“Leonard,” Christopher says, lowering his voice even though he is standing next to McCoy’s chair, “think for a minute. This isn’t some juvenile misdemeanor I can sweep under the rug or that your parents will settle with money.”

“I know that, sir,” the young man responds, equally quiet. He won’t look Pike in the eyes. Which is very bad news.

“Then why the hell do you want to be prosecuted for a crime you didn’t commit!” Chris snaps at him, exasperated.

Leonard finally lifts his head, having endured Pike’s rant since his arrival some good ten minutes ago. Defensive anger heats his voice. “I said I confess. Are you deaf,” he challenges to the mirror over Pike’s shoulder, “or just damned stupid? Or maybe you just waitin’ for a confession in blood?”

Pike closes his eyes and puts a hand to his temple, his headache having tripled since the shooting. “Jim wouldn’t want you to do this,” he says as a last resort.

“Yeah, well,” McCoy replies, standing up to indicate the end of his patience with their argument, “I think we can both agree Jim never appreciates the easy solutions in life.” He tugs uselessly at the handcuff anchoring his arm to the table.

Apparently neither do you. Pike bites back the retort. But then, by that measuring stick, they all fall short. Anybody who purposefully wants Jim in his or her life is guilty of the same fault, because Jim has always been anything but easy to handle, let alone love.

“Sit down,” he commands.

Leonard’s expression turns mutinous.

“SIT DOWN!” Chris bellows.

The young man drops back into his seat like his legs suddenly are weak.

The walls barely muffle the slam of a neighboring door and within the next second or so, Archer is striding into the room, muttering under his breath. He grabs the back of McCoy’s chair and drags Leonard around until they are almost nose-to-nose. “Listen up, sourpatch,” Jonathan growls, “if you don’t fucking get your head out of your ass, I will pull it the fuck out. And it’s gonna hurt like hell!”

Leonard looks at Jon funny before craning his neck back so he can see Pike. “What the heck is this? Aren’t you supposed to be grateful?”

“Grateful?” rumbles Pike. “Why should we be grateful? Because you want us to ruin an innocent man’s life? The law, McCoy, is to protect the innocent, not harm them.”

Archer straightens up, releasing his hold on Leonard’s chair. “Unless, of course, you think we’re that damn soulless.”

“I don’t,” Leonard says, looking unhappy. “It’s not about… I’m tired of, of worrying that he might—damn it.” Leonard looks imploringly at Pike. “Haven’t you ever wanted to protect someone?”

“Yes. The day I decided to petition the state for custody of Jim.” Chris suddenly feels older than forty-four. He crouches next to Leonard’s chair. “I understand, Leonard. You know I do. But this isn’t the right way to help my son. He’d be devastated if he lost you, especially like this. He told me once that meeting you was the best part about moving out to be his own.”

McCoy’s eyes are suspiciously wet.

“Do you really want to hurt Jim?” Chris asks gently, knowing he has won even before he finishes speaking.

“No, sir,” murmurs the dark-haired young man.

Pike pats Leonard’s shoulder in sympathy. “You are a very good friend to my son, McCoy.”

Strangely, Leonard’s face crumples with guilt, as if Pike had accused him of the exact opposite.

“Aw, shit,” mutters Archer, searching his pockets. “You’re not going to cry, are you?” He holds out a wadded-up Kleenex.

“Don’t give it to him if it’s been used!” Chris admonishes, caught between disgust and amusement.

“It’s all I’ve got!”

“No, it’s okay,” Leonard says, wiping at his face with his free hand and doing his best to regain control of himself. When Archer adamantly sticks the Kleenex under Leonard’s nose, Leonard rears back with a strangled sound. “No, really! Throw that away!”

Archer tucks the Kleenex back in his pocket. “Germs,” he says, solemn-faced, to both of them.

“There is something very wrong with you,” Leonard mutters, which is precisely what Pike is thinking.

“I’m the Sheriff,” Jonathan points out, like that explains it all.

Maybe in Jon’s world it does. Chris really doesn’t want to know, or have Jon’s insanity confirmed, so he doesn’t ask questions. Instead he takes the man’s arm and steers him to a corner for a quick, semi-private chat.

