Fic: Witness Protection, part 17/??
Title: Witness Protection, part 17/?
Fandom: Parks and Recreation
Characters/Ships: Ben/Leslie, Chris/Ann, Andy/April, Ben/Pawnee, ensemble
Rating: R (this chapter only)
Word Count: ~ 8,000
Summary: When corporate whistleblowers Ben Adams and Chris Robinson barely escape an attempt on their lives, they gladly accept the protection of the Federal Witness Protection program. What they don't count on is being sent to a city that feels more like something out of a movie or a sitcom than real life: Pawnee Indiana. An AU starting in "Master Plan."
Author's Notes: I wrote most of this chapter in the car on my way home from a visit to my sister for Thanksgiving, so you can thank my husband for driving the whole way. I still can't give a final chapter estimate, but I can tell you with confidence that we're heading into the home stretch. The end is finally in sight. It could be 5 more chapters, or it could be 8, but I know where we're headed and we're getting there soon. As ever, thank you so much for all your wonderful comments. They really keep me energized. Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part 11, Part 12, Part 13, Part 14, Part 15, Part 16
Leslie's jaw dropped at the sight of Ann Perkins standing on her front stoop. "Heeeyyy…"
"Thank god you're here!" Ann said, pushing past Leslie to come inside. "I was worried about you. You haven't answered any of my calls or texts for more than a day. You never do that. I was afraid you'd been in an accident, or that one of your piles finally fell on you and you were trapped." She gestured at the stacks of bins and boxes cluttering one end of Leslie's front room.
Immediately Leslie raised a finger and wagged it as she responded. "Those piles are much more stable since that organizer came through, and you know it."
Ann sighed. "Yes. Of course. I know. But still, what's going on? You dropped off the face of the earth yesterday afternoon. I was worried. Are you sick? Do you need me to check your temperature? I brought my thermometer."
At times like this Leslie still marveled that she'd managed to score such a wonderful best friend. And no matter what else happened, Ann wasn't going anywhere. Except right now. Because she needed to get Ann the hell out of there before Ben showed up. "You perfect, beautiful nurse. Thank you, forever, thank you for caring so much about me. But I'm fine. Really. I was feeling a little under the weather yesterday afternoon so I went home early, but I got a good night's sleep and now I feel fine."
Ann's forehead knit and her lips were tight. Leslie cringed a little, knowing how transparent her lie had been. Damn. I'm really going to have to get better at this.
"So why weren't you answering your phone?" asked Ann.
Crap. "Uh-I lost it. And the power died. And I forgot to plug it in."
"You didn't answer you home phone, either."
Double crap. "I must not have heard you. Because I was making noise while I was-was cleaning the house. You know-faucets and vacuums and stuff. Very noisy." Leslie nodded emphatically.
Ann arched an eyebrow and surveyed the still very messy front room. "Sure."
"I was doing this room next."
Ann nodded slowly.
Leslie sighed. "I'm sorry you were worried. And I'm sorry I didn't call you back. Because you're my best friend. Always. And I love you. But I'm expecting someone any minute, and it's kind of private, so I really need you to leave."
"Who are you expecting?" Ann's frown deepened.
"Ben." Leslie opted for the truth, because it seemed like the best way to get Ann to leave.
"Oh my god. Seriously? This is still going on? After everything he's done to you?"
Leslie gritted her teeth. She'd known Ann would disapprove of her making any more moves with Ben, which was why she hadn't told her anything before her talk with Ben yesterday afternoon. So she'd already been bracing for this lecture. "Yes. And I know that on the surface it looks really bad, and needy, and desperate. But he means a great deal to me and I care about him very much. We had a good talk yesterday where he shared some very important things with me about his past, and why he's so nervous about long-distance relationships. But he really cares about me, too, and we decided to spend the night apart, thinking things over to see if we can come up with a plan for staying in each other's lives. And he's about to come here and talk to me and if you're here, you'll scare him away because he knows you don't approve of him, so I really need you to leave." There. That was nearly the truth, and Ann would certainly buy it.
Ann shook her head. "You're asking for trouble. Ben is clearly not ready for a commitment. I'm only saying this because I love you-but you're being really stupid. He's going to end up breaking your heart, just like Chris broke mine."
Leslie's throat tightened. On that point, she couldn't disagree. Ben probably would break her heart-just not for the reasons Ann thought he would. She fought down her emotions. "Maybe he will. I don't know. But I need to do this. Maybe it's a mistake, but this is my choice, and I need to make it. Just let me have it out with Ben tonight. Please-I'll talk to you tomorrow."
Ann continued to frown, but nodded. "Fine. You know I'm not going to stop worrying about you, though."
"I know," replied Leslie, reaching out to rest her hands on Ann's shoulders. "And I am so unbelievably grateful that I have someone like you in my life. But right now I really need you to scram."
"Ok," said Ann, still looking frustrated. "However this goes-good luck." She squeezed Leslie in a brief hug, which filled her with new energy and strength.
"Thank you," Leslie said, squeezing back before ushering Ann out the door.
She sank onto her couch and rubbed her face. More lies. Already, more lies.
Just a few minutes passed before the doorbell rang again.
~ ~ ~
As he stood on Leslie's stoop and pushed her doorbell, Ben started to deeply regret that cheeseburger. JJ's non-breakfast food was passable on a good day; however, this was anything but a good day. He sincerely hoped he wouldn't throw up on Leslie's sofa.
He jumped back nervously when Leslie flung the door open and glared at him.
She wore faded black sweatpants and a baggy Pawnee Rec Center t-shirt, with her hair pulled back in a rumpled ponytail. "I just had to lie to Ann for you," she said unceremoniously and then stalked back into her front room.
Ben blinked a few times, and then shuffled after her. "Uh, sorry?" he said, closing the door behind him.
Leslie shook her head and sank down onto her sofa, looking defeated. "She just showed up because she was worried about me not answering my phone. I had to lie to her to get her to leave. And this won't be the last time I have to lie for you, will it?"
Ben sat gingerly on the other end of the sofa, debating whether or not there was any way to soften this blow. Probably not. He sighed. "No. It won't be."
They sat in silence for a few minutes. He watched her as she stared down at her interlaced fingers in her lap.
Eventually she said, "How do you do it? How do you keep up the lies, day after day after day?"
"It's not easy," he admitted. "At first it was something I had to think about all the time. And then I started getting used to the lie. I fell into the role until I didn't know where Ben Wyatt ended and Ben Adams began. So for a while there it wasn't that hard any more. But then I started wanting to tell you the truth, and the only way I stopped myself was by reminding myself of the potential consequences."
Leslie tilted her head up to meet his eyes. "What exactly are the consequences?"
Ben ruffled his hair with one hand and sighed. "There's a lot of potential consequences. I know you wouldn't give us away on purpose. I know that. But the burden of lying all the time is really heavy, and it would be easy to slip up once in a while. If someone overheard something and then blogged about it or posted something on Facebook or Twitter or even just mentioned it to the wrong person, who knows where that information might end up? Everson has hired professionals to silence us before, and if he ever had any inkling as to where we're hiding, I know without a doubt that he'd do it again. Then it wouldn't just be me and Chris on the line. It would be all our friends and coworkers. Everyone we care about would be in danger."
Leslie sucked on her lower lip and nodded, her eyes flitting downward.
"That's a worst case scenario," Ben said. "More likely, the marshals would figure out that I'd let the truth slip, and they'd swoop in to relocate me and Chris again. One day we'd be there, the next we'd be gone. The bottom line is, it's not just about my life, or Chris's life. It's about justice. George Everson and his co-conspirators need to pay for the harm they did to millions of investors and thousands of cancer patients and their families. That's what this all comes down to. My testimony and Chris's testimony are the centerpiece of the case against them. The people Everson harmed will never see justice done unless Chris and I protect ourselves. You understand that, don't you?"
"Of course I do," Leslie replied indignantly. "What I don't understand, is why did you try to tell me, anyway? If you faced all those consequences, then why'd you try to get me to read about the Everson trial while we were planning the Harvest Festival?"
Ben looked away from her gaze and winced at the pain in his gut. He should have known this would come up. He shook his head slowly. "The truth is-the truth is I've been playing with fire since the first week I got here. Do you remember that day when you apologized for yelling at me, and then you yelled at me some more, and then I took you out for beers at ten-thirty in the morning?"
"I remember."
"When we were walking back to City Hall you asked if we'd ever met before, because I looked familiar. Somehow, after knowing you for less than twenty-four hours, I knew in my gut that you remembered reading about teen-mayor Benji Adams. I just knew it. And I should have called the marshals that night and gotten a transfer out of Pawnee the next day. But I saw something in you that made me want to damn the consequences and stay anyway. And I really should have called the marshals when you confronted me about my name at the Chamber of Commerce meeting. But by then I was too hooked on Pawnee-too hooked on the people I'd met here-that I convinced myself it would be safe to tell you. That having you know the truth might make it easier." He shook his head.
"So what stopped you? What changed your mind?" She held his gaze, pleading with her eyes.
Ben swallowed hard. "The more attached I got to you-the more I came to care about you-the more I realized how selfish it would be to tell you. It might make me feel better, but it has the potential to put you in harm's way. That's the last thing on earth that I want to do."
