallowed, suddenly glad to have the table and the kitchen island between them. He couldn’t imagine that this conversation would be anything but unpleasant and awkward. “I’m not sure I know what you are talking about.”

“You remember how Taylor took me out to breakfast a little while ago?” Eddie asked, not quite meeting Buck’s gaze.

“As I wasn’t included in that little breakfast date, no,” Buck said with raised brows.

Eddie rolled his eyes. “She told me, in these exact words, that she’d happily step aside if I got my shit together now that I had finally ended things with Ana.”

Buck groaned and dropped his head onto the counter of the kitchen island. He had really hoped Eddie would just forget that after Taylor had told him about it. “You can’t be serious.”

“I am,” Eddie chuckled. “I’m not good at this kind of conversation, you know?”

“We don’t need to have this conversation,” Buck muttered into the crook of his arm as he pulled them around his head, his head still lying on the kitchen counter. “You could just forget all of Taylor’s nonsense.”

“I talked about my will with my therapist last week, and why I didn’t tell you about it earlier.”

Buck raised his head and stared at Eddie, his brows furrowed. He wasn’t able to follow the change of topic or see any sense in it.

“Mark is really good, you know,” Eddie said. “Or maybe I’m just at a point now I hadn’t reached when I saw Frank, but even then, I don’t think Frank would have been able to find my weak spots this easily. Mark always finds exactly the one question for any topic that will bring down barriers in my head I didn’t even know existed.”

Buck exhaled slowly. “Okay?”

“What was I afraid of that made it so I didn’t tell you about my will as soon as I had changed it?” Eddie asked, his head cocked to the side.

Buck shrugged, wondering how that subject had even come up at all during Eddie’s therapy. He was going two times a week for the time being, but it had only been three weeks since he had started to see his new therapist, and Buck had thought they would concentrate on the reasons behind Eddie’s panic.

Eddie held Buck’s gaze for a moment before he continued, “I couldn’t answer when he asked me that. I mean, I haven’t been able to answer any of his questions right away, but this one struck me a little more than I had expected.”

Buck sighed. “I have really no idea what you are trying to tell me.”

Eddie ran his tongue over his lips and lowered his gaze. “Leaving the most important person in my life in your care if something happened to me says a lot about your place in my life, doesn’t it? It says a lot more than I was prepared to admit even to myself when I changed my will.”

“It doesn’t have to mean anything more than your parents can be ableist assholes and you’re trying everything in your power to protect Chris from that,” Buck murmured.

Eddie laughed. “That’s true, too. They are also homophobic assholes, and I was always glad that my attraction to men as well as women was mostly theoretical and limited to celebrity crushes until I met you. The last thing I wanted to do while I lived in El Paso was to have to face their judgment over that.”

“Ah.” Buck blew out a breath. It was rare that he didn’t know what to say, especially while talking to Eddie, but he had no idea what kind of reaction was appropriate here.

“So, this is not me letting you down gently or whatever you thought earlier,” Eddie said softly. “That’s really the last thing I want to do. I’m still just really confused about your relationship with Taylor and why she has been trying to push us together when I thought the two of you were a thing.”

“Taylor and I are primarily friends,” Buck said. He straightened his back and put his hands flat on the kitchen counter. “Friends who have sex because we both like sex and it gave us both comfort and it was easy to give each other that. But it won’t change anything in our friendship when we eventually stop having sex with each other. Taylor will find someone else who’ll accept her emotional boundaries, or she’ll return to one-night-stands, whatever she is more comfortable with.”

Eddie frowned. “Taylor told me she’s aromantic. I have to admit I had to look that term up, but that didn’t help much with the confusion. When I was in the hospital you told me she had asked you out, and I got plenty of romantic vibes from what you told me then.”

“Yeah.” Buck chuckled and shook his head. “Those first few weeks were a little bit confusing for both of us.” He paused with a sigh. Taylor might have given him blanket permission to talk with Eddie about her, but he felt uncomfortable talking about someone else’s sexuality with anyone but that person. “Eventually finding a romantic partner is what’s expected of everyone, right? It’s an expectation that’s promoted everywhere around us, usually with the addition that it should be a partner of the opposite sex. Asking me out was Taylor’s attempt to achieve that for herself even though she doesn’t have any interest in it. She thought she would eventually be able to fall in love with me. Probably like you thought you would eventually fall in love with Ana and be able to build that core family your parents expect you to have.”

Eddie huffed and folded his hands on the table.

“I’m only telling you this because Taylor gave me permission to talk about it, okay?” Buck said. “We spent a lot of time figuring this out, and there were a lot of awkward moments involved in that. Aromantic is the term Taylor felt most comfortable with in the end, after we went through all the possible labels there are that we could find. I think falling in love with anyone is a completely foreign concept to her. She has lots of distant friends, very few and selected really good friends, and then some friends in both of those groups she likes to have sex with. But it’s never more than friendship for her. She thought she had to find that something more, and for some reason she thought she might be able to find that more in me.”

Eddie bit his lip, clearly trying to hold back his smile. “I can understand how she got that idea.”

“Yeah?” Buck grinned and finally left his spot behind the kitchen island. He sat down in the chair beside Eddie, who turned his own chair to face him. “Speaking from experience there, huh?”

“Didn’t work out for her, though, did it?”

Buck shrugged. “It’s also not what she really wants. But helping her figure that out about herself provided a great distraction for me while you were recovering.”

“You spent most of your time with me, I don’t even know how you had time to help Taylor figure this out.”

“Ah, I spent enough time with Taylor,” Buck grinned. “Was mostly pillow talk anyway, and research binges in between sex. There were enough moments when I felt I should leave Ana and you alone.”

Eddie swallowed visibly and nodded. “You have talked a lot about Taylor and very little about yourself.”

Buck shrugged. “What do you want to hear from me? Taylor was a good distraction, and a good fit because she would never expect more than sex and my friendship. I’ve tried to get over you, but Taylor helped me understand that I didn’t need to push that. Up until a couple of minutes ago I was convinced you were straight, so dealing with my surely unwelcome, not at all platonic love for you was something I tried very hard to do without revealing it to you.”

“Not unwelcome at all,” Eddie murmured.

Buck grinned. “Good to know. And I’m very happy to hear that. I thought for sure Taylor was seeing things that weren’t there.”

Eddie bit his lip, watching him with a frown.

“I guess I’ll call Taylor later and tell her that she and I are going back to friends without benefits,” Buck said, leaning forward slightly.

Eddie sighed and rubbed his fingers over his eyes, but part of the tension in his shoulders vanished. “I’m a mess right now, Buck.”

Buck laughed. “So? Me, too. I don’t mind if we’re a mess together.” He put his hands on Eddie’s knees and leaned into his space as far as he could without outright leaving his own chair. “I’m in love with you, have been for a long time, really. And I’d be happy to be your best friend and co-parent for the rest of our lives. But if there is a chance for more, I’d love if we took that chance and saw where it led us.”

Eddie inhaled sharply as he put his hands over Buck’s. “I’m in love with you too.”

“And that’s scary?”

Eddie huffed and rolled his eyes. “You are my best friend. And I tend to make bad relationship decisions. I know I have a problem with properly communicating. Yes it’s scary, because what if I ruin this relationship as well?”

“I’m pretty sure I can out-stubborn you,” Buck said with a small grin. “And it’s not like we just met and don’t know the bad things about each other. I think we have seen each other, and supported each other, through some of the worst experiences of our respective lives. I know how to get you to talk to me, and most of the time I can make a pretty good guess about what you aren’t saying when you try to avoid talking.”

Eddie chuckled. “True.”

“So, let’s do this,” Buck whispered. He turned his hands and clasped his fingers around Eddie’s wrists, who did the same without hesitation. “Let’s take this step and see where it takes us.”

Chapter 13

Taylor scrolled through her text chat with Buck, shaking her head and grinning at the pictures he kept sending her. There were both newly taken and old pictures of Eddie, or of the pair of them, annotated with short and mostly dorky comments that were overflowing with his happiness and love. There had been a shift in Eddie and Buck’s relationship the day after their abduction, and ever since then, Buck was sharing all his exuberant happiness with her.

Buck kept finding old photos or taking new ones to send her with comments, sometimes about the smallest of things he loved about Eddie. It had been nearly a week, but Buck wasn’t getting tired of it. The next time she saw Eddie, Taylor would make sure to share it with him, if only to see Buck blush and stammer.

Taylor had spent most of her weekend with them, and she had expected them to be inseparable and insufferably presenting their love to everyone who looked at them after the texts and pictures Buck had sent her the two days before, but she wouldn’t have necessarily thought anything had changed between them just from looking at them. But that might only be yet more proof that them admitting they were in love with each had been long overdue. It was just an acknowledgment of something nearly everyone around them had been aware of for a very long time.

“Taylor.”

She looked up and jumped out of her seat as she saw the friend she had been waiting for before she got distracted by Buck’s antics. Taylor had nearly canceled on Rachel, too torn up by the decision she still had to make about her father and dreading the connection Rachel provided to her teenage years, but hugging her now made her aware of how much she had really missed her. They didn’t see each other nearly often enough, and just talking on the phone would never be the same as being in the same place.

“It’s good to see you,” Rachel said softly.

Taylor swallowed and pressed her face against Rachel’s neck for a moment. “Yeah, same. I already ordered tea for you and asked them to prepare it as soon as they saw you arrive.”

“Thanks,” Rachel laughed. “I had half expected you would cancel on me.”

Taylor sighed. “You are the only one who hasn’t sent me any messages with demands about what I should do.”

After her father had been arrested, Taylor had been taken in by her mother’s older sister. Rachel’s father and the husband of that aunt were brothers, so she was technically family, but she had also always been far enough removed from all of it to never make any demands of Taylor or tell her what she should feel and think about the situation. They had been pushed together by their family because they were the same age and Taylor had been sent to the same school Rachel had already been attending. Meeting Rachel was the only good thing Taylor could remember about the first two years after her mother’s death.

Taylor hadn’t seen Rachel often since she had moved to LA, mostly because Rachel had moved to the east coast. She was in LA for four days on a business trip, and Taylor knew that it wouldn’t have been easy for her friend to make room in her schedule to meet her. In the end, that had been the main reason why Taylor had decided against canceling their coffee date—that and she trusted Rachel to stay far away from the topic of her father if Taylor asked her to.

Rachel rolled her eyes as they sat down. “Same as ever, then. Tell me what you were grinning about when I arrived.”

Taylor chuckled. “A friend who finally confessed his undying love to his best friend last week and is now floating on cloud nine and unable to contain his love and happiness. At the same time, I’m probably the only person right now Buck really wants to share that with, because there are a lot of other things going on in his life.”

It made her a little sad that Buck’s life was in so much disarray that she seemed to be the only one he felt comfortable sharing his newfound happiness with. She would have been happy to be his sounding board either way, but she had tried to match his excitement a little more than she felt she would have done otherwise.

“Buck?” Rachel asked. “Isn’t that the guy you were seeing the last time we spoke?”

“Yes,” Taylor agreed. “Though I might have been exaggerating when I spoke about that relationship. I knew all along he was in love with Eddie, but Buck is a great lay and thought Eddie was unavailable. We had a lot of fun, and Buck’s a great friend. Lately even Eddie is turning into a friend, and I’m happy for them.”

“And that’s not awkward?”

