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When SSA Derek Morgan had been forced by SSA Jason Gideon—then Unit Chief of the Behavioral Analysis Unit—to assist rookie cadets at the FBI academy who needed an extra something, he’d been irritated.
“You’re too hot-headed, Morgan,” Jason admonished. “You could have gotten Agent Baylor—your own team member—killed because you’re too damn stubborn to listen. You don’t trust your teammates, and you want to handle things yourself. That’s not how this works. I know you went deep undercover for two years in your previous post, but you need to relearn the value that you—are not—an island.”
Derek hated every bit of it. The first cadet he helped train was an alpha male who acted like he knew far too much to be going through such mundane training and who didn’t care to take any of Derek’s direction without arguing. He was sure that this was what Jason wanted him to assist with—garnering a compatible and humble attitude with fellow cadets—because the cadet in himself was not lacking in physical skills. He had lasted a mere 250 hours into the program, though, and was discharged from it for belligerence and unsuitability. Derek didn’t know how he had passed the screening in the first place.
But Jason had viewed it as a failure on Derek’s part. That cadet had been his responsibility. Derek didn’t care how Jason felt about it. He wasn’t the type of person to try to justify his actions if he knew them to be right. He did what he did, and there was no regret. He knew the cadet better than Jason did over the weeks, and he knew that that man was not fit to uphold justice.
This was the second year in a row that he had been given the assignment, and he was already over it before it even began.
“This cadet needs all the help he can get in physical training,” Jason declared in exasperation. “But his potential is unparalleled. He’s a little wet, though, so—” He gave a shrug in that laissez-faire you’ll-see-for-yourself manner and left it at that.
It was before dawn when the mornings would still chill down to the bone and the breaths puffed out in white clouds. He wore a baseball cap and his hoodie over his head to protect himself from the sting of the cold. He was to meet the cadet at the bleachers, where he had just walked through. He looked at the seats. No one was there. He peered back into the entryway, no one was walking through, either.
Of course not. Another cadet that spurned the work. Unacceptable. What was his name again? Cadet Reid? In forty-five more seconds, he would receive a demerit for tardiness—in Derek’s book, a minute late was inexcusable. He was on time; this cadet should be, too. The cadet should have been waiting for him, in fact.
“This is bull,” he murmured, looking at his watch. Ten, nine, eight . . .
The tap-tap-tap of shoes on the track thumping in his direction caused him to kick his head to his left. Peering for a better view of the source of the sound, he saw what he hadn’t initially seen, and almost outright laughed at the sight coming towards him.
A young man—a very young man—reached Derek the moment that his watch beeped twice to indicate the turn of the five o’clock morning hour.
“Cadet Reid?”
The young man—face covered in sweat, patchy and red, wheezing and placing his hands on his knees—nodded. “I’m—yes—Cadet Reid.” There was barely a voice behind the statement.
Derek couldn’t understand what he was looking at. The cadet was wearing a pair of low Chuck Taylors, mismatched long socks that weren’t even the same length, a pair of shorts that were just a little too short, arm bands, a color-block hoodie that he drowned in, horn-rimmed glasses that were ready to slip off his face, and a headband in his mangy hair. These must be his own personal clothes, and he would be changing into a clean uniform later, when his actual mandated physical training would begin. No one was foolish enough to wear non-regulated clothes otherwise.
He looked like he didn’t even break twenty—frail-looking enough that a soft wind could knock him over. Derek wasn’t one to judge, but in this, he felt that the standards were lowering. For the hundreds of thousands of like-minded people who vied for the position to even be selected to train as a cadet, how did this little dweeb manage to squeeze his skinny white ass here?
Ugh. Must have some parents with deep pockets that let him have his fifteen minutes of fun whenever he wants. Won’t last long.
Despite his irritation, he would give him the benefit of the doubt. Jason had asserted that he had unparalleled potential. Whatever the hell that meant. Either way, nothing could be worse than last year.
So thinking that he would break the ice, Derek gave a chuckle. “Kid, the eighties called, and they want . . .” He trailed off and then pointed an open hand at the outfit, “Whatever this is back.”
It fell flat. The cadet blinked at him, and something crossed his features before he steeled them.
“Mm. I’m Agent Derek Morgan.”
“Yes.”
“Stand at attention.”
“Sir.”
The cadet did as told; Derek lowered his jowls. The last one had rolled his eyes with an undulating swagger, but this one straightened right up.
“You got here early, then.”
“I calculated my mile so that if I ran each lap consistently at three minutes and forty-five seconds, then I would reach the entrance at five o’clock, and I was advised to be here promptly at five o’clock.”
