Chapter 15

"Sarah, it's Saturday morning. Why are you here so early?"

"Because you need me to take care of you."

"You really don't have to be here every second you're off work," Bryan said as he forced a smile, leaning on the edge of the door. "See? I'm up. I'm dressed. I ate... something." Although he couldn't remember what it was.

The petite red-head gave him a stern look as she pushed passed him through the door. "Yeah, yeah, I'm sure. What was it—a cracker?"

"No," he snapped back. But it might have been. Who knows? He last remembered really eating at his mom's yesterday.

"Look at you, you're going to make yourself sick. You won't do Wyatt any good if you—"

He flopped down on his couch, interrupting her rant at him. "Look. I'm fine, alright."

"No you're not. And Wyatt will have my ass when he comes back and finds out I let you do this to yourself." She stared down at him with her hands on her hips.

"Yeah, well, it looks like we won't have to worry about that now, will we?" he mumbled distantly.

Sarah's breath hitched. "Bryan," she whispered as she dropped to her knees in front of him, "look at me. You can't give up on him yet, alright?"

"I don't want to, Sarah. I really don't, but it hurts so much just sitting... and waiting... I don't... I can't..." He felt the tears slip free again. God, he was sure he didn't have any more left by now.

"Shh, shh," she quieted his ramblings, "I know it hurts. You feel like something is stuck in your throat all the time. Like you have a boulder sitting on your chest and you just can't breathe."

"Yes..."

"But you have to fight that. You have to be strong for him, to fight for him. You can't give up—"

"Why not?" he snapped. "You have." He flung his arm out. "Everyone else has. You said it yourself—the bench is a sign of how much Wyatt was loved. You've already accepted it. Everyone else has practically already mourned his—"

He broke off. "Fuck," he choked on a sob. He knew he had to start living again, going to work... moving on. But how could he do that? He didn't want to do it, not without Wyatt by his side.

"Look," Sarah said sternly, biting back her own tears, "I screwed up, okay? You know I didn't mean it that way."

"I'm sorry, Sarah," he sighed. "I can't stop hoping, believing that he might... But, you're right, I'm not okay. I'm dying slowly inside, and the only way I can stop it is to ... move on."

"Yes," Sarah agreed, "yes, you move on, but moving on doesn't mean you are giving up, that you are forgetting. You can get up each morning and go to work. You can go visit with friends and visit family. You can still do things, Bryan, without feeling like you're giving up on Wyatt."

"But it just doesn't seem right, me going on, going to work, laughing with friends at a bar, when he..." he sighed. "Moving on feels like I'm giving up, like everyone else has."

"Look, you know that's not true. Sgt. Woods hasn't given up. That kid Marc hasn't given up. I haven't given up."

Bryan studied her earnest face for several moments. She was right. Living didn't mean he had to let go.

"Come on." She tugged him up. "Let's go get some brunch at Magiano's, then I'm taking you to a movie."

He'd allowed himself to be pulled up but baulked at the idea of going to a movie. "No....a movie? I can't..."

"Yes, you can. We can, Bryan. Think of it as your first step back. A couple hours. That's all."

He heaved a resigned breath before nodding. Getting back into his old routines would be hard, but at least he had Sarah to help him.

@@@@

Nathan Woods leaned in the doorway of his son's bedroom, watching him stare at his math book. Marc hadn't moved in several minutes, and Nathan suspected he knew why. Marc wasn't really seeing the math problems any more.

And it was his fault.

He had failed as of yet to find Wyatt Kinnon. His son, Bryan Foxgrove, and most of Granger High School had counted on him, and he'd failed. How much did his son blame him?

His heavy sigh drew his son's attention, snapping the teen from his reverie. He swiveled in his chair. "Oh, hey, dad. Were you calling me?"

Nathan shook his head. "No. Just checking on how you are doing. Need any help?"

Marc flushed as he glanced at the geometry book. "Oh, uh, no. I just... couldn't concentrate."

"I see."

"It's just... you know... hard to not think about Mr. Kinnon when I keep hearing his voice in my head when I'm working on math."

