10. Chapter 10

Author's Note: Hi all! This chapter is date night PART 2 :) The website didn't show that I updated for the last chapter, so I just want to make sure you don't skip ahead!

Happy reading! And thanks for all of the reviews :)

Chapter 10,

Before Jay put the keys in the ignition, he began typing in Erin's address into his Google Maps application. Well, Voight's address, but that was beside the point.

Either way, he was extremely disappointed to be typing in the address so soon. He really didn't want this night to end.

"What are you doing?" Erin asked him, as he pressed the Start button on his iPhone and the directions came to life.

"Taking you home?" He turned the key, and the car roared to life.

"My house is way out of the way." She said, emphasizing the word, and hoping he wouldn't realized that it wasn't exactly true. "Take me to your place. I'll have Hank pick me up later."

Later. Without another word, he exited out of the application and smiled. She didn't want the night to end either.

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As soon as he turned the key into the lock and opened the front door to his apartment, Maddie ran towards him. "Daddy, Gracie doesn't feel good." Her face was sad and her eyes full of genuine worry.

"I know, baby." He lifted Maddie into his arms and gave her a comforting squeeze, then placed her back on the ground. "Where is she?"

"In the bathroom with Sam." The two Halsteads walked into the apartment, and Erin stayed behind to hang her jacket on the hook.

From down the hall, she heard him say, "Can you stay here with Erin, Mads?"

Maddie hadn't noticed Erin at first, and her face brightened when she heard her name. "Erin!"

"Hi, Maddie!" Erin slid off her heels and moved further into the apartment.

"You look pretty." Maddie said, shyly. "Did you have fun at dinner with Daddy?"

Erin sat down on the couch and laughed, "I did. Did you have fun at home with Grace and Sam?"

"Yes! We made chocolate chip cookies with peanut butter and then we played Hungry, Hungry Hippos AND Pretty, Pretty Princess." She pointed towards the games, still scattered on the living room floor.

"Wow! That sounds like a really fun night." Erin smiled. One of her favorite things about Jay as a father was his "No TV" rule, unless it was a special occasion. Instead of Maddie and Grace just sitting together in front of a screen, they were really spending time together, getting to know each other, and bonding.

"It was!" Maddie's face turned somber. "But then Grace said she didn't feel good, and she threw up!" Maddie walked over and deposited herself next to Erin on the couch.

Erin wrapped her arm around Maddie and Maddie leaned into Erin's body. "Well, your Daddy's here now." She said quietly into Maddie's ear. "So everything is going to be just fine."

She looked at her watch and realized that it was nearing 9 pm. "Are you tired, Maddie?"

As if on cue, Maddie yawned loudly. "Yes," she sighed. "I'm wiped."

Erin wanted to laugh at her use of the grown up term, but instead she said, "Would it be okay if I put you to sleep tonight?"

Maddie nodded, and threw her arms around Erin's neck. Erin took that as a cue to lift Maddie and carry her to bed.

It was the first time Erin had been this far into the apartment, and she marveled at how well decorated it was. Jay may have been a single father, but he made sure his daughter wasn't growing up in a bachelor pad.

Maddie's room was painted a light pink, and there were two twin beds on each wall. Both beds had matching pink and white comforters, but over one bed there was huge wooden letters spelling out Maddie. The letters were white, and they perfectly matched the rest of the furniture in the room. Erin walked towards that bed and laid Maddie down.

"You have to read to me." Maddie said, shyly.

Erin loved learning about Maddie's bedtime routine, and even more than that, she loved that she got to be a part of it. "Of course I'm going to read to you."

Erin sat on the bed with Maddie and read to her, and by the time she was in the middle of the second book, Maddie was snoring softly beside her. She tucked Maddie in, and before she could stop herself, leaned down and kissed a sleeping Maddie on the forehead. She closed her eyes and inhaled the little girl's scent, and once again tears formed in her eyes. This time she didn't wonder if the tears were from gratefulness or nostalgia. Because this time she knew with certainty where they were from. She felt a deep longing to be part of this wonderful family. For this to be her normal bedtime routine, too.

She turned on the bedside lamp, and turned off the overhead lights. She quietly closed the door and walked out to stand in the hallway.

She knew she should go back to the living room. Being back here was like invading Jay's personal space. She hadn't been invited back here.

