I try to escape Caro. Once dinner is ending and people are heading out I just sort of slip out of the room and head into the bathroom. My face looks the same as ever. Pale, pink, freckled. I smooth out the hairs that are beginning to fly away from my head. Then, I emerge into the hallway. Reid stands there, leaning against the wall opposite the bathrooms. When he sees me, he straightens up.

"I brought you here as a date, not a bodyguard," I smile at him. "Please tell me you didn't bring your Glock with you."

Reid shakes his head, but he smiles widely. I meet him, lock my arm around his holding it as we head toward the parking lot together.

"So, tell me what I missed," I whisper.

He starts to relay the instructions. People are just starting to leave now, which is nice. I can get lost in the crowd. While Reid explains the ceremony, I smile, trying to make it look like we are having a more intimate moment. We get outside. It's not even a quarter past eight, but the sun has long since dipped over the horizon. My arms are freezing. My feet pick up pace after he finishes the instructions that are relevant to me, halfway to the car. He stops, if just for a second.

"There aren't a lot of lights," he whispers.

I feel how stiff his body has become. I position myself so I'm in front of him. He stares past me. The cold air blows through us, and I take the brunt of it, but it doesn't matter to me. My eyes or focused on his chest, watching for the way he breathes. It seems too quick. I close my eyes and then put my hand on his chest. Beneath my fingers, I can feel his collarbone behind the button-up he's wearing. I can feel his heart, hammering away.

"Look down," I tell him. "Spencer, look at me."

He obeys my command, his eyes finding mine.

"It is dark," he tells me.

I nod my head.

"It was..." he swallows. I watch him blink, and his voice starts to shake. "It was a farm. JJ and I were on a farm when Tobias Henkel abducted me. We had split up. He kept me in a barn."

I look up at him.

"We are here," I manage. "We aren't there."

The details of his abduction are ones that I avoid. The days after were terrible, nearly as bad as any May.

"I know," he tells me.

He meets my eyes, but he doesn't meet me. There is something missing in his gaze. As if maybe he's able to move his eyes around but there is no visual input going to his brain. Like he's a buzzing red sign at a hotel, inviting stragglers to book one of the dozens of empty rooms. Maybe the problem isn't that he's never been allowed to see me. Maybe the problem is that I've never thought about how I see him.

"Should we go back inside, for a second?" I ask.

He shakes his head, "I'm... acclimatizing. I've been on farms since then for cases. Even farms at night. Usually though, we're involved in active investigations and I have my gun drawn so there's some adrenaline in me. I think I'll be fine. I just want to stand here for a second, if that's okay."

"Of course," I manage.

My hand is still on his chest. A wiser woman would pull it away, but I leave it there. I feel his pulse beneath my hand. It's fading away. Yet he feels closer. I try to count how many seconds go by and how many beats there are over each ten second interval. I may have a master's in mathematics, but I'm not able to count both at the same time.

Reid looks down at me again, and he's there. I pull my hand away.

"Cole!"

I look over to where my name is called. It's Bastien, in the parking lot. There are only a few cars left, and I imagine only one with DC plates because Bastien is leaning against my rental car. Stéphane is with him as well, although he's on the phone. Even with the wind carrying Bastien's voice to me, I can't even make out Stéphane's whispers. So, I pull back from Reid and close the gap, heading toward the lot.

"What do you want?" I manage.

"Rude," Bastien says. "Caro is looking for you."

I only quicken my pace. Reid catches up next to me as we head to the parking lot. I unlock the car.

"Thanks for the head's up," I tell him once I've finally caught up to him. "Just tell her that I've got a long drive home so I'll see her tomorrow."

A car door slams behind us and I close my eyes.

"Yeah, I don't think that's going to work," Bastien lowers his voice.

I turn around, and Caro is there. The headlights to the car she was in are turned off. She's climbing out of the passenger's seat, and it's too dark to see if Cletus is in there now, waiting for her to finish yelling at me.

"Couldn't even stay for the whole rehearsal, could you?" Caro calls out.

"It was a work call, Caro," I manage, rolling my eyes. "Some of us have serious jobs."

Caro reaches her hands up, threading her fingers in her hair as he face contorts in anger. It's too dark to see the tears in her eyes, but I hear the beginning of her upcoming sob in her voice, "you don't get to sulk. It's my wedding day. Mine."

"It was urgent," I tell her.

Stéphane hangs up the phone. I know he's going to do something, so I cross the space toward Caro. At least then, maybe there will be space between us and Reid. I'm leaving him alone here, on a farm at night, but I don't know what else to do.

"Nothing is that urgent," Caro spits out. "You're telling me no one else at the FBI knows how to use a database?"

"It's May, Caro!" I shout. I can feel my hands shaking. The farm is quiet, the wind whistling, and I'm sure if Cletus is in that car he can hear my words clear as day. Someone puts a hand on my shoulder and I shrug it off. "It's fucking May."

Caro flinches.

"You think May is about you?" she rolls her eyes. "Do you ever ask how Stéphane feels in May? Do you ever ask how I feel?"