“I think it was a little bit awkward for Eddie when I told him I wouldn’t be in his way if he finally got his shit together and made a move on Buck,” Taylor said. “But he evidently got over that.”

Rachel laughed. “So, you were playing matchmaker while still sleeping with one of them?”

“Why should I miss out on fantastic sex?” Taylor asked with raised brows. “You would think that’s easy to come by in a city like LA, but let me tell you, it’s not.”

Rachel nodded and bit her lip. “Do you want to talk about your father?”

Taylor huffed. She really didn’t want to talk about it, and Rachel would accept that without question if she said no. But at the same time, maybe Rachel would be able to help her make a decision. Taylor needed to make a decision sooner rather than later, and she had used the whole drama in Buck’s life to let herself be distracted from her own drama. “What is there to talk about?”

“You said he asked you to speak at his parole hearing,” Rachel said. “How? I thought he didn’t talk to you anymore?”

“He sent me a letter through his lawyer,” Taylor explained, staring down at her coffee. She paused as Rachel’s tea was brought to their table and her friend ordered a piece of cake. “He tried to call me last week, but I didn’t accept the call. Talking with him won’t help. Not at this point.”

“Dad has been complaining about Aunt Gabi for weeks whenever I talk to him,” Rachel said. “She’s apparently already fed up that your father is getting a parole hearing at all. She is convinced he won’t get out, but that doesn’t stop her from going crazy over it.”

Taylor took a deep breath. “I have ignored her calls as well. I know she wants me to attend and to speak up against the parole. I don’t need to listen to her endless tirades again.”

Rachel nodded. “Dad has been trying to tell her that she needs to leave you alone.”

Taylor rolled her eyes. “She took me in and raised me, so I owe her, right? That’s what most of her arguments seem to boil down to.”

“It’s bullshit,” Rachel muttered. “I’m so glad you got away from that for the most part. And found your own way. I thought you would be dragged into that whole family war for a while.”

Taylor shrugged and stared down at her latte. “It doesn’t matter what I do, no matter what, one side of my family won’t talk to me anymore after it, right? And if I don’t do anything, if I don’t even attend that damn hearing, no one will ever talk to me again.”

“Maybe some will come to see that it’s bullshit asking you to decide anything,” Rachel said.

“Sure.” Taylor huffed, shaking her head.

“Is not going to the hearing something you want to do?” Rachel asked.

“I don’t even know that,” Taylor murmured. “I don’t know anything, and I don’t know how to make a decision. And I have used everything I could to give me a distraction from all of it. I was nine fucking years old when my whole world broke apart, how do they expect me to know anything?”

“But you probably do have a better picture of all of it than anyone else.” Rachel reached over the table for her hand. “You spent so much time talking with everyone, sorting through the evidence. I think … I think at least some have been waiting for you to make a decision to know what they should believe. Not everyone on our side of the family is as convinced as Aunt Gabi that your father is guilty. And that makes me think that there are people on his side of the family not convinced of his innocence.”

“That’s even more fucked up,” Taylor growled. “Eddie told me last week that finding out the truth might not bring the salvation I’ve been searching for all my life. And I haven’t been able to stop thinking about that.”

Rachel squeezed her hand, her mouth hanging open. “You talked with Eddie about this? Really?”

“Buck and Eddie both,” Taylor nodded. “I … did something that I know was the right decision, but it could have very well cost me my friendship with Buck. When he came over to talk about it, I felt I … should be honest with him. And then I had already talked with Buck, and Eddie and he are practically a unit, so I didn’t see any fault in telling Eddie about it as well.”

“Wow.”

Taylor met Rachel’s gaze with a soft smile. “Right?”

“I think I might need to meet that guy even if you aren’t romantically involved with him anymore,” Rachel said with raised brows. “This is … Is this the first time you told anyone about your parents?”

Taylor took a deep. “Pretty much. At least voluntarily.”

Rachel sighed. “And you just let him go.”

“I didn’t let him go. We are still friends. Good friends. And I never even once was in love with him.” Taylor paused, biting her lip. She loved Rachel a lot, but Rachel was also one of the people who had repeatedly told her she would eventually find the love of her life when she got over the trauma her parents’ situation had inflicted on her. Their time today was much too precious to start that kind of discussion, though.

“And he was already in love with someone else,” Rachel nodded. “That’s a real shame.”

Taylor shook her head, grinning. “It’s not. They make a really adorable family, and I’m very happy to be able to witness that.”

Rachel watched her for a while silently. “You said you couldn’t stop thinking about what Eddie told you.”

“Regardless of what I decide to believe, it always comes with accepting the worst about one of my parents, doesn’t it?” Taylor said, frowning. “And the same goes with finally getting confirmation about what really happened. Either possibility is equally horrible.”

“But you feel you need to make a decision.”

“Don’t I?”

“Do you really?” Rachel cocked her head. “What if you just don’t make a decision? And don’t tell me you want to keep in contact with at least part of your family, because you haven’t done that for the last couple of years anyway. How they’ll react to your decision shouldn’t in any way play into your thoughts about this.”

“Because that’s so easy,” Taylor muttered.

“I know it’s not. But … Hey, Tay. Look at me.” Rachel waited until Taylor followed her instruction. “I will always be on your side. And I’m completely convinced I’m the only person of that whole bunch who deserves your attention anyway.”

Taylor laughed wetly. “You are. I don’t think I want to talk about this anymore.”

Rachel smiled. “Okay. So, tell me more about Eddie and Buck!”

***

Buck stared at his phone and wondered for a moment if he should start dreading getting calls from unknown numbers. He had known that filling charges for the punch had resulted in an outstanding arrest warrant for Chimney, but Buck hadn’t expected the Boston PD to call him because they had arrested Chimney and would keep him in custody until they could bring him to California. They hadn’t even called about the arrest, but because they tried to find someone who would take custody of Jee-Yun.

Buck flinched when his phone started ringing again and he nearly rejected the call when he saw Albert’s name on the screen. He sighed deeply and answered the phone with closed eyes. “Hey, Albert.”

“Hey…” Albert hesitated. “I’m not sure if I’ve just fallen victim to a prank call or not.”

“If it was the Boston PD calling because of Chim and Jee, then no, it probably wasn’t a prank call,” Buck muttered.

“So, Chimney really has been arrested?” Albert asked. “Why? The man I talked to didn’t want to tell me anything. He wanted to know if I could come to Boston to take temporary custody of Jee-Yun. Did they ask you the same?”

“Yes. Have you talked to Chimney at all since he left LA?”

“Not really.” Albert sighed. “He told me he didn’t have time to take care of me. He was in a really bad mood the two times he took my call. You don’t think he did something stupid, do you?”

Buck sighed. “He did something … let’s call it impulsive. And he did it while he was still here, which seems to be the reason they seem to plan to extradite him here so that a judge can make a decision about bail. I’m pretty sure they’ll let him out on bail or even OR, so he’ll be able to take care of Jee again as soon as those formalities are taken care of.”

“I think I only understood half of what you just said,” Albert muttered. “So you know what happened?”

“I … yes. Maybe talking about this on the phone isn’t the best choice,” Buck said.

“I could come by the 118? My Captain was standing right beside me when I took the call, and he gave me the rest of this shift and my next shift off so that I can take care of this. Are you planning to go to Boston?”

Buck bit his lip. The detective he had talked to had asked about Maddie because Chimney had told them he didn’t want them to give custody of Jee-Yun to Buck. There had been nothing said directly about Albert, but Buck had gotten the impression that someone in Boston wasn’t comfortable with considering Albert even as a temporary guardian for Jee-Yun either. Whatever was going on was a big mess.

“I’m not sure yet,” Buck said finally. “Probably.”

“They said it could be a problem for me to take Jee-Yun because I don’t have an American passport,” Albert muttered.

Buck blew out a breath. “What a load of bullshit. Chimney doesn’t want me to take Jee, and they are trying to find Maddie right now to get her opinion, I guess? And even if they give Jee to me to bring her back to California, I don’t think it’s a good idea for me to keep her considering the argument between Chimney and me. Do you think the Lees would take care of Jee?”

“They wouldn’t hesitate for a second,” Albert said. “What argument are you talking about? I mean, I’ve heard his voicemail message, but what’s going on?”

Buck shook his head. “I think you coming here to talk about this is a good idea. And bring the Lees as well, I assume they have no idea what’s going on either and I don’t want to go through this more than once today.”

“Can you make sure you won’t be on a call out?”

Buck laughed. “I’m man behind the whole day, same as last shift. I guess I won’t be here next shift, and I had seriously been looking forward to being done with light duty.”

“Man behind the whole day?” Albert asked appalled. “What did you do to make Bobby that angry?”

“Got abducted by two criminals in our ambulance while I should have been waiting outside the prison far away from all the ruckus.”

“That was you?” Albert shouted.

“Will the Lees be able to come here on such short notice?” Buck asked, redirecting the conversation back to the point.

“They’re both retired. I’ll call them right away. I guess it will take about an hour for us all to get to you?”

Buck nodded. “I’ll be here, no reason to hurry.”

Albert hung up after a short goodbye and Buck pressed his forehead against his palms, his elbows propped up on his knees. The day had just turned from overly boring to a total clusterfuck, and he didn’t know how to handle it. The Lees and Albert were Chimney’s family, why should they believe him over Chimney?

Buck shook his head and pushed that confrontation away because he had another phone call to make. It took him a moment to find the number of Detective Romero. “Detective Romero, this is Buck, uhm, Evan Buckley.”

“How can I help you, Mr. Buckley?”

“I just got a call from Boston PD,” Buck said. “I talked to a Detective Patrick Choi. They have apparently arrested Chimney and are trying to find my sister because of custody problems concerning my niece. I didn’t give out the information I had over the phone and told him to contact you officially for the information.”

Athena had shown up at Isabel Diaz’s house the afternoon after the whole fiasco at the prison and dragged Buck away for two hours so that he could update the missing person’s report he had filed for Maddie now that he knew where she was. No one had tried to make contact with Maddie in the days since, but Romero knew how to contact her if it was necessary and the police weren’t actively looking for her anymore.

“I’ll make sure they get the information they need. Do they want you to take temporary custody of your niece?”

Buck sighed. “Chimney doesn’t want that, but someone behind the decision-making isn’t happy with his brother because he isn’t a US citizen. They want to ask Maddie about her opinion, I guess. Which is horrible, because she has no idea at all what’s been going on.”

“I’ll make sure to send someone sensible to talk to her if it becomes necessary,” Romero assured. “Thank you for calling me; it probably won’t be until tomorrow before I hear anything from my colleagues up in Boston. I’ll have all the information they’ll need ready so that the process of taking custody of your niece can be as short as possible.”

“Chimney will be let out on bail pretty much as soon as he gets here, won’t he?” Buck asked.

Romero sighed. “Probably.”

Buck nodded. “How long will that take?”

“Are you really asking me for an estimate with all the red tape we’ll have to handle?” Romero chuckled. “I’m sorry, but I won’t dare to hazard a guess. But I will inform you as soon as Mr. Han is back in California. After that, it will only take a day or two max before he is seen by a judge.”

“Thank you,” Buck murmured and stood as he heard the truck return. “I’m sorry, but I have to go.”

“No problem. I’ll call you if I have any questions or news.”