But she just couldn't make herself leave and instead she stood in the hallway, peering at one picture after another.

At one point, Jay stepped out of one of the doors, a sleeping Grace in his arms. He motioned his head to indicate he was going to put Grace to sleep, and that he would be right back.

A moment later, Jay stood next to her in the hallway. Erin was still staring at one of the pictures on the wall. It was of a young blond woman in a hospital gown, holding a sleeping newborn baby in her arms. "She's beautiful." Erin whispered. "Maddie looks just like her."

"She was." Jay sighed, his voice full of sadness. "I wish you could have met her." He turned to Erin, wrapping his arms around her waist. "You would have liked her, I think."

Gone was any hint of jealousy Erin had been feeling, and a new sensation came over her. Was it love? Was it happiness? Or was she just in awe that this amazing man wanted to include her in his life. That he spoke so openly with her. That when she looked into his eyes, it was like a window into his soul. "I think I would have liked her, too."

She wanted to kiss him in that moment, but something stopped her. The rawness in his voice, in his eyes. Here in the darkness of the hallway, she suddenly felt the need to tell him everything about her life. And she had never wanted to do that with anyone, let alone felt like she needed to.

She needed to get it all out now, before she lost her nerve.

"Can I interest you in a glass of wine?" Jay asked.

She nodded, "Wine sounds perfect."

He released her waist and began walking towards the kitchen.

At the broken contact and at the vastness and light of the kitchen, she lost her nerve. Instead, she asked about Grace as he poured two glasses of wine. "Where's Sam?" She asked, suddenly realizing she hadn't seen the young girl leave.

"I sent her home like fifteen minutes ago." She must have been reading to Maddie and hadn't noticed.

He handed her a glass of red wine, and took her hand, moving them both towards the couch. When they were both sitting comfortably, he took a small sip of his wine and then looked at her. She looked so beautiful sitting there in the dim light of his living room. He liked seeing her like this, her legs tucked under her body in a relaxed position. He had been glad to take her out to dinner, but in truth, this is what he had really wanted. It felt more intimate, the two of them, just sitting here together. "Tell me something," he whispered.

She took a sip of her wine, allowing the alcohol to relax her. "Like what?" She smirked, trying to play it off and keep it light. Even though she knew exactly what he wanted to know.

"Something personal." He had told her about Allie. He had invited her to the zoo and to several meals with his daughter. Hell, she knew more about him than most people just from the forms he had had to fill out. And it wasn't that he wanted this to be a quid pro quo type situation, he just wanted to know her. Like she was getting to know him.

"Okay." She said, her voice unsteady.

She had never really told anyone her story. Sure, she had told bits and pieces to dozens of foster children over the years. She had even told Olivia some of it. But she had never just sat and shared the most private parts of herself to someone who didn't need to know it for one reason or another. She had never told someone because she wanted to tell them.

Until now.

"I'll tell you why I became a social worker."

His heart dropped when he heard her say those words. He had already heard this. It was a week ago today that she had sat in this very room and told Grace and Maddie why she had become a social worker. He wanted her to trust him. To tell him more than the practiced story she had told to countless people. He nodded nonetheless, signaling for her to continue. She didn't actually know that he had already heard this, and he wasn't about to tell her.

"My mom was a mess. The stuff she was into..." she shook her head in disgust. "It was bad. She would bring drugs into the house, men into the house. I never felt safe, I never felt like I had a real home or a real family."

Even though Jay had heard this before, it didn't break his heart any less the second time. He reached for her knee, squeezed it in a comforting gesture, and then let it rest there, basking in the warmth of her skin.

"When I was 14, my mom disappeared. She always left for days at a time, sometimes even a week or two, but this time she was gone a while. The electricity and heat got turned off in the apartment. It was December." An involuntarily chill came over her body and she shivered when she thought about the cold days she spent in that apartment. She had piled on every piece of clothing she owned but she could never get warm. "That's when I met Charlie."

Jay watched as Erin retold her story. She was looking down at his hand on her knee, and she seemed to be in a daze. Jay found himself holding his breath, as if the sound of his breathing might bring Erin back to reality and cause her to realize she was speaking out loud. He didn't want to stop sharing her story.

"Charlie was older. Much older. He got me hooked on drugs, the same bad shit my mom was into." She shook her head, disgusted with herself. "But he kept the heat on, food on the table, and so I was loyal to him."

