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The restaurant Charlie had chosen is a fancy one. Black and white, smooth lines everywhere; the clientele is much the same. Everywhere he looks, Jesse finds things he hates more but his heart warms knowing it was chosen simply to impress him.
The entire date would have been amazing… if only Charlie had shown up. It has been almost an hour and, while Jesse tries to blame it on traffic or snow or any other unforeseen circumstances, Charlie isn’t answering his phone. As much as he wants to be angry that Charlie chose now to have another sexuality crisis without informing him, he can only feel upset; his jaw numb with the effort not to cry each time the server gives him a new basket of bread rolls.
Floor-to-ceiling windows display the whirling snowflakes dancing in the ever-darkening sky while the last of the dependency on natural light bleeds into reliance on street lamps visible through the gaps in the buildings. Snow piles high, and drifts to cover every surface. It’s beautiful in its own deadly way and Jesse reflects on how close it is to nature - so ‘pure’. Maybe Charlie is stuck out in it, maybe his satsuma-coloured sedan finally jacked it in after the horrible treatment it’s faced over the years in many car chases.
He should have suggested a night in. They could be sitting in their pyjamas, eating takeout in front of the tv right now. He wouldn’t be in this predicament; he could be stood up in his own home and not have to face his embarrassment in front of an audience. People couldn’t window shop his misery, the panes framing this snapshot of his life.
While the seat across from him remains empty, Jesse busies himself by fiddling with anything and everything; bottle labels not standing a chance. He’s demolished three baskets of bread rolls out of sheer anxiety, fiddling with them until they become mostly crumbs, then scooping them off the table, putting them back in the basket, and eating whatever was left in his hands.
He closes his eyes and takes a breath, promising himself that when the clock hits eight, he would leave. Dread fills him at the thought of getting up and leaving the restaurant in front of all those knowing eyes and the sympathetic mumbling. What a prick Charlie is! Jesse has successfully avoided a panic attack for almost a month and he’s not going to ruin that streak now. He takes a breath…
In for one…
Out for two…
As he comes back to consciousness, Charlie feels his head loll to the side. His head pounds and reels to the point of nausea. He lets out a groan as he tries to shuffle only to find his limbs are restricted… restrained.
“Rex!” The name escapes his lips even before the bleariness clears from his eyes.
Footsteps approach. “Rex can’t help you now, Hudson.” A voice sneers. A faint outline of a body appears through the bleariness of his vision.
Cold fear drenches him as he fights the haziness in his head to just think. Why can’t his brain work? What’s wrong? He should be doing something right now… he just can’t think what…
But all that thinking wears him out and he drops back into unconsciousness.
In for one…
Out for two…
In for—
His phone rings and he can’t find the energy to be embarrassed by how fast he snatches it off the table.
“Hello?” He can hear his own nervousness in his head, can feel how tightly he clutches his phone. He waits for a beat and repeats: “Hello?”
Jesse jumps when a voice chuckles darkly which is definitely not Charlie’s. Nothing could compare to the discomfort of knowing someone has his phone, someone that isn’t Charlie.
“Who’s there?” He says like this is just some perverse knock-knock joke.
“Unimportant.” A modulated voice replies. “I have sent you an address. If you want to see Charlie Hudson alive again you will come here without telling a soul.”
Jesse’s head fills with so many questions but trepidation fills his throat, and the stranger hangs up before a single sound can escape him. It takes a few seconds for his body to cooperate and do something, anything. He drops the bread roll he was fiddling with, runs out of the restaurant without so much as a nod to the waiter and gets in his car. He picks up the phone.
“Donovan.”
“Hi, it’s Jesse.” He gasps. “Charlie’s in trouble.”
“What happened?”
“We—I—someone… I got a phone call and an address. They said they have Charlie and he was supposed to— I mean I believe them. He’s gone.”
He and Charlie hadn’t spoken about how they would navigate their relationship at work but this feels like a bad time to break the news.
“Okay. Stay calm. Send me the address, go to the office and find out what you can about the location.”