"What about now?" she asked. "Is telling me now still selfish? Is it still putting me in harm's way?"
"Yes. Probably. I'm sorry. I-I-I couldn't take it anymore. Lying to you day after day. It was eating away at me. I couldn't stand it. Especially after what you told me yesterday. I had to tell you. I probably should have hurt you and made a clean break and walked away. That would have been the best way to keep you safe. But I guess I'm just too selfish for that. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry to do this to you." He couldn't meet her eyes anymore.
"No," she said firmly. "No. Telling me now isn't selfish. Telling me the truth is the right thing to do. And telling me two months ago would have been even righter. Don't act like I'm some delicate little bird that you need to protect. Don't do that."
He felt her glare beating down on him before he dared to lift his eyes and look at her face. "Two months ago, did you care about me enough to keep this secret for me? Could you have become a part of this conspiracy? Could you have lied to Ron and Ann and Paul and everyone else? Or would I have had to leave Pawnee?"
Leslie took a slow breath. "I don't know. I wish I could say yes, but really, I don't know."
Ben's gut churned again. Now came the real question. "What about now? Do I have to go home and tell Chris that we need to pack our bags because we have to leave Pawnee tomorrow? If that's what you want, I'll do it. I'm ready."
She scrunched her forehead and looked away from him, her eyes glistening. "That's not what I want."
"Leslie?" His heart flipped in his chest. Was there still a chance that she could forgive him for deceiving her for so long? "What do you want me to do? Just name it, and I'll do it. Anything."
"I still don't know." She shook her head. "I want everyone to be safe, but-but I don't want you to leave. Not yet."
She held his gaze, and the hope in his chest rose even higher. "Okay. Okay. So-so what about right now? What do you want right now?"
Her chest swelled with another deep breath. "Talk to me. That's what I want. Right now. You told me some of the truth yesterday and in that email. But I want to hear it from your mouth. I want to talk to the real you. To Ben Adams."
This was what he'd been wanting. What he'd been waiting for. Yet he'd been holding onto his lies for so long that it almost hurt to let them go. But it was the best kind of pain-like pulling out a splinter so the wound could start to heal. "Okay. I can do that. Where do I start?"
She gazed off into space for a moment before meeting his eyes again. "Start at the beginning. Tell me about what it was like to get thrown out of office when you were mayor."
Oh boy. He nodded and started to speak.
~ ~ ~
Leslie felt as if she were seeing Ben with completely new eyes as she listened to him talk about being an eighteen year old kid, facing down the entire town council as they cast their unanimous votes to kick him out. She could tell that the old wound from his time as mayor of Partridge hadn't healed cleanly.
Ben shook his head as he finished his sad tale. "There's no question I screwed up. I screwed up big. But the town council also found the perfect scapegoat for all the screw-ups they'd been making with the town budget for ten years or more. They had me, and they had Icetown. So they managed to hide every ball they'd dropped over the years by dumping the whole kit and caboodle right in my lap. And the whole town bought it. Even my dad." His voice was heavy with old bitterness.
"So what you told me about your father-that was true?" she said.
"Every word of it."
"Did you leave right away?" She wouldn't blame him if he did. What they'd done to him was far too much for a kid his age to have to bear.
He shrugged. "I tried to stick it out for a few months. I'd deferred my acceptance to Northwestern in Chicago to spend a year playing mayor, so I couldn't start up right away. But Partridge got pretty unbearable pretty fast. So when a cousin of mine who lived in Wisconsin told me I could crash with her until it was time for my freshman year to start, I jumped at the chance. I stayed with her until September, and then started up school in Chicago. I haven't been back to Partridge for more than five days at a time ever since."
Leslie bit down on her tongue to stop herself from exclaiming her shock. Even when she'd been living in Bloomington for school, she'd come home at least once a week. But she'd had friends and parents who loved her to come to. Ben hadn't been so lucky.
"So, is all that mess the reason you chose the corporate world over public service?"
Ben sighed and leaned farther back into the couch cushions. "Not completely. I still had hope that other avenues of public service might still be worthwhile. I majored in accounting, but I got a minor in political science. The summer after my junior year I interned at a congressional office in D.C." Ben had a sour look on his face.
"I take it from your tone that it didn't go well?"
"At first it seemed to go great," he said. "I was in the nation's capitol, working for an honest-to-god lawmaker. The congressman seemed like a good man. I respected his policy positions, and I was happy to be contributing. I thought I was living the dream-rubbing shoulders with the people who really made a difference in our country."
It did sound pretty great. "So what went wrong?"
"There was this girl," Ben shook his head. "Another intern. She was smart and pretty and fun, and she seemed to like me, but when I asked her out she shot me down." He shrugged. "I'd been rejected before. I got over it. But then at the end of the summer, word of a scandal hit the news. The congressman had been caught having an affair." He met Leslie's gaze with a bitter glint in his eyes. "With one of his interns."
Leslie felt sick. "With the girl you liked?"
He nodded. "The very one. It was a fairly disillusioning experience, to say the least."
"God, you had the worst luck. No wonder you decided the corporate world might be a better place to hang your hat."
"That was pretty much my line of thinking." His face took on an almost apologetic expression. "I wanted to serve my community. I wanted to help people. To make the world a better place. But after the impeachment and then the congressional scandal I felt like my idealism had been nothing but a child's dream. I didn't believe that genuinely good public servants really existed. It was all a pleasant fantasy that people tried to hold onto to help them sleep better at night. At least in the corporate world people would be honest about their greed and self-interest. They didn't try to hide it behind pretty words and political platforms. But then I went to work for Everson." He looked out into space, his eyes bleak. "And I realized that their lies could be even worse."
Leslie sucked on her bottom lip, unsure of what to say. It was a wonder his faith in humanity hadn't vanished completely.
He turned his head to look at her again. "Then I came here." His lips curled up in a faint hint of a smile. "And I realized that good people and good public servants still existed. I just hadn't known where to find them."
Leslie's heart flipped in her chest. She snaked her arm out over the distance between them on the couch and grasped his hand. "I'm glad you came here."
"So am I."
She held his gaze for a moment, her heart racing. But she couldn't let herself get too distracted by emotions. Not yet. They still had a lot of ground to cover.
"So," she said, "let's move on to your adventures in corporate America. Tell me how you ended up in the medical industry."
~ ~ ~
Ben felt like pulling his hair out. Why wouldn't she understand? She'd been fine during his hour-long recitation of his pre-Everson work history, but now she was stuck on this, and he couldn't get her past it.
"There was nothing I could have done," he repeated again. "Every time I noticed one of those discrepancies, I reported it up the chain. That was my job. That was what I was supposed to do. I wasn't a forensic investigator. I was an auditor. Those aren't the same thing."
"So all those little discrepancies," Leslie put air quotes around the word, "didn't make you suspicious that maybe you were working for a greedy ruthless despot?"
"Ugh." He clenched his fists and pounded once on his thighs before taking a deep breath. "Yes, I was suspicious. Yes, doubts nagged the back of my mind. But most of what I found was normal, ordinary things. Little accounting blunders that anyone anywhere could have made. It's not like the suspicious stuff was pilling up in a massive, undeniable way. Because it wasn't. So I reported them, my superiors told me they were being taken care of, and I moved on. I had no cause to do anything more."
Leslie opened her mouth with what was sure to be another emotionally charged accusation, but Ben cut her off. "And yes, I could have dug deeper and done some investigating on my own, but you know what would have happened then? I probably would have been reprimanded for straying from my assigned projects. I would have been transferred, or even fired. And then who knows if anyone ever would have brought the evidence to the feds?"
"But don't you feel guilty?" she retorted.
"Of course I feel guilty!" How could she believe otherwise? "These crimes were perpetrated under my watch. People were defrauded and hurt and even died while I was employed there. How could I not feel guilty? So yes, I do lie awake at night wondering what more I could have done. And yes, I feel culpable in my own small way for those people who relapsed after their drugs weren't available any more. I feel that blood on my hands each and every day. But every time I dissect it-every time I analyze it-I don't think I could have done any more than I did." He shook his head.
"I don't know what more I can say to you," he continued. "I really don't. I'm trying to bring justice to the people who were most responsible for these crimes. And maybe, in some way, this will help make amends for my not being able to stop them from committing the crimes in the first place." He met her eyes. "But if you think I won't carry the guilt of those deaths and that suffering for the rest of my life, then you're dead wrong."
Instantly Ben worried that he'd gone too far when he saw Leslie blinking back moisture from her eyes.
"I'm sorry," she said. "I shouldn't have pushed you like that. I know you care. I know you feel responsible. I'm sorry."
Ben scooted closer to her and took her hand again. "Hey-it's okay. I didn't mean to snap at you like that."
She shook her head. "I deserved it."
"No. You didn't." Ben's heart hurt. God, even when she was being a brat, all he wanted to do was hold her. Does she even have any idea how amazing she is? He was inclined to think that she didn't.
"Do you want to change the subject for a while?" he asked.
"Yes," she said. "How about-how about you tell me more about your family?"
~ ~ ~
"You mean you were in Indianapolis that whole time you were supposed to be in Partridge?" Leslie exclaimed. She felt a well of outrage rising inside of her. She'd chosen this topic to stop them from fighting more, but it appeared to be having the opposite effect.