Jay nodded. He couldn't imagine what that had been like for her, and his heart broke for the trapped and scared fourteen year old girl.

"I was selling drugs for Charlie the first time I met Voight." Jay heard the smile in her voice, the wistful tone. She finally looked up, met his gaze. "He intimidated the crap out of me when he brought me in," she said smiling, even as the tears filled her eyes. "I didn't give him the satisfaction of seeing me squirm though." She had been terrified.

Jay laughed, "I'm sure you didn't." He wiped away her tears with the pad of his thumb.

"After the third or fourth time Voight picked me up, he gave me his card." She smiled, finding Jay's eyes. "I still have it, actually."

She seemed like she wanted to stop, like maybe the story was over. But it wasn't. He wanted to hear the rest. "How did you wind up living with Voight?"

He watched her take another sip of wine, followed by a deep breath.

She decided to tell him about that night. The night that had changed the trajectory of her life. "I've never told anyone this before," she whispered, by way of introduction.

"You don't have to tell me if you don't want to." He touched her cheek, "I didn't mean to push you."

She leaned her face into his hand, and closed her eyes. When she opened them, she whispered "I want to." She took a deep breath and continued. "When my mom came home from..." she motioned her arms and shook her head, "Wherever it was she had been, I moved back in with her and her new boyfriend. Things were okay for a while, but then one week she didn't come home."

A lone tear fell from her face, and Jay wiped it away. She allowed his touch to give her the strength to continue. To say the words she had never once spoken out loud. "Usually, I would just go to Charlie's if my mom wasn't around... but Charlie and I had gotten in a fight, and well, I couldn't go there." Erin paused, taking another sip of wine before continuing.

"My mom's boyfriend decided he had had enough of waiting for my mom." She visibly shuddered whenever she thought about that night.

Jay watched her eyes refill with tears, and she began to tremble. He hoped this story wasn't going where he thought it was going. "He didn't try to-"

"No, not that. He brought home some girl from a bar." She watched Jay's shoulders sag in relief.

Just wait, she thought.

"But my mom chose that night to come back home, and she found them in bed together. She..." Jay listened as voiced trailed off slightly, as if she lost her train of thought.

She hadn't. She just couldn't believe she was about to tell this story. "She lost her mind... she started screaming and crying and hitting her boyfriend. She took one the empty bottles from the nightstand and hit the girl over the head with it. She went completely nuts. So her boyfriend... he pulls a gun on her." Tears were falling freely at this point, but Erin pressed on. "I called Hank. It was the first time I used his card. I was hiding in my bedroom and I begged him to come." She whispered. "By the time he got there, my mom's boyfriend had us both tied up and he was holding a gun to my head." She would never forget that night. Sometimes when she closed her eyes, she could still feel the cold metal pressed against her temple. She had been so defenseless, so scared.

That he hadn't been expecting. "Oh my God, Erin." Jay said, and he wrapped his arms around her and let her cry on his shoulder. "I'm so sorry that happened to you." He stroked her back, until he felt her relax in his arms.

She leaned back, determined to finish the story. "I stayed with Hank and his wife Camille that night. And I became Hank's CI after that. He saved my life." She wished that was the end of her story, "But I moved in with Charlie, because I was still hooked on heroine and I wasn't ready to give it up." She sighed, angry at herself for not accepting Hank's offer from the beginning. "Eventually, after Hank arrested me another time, I finally agreed to move in with him, Camille, and their son Justin. I detoxed, he got me into an all girls private school. I finally felt safe, and my life started to turn around."

The way he was staring at her, like she was the strongest person he had ever known, warmed her insides and filled her with a deep sense of pride. "Feeling safe sometimes makes all the difference in the world. And that's why I do what I do."

He let her words stand for a moment, and he continued to hold her gaze in the comfortable silence that followed. "Thank you for telling me," he whispered the words, wishing he could find better ones. Sufficient ones. She was so unbelievable, and he was completely stunned by her story.

No wonder she hadn't been easily forthcoming.

"I wanted to." She said, holding his eyes. "All night, actually." She smiled, "But I couldn't exactly tell you this over dinner at a restaurant." She motioned to her tear stained face, and laughed, a deep throaty laugh. "Now you have to tell me something."

"I fell in love with the sound of your laugh the first time I heard it."

Now, it was her turned to be stunned.

xoxo

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