“Are you satisfied now?” Jon asks him in a soft voice.

“It would gone faster if I could have throttled him.”

The corners of Jonathan’s mouth lift slightly. “You still can. I turned off the cameras—and I’m not telling.”

“Who the hell was crazy enough to vote you into a position of power?” Chris demands, partly serious.

“I have my ways,” Archer replies mysteriously.

“You mean you’ve pulled the wool over everyone’s eyes,” retorts Pike.

Leonard rattles his handcuffs, clearly disturbed by the way they are whispering together.

Jonathan sticks a thumb in McCoy’s direction as if to say so what do we do with that idiot?

Chris looks to Leonard, and Archer’s gaze follows suit. “We keep him in here for a while.”

Archer grimaces. “Kirk will explode.”

“You said you wanted results, Archer. I’m going to get them for you.”

“Okay but you can explain to the Town Council why my men will be scraping bits of exploded Kirk off the wall.”

“…I did not need that image in my head, thank you, Jon. Just stay quiet, please, and go stand outside the door. Look menacing or something.”

“That’s my forte,” Archer declares, shooting a toothy shark’s grin at McCoy as he ambles to the other side of the room then out the door.

Leonard looks wary as Pike takes a seat at the table. “Have you forgotten I’m not going to talk?”

“Oh, I haven’t,” Pike assures him. “But I do have questions… as a father.”

Leonard sits back in his chair, eyebrows moving towards his hairline. “What do you want to know?”

“Everything Jim doesn’t tell me in our weekly chats.”

“Hm. Do you know he eats twinkies for breakfast?”

“Unfortunately, yes. It’s a bad habit of his I tried break when he was in his teens. I guess my lectures on the proper dietary health of young men failed to make a lasting impression.”

Leonard’s eyes gleam with suppressed humor. “He eats them for dinner, too, sometimes. And dips them in coca-cola.”

Chris closes his eyes.

“But I am going to break that habit,” Leonard goes to say with surprising determination.

“How?”

“I have a new friend, Christine, who works at a dentist’s office. Trust me. Jim will run screaming from sugar for the rest of his life.”

Chris bursts out laughing.

There comes a quiet rapping on the door just before it opens and a deputy pokes his head into the interrogation room. Pike, professional mask readily in place, looks non-plussed at the interruption. McCoy keeps his head bowed, which is just as well since he is still in throes of laughter over one of Jim’s childhood stories. The deputy looks alarmed at McCoy’s choked noises, undoubtedly mistaking them for sobs, and views Chris with new trepidation.

“Detective Pike, you are needed in the Sheriff’s office.”

Leonard drops his forehead to the table, neck bent painfully almost in half, and shakes harder.

Chris rises and goes to the door, letting his silence become truly intimidating. Eyes wide, the deputy steps aside to let him pass, though he ventures to stop Pike in the hall with a nervous “S-Sir?”

Chris turns, wordlessly raising an eyebrow.

“Um, what should I do about him?” He glances at the closed door of the interrogation room with a disturbed expression.

“Leave him,” Chris orders. “I’m not done with him yet.”

The sympathy in the deputy’s face is clearly not for Pike. Chris turns away. Otherwise the deputy will interpret his smiling as far more sinister than it is.

Archer has a phone receiver cradled between neck and shoulder when Chris gives the office door a perfunctory knock and enters the room.

“Yes, sir,” Jon is saying to the person on the other end of the line. “Yep.” He rolls his eyes as Chris takes a seat in front of the desk, and he reaches over to punch the speaker button.

A man’s voice fills the room, roiling with temper: “…news cameras go live at seven. If that blasted thing isn’t down here by six, I will have your head on a fucking platter, Sheriff! It isn’t too late to replace you before the new term!“

“The mayor?” Chris mouths.

Jonathan smiles wryly and drawls to the jackass on the phone, “Understood, Mr. Mayor. I’ve got in under lock and key, and I will deliver it personally to your doorstep in the morning.”

“You’d better.” The line goes dead.