Ben spread his hands and shook his head. "What else was I supposed to do? I needed to maintain my cover, and, at the time, I felt like putting a little distance between us might be a good idea."
"Oh my god." Leslie put a hand to her head. It was all she could do to stop herself from throwing a pillow at him. They'd shared an intense, beautiful, emotional night together, and he'd felt like putting distance between them was a good idea? "So all that crap about your mom, and all that research we did-"
"Hey," he interrupted, "the thing with my mom was real. She really did get in a car crash, and I really did find out about it that day. That part wasn't a lie."
Sifting the truth from the lies was more complicated than Leslie had imagined. "Your mom really was in the hospital? Is she okay?"
Ben wore a pained expression. "I think so. I hope so."
"Why didn't you go to her?" She thought she knew the answer, but she wanted to hear it from him.
"Because that's exactly what Everson wanted. He wants to draw me out of hiding so his goons can finish the dirty work. That's why they tampered with my mom's breaks to make sure she had an accident."
Leslie's jaw dropped and she rose to her feet, her ire overflowing. Only this time it had a new target. "He went after your mom?!" She stomped, pacing back and forth across the room. "Oh my god-that man is pure evil. He is the literal worst. You have to stop him. He must be stopped."
"Exactly!" Ben sat up straight, shaking his hands at his sides in emphasis. "And that's exactly what my mom told me. We were able to talk for a few minutes, and she told me not to worry about her because taking Everson down is the most important job in my life right now. But then I slipped up and got drunk and told you too much, and so I had to pretend to be going to Partridge to maintain my cover. But that research-it was all real. It was exactly what I would have done if I'd been able to go to Partridge for real. I saved everything in a document on my laptop. I've thought about trying to mail it to her, but it seemed too risky. I want to do something to help, but my hands are tied."
Leslie stopped her pacing and stared at him, her chest heaving with emotion. "I could send it to her. After you leave. I can send it to her."
Ben's eyes went wide. "You'd do that for me?"
"Of course I will. You put all that effort in because you love your mom. And some of it might even be things she hasn't thought of yet. Absolutely I'll send it to her."
Ben pointed and wagged his finger. "Better yet, send it to her best friend, Autumn Forkner. My mom still isn't in a position to be doing much for herself. I'm sure Autumn is stepping up to take care of her."
"Yes. I'll send it to both of them if I have to. Email the document to me with their addresses and I'll mail it the day after you leave."
Ben's smile looked almost disbelieving. "Thank you. That means a lot to me."
"No problem." She hated that normal acts of human kindness shocked him so much. No one deserved to live that kind of life. Especially not someone as good as Ben.
Because he was good, she realized. In spite of everything he'd been through, he was an amazingly good person. Sure, he'd made his share of mistakes-but that only made him human.
Leslie sat back down beside him. "Hey-I'll check in on her, for you. I'll make sure she's all right."
His eyes glistened as he looked away and nodded. "I can't think of anyone I'd rather have on the job."
~ ~ ~
". . . conspiracy, and the big one, fourteen counts of negligent homicide," said Leslie, ticking Everson's charges off on her fingers. "Did I get them all?"
Ben smiled down at his hand resting on Leslie's thigh. He still felt more than a little excited that she hadn't objected when he put it there. "You missed one," he said. "Tax fraud."
"Yes! How could I forget tax fraud," she said, her eyes lighting up. "Hey-I think I read something about you and Chris standing to get some sort of financial pay-out if the conviction for tax fraud goes through. What's up with that?"
Ben sighed and rolled his eyes. "It's this old IRS rule to incentivize whistleblowing. If they succeed in recovering back taxes, they pay out a percentage of the recovered funds as a reward to the person who reported the tax fraud. But I hope you don't think that had anything to do with me and Chris going to the feds, because it didn't."
She shook her head and smiled. "I don't think that. You went to feds because it was the right thing to do. Because you're good guys."
"Exactly." Ben felt warm all over. "We're good guys."
Leslie's stomach rumbled loudly. "God, I'm starving," she said. "I don't think I've had anything but coffee and chocolate since lunch yesterday."
Ben raised his eyebrows. "Do you want to make something? Or-"
"JJ's. I need waffles."
There was no arguing with that.
~ ~ ~
"Remember," murmured Leslie urgently, "no conversation. We order, we eat, we leave. I'm too hyped up to talk-I'll say something I shouldn't."
"Got it." Ben nodded as they sat down at their table. "No talking."
"Silence."
"Complete silence."
Leslie fidgeted and twitched constantly while they waited for their food. She felt like a seven year old taking a math test. How was she supposed to keep quite while there was so much going on inside her head?
Ben smiled at her bemusedly. "You don't seem to be handling this whole silence thing too well."
"Shut up." She glared at him.
Finally, their food arrived. She wolfed down her double order of waffles with ravenous abandon. Waffles had never tasted so good.
On her last bite her eyes went wide and she perked up as a sudden epiphany struck. "Tonya's one of your marshals!"
Ben froze, his fork halfway to his mouth, looking stunned.
"Crap!" Leslie covered her mouth. "Silence. Sorry."
A few minutes later, after heading out and sliding back into her car, Ben said, "Just for the record, you're right. Agent Tonya Burdette is, in fact, one of the marshals handling me and Chris, along with agent Ryan Lewis."
Leslie shook her head as she drove. "God. I can't believe I used to be jealous of her."
"Really?" Ben sounded positively tickled. "You were jealous?"
Smug idiot. If he wasn't so cute, she might almost get mad at him again.
~ ~ ~
Ben sat with his arm around Leslie's shoulders as she leaned against him on her couch. Yeah-he could be happy doing this pretty much forever.
"I'm not trying to defend how he treated her," Ben said, "because it's true, he treated her like crap."
"Yes, he did," Leslie agreed. Of course she would agree-it was her best friend they were talking about.
"But he genuinely thought that she was just using him to rebound from that Mark guy, so he thought it would be fine to use her to rebound from his ex back in Atlanta. That doesn't excuse the way he drew things out after Ann started to get more serious." Ben shrugged. "I don't know. Neither of us handled this whole secret identity thing very well. I'm sorry that his mistakes ended up hurting Ann like that."
"I guess I understand." Leslie snuggled a little closer. "But it still sucks."
"Yes, it does." Lord, it felt good to hold her.
"Did he really love her-the woman in Atlanta?"
Ben nodded. "Yep. He really did. They were getting ready to move in together when he and I finally decided to go to the feds together. He felt like he had to break up in order to protect her. But he's still not over her."
"That really sucks, too."
"Yeah. It does." Ben held her a little tighter, wondering how long it would take him to get over Leslie. Even thinking about it hurt like hell.
He closed his eyes and tried to think about something else.
~ ~ ~
It was long after dark, and Leslie felt exhausted. There was only so much deep, soul-searching conversation a person could handle in a day, and she'd just about reached her limit. But there was one more thing she needed to ask.
She cleared her throat. "So-what comes next? After you leave. What happens when you get to Atlanta?"
Ben rubbed her arm with his hand and pulled her a little closer. "They'll keep us in a safe-house near the city until it's time to testify. And then we'll testify. And then we'll wait for a verdict."
"And what then? What happens to you after the trial? Will you ever be able to go back to your old life?"
"It depends on the verdict. The prosecutor's team went through all this with us before we came to Pawnee. If Everson and the others are guilty on most or all counts, we'll stay in protective custody a little longer to see what might happen with appeals. Then, a year or so down the road, we'll reassess the danger level, and if the threat against us has receded they'll give us a choice between taking our chances and returning to our previous lives, or they'll give us the option of permanent relocation with a permanent new identity. It all depends on the threat level and whether or not they'll need us for in-person testimony at any appeals trials."
"A year?" It was even worse than she'd expected.
"Or more. Nothing is certain with this kind of situation. You kind of have to take it one day at a time."
Leslie's throat tightened up and she fought to blink back tears. "And what about if he's found not guilty?"
Ben's voice was rough when he answered. "They'll give us the same options. But Everson is a pretty vindictive guy. Going back to our old lives would pretty much be inviting him to come after us."
"So you'll either go into hiding for the rest of your life or live with a constant death threat hanging over you?" No one deserved to live like that. No one.
"That about sums it up," he replied.
Leslie couldn't stop her tears from welling. It wasn't fair. None of it was fair.
Ben was the good guy. He was the one who'd done the right thing. Yet he was being punished for it. Why should he have to give up years of his life-or more-just because he chose to do the right thing? Nothing about this was fair.
"I wish it could be different," he said softly. "You have no idea how much I wish it could be different. And for what it's worth, if I really was Ben Wyatt, I'd say to hell with the Atlanta job in an instant and do everything in my power to stay right here in Pawnee for as long as possible. I just-I wanted you to know that."
Leslie clutched at his shirt and buried her face against his chest as a sob escaped her throat. She couldn't think-she couldn't reason-she could only feel a horrible, bleak sense of loss.
Ben didn't deserve any of this.
And she didn't want him to leave. But there was nothing she could do to stop him. And she might never see him again.
Everything hurt.
She sobbed again.
"Oh god," he said, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to make you cry. I'm so sorry." He wrapped his arms around her as she shook against him, sobbing even harder.
