Tellings of the Time: Complete series

22. 21

It’s early morning at the office, and I’m filling in forms. It feels like I’m always filling in forms, even if these ones are somewhat fun. I’m ordering new guns for the whole tac team because we could use the upgrade and we’ve got the funds to do so. Also, I just wanted to order some new guns, so this is working out fine. Robin never told me about retail therapy being an unhealthy lifestyle, but maybe that has something to do with the fact that I hate shopping. Except for guns obviously.

Beckett sits on the opposite side of my desk, using his laptop to do whatever the hell it is he does. As he said, he had some leads to follow up on and wanted to stay near, so we went into the office together. Chester came to the office while Remy slept in after his midnight dance session.

I’m running on caffeine and the prospect of new firearms. It’s a peaceful morning by any means.

Until the door opens, Chester comes running in, his laptop held out in his hands.

“I’ve got the evidence!” he yells.

“What evidence?”

“That Abraham literally is the devil, and he didn’t just ruin my life, but many lives.”

Beckett gives him a disconcerted look. “Explain what you found.”

Chester inhales deeply, trying to calm down enough to properly explain what’s going on. He’s visibly shaking and walks to the windowsill, placing his laptop on his lap.

“Remember Farid?” he asks, and we both nod. Remembering the criminal who bought and sold children whose house we blew up and took into custody wasn’t that hard to do. “He had a lawyer. Bitters. He’s a partner in a law firm called Barnes, Barclay and Bitters.” I nod again because he had figured this out already, but I’m unaware of the rest of his reasoning. “Well, the Assistant Director had a lawyer as well. That would be Barnes. And Barclay would be Thomas Barclay, my father’s lawyer.”

Then he remains quiet as if this explains everything.

“So?”

He sighs irritably. “So, that means that whole firm is dirty as fuck. They represent criminals and make good money off of it. So I went through everything, and while they look legit, they’re not. They’re criminals themselves. So I followed all the loose ends, the trails, and the money, and then I found out that they’re tied to this organization we’ve been chasing. You know? The one we thought only dealt in kids like it was crack, but Farid let slip was bigger than that? Well, these fucking lawyers represent all the divisions of this organization. They deal in everything. People, kids, drugs. I even found evidence of people harvesting organs and selling them. And these three fucknuts make them get away with it.”

By the end of his rant, Chester is panting. I don’t think he took a breath the whole time he was talking. And I understand, because my heart is beating like crazy as well. I’m just not sure how Abraham fits into all of this.

“Okay, so that’s a good start,” Beckett says.

“I’m putting out an arrest order for him,” Chester says defiantly while he starts typing.

Beckett takes away his laptop. I don’t know if he’s being really brave or really dumb.

“You can’t just do that!” the agent yells. “There’s a protocol to follow!”

“Fuck protocol! I’ve got evidence of everything he did. Abraham is part of this. He bought and sold women! Doing God knows what with them in the meantime! He needs to pay!”

“I absolutely agree, but there are rules, and they’re there for a reason. We need to jump through the proper hoops to do what you want to do. We’ll get him, I swear we’ll get him and make him pay, but we’ve got to do it the right way.”

“I’ll never fall in line,” Chester says, standing up and walking towards my computer, which also happens to have a keyboard.

Beckett walks over and shoves him away from my computer.

“This isn’t right, let me do it right.”

Chester isn’t rational any more. While he always has trouble playing by the rules, all the rules go overboard for his parents. There’s too much hurt, and too much has happened in the past for him to do the right thing. In his mind, he is doing the right thing.

“That’s taking too long! And who’s to say that the next director won’t be as dirty as the one before? What if it never happens? Just let me do this myself!”

I can hear his cry for control. It all comes back to that need. He felt out of control in the situation with his parents and his nanny, and as a survival strategy, he needed to have control in every aspect of his life. Right now, he needs to be the one who keeps the situation in hand, because he’s about to go off in the deep end.