Buck shoved his phone into his pocket and waited anxiously until the team had gone through their post-call routine before he pulled Bobby aside to tell him about Chimney and that Albert and the Lees would arrive shortly. Somehow after that, Buck didn’t need to take care of anything else, and when Albert arrived with Chimney’s foster parents a little more than an hour later—and thankfully without another call out for the 118—Bobby greeted them with a bright smile and ushered them, Buck, Eddie, and Hen into his office.

“Thank you for taking the time to come by,” Bobby said, sitting down in the chair behind his desk. The Lees had taken the chairs in front of the desk, Eddie had dragged Buck to the couch, and Hen and Albert were standing on either side of the Lees. “It’s been a difficult time for all of us, but I understand Chimney hasn’t told you what happened during and right after the blackout?”

“Only that Maddie left,” Albert agreed, but judging by the tension in Mr. Lee’s shoulders and Mrs. Lee shaking her head, Buck thought they probably hadn’t known about that until recently. “Then he left to look for her and it’s become very difficult to reach him.”

“I am not sure if we should talk about Howie’s problems with so many people in attendance,” Mrs. Lee said.

“Everyone in this room is involved in the situation in some fashion or another,” Bobby said. “And I think it’s a good idea if we could all be on the same page going forward.”

Hen snorted, but a pointed look from Bobby stopped her from saying anything.

“Do you know why Howard has been arrested?” Mr. Lee asked.

“Yes,” Bobby said while Buck did his best to ignore Hen’s glaring. “And I have a video of the incident that led to this. I think it’s best to show you instead of trying to tell you about events I wasn’t present for.” He looked at Hen. “And I think it would be good for you to finally see this as well.”

Buck sighed. He wasn’t looking forward to this, but he had expected it. Bobby had asked him about the video earlier, but Buck hadn’t been able to provide a copy since he had never asked Taylor for one. Surprisingly enough, Eddie had been able to send the file to Bobby instead.

“That it was even taken was a breach of Chim’s privacy!”

Bobby rolled his eyes. “That’s debatable at best and not why we are here. It is evidence in the case against Chimney.”

“We won’t like this, will we?” Albert muttered, watching Hen with a frown.

Bobby sighed and turned the laptop around so that Albert, the Lees, and Hen could look at it. Buck stubbornly stared at a spot on the floor, Eddie’s arm tightly wrapped around his shoulder. He wished it was as easy to avoid hearing the conversation as it was to avoid watching the whole mess unfold on screen. He flinched when he heard the punch, not expecting that it would be such a distinct sound.

“Buck,” Albert whispered with a broken voice. “Are you alright? Is that why you are on light duty?”

“Yes,” Bobby answered in his stead. “Buck was on medical leave for two weeks, and following that has been on light duty until today because of a hairline fracture in his cheekbone. His girlfriend took this video, and she is also the one who reported the assault to the police. Chimney didn’t know about that because he left LA the morning after this occurred.”

There was a moment of silence, but Buck kept staring at the floor.

Then Mr. Lee exhaled slowly. “Thank you for showing us this video. But I assume this is not the reason Albert asked us to accompany him here. He mentioned a problem with Jee-Yun.”

Buck cleared his throat. “Yes, that is … Chimney took her with him when he went on his quest to search for Maddie. CPS in Boston took her into custody when he was arrested, and they won’t hand her back to him until after he has been brought back to California and is out on bail. Which means someone has to go to Boston, take temporary custody of her, and bring her back here. The Boston police called Albert and me about this, but it’s not clear yet who they’ll give custody of Jee to.”

“You are both her uncles,” Mrs. Lee said quietly.

“But Chimney was very clear apparently that he doesn’t want me to have custody,” Buck said.

“And they aren’t happy about my citizenship status,” Albert continued. “Aside from that, I’m really not good at taking care of a baby. Last time I had to call Eddie for help after just a few hours. They are looking for Maddie right now, but I think that’s a long shot.”

“I’m sure we’ll be able to find some kind of arrangement to at least bring her back here,” Buck said. “But after that … I’d not hesitate to take care of Jee, of course, but with the situation between me and Chimney as it is, I don’t think that’s a good idea. He doesn’t need another reason to be angry at me. Which is why I asked Albert to bring you here. You are as good as parents to Chimney; I know Maddie and he both view you as Jee-Yun’s grandparents. I’m sure we’ll be able to make an arrangement with CPS here so that they allow you to take her.”

“Yes, of course,” Mrs. Lee said. “We could go to Boston as well.”

“No,” Hen said, strangely quiet. “You aren’t related to Jee-Yun, and they’ll want to hand her over to a relative. It’s different here, but the situation in Boston is to arrange for her travel back. If that can’t be arranged, they’ll find foster parents for her until a relative or Chimney or Maddie themselves can come and bring her back here. I’d offer to go myself, but being certified as a foster parent here in California won’t do any good either.”

“We’ll take care of Jee-Yun,” Mr. Lee said. “And we’ll have a lawyer waiting for Howard as soon as he arrives here.”

Mrs. Lee turned around and looked at Buck with a sad smile. “How long will it take until we know who will be allowed to take custody of Jee-Yun in Boston?”

Buck shrugged. “A day, maybe two? I thought Albert and I should just fly out there. Surely it’ll be easier to deal with CPS when we’re there than doing it over the phone. I’d like to bring her home as soon as possible.”

“Good idea,” Albert agreed. “Maybe I’ll even be able to see Chimney. Try to convince him to allow you and me to bring Jee-Yun back here together. I mean, he should be able to decide that, right?”

Hen nodded. “Yes. Chimney should have a say in this whole situation: being arrested doesn’t take away his rights as a parent, it just makes it impossible to have Jee-Yun with him. So, if he agrees to you bringing Jee back, there should, in theory, be no problem with that.”

Chapter 14

The fire station was deserted when Taylor arrived, the wide open space that usually housed the vehicles empty. It looked strange and made the space seem much bigger than it actually was. She had never seen the station like this since she had followed the crew on all their calls during the shift when she had shadowed them.

“Buck?” Taylor called out. She knew he had to be here because Bobby had ordered him not to leave the house during this shift and the previous one, something that Buck had only grudgingly accepted. He had texted her not even an hour ago, and even though it had only been a ‘Can you come over?’ she knew the way he texted well enough by now to be worried.

“I’m here.” Buck came out of the locker room, his shoulders hanging down and his face crestfallen despite the effort he put into his smile.

Taylor frowned and stopped right in front of him. “What happened?”

Buck sighed and Taylor grabbed his hands. “Chimney has been arrested. In Boston. Albert and the Lees were here earlier so that we could explain the situation to them. Because both Albert and I were called concerning Jee-Yun.”

Taylor blinked. “That was to be expected at some point, wasn’t it?”

Buck shrugged. “Yeah, sure. But…”

“Let’s sit down upstairs, okay? Any idea when the rest will be back?”

“Three alarm fire,” Buck muttered. “That usually takes time. I didn’t want to be alone. I hope … It was okay that I texted you, right?”

Taylor smiled softly. “Yes, of course.” She turned to the stairs and didn’t let go of Buck’s hand as she dragged him up to the loft. “What has you so rattled about this?”

Buck shrugged. “All of it? Now Chimney knows I pressed charges against him. And Albert and I have to go to Boston to take care of Jee, but Chimney told them he doesn’t want me to get custody of her.”

“Custody?” Taylor asked surprised. She pushed Buck down onto the nearest couch and sat down beside him.

“The police will transfer Chimney to California,” Buck explained quietly. “But they won’t allow him to have Jee-Yun with him. So, someone has to go to Boston to bring her back.”

“Which will be Albert and you.”

Buck shrugged. “Hopefully? Chimney has a say in the situation, but he doesn’t want me. CPS seems to be unhappy with Albert because he’s a Korean citizen, not American. Maddie is out of the picture currently. So, if we don’t find a solution, Jee could end up in foster care for now. Or worse, someone could call my parents.”

“When are you going to Boston?” Taylor asked.

“As soon as possible. We have to get flights first. Albert’s captain gave him the rest of the shift off as well as his next one on Friday. Bobby did the same for me and said I could leave before this shift is over if necessary. He wanted to send me home, but I didn’t want to be alone.”

Taylor sighed, forcing herself not to look around the empty firehouse. “I’ll come with you. Do you already have plane tickets?”

Buck blinked, clearly confused. “You want to come to Boston with me? Why?”

“I’m not leaving you alone with Chimney’s brother,” Taylor said. “And even without that, I wouldn’t want you to have to go and deal with all this alone. So, yes, I’m coming with you to Boston.”

“What about your work?”

“I can take a couple of personnel days, no problem at all. Have you already booked a flight?”

Buck shook his head. “I agreed with Albert I’d look for both of us, but it was a little bit hectic after he left, and then I…” He sighed. “He is my friend, too, you know? He isn’t just Chimney’s brother. When he learned about what had happened, the first thing he did was to ask about my health.”

Taylor blew out a breath. Albert seemed to have more common sense than Hen, which was a big point in his favor. But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t eventually turn on Buck if he had to choose between his brother and his friend. “I’m still coming with you. Let’s see what the first available flight with three seats is from here to Boston, okay?”

Buck stared at her for a moment before he leaned against her, his forehead resting on her shoulder. “Thank you.”

“Of course.” Taylor wrapped her arms around him. “Can you tell me what is so troubling for you about this situation? I mean, we’ve been waiting for something like this, haven’t we?”

“I didn’t expect him to actually be arrested,” Buck murmured. “I thought he would eventually come home from his insane quest and have a chance to go to the police on his own to give them his statement. And I really didn’t like that Bobby showed Albert and the Lees that video you took.”

“Why? This way they can’t question what happened,” Taylor said. “Did Hen take the opportunity and watch it as well?” She had wondered why neither Eddie nor Buck had shown it to Hen so far, but she hadn’t felt it her place to question them about it.

Buck nodded. “Hen and Eddie were there with us when Bobby and I talked to them. She seemed pretty rattled.”

“So, you watched the video as well?”

Buck shook his head. “Listening to it was bad enough.”

Taylor hummed. She knew Buck had talked about the confrontation with Chimney with his therapist, but she wondered how much of it he had really worked through and how much he had just repressed since then. The way he was reacting now to being confronted with Chimney again, even just indirectly, made her think he hadn’t worked through it as much as she would have wished for him to have already done.

“Are you sure about coming with me?” Buck asked quietly. “I don’t even know yet how long this whole thing will take. Or how we’ll come back. I mean, it’s not just Jee, there’s also Chimney’s car to deal with.”

Taylor huffed. “No, Buck, stop. The only thing you should worry about is the well-being of your niece. You don’t need to fix anything else for Chimney, and I don’t think you should even try. Forget about the car. If there is a reason that Jee-Yun can’t fly, we’ll take the train back.”

“Chimney will need his car,” Buck protested.

“But that’s not your problem. He can take care of getting his car back from Boston on his own. If he had listened to you, he would have known he needed to come back a week ago. Or if Hen had been less stubborn and told him that the police were looking for him, he could have turned around and come back to take care of it. I know you like to fix things, but this isn’t something you should try to fix. Chimney wouldn’t appreciate it anyway. He would probably turn around and accuse you of damaging his car.”

Buck huffed. “True.”

“So, you’ll only focus on Jee-Yun, okay?”

“Yeah, okay. You are right.” Buck leaned into her a little more before he sat up with a sigh. “So, let’s get these flights sorted out. The prices will be horrendous on such short notice, and we can’t even book the flights back yet.”