"Leslie-I'm so, so sorry. This is why I tried not to get involved with you. Because I knew it would end this way. What can I do? I'm so sor-"
She lifted her head and glared at him. "Just shut up and let me cry, okay? Sometimes a person just needs to cry."
"Okay."
She buried her face back into his chest and let the tears flow free as sobs continued to shake her body. There was nothing else she could do but cry.
It took a long time for her tears to dry up and her sobbing to quiet down.
She felt utterly drained. But still she clung to him. It was childish, she knew, but she didn't want to let go. If she just held on tight enough, she could pretend that he wasn't going anywhere.
She was starting to understand why all of this had hit her so hard.
Ben was a man she could have fallen in love with. She could see that now. With his decency and his commitment to doing the right thing, with his cute nerdiness and his adorable face, with his kindness and intelligence, with his quirky sense of humor and his persistent tendency to put the needs of others before himself, he was everything she could have fallen for permanently and irrevocably.
She grasped his shirt a little tighter.
She wasn't ready to let go.
~ ~ ~
Ben let a few tears roll down his own cheeks as he held Leslie against him, his heart breaking all over again.
He'd had weeks-months, even-to prepare himself for this. But it hadn't been enough. Nothing would have really been enough. And for Leslie, to have it all dumped on her over the course of a day and half, he couldn't blame her for needing to cry.
He wished with all his heart that there was something he could do to help her-to make things better. But what could possibly make this better?
Eventually her sobbing quieted, and she lay still against his chest. He stroked her soft golden hair, and briefly let himself imagine a world where he got to hold her like this every day. He knew he shouldn't torture himself like that, but sometimes he couldn't help himself.
"I think I've cried all the tears I have in me for today," she said in a raw voice, just above a whisper.
Ben stroked her hair again and ran a hand up and down her back. "I don't know what else to say. I wish I knew what to say."
Leslie lifted her head to meet his gaze with red eyes and a pale, weary face. She shook her head. "You don't have to say anything."
Her eyes held his for another moment before flitting down to his lips. Just as he realized what was happening she moved forward, brushing her lips against his.
He kissed her back. How could he not?
What he didn't expect was her response.
She clutched at his face and his neck, shifting her whole body onto his lap and opening her mouth to him, pulling him deeper. She ground against him, stroking and caressing him as she kissed him with a wild, wanton hunger that sent waves of heat coursing through his veins.
His heart pounded as his hands eagerly explored her body and he feasted on her kiss. He grew dizzy with excitement when she gasped against his lips.
He pulled back slightly, still touching and caressing her as he struggled to catch his breath. "This is insane. I'm leaving in just over two weeks. What the hell are we doing?"
"I don't care if it's crazy. The next two weeks might be all we ever get, and I just want to be with you, starting right now. Spend the rest of the weekend with me. Please? I just want to be with you." Her voice cracked as she spoke.
His head spun in disbelief. After all this-after all the lies and all the danger-she still wanted him. The real him. It was more than he'd ever let himself hope for.
God, he loved her. He might go the rest of his life loving Leslie Knope.
"It's going to be so hard when I have to leave . . ." His voice came out rough with emotion.
"It's going to be hard no matter what," she said, cupping his face in her palms and caressing his cheeks with her thumbs. "Nothing's going to make it easier. So let's just be together now, while we have a chance. This is what I want. What do you want?"
The mixture of fear and hope on her face and in her voice overwhelmed him. What had he ever done to deserve this?
"Yes," he said, unable to answer any other way. "Yes." And he captured her lips in another kiss.
~ ~ ~
Leslie tore at Ben's buttons. The damn things wouldn't come undone fast enough. A giddy giggle escaped from her throat as she finally pushed his shirt open and ran her hands over his deceptively slender but strong body.
"What's so funny?" he asked, grinning at her where she sat still perched in his lap.
She shook her head, the loose curls that had fallen free from her ponytail swishing against her face. "Nothing. Everything. I don't know."
She kissed him again. And again.
His hand slid across the skin under her t-shirt, and he worked his way under her bra to massage her breast. She leaned into his touch and laughed again.
This time Ben laughed back. "What? Are you ticklish?"
"No. I just-I feel like laughing." It was either that or start crying again, and she'd had enough of tears for one day.
Leslie scooted off his lap and stood up before tugging him to his feet after her.
"Okay," she said, "I've got you to myself for the next thirty-six-ish hours, and we're going to make the most of it. But first, it's been nearly two days since I showered. I'm inclined to think that the rest of this evening's activities will be funner for both of us if I clean up a little first. So, how about we head upstairs to my room, and I'll take a shower, and maybe you can join me?" She wagged her eyebrows suggestively.
He clung to her hand and ran the fingers of his other hand up and down her arm. "That sounds like a pretty awesome plan, to me."
"Good." She cocked her head toward the stairs. "Come on."
Though she'd felt utterly spent just a few minutes ago, a fresh surge of energy coursed through her. She thought it must be something like the adrenaline rush skydivers felt while they were free-falling, but before they pulled their parachutes.
Everything about what she was doing was utterly insane. She'd made quite a few rash decisions in her life, but nothing quite like this. Oh well. No regrets. No turning back. She'd made up her mind, and nothing was going to dissuade her.
Once they reached her bathroom, Leslie finished pulling Ben's shirt off of him and made quick work of his pants, too. In just a few seconds he stood in front of her wearing nothing but the hands she couldn't seem to keep off of him.
She ran her fingers over every inch of him, trying to memorize every curve and contour. She never wanted to forget this. None of it.
"I think you have me at a disadvantage," he murmured, hooking his fingers inside the waistbands of both her sweatpants and her panties and tugging them down all at once.
She giggled again and took her hands off of him long enough to let him pull her t-shirt off over her head. She had her bra unlatched before the shirt even hit the floor.
This was perfect. Nothing between them-no lies, no distance, no fabric. Everything could finally just be real.
Ben kissed her again. He kissed her like there was no tomorrow, and she ached again for just a moment as she remembered that in two weeks there really would be no tomorrow.
No. Not now. Not thinking about that tonight.
She ran her hands over his back and grabbed his ass, pulling him closer.
His lips drifted off of her mouth and snaked their way down her neck. She gasped when his hand slid between her legs.
Okay. She couldn't wait for the shower.
"Now," she groaned.
He lifted his head and raised his eyebrows. "Now?"
"Get over here." She stepped to her bathroom counter, tugging him after.
Pushing her scattered products out of the way, she sat on the bare counter between her two sinks and pulled Ben between her legs. "Come on. Right here, right now."
Ben nodded, a dazed expression on his face, before leaning forward to kiss her one more time.
Too slow. She needed more.
She reached out to guide him in, and closed her eyes, breathing sharply as their bodies merged.
He started to thrust, slowly and rhythmically, while she wrapped her legs around his waist, drawing him deeper. She clung to his shoulders, digging her fingertips into his back.
Closer. She needed him closer. He could never be close enough.
"Leslie-you're amazing," Ben muttered, his lips moving against her left temple. "You're so fucking beautiful."
She laughed again, though it almost came out as a sob. When he called her beautiful, she could actually believe it. Tonight, anything was possible.
A few minutes later, Ben came with a shudder and a moan. Leslie continued to cling to him, wanting to hold onto that closeness for just a little longer.
Eventually he shifted, placing a soft kiss on her forehead and running his fingertips along her jaw before meeting her eyes.
"I guess we both really needed that," he said, wearing a boyish grin.
"Yes. Most definitely." And she felt confident that she'd need it several more times before the weekend was out. "And now," she added, "I really need that shower. Come on."
Once again, he followed where she led.
~ ~ ~
In the dim light of a single lamp, Chris stared down at the text glowing up at him from the screen of his phone.
"Spending weekend with Leslie. Everything's good. Don't worry."
He sighed. But he would worry. Just like he'd worried all day.
He put his phone down and walked over to his bed where his suitcases sat, packed and ready to go.
"I guess it's time to put these away," he whispered aloud.
One at a time he lifted his carefully folded and arranged clothes out of the suitcases and hung them in his closet or placed them in drawers. The condo was utterly, eerily silent around him.
He'd never felt more alone in his life.
When Chris reached the bottom of his suitcase, he stared at the book lying there.
It was a beautifully illustrated copy of the Tao Te Ching-one of the few possessions he'd managed to salvage from his previous life.
Kelsey gave it to him as a gift not long before they broke up.
It hadn't been a special occasion. She'd simply seen it in a book shop, and bought it for him because she thought he'd like it.
He picked it up and ran his fingers along the spine, knowing that what he was about to do would draw him into a spiral he might not be able to escape from.
He did it anyway.
Cracking the spine, he lifted out the bookmark: a single strip of three photos from a novelty photo-booth.
He and Kelsey sat side by side, her arm around his shoulders, their cheeks pressed together as they smiled and made silly faces for the camera.
They were the only pictures of Kelsey he had left, and he hadn't looked at them in nearly a year.
Chris felt his heart contract painfully as he sank into his desk chair, staring at her face. He could still remember the scent of her shampoo. The sound of her laughter. The glint of her eyes in the moonlight.
He stared at those photos long into the night, desperately trying to remember what it felt like to be happy.