“I can’t give you those guarantees, nobody can. But if you do this, if everyone who can learn how to do this starts doing it themselves, we’d be left with total anarchy! There are laws, rules, and protocols for a reason! If you don’t believe in justice anymore, you’re just a hair’s breadth away from being someone who needs to be put away as well. Besides, if we don’t do it the right way, then it will never stick. He will walk away and then they will keep on hurting people.”

Chester’s jaw is so tight it looks like it hurts. I’m seconds away from going to Chester to hold him and calm him down, but Beckett turns Chester and faces him before I can do so. He lays his strong hands on Chester’s shoulders, making him face him, the two of them staring at each other.

It’s like the Battle of the Titans.

Then Beckett hugs Chester to him, and I’m left standing there, stuck between awe and surprise. Beckett brings his mouth to Chester’s ear, but I can still hear what he’s saying crystal clear.

“Give me a week. A week to do this properly. Let me prove to you that we can do this right. If I can’t do that, we’ll do it your way.”

Chester scowls, but doesn’t answer. He nods once before freeing himself from Beckett’s embrace, grabs his laptop and leaves the office again, slamming his door on the way out.

Remy enters my office with a bag of sandwiches later that afternoon that he offered to get us after his rehearsal ended. His hair is wet after taking a shower at the theater before coming over and feeding us. The man sometimes really is too good to be true.

I lock my computer while he starts unloading the sandwiches, and then music starts playing over the office sound system. And it’s fucking loud. I recognize the first notes of My Way by Limp Bizkit, and I immediately know something is up.

“Where’s Chester?” I ask Remy.

“He wasn’t at his desk when I came in,” he answers, looking confused. The music starts to really pick up, and it’s so loud it makes thinking hard.

“Call him,” I order.

Beckett grabs his phone and calls Chester, quiet until he scrunches his nose and pinches the bridge. “It’s the same song playing when I call him.”

“Oh for fucks sake.”

I storm towards the door, open it, and get met with a lot of confused faces. “Zoey?” I yell, trying to make myself heard above the music.

“Yes, boss. What the hell is this?”

“Try to trace Chester’s phone.”

She raises an eyebrow but doesn’t ask questions and starts doing something on her computer. I’m just praying to fuck he hasn’t disabled us tracking him. I know he can be a pain in my ass, but usually, he’s smarter than going off on his own, even if he’s trying to make me believe he’s going to do this ‘it’s my way, my way or the high way,’ according to the song he’s forcing us to listen to.

“He’s driving towards Northwest,” she says and my suspicions grow.

“Crap,” I turn around and see a very confused-looking Beckett and Remy looking at me. “Okay, so we should probably go, because if I’m translating this whole situation from speaking Chester’s language to normal human being language, he’s going to his parents and he’s ending this.”

“...This time I”ma let it all come out. This time I”ma stand up and shout…”

Two sets of big eyes stare at me. “How the hell did you get that from a song and a direction?” Beckett asks.

“Because when it comes to emotions, Chester speaks in music. You might not believe that lyrics mean anything, but I’ve spent more than half my life with a man who can’t put his feelings into words, so he lets music do it for him.”

I walk towards my desk, grab my gun, put it in my holster and put on my leather jacket before I hurry towards the door.

“Hurry, we can talk along the way.”

They both finally come into action, and I’m already halfway towards the office”s front door before they catch up. We rush towards the elevator while I keep explaining what’s going on.

“If he really wanted to do this alone, he wouldn’t have let us know what he’s doing, and he would’ve deactivated his phone so we can’t trace him. Trace him to his parents” house because that’s where they live. So now just fucking hurry, and help me help Chester.”

We’re almost in the basement of the building where the parking lot is before Beckett loses his shit.

“He was going to give me a week!”

I shrug. “I don’t think he could wait so long.”

“You’re condoning this?”

“No, absolutely not. But I know better than anyone that if that man puts his mind to something, nothing will stop him.”

Remy wordlessly follows us; he accepts all of this as if it were the most normal thing in the world, and I could kiss him for it. We get into Beckett’s car, and I silently smile when I see that my own car is missing. Guess that answers the question of how Chester is going to his parents.