“But—“
“No. Do not go to the address. It’s a trap and backup won’t be there for a while, not in this snow.” Donovan takes his silence as an indication that Jesse is considering doing something reckless. “Jesse—“
Jesse hangs up. He throws the phone on the passenger seat and grips the steering wheel with both hands until his skin turns white. Just when things were on the up for him, things go to shit. His whole life has been a truckload of piss-poor decisions that end up hurting him and/or decommissioning him emotionally for the next year. The one thing he had just slipped from his grasp and now he’s left with fucking breadcrumbs clinging to his fingers.
Deep down he knows what he’s going to do but he’s never disobeyed Donovan’s orders before. That isn’t entirely true but the last time he did he got shot. It’s a rush that settles deep in his stomach… like a fucking bread roll. He wishes he ate more.
If their positions were swapped, Charlie would save him, right? Without a doubt. Even if they weren’t on the precipice of ‘going out’, even if he really had fucked everything up by demanding pity sex. Charlie was one of the few people who had ever believed Jesse was more than the dirt on his shoe, who had seen him as someone worthy of attention and affection. He couldn’t and wouldn’t let that be taken away from him. Then there’s Rex… if anything bad happened to Rex he would positively die. That dog has become his entire world.
“Fuck it.” He turns on the engine.
Snowflakes whirl around the car as he drives up a bumpy, off-road track to a fairly unassuming warehouse. It must have been used to store heavy machinery, judging by the ceiling-high door panels. Canada is ridden with decommissioned warehouses, they don’t stand up well to the harsh conditions. There’s a car outside, parked exactly parallel to the barn, too far away for Jesse to be sure of the make. It looks hauntingly familiar, but he can’t place it. He pulls up at a safe distance and tries to push the fear and the rage away, to think of some way to get inside without being seen.
As he sneaks up to the side of the building, he breathes to calm his heart. In for one, out for two, in for one, out for two. He listens for footsteps but can’t hear anything over the raging wind and the trembling of the doors. It gives him an idea. He could throw open the door to which the guy on the phone will think it’s the wind and go close it, then he can grab Charlie and belt it out the other door on the opposite side of the warehouse. Foolproof.
He uses all of his strength to open the door against the wind until it catches and slams against the side of the building. Jesse flinches, freezing for a second before forcing his legs to move. He stumbles against the snow; a wind tunnel is created around the structure’s side, so much so that he is almost blinded when his scarf slaps him in the face. Swearing under his breath, he slips inside the building.
Inside is a gallery of old forklifts and boxes covered in tarpaulin and dust. Out of the brunt of the wind, he can hear footsteps, so he ducks behind a scissor lift and waits for them to pass. When they do, he tiptoes a few paces and then attempts to quietly jog through the maze towards where he thinks Charlie might be. However, as if bloody anthropomorphic, an edge of a plastic sheet wraps around his foot and yanks him down. He hits the floor with a smack, glasses flying off his face with the movement. He freezes. Everything remains quiet, no footsteps, no voices. But the sounds of the blizzard outside are muffled; the door must be shut. He gets to his knees so he can feel around for his glasses. I knew I should have gotten contacts.
Earlier that year he’d brought the topic up with Charlie who simply chuckled and said he couldn’t imagine him without his glasses. Jesse fell hook, line, and sinker for that and never looked any more into it. He edges forward, doing his best to avoid the rustling of plastic sheets on the floor. He swipes his left hand across the floor and hears hard plastic skitter across the floor towards his right. He follows the sound and turns a corner around a veritable mountain of boxes. He feels for them and his hand catches onto the frame. He lifts them to his face, adjusting them so they sit straight. In an attempt to gauge his surroundings, he looks up. But instead of finding more bloody boxes, he finds himself staring down the barrel of a gun.
“Ah Jess, you’re finally here.”
Velma moment.
Charlie’s nerves thrill with panic when he sees Jesse being hauled towards him. They have been in this kind of situation before; they both know that. He didn’t ask for it, yet he winces as if he had. Not that he was thrilled about it either. Jesse always had his back, more than he had any right to expect, from anyone, let alone a grown man who had barely experienced anything in the field. Not enough to make him calm and level-headed. His face is red, and his eyes narrow as if Jesse believes himself the most dangerous thing in the warehouse. Which of course is true. Hell hath no fury as a tech specialist scorned. If Charlie had his druthers, Jesse would not have been put in this position at all.