Taylor pulled her laptop out of her bag and pressed her leg against Buck’s as she put it on the table. “We’ll also need a hotel that will allow us to have Jee-Yun with us. Not all hotels allow children, and some only allow children of a certain age.”

Buck sighed. “Right.”

Taylor grabbed his hand. “We’ll manage this, don’t worry.”

***

“Hey,” Albert smiled self-consciously as Buck sat down beside him at the table in the hotel restaurant. It was the same table they had eaten their dinner at and where Taylor and Buck had left him behind when they had gone up to put Jee-Yun to bed. “That was faster than I had expected.”

Buck grinned. “Not everyone makes children cry by just being in the same room with them.”

“Harsh,” Albert chuckled. “And I’m not that bad.”

“You need to get over your fear of doing something wrong when you are holding Jee,” Buck said. “She senses your insecurity, and that makes her feel anxious. And short of dropping her, there is nothing you can do wrong.”

“I can try again tomorrow, right? We have a whole flight with her ahead of us.”

“And won’t that be a great experience, flying with a baby,” Buck muttered. “But better than having her in a car seat for days on end again. Thanks for going to talk with Chimney. I can’t imagine that was a pleasant conversation.”

They had spent one and a half days negotiating with the woman responsible for Jee-Yun’s case at CPS, and in the end, Albert had needed to visit Chimney twice to convince him that he should allow Buck to bring Jee-Yun back. Thankfully, with the choice between leaving Jee-Yun in foster care in Boston or having Buck take custody for a few hours to bring her back to California where the Lees would meet them right at the airport to take Jee-Yun, Chimney had finally relented.

“He is unspeakably angry at you,” Albert murmured, shaking his head. “I have no idea where this is coming from. I know he can be resentful and hold a grudge, but this is just extreme.”

“I’m half convinced Maddie isn’t the only one suffering from PPD, and I hope he’ll get some therapy once he is back home,” Buck said. “The department will make him see a therapist anyway, I guess. But that only helps if he gives it a chance.”

“You don’t think they’ll fire him over this, do you?”

Buck shook his head. “No. Bobby thinks Chimney will be assigned to another station and suspended for some time. But that’s bad enough. I didn’t want any of this, you know?”

“He punched you. He has to live with the consequences.”

“If Taylor hadn’t been there and seen all of it, I wouldn’t have told anyone,” Buck muttered, staring down at the table. Over the past few weeks, he had stopped doubting his decision to support the police investigation since he couldn’t stop it anyway, but now with Chimney arrested and all these problems arising for Jee-Yun, that doubt had returned stronger than ever before.

“How’d you have explained your black eye then?” Albert asked.

“He told Hen he had accidentally hit me with his elbow when I tried to hold him back because I didn’t want him to search for Maddie.”

Albert huffed. “And you’d have just gone with that lie? That’s bullshit, Buck.”

Buck shook his head. “I know. It would have been the wrong choice. And I’m not angry at Taylor anymore for going to the police. I needed that wake-up call myself. Doesn’t mean I can’t wish all of this had gone down differently.”

“Chimney is blaming you for everything right now,” Albert said. “For his arrest, of course, but also for things like that he hasn’t found Maddie yet, that he has been driving aimlessly through the country for weeks, that Maddie left in the first place. I think the one who needs a wake-up call is Chimney. And being put on trial for punching you might be the only thing capable of doing it.”

“I wasn’t sure how you’d react to any of this. I’m grateful that you have been supporting me so much the last two days.”

“I’ll support Chimney as much as I can,” Albert said. “But I’ll also support you. There is no doubt in my mind who is in the wrong here, and supporting my brother right now means making him understand that he is risking everything he has built for himself in his life with his behavior. I’m not following his insane narrative just because he is my brother. I’d have always listened to your version as well.”

Buck swallowed, thinking about Hen who had been very subdued for the rest of the shift after the Lees and Albert had left. Bobby had tried to send Buck home again after coming back from the three-alarm fire, but Buck had insisted on staying. There wouldn’t have been anything for him to do at home, and there had been plenty to do at the station to distract him. By that point he had already booked the flights with Taylor, and she had driven home to pack for both of them. She had come back in time to pick him up to catch their flight, which had left hours before his shift would have ended.

“I take it Hen didn’t listen to you?” Albert asked. “I saw her glare at you when we arrived and then her whole demeanor changed after we had seen the video.”

“She’s been listening to Chimney vent his anger at me the whole time since he left,” Buck said. “And yes, she didn’t believe a word I had to say about that evening and was additionally angry at me for involving the police.”

“But she didn’t tell Chimney about that?” Albert frowned.

Buck shrugged. “Didn’t want to bother him with that nonsense and distract him from his worry about Maddie, or something like that. I don’t think she believed the charges would lead to anything.”

“Why didn’t you show her the video before?”

“Why wasn’t it enough for her that I told her Chimney had punched me?” Buck asked.

Albert sighed. “Fair. What do you think Maddie will say when she learns about this?”

“I really have no idea,” Buck shook his head. “And I won’t speculate about it. I’ll just wait and see because otherwise I’d drive myself insane. How did the Lees take all of this?”

“They are very disappointed with Chimney,” Albert said. “But they’ll stand by his side, and they’ll never question him openly. He will face their disappointment in private, though. You were right about them being his parents, you know? Emotionally, for them, Chimney is their son. They regret that they let their grief about Kevin come between them and Chimney for a couple of years, and that regret is the reason they took me in initially. I kinda think they have adopted me now, too. But anyway, they won’t let anything else come between them and Chimney again, regardless of what he does.”

“They didn’t say much yesterday,” Buck said. “And I wasn’t able to read anything in their faces or body language.”

“They are both very private people. They always try to contain themselves in front of strangers. But they will support Chimney without question, regardless of what comes his way.”

Buck smiled. “That’s good. Chimney deserves that kind of support. I know he’ll eventually get over his anger. I didn’t expect Hen to turn her back on him either, you know? I always knew she would stand by him. It just would have been nice if she’d been able to recognize that he actually might be the one in the wrong even though he had told her something else.”

Albert sighed. “If you know where Maddie is, don’t tell Chimney until he has considerably calmed down.”

“Okay,” Buck said slowly and raised his brows. “Where is that coming from?”

Albert shrugged. “Both times when I saw him yesterday and today, he was insisting that everything would turn out alright if he only found Maddie and could reunite her with Jee-Yun. I don’t think he would support her and any treatment she chose in the way she needs it. Not right now, at least. I’m worried about that even more than about his anger at you.”

“Why?” Buck asked, though he shared that opinion.

“Because it would hinder her healing,” Albert said. “And I wonder … When Maddie left, that didn’t just come out of the blue, did it? How much has his behavior played into her leaving if she didn’t see any other way to get the help she needed?”

Buck shuddered. He had wondered the same, and it was disconcerting that Albert, who normally had a difficult time reading the mood of a room, saw it as well. How long had Chimney been holding onto his belief that spending time with Jee-Yun would eventually be enough for Maddie to overcome her PPD?

“You are right, my brother needs therapy as well,” Albert said. “I’ll talk with Anne about this when we are back, because between John and her, I think they’ll be able to make Chimney see sense. But until he has gotten help himself, and until Maddie feels considerably better than she felt when she left, I don’t think it’s a good idea for them to reunite.”

“You’ve grown a lot since you moved out of my apartment,” Buck said grinning, feeling proud of the man his friend was growing into.

Albert shrugged. “Nearly dying puts a lot of things in perspective, right?”

Buck sighed. “Yeah. Maddie is reading Chimney’s emails, though. The whole reason we ended up in Boston was because she called me about an email Chimney had sent her and I heard these bells in the background.”

“Which seem to have been a false trail.”

Buck nodded, deciding not to comment on that. “We won’t be able to stop her from reaching out to Chimney when he writes her about all of this. We just have to hope that she has had enough time to get her feet under her again.”

Albert nodded. He tapped his fingers on the table, hesitating for several minutes, before he said, “Chimney told me that you weren’t allowed to see Jee-Yun again once the Lees have taken her. He gave me a letter for John and Anne, and I assume he has given them the same instructions.”

Buck swallowed around the lump in his throat. “I was expecting that. He’s threatened it before, and while I think it was intended to be a joke then, I’m not surprised he has brought it up again.”

“Maddie won’t stand for that, you know that, right?” Albert asked, reaching out to put his hand over Buck’s. “She’ll kick his ass when she learns about this nonsense.”

Buck smiled sadly. “We’ll see.”

He wasn’t as sure about what kind of reaction he could expect from Maddie, and that had less to do with her current mental struggles and more with her core personality. The truth was that he didn’t know his sister as well as he wished he did. They had tried to get to know each other again in the three years since she had come to LA, but there had been a huge setback in that when he had learned about Daniel, and he felt there hadn’t been any time at all to recover from that yet.

“No,” Albert shook his head. “I’m sure of that, okay?”

Buck stared at him for a moment, before he nodded silently.

Albert sighed. “Even if Chimney doesn’t want you to see Jee-Yun, I’ll keep you updated on her. I’ll send lots of pictures. But maybe we’ll call it a night. We have an early start tomorrow. And your girlfriend is waiting for you.”

Buck chuckled. “She isn’t my girlfriend, she’s just a very good friend. One who thinks I shouldn’t face anything concerning Chimney alone, including you.”

Albert frowned and shrugged. “Okay, whatever. Still, I think I need to get all the sleep I can before we take Jee-Yun on a plane.”

Buck grinned. “I’ll see you tomorrow, bright and early for breakfast.”

They left the restaurant together, but their paths diverged at the stairs. Buck found Taylor sitting in bed reading, on the side closer to the crib Jee-Yun was sleeping in. She looked up with a soft smile when Buck entered their room and put her book aside.

“Everything alright?” she asked quietly.

Buck nodded. “I think so.” He slipped out of his shoes and his jeans before he crawled on the bed beside her, lying down with his face pressed against her hip. He felt so exhausted, but at the same time too wired up to think about going to sleep. “Albert and I are good. Thanks for coming here with me. It’s a lot easier not doing this alone.”

Taylor carded her fingers through his hair. “Every time. But maybe you will protest less next time.”

“I’ll try,” Buck murmured. “No promises, though. I’ve been told repeatedly these past couple weeks that I’m bad at accepting help.”

“You are,” Taylor agreed without hesitation.

“Will you accept my help as well in return?” Buck asked. “I’d like to accompany you to that parole hearing for your father.”

Taylor’s fingers in his hair froze. “I’m not even sure yet if I’ll attend myself.”

“But if you do, I don’t want you to go alone.”

Taylor sucked in a breath. “You don’t need to do anything in return for me coming here with you.”

Buck sighed and sat up with crossed legs, facing Taylor. “That’s not what this is about, Tay. I really appreciate that you are here with me. Leaning on you emotionally has made it a lot easier to handle all the bullshit Chimney has created. But I’ve been wondering for a while how I could offer to come with you in December without you blocking any talk about it right away. You don’t need to face that alone.”

Taylor frowned but remained silent.

“You don’t want to talk about it and that’s okay,” Buck continued. “But I don’t want you to have to make that journey alone. I’d like to come with you, even if all I’ll do is sit silently beside you so that you know you have someone in your corner regardless of the decision you make in the end.”