Jonathan drops his head against the back of his chair and sighs loudly. “One of these days I’m going to give that son of a bitch a piece of my mind.”

“I hope you voted for the other guy.”

The man grimaces. “The other guy seemed like he would be worse. Creepy stalker stare. At least this moron I know I can back into a corner if I have to.”

Chris doesn’t envy Jon his position at all. “This is a perfect example of why I intend to retire as a detective. Politics give me a headache.”

“But you had the chance, didn’t you?” asks his friend, looking at him sharply. “When that old Chief of yours threw in the towel…”

“He’d been on the force almost forty years, Jon. He didn’t throw anything in—he retired to a beach in Florida so he could be near his grandkids.”

“I’ll never quit,” Jonathan mutters. “I’ll die at this desk.”

Chris frowns. “Don’t say that.”

“Why not? What you see—” Jon waves at hand at their surroundings. “—is my life, Christopher.” His smile seems oddly bitter.

Chris doesn’t know how to respond to that. Thinks he shouldn’t. “So did you drag me in here just to listen to your mayor in all his asshole glory?”

Archer barks out a laugh. “I wish you’d said that while he was still on the phone! Alas, no. I want your opinion on something.” He abandons his chair and strides to a door cattycorner to them and unlocks it with a key. It’s a closet, Chris realizes as Jon pulls on a cord to engage an overhead light bulb. Jon grabs something bulky and tugs it from the closet with a muttered curse, tossing the blanket off of it for Pike to see.

Chris knows what the object is without being told. He says, incredulous, “You hid the star in your office closet?“

Jon grunts, “It’s the safest place in this building.”

Chris is tempted to laugh. He settles for a grim chuckle. “I won’t ask. But why are you showing it to me?”

Jonathan stares down at the star propped against his leg and scratches his head. “Does it look odd to you?”

“How would I know? I’ve never seen it before.”

Jon pokes at it. A piece of tinsel falls off.

Chris slaps at his hand with a sharp, remonstrative “Don’t break it, you idiot!” and gently lifts the Christmas star from the floor into his chair despite the protest of the muscles in his back and injured arm. Damn, the thing is heavier than it looks.

“Hold on!” Jon says suddenly and scoots behind his desk, typing furiously at a keyboard. “The internet god knows everything… Voila!” He turns his computer screen around.

Pike peers at a large photograph of last year’s Christmas parade. The rotund, grey-haired little man standing beneath an enormous Christmas tree must be the mayor, has to be the mayor since the red ribbon cutting diagonally across his chest states that title in bold block letters. Jonathan points at the top of the Christmas tree.

“I can’t see that,” Chris complains. And he didn’t remember to pick up his glasses this morning before he left the house. “Can you make it bigger?”

“How do I do that?”

“I think if you click on it, a magnifying glass will show up.”

It doesn’t work. They spend the next two minutes futilely searching for a magnifying glass until Pike steals the computer mouse from a frustrated Jon and figures out they can use the Zoom option under View on the browser window. “Usually Jim talks me through this computer stuff. I’m not very good at it,” Chris confesses.

Jon snorts. “Isn’t it funny how that works, considering PDs were using electronic databases long before personal computers were popular?”

“I guess it’s our advanced age.”

“Speak for yourself.”

“You’re older than I am, Jon,” Chris counters, amused.

“Whatever. So what do you think?”

They compare the star on the computer screen, though it’s still tiny enough that Pike has to squint, to the one in the chair. Chris shrugs. “It’s the same.”

Archer frowns, looking dissatisfied.

“Jon?”

Archer huffs out a breath, shutting down the website and turning away from the computer. “Yeah, yeah. Don’t know what I was thinking. Are you done trading stories with that McCoy kid?”

“Give me ten more minutes. He knows about that time Jim drunk-dialed me last month asking for a block of cheese, I’m certain of it.”

Jon gives him a funny look. “Is that a story you’d really want to hear?”

Chris’s mouth curves into a wicked smile. “For blackmail purposes, yes it is.”

“…I see. I guess being a parent has its advantages.”

“Only once the children are grown.” Chris leaves Jon snickering while the man drags the star back to the office closet for safe-keeping.