TBC
Part 18 here
Fandom: Parks and Recreation
Characters/Ships: Ben/Leslie, Chris/Ann, Andy/April, Ben/Pawnee, ensemble
Rating: R (this chapter only)
Word Count: ~ 8,000
Summary: When corporate whistleblowers Ben Adams and Chris Robinson barely escape an attempt on their lives, they gladly accept the protection of the Federal Witness Protection program. What they don't count on is being sent to a city that feels more like something out of a movie or a sitcom than real life: Pawnee Indiana. An AU starting in "Master Plan."
Author's Notes: I wrote most of this chapter in the car on my way home from a visit to my sister for Thanksgiving, so you can thank my husband for driving the whole way. I still can't give a final chapter estimate, but I can tell you with confidence that we're heading into the home stretch. The end is finally in sight. It could be 5 more chapters, or it could be 8, but I know where we're headed and we're getting there soon. As ever, thank you so much for all your wonderful comments. They really keep me energized. Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part 11, Part 12, Part 13, Part 14, Part 15, Part 16
Leslie's jaw dropped at the sight of Ann Perkins standing on her front stoop. "Heeeyyy…"
"Thank god you're here!" Ann said, pushing past Leslie to come inside. "I was worried about you. You haven't answered any of my calls or texts for more than a day. You never do that. I was afraid you'd been in an accident, or that one of your piles finally fell on you and you were trapped." She gestured at the stacks of bins and boxes cluttering one end of Leslie's front room.
Immediately Leslie raised a finger and wagged it as she responded. "Those piles are much more stable since that organizer came through, and you know it."
Ann sighed. "Yes. Of course. I know. But still, what's going on? You dropped off the face of the earth yesterday afternoon. I was worried. Are you sick? Do you need me to check your temperature? I brought my thermometer."
At times like this Leslie still marveled that she'd managed to score such a wonderful best friend. And no matter what else happened, Ann wasn't going anywhere. Except right now. Because she needed to get Ann the hell out of there before Ben showed up. "You perfect, beautiful nurse. Thank you, forever, thank you for caring so much about me. But I'm fine. Really. I was feeling a little under the weather yesterday afternoon so I went home early, but I got a good night's sleep and now I feel fine."
Ann's forehead knit and her lips were tight. Leslie cringed a little, knowing how transparent her lie had been. Damn. I'm really going to have to get better at this.
"So why weren't you answering your phone?" asked Ann.
Crap. "Uh-I lost it. And the power died. And I forgot to plug it in."
"You didn't answer you home phone, either."
Double crap. "I must not have heard you. Because I was making noise while I was-was cleaning the house. You know-faucets and vacuums and stuff. Very noisy." Leslie nodded emphatically.
Ann arched an eyebrow and surveyed the still very messy front room. "Sure."
"I was doing this room next."
Ann nodded slowly.
Leslie sighed. "I'm sorry you were worried. And I'm sorry I didn't call you back. Because you're my best friend. Always. And I love you. But I'm expecting someone any minute, and it's kind of private, so I really need you to leave."
"Who are you expecting?" Ann's frown deepened.
"Ben." Leslie opted for the truth, because it seemed like the best way to get Ann to leave.
"Oh my god. Seriously? This is still going on? After everything he's done to you?"
Leslie gritted her teeth. She'd known Ann would disapprove of her making any more moves with Ben, which was why she hadn't told her anything before her talk with Ben yesterday afternoon. So she'd already been bracing for this lecture. "Yes. And I know that on the surface it looks really bad, and needy, and desperate. But he means a great deal to me and I care about him very much. We had a good talk yesterday where he shared some very important things with me about his past, and why he's so nervous about long-distance relationships. But he really cares about me, too, and we decided to spend the night apart, thinking things over to see if we can come up with a plan for staying in each other's lives. And he's about to come here and talk to me and if you're here, you'll scare him away because he knows you don't approve of him, so I really need you to leave." There. That was nearly the truth, and Ann would certainly buy it.
Ann shook her head. "You're asking for trouble. Ben is clearly not ready for a commitment. I'm only saying this because I love you-but you're being really stupid. He's going to end up breaking your heart, just like Chris broke mine."
Leslie's throat tightened. On that point, she couldn't disagree. Ben probably would break her heart-just not for the reasons Ann thought he would. She fought down her emotions. "Maybe he will. I don't know. But I need to do this. Maybe it's a mistake, but this is my choice, and I need to make it. Just let me have it out with Ben tonight. Please-I'll talk to you tomorrow."
Ann continued to frown, but nodded. "Fine. You know I'm not going to stop worrying about you, though."
"I know," replied Leslie, reaching out to rest her hands on Ann's shoulders. "And I am so unbelievably grateful that I have someone like you in my life. But right now I really need you to scram."
"Ok," said Ann, still looking frustrated. "However this goes-good luck." She squeezed Leslie in a brief hug, which filled her with new energy and strength.
"Thank you," Leslie said, squeezing back before ushering Ann out the door.
She sank onto her couch and rubbed her face. More lies. Already, more lies.
Just a few minutes passed before the doorbell rang again.
~ ~ ~
As he stood on Leslie's stoop and pushed her doorbell, Ben started to deeply regret that cheeseburger. JJ's non-breakfast food was passable on a good day; however, this was anything but a good day. He sincerely hoped he wouldn't throw up on Leslie's sofa.
He jumped back nervously when Leslie flung the door open and glared at him.
She wore faded black sweatpants and a baggy Pawnee Rec Center t-shirt, with her hair pulled back in a rumpled ponytail. "I just had to lie to Ann for you," she said unceremoniously and then stalked back into her front room.
Ben blinked a few times, and then shuffled after her. "Uh, sorry?" he said, closing the door behind him.
Leslie shook her head and sank down onto her sofa, looking defeated. "She just showed up because she was worried about me not answering my phone. I had to lie to her to get her to leave. And this won't be the last time I have to lie for you, will it?"
Ben sat gingerly on the other end of the sofa, debating whether or not there was any way to soften this blow. Probably not. He sighed. "No. It won't be."
They sat in silence for a few minutes. He watched her as she stared down at her interlaced fingers in her lap.
Eventually she said, "How do you do it? How do you keep up the lies, day after day after day?"
"It's not easy," he admitted. "At first it was something I had to think about all the time. And then I started getting used to the lie. I fell into the role until I didn't know where Ben Wyatt ended and Ben Adams began. So for a while there it wasn't that hard any more. But then I started wanting to tell you the truth, and the only way I stopped myself was by reminding myself of the potential consequences."
Leslie tilted her head up to meet his eyes. "What exactly are the consequences?"
Ben ruffled his hair with one hand and sighed. "There's a lot of potential consequences. I know you wouldn't give us away on purpose. I know that. But the burden of lying all the time is really heavy, and it would be easy to slip up once in a while. If someone overheard something and then blogged about it or posted something on Facebook or Twitter or even just mentioned it to the wrong person, who knows where that information might end up? Everson has hired professionals to silence us before, and if he ever had any inkling as to where we're hiding, I know without a doubt that he'd do it again. Then it wouldn't just be me and Chris on the line. It would be all our friends and coworkers. Everyone we care about would be in danger."
Leslie sucked on her lower lip and nodded, her eyes flitting downward.
"That's a worst case scenario," Ben said. "More likely, the marshals would figure out that I'd let the truth slip, and they'd swoop in to relocate me and Chris again. One day we'd be there, the next we'd be gone. The bottom line is, it's not just about my life, or Chris's life. It's about justice. George Everson and his co-conspirators need to pay for the harm they did to millions of investors and thousands of cancer patients and their families. That's what this all comes down to. My testimony and Chris's testimony are the centerpiece of the case against them. The people Everson harmed will never see justice done unless Chris and I protect ourselves. You understand that, don't you?"
"Of course I do," Leslie replied indignantly. "What I don't understand, is why did you try to tell me, anyway? If you faced all those consequences, then why'd you try to get me to read about the Everson trial while we were planning the Harvest Festival?"
Ben looked away from her gaze and winced at the pain in his gut. He should have known this would come up. He shook his head slowly. "The truth is-the truth is I've been playing with fire since the first week I got here. Do you remember that day when you apologized for yelling at me, and then you yelled at me some more, and then I took you out for beers at ten-thirty in the morning?"
"I remember."
"When we were walking back to City Hall you asked if we'd ever met before, because I looked familiar. Somehow, after knowing you for less than twenty-four hours, I knew in my gut that you remembered reading about teen-mayor Benji Adams. I just knew it. And I should have called the marshals that night and gotten a transfer out of Pawnee the next day. But I saw something in you that made me want to damn the consequences and stay anyway. And I really should have called the marshals when you confronted me about my name at the Chamber of Commerce meeting. But by then I was too hooked on Pawnee-too hooked on the people I'd met here-that I convinced myself it would be safe to tell you. That having you know the truth might make it easier." He shook his head.
"So what stopped you? What changed your mind?" She held his gaze, pleading with her eyes.
Ben swallowed hard. "The more attached I got to you-the more I came to care about you-the more I realized how selfish it would be to tell you. It might make me feel better, but it has the potential to put you in harm's way. That's the last thing on earth that I want to do."