Charlie is not sure if Jesse knows what he’s doing. Maybe he really is angry, furious that this guy ruined their date. Or maybe he’s scared, camouflaging his fear with bravado even though his knees buckle. Whatever it is, Jesse's shoulders fall, the muscles that should hold him still and strong have melted into jelly, leaving him unable to stand, or even move his head. The chair next to his groans and shunts back slightly as Jesse is thrown into it. As the back of Jesse's head slams into his chair, Charlie's heart stops. He is a monster for dragging him into this.
"Jesus!" Jesse's voice is shrill.
Their captor ties him up, each limb tied to the chair separately and his chest is pulled taught so his breath gets punched out of him. Happy with his knots, the masked man leaves them, promising to be back soon.
Charlie freezes, trying to catch Jesse’s unfixed gaze, hoping that at least they will get through this together. More than anything, at the moment, Charlie needs to hug him. He looks at the side of Jesse’s head, trying to force words through his lips to express his regret, his guilt about dragging him into this. Silence reigns for a moment. Then Jesse looks across at Charlie, eyes full of tears. Bitterness grips Charlie’s heart like a vice. There are so many things he wants—needs to tell him but a single word bubbles out of his mouth before he can stop it.
“Idiot.”
He curses himself immediately. Jesse has put himself in danger to save him and all he can do is insult him. He’s about to backtrack and replace it with just about anything his dizzy brain can think of. Only… Jesse laughs, quietly but with humour.
“Well, you know, best-laid plans…”
Charlie grins ruefully. “This isn’t what I had in mind for our first date.”
“But, hey, at least you didn’t just stand me up! That’s what I thought… when you didn’t turn up.”
Charlie tuts. “You know me better than that, Jess. I could never do that to you.”
His face lights up with a warm, lopsided smile. “Yeah, I know.”
Charlie nods in response. The thought that Jesse would be worried about that at any point in time gives him the shivers.
A sharp, scraping noise grates their ears and captures their attention as they watch the man drag a foldable table up to them. He leaves and then returns with a laptop, setting it up so it sits in line with the edge of the table. The methodical motions give Jesse the same sense of familiarity that the car did.
”Joe?”
“I wondered how long it would take you.” The man looks up and lifts his mask, grinning. “It’s been too long.”
“What the fuck are you doing? Let us go.”
Joe gets a wicked glint in his eye and grabs Jesse’s chin as if his hand had always belonged there. “I am so sorry, baby, but I just can’t do that.”
Charlie’s head snaps to look at Jesse whose face is red hot, his jaw tense and eyes steadfastly avoiding his inquisitive look. He doesn’t know a lot about Jesse’s past romantic excursions but this ‘Joe’ must have a part to play. He’s surprised and ashamed to feel jealousy bubble up his throat.
“What do you want from us?” Charlie supplies when nothing is moving forward as his date is locked into a staring contest with his ex.
Joe lets out an amused sigh, releasing Jesse’s jaw and straightening up. Then he paces before them. “It’s not you who I want, it’s Jesse. I only needed you to lure him here.”
“I’m not doing a single thing you ask me to.” Jesse spits in uncharacteristic anger.
In the blink of an eye, Joe snatches his jaw and squeezes hard enough to leave marks. “You will, or your boyfriend gets it.” He cocks his gun and points it right at Charlie.
Jesse tenses his jaw under the grip and snarls, “Do it.”
He doesn’t spare a glance at Charlie. He knows that he can’t possibly mean it but with a gun pointed at his head and no way of protecting himself, he starts to seriously question just how upset Jesse is that he didn’t show up to their date.
Thankfully, Joe huffs and puts the gun away. Jesse looks quietly pleased with himself.
“Whatever, get on with it. Your instructions are on a word document. I expect you to follow them.” He states. “And no funny business or Butcher here will have no problem with shooting your dog.”
