Romancing the Pain - Part 12
Title: Romancing the Pain
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Pepa/Silvia
Summary: Post episode 104 as well as my last fic, Come Back to Me. It’s basically its sequel; the events that occur after Silvia was released from the hospital.
A/N: Was gonna post this when I got up this morning but I overslept and it turned into one those "you know when your day starts off bad it's just gonna get worse (and it did)" days. *scowls* But anyway, here's the next installment. Thank you for those who continue to read and comment. I'm really grateful for your continued support and appreciative that you take the time to drop a note about what you thought. So thank you. Hope you enjoy this one.
ROMANCING THE PAIN - Part 12
Three weeks later
Silvia leaned forward onto her desk, sifting through the array of photographs she had taken at the crime scene of the precinct’s latest case. She sighed and rubbed at her temples, attempting to ward off an impending headache she knew was knocking teasingly at the base of her skull.
***********
It had been three weeks since Pepa disappeared. Three weeks of panic attacks, paranoid thoughts, jumping to the worse case scenarios. Three weeks of swinging from bouts of anger to drowning in such loneliness that Silvia thought she was going mad. Finally, Silvia couldn’t take it anymore. She had stormed into the precinct, hair mussed from constant disturbance of restless fingers, eyes slightly wild and face so gaunt and pale that it was disturbingly obvious to observers that the redhead was bordering on a nervous breakdown. The redhead had pointedly ignored the looks of pity and trepidation aimed her way, brushed past an overly concerned Rita and barged into her father’s office, demanding to be let off her sabbatical lest she lose what was left of her mind.
Don Lorenzo nearly underwent a case of shock upon seeing his daughter burst into his office, looking like she had gone through the seven circles of hell…twice. Her normally thin frame was reduced to nothing but skin and bones and her creamy white skin was overshadowed by a pasty whiteness that was touching on the shade of unhealthy. However, it was the swirling emptiness in her eyes, confounded only by a primal wildness that had caused the commissioner to flinch. It was a look normally reserved for victims of war or natural disasters and yet here it was, in all its glory, glinting dangerously off Silvia’s chocolate brown eyes.
The older man had only agreed, after tearing into his daughter about (literally) worrying herself to death, to Silvia’s terms because he felt it safer for his daughter to be in the same building where he could keep an eye on her. If not him, then any other member of the precinct, who was just as worried and apprehensive of what Silvia could and would do if left alone.
When his daughter left just as abruptly as she had come, the commissioner had sunk back into his chair, feeling all of his sixty odd years crashing down on him, pressing on his shoulders with such a force that he thought he felt his spine creak under the pressure. He had kneaded at fatigued eyes with intermittent swipes of his knuckles, willing for some sense of serenity he knew was too far out of reach.
For three weeks, he had exhausted every manpower under his direct command in trying to find his daughter in law. He himself had wrangled a list of Pepa’s favorite haunts from Silvia and diligently staked those places out. From bars to beaches to parks to that indoor paintballing facility downtown. He had even taken a day off to drive down to Sevilla to inquire about Pepa’s whereabouts at her old precinct. Yet nothing. It was almost as if the brunette had dropped off the side of the earth.
The older man’s frustrations over the past three weeks had grown and mounted to such a height that he suffered a near collapse the other day when he was about to leave the precinct. That was when Silvia called off the search after helping her father into a chair and checking over him, her administrations jerky and panicked. “Let her come back on her own,” his daughter had said. She did not sound angry. She was simply resigned and Don Lorenzo was secretly relieved. He knew of Pepa’s infamous stubbornness firsthand. If she did not want to be found, he knew that not even trained professionals had a shot in hell of finding the lanky brunette. Therefore, Don Lorenzo obliged his daughter, along with her request to return to work.
And work was all Silvia did. She threw herself into examining evidence, combing crime scenes and filling out autopsy reports with a meticulousness and drive that clearly indicated just how desperate she was to block everything else out. Pepa. Her father. Her friends. Her feelings. Life. Especially life. Without Pepa, there was no life. Without Pepa, Silvia was merely a smear on the vast ocean of existence. A ship without its captain and crew. Silvia wanted no part of this existence. Work gave her amnesty from that. A way to forget, to pretend.
The redhead knew that the only reason her father hadn’t called her out on her sudden ability to churn out twice her weekly workload or why she was always the first to arrive and the last to leave the precinct (if she left at all), was because he was petrified at what she would do if she was home alone.
So Silvia took advantage of her father’s blind eye to her workaholic ethic. She spent all day in her lab, locking herself out from the world. Lost in her autopsies, evidence and chemicals, Silvia could almost imagine everything was ok...until Sara, Paco, Rita or her father knocked on the door and pierced her bubble of solitude. Silvia would grudgingly allow them in, curtly answer their questions, bluntly brush away their tentative concerns and abruptly end a painfully one-sided conversation in way of getting them to leave. Her tactics eventually took hold; their visits had become rare in the last week or so.
**************
A sharp knock on the door caused the redhead to roll her eyes. Apparently not rare enough. “Come in,” Silvia barked in an agitated tone. She shoved her nose back into the pile of photographs, purposely purporting the illusion that she was busy.
Don Lorenzo walked in, closing the door behind him. He leaned against it and crossed his arms, sighing in exasperation at the sight of his daughter before him. “Hija, it’s eleven o’clock. Go home.”
Silvia waved a dismissive hand in her father’s direction. “I’m not tired.” She refused to look at the older man. Refused to be confronted with the looks of fatherly concern she knew would be projected from his eyes. No. Silvia could not afford to break down. She needed to be strong. She needed to solve this case.
Don Lorenzo blew out an annoyed breath. “Silvia, cojones, it’s late. Go home.” He emphasized the