The moment Beckett starts the car, ‘My Way’ comes blaring out of the car speakers as well, and it shouldn’t be funny, but I crack up. Beckett’s eye twitches while he tries to turn the music off but fails. Remy is silently chuckling from the backseat.

“Where are we going?” Beckett asks through grinding teeth.

I give him the address, and we leave with screeching tires.

We drive up to the Von Liechsenfield’s house. I’ve actually never been here and I would’ve been happy never changing that fact, yet here we are. I spot my car in the driveway, parked perfectly. The front door is opened, and I almost jump out of the car before Beckett has parked – which he unceremoniously does right in front of the entry.

The music turns off as soon as Beckett turns off the car, and silence returns when the neverending repeat of ‘My Way’ finally stops. If I never hear that song again, it still will be too soon.

The silence only somewhat returns because yelling comes from within the house.

I run up the few steps towards the door, seeing a person with his back towards me. I still recognize his baggy jeans, even if he’s hiding his telltale shoulder-length blond hair inside the hood of a black hoodie.

“...is absolute ludacris!” Abraham is yelling. His usual calm, cool and collectedness is nowhere in sight. His face is red and his hair looks wild. Weirdly enough he’s wearing his impeccable shoes inside of his own house as well. I wonder if he ever wears something the likes of sweats and holey t-shirts.

“I’ve got evidence of all this ludicrous,” Chester says calmly.

“Which you probably obtained illegally,” Abraham says.

Chester’s mother, Sandra, is standing in the entry to another room, holding a robe around herself. She looks different now that she isn’t completely primped and dressed for a function.

“What do you want?” she asks, eyeing her son suspiciously.

“I want both of you to rot in jail and own up to all the shit you’ve put others through.”

“Is this about Esther again?” she asks.

“No Lydia,” Chester spits out. “This isn’t just about that, this is about what you put all the other women through!”

“Lydia?” Remy whispers behind me. “I thought her name was Sandra?”

I try my hardest to keep my laughter back. “Her name is Sandra, but for some reason he really hates the name Lydia and he calls her that.”

“Great, there are witnesses here!” Abraham yells when he sees us in the entry. “You’re with the FBI, right? This boy is spitting nonsense, and I want him arrested for spreading lies about me.”

“If I’m going to arrest everyone that ever lies, we’re going to have to take everyone in,” Beckett responds. He’s casually leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed in front of his chest, observing everyone as if there isn’t a cloud in the sky.

“Don’t worry, the FBI will get here eventually, I’ve already sent all the evidence over. Once I figured out your lawyer was the linchpin, I figured it all out. Right now, it’s all up in the air. You could just be one of the buyers, or you could be running this whole gig,” Chester states. He seems calm, but I can see him spin his thumb ring. I get what he’s doing. He’s digging for more information. And getting his pound of flesh. So I keep my distance and let him be. He’s not harming anyone right now.

Sandra pales, but Abraham isn’t having it.

“Do you want more money? Is that what you’re after?”

“Oh for crying out loud! When is it ever going to get through that thick skull of yours that I really don’t give a fucking crap about the money? It’s never been about the money! And because that’s something you can’t understand, you never understood me. All I’ve ever wanted was your attention and your love, but you chose the fucking housekeep over me!”

Abraham looks about ready to pounce on Chester, but he just balls his fists and then turns toward a drink cart. God only knows what a drink cart is doing in the entryway of a mansion, but I’ve never understood rich people and their ways.

“You’ve got nothing,” Abraham says, trying to call Chester on his bluff, even if I know he has the evidence.

“It’s your own fault really,” Chester says.

Abraham squints his eyes, while Sandra is visibly shaking. No matter how good Satan’s poker face might be, his wife is his tell.