Summoned, ‘Butcher’ steps forward out of the shadows behind them and comes to stand in front of them.
“Brian? Is that you?”
“Jesse, when we get out you're gonna have to explain to me how you know such unsavoury characters.”
He sighs. “It’s not that deep, Charlie, I lived in a foster care home for a bit. It’s fine.”
“You what?”
“I don’t want to talk about it right now.” He shrugs it off and then nods his head towards Butcher. “Hey, Bri, I don’t suppose you could untie us? For old time's sake?”
This supposed Brian grunts and turns his back to them and Jesse sighs.
“Jesse, I want to talk about this now.”
“Well I don’t and surprise surprise, it's not about you. I'm the one under pressure to save your fucking life.”
Joe slams the gun on the table which startles them into silence. “This is the problem with cops, Jess. They ask too many questions.” Then he tilts his head. “Clearly not the right ones though if he’s willing to date you. You’re still one of us.”
“I left that part of my life behind me.” Jess grits out. “I’ve changed.”
“Oh yeah? I bet you still have some of those badges kicking around your apartment. What did they say?” He asks rhetorically. “‘No good cops, no bad dogs’ I believe.”
Charlie watches closely for Jesse’s response, hoping that anti-police sentiment had never crossed his mind. However, his guilty flush gives him away.
“That was after—,” Jesse cuts himself off.
“Say it,” Joe demands. When Jesse tries to look away, he uses his gun on his chin to guide his gaze back to him. “Say his name.”
“What happened to him—,”
Joe grabs a fistful of hair and yanks it back, making him gasp. “To who, Jesse?”
“To Jasper.”
Unwittingly, Charlie’s memory flashes back to the time he caught Jesse with an old case file. One he only had vague memories of. He remembers the way Jesse jumped out of his skin as if his chair was on fire, attempting to shove everything back into the folder. He only caught a glimpse of the name before Jesse was babbling about something and speeding away from his desk and out of the room. Jasper Hollow.
Charlie was a junior officer at the time, fresh-faced and ready to learn and thankfully far enough adjacent to the case not to get caught up in the media flurry. Headlines varied only in vocabulary since the evidence of a police officer shooting an unarmed youth was clear. Reports of his friend yelling “give it to him” flooded households that year; half excusing the officer and half condemning him. When two criminals were apprehended before they could even commit a crime, under the veil of darkness Officer Peters believed them to be armed. When one shouted and the other brandished what looked like a weapon… he shot him. Later, he claimed self-defence and the whole thing was brushed under the rug.
“Joe…”
“I saw him die, Jesse. I saw him murder my best friend.”
“Listen, I looked into it.”
“Shut up. Do what I ask and your new boyfriend stays alive.”
With that, he marches out of eyesight through the maze of boxes.
Charlie opens his mouth to say something but everything he wants to say fights to get out first so all that comes out is a garbled mess. Jesse blinks at him and waits for something of more sense.
“If you were… if you were so anti-police, why did you start working for us?”
Jesse sighs deeply and Charlie knows he isn’t going to get his answer any time soon. Anxiety sits like a rock in his stomach, first Jesse asking Joe to shoot him and now this. Maybe he still is anti-police and playing the long game. Part of him that knows Jesse trusts this is all a big misunderstanding and they will get out of there and Jesse will say it was all a ruse, a plan, to help them escape. But another part, the logical one, knows that everything he once knew about the man has been tossed out the window.
At that moment, they hear a high-pitched yawn. Stretching their necks, they turn to see Rex stretching on his side and rolling onto his stomach as if just waking from a nap.
Jesse gets a glint in his eye that makes Charlie suspicious.
“Hey, Bri?” Jesse calls, catching the man's attention. “For what Joe wants me to do, I’ll need my hands, could you ask him to cut my arm ropes please?”
He hesitates.
“Pretty please? You only have to ask.” Jesse pouts.
Butcher huffs and turns around.
Charlie gets an idea. “Y’know, I bet he’s used to only doing what he’s told.” He says, broadcasting his voice.
