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As far as last words go, Timothy Bradford thinks that his are pretty good ones. They’re whispered to the woman he loves, over and over again, filling the space and the silence of their last moments together.
He wishes they had more time, of course.
He thinks he’ll always want more time with her.
But he treasures the time they did have, every single second they spent together.
“Tim,” she whispers, and he nods as he lurches forward, his arms tightening around her as they hear the telltale click beneath the floor they’re standing on. He breathes in her unique scent of lavender and vanilla and something that’s just her, and he barely holds back a sob as he leans forward and presses his lips to hers.
“I love you,” he whispers.
Yeah, he thinks.
If those are the last words he ever says, then he thinks they’re pretty good ones.
_____________________________________
Two Hours Earlier
“No signs of the bastard or anything to point where he’s planning on setting off the second bomb,” Lucy says dejectedly as she holsters her weapon and stands in the middle of the living room. The apartment is cleared out, all the rooms empty and scrubbed clean of anything that could have possibly led to the capture of the man who had already detonated one bomb in a (thankfully) sparsely populated area.
Tim sighs as Metro walks up behind her. He’s frowning as he glances around the apartment.
“We’re too late,” he says, and Lucy nods dejectedly, her lips pressed into a thin line.
“Tim, if he sets this one off in a more densely populated area…” she says, and even though she can’t force herself to continue, Tim knows.
Tim always knows.
“I know,” he whispers, his voice softer than he’d normally allow it to be while on the clock. He walks up behind Lucy and wraps his thick, strong fingers around her elbow, offering what support he can while they’re surrounded by her team and his. She leans back into him, an almost imperceptible movement, and he knows she’s thinking about the single casualty from the first bomb, a mother who had heroically thrown herself on top of her child.
She’d been almost unrecognizable.
“We’ll find him,” he promises, and he hopes desperately that it’s a promise he can keep.
Lucy nods and lets herself lean on Tim for one more long moment before she takes a deep breath and forces herself to pull away. Tim sighs, already missing her warmth, and then turns toward his team. He scrubs a hand over his hair, messing up the carefully styled locks, and then rests his hands on the straps of his Metro vest.
“Let’s clear out and meet back up at the station. We need to be ready to roll at a moments notice if and when we hear something, and —”
“Tim.”
Tim stops in the middle of his sentence, and his blood runs cold at the way Lucy whispers his name.
He knows Lucy.
He knows her happy voice and her sad voice. He knows her horny voice and how she sounds when she’s tired and cranky and hungry. He can clock the tiny, almost indiscernible hitch in her voice when she’s trying not to cry and he knows when to take a few steps back because she’s on her period and he’s just said something incredibly stupid.
But this voice…
He doesn’t know this voice.
All he knows is that it sends chills down his spine and he feels his heart plummet all the way to his stomach as he slowly turns around to face her.
She swallows and shrugs and it takes Tim a moment to realize that everyone surrounding her, Aaron and Angela and Nyla and Nolan, are all staring at her with varying degrees of horror on their faces.
Lucy offers him a small smile, strained and scared, as she licks her lips.
“I… um. I think I found the second bomb.”
Tim lurches forward but stops immediately when everyone present, everyone, screams for him to.
“TIM! No! No, stay back, baby, please,” Lucy cries, and he stops mid-step, his heart racing and his eyes wide as he watches Angela and Nyla walk around Lucy in a wide circle before they converge on him, each one wrapping their hands around his arms and holding him back from moving toward her.
“We need the bomb squad now,” Angela shouts back at Nolan, and Tim vaguely registers both Nolan and Aaron moving carefully toward the door, their eyes wide and their hands shaking. Aaron grabs at his radio and begins speaking into it, but Tim doesn’t hear a single word he says.
He’s staring at Lucy, at the way she’s holding her muscles taut. She hasn’t moved a single inch, and Tim wants to ask why, to scream at her to move, to come to him, but the words stick in his throat as he watches her smile sadly at him.
“It’s gonna be okay,” she says, and Tim shakes his head because what will be okay?
What is going on?
(He knows, deep down, what’s happened, but he doesn’t want to believe it.”
“Lucy, what’s happening?” he asks, and he pauses after he speaks to clear his throat and lick his suddenly dry lips. He hates that his voice is hoarse, that he’s barely hanging on by a thread and all his men are watching him. He’s always hated being weak, but he’s willing to be weak for her.