“If you hadn’t suddenly urged me to get into contact with you, hadn’t forced your money on me, didn’t suddenly want me back in your life again, I never would have known. It all started when we started hunting this organization, and you got afraid that I was onto something when we caught Farid. Through him, we could tie the activities to you through those nitwit attorneys. But you figured that if we were on good terms again, it would look like I was involved with others. Or you had some kind of psychosis in which you actually believed that I wouldn’t turn against you once I had access to the family fortune.”

Two things happen at once: Abraham gets furious, and Sandra gets scared to death.

After they failed Chester as a child, they only ever had to do one thing: leave him alone. But no, they had to meddle. Had to try and control everything, even if they were wrong. So, so wrong. They’ve been buying women? What the hell have they been doing with them? Where did the women end up? Are they dead? Are we dealing with another serial killer? I’ve got so many questions.

“I’ll give you all the evidence you need for what Esther did to you if you withdraw everything you sent the FBI,” Sandra says. It’s the most forward I’ve ever heard her speak. Normally she lets Abraham do everything. The real probability of going to jail is making her brave so it seems.

“You just gave me everything I needed,” Chester says.

“W-what?” she stammers, her eyes wide with fear, her bottom lip wobbling while she’s laser-focused on Abraham. Satan is showing his true colors in the meantime. While he might be getting a little older, he’s still an impressive man to see. He’s tall, and he’s fit, and he looks like he’s either about to bolt or to attack Chester.

“You just said there’s evidence. I’ve got witnesses here.”

“Your witnesses will never hold. You’re personally involved with them.”

My stomach sinks. Fuck. He’s right. Beckett might be with the FBI, but he is in a personal relationship with Chester. A good attorney will wreck his testimony.

“But not with us,” an unfamiliar voice coming from behind me says. I turn around and see a guy I don’t know in an FBI outfit. He’s a tall bastard with dark, brooding eyes and a well-groomed beard. If I were any less of the badass I claim to be, I’d be scared shitless if I would run into him in a dark alley.

“And who are you?” Abraham asks. There’s a tiny moment where I see fear flickering in his eyes, and the satisfaction that gives me is priceless.

“I lead the FBI team that’s there to bring you in for questioning. We’ve got some very compelling evidence of your involvement in human trafficking. Somehow the evidence got pushed forward with top priority.”

Chester beams. Bastard did that, I’m sure of it.

Abraham gets his act together, straightening his spine, and looking the agent dead in the eye. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, and I would like to see a warrant now. And your name. And the name of your supervisor.”

It never ends well with people who think they’re above the law and can demand to speak with a supervisor. Law enforcement tends to react badly to that.

“I just heard your wife admit that she’s withholding evidence of a crime,” tall, dark, and brooding says.

“She was joking.”

He reaches around in his pocket. “And here is my warrant. It’s signed by all the right people. My name is James Young, and I’ll be your host for this evening. My supervisor will not be able to meet your request in the foreseeable future on account of us not dealing with rich dicks who think they’re above the law.”

I snort. I love this man. Maybe I do need more men in my harem.

“Are you taking in my lovely mother as well?” Chester asks. He should look relieved, but he’s pale as a ghost, spinning his thumb ring with lightning speed and chewing his bottom lip.

“Yeah,” Agent Young says. “She seems to know a lot about the shit that is going down here.”

Sandra shrieks. She literally shrieks, turns around and tries to flee. Agent Young sighs and motions to someone who’s still standing outside and another agent rushes in, going after Sandra. I don’t know what kind of pilates and jogging regimen she follows, but she thinks she can outrun trained FBI agents and I’m not sure if I should respect her or admire her stupidity.

Agent Young steps inside scrunches his face when he sees me, nods to Beckett and grabs Abraham. It’s completely cathartic to see him get cuffed and taken away. While he’s told his Miranda rights, he glares at Chester, giving him a foul and dark look. Agent Young isn’t gentle when he pushes Abraham’s head down to get him into the back of a car.

Remy is the one who eventually moves forward and grabs Chester, who’s now shaking. It’s about a minute later when Sandra gets moved outside in cuffs as well, her robe hanging open. Fat tears streak over her face, but I can’t find a grain of compassion for her.