Was he showing off? Okay, yes, I’m impressed that he calculated things down to the last second, but nope. “I hope you’re not fishin’ for compliments. That’s a fifteen-minute mile. Almost twice as long as the requirement, kid.”
The cadet paused and blinked multiple times, jaw clenching. “It’s to the best of my abilities, sir.” He then corrected himself. “Agent Morgan.” And then he continued. “I expect that your training should reflect a better result in time, just as you expect that I should improve. Sir.” He corrected himself again. “Agent Morgan.”
Excuse me? Derek wanted to needle him, see how far it would take for the cadet to show his true colors. Right now, he was merely showing contrived deference.
“Nah. Ain’t here to hold your hand, kid. I’m not into that Bagger Vance nonsense. Is this what they’re lettin’ into the Academy now? Mm-mm. Standards are damn low.”
Ah, there it is. Something alighted in Derek’s eye as he watched: the cadet flushed, his eye twitched, and his hands—flat at his sides before—tightened into fists. But the cadet spoke and said something he didn’t expect in the least.
“I’m an adult.”
“What?”
“Sir,” he added. And then he corrected himself: “Agent Morgan.”
“Yeah, good, but what?”
The voice was soft, but it was firm. “You’ve referred to me as kid three times, Agent Morgan. I’m an adult, and respectfully insist that you not use that moniker for me. Cadet Reid will suffice.”
Derek didn’t respond and had to refrain from balking.
“Sir,” Cadet Reid finished. “Agent Morgan.”
Derek kicked his head back and rolled his eyes. Great. A wiseass.
He met with the cadet three times a week, and the two of them didn’t quite see eye to eye those first few times. He had to admit: the cadet wasn’t like the previous one. The first one had downright repulsed him.
Cadet Reid, though, was an irritating pain in Derek’s ass.
He didn’t fish for compliments—he spoke facts. He always seemed to have something to say, but only ever in response to comments or jabs thrown at him. He never initiated things. He was a little all over the place, too. He was smart—damn smart—but oftentimes, the cadet would take things he said too literally. He didn’t refrain from correcting him, either. He didn’t understand some of his references to modern shows or music, and he didn’t always understand the point of his jokes and his light-hearted jeers.
One day—and still within the first month of their acquaintance—the cadet arrived at their pre-arranged meetings late, sporting a busted lip and a bruised eye that would, in the days to come, become a black eye.
Derek railed against him for being late. “You probably deserved that shiner, too, ‘cause of that smartass mouth.”
Despite the words, though, the cadet’s lack of response and his blanketed expression didn’t sit well with Derek, and it wasn’t until he had left that he realized that the cadet hadn’t spoken a word—he had done as told. Yes, it didn’t sit well with him at all.
He had to give it to Cadet Reid, though. He was persistent, and he didn’t give up. What he lacked in strength, he made up for in speed; what he lacked in social graces, he made up for with his intelligence; what he lacked in stamina, he made up for with grit. Derek reluctantly acknowledged these things. The twerp damn well demanded his respect.
Somewhere along the lines, he began to look forward to their sessions for reasons he couldn’t understand.
And one day they had a harmless conversation—strangely humorous, insightful, suddenly sobering, and formative. The little punk reeled him in, and the ties of their strange bond thickened as the weeks passed.
Derek enjoyed needling him until his nose would flare and he’d straighten his lips before he would break into an unsure, puckered grin. He liked jabbing him until—on one occasion—he barked out in laughter. The tension and quailing from the hair ruffling lessened. The flinching at a cuff to his arm lessened. He was like Clooney, his rescue dog. Until he was more than Clooney.
Derek mulled over the fond memories in relish. If he didn’t latch on to them, then he was left imagining what Spencer was enduring.
It wasn’t like the times when he would drop Spencer off at the airport to take a flight west to visit his mother or to give a guest lecture somewhere faraway or visit criminals with fractured minds like Amanda Jackson or, lately, Ben Foster. There was an unspoken promise of return on those occasions. Despite his absence, Spencer would send Derek a funny text message of something that occurred while away, or he responded to one of Derek’s texts with multiple paragraphs to correct him or to did-you-know him or to how-would-you him.
He missed him. He had half a mind to send a text. The phone was still unable to be traced.
Mere weeks had passed, but he missed Spencer. It was a pang as sharp as a constant, twisting dagger in his soul. He didn’t know how long it might take before this feeling passed or before the blade would withdraw from his chest. How could it? His heart was tied to Spencer in ways he couldn’t explain and hadn’t known until he wasn’t here and there was no promise of return.