"What about now?" she asked. "Is telling me now still selfish? Is it still putting me in harm's way?"
"Yes. Probably. I'm sorry. I-I-I couldn't take it anymore. Lying to you day after day. It was eating away at me. I couldn't stand it. Especially after what you told me yesterday. I had to tell you. I probably should have hurt you and made a clean break and walked away. That would have been the best way to keep you safe. But I guess I'm just too selfish for that. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry to do this to you." He couldn't meet her eyes anymore.
"No," she said firmly. "No. Telling me now isn't selfish. Telling me the truth is the right thing to do. And telling me two months ago would have been even righter. Don't act like I'm some delicate little bird that you need to protect. Don't do that."
He felt her glare beating down on him before he dared to lift his eyes and look at her face. "Two months ago, did you care about me enough to keep this secret for me? Could you have become a part of this conspiracy? Could you have lied to Ron and Ann and Paul and everyone else? Or would I have had to leave Pawnee?"
Leslie took a slow breath. "I don't know. I wish I could say yes, but really, I don't know."
Ben's gut churned again. Now came the real question. "What about now? Do I have to go home and tell Chris that we need to pack our bags because we have to leave Pawnee tomorrow? If that's what you want, I'll do it. I'm ready."
She scrunched her forehead and looked away from him, her eyes glistening. "That's not what I want."
"Leslie?" His heart flipped in his chest. Was there still a chance that she could forgive him for deceiving her for so long? "What do you want me to do? Just name it, and I'll do it. Anything."
"I still don't know." She shook her head. "I want everyone to be safe, but-but I don't want you to leave. Not yet."
She held his gaze, and the hope in his chest rose even higher. "Okay. Okay. So-so what about right now? What do you want right now?"
Her chest swelled with another deep breath. "Talk to me. That's what I want. Right now. You told me some of the truth yesterday and in that email. But I want to hear it from your mouth. I want to talk to the real you. To Ben Adams."
This was what he'd been wanting. What he'd been waiting for. Yet he'd been holding onto his lies for so long that it almost hurt to let them go. But it was the best kind of pain-like pulling out a splinter so the wound could start to heal. "Okay. I can do that. Where do I start?"
She gazed off into space for a moment before meeting his eyes again. "Start at the beginning. Tell me about what it was like to get thrown out of office when you were mayor."
Oh boy. He nodded and started to speak.
~ ~ ~
Leslie felt as if she were seeing Ben with completely new eyes as she listened to him talk about being an eighteen year old kid, facing down the entire town council as they cast their unanimous votes to kick him out. She could tell that the old wound from his time as mayor of Partridge hadn't healed cleanly.
Ben shook his head as he finished his sad tale. "There's no question I screwed up. I screwed up big. But the town council also found the perfect scapegoat for all the screw-ups they'd been making with the town budget for ten years or more. They had me, and they had Icetown. So they managed to hide every ball they'd dropped over the years by dumping the whole kit and caboodle right in my lap. And the whole town bought it. Even my dad." His voice was heavy with old bitterness.
"So what you told me about your father-that was true?" she said.
"Every word of it."
"Did you leave right away?" She wouldn't blame him if he did. What they'd done to him was far too much for a kid his age to have to bear.
He shrugged. "I tried to stick it out for a few months. I'd deferred my acceptance to Northwestern in Chicago to spend a year playing mayor, so I couldn't start up right away. But Partridge got pretty unbearable pretty fast. So when a cousin of mine who lived in Wisconsin told me I could crash with her until it was time for my freshman year to start, I jumped at the chance. I stayed with her until September, and then started up school in Chicago. I haven't been back to Partridge for more than five days at a time ever since."
Leslie bit down on her tongue to stop herself from exclaiming her shock. Even when she'd been living in Bloomington for school, she'd come home at least once a week. But she'd had friends and parents who loved her to come to. Ben hadn't been so lucky.
"So, is all that mess the reason you chose the corporate world over public service?"
Ben sighed and leaned farther back into the couch cushions. "Not completely. I still had hope that other avenues of public service might still be worthwhile. I majored in accounting, but I got a minor in political science. The summer after my junior year I interned at a congressional office in D.C." Ben had a sour look on his face.
"I take it from your tone that it didn't go well?"
"At first it seemed to go great," he said. "I was in the nation's capitol, working for an honest-to-god lawmaker. The congressman seemed like a good man. I respected his policy positions, and I was happy to be contributing. I thought I was living the dream-rubbing shoulders with the people who really made a difference in our country."
It did sound pretty great. "So what went wrong?"
"There was this girl," Ben shook his head. "Another intern. She was smart and pretty and fun, and she seemed to like me, but when I asked her out she shot me down." He shrugged. "I'd been rejected before. I got over it. But then at the end of the summer, word of a scandal hit the news. The congressman had been caught having an affair." He met Leslie's gaze with a bitter glint in his eyes. "With one of his interns."
Leslie felt sick. "With the girl you liked?"
He nodded. "The very one. It was a fairly disillusioning experience, to say the least."
"God, you had the worst luck. No wonder you decided the corporate world might be a better place to hang your hat."
"That was pretty much my line of thinking." His face took on an almost apologetic expression. "I wanted to serve my community. I wanted to help people. To make the world a better place. But after the impeachment and then the congressional scandal I felt like my idealism had been nothing but a child's dream. I didn't believe that genuinely good public servants really existed. It was all a pleasant fantasy that people tried to hold onto to help them sleep better at night. At least in the corporate world people would be honest about their greed and self-interest. They didn't try to hide it behind pretty words and political platforms. But then I went to work for Everson." He looked out into space, his eyes bleak. "And I realized that their lies could be even worse."
Leslie sucked on her bottom lip, unsure of what to say. It was a wonder his faith in humanity hadn't vanished completely.
He turned his head to look at her again. "Then I came here." His lips curled up in a faint hint of a smile. "And I realized that good people and good public servants still existed. I just hadn't known where to find them."
Leslie's heart flipped in her chest. She snaked her arm out over the distance between them on the couch and grasped his hand. "I'm glad you came here."
"So am I."
She held his gaze for a moment, her heart racing. But she couldn't let herself get too distracted by emotions. Not yet. They still had a lot of ground to cover.
"So," she said, "let's move on to your adventures in corporate America. Tell me how you ended up in the medical industry."
~ ~ ~
Ben felt like pulling his hair out. Why wouldn't she understand? She'd been fine during his hour-long recitation of his pre-Everson work history, but now she was stuck on this, and he couldn't get her past it.
"There was nothing I could have done," he repeated again. "Every time I noticed one of those discrepancies, I reported it up the chain. That was my job. That was what I was supposed to do. I wasn't a forensic investigator. I was an auditor. Those aren't the same thing."
"So all those little discrepancies," Leslie put air quotes around the word, "didn't make you suspicious that maybe you were working for a greedy ruthless despot?"
"Ugh." He clenched his fists and pounded once on his thighs before taking a deep breath. "Yes, I was suspicious. Yes, doubts nagged the back of my mind. But most of what I found was normal, ordinary things. Little accounting blunders that anyone anywhere could have made. It's not like the suspicious stuff was pilling up in a massive, undeniable way. Because it wasn't. So I reported them, my superiors told me they were being taken care of, and I moved on. I had no cause to do anything more."
Leslie opened her mouth with what was sure to be another emotionally charged accusation, but Ben cut her off. "And yes, I could have dug deeper and done some investigating on my own, but you know what would have happened then? I probably would have been reprimanded for straying from my assigned projects. I would have been transferred, or even fired. And then who knows if anyone ever would have brought the evidence to the feds?"
"But don't you feel guilty?" she retorted.
"Of course I feel guilty!" How could she believe otherwise? "These crimes were perpetrated under my watch. People were defrauded and hurt and even died while I was employed there. How could I not feel guilty? So yes, I do lie awake at night wondering what more I could have done. And yes, I feel culpable in my own small way for those people who relapsed after their drugs weren't available any more. I feel that blood on my hands each and every day. But every time I dissect it-every time I analyze it-I don't think I could have done any more than I did." He shook his head.
"I don't know what more I can say to you," he continued. "I really don't. I'm trying to bring justice to the people who were most responsible for these crimes. And maybe, in some way, this will help make amends for my not being able to stop them from committing the crimes in the first place." He met her eyes. "But if you think I won't carry the guilt of those deaths and that suffering for the rest of my life, then you're dead wrong."
Instantly Ben worried that he'd gone too far when he saw Leslie blinking back moisture from her eyes.
"I'm sorry," she said. "I shouldn't have pushed you like that. I know you care. I know you feel responsible. I'm sorry."
Ben scooted closer to her and took her hand again. "Hey-it's okay. I didn't mean to snap at you like that."
She shook her head. "I deserved it."
"No. You didn't." Ben's heart hurt. God, even when she was being a brat, all he wanted to do was hold her. Does she even have any idea how amazing she is? He was inclined to think that she didn't.
"Do you want to change the subject for a while?" he asked.
"Yes," she said. "How about-how about you tell me more about your family?"
~ ~ ~
"You mean you were in Indianapolis that whole time you were supposed to be in Partridge?" Leslie exclaimed. She felt a well of outrage rising inside of her. She'd chosen this topic to stop them from fighting more, but it appeared to be having the opposite effect.