“What are you doing?” Jesse whispers.
“I think he’s just Joe’s bitch! Always following orders when really he’s the one who should be in charge.”
“Charlie…”
“Shut up!” Butcher snaps.
It only makes Charlie press on. “You don’t give the orders around here, remember?”
“I said shut it.” He growls dangerously.
“Or what?”
A sadistic smile crawls across his face. “I am so glad you asked.”
In one swift movement, he lunges forward and buries a knife deep into Jesse’s thigh. He screams. It’s more from shock than anything else, it didn’t feel like more than a punch. He didn’t even know the man had a knife.
Charlie freezes as shock washes over him like a bucket of ice. That is not what he had in mind. If he knew what was going to happen… he is so out of his depth but he ran his mouth and now Jesse has a knife in his leg.
“Now stay put,” Butcher grumbles while walking away, presumably to alert Joe.
“Rex,” Jesse hisses.
“What are you doing?” Charlie asks, quite convinced his date has lost his mind.
Jesse ignores him.
“Rex! Come here, boy, I need you.”
Rex obliges, dragging his sleep-laden legs towards him.
“Fetch.” He eyes the knife in his thigh and hisses as Rex pulls it out. Jesse seethes in pain, struggling to breathe evenly.
Rex nudges it into his hand
He twists it so he can saw through the rope on that hand. The tautness of the ties allows him to cut through quite easily, allowing Jesse to wiggle his arm until the rope loosens enough for him to slip out of it. With his right hand loose, he begins freeing his limbs from the other ropes.
“What are you—“
Jesse only shushes him as he gets to work on the rest of his ropes.
Charlie can only watch, rapt. This is a whole other version of Jesse, one that’s commanding and sure of himself. It’s such a contrast to the shy, bespectacled tech nerd who tried his best to avoid stepping on toes… and who only blushed for him.
Charlie only manages to get half freed from his confines before they hear a noise: scuffs of shoes. They’re coming back. He has to act fast. Jesse directs Rex away from them, out of danger then rushes to sit back down, arranging his ropes as if nothing happened, assuming his previous air of reluctant compliance.
Alarm courses through Charlie, bile rushes up his throat and he tamps it down by saying, “Jesse, I want you to know if this goes badly... I really like you and I see a future with you.”
"Shut up. We're getting out of this." Without thinking twice Jesse shoves the knife back into his thigh.
“Jess!”
Jesse groans but chokes it down when his eyes land on the men entering the room.
“What have you been up to?” Joe smiles sadistically.
“Well, you know, the usual. Bleeding incessantly because your bitch didn’t like the truth.”
Joe gestures his hand as if to brush it away to which Butcher grunts and crosses his arms. “What was it you wanted?”
“Um. Could I ask for a glass of water? You know me, I’m always dehydrated… mon ange.”
“Wait, that’s not—,” Butcher tries, only to be silenced when their captor interrupts.
Something switches in Joe’s face and he softens. “Of course, mon chéri.” Then he leaves. Both Charlie and Butcher watch in shock.
“Hey, Bri, come here,” Charlie says with an open, friendly expression.
Butcher sighs, resolute in his attempt to ignore them.
“C’mon, man, you owe me a favour for the knife. I have to tell you something.”
Butcher reluctantly gets closer, leaning into Charlie’s space when he motions for him to. Then Charlie reels his head back and rams it into Butcher’s as hard as he possibly can. They watch as his limp body falls to the floor. He looks at Jesse when he gasps. The man jumps up on his good leg and hops over to look at him, placing his hands on either side of his face.
“Your forehead is bleeding.” His face crumples like he wants to cry.
“Hey, hey, yeah woe is me but we have work to do. Untie me. I have a plan”
“Where’s Butch?”
“He said something about a noise?” Jesse recalls.
Joe frowns and approaches the table with the glass of water, placing it exactly in line with the laptop.
“Anything else?”
“I need you to unlock it. I need you to open it so I can do what you want.”
He tosses a glance to Charlie before he says, “Of course, baby, I got you.” He proceeds to bend over the table and spin the laptop to face him.
