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Only a week after Stiles takes him into custody, does he pay a visit to Derek at the penitentiary where he’s awaiting trial; the visit only lasts about five minutes, just long enough for Stiles to see Derek locked away behind bars - a position Stiles never thought he’d find him in.
“Three years and it’s come to this.” Stiles stands leaning against the bars, one hand casually resting in his pocket – playing with his badge that only after five years now does he actually feel worthy of possessing. He glances through the bars – noting how the shadows they cast leave stripes of light and darkness across the other man’s face.
Derek is lying on his back on the narrow cot, tucked away in the corner against the left hand wall of the 10 by 10 cell; head on his pillow, eyes closed and steady breathing – he could almost be asleep. He hums non-committedly; “longest relationship I’ve ever had.”
Stiles raises an eyebrow and stands upright, releasing his hold on his badge, and resisting the urge to fiddle with his belt loops instead. “I honestly never thought I’d see the day you know? I’ve followed you across 38 states, 14 countries and 4 continents – and we’re here, right back where we started.”
Derek smirks “Honey-moon period was over I guess – still, at least you’re on the other side of the bars this time...”
Stiles flushes, “I still can’t believe I was wet enough behind the ears for you to trick me like that. Two years on the job, and you were still able to pull it off.” He gives a small smile, “Mexico was nice though.”
Derek laughs, slow and deep; “I aim to please.”
Stiles brings up a hand and taps the bars in a sort of farewell gesture; “I should be going, I’d say good luck with the trial but...” He trails off, and looks up at Derek.
The dark haired man meets his gaze and nods, “We both know how that’s going to go.”
Stiles shifts from one foot to the other before turning to leave, but he freezes as Derek calls after him; “I still maintain that I didn’t do it, you know.”
Stiles doesn’t turn back around, and continues to walk away with shoulders held noticeably stiffer than a few moments prior. Derek watches him leave; the setting sun giving a red tint to his uniformed back as he goes - boots echoing on the tiled floor, and a twang as he trails his fingers over the bars.
---
It becomes something of a routine after his sentencing – life imprisonment with no chance of parole, and the highlights of Derek’s months are the first Saturday; when the young agent comes and spends a few hours just talking.
He doesn’t even expect Derek to talk back. Derek kind of loves that.
Stiles appreciates the fact there is someone willing to listen.
---
The visit in May, a week after Derek’s appeal is rejected, is the hardest so far – Derek sits with his back pressed against the wall, hunched; like he’s carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. For someone who is normally such a charming man, he is absolutely intolerable.
Stiles drags a small stool in with him, and settles back leaning against the bars; “Do you want to talk about it?” He questions after a few moments of silence, head tilted ever so slightly to one side.
“About what?” Derek jerks his head up to affix Stiles with a penetrating stare, and practically snarls “About the fact my big sister, not to mention the rest of my family, are dead – and I’ve been locked up in here and left to rot?”
Stiles swallows audibly – he’s not scared of Derek, but the man looks insane with desperation – his eyes wild and unfocused.
“Derek...”
“Stiles” he replies mockingly, a smirk quirking his lips upwards as the shutters come down over the raw pain in his eyes and he tilts his head back, resting it against the concrete wall.
Stiles huffs and shakes his head, slowly running the iron bars between his fingers, only stopping to pick at a loose paint chip with his nail; “I don’t know why I keep coming back, if you’re just going to behave like a dick.”
Derek closes his eyes and nods, “Yes, you do.”
Stiles’ brow furrows as he considers the older man, “Ok,” he acquiesces, “yes, I do.”
Stiles leaves a few minutes later, but he receives a crudely drawn ‘Sorry’ card in the post a week later - so he supposes he can forgive Derek.
---
Just over a year after he was caught is Derek’s 29th birthday; it’s not a Saturday, and is midway through March, but Stiles turns up anyway. He brings cake – Derek is grateful, not that he’d admit it, but the food here is awful. (Plus, it’s strawberry and chocolate.)
Stiles regards him from where he’s sat on one of those little iron chairs; those monstrosities where you’re practically crouched rather than sitting if you happen to be anything over 5’5. Derek on the other hand is in his customary position reclining on the cot – he can’t really see the point in moving.