Ben spread his hands and shook his head. "What else was I supposed to do? I needed to maintain my cover, and, at the time, I felt like putting a little distance between us might be a good idea."
"Oh my god." Leslie put a hand to her head. It was all she could do to stop herself from throwing a pillow at him. They'd shared an intense, beautiful, emotional night together, and he'd felt like putting distance between them was a good idea? "So all that crap about your mom, and all that research we did-"
"Hey," he interrupted, "the thing with my mom was real. She really did get in a car crash, and I really did find out about it that day. That part wasn't a lie."
Sifting the truth from the lies was more complicated than Leslie had imagined. "Your mom really was in the hospital? Is she okay?"
Ben wore a pained expression. "I think so. I hope so."
"Why didn't you go to her?" She thought she knew the answer, but she wanted to hear it from him.
"Because that's exactly what Everson wanted. He wants to draw me out of hiding so his goons can finish the dirty work. That's why they tampered with my mom's breaks to make sure she had an accident."
Leslie's jaw dropped and she rose to her feet, her ire overflowing. Only this time it had a new target. "He went after your mom?!" She stomped, pacing back and forth across the room. "Oh my god-that man is pure evil. He is the literal worst. You have to stop him. He must be stopped."
"Exactly!" Ben sat up straight, shaking his hands at his sides in emphasis. "And that's exactly what my mom told me. We were able to talk for a few minutes, and she told me not to worry about her because taking Everson down is the most important job in my life right now. But then I slipped up and got drunk and told you too much, and so I had to pretend to be going to Partridge to maintain my cover. But that research-it was all real. It was exactly what I would have done if I'd been able to go to Partridge for real. I saved everything in a document on my laptop. I've thought about trying to mail it to her, but it seemed too risky. I want to do something to help, but my hands are tied."
Leslie stopped her pacing and stared at him, her chest heaving with emotion. "I could send it to her. After you leave. I can send it to her."
Ben's eyes went wide. "You'd do that for me?"
"Of course I will. You put all that effort in because you love your mom. And some of it might even be things she hasn't thought of yet. Absolutely I'll send it to her."
Ben pointed and wagged his finger. "Better yet, send it to her best friend, Autumn Forkner. My mom still isn't in a position to be doing much for herself. I'm sure Autumn is stepping up to take care of her."
"Yes. I'll send it to both of them if I have to. Email the document to me with their addresses and I'll mail it the day after you leave."
Ben's smile looked almost disbelieving. "Thank you. That means a lot to me."
"No problem." She hated that normal acts of human kindness shocked him so much. No one deserved to live that kind of life. Especially not someone as good as Ben.
Because he was good, she realized. In spite of everything he'd been through, he was an amazingly good person. Sure, he'd made his share of mistakes-but that only made him human.
Leslie sat back down beside him. "Hey-I'll check in on her, for you. I'll make sure she's all right."
His eyes glistened as he looked away and nodded. "I can't think of anyone I'd rather have on the job."
~ ~ ~
". . . conspiracy, and the big one, fourteen counts of negligent homicide," said Leslie, ticking Everson's charges off on her fingers. "Did I get them all?"
Ben smiled down at his hand resting on Leslie's thigh. He still felt more than a little excited that she hadn't objected when he put it there. "You missed one," he said. "Tax fraud."
"Yes! How could I forget tax fraud," she said, her eyes lighting up. "Hey-I think I read something about you and Chris standing to get some sort of financial pay-out if the conviction for tax fraud goes through. What's up with that?"
Ben sighed and rolled his eyes. "It's this old IRS rule to incentivize whistleblowing. If they succeed in recovering back taxes, they pay out a percentage of the recovered funds as a reward to the person who reported the tax fraud. But I hope you don't think that had anything to do with me and Chris going to the feds, because it didn't."
She shook her head and smiled. "I don't think that. You went to feds because it was the right thing to do. Because you're good guys."
"Exactly." Ben felt warm all over. "We're good guys."
Leslie's stomach rumbled loudly. "God, I'm starving," she said. "I don't think I've had anything but coffee and chocolate since lunch yesterday."
Ben raised his eyebrows. "Do you want to make something? Or-"
"JJ's. I need waffles."
There was no arguing with that.
~ ~ ~
"Remember," murmured Leslie urgently, "no conversation. We order, we eat, we leave. I'm too hyped up to talk-I'll say something I shouldn't."
"Got it." Ben nodded as they sat down at their table. "No talking."
"Silence."
"Complete silence."
Leslie fidgeted and twitched constantly while they waited for their food. She felt like a seven year old taking a math test. How was she supposed to keep quite while there was so much going on inside her head?
Ben smiled at her bemusedly. "You don't seem to be handling this whole silence thing too well."
"Shut up." She glared at him.
Finally, their food arrived. She wolfed down her double order of waffles with ravenous abandon. Waffles had never tasted so good.
On her last bite her eyes went wide and she perked up as a sudden epiphany struck. "Tonya's one of your marshals!"
Ben froze, his fork halfway to his mouth, looking stunned.
"Crap!" Leslie covered her mouth. "Silence. Sorry."
A few minutes later, after heading out and sliding back into her car, Ben said, "Just for the record, you're right. Agent Tonya Burdette is, in fact, one of the marshals handling me and Chris, along with agent Ryan Lewis."
Leslie shook her head as she drove. "God. I can't believe I used to be jealous of her."
"Really?" Ben sounded positively tickled. "You were jealous?"
Smug idiot. If he wasn't so cute, she might almost get mad at him again.
~ ~ ~
Ben sat with his arm around Leslie's shoulders as she leaned against him on her couch. Yeah-he could be happy doing this pretty much forever.
"I'm not trying to defend how he treated her," Ben said, "because it's true, he treated her like crap."
"Yes, he did," Leslie agreed. Of course she would agree-it was her best friend they were talking about.
"But he genuinely thought that she was just using him to rebound from that Mark guy, so he thought it would be fine to use her to rebound from his ex back in Atlanta. That doesn't excuse the way he drew things out after Ann started to get more serious." Ben shrugged. "I don't know. Neither of us handled this whole secret identity thing very well. I'm sorry that his mistakes ended up hurting Ann like that."
"I guess I understand." Leslie snuggled a little closer. "But it still sucks."
"Yes, it does." Lord, it felt good to hold her.
"Did he really love her-the woman in Atlanta?"
Ben nodded. "Yep. He really did. They were getting ready to move in together when he and I finally decided to go to the feds together. He felt like he had to break up in order to protect her. But he's still not over her."
"That really sucks, too."
"Yeah. It does." Ben held her a little tighter, wondering how long it would take him to get over Leslie. Even thinking about it hurt like hell.
He closed his eyes and tried to think about something else.
~ ~ ~
It was long after dark, and Leslie felt exhausted. There was only so much deep, soul-searching conversation a person could handle in a day, and she'd just about reached her limit. But there was one more thing she needed to ask.
She cleared her throat. "So-what comes next? After you leave. What happens when you get to Atlanta?"
Ben rubbed her arm with his hand and pulled her a little closer. "They'll keep us in a safe-house near the city until it's time to testify. And then we'll testify. And then we'll wait for a verdict."
"And what then? What happens to you after the trial? Will you ever be able to go back to your old life?"
"It depends on the verdict. The prosecutor's team went through all this with us before we came to Pawnee. If Everson and the others are guilty on most or all counts, we'll stay in protective custody a little longer to see what might happen with appeals. Then, a year or so down the road, we'll reassess the danger level, and if the threat against us has receded they'll give us a choice between taking our chances and returning to our previous lives, or they'll give us the option of permanent relocation with a permanent new identity. It all depends on the threat level and whether or not they'll need us for in-person testimony at any appeals trials."
"A year?" It was even worse than she'd expected.
"Or more. Nothing is certain with this kind of situation. You kind of have to take it one day at a time."
Leslie's throat tightened up and she fought to blink back tears. "And what about if he's found not guilty?"
Ben's voice was rough when he answered. "They'll give us the same options. But Everson is a pretty vindictive guy. Going back to our old lives would pretty much be inviting him to come after us."
"So you'll either go into hiding for the rest of your life or live with a constant death threat hanging over you?" No one deserved to live like that. No one.
"That about sums it up," he replied.
Leslie couldn't stop her tears from welling. It wasn't fair. None of it was fair.
Ben was the good guy. He was the one who'd done the right thing. Yet he was being punished for it. Why should he have to give up years of his life-or more-just because he chose to do the right thing? Nothing about this was fair.
"I wish it could be different," he said softly. "You have no idea how much I wish it could be different. And for what it's worth, if I really was Ben Wyatt, I'd say to hell with the Atlanta job in an instant and do everything in my power to stay right here in Pawnee for as long as possible. I just-I wanted you to know that."
Leslie clutched at his shirt and buried her face against his chest as a sob escaped her throat. She couldn't think-she couldn't reason-she could only feel a horrible, bleak sense of loss.
Ben didn't deserve any of this.
And she didn't want him to leave. But there was nothing she could do to stop him. And she might never see him again.
Everything hurt.
She sobbed again.
"Oh god," he said, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to make you cry. I'm so sorry." He wrapped his arms around her as she shook against him, sobbing even harder.
