Inamorata (19/36) – WMC fic

PAIRING: Lindsay/Cindy
DISCLAIMER: Characters, not mine. Story, mine.

If there was something that she needed to know, Tom would call. The fact that he hadn’t done so yet, solely to yell about her ditching her detail, was evidence of how much effort he was putting into the search for Cindy. Because he should know everything by now… if Burnish did as he was told. The idea that the officer would even consider not following her orders after what he had done to aid in this made Lindsay’s hands tighten painfully on the steering wheel, her shoulders tensing up as if she’d just been hit.

Distracted as she was by her own thoughts, regardless of how anticipated it was, the ring of her cell made her jump. Knowing that the call would be about Cindy or Ashe was counteracted by the knowledge that the news could be either good or bad. As a result, her answering speed was sluggish.

“Tell me,” she said as she picked up.

“Where the fuck are you?”

She was wrong. Tom wasn’t yelling. His anger was actually quite subdued. It was like he’d been expecting to take part in this conversation sooner or later.

“Did Burnish tell you about Ashe?”

“Yes,” Tom answered roughly. She could practically hear him drag his hand over his face. “He’s just left the FBI.”

“In his car?” Lindsay asked. She knew the answer.

“No. He went the other direction. He’s probably headed toward the BART. There’s a station a quarter of a mile from the FBI office.”

Even though he couldn’t see it, Lindsay nodded along. Of course there was. That’s how he’d done it. Ashe was law enforcement. He knew how to provide himself an alibi.

“You’re tracking him?”

“Mason and Davidson are keeping pace. Cho is already at the station.”

“Okay,” Lindsay responded.

It was a relief, kind of, that they knew where he was. And that he was moving. If Ashe didn’t know they were onto him, it was possible he would guide them right to her.

“He’s there. They’ve got him in sight. A train comes into that station in one minute. It’s heading south to SFO,” Tom said.

The airport? Why? A momentary fear that Ashe might just run gripped Lindsay, then released. She really didn’t expect that from him. There were plenty of places where Cindy could be in the area. Of course, there were plenty of stops along the way too. If he got off at Balboa Park, he could transfer and head anywhere in the city. His options were unlimited.

Tom started talking, but it wasn’t to her. He was giving someone orders, sending officers to stations along the route.

Lindsay tilted her head toward the scanner on her dash, and Jacobi turned it on. The interior of the SUV, which had been deathly silent since they left the garage, was suddenly filled with the sound of dispatch and officers relaying pertinent information back and forth.

“Cho, Mason, and Davidson are going to board the train,” Tom informed her.

“Ashe can’t see them,” she said quickly.

“I know that,” Tom gently responded. “So do they.”

Subject has boarded for SFO, was the first relevant information that came across on the scanner.

If things were normal, if this were any other case, Cindy would be home right now, listening to her own police scanner, one of those items that came with her job that only Cindy could consider a perk, getting inappropriately excited over the thrill of the pursuit and the prospect of a really big, front-page, above-the-fold story.

“They’re on the train?” Lindsay asked.

“Cho is in the car behind. Mason and Davidson in front.”

Or maybe Cindy wouldn’t be home. Maybe, if Ashe had never appeared at her door, things would be different. Maybe she and Cindy would be out at some casual restaurant, talking about nothing important, sharing one side of the booth as if Jill and Claire might appear, though they hadn’t actually been invited.

There had been no better nights for Lindsay than those nights when she walked into Papa Joe’s to discover that the open seat was the one next to Cindy.

“They can see him, right?”

“Yes, they can see him.”

When Lindsay was called in, interrupting what she would refuse to call a date, because Kiss-Me-Not would still be a shadow on her life, preventing that kind of happiness, she’d want to drop Cindy off at home, but Cindy would turn those big eyes up at her and pout a little and ask if she could get a ride to the crime scene. And Lindsay would give in.

God, did Cindy have any idea how much power she had over her?

“We’ve got officers at every stop on the route, Lindsay. We’re going to find her.”

Tom wasn’t just saying it for her sake. This need belonged to him too. He couldn’t let Cindy die on his watch. He’d been wrong about Ashe. Lindsay had tried to shut the door on him from the beginning. Tom was the one who’d invited him in. He hadn’t forgotten that. Though she wished she could, she hadn’t either.

The subject is moving.

He was on the train. Where in the hell could he be moving to?

When Tom repeated the phrase aloud nearly word for word, Lindsay almost laughed. But it was hardly out of humor. If Ashe didn’t go to Cindy, what happened then? Did he have things worked out in case he never made it back to her? Lindsay trusted that he’d thought that far ahead.

Was Cindy trapped now? Unable to get free on her own? Hidden somewhere ingenious where no one would ever think to look? If so, there would be no elaborate plans required. Left alone, in a place where she couldn’t be located, to starve to death would be torture enough for anyone.

Sadly, that was just a possibility. It wasn’t even a worst case scenario. Most people couldn’t imagine anything more horrific than dying like that. Unfortunately, Lindsay wasn’t one of those people. She was much too aware of the fact that there were far worse things.

Ashe had ideas for Cindy. Lindsay knew it whether she wanted to or not. It was the only reason she’d told him anything. She knew that whatever she said wasn’t going to keep him from following through. As long as it was possible to follow through. The only things that would keep him from going back to Cindy was getting caught or the belief that he was about to be.

“He switched cars. He’s talking to Cho,” Tom spoke quietly like he was on the train right beside them.

He must have had someone on another line, because the information didn’t come through the scanner. In fact, the scanner was suddenly hushed, as if it too sensed imminent peril.

What if Ashe had made more than one friend on the force? It’s not like he hadn’t been around enough to form alliances. Of all people, Cho was someone that she thought she could count on to look out for Cindy’s interests. He wasn’t completely unobvious in his crush on her. But she couldn’t be positive. Every person that Lindsay was absolutely certain would put Cindy above all was currently in her presence.

“Shit,” Tom whispered.

Before Lindsay could ask, the scanner crackled back to life.

Shots fired! Shots fired!

“Tom, what is going on?” Lindsay shouted.

“Hold on, Lindsay.” It was an order. He was in authoritative mode. Her boss now. No longer her friend.

No one in the vehicle made a sound, but it was far from silent. The SUV was filled with the constant noise from the scanner, the sharing of the little data available, the directing of officers, audible indicators that the best laid plans had a tendency to go to hell.

The train is stopped in the tunnel.

Which meant Ashe pulled the emergency break to make his escape.

Suspect is on the move.

Already out of the car, no doubt, and onto the tracks in the pitch black passageway, with only three officers nearby enough to be of any real use, one of whom, more than likely, had already been shot.

They would get the emergency lights on in the tunnel. Tom would send officers in, surround the area. But this wasn’t some street punk they were dealing with. It was a trained FBI agent who probably knew this city better than they did. He knew how much time he had to make himself invisible.

Jacobi reached up and turned off the scanner. He might have been doing it for her. Or he might have been doing it because the pain in his head was excruciating and deafening chaos didn’t help.

Tom was her only link to what was happening now, but he was silent too, waiting for some solid information to give her, because, for the moment, he knew as little as she did.

Minutes passed.

Lindsay just continued to drive, making squares on the streets downtown, not wanting to go too far one direction or the other, but not wanting to stop for fear of being apprehended herself. Though she somehow doubted they were still a priority.

Her passengers had nothing to say. Tom’s breathing, strained now, was the only sound.

“Linds,” his voice hesitantly intruded.

She heard it.

Failure.

“What?” she asked, her own voice strangled. The road ahead blurry.

“We lost him.”