Agent Young returns to Beckett after putting Sandra in his car, both men shaking hands.

“Saw you sent the same evidence as someone else. I’m guessing it has something to do with that young man inside. We suddenly had a new file with top priority, and somehow everyone who opened the file had a song starting to play on their computers. Figured we would have a look.”

Fucking Chester.

He’s going to be so pleased with himself.

Beckett grunts. “I told him to give me a week to start and do this through proper channels. He didn’t listen.”

Agent Young’s eyes become friendly. “I’m guessing this is personal for him.”

“You could say that. It’s been a long time coming.”

The agent slaps Beckett on his shoulder and squeezes it. “I’ll keep you posted. And please see if you can make the fucking song stop.”

I can’t help but smile.

“I’ll do my best.”

I’ve been quiet during this whole ordeal. Everyone around me seems to have everything under control and figured out. I’m feeling especially useless, but that doesn’t seem to matter today. Chester took things into his own hands and did it his way. I’m hoping that this is it in terms of side projects he has going on, and he can go back to a semi-regular working pattern again. But who knows? He might be trying to make world peace happen just because he thinks he can.

Chester and Remy step outside, Remy’s arm over Chester’s shoulder and Chester’s arm around his waist. He still looks pale, but there’s a hint of a smile surrounding his lips.

“Can we go get something to eat?” is the first thing my very annoying, very rebellious friend says.

“I had a bunch of sandwiches ready for everyone,” Remy chastises him.

“I want to eat a steak. Today feels like a good day for a steak.”

“Oh, we’ll go get a steak,” Beckett says. Fumes appear to be coming out of his ears, and the vein on the side of his neck protrudes. “Remy and Abby are going to take a drive to that diner next to my old motel,” he says, looking at me and making me understand where we’re going. “And you are going to take a little drive with me, after you’ve made sure that you kill that song playing on every object you’ve made it play it on repeat. If I find out you’re still playing that song anywhere, I will cuff you and make you listen to a song of my liking for twenty four hours straight. Do not push me on this.”

“Oh Becky, that sounds like torture. I thought you didn’t torture people. The cuffs sound like it could be the start of a good time. Can I use them on you sometime?”

Beckett can’t laugh about it, tapping Chester on his head with a flat hand. Remy and I try to hide our chuckles.

Today has been a weird day.

We lived in Chester’s world today, and after total anarchy, there is finally order. It’s been weird.

We reach the diner before Beckett and Chester get there. We’re seated by the same woman who served us last time, Wendy, and pick a window booth. I have been thinking about these milkshakes every now and again. They were that good.

“So, how are you holding up?” I ask Remy. He’s been taken along on a crazy ride, while this is not what he does.

“I’m happy for Chester,” he says, picking up the huge menu with the pictures and studying it.

“That’s not what I asked. I asked how you were doing.”

“Really? I’m mostly fucking proud. He did it, you know? But I would’ve been fine if I couldn’t witness it.”

We lock eyes, and there’s an understanding there. Then a smile creeps on his face.

“It was pretty fucking epic to see it though.”

I can’t help but mimic his smile. The door opens, and Beckett catches me smiling while his face looks like thunder. He’s closely followed by Chester, who has his hands tucked into the front pocket of his hoodie, but looks pretty pleased with himself. With the discrepancy between how they’re both behaving, I’m unsure how to act.

Was it wrong what Chester did? Maybe. Probably. But he also deserves this.

They quickly make their way to our booth while Beckett greets Wendy on the way over here, and they sit opposite to Remy and me.

“So, how was the car ride?” Remy asks by way of making conversation while he goes back to studying the menu.

“Beckett yelled the whole way over,” Chester says with a smile.

“Because you deserved fucking being yelled at,” he grunts.

“It was the best yelling I’ve ever heard.”

I try to hide my smile, but the way he’s being proud of himself makes me share the sentiment.

“It was better than that time when Abraham yelled at me because he found out I was gay and was never going to have babies.”