Taylor closed her eyes and shook her head, but she said, “I-I’ll think about it.” She inhaled slowly and opened her eyes again. “Let’s talk about you and Eddie instead, shall we?”

Buck chuckled and rubbed the back of his head. “You aren’t fed up yet with all the gushing I’ve done via text? There isn’t much to talk about yet.”

“Really?” Taylor raised her brows. “When I came over to have breakfast with the three of you last weekend, you had clearly spent the night at Eddie’s house. And not on the couch.”

“So?” Buck huffed. “Two adults can share a bed platonically. That’s what we did last night, what we’re doing again tonight.”

“Which isn’t the same at all.”

Buck rolled his eyes. “It’s not even the first time Eddie and I have shared a bed. We did that for weeks at the beginning of the pandemic. It’s not a big deal.”

“Except that you hadn’t confessed to each other you were in love back then,” Taylor said.

Buck crossed his arms over his chest. “I won’t share any details about sex with Eddie with you anyway, so stop prodding. We are taking things slow right now, but even when things eventually aren’t so slow anymore, you won’t get any information out of me.”

Taylor laughed loudly and hurriedly clapped her hands over her mouth with a startled gaze at Jee-Yun, whose sleep didn’t seem to be disturbed by the sound at all. “That’s not what I’m after, though I wouldn’t mind hearing about it. Or watching. Or joining, if that’s something you and Eddie are interested in.”

“I’m not,” Buck muttered with a glare.

“Very sad for me,” Taylor said grinning. “This was a lot more fun for me when you were still mooning over Eddie and willingly shared your thoughts and fantasies.”

Buck huffed and wondered if he’d come to regret how much he had shared with Taylor at some point. It had seemed only fair after she had laid open all her own inner thoughts and desires while they had worked out their relationship nearly half a year ago, and it had been a surprisingly big comfort to share all the thoughts about Eddie he had kept so close to his chest for such a long time. But at that point, it had been fantasies he had been convinced didn’t have any chance of ever coming true.

“I’m happy for you,” Taylor said with a soft smile.

Buck lowered his gaze, smiling. “Thanks for pushing us. Though, I still can’t believe you told Eddie you would step aside for him!”

“With the pace you were going, anything more subtle wouldn’t have worked!” Taylor shoved her foot playfully at his knee. “He more or less made you a second parent to his kid, one he couldn’t be more devoted to, and then turned around and searched for a girlfriend? And you were sitting on the sidelines, telling me all you wanted was for Eddie to be happy and you didn’t want to disturb his life, while he hadn’t stopped jealously glaring at me for a single second during the treasure hunt.”

“You are exaggerating,” Buck muttered. He felt himself blush, and he knew she wasn’t exaggerating as much as he wished she was.

“Believe whatever you need to feel better,” Taylor chuckled. “I expect my part in your little love story to be included in some sort of speech during your wedding reception though.”

“Tay!” Buck buried his face in his hands. “You are the worst.”

“But you still love me!”

Buck shook his head, quietly laughing. “You’ll make me reevaluate our friendship if you don’t stop. And anyway, even if there ever is a wedding, that’s an event far in the future. Who knows where you will be then, reporting about the kind of events everyone remembers exactly where they were when they heard you tell them about it even decades later.”

“I’ll take a break from that for your wedding,” Taylor promised with a soft smile.

Chapter 15

“Bucky!”

“Superman!”

Buck wrapped his arms around Christopher and lifted him up, whirling them around and matching Christopher’s excitement with every beat. Eddie chuckled to himself as he stopped just out of arm’s reach from them and watched their exuberant reunion. Everyone around them watching would probably assume they had been separated for much longer than the two days Buck had been gone. Though, it had been two very exhausting days, for him and Christopher as well as for Buck judging by the shadows under Buck’s eyes and the way he had held himself before he had seen them.

“I told Dad we had to welcome you properly!” Christopher said, his arms tightly wrapped around Buck’s neck. “But he wouldn’t let me make a sign so that you could find us in the crowd.”

Buck laughed and searched for Eddie’s gaze. “That’s a shame, I would have loved a sign! I missed you both so much.”

“You were only gone two days,” Eddie reminded him, not mentioning that Christopher had only asked about a sign an hour before they had needed to leave for the airport and that was the only reason he had talked his son out of the idea.

Christopher signed unhappily. “Still too long.”

“Next time I go anywhere, you’ll both come with me,” Buck promised as he put Christopher back on his feet.

Christopher nodded and asked with shining eyes, “Where is Jee-Yun? I thought I could finally meet her!”

Buck’s face fell and Eddie wrapped an arm around his shoulders, pressing a kiss against his temple. Buck had texted him before his flight had left Boston and told him about the arrangement with the Lees. Eddie remembered a throwaway comment from Chimney during the blackout about how he joked about keeping Jee-Yun from Buck to get around the paperwork Buck had made everyone fill out, and he wondered now how much of a joke it had ever been, and if Chimney had known from the very beginning how powerful that threat was.

Buck sighed and leaned into Eddie heavily. “I’m sorry, I already gave her to her grandparents. They’re supposed to take care of her, but they couldn’t go to Boston to get her themselves. That’s why Albert and I went to get her.” He turned his head to Eddie questioningly, clearly searching for help.

“Let’s head to the car,” Eddie said. This wasn’t a discussion he wanted to have at the airport. “Abuela is preparing dinner for us, and we don’t want to make her wait, do we?”

Buck chuckled. “It’s just after lunchtime here.”

“So?” Eddie shrugged. “My Abuela wants us to spend the afternoon with her. Do you want to tell her no?”

“I’m pretty sure it’s a rule that no one is allowed to say no to Isabel Diaz,” Buck laughed.

Christopher frowned up at them, not at all deterred by their attempt at lighthearted banter, but he turned without protest. Buck shared another glance with Eddie who sent him a reassuring smile. Buck had to be as aware as Eddie that Christopher wouldn’t let this go, but he hoped that maybe he would at least wait until they had reached Isabel’s house.

Christopher’s patience only held until Eddie had started the car. “Can we visit Jee-Yun at her grandparents?”

Buck sighed and clenched his hands on top of his thighs. “It will take a little while until that’s possible.”

Christopher huffed. “Why?”

Buck shrugged. “It’s … not an easy situation right now. Chimney doesn’t want me to see her, and Maddie isn’t here to say anything about that decision, so we’ll respect Chimney’s wishes for the moment, okay?”

“Why doesn’t he want you to see Jee-Yun?” Christopher asked. “And why didn’t he bring her back from Boston?”

Eddie sighed. “Let’s table this conversation for later, okay, bud?”

Christopher huffed and pouted, but Eddie saw him nod in the rearview mirror. After a moment of silence, Christopher asked, “Will Maddie be gone as long as Mom was? I think Jee needs friends if her mom stays away so long.”

Eddie sighed again. So much for changing the topic. He probably should have expected that Christopher would see a parallel between his own experiences and Jee-Yun’s situation, especially after the meltdown they had handled two days ago after a joint therapy session which Eddie hadn’t expected to turn out nearly as exhausting as it had been.

Buck looked at Eddie with a helpless frown.

“I’m sure Maddie will come back a lot sooner than Mom did,” Eddie said when the silence had stretched uncomfortably long.

Buck sighed and turned in his seat far enough to look at Christopher. “Maddie went to get help because she didn’t feel well. And she was afraid of taking care of Jee because she had an accident with her, so she left her with her dad. At some point, she’ll be better, hopefully soon, and then she’ll come back for Jee.”

“So, it’s not like Mom?”

Eddie winced. “Mijo, please let’s wait to talk about this until I’m not driving anymore, okay?”

There wasn’t any audible reaction from Christopher, but Buck turned around again after a little while to face forward and put his hand on Eddie’s knee in the same motion. “Everything okay?”

Eddie glanced in the rearview mirror at his son who was staring out of the side window now. “No. Our appointment on Thursday wasn’t easy, but I can’t discuss that while I’m driving either.”

Buck nodded and squeezed his knee. “Thanks for coming to get me. I thought I’d have to take an Uber home all by myself after Taylor abandoned me to go to work.”

“We wanted it to be a surprise,” Christopher whispered. “You’ll spend the whole weekend with us, right? You’ll stay the night and come to brunch at Harry’s place tomorrow?”

“Brunch with Bobby and Athena?” Buck asked surprised.

Eddie chuckled. “Bobby invited us. They’ve taken Denny for the weekend while Hen and Karen take a wellness weekend. Chris didn’t want to join the sleepover tonight, but he was excited to spend the day with Harry and Denny tomorrow. Bobby graciously invited us along. It’ll only be Bobby, Athena, you, and me on the adult front. Maybe May as well.”

“Sounds great,” Buck said with a smile.

It was unusual for the car to be quiet when he drove with Buck and Christopher, because the pair usually didn’t stop talking, changing subjects at a speed Eddie sometimes had difficulty following. Eddie felt uncomfortable with the persistent silence that fell over them now, Christopher ignoring everything Buck tried to talk to him about. He had thought the worst was behind them, even though Christopher’s therapist had warned him that there would probably be a second meltdown soon.

Christopher dragged Buck to the back porch of Isabel’s house as soon as they arrived, and Eddie followed them after he warned Abuela to give them some time alone. Her only reaction had been to nod and to give him a pitcher filled with her lemonade and three glasses. Eddie found Buck and Christopher sitting huddled together on the stairs, one of Buck’s arms wrapped around Christopher in a tight hug, and for a moment he froze, thinking back to the day when he had decided to leave El Paso.

Eddie put the lemonade and glasses on the table and sat down beside them so that Christopher was sitting between them. “Do you want to tell Buck what we talked about on Thursday, or should I tell him?”

Christopher sighed deeply and shrugged. Eddie carded his fingers through his son’s hair, who didn’t protest that for a change, and was as lost for words as Christopher seemed to be. Not for the first time Eddie wished Buck had been there on Thursday.

“You had your joint therapy session on Thursday,” Buck murmured. “I’m sorry I couldn’t be there to wait for you outside like I promised.”

“You had to care for Jee-Yun,” Christopher said, sniffling slightly. “That’s important. She can’t take care of herself yet. She can’t even walk on her own yet, right?”

Buck chuckled. “Yeah. But she has learned to crawl, and you won’t believe how fast she is. But I’d still have loved to be here for you as well. Did you talk about your mom?”

Christopher shook his head. “We spoke about how you’d take care of me if something happened to Dad again.”

Buck sucked in a breath and Eddie reached around Christopher to put his hand on Buck’s shoulder. It hadn’t been that straightforward: they had also talked a lot about how Christopher had felt during Eddie’s recovery, but most of that Eddie had already been aware of. What he hadn’t known was how much Christopher had thought about the possibility of what would have happened if Eddie hadn’t survived.

“Of course I will,” Buck said. “But I will also always do my best to protect your dad, you know that, right? If I have anything to say about it, I’ll keep him alive.”

“Like you did when he was shot?”

“Exactly,” Buck said, his voice breaking. He cleared his throat. “I know you are worried about that, but we are all protecting your dad when we are on the job. We are always careful. But if something does happen again, I’ll take care of both of you. Like I did earlier in the year.”

Christopher nodded. “But what if something happens to you? I don’t want anything to happen to you either. And someone hurt you. I think it was Chimney, but Dad didn’t want to tell me, and you went to Boston to meet him. Will he really watch out for you in a fire when he already hurt you?”

