I always find you

Chapter 14

The police station seemed like a threatening place now that Carlos wasn't there and people walking past him were staring at him. TK shuddered and stared at his hands. There was no blood on them but he could almost see them covered in the red liquid, though what really bothered him was remembering the weight of the gun he had fired, the smell of... had he been able to smell the gunpowder? He wasn't sure, probably not and it was just a damn head game.

He was a mess, suddenly the memories weren't so clear anymore. Had he had a chance to avoid shooting? Had he done it in cold blood? They were going to put him in jail for the next ten maybe twenty years; the kids would be adults when he saw them again without a glass in front of him.

Suddenly a hand on his shoulder made him jump in the chair he was sitting in and he had to bite his lip to keep from screaming. He turned, first seeing Gabriel beside him, standing with that fatherly look that reminded him so much of his father.

He had asked Owen to go home. The kids were with Judd and Grace, but he wanted them to be with their grandfather, safe at home for any questions they wanted to ask him.

As a Ranger, he was better off having Gabriel with him. What he didn't expect was to find Carlos there too, sitting next to him in the waiting room. He was pale and sweating, he had one hand on his own knee, squeezing it, the other on the back of the chair next to him.

"Carlos, what are you doing here?"

"You didn't think I was going to stay in a hospital bed while they want to charge my husband with murder? You saved my life, you saved the kids. They could have killed you and someone is trying to pin something on you."

"Carlos, my love, you...you shouldn't..." TK felt his hands shaking, he pressed them to his knees, lowered his gaze to the floor and bit his lip so that even Carlos wouldn't hear him sobbing. "I can't..."

"Ty, hey..." Carlos asked his father to help him up and sat a little closer to his husband. "It's going to be okay, I promise. I'm a cop, those people almost killed me a couple of times. No one will be able to believe you're to blame for anything."

"I don't want to go to jail." TK buried his head against his husband's chest and Carlos just had to close his arms around his body to hug him. "I didn't mean to kill him, I shot because I was scared, to protect you."

"I know, I know, tiger."

"Mijo, TK." Gabriel crouched down in front of TK and rubbed his shoulder. "I won't let anyone take you to jail. You're my son and we all know you were protecting your family."

"Strand!"

The call from down the hall, made TK stop breathing. He stood up and was forced to let go of Carlos' hand, to make his way toward the detectives waiting for him at the door of one of the interrogation rooms.

Carlos also got to his feet, but he staggered and Gabriel had to hold him by the waist.

"You shouldn't have asked for voluntary discharge from the hospital. You're in no condition to go anywhere."

"I'll go back to the hospital as soon as TK is free, Dad. I meant it, I couldn't stay comfortably in a hospital bed and leave TK here alone."

He was dizzy, the dose of drug he had been injected with this last time had been high and the doctors had told him he would need at least three days to feel able to get out of bed.

Not even one day had passed and he already felt like throwing up, closing his eyes and lying down on the floor of the police station because everything was spinning.

TK sat in the same chair where he had been questioned before, with the same detectives there. If one of them had been Washington, things would have been very different.