I remember that fight. Chester told me all about it in a treasure moment. It wasn’t pretty, but he was so pleased to have found a way to really hurt his dad. It was just a couple of years after he had made plans to kill himself, and being gay and coming out of the closet had been something that empowered him. Just because he could get to his dad this way.

I can’t hide my smile. Wendy makes her way to our table, and we all place our orders. We get steaks prepared to our specific likings and then all pick a different milkshake flavour, because I insist on tasting them all. Beckett isn’t prone to sharing his food, and while I get that, it’s incredibly annoying. Sure, I don’t want to share my own food, but I like to taste his food.

“So,” I say while sitting back in the booth and leaning against Remy. “Why couldn’t you give him the week like you promised?”

His brows furrow, and he looks down at the table, starting to spin his thumb ring. When he finally speaks up his tone is more serious.

“I could get him for everything. The women, selling them, and buying them. I even found some evidence of him making a profit off selling a kidney from one of them. I’m trying not to think about it. But I couldn’t prove what Esther did to me and her involvement in everything.”

Finally he lifts his baby blues to me, and there’s a fragility there that I didn’t expect to see today. He was a fucking badass today, but his means for vengeance comes from a place of hurt, and putting a bandaid on it doesn’t fucking fix it.

“So you lied to Beckett and you went there on a Hail Mary to see if you could find something to pin on her?”

He has the decency to look ashamed.

“There might have been a slight error in judgment. Knowing what they did and that they were going to go away for a long time made me see red. I’m pretty sure I can plead temporary insanity.”

“Hell fucking no,” Beckett says, giving him a look so dark it comes straight out of the dark side of the moon. “You hacked the office sound system, your phone, the fucking FBI servers. You installed programs that played that fucking song to whomever opened that file and you hacked my car. If there’s a prime example of premeditation, this is it.”

“This was just a fucking oopsie.”

“There was no fucking oops about this,” Beckett argues.

“Ryan will back me up.”

“Well, you pay Ryan, so let’s see what an independent therapist has to say about this.”

Chester actually looks scared because therapists he doesn’t know are his version of hell. His words, not mine.

“Do you feel better now?” Remy asks, his eyes stuck on his lover.

Chester shrugs, and to me, he looks like that twelve year old boy I met in the hallway of boarding school all those years ago – unsure what life was going to bring him and even more unsure if he wanted to be part of life anymore.

Getting revenge isn’t everything.

Don’t get me wrong. It’s something. It’s a big something. But it doesn’t erase the damage Esther did. The fact that Chester is still able to be intimate, not just to have negative associations with anything having to do with sex, is a wonder.

Wendy interrupts our conversation when she puts down the milkshakes we ordered. They’re motherfucking huge and I couldn’t be more happy. Beckett tries to shoo me away when I try to taste his hazelnut milkshake, but when I remind him where else we place our mouths, he gives in and I get a taste. It’s good, but not as good as the chocolate one I ordered myself.

“So,” Remy continues. “What happens to the money when Abraham and Sandra get convicted?”

I like the way he makes no room for doubt in his statement. He’s that sure they’ll get convicted. And I have to agree with him.

Chester shrugs.

“Well, most of the money doesn’t have anything to do with the crimes they committed. Any profits they make from illegal activities will probably have to be paid back to the State. And for the rest of it, it depends on whether they’re going to freeze their assets.”

“So what does that mean for our annual donation?”

“That there’s a chance we won’t get it.”

Chester focuses on his milkshake. While I’m sure we can keep our work going without the ten million he was supposed to get every year, it would’ve made our jobs tremendously easier if we had that steady flow of income. At least we got this year’s amount already.

“Don’t worry about it,” Remy says. “I’m loaded and willing to keep you guys going. Now all you have to do is catch Wayne so I can sell my house and move in.”

We all look at each other.

Sure.

All we have to do is catch Wayne.

That’ll be easy.

We spend the rest of the wait for our steaks in silence, all lost in our own thoughts.