I step back from her. It's her wedding weekend; she is obviously too emotional to have this conversation. I turn around and bump into Stéphane. He's crying, actively. He reaches for me and I knock his hands away. Bastien is still standing with Reid at the car. Bastien's jaw is set tightly. I feel the colour rush out of my face.

"Is it ever about anyone but you?" Caro says behind me.

"I'm not doing this," I call back, shaking my head.

"Why?" she calls. "Need to catch a plane ticket? Which country are you going to run to... to escape me this time?"

I think of every Christmas I spent alone, years in a row. I think of my birthdays, but I think of Caro's. And Seb's too. Stéphane's birthdays. We are twins, born minutes apart one day after the other, and his birthday too. I think of my father's funeral and cold hospitals and every second I spent away from them. Away from this continent. I think of a language I don't speak anymore, a place I love that I refuse to visit.

I spin around, "a country where I won't have to put up with you, obviously. Because that's why I left, right? To spite you personally?"

"We should maybe take a second to breathe," Stéphane offers, hiccupping back a sob. He looks at me and switches to French. "We don't need to fight today of all days, okay?"

"You're being a bitch, Caro," Bastien jumps in.

"Knock it off, Seb," Stéphane's voice is the warn of a father.

"I'm not a child."

"Well, you are acting like one," Stéphane cuts him off.

I shake my head at them all. I dig into my purse to search for the car key. My arms are freezing, even with the cardigan. I look at Reid. We're too loud. At the very least, I wish he'd be inside the car. When I pull out the keys, Caro shrieks.

"You don't get to leave!" she shouts as I turn away. "You don't get to draw the line because of my wedding day, because it's in May. It's not even the eighteenth, it's the seventeenth."

"He doesn't know!" I switch to French to scream at her. I go to cross the parking lot, and this time it's Bastien that grabs me. He's not like Stéphane. There is no comfort to his touch, only a hard fist yanking me away from her. "Don't you dare say because Reid doesn't know!"

"I'm not going to speak French because it suits you now," she spits. "I've done everything for you. I changed my last name, I moved countries, I've stayed here for you. Since I turned twelve, every second of my life has been in your service."

"Want to trade histories?" I ask. "Do you want to be in my place?"

Caro closes her mouth.

Stéphane moves toward me, and she laughs, "yes, let's everybody comfort Cole. Poor Cole, told off for making her sister's wedding about her. You know, Stéphane, at least you have the good sense to keep your problems to yourself. No one ever hears him crying all May because his best friend-"

"Shut the fuck up!" Bastien shouts. "Both of you. All of you. You're all telling the truth. Yes, Cole makes everything about her. But you chose to have your wedding tomorrow, Caro. If you wanted it to be yours, you could have had it next week. And Stéphane, you treat us all like children. You don't have custody of us anymore."

I feel the wind whip through me. Bastien didn't even address me. He told off Caro and Stéphane directly. When it comes to me, he was spoke like I'm incapable of change. Like I've chosen this life.

"It's always been about you, Cole. Even my own damn wedding. I'm always trying to keep you here, because I'm worried you are going to leave again, and I don't even know why I want you here when all you want to do is leave me!" she is crying, and I feel like I can't really breathe. "Yes, I scheduled my wedding for tomorrow, but it wasn't even for me. It was for you, so some other better thing could happen right now. It was for Stéphane. You know he has panic attacks whenever you miss his calls? Even if it's because you're at work, or you're taking a fucking shit. He's had to be hospitalized twice this year. Did he ever tell you that? And it's for Bastien, who nearly was sent to juvie twice trying to be tough enough to leave the space you and our parents left when he was twelve. We've been pulling ourselves together for years. So, can you just manage one day?"

I feel my arms vibrating. All I can do is concentrate on my own breathing. Obviously, I can't. I'm trying. Maybe I didn't for the better part of a decade, but I'm trying now.

"Can we just get along?" Stéphane looks between us all. "We're all the family we've got left."

She shakes her head, "Cletus is my family. Maybe you all think I'm settling for a loser, but at least some one in my life actually puts me first. He treats me as an equal, which none of you have ever done."

I dig through my purse and pull out the keys. I walk over to the car and unlock it. No one says anything. Although, there isn't much left to say, is there. Reid stands at the driver side door. He's pale, looking past me. Bastien grabbed me and left him. I put my hand to his chest and he looks down at me.

"Get in," I whisper to him.

He listens, wrapping around the side of the car. I'm so cold and the air conditioning is probably still on inside it. We're going to be driving back in the dark. Caro was glowing today, but there is no light in this parking lot.

"Caro's right, it's her wedding," I manage to say. I look at her. "It's your family too. Your brothers, maybe more than they are mine. I've been gone long enough. I'm going to start my PhD at a Swedish university in the fall, so I'll be leaving again. See you in the morning."

I climb into the driver's side door. Reid is sitting next to me, buckled in. Then, I back out of the parking spot and drive out onto the highway.

~~~~~

When I first wrote this chapter, I wanted Cole to be the bad guy. At least, I wanted it to be complicated. What do you guys think here? I am curious if she comes off more empathetic or not?

Next chapter is definitely, DEFINITELY, going to be a major bomb drop. Any predictions?