In for one—
Out for two—
In for one—
Charlie whistles and Rex leaps out from his hiding place behind them to take down Joe. In sync, Charlie and Jesse stand and pick the table up so that it upturns on Joe and traps him beneath. Water blinds him while the glass it was in smashes around him. It crunches under Charlie’s shoes as he holds the struggling man down. Jesse ties his wrists and legs with the rope that had once been on them. The blare of sirens and speeding cars sound from outside.
Charlie walks into Jesse’s hospital room to find Donovan berating the poor man on the bed.
“Jesse, what you did was reckless and dangerous and it’s good you’re on medical leave because otherwise, I would have suspended you!” Donovan doesn’t get angry often but when he does it’s scary. “That being said… you’re the bravest officer I know.”
He waits a moment before entering, not wanting to interrupt the father and son thing they have going on. He sits on the chair next to his bedside and scratches Rex who is lying alongside Jesse on the bed, on the side of the uninjured thigh. Donovan bids his farewell when he sees he has lost Jesse’s attention to the box in Charlie’s hands.
“You ordered pizza to the hospital?”
“I could hardly leave you to eat hospital food,” Charlie replies, opening the box and detaching a slice for Jesse. “You’ve been through enough for one day.”
Jesse smiles, accepting the proffered slice of pepperoni.
“Look… I’m sorry this happened. It seems like our whole relationship thus far has been a total failure.”
Jesse takes his hand. “It’s not perfect but it’s us.”
“Yeah.” Charlie smiles, brushing his thumb pad over Jesse’s knuckles. “I do have a question though.”
“Oh yeah?”
“How did you know he wasn’t going to shoot me?”
“I didn’t,” Jesse says nonchalantly. Charlie blinks in horror only for Jesse to laugh and take his hand. “I’m joking! He has OCD, his number is seven. He doesn’t do things on minutes that aren’t divisible by seven. I saw your watch, it wasn’t even near.”
“That’s a fucking relief, I thought you blamed me for getting you in the situation.”
Jesse gives him one of his blinding smiles and looks at him through half-closed eyelids. Charlie’s stomach drops for a whole different reason.
“Apart from the stabbing, I wouldn’t have it any other way.” He grins. “Well, that and you finding out about my darkest secrets.”
“Yeah, I’m sorry I pushed you to talk about it.”
“It’s alright, I can imagine it’s a lot to hear about someone you thought you knew.”
“I do know you, Jess.” He encases Jesse’s hand in both of his. “I know that you’re a wonderful, caring, sensitive, passionate tech nerd who for some heaven-sent reason likes me… that’s all I need to know.”
“You’re full of shit.” Jesse laughs. “I’m only telling you this because I’m high as balls, okay?”
“Okay,” Charlie agrees, smiling.
“My parents died in a car crash when I was young and my uncle took me in. Then… he got sick and couldn’t take care of me. Hence, I got tossed into the foster care system. And my whole thing with Joe was just a byproduct of my situation. He was the only one who made me feel safe.”
Charlie frowns. He never would have expected that to be his origin story.
“And Jasper? The police?”
“I was seventeen. We stole things. I was supposed to go with them but I had a stomach bug.” Jesse smiles ruefully. “It should have been me. I could have been there, I could have saved him.”
“No,” Charlie says firmly. “Nothing could have been done. Peters was crooked.”
Jesse blinks at him. “You know?“
“I know. He’s in prison. He killed Jasper on purpose.”
“What? Why was it not in the file?”
“Peters killed him so he wouldn’t report his cocaine habit. It was a set-up. The higher-ups covered it up. Justice was done but we couldn’t talk about it.”
“Oh.”
“Is that why you got involved with the police? Justice?”
“I want to help people. This is the way I know how.”
“I’m glad,” Charlie smirks. “I’m pretty sure a cop and thief romance is forbidden.”
“You would date me even if I were still a criminal?”
“Well, you sure have stolen my heart.”
Jesse rolls his eyes and grabs Charlie’s shirt to pull him into a kiss.
“In time, maybe I’ll steal your last name.”