Nathan folded his arms over his broad chest, his head dipping down. "I'm so sorry, Marc."

His son frowned at him. "For what?"

"That I haven't been able to find him. We really thought Roque had something to do with it, and now there's the mystery fingerprint—"

"Dad. Dad!" Marc interrupted, jumping out of his chair. "Jeez, dad, you don't think I blame you, do you?"

Nathan hesitated.

"Oh, fuck, you did, didn't you?"

"Language," he snapped at his son, who abruptly laughed.

"You sound just like Mr. Kinnon," Marc chuckled.

Nathan let a small smile loose. "I know you miss him. And I'm sorry—"

"Dad. Stop. Yes, I miss him. We all do. But no one blames you. It's not your fault. Bryan told me—"

"You're on a first name basis with Mr. Kinnon's fiancé?" Nathan quirked an eyebrow.

Marc shrugged. "He told us to call him Bryan when he came looking for Mr. Kinnon. It's more weird to think of Mr. Kinnon as Wyatt. I mean, he's a teacher, so he's older and all."

Nathan snorted at his son's logic. "You realize that Bryan Foxgrove is older than Mr. Kinnon, right?"

Marc laughed. "Yeah, well... whatever. Bryan's the one who reminded me that no one thinks you aren't doing everything you can to find Mr. Kinnon. I wondered if he blamed you for not finding him already, but he doesn't. Nobody does, dad. I certainly don't."

Nathan reached out and grabbed Marc by the neck and drew him in for a hug. His gnawing guilt at not having made more headway in Kinnon's case eased slightly. Knowing he was doing all he could was one thing, but hearing it from his son, the one person who meant the world to him, was another story. He pressed a quick kiss to the top of the teen's mop of hair.

"Thanks," he murmured softly before releasing Marc. "I'm heading into the office. I've called in all my favors to the tech guys to get them to hopefully find something on that fingerprint. I just hope it's in a system somewhere. Maybe the person works at a hospital or government building..."

Marc just nodded. Even though it was a Saturday, Nathan was glad his son understood his need to check in with work. He'd spent hours going over their notes already, but Marc seemed to understand this was something he needed to do.

"I shouldn't be too long, but feel free to eat if you get hungry before I get back."

"Sure thing, dad. Try not to drink too much coffee," Marc teased, and Nathan winced at how well his son knew his habits.

Nathan squeezed his son briefly in another quick hug before letting him go back to his homework. As the teen smiled back at him, he was hit with his wife's smile, her bright eyes, in the boy's features, and his heart stuttered. Marc was so much like his mother, God rest her soul. Nathan turned down the hall sadly. He could protect his family from many things, but cancer wasn't one of them.

He shook off his melancholy as he drove back to the precinct.

When he got to his desk, he opened the file again on his computer. Sometimes, rereading their notes helped things to click. He constantly hoped that happened, but so far it hadn't.

Everything pointed to the fact Wyatt Kinnon had left the Turner Estate in a cab and was dropped off in front of his apartment building. After that, the only lead they had was his cell phone, hat and scarf being located in the dumpster five blocks away—and finding those had been pure luck since the trash was scheduled to be picked up the next morning.

Analysis of the cell phone showed it had been handled by Wyatt and Carol Foxgrove, which matched her statement of calling the cab from his cell. The hat had hair traces that matched Wyatt, Bryan, and Carol. He'd made the note to himself that he thought Carol's hair being on the hat a little odd, but his partner had made the point that Carol had handled it as she helped Wyatt get ready to leave, so maybe that's where the one trace of hair came from.

Finding the electronic file unwilling to blaze answers at him, he flipped open his notebook, scanning over the hastily scrawled notes. He even picked up Janet's as she had left it with him when she went home yesterday, in case he needed to look over anything. She knew him too well and had probably suspected he'd be in today looking over things again.

He smiled at her sharp handwriting as well as the icons she would note in the margins—she'd made her own little shorthand for noting what she thought of what the witnesses or suspects were saying. She'd obviously found Simon to be a bit stiff and formal, but she'd believed him just like he did. Janet had liked Valens, the cabbie, thought he was pretty open and honest. She'd questioned why Wyatt was so bundled. They both had.