Buck turned his head to Eddie wide-eyed. Eddie nodded silently. He had decided to let Buck and Christopher talk until one of them actively involved him. He had had his chance to talk about all of this with Christopher two days ago, now was Buck’s turn.

“Why do you think it was Chimney?”

Christopher huffed. “I’m not a baby! And I’m not dumb!”

That was the same answer Eddie had gotten two days prior. Overall though, it didn’t seem important to find out how Christopher had gotten to that conclusion.

“Chimney won’t work with us anymore,” Buck said hurriedly. “Bobby said Chimney will work at another station in the future, and you can ask him about that tomorrow if you like. So, there is no reason to worry about him not having my back when he is angry at me again, okay?”

Eddie raised his brows. He hadn’t heard anything about that yet, but he had also been more worried about keeping Hen away from Buck and supporting Buck to think much about the consequences Chimney would have to face with the department. Eddie had hoped for Chimney to be transferred to another shift at least, but he had also worried about Chimney coming back to work and their ability to work together again, though it had been a very distant worry since it would be a while before he came back anyway.

“So, it really was Chimney,” Christopher muttered.

Buck looked helplessly at Eddie.

“Yes,” Eddie sighed. “It was Chimney who punched Buck. It’s really important for you to know who hurt Buck, isn’t it?”

“So we know who to be careful around,” Christopher whispered. “He didn’t hurt Maddie, did he? That’s not why she left, right? She would have taken Jee-Yun with her then, right?”

“Yes,” Buck said hurriedly. “When Chimney punched me, he was very desperate and very angry. I don’t believe that he’d hurt Maddie. What’s happening with Maddie is … Bringing a child into the world is a lot of work for a woman’s body, and a lot of things are changing in the body during the pregnancy and then after the birth again. Sometimes those changes are hard to deal with, or those changes go wrong without anyone being at fault for it. That’s what’s happened with Maddie. There is medication and therapy to help women in that situation, and that’s the help Maddie’s getting right now. It has nothing to do with anything Chimney did.”

Christopher sighed. “Everyone is always leaving.”

Buck flinched and Eddie had to fight back his tears again. Christopher hadn’t been this direct about it when they had talked, neither during the therapy session nor in the evening after it when they had spent hours cuddling on the couch and trying to work through all the things he had mentioned during the therapy, but it had still shone through everything he had said two days ago. Eddie had nearly taken the day off and taken Christopher out of school for the day so that they could both recover, but Christopher’s excitement about going to school the next morning had made Eddie decide not to.

“Your dad and I are both here,” Buck whispered and kissed the top of Christopher’s head. “And neither of us intends to leave.”

“You could still die.”

“That’s a risk everyone has to live with,” Eddie said quietly. “We talked with Dr. Lim about helping you deal with that fear, didn’t we?”

Eddie hadn’t felt as helpless in a long time as he had two days ago when Christopher had looked at him much too solemnly and asked him, “What if you die, too, Daddy?” There was no answer to that question that would satisfy Christopher, he had known that from the very beginning. Christopher had seen too much in his short life to be pacified by a hug and empty assurances that Eddie wouldn’t die.

Christopher sighed unhappily.

“Life can be scary,” Buck muttered. “Do you remember when we were sitting on the truck during the tsunami?”

Eddie swallowed hard, and Christopher nodded silently.

“That was really scary, too, wasn’t it? But we kept going because neither of us wanted to give up, do you remember that as well?”

“We kept swimming. Like Dori.”

“And that’s all we can do sometimes,” Buck said. “Just keep swimming until we reach a point when we feel safe again. That’s why you are going to therapy, and why your dad and I go to therapy as well. So that we can reach a point where life isn’t so scary anymore for a while. And in the meantime, we have to remember to enjoy the little moments when we are happy and carefree. Like earlier, when I found you at the airport when I didn’t even know you were coming to pick me up. Next time I’m expecting a sign, though!”

Christopher turned his head to glare at Buck. “You said next time Dad and I go with you!”

“I did, didn’t I?” Buck asked wide-eyed and then he started to laugh. “You’re right, so then there will be no sign for me, of course. You really missed an opportunity there, Superman!”

“I’m sure we’ll find another opportunity to make a sign for Buck,” Eddie said grinning, hopefully leaving the discussion about Christopher’s fears behind for the day. “But I’m sure we can make one for Maddie when she comes home, you know, because Jee-Yun is still too small to make her own sign.”

Christopher turned to him with shining eyes. “Yes!”

Eddie kissed the top of his head. “I love you, mijo.”

“Love you, too, Daddy.” Christopher wrapped his arms around Eddie’s neck and hugged him tightly.

Buck sighed dramatically. “I feel neglected!”

Christopher giggled and turned to him to give him a hug as well. “I love you, too, Bucky.”

Buck smiled into Christopher’s hair. “I love you as well.”

“I think Abuela deserves to know that you love her, too,” Eddie said. “And then we’ll help her with her dinner preparations so that she doesn’t spend the whole afternoon alone in the kitchen making dinner for us.”

Christopher grinned. “You can just say that you want to be alone with Buck, you know?”

He used both Buck and Eddie as support to stand and get up the two steps, leaving his crutches behind as he entered the house. Eddie watched him with a smile, happy that his house wasn’t the only place Christopher felt secure enough to walk through without that aid. Part of their conversation two days prior had also brought up again how much of a hindrance Eddie’s parents had been to Christopher’s growth, since he had been very insistent that he didn’t want to go to live with them if something happened to Eddie. It made the independence Christopher had found since they had come to California all the more precious.

“Hey, you alright?” Buck asked quietly long after Christopher had vanished inside the house.

Eddie took a shaky breath. “No, but you made a lot of this so much better.” He leaned into Buck and pressed a kiss against his lips. “I hate needing to have that kind of conversation with my ten-year-old son. And here you are, finding the words I couldn’t like it’s nothing.”

Buck leaned their foreheads together. “It’s not nothing. I don’t know why I’m not a sobbing mess right now. Reassuring him is all we can do, right? We can’t make any empty promises, he wouldn’t believe them anyway.”

“Yes,” Eddie agreed. “I’m so glad that Chris and I have you in our lives. I’ve felt like I wasn’t able to breathe since all of this came up. I don’t think anything I said to him was able to penetrate his fear the way your words just did.”

Buck cupped his cheeks with his hands and leaned back, smiling softly. “Or maybe you are so wrapped up in your own emotions that you aren’t able to see how much your words and actions help Chris. I’m sorry I couldn’t be here for this.”

“I think you being gone, even though we knew it would only be a couple of days, brought up some things he’d have otherwise bottled up for longer,” Eddie whispered. “Apparently my mother told him he needed to be careful about what he burdened me with because I already had enough to handle. I think I need to start supervising their phone calls and have another frank discussion with my parents.”

“We’ll help get Chris through this phase,” Buck promised quietly. “We’ll make sure that he won’t have to live with this fear all the time.”

***

“I see you and Eddie have things figured out,” Athena said smiling as she gave Buck the lettuce she had ordered him to wash.

The morning had long turned into the afternoon, with Eddie and Buck staying over the whole time, getting lost in conversations with Bobby and Athena or getting roped into playing with the boys. It had turned out to be a relaxed day during which they had mostly ignored all the trials and tribulations life had thrown at them over the past few months.

With the evening fast approaching, Bobby had decided to start the grill and invited Eddie, Buck, and Christopher to stay for dinner as well. They had agreed without any hesitation, of course, never willing to pass up a meal Bobby offered. Athena had ordered Buck to follow her to the kitchen and help her prepare some side dishes for the steaks Bobby had taken out of the freezer.

Buck chuckled. “Is idle gossip about Eddie and my relationship really the reason you ordered me to help with the salad and bread?”

“In part. Last time we spoke, you tried to convince me there was nothing going on between you, that Eddie couldn’t possibly be in love with you as well.”

Buck huffed. “I remember. And the funny thing is, that changed just a couple of hours later. Turns out, talking to each other can actually be helpful.”

“But Taylor still accompanied you to Boston?” Athena asked with a slight frown, sounding confused.

“Like I said, we’re friends. And she and Eddie have become friends as well, though I’m not so sure what to think about that yet. They have shown a worrisome tendency to team up against me. Eddie even texted her, asking her if she could accompany me to Boston, though by that point we had already booked flights and the hotel together.”

Athena laughed. “That does sound exactly like the kind of friend you need. You avoided Bobby’s question about Boston very elegantly earlier.”

Buck rolled his eyes. “It was a lot of pointless conversations with someone from Child Protective Service, waiting for Albert to come back from his meetings with Chimney, worrying about Jee-Yun, and having to field questions these people had no business asking. I was so glad when we could finally take Jee and leave all that behind.”

“Chimney is being brought back to LA today,” Athena said and Buck froze for a moment. “He’ll have his hearing tomorrow morning, and I don’t see any reason why he won’t be let out on bail. He’ll be warned to stay away from you, but from what I have heard from Hen about his behavior, I wouldn’t trust him to follow that warning.”

Buck sighed. “Great. But he’ll have to stay in California, right?”

“Yes,” Athena said. “Are you planning to leave?”

Buck rolled his eyes. “No. But at least it will stop him from taking Jee-Yun on another crazy journey. I’m not sure how she had time to learn to crawl with the amount of time they both spent in the car.”

“It took him quite some time to get from here to Boston,” Athena said. “Hen said he had restricted himself to a set amount of time he would drive every day and concentrated on Jee the rest of the time.”

“That’s good,” Buck murmured. “At least he hasn’t lost his mind completely. Did you … I mean, no forget I asked.”

Athena chuckled. “I have spoken with Hen. She was very dejected, and I think she will need a little while to work through her guilt and disappointment. This whole weekend is part of Karen’s plan to finally set Hen’s head straight again.”

Buck blew out a breath. “Okay, good. I could do without getting the cold shoulder from her at work. But maybe I understand why she has been so … outraged on Chimney’s behalf. Albert told me that if I knew where Maddie was, I shouldn’t tell Chimney as long as he hadn’t had a lot of therapy himself. That’s not a good sign, is it?”

Athena hesitated for a moment. “It’s worrisome. Especially as I remember Albert as a very inexperienced young man who has problems reading the room sometimes.”

Buck chuckled. “He’s gotten better at that. In his own words, nearly dying changes a lot.”

“It’s not your task to fix Chimney, or even your responsibility,” Athena said. “Chimney has his own support network here in LA. His brother, his foster parents, Hen. We have to hope that he’ll remember that now that he is here again. Don’t try to fix this, Buck, because you are bound to fail as long as Chimney isn’t prepared to do the bulk of the work to fix it himself.”

Buck sighed and chuckled. “Are you meeting with Taylor in secret? And didn’t we have this same conversation at the hospital?”

“Part of it,” Athena agreed. “But I think you needed to hear it again. And I’m happy to repeat it as often as you need to hear it.”

“Yeah.” Buck sent her a soft smile. “Thanks.”

“I know things seem to be difficult and overwhelming right now, but they’ll calm down again as well,” Athena said. “And we are all here to support you through it.”

“I’m not the only one who’s been working through a difficult time,” Buck murmured. “Harry seems to be a lot more relaxed than the last time I saw him. And you aren’t watching him like a hawk the whole time, so I assume it’s starting to get better for you as well?”

“We had a couple of very rough moments.” Athena cleared her throat. “Moments I’d have never thought I’d need to face as a mother.”