"Leslie-I'm so, so sorry. This is why I tried not to get involved with you. Because I knew it would end this way. What can I do? I'm so sor-"
She lifted her head and glared at him. "Just shut up and let me cry, okay? Sometimes a person just needs to cry."
"Okay."
She buried her face back into his chest and let the tears flow free as sobs continued to shake her body. There was nothing else she could do but cry.
It took a long time for her tears to dry up and her sobbing to quiet down.
She felt utterly drained. But still she clung to him. It was childish, she knew, but she didn't want to let go. If she just held on tight enough, she could pretend that he wasn't going anywhere.
She was starting to understand why all of this had hit her so hard.
Ben was a man she could have fallen in love with. She could see that now. With his decency and his commitment to doing the right thing, with his cute nerdiness and his adorable face, with his kindness and intelligence, with his quirky sense of humor and his persistent tendency to put the needs of others before himself, he was everything she could have fallen for permanently and irrevocably.
She grasped his shirt a little tighter.
She wasn't ready to let go.
~ ~ ~
Ben let a few tears roll down his own cheeks as he held Leslie against him, his heart breaking all over again.
He'd had weeks-months, even-to prepare himself for this. But it hadn't been enough. Nothing would have really been enough. And for Leslie, to have it all dumped on her over the course of a day and half, he couldn't blame her for needing to cry.
He wished with all his heart that there was something he could do to help her-to make things better. But what could possibly make this better?
Eventually her sobbing quieted, and she lay still against his chest. He stroked her soft golden hair, and briefly let himself imagine a world where he got to hold her like this every day. He knew he shouldn't torture himself like that, but sometimes he couldn't help himself.
"I think I've cried all the tears I have in me for today," she said in a raw voice, just above a whisper.
Ben stroked her hair again and ran a hand up and down her back. "I don't know what else to say. I wish I knew what to say."
Leslie lifted her head to meet his gaze with red eyes and a pale, weary face. She shook her head. "You don't have to say anything."
Her eyes held his for another moment before flitting down to his lips. Just as he realized what was happening she moved forward, brushing her lips against his.
He kissed her back. How could he not?
What he didn't expect was her response.
She clutched at his face and his neck, shifting her whole body onto his lap and opening her mouth to him, pulling him deeper. She ground against him, stroking and caressing him as she kissed him with a wild, wanton hunger that sent waves of heat coursing through his veins.
His heart pounded as his hands eagerly explored her body and he feasted on her kiss. He grew dizzy with excitement when she gasped against his lips.
He pulled back slightly, still touching and caressing her as he struggled to catch his breath. "This is insane. I'm leaving in just over two weeks. What the hell are we doing?"
"I don't care if it's crazy. The next two weeks might be all we ever get, and I just want to be with you, starting right now. Spend the rest of the weekend with me. Please? I just want to be with you." Her voice cracked as she spoke.
His head spun in disbelief. After all this-after all the lies and all the danger-she still wanted him. The real him. It was more than he'd ever let himself hope for.
God, he loved her. He might go the rest of his life loving Leslie Knope.
"It's going to be so hard when I have to leave . . ." His voice came out rough with emotion.
"It's going to be hard no matter what," she said, cupping his face in her palms and caressing his cheeks with her thumbs. "Nothing's going to make it easier. So let's just be together now, while we have a chance. This is what I want. What do you want?"
The mixture of fear and hope on her face and in her voice overwhelmed him. What had he ever done to deserve this?
"Yes," he said, unable to answer any other way. "Yes." And he captured her lips in another kiss.
~ ~ ~
Leslie tore at Ben's buttons. The damn things wouldn't come undone fast enough. A giddy giggle escaped from her throat as she finally pushed his shirt open and ran her hands over his deceptively slender but strong body.
"What's so funny?" he asked, grinning at her where she sat still perched in his lap.
She shook her head, the loose curls that had fallen free from her ponytail swishing against her face. "Nothing. Everything. I don't know."
She kissed him again. And again.
His hand slid across the skin under her t-shirt, and he worked his way under her bra to massage her breast. She leaned into his touch and laughed again.
This time Ben laughed back. "What? Are you ticklish?"
"No. I just-I feel like laughing." It was either that or start crying again, and she'd had enough of tears for one day.
Leslie scooted off his lap and stood up before tugging him to his feet after her.
"Okay," she said, "I've got you to myself for the next thirty-six-ish hours, and we're going to make the most of it. But first, it's been nearly two days since I showered. I'm inclined to think that the rest of this evening's activities will be funner for both of us if I clean up a little first. So, how about we head upstairs to my room, and I'll take a shower, and maybe you can join me?" She wagged her eyebrows suggestively.
He clung to her hand and ran the fingers of his other hand up and down her arm. "That sounds like a pretty awesome plan, to me."
"Good." She cocked her head toward the stairs. "Come on."
Though she'd felt utterly spent just a few minutes ago, a fresh surge of energy coursed through her. She thought it must be something like the adrenaline rush skydivers felt while they were free-falling, but before they pulled their parachutes.
Everything about what she was doing was utterly insane. She'd made quite a few rash decisions in her life, but nothing quite like this. Oh well. No regrets. No turning back. She'd made up her mind, and nothing was going to dissuade her.
Once they reached her bathroom, Leslie finished pulling Ben's shirt off of him and made quick work of his pants, too. In just a few seconds he stood in front of her wearing nothing but the hands she couldn't seem to keep off of him.
She ran her fingers over every inch of him, trying to memorize every curve and contour. She never wanted to forget this. None of it.
"I think you have me at a disadvantage," he murmured, hooking his fingers inside the waistbands of both her sweatpants and her panties and tugging them down all at once.
She giggled again and took her hands off of him long enough to let him pull her t-shirt off over her head. She had her bra unlatched before the shirt even hit the floor.
This was perfect. Nothing between them-no lies, no distance, no fabric. Everything could finally just be real.
Ben kissed her again. He kissed her like there was no tomorrow, and she ached again for just a moment as she remembered that in two weeks there really would be no tomorrow.
No. Not now. Not thinking about that tonight.
She ran her hands over his back and grabbed his ass, pulling him closer.
His lips drifted off of her mouth and snaked their way down her neck. She gasped when his hand slid between her legs.
Okay. She couldn't wait for the shower.
"Now," she groaned.
He lifted his head and raised his eyebrows. "Now?"
"Get over here." She stepped to her bathroom counter, tugging him after.
Pushing her scattered products out of the way, she sat on the bare counter between her two sinks and pulled Ben between her legs. "Come on. Right here, right now."
Ben nodded, a dazed expression on his face, before leaning forward to kiss her one more time.
Too slow. She needed more.
She reached out to guide him in, and closed her eyes, breathing sharply as their bodies merged.
He started to thrust, slowly and rhythmically, while she wrapped her legs around his waist, drawing him deeper. She clung to his shoulders, digging her fingertips into his back.
Closer. She needed him closer. He could never be close enough.
"Leslie-you're amazing," Ben muttered, his lips moving against her left temple. "You're so fucking beautiful."
She laughed again, though it almost came out as a sob. When he called her beautiful, she could actually believe it. Tonight, anything was possible.
A few minutes later, Ben came with a shudder and a moan. Leslie continued to cling to him, wanting to hold onto that closeness for just a little longer.
Eventually he shifted, placing a soft kiss on her forehead and running his fingertips along her jaw before meeting her eyes.
"I guess we both really needed that," he said, wearing a boyish grin.
"Yes. Most definitely." And she felt confident that she'd need it several more times before the weekend was out. "And now," she added, "I really need that shower. Come on."
Once again, he followed where she led.
~ ~ ~
In the dim light of a single lamp, Chris stared down at the text glowing up at him from the screen of his phone.
"Spending weekend with Leslie. Everything's good. Don't worry."
He sighed. But he would worry. Just like he'd worried all day.
He put his phone down and walked over to his bed where his suitcases sat, packed and ready to go.
"I guess it's time to put these away," he whispered aloud.
One at a time he lifted his carefully folded and arranged clothes out of the suitcases and hung them in his closet or placed them in drawers. The condo was utterly, eerily silent around him.
He'd never felt more alone in his life.
When Chris reached the bottom of his suitcase, he stared at the book lying there.
It was a beautifully illustrated copy of the Tao Te Ching-one of the few possessions he'd managed to salvage from his previous life.
Kelsey gave it to him as a gift not long before they broke up.
It hadn't been a special occasion. She'd simply seen it in a book shop, and bought it for him because she thought he'd like it.
He picked it up and ran his fingers along the spine, knowing that what he was about to do would draw him into a spiral he might not be able to escape from.
He did it anyway.
Cracking the spine, he lifted out the bookmark: a single strip of three photos from a novelty photo-booth.
He and Kelsey sat side by side, her arm around his shoulders, their cheeks pressed together as they smiled and made silly faces for the camera.
They were the only pictures of Kelsey he had left, and he hadn't looked at them in nearly a year.
Chris felt his heart contract painfully as he sank into his desk chair, staring at her face. He could still remember the scent of her shampoo. The sound of her laughter. The glint of her eyes in the moonlight.
He stared at those photos long into the night, desperately trying to remember what it felt like to be happy.
TBC
Part 18 here