Chris returns to find Leonard composed and idly picking at a loose thread of his shirt sleeve. Closing the door softly, he asks the young man, “What’s wrong?”

“Maybe you should let me go back now.” Leonard looks at Pike. It’s clear he has been biting his bottom lip.

“Jim is fine. Ten more minutes of a little worrying won’t hurt him,” Chris tells McCoy.

Leonard doesn’t seem entirely convinced but he nods his acquiesence anyway, and they pick up their conversation where they had left it.

All good things must come to an end. That is the way of the world.

Christopher stares at the table for a long time after Leonard is gone. In the periphery of his vision, the sheriff waits silently by the propped open door. Already a sense of foreboding has returned, driving away the light-heartedness he had experienced while talking with McCoy. Chris is troubled now, more so than when he first arrived. Perhaps the feeling stems from what he knows he must do.

Giving in to a soft sigh, he glances at Jon and says, “I want to talk to my son.”

“Why?”

It’s a simple question, and a loaded one. “I don’t know who the real culprit is,” Chris admits. “I’ve got half a picture and a handful of suspicions. But I do know we will never gain more than what we have now unless we convince Jim to talk.” His pulse thundering under his skin, Chris turns fully toward his friend, seeking some response.

Jonathan’s expression is, inexplicably, sad. “Can you break him?”

“If I have to.”

“Will you?”

He offers the truth. “I don’t know.”

“If I allow you to talk to Kirk and you can’t do what’s necessary, I will.” Even if you hate me for it, Jon is trying to tell him.

“I understand.” I won’t hate you, Jon.

The man nods. He motions for Pike to follow him. “Let’s go get him, then.”

Chris does his best to hide the trembling of his hands as they walk to the second building. He is grateful to have Jon beside him, and he realizes with a start it doesn’t seem like they have been parted for years.

He can’t think about that now. From the very beginning he knew they would have to face this moment, and as much as Chris wants to see his son, he also dreads it. Jim has to give them a lead, a reason for this madness, and Pike has to force him to do it. Aware of how he plans to accomplish that task, Pike hates himself already. He is fairly certain Jim will hate him in the end, too.

He hears his son before he sees him, a low murmuring then a laugh. Pike slows his pace, allowing Archer to approach the cell first. He keeps to the side, just out of sight.

“All right, boys—erm, and lady—” cries Archer like he’s shouting through a bullhorn, “—wakey, wakey!”

Groans fill the air. Someone mutters, “Fuck, he’s back.”

“Hello there, Sheriff of Nottingham!” Jim responds, and Pike has to smile at Jim’s jovial tone.

“If I’m the Sheriff of Nottingham, you must think you’re Robin Hood. That’s good, ’cause you’ll be the one I’m wanting to hang. Let’s go, Kirk. Time to face the gallows.”

For a moment there is dead silence then, like someone flips on a light switch, the protests begin, rising quickly in pitch and demand—though nothing comes from Jim himself. The guard in front of the cell bangs his fist against the bars, ordering, “Quiet down!” Archer motions at his deputy to unlock the cell door.

“Against the back wall,” Jonathan orders his prisoners congenially. “That’s right, even you, Mr. McCoy. No, don’t give me that face. I won’t shoot you, but I will taser you until you’re cross-eyed and drooling.” So this is why Jon was muttering at one point during the evening about there being a veritable zoo in his station.

“It’s all right, Bones,” Pike hears. “It’s only fair I get my turn.” He doesn’t need to see Jim to picture his bravado.

Pike steps back as the deputy goes into the cell and comes out again, Jim in hand. Jim is watching Archer, a flat smile playing about his mouth. “What took you so long, old man?”

Archer stays quiet.

“Jim,” Pike calls, voice rough.

Kirk’s smile dies. He turns, and their eyes meet. “Dad?”

Pike says nothing, can say nothing here, and nods to Archer, who grabs Jim’s arm in response. Then Chris spins around and heads to the exit at the end of the cell block. He lets the sound of Jim’s footsteps comfort him that, at least for the moment, Jim is close enough to be protected.

But who is going to protect Jim from him?

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