Then there were her notes about Carol Foxgrove. He frowned as he saw a sad face next to her name. He chuckled, obviously his partner didn't think much of Bryan's mother. Nathan tended to agree with that assessment. She had come across as a bit over-protective of her adult son.

He flipped over to the next page, catching an odd note in the corner.

Doesn't like son being gay?

Hmm, he wondered why Janet hadn't mentioned why she thought that. Mrs. Foxgrove was the epitome of a southern matriarch, but she had been planning to host her son's wedding to Wyatt.

He flipped over to her notes on Darrin Rogue's statement, nearly laughing out loud. She'd drawn a thumbtack next to his name. Normally that wouldn't mean anything to anyone else, but Nathan knew enough of her shorthands to know it was her way of saying she thought he was a 'prick'. It was her subtle way of making her feelings known, without getting in trouble. Even though she thought so 'highly' of him, her notes matched their conclusions that Darrin was telling the truth.

It hadn't taken much to verify he had indeed left Saturday morning and spent the week in California with his mother. While his whereabouts on Friday still left him the opportunity to possibly be involved in Kinnon's disappearance, general consensus and lack of any other evidence dropped him as the main suspect.

Now all they had was the mystery fingerprint. That person obviously HAD had something to do with Wyatt's disappearance. The problem was finding him.

He pinched the bridge of his nose and leaned back in his chair. He felt a sympathetic pat on his shoulder as someone walked by.

"You'll find him, Nate."

Nathan just nodded. He had nearly fallen into a slight doze when he felt his phone vibrate in his pocket. As he pulled it out, he felt a smidgen of wishful thinking when he saw the number for Louis, one of the tech guys.

"Hey, Lou," he greeted, "tell me you got something."

He could practically hear the smile on the other end from the computer nerd. "I got something."

Nathan jerked forward in his seat, anxiously leaning on his desk. "Tell me."

"Fingerprint match. Our search of hospitals and the like hit pay dirt. An assisted living facility a couple hours away."

"Assisted living? Like an old folks home?" Nathan frowned. An elderly person was involved in Kinnon's disappearance.

"No, like mental patients," Louis corrected. "Not violent or anything like that, just ones who can't live on their own without a little help."

Nathan mulled that over. A mental patient. "They can come and go as they please?"

"Not usually, but they aren't locked up."

"But our guy could have left on his own and—"

"You're assuming it's a guy."

Nathan frowned. "Isn't it?"

Louis laughed. "Yeah, it is... a really big one by the looks of him."

"Bastard. Big enough to move a man Kinnon's size?"

"Oh, yeah, probably pretty easily."

Nathan felt his pulse racing. Finally! A freaking break!

"Good, send me the file," Nathan demanded.

"Already done, man. Think you're going to find it rather interesting."

"Why?"

"The name's going to sound familiar."

"What is it?"

"Edward Foxgrove."

Nathan froze. "As in related to Bryan Foxgrove?"

"Older brother."

"Oh, fuck," Nathan groaned.

Lou chuckled. "Yeah, that's what I thought too. Good luck with that."

"Thanks, Lou. I owe you."

"Naw, it's all good. Just glad to help out."

Nathan hung up, already clicking on the file from the tech lab. A basic profile of Edward "Eddie" Foxgrove appeared. He'd need a warrant for detailed medical records. He wondered just how the hell Bryan's brother had become involved. He dialed his partner.

"Lettman, here," she answered automatically.

"Jan, it's Nathan. We got a break. Fingerprint match."

"Thank God," he heard her breathe. "So, you need me to come in?"

"Maybe, I think we need to talk to Bryan again too."

"Why? Does he know the suspect?"

"Yeah, it's his brother."

He heard the sharp hiss as she bit back her curse. "Really? What the hell? Where is he? Why haven't we heard about him before?"

"Kinda my thoughts too. Come on in so we can figure this out, file for some warrants."

As he hung up, he stared at the gentle smile of the man in the picture of the file.

What the fuck was going on?