“Twenty nine, huh?” Stiles asks, obviously trying to glean Derek’s reaction from the way he’s watching for the smallest twitch of a brow, trying to gage his irritation.
Derek shrugs nonchalantly; “Just over a year ago, I would never have thought that this is how I would be spending it to be honest.” He smirks, “I pictured more hookers for one thing. And I’m pretty sure expensive champagne at a hotel in Paris was involved somewhere.”
Stiles is quite obviously fighting down a grin, “So like Rome, but less... Tasteful?” Derek snorts, “High standards – Rome was extremely tasteful I’ll have you know.” Stiles shakes his head. “I’m well aware; I was there in case you don’t recall who it was chased you through the city to the airport at three am in some cheap remake of the Italian job.”
Derek is now the one fighting back a grin – he also happens to be failing miserably; “There was nothing cheap about that Lamborghini.”
Stiles groans and drops his head in his hands - but he’s smiling now too. “That was a beautiful car before you got your hands on it. Not to mention the priceless Van Gogh’s stashed in the back that were also rather beautiful before you ran the car off a bridge.”
Derek attempts wide eyed innocence, but just looks wicked as he comments “I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about – likewise with the Monet.” He cracks and grins “Beauty comes at a price, anyway.”
Stiles is laughing so hard he is actually crying, and looks in danger of toppling off of that wretched little chair any minute now - Derek’s not going to deny it to himself, it may not be what he expected, but this birthday is turning out kind of awesome.
---
It’s summer – the first Saturday of July – in the second year of his incarceration, and Derek is annoyed; he knows how warm it must be outside, but the concrete keeps the building cool and he’d just like to bask under the hot sun for five minutes for God’s sake.
By the time Stiles arrives, hot and sweaty with his shirt sticking uncomfortably to his back, Derek has worked himself into a rather tetchy mood. He can see the sun, see the blue sky through the window across the corridor – he wants to touch it. Wants to lay on rock and sand and stare up at a nearly cloudless sky, gravel digging into his back, a cold beer in hand, and his iPod playing music as loud as he likes.
Instead he gets an exuberant 25 year old who cannot stop talking about this vacation he has planned with his friends – they’re all going to drive south along the West coastline until they find a place they like, and then just stay there for a while. Surfing, fishing, camping in tents on beaches in out-of-the-way coves and inlets, whatever – just living. Stiles wrinkles his nose and tells Derek that his idea of a vacation may not be up to the standard of some of the places he’s stayed – Stiles would know, he was always only one step behind him – but Derek thinks it sound pretty f*cking perfect.
He’ll only be gone three weeks he reassures Derek, so he’ll still make their next meeting; Derek shrugs and turns to face the wall. Living vicariously has never been his style; he needs to feel the sand crunch under his toes, taste the salt on the ocean breeze for himself.
He wants out.
Stiles carries most of the conversation for the remainder of his visit, but though Derek is annoyed at pretty much everything right now, he doesn’t have the heart to tell the younger man to leave.
Two weeks later he gets a postcard – it’s a photograph of turquoise sea and a Corona half buried in the sand; there are surfboards haphazardly piled off to one side, and high cliffs bracket the shot. It looks like paradise to Derek, but he cracks a grin when he turns it over:
“This place is pretty f*cking awesome, but it has absolutely nothing on Antigua.”
Derek shrugs, things could be worse.
---
Summer passes quickly into autumn, and as winter approaches Derek starts to think more about what January will bring – the marker of his third year behind bars for one thing.
When Stiles visits in October he brings with him a pile of paperwork, which he deposits next to Derek where he sits perched on the edge of his narrow cot.
“I thought you might like to see this before they inform you officially – it’s about your Uncle.” Stiles sits on Derek’s other side and reaches over him to pick up the first document. He leaves a hand placatingly on Derek’s arm as the other man noticeably tenses at his words, and proceeds to read aloud from the information brief he is holding:
“Your dearest Uncle Peter got up and left the mental institution; it would appear he was found near where you used to live in the possession of several weapons including illegal firearms. After further psychiatric assessment they have come to the conclusion that he is a sociopathic nut job who was on his way to kill you, unawares that you are already doing time for his crimes.”
Derek looks condescendingly at Stiles, who at least has the good grace to cringe and look abashed; “I may have paraphrased?”