“Like what?” Buck asked quietly. “If you want to share, that is.”

Athena braced her hands on the counter, taking a slow and deliberate breath.

“I’m sorry, just forget I asked,” Buck muttered.

“Harry has been acting out, but that was to be expected after what he went through. He is also … You remember how you told me calling Hudson by his given name was creating more familiarity than he deserved?”

Buck nodded.

“Harry has been mostly reading articles defending Hudson, calling me a rogue and bloodthirsty cop. Hudson got into his head, but it took us all some time to even understand that. Harry blames … blamed me and Michael both for the abduction, and he isn’t wrong about that, is he?”

“Hey.” Buck stepped beside her and rubbed her back. “That’s not true. Michael and David tried to be good neighbors during the blackout, and you didn’t even know Hudson was on the run for the longest time.”

“But when I learned about it, I should have known he’d try to get revenge on me, and I should have protected my family,” Athena whispered. “I protected his victims, but I didn’t even think for a moment to protect my own family.”

Buck thought it was telling that Athena still didn’t include herself when she spoke about Hudson’s victims, but he wouldn’t discuss that part with her. “Which is not your failure alone. There is a reason why you aren’t allowed to work cases that involve family or yourself. You weren’t in a position to make a rational decision. Frankly, your captain should have pulled you from that case. And she is the one who should have thought about the danger to your family.”

“But that’s not what Hudson told Harry, is it?” Athena shook her head. “Harry called me a terrible mother, more concerned with my job than protecting my children.”

Buck flinched and only hesitated a moment before he pulled Athena into a tight hug. “That has to have been hard to hear.”

Athena huffed and pushed him away, turning her back to him. “I can’t imagine that there is anything I could hear from him that would be more horrible.”

“What did you do?”

Athena shook her head. “What could I have done? I stood and left. I didn’t know how to handle that, how to react to my own child.”

Buck rubbed a hand over her back, completely at a loss for what he could say, and overwhelmed that Athena was even opening up about this to him.

“I don’t know what Harry saw in that moment, but something changed after that. Who knows, maybe it’s just the simple fact that he finally voiced those thoughts about us. Harry went back to the place where Hudson had hidden him a while later, and since then most of the time it’s as if nothing ever happened.”

“Maybe he found what he needed,” Buck said. “Or maybe it will come up again later. But the important thing is that you have been here for him all the time. He knows you love him, I have no doubts about that. And that’s the most important thing, okay?”

Athena took a shuddering breath.

“Let’s get on with this salad, shall we?” Buck said, deciding that they had talked quite enough about painful things.

Athena blew out a breath and turned back to him. “Yes. And I did bring you here to hear all about how you and Eddie finally got your act together. So, let’s go back to talking about that.”

Buck laughed, even though he had no idea why Athena would be that interested in talking with him about his relationships. But he would happily answer all of her questions and use the opportunity to gloat about how happy he was with the development.

Chapter 16

Buck closed his eyes and bit his lip when he looked through the peephole and saw Chimney standing in front of his door, his face a grim mask, rocking back and forth on his heels impatiently. He wasn’t prepared for this confrontation, and he had hoped to have at least another day before he had to handle this.

Buck took a step back and grabbed his phone instead of opening the door. Athena’s warning during their conversation at the hospital rang in his ears, and he dialed her number without thinking about it, frowning unhappily at his door when Chimney rang his bell again, holding it for much longer than was necessary.

Athena picked up nearly right away. “Hey, Buck.”

“So, you were right about Chimney yesterday,” Buck sighed. “He’s standing outside my door and I don’t know if he will go away if I ignore him.”

Athena was silent for a moment. “He has to have come to you straight from the court. What is he thinking?”

“Open the door, Buck!” Chimney shouted, banging at the door. “I know you are home!”

“I don’t think he’s thinking at all,” Buck said. “To be honest, I’d really like to just get this over with, but I’m alone and … I don’t want to create a situation where it’s just my word against his. And how fucked up is it that I don’t trust him to have a civilized conversation with me?”

“No, you are right to worry about that,” Athena said. “But you have the choice to ignore him. You don’t have to face him now on his terms, you can do it on your terms later when and where you want.”

Chimney kept banging on his door. “Buck!”

“You think he’ll leave without my neighbors calling the police?” Buck asked. “He is just making the whole situation worse for himself.”

Athena sighed. “You are still trying to protect him?”

“We both know he isn’t a bad guy, ‘Thena,” Buck murmured sadly. “He’s spiraling, that’s all. If he could just calm down and start evaluating his situation rationally, all of this could be over so much sooner.”

“It is not your responsibility to make him see sense,” Athena said. “Especially not after how his last visit to your apartment went. Do you want to speak with him? If not, you can call the police yourself to have him escorted out of your building.”

Buck closed his eyes and tried to ignore the noise from the door. “I just think it would be good to try to clear the air.”

“That can be done on your conditions, later and in a neutral place,” Athena cautioned.

Buck looked to the door with a frown when he heard the scratching of a key in the lock. He had forgotten that Chimney still had a key from when he had lived here. Not that the key was of any use now, and Buck shuddered when he realized just how relieved he was that Chimney couldn’t storm in here, that he had to wait for Buck to open the door, if Buck ever did at all.

“Buck?” Athena asked.

“I think I need to get this conversation out of the way now,” Buck muttered. Anything else would just make Chimney’s anger grow even more.

“Put the phone on speaker and put it on the table. I want to listen in to this conversation,” Athena said. “You’re right, you shouldn’t have it alone.”

Buck sighed. “This feels even more underhanded than recording our phone call.”

“It’s covering your bases,” Athena said. “Chimney has already proven that he’ll change the narrative of events to suit him. And he shouldn’t be anywhere near you as long as the court case between the two of you is unresolved. I’ll stay silent as long as I don’t think that this is escalating. Don’t give him a chance to get physical with you again, Buck. Keep your distance from him.”

“Yeah, true.” Buck shook his head. “Okay, I’m putting you on the table now.”

He turned to the door after putting the phone down, but hesitated again with his hand on the handle. Chimney had started banging on his door again after realizing he couldn’t unlock it, growing louder and more impatient each time he called out Buck’s name. Buck took a deep breath before he finally opened the door.

“Took you long enough!” Chimney growled and stormed in without waiting for an invitation. “Did you really change your locks? That’s going pretty overboard with your bullshit, don’t you think?”

Buck closed the door and shoved his hands into his pockets as he turned to Chimney, who had stopped halfway between the door and the stairs, which was probably not the amount of space Athena wanted between them. “Eddie’s keys were stolen a little while ago. He got them back, but we don’t know what was done with them in the meantime, so we had both his and my locks changed.”

Chimney huffed and crossed his arms over his chest. “What the hell were you thinking filing charges against me?”

Buck shook his head. “Wasn’t me. You didn’t notice her, but Taylor witnessed our whole confrontation from the top of the stairs.”

He nodded in that direction and Chimney turned to look up there. Buck used that moment to walk around the table to heed Athena’s advice, putting not just more space but also the table between them. He wanted to believe that Chimney wouldn’t get violent again because Buck knew that wasn’t the kind of man he was, but Chimney had also spent weeks now cultivating his anger against him.

“That’s a pathetic excuse!” Chimney growled and turned around. He sneered when his gaze finally landed on Buck again. “You could ruin my life with this bullshit, Buck! I didn’t do anything wrong! You should have told me about Maddie!”

Buck shook his head. “Was shouting at me the only reason you came here?”

“I came here to make you see some damn sense!” Chimney said agitatedly. “You had me arrested for no damn reason! Is this your new grand plan to keep me from finding Maddie? I thought the last time we spoke that you finally understood that I need to find her!”

Buck took a deep breath. “I had a concussion and a hairline fracture.”

Chimney rolled his eyes. “In your dreams, maybe. I didn’t hit that hard. And you deserved it. You shouldn’t have kept it a secret that Maddie called you! You should have told me what you knew! You need to go to the police and make those charges go away again. I need to get back to Boston, I barely had any time to look for Maddie there!”

Buck shook his head. “I wasn’t the one who filed those charges, I can’t do anything about them.”

“You are the supposed victim! When you tell them it was all a misunderstanding, they have to stop this bullshit. I’m out on bail, Buck, like some damn criminal!”

“You just said I deserved the punch, doesn’t sound like a misunderstanding or even an accident at all to me,” Buck said darkly. “You’ve been behaving irrationally the entire time since Maddie left, Chim. You need to stop and calm down and look at what kind of situation you have created!”

“I didn’t create any situation!” Chimney spat. “That’s all on you!”

Buck nodded slowly. “I won’t do anything to stop the charges. I didn’t deserve your punch, and I don’t deserve the anger you’ve been holding against me for weeks now.”

Chimney braced his hands on the table and glared at Buck. “You deserve every single ounce of anger I have in me! Your indifference to Maddie is galling! You haven’t tried even for a moment to help me find her! She could have killed herself in the meantime, but you don’t care about that, do you?”

“And do you really care about that?” Buck said, trying desperately to hold onto his calm. Chimney’s suggestion came right out of his nightmares, and he was relieved to have the certainty that it hadn’t happened. “Or do you only care about the picture of your family you created in your head and that kept you from reaching out for help when you knew Maddie was suffering?”

Chimney reared back. “I did everything I could to support Maddie!”

“Really?” Buck asked, his own anger rising now, even though he knew that would just escalate the situation. “Is that why you left her alone for five days during the blackout? And don’t tell me you didn’t have a choice! Bobby would have let you go for a couple of hours if you had told him the truth!”

“I promised Maddie not to tell anyone about her problems!”

“And of course, you’re entitled to keep your toxic promises while I’m not allowed to keep a much less sinister promise to my sister?”

“I kept my promise because I care about her!” Chimney shouted. “You just wanted to spite me. You enjoyed seeing my suffer, didn’t you?”

Buck leaned back and blinked dumbfounded. “What?”

“That’s why you didn’t tell me she had called, isn’t it? And that’s why you waited to have me arrested on these trumped-up charges until I had arrived in Boston and had a chance to finally find her!”

Buck inhaled slowly, trying to digest what Chimney was saying, but it was difficult to follow the leap of logic he seemed to have taken. “I think you need a big reality check, and to see a therapist. What you are shouting is insane. Why the hell should I enjoy seeing you suffer?”

“How should I know what’s going on in your head?” Chimney threw his hands in the air. “But you need to stop this! You need to help me find Maddie!”

Buck shook his head. “I’m worried about Maddie, too, but she is clearly reading your emails. Maybe you should think about why she called me with a question about that instead of you. I won’t help you find her, because the choice she made there clearly tells me she doesn’t want to have direct contact with you right now.”

“She is confused and afraid because of her accident with Jee,” Chimney hissed. “She isn’t thinking rationally…”

“Neither are you,” Buck interrupted him. “You wouldn’t be here shouting all this insanity if you were. If you don’t stop what you’re doing, I can’t see how you and Maddie will ever be able to repair your relationship.”

Chimney froze and fisted his hands. “Is that what you want? To ruin Maddie’s and my relationship?”

Buck closed his eyes for a moment, shaking his head and exhaling slowly. “I’m not the one ruining your relationship. I’m not the one trampling all over Maddie’s boundaries. I’m not the one neglecting her daughter. That’s all you, Chimney.”