“I stepped on a pressure plate,” Lucy whispers, and Tim whimpers as she confirms his worst fear. “It … it could be nothing. A trap, a-a false alarm to keep us busy while he sets the second bomb. It’s … it’s probably nothing.”
Tim appreciates that she’s trying to comfort him, but he knows her.
He knows what she sounds like when she’s lying through her teeth, and she’s definitely lying through her teeth right now.
“Out,” he whispers, and Angela, who is still holding onto his arm, makes a confused noise. “Everyone out, except me and Lucy and Ang.”
No one moves for a second, and Tim feels an irrational surge of anger when he has to tear his eyes away from Lucy to repeat himself. “I said get out! This situation is dangerous enough without twenty people walking around this room. Get the fuck out before someone fucks up and causes the bomb to go off!”
There’s a mad rush to follow his directions, and Tim feels like he doesn’t breathe again until everyone is gone except for him and Lucy and Angela.
(He’d wanted to tell Angela to leave, too, but he knows that he needs someone to keep him from doing something stupid).
“Lucy,” he whispers, and he moves to take a step toward her and both she and Angela scream at the same time. He swallows hard and nods, and even though every muscle in his body is screaming at him not to, he takes a step back, his body moving further away from hers even though it’s the last thing he wants to do.
“Tim, stay back, please,” Lucy begs. Tim watches her, his eyes glued to her body, and he can see the tension radiating off of her. “And… and you should go, too. You and Ang. We don’t know if it’s a dead man’s switch, or-or if it’s on a timer. We don’t know, and until we do you need to get out of here.”
Tim is already shaking his head before she finishes her sentence.
“No,” he says, and then, before Lucy can open her mouth and argue, he continues. “Fuck no. I’m not leaving you, baby.”
Lucy whimpers and Tim watch as her arms tremble at her sides. He realizes, all at once, that she’s trying desperately not to move.
“Where is the bomb squad?” he snaps, and Angela reaches for her radio without him having to ask.
He doesn’t know how long Lucy can stand there, perfectly still, but he knows that he doesn’t want to find out.
“If… if I don’t make it,” Lucy whispers, but Tim shakes his head as he takes a step forward, ignoring the noise of devastation Lucy makes. He knows he can get at least a little bit closer; Aaron and Nolan had been standing within arm’s reach and neither of them had set anything off.
“Don’t say that,” he snaps, and Lucy bites her lip as she glances down at the floor. “We’re gonna get the bomb squad in here and they’re going to disarm this thing, and then I’m going to take you out to dinner like we had planned, okay? This isn’t… this can’t be how it ends, baby. We have so much left to do.”
Lucy sniffles and nods, and Tim wants to reach out and brush the tears away from her eyes but he knows he can’t.
“I’m going to ask you to move in soon,” he whispers, and the tears Lucy had been trying desperately to hold back begin to fall as Tim smiles one of his soft, little, Tim Bradford smiles. “I want us to buy a house that’s all our own. One that has a guest room for Tam that she can live in full time or-or just visit when she comes home on break from school.”
“Just one extra room?” Lucy asks, and Tim cocks his head to the side, confused, until Lucy slowly, carefully, moves one of her hands from her side to her belly. She caresses the area purposefully, and the second the intention behind the movement registers, Tim is fighting tears of his own.
“Yeah?” he asks, his voice high and light, and Lucy bites her lip as she shrugs.
“I was gonna take a test tonight,” she whispers.
“We can do it together,” Tim says, and Lucy nods but from the look in her eye, Tim can tell that she doesn’t believe she’ll make it to tonight. “We can go by the pharmacy on the way home and pick up some Thai food from that place next to it, the little hole in the wall you love so much?”
Lucy nods and then sobs, the noise breaking free from her chest as she reaches her hand out. Tim takes another step forward and then another, and then he’s wrapping his fingers around Lucy’s, holding on tightly.
“Tim,” she whispers, and he nods. He wants to move forward and wrap her in his arms, but he doesn’t. He knows that if he steps onto the pressure plate that he’ll most likely set it off, and if he has even a miniscule chance of getting Lucy out of this alive, he knows he has to take it.
“Hey,” Angela whispers, and Tim sniffles as he turns around to see her staring at them with wide, wet eyes. “The bomb squad is close. They told me to clear out. Well, they told both of us to clear out, but I told them that wasn’t happening.”
“Okay,” Tim whispers, and then, “Thank you.”