Derek snorts and drops his head into his hands, elbows braced on his knees. “So what now?”
Stiles winces as he notices what can only be hope in the other mans inflection – he does his best to keep his voice calm, “Now we wait. The courts are re-reviewing the evidence; if you did not commit the original crime of the double murder of your sister and Kate Argent, well...” Stiles shrugs, “We may actually be able to swing the mad dash across the globe in our favour as a wrongly accused man fleeing the death penalty; so not only will you have served over two years, but you will have been persecuted for three years prior to that.”
Derek looks at him and holds his gaze with a piercing stare – he didn’t miss the use of ‘we’ and ‘our’, but decides not to comment; “And the um...” he coughs “Grand Theft Auto and ‘shopping sprees’?”
Stiles grins at that, “They were never actually able to make any of that stick. They are, of course, well aware that it was you - but there was never any substantial evidence; it was all ‘coincidence’. I mean, how could you have possibly got past 10 steel vault doors, laser trips and motion sensors in the Swiss Bank, without leaving any trace? It just wouldn’t be humanly possible.”
Stiles doesn’t want to set the other man up for a fall, but Derek’s grin is blinding, and Stiles wants him to keep smiling. So he pats his shoulder and stands; “I’ll leave you with this little lot for now. I’ll come back to see you when they set a date for the tribunal.”
Derek isn’t even hiding the fact that his eyes are shining and Stiles hopes to God that he isn’t about to cry, because Derek is a lot of things; charming, persistent, fierce, and downright scary to say the least - the man’s serving time for a double-homicide for God’s sake. But crying? That is something Stiles just can’t deal with – he’s known Derek for five, nearly six, years now, and Stiles has only seen him cry once in all of that time; the day he was sentenced for the murder of his big sister. (And the douche lady - but Stiles is pretty sure that he wasn’t crying for her.)
And so Stiles leaves, and gives Derek his moment of privacy because f*ck, if anyone deserves that right now it’s Derek, and Stiles can be far more useful than playing the emotional pillar anyway. Like, doing some actual investigating of the case for example - you know - his job.
(In reality, Stiles stopped pretending that his attachment to Derek is purely about work a long time ago, but that’s easier to admit when the guy is behind bars, and looks set to stay that way for a long time.)
---
December 22nd sees Derek stood outside a courthouse – his face turned skywards and alit by the yellow glow of streetlights, as he ignores passers-by in favour of staring at the stars. He’s wearing a long black coat and clutching an umbrella, but he has little else, and doesn’t really know what to do with himself beyond looking for a place to sit and spend an hour or five just absorbing everything. Because it’s sad but true that for the two years he’s been locked away the world didn’t just stop turning; he feels like he’s missed so much – like he’s being born again.
He startles as he feels a hand settle on his elbow, but a grin quickly breaks when he registers that it’s Stiles; the man who had, for three years, pledged his life to putting Derek behind bars - and then spent the next two trying to get him back out. Stiles draws him in for a quick hug, unable to contain his own happiness. “So, what’s next for you?” He questions, and Derek can only shrug.
“I don’t really know. I mean, my bank accounts were unfrozen, so it’s not like I’m hard up.” He smirks, “– maybe I’ll go to Monaco and actually pay for my room this time.”
And when Stiles laughs it’s like hot days on the beach in Antigua, chases through crowded markets in Istanbul where Stiles somehow ended up tangled in a hijaab and Derek could only laugh at the law enforcement they’d sent to pursue him. It’s like Mexico, and Switzerland, and all of the 38 states they’d crossed, and that time with the diamonds in Zaire where Derek managed to lose his pursuer because Stiles got lost in a shopping centre of all places.
And so Derek kisses him. Because he’s come to realise that maybe he ran so far and so fast just to keep life interesting, just so Stiles would be tempted to follow because both of them love a challenge; and Derek is totally, unsurprisingly, fine with that. (So is Stiles).
“Come stay with me and my dad for Christmas.” Stiles whispers against his lips as they break for breath, and Derek nods without hesitation, because he’s been running for too long, and now that there’s nothing chasing him, maybe it’s time he started following Stiles instead. Stiles thinks he’d like that. (So would Derek).