“No.” Chimney shook his head. “No. You want to keep me away from Maddie, I’m starting to see the pattern now. You haven’t helped me look for her from the very beginning because you don’t want me to find her, is that it? You have been sabotaging me from day one. Is she even in Boston?”

Buck sighed. “Please leave.”

Chimney huffed. “Not a chance. Not before you’ve told me where Maddie is.”

“You are jumping to conclusions again,” Buck said. “You are clearly not here to apologize or to talk about any of this rationally. I’m not prepared to let you throw baseless accusations at me. I want you to leave my apartment.”

“I don’t think so,” Chimney shook his head. “You aren’t getting rid of me just because you want to avoid uncomfortable questions. Tell me where Maddie is!”

“I haven’t had any contact with her since that last phone call I told you about,” Buck said.

Chimney sneered at him. “Do you really think Maddie will choose you when you make her decide between the two of us? We have a daughter together, that will trump being her brother for the rest of your life.”

Buck rubbed a hand over his forehead. “You have completely lost your mind, Chimney. Please leave. We can talk again when you have seen a therapist and have found some perspective. I’m not the bad guy. I’ve never been the bad guy you have suddenly made me out to be in your little drama.”

“You know where Maddie is, don’t you?” Chimney snapped.

Buck shook his head. “Maddie hasn’t told me anything. And I haven’t tried to contact her, because I’m trying to accept her wishes. We are circling back to the same argument over and over again, you do know that, right?”

“You won’t take my family away from me, Buck,” Chimney hissed. “I won’t let you take this away from me! What do you think Maddie will think of you when she learns you accused me of attacking you? That you lied to the police about this to keep me from helping her?”

“Do you really believe what you’re saying here? You punched me.”

“Did I, though?” Chimney crossed his arms over his chest. “That’s your version of the story, maybe. How I remember it is that you tried to confine me here when I told you I was going to search for Maddie, and I hit you with my elbow when I tried to free myself from your grip on my arm. That falls under self-defense.”

“Did you forget that there was a witness to all of this?” Buck asked. “I know that’s the same story you told Hen, but the lie won’t hold up in front of a court.”

Chimney huffed. “That so-called witness is your girlfriend, who probably wasn’t even really here. I mean, this place is so open I couldn’t have possibly overlooked her when I was here. You’ll fail with this charade, and Maddie will never talk to you again. We won’t have someone in our life, or the life of our daughter, who tries to manipulate our relationship by throwing around false accusations.”

“You should know by now that this kind of tactic won’t lead you anywhere. I’m sure you have been informed that part of the evidence is a video taken of your last confrontation with Buck.”

Chimney whirled around to face the door, but Buck didn’t take his eyes off of him to look at Athena. He hadn’t expected her to come over, but he was glad for the support.

“What are you doing here?” Chimney asked surprised.

“None of your business,” Athena said with the kind of tone Buck had only ever heard her use when they had both been called to the same scene and she had to deal with an especially obnoxious person. “I’ve been standing here for a while listening to your … well, I can hardly call it an argument. Your diatribe maybe. I believe Buck has asked you several times to leave his apartment. I’d advise you to follow that request before he has to repeat himself again. You showing up here right after you have been let out on bail already won’t look good to the court. Don’t make me add to it by having to arrest you for trespassing.”

“You don’t understand,” Chimney snapped.

“Do you think I’m wearing this uniform for fun?” Athena asked. “Leave now.”

Chimney stared at her for several seconds before turning his head to Buck. “This isn’t over!” He stormed out of the apartment, barely leaving Athena enough time to step to the side.

Buck leaned against the kitchen island behind him with a heavy sigh. “This is not what I gave you and Bobby the key for. Do you always carry it with you while you are on shift?”

“Let’s just say I had a hunch this morning when I left the house,” Athena said and closed the door. “How are you?”

Buck stared at the floor with furrowed brows. “Confused. I mean, where the hell are the things that he accused me of coming from? When did I ever so much as hint that I had a problem with his and Maddie’s relationship?”

“There didn’t seem to be much rational thought left in him,” Athena said. “I took a page out of Taylor’s book, by the way, and recorded the phone call from the moment you put the phone down on the table. You need to do that with all your conversations for the time being so that he can’t twist what was or was not said. He has proven his intent to do so on more than one occasion. It’s important to cover your bases.”

“He has made me the villain to his hero in his personal life story, hasn’t he?” Buck whispered. He sank down onto a chair with a heavy sigh. “I just wish I knew why.”

Athena came around the table and wrapped him in a tight hug. “Don’t fret about this, sweetheart. You won’t be able to look into his head. You have to concentrate on yourself here, and I’m very proud of how calm you stayed during this whole encounter. Those are the kind of questions you can maybe ask if he reaches out someday to mend fences.”

Buck blew out a breath. “I don’t know if that’s possible anymore. I don’t think I can ever get over the things he threw at me. Especially … I won’t let anyone pressure Maddie into cutting contact with me again. I know Chimney isn’t anything like Doug, but…”

“Some of the things he said still bring up that comparison,” Athena agreed. “Do you think Maddie will let something like that happen again?”

“I don’t think Maddie made a conscious decision to accept the things Doug did to her,” Buck said. “That’s a behavior that crept into their relationship slowly, unnoticed. That could happen again easily enough.”

“I think right now you’re borrowing trouble that isn’t here yet,” Athena said. “I will have to write a report about this, and I’ll include the recording I made as evidence.”

“There is nothing we can do to stop him, is there?” Buck asked desperately.

The charges were an obstacle, he had known that from the very beginning, but he had still hoped they would eventually be able to reconcile. He had hoped Chimney would come back and apologize, but even if he did that now, Buck knew it wouldn’t be enough.

It felt as if something had permanently and irreparably broken today.

***

Eddie was exhausted when he came home from his therapy session, and he was looking forward to lying down for a nap before he had to pick Christopher up from school. But those plans were immediately derailed when he stepped into his house, heard noises from the kitchen, and saw Buck’s shoes neatly put away on the shelf beside the door. Eddie followed the noise, and a moment later the delicious aroma of baked goods, into his kitchen where he found Buck pulling a tray of muffins out of the oven, several rows of them already cooling on the table.

“Muffins?” Eddie muttered with a little shudder.

Buck laughed. “Hey, we have to get you over your muffin trauma somehow, don’t we?”

Eddie chuckled. “It’s not so much a ‘muffin’ trauma as a ‘nearly ruined my kitchen’ trauma, and I know I won’t ever have to worry about that with you. What’s all this about, though?”

They should have been meeting at the park in the afternoon, not that Eddie had any problem with finding Buck in his house. It was nice coming home to Buck and seeing him so at home here. Buck had never really felt like a guest when he had stayed over, but something in the way Buck was standing in the kitchen now like he owned it awoke the desire in Eddie to never see him leave again.

Buck shrugged and concentrated harder on taking the fresh muffins out of the hot pan than Eddie thought was really necessary. “I needed something to do. Something productive and positive and a little bit mindless. I nearly started to sort through the boxes in your spare room before I started baking to stop myself.”

“What happened?” Eddie asked. He came up behind Buck and hugged him, careful not to hinder the movement of his arms.

Buck shrugged. “Chimney came by to rant at me and demand I make the charges against him go away. I don’t think he cared that that’s not my decision and completely out of my hands. I’m at fault for everything that’s going wrong in his life right now apparently. Because that makes so much sense.”

Eddie tightened his arms around Buck’s waist. “Are you okay?”

Buck turned around, smiling softly. “Yeah. We just talked. And I kept the kitchen table between us like Athena had told me to.” He stopped and frowned. “That’s not good, is it? That I felt safer putting a table between us to keep us apart.”

“It’s not wrong to feel that way,” Eddie whispered. “The last time you spoke face to face ended really badly for you. I’m glad you heeded Athena’s advice. Did she warn you that Chimney could come over?”

Buck shrugged. “Yeah, that too. But I called her when I saw Chimney through the peephole, and she listened in on the whole thing over the phone and came over to send him away. Because he was more than happy to ignore me when I told him he should leave. Nothing happened except a couple of heated words, but I still didn’t want to stay there.”

Eddie raised his hand and carefully cupped Buck’s cheek, rubbing his thumb over the place where the black eye had been. “We both know that the physical pain isn’t the worst thing he did to you.”

Buck leaned heavily against him, burying his face in Eddie’s neck. “He threatened that Maddie would cut contact with me when she learned about the charges.”

“That’s bullshit.”

Buck huffed. “I can’t be sure, though, can I? I want to believe that Maddie won’t vanish from my life again, but she did it before. If Chimney stays this stubborn and demands she choose between the two of us, it could go either way at this point.”

Eddie shook his head. “He won’t make that mistake. Because he has to know it won’t go in his favor. He said that because he knew it would hurt you, and maybe he hoped it would be enough of a threat to make you take back the charges filed against him.”

“I think he believes he’ll walk out of court without a scratch, without even a slap on the wrist,” Buck whispered. “He insinuated that he’d argue Taylor couldn’t have been there to witness anything.”

“Aren’t you glad now that Taylor recorded all of that?”

Buck shook his head. “No. It’s only making me sad that we need the video at all.”

“Fair.” Eddie sighed. “What was that you said about my spare room earlier?”

Buck leaned back to look at him with a grin. “Did you truly intend to make it a storage room when you moved in here or did you have other plans for it?”

“I had other plans,” Eddie murmured. “But it was a convenient place to store all those boxes, and I never got around to sorting through them. Especially after … I added quite a few boxes after Shannon’s death. Things I think Chris will be glad to have someday, and other things I wasn’t interested in sorting through at the time.”

“What had you planned to do with it when you moved in?”

“A small home gym. There is equipment that could help Chris with his daily exercises, and some of it my insurance would even help cover.”

Buck chuckled. “And instead of doing that, you built your morning workout routine around the furniture in the living room. Sounds reasonable. Maybe we could start sorting through the boxes and make space for that gym you wanted.”

Eddie shook his head. “I have no idea where to store the things I want to keep other than in that room.”

“Isabel has a lot of space in her attic,” Buck said with raised brows. “I know that because you used your injury to get out of crawling all through it for her to find the things she wanted to donate over the summer.”

“Don’t blame me! You freely offered your service to her,” Eddie laughed. “And got tamales out of it, so I don’t see any reason for you to complain. But I can’t just ask my Abuela to…”

“She offered,” Buck interrupted. “Because Chris hasn’t given up on his plan to make my apartment into our storage room so that I can move in here, and has apparently decided that the more people he tells about it, the greater his chances of success. Isabel couldn’t stop laughing when she told me we could just use her attic instead.”

Eddie shook his head, grinning. “He doesn’t get his cheek from me.”

“I’m not so sure about that.”

Eddie laughed and eyed the muffins. “Are you done with them?”

Buck shrugged. “Would have probably started another batch if you hadn’t come home.”

“No, I think that’s already more than we can eat,” Eddie said. “Let’s go look at the boxes in my spare room. Maybe we can sort through some of them together with Chris later. To remember Shannon and to see if he already knows if there are things he doesn’t want to keep.”

Buck smiled softly. “Thanks. I really just need to do something that feels like it’s doing something good for us. And that spare room has always been in such a sorry state.”

“You realize that Chris will take this as a sign that you’ll move in with us, right?”

Buck chuckled and pressed a soft kiss against the corner of Eddie’s mouth. “I’m pretty sure at some point he’ll get his wish anyway.”

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