Chapter Text
You couldn’t get to your phone fast enough.
It had been a brutal day. The sort of day that made you want to crawl into your bed, bury yourself beneath the blankets, howl with misery and just never come out again. Ever. And it was getting worse with every passing second. You could still smell the blood and it was making you faint but what you remembered most distinctly was the look in Ella’s eyes as she lay dead on the lobby floor- it was one of pure terror. Your world had come to a standstill. It couldn’t be, not her.
You had known Ella for only a few weeks now. She had been the new receptionist at the corporate firm where you worked. Her big brown eyes and friendly, inviting smile had made you linger at the reception a little longer while swiping your card. Later, at the weekend office party, you had bumped into her and the two of you had hit it off just like that. She was just as crazy as you the moment she was two drinks down. You had talked all night long about past boyfriends, shared love for chicken enchiladas and classic movies. You had even told her about him, something you almost never did. In that short course of time, you had become the best of friends.
It was painfully ironic that it was you who had found her lifeless body on the lobby floor. It had been mangled and distorted; there was blood everywhere. Your heart stopped, but your mind went into an overdrive as it tried to reject the images that were flooding your brain. If it hadn’t been for Mark, who had held you just in time, you would have collapsed to the ground.
The hours that followed passed in a blur with the police investigation, the talk with the guy from HR and all the hundred questions you didn’t want to answer. You couldn’t comprehend it, you could barely speak. There had been a streak of murders in the area, all victims were young office going brunettes. There was a serial killer on loose.
Mark had dropped you back home probably because you fit the killer’s MO but you had hurried out of his car without a backward glance at him. You had to get inside. You fumbled with the keys, desperately trying to get into the house, to get to your phone which you had forgotten at home that morning.
Even though every fiber, every cell in your body ached to get into the bed and just let go, you knew that if there was something, someone who could help you get through this, it would be Sam.
It had all started 15 years back. A high school social ethics teacher had set an assignment for a class to write a letter of encouragement to random fellow school students, to spread goodwill. You weren’t supposed to disclose yourself to the person allotted to you and you hadn’t received yours till the end of the week. Just when you had started to freak out over not getting yours, on the last day, it just tumbled out of your locker- a letter, tucked around two beautiful red roses. How it had gotten inside without the lock being broken, you had no idea. It was a neatly rolled scroll, tied with a leather string, unlike the enveloped letters that were being passed around.
Beneath an articulately phrased prose that seemed to reference a lot to little things about you, which no one had ever noticed before, was a single sign- Sam. It was followed by an email address in a tiny scrawl- like an afterthought. In spite of being a shy girl back then, you had scourged the entire school for this Sam but he was nowhere to be found. All you got was that he was a tall, scrawny boy who had left school and moved out of town. It had been a bit heart- breaking. Nevertheless, you had gathered courage and emailed him.. and.. he had emailed back.
It had been like that ever since. You could surmise even back then that Sam was a brilliant student. He was smart enough to guide you through academic difficulties so you weren’t surprised when you found out about him being accepted into Stanford. There had a been a time however, few years after, when you hadn’t heard a single word from him for over a year. It had affected you more than you were willing to believe. You had spent many a sleepless nights wondering if he was alright but he had emailed again eventually and that was that. He seemed to be different though. In the sense that he stopped talking about his life, what he did, where he was but even so, he was ever the caring friend.
You gave him his space even though sometimes it was hard. He never told you about his life and you never asked.
Sure there were gaps in the conversations now, ranging from a few weeks to even months at times. You would like to believe it’s because he was busy running some high-end law firm but you couldn’t be sure. However, when you did catch up, you would pour your heart out to him. All the angst over the heart breaks and sick office days and everything in between simply melted away when he consoled you. There were also times when you just knew something was not right with him, that he was hurting and you did your best to talk him out of whatever his pain was.
Sometimes late at night, lying in your bed you wondered what Sam looked like. Maybe he was thin, clean shaven, bespectacled with intense gray eyes and short-cropped hair just like the lawyers you saw at your firm. Other times, you couldn’t help but imagine him as the scrawny boy everyone at school had described. The features of the adult Sam in your head were crisp and sharp but he always had the kindest of smiles.
Even though it was all texting and calling and images these days, you were never tempted to ask him for his number. A part of you was scared of unraveling the enigma that was Sam. Hell, you didn’t even know his last name. What if he was nothing like you had imagined? Worse, what if he was better than how you imagined? It had been hard to not feel jealous when he talked about Jess. Time and time again you had had to beat down hopes of finally getting to meet Sam and tell him you wanted to be more than just friends. No one had ever understood you the way he did. He was kind and humble. He was everything you could have ever asked for… but what if he wasn’t?
There was also the fact that Sam had never shown any inclination to see you or… of wanting more. You didn’t want to mess up what you had with him because you wanted more. So you went through the process of it, dating and seeing men. A few of them where really nice, too, but it always boiled down to the fact that they weren’t him. After the initial phase, you would start looking for all the Sam-things in them and it would eventually fizzle out. You were always wary of romantic conversations with Sam, never letting him know that maybe it was different for you than it was for him.
But today you needed him.
The moment you entered the house, you flung your bag , kicked off your heels and rushed to your phone. You waited impatiently while the mail loaded. There was an email waiting from Sam:
*That’s alright, Y/N. Maybe going out with Mark isn’t such a bad idea. Why don’t you give it a shot? Sure he is your boss but he seems like a nice guy.*
It was in context to your earlier email, discussing your situation about how your boss was hitting on you.
You promptly hit reply and typed-
*Sam…
That was all it took. It was too much and you broke down, your fingers clutching the cell phone tightly. If only you could wrap your arms around him. You craved physical comfort.
A ping from your phone startled you. There was a new message from Sam. You realized you had accidentally hit the send key.
*Y/N, are you okay? Talk to me. Tell me what’s wrong.*
You cried harder.
Just as your fingers grazed the keys to type a reply, the doorbell rang.
You wanted to ignore it, just let it ring. You couldn’t face the world just yet. Except, it could be someone from work. Wiping your eyes as best as you could, you walked up to the door and counted to three before opening it.
Two unusually tall and handsome men in crisp suits stood on the porch. The one standing to the right was easily 6 feet or maybe more. He had piercing green eyes and short cropped hair. The one to the left was even taller, with long silky hair that fell below his jaw-line. He was the first to speak.
“ Miss Y/N Y/L/N?” His voice was firm but soft and comforting at the same time.
“Uh… Y-yeah,” you stuttered. He had the most beautiful eyes that changed color as he spoke in the kindest voice you had heard in a while.
“I’m Agent Tyler and this is my partner Agent Perry. We’re with the FBI. If you don’t mind, we’d like to ask you a few questions about the death of Ella Lance.”