Angela nods and then turns to Lucy.
“Be safe,” she whispers, and Tim watches as she drops her hand to her own distended belly. He knows that Angela heard and saw everything, and he imagines there’s a lot more she wants to say but she doesn’t. She gives them each one more long, lingering look, and then walks out of the door, leaving them alone.
Tim tightens his fingers around Lucy’s hand, and they wait.
_____________________________________
“It’s a pressure plate,” the bomb tech tells them, and Tim swallows hard as he nods. “I’ve got men on the floor below, cutting into the ceiling to try and get at the bomb. We’ll know more soon, but for now, no sudden movements. No one steps onto or off of the plate. Shifting your weight or taking a deep breath shouldn’t cause it to go off, but anything more than that will. Sergeant Bradford, you need to let go of her hand.”
Tim’s arm is already aching, but he shakes his head. “No.”
“Sir—”
“I said no. What else?”
“You need to leave,” the tech says, and Tim sighs as he shakes his head.
“No.”
Lucy makes a noise and Tim turns to her. She’s crying again, tears staining her beautiful cheeks, and he wants to wrap her in his arms and take her away from here. He wants to wrap her up in their bed, to curl his body behind hers. He wants to tuck his face into her neck and breathe her in.
“Tim, you should go,” she whispers, and Tim laughs a humorless laugh as he shakes his head again.
“I’m not fucking leaving you,” he says. “Okay? I’m here until the end. Whether that’s today or in forty years, I’m here, Lucy. I will never, ever leave you alone, you got that?”
Lucy whimpers and darts her tongue out to wet her dry lips. “But Tim, if this bomb goes off…”
“Then I’m right where I want to be.”
He knows that, if they make it through this, he’s going to have several mandated therapy sessions with the precinct shrink. He’s basically admitting to suicidal ideation, but he doesn’t give a shit. If Lucy, the love of his life, is here… then he is, too.
“I don’t want you to die,” she whispers, and Tim tightens his fingers around her hand as he stares into her beautiful, endless brown eyes.
“I don’t want you to die, either, baby,” he says, and despite the fact that the bomb tech is still there, carefully drawing a chalk outline around the pressure plate of the bomb (just inches in front of the toes of Tim’s shoes), he opens his mouth and bares his heart. “I don’t want either of us to die. What I want is to take you home and take that test tonight. I want to buy a house with you. I want to fill it with babies and dogs, and I want to grow old with you. I want to sit on the porch one day with creaking joints and grey hair, and I want to look back on our lives together. I want forty more years with you, baby. Fifty. Sixty, even. I want forever. But if this is all we get, these last few hours, then I want them, too.”
Lucy is openly crying now, her eyes red and wet and her nose stuffed as she sniffles.
Tim continues, because he needs her to understand.
“If I leave and you die, then I’m dead, too, don’t you understand? I … Lucy, losing you and our baby?”
He doesn’t even know for sure if she’s pregnant, but she might be, and that’s enough to make him realize that moving on from her will never, ever be an option.
“If you die, I’ll never live again. I won’t move on, I won’t fall in love again. You’re it, okay? I refuse to live without you, so if you’re here, I’m here.”
“I love you,” Lucy breathes, and Tim feels his heart swell in his chest. It feels like it’s pressing against his ribcage, aching, trying to burst free from his chest to make itself at home where it already belongs.
“I love you, too, baby,” Tim whispers, and he holds her hand tighter as the bomb tech stands up and brushes the chalk off of his hands.
He tells them to stay put (as if they’re going anywhere), and then he leaves again.
Tim stares at Lucy and tries to make her understand that she is his life, that it’s not worth living without her.
“Tim,” she tries, but he shakes his head.
“Together,” he says, and Lucy sobs but nods as she holds his gaze.
“Okay,” she whispers, giving in. “Together.”
_____________________________________
“It’s on a timer,” the tech announces when he shows up next, and Tim nods slowly.
This is it, he thinks.
They’re not making it out of this alive.
“How long?” Lucy asks. Her voice is quiet and soft, and Tim wonders if she’s beginning to accept the inevitable like he is.
“It likely had an hour when you first set it off. It’s now down to eight minutes,” the tech says, regret saturating his every word. “It’s time for you to leave, Sergeant Bradford. We’ll do everything we can, I swear, but we’re evacuating the building and the surrounding areas.”
“Then you’d better get a move on,” Tim says. He doesn’t break eye contact with Lucy as he speaks, and he can tell that it’s taking everything in her to not break down and beg him to leave. “But before you do, what's the exact countdown?”
The tech frowns but glances at his phone. “Seven minutes, thirty two seconds now. We’re doing everything we can, but… ” he trails off, and Tim nods as he reaches for his own phone, opens the timer, and sets it for seven minutes and twenty seven seconds. “You really should leave, Sergeant Bradford,” he tries again, but Tim just shakes his head as he lets go of Lucy’s hand to lay his phone on the floor. He’s standing back up, his fingers searching for hers, before he speaks again.
“No. I’ve made my decision.”
The tech sighs and nods, and then leaves.
It’s less than a minute later that Angela and Nyla and Grey begin yelling at him through his radio, so he turns it off and tosses it across the room.
“You should, you know,” Lucy whispers, and Tim sighs as he glances up to meet her gaze. She’s still crying, tears coursing down her cheeks, but there’s a small smile on her lips as she watches him shake his head.
“No, baby, I’ve made my decision. My entire life is here, in this room. And I know it’s selfish, that our friends and family and… and I should want to live for them, but I can’t, Lucy. I can’t live in a world without you. I’m in this until the end, baby.”
Lucy nods and sniffles and tightens her fingers around Tim’s until her skin is white.
“Do you remember my first few days as your rookie?” she asks, and Tim chuckles as he nods.
“Yeah, I do. God, but you were a feisty little thing.”
Lucy giggles and then sniffles, and Tim wants to reach out and brush her tears away but there are still four minutes on the timer.
“You called me on my shit and yelled at me when I took you to Isabel’s apartment, and then again about the drugs… god, baby, you made me a better man, and I will always be thankful that you crashed into my life when you did.”
“You made yourself a better man all on your own,” Lucy whispers, because he had. He’d put in the work and made the hard choices, and she’s always been so goddamn proud of him that it hurts. She's loved watching him change from the angry, closed off man he’d been when she’d met him into the man he is now, the man who smiles and laughs and wears the stupid Mickey ears when she hauls him to Disneyland.
Tim glances down at the timer.
Two minutes.
“It’s not fair,” he whispers, and his voice finally breaks as he watches the seconds count down. “I wanted a whole life with you. I want to buy a house and have children with you and grow old with you. I want to wake up for a thousand mornings in your arms, and go to bed with you a thousand times. I want… it’s just not fair.”
“It’s not,” Lucy agrees, and she reaches for him with both of her hands as the sobs begin to break free from his chest. “You could… with someone else, you know. You can still get out of here. You can still have that life.”
Tim shakes his head, though, and Lucy knows that it was stupid to try but she had to try anyway.
She glances down at the timer, and her chest aches and her eyes burn.
One minute.
“I love you,” she says, and Tim nods, licking his lips and blinking away tears as he stares at Lucy.
If he has one minute to live, he wants to spend all sixty seconds staring at her.
“I love you, too. More than anything,” he whispers, and his voice breaks but he doesn’t even care. “I love you, Lucy. I love you so much, baby.”
Forty five seconds.
“I know you don’t believe in god, and I don’t either,” she says, and Tim looks confused for a moment before she continues. “But I believe in after, and if there’s an after… ”
“If there’s an after, there’s nothing that will keep me from finding you. Nothing,” he insists, and Lucy nods, her eyes glazed with tears as Tim holds onto her tightly. “I’ll find you, and then we’ll have eternity together, yeah?”
“Yeah,” Lucy agrees, and her stomach lurches as she glances down at Tim’s phone.
Ten seconds.
Tim sucks in a breath and counts down in his head.
Nine.
“I was so fucking lucky to have met you,” he whispers.
Eight.
Lucy chokes on a sob and nods, tugging on their clasped hands.
Seven.
“Me, too. Me, too, Tim. I’m so… so happy that we met and fell in love.”
Six.
“I love you.”
Five.
“I love you, I love you, I love you.”
Four.
“Tim.”
Three.
“Tim,” she whispers.
Two.
“I know, baby.”
One.
He lurches forward and wraps her in his arms as they hear the telltale click beneath the floor they’re standing on.
I love you.
_____________________________________
Thomas Edison’s last words were: “It’s very beautiful over there.”
I don’t know where there is, but I believe it’s somewhere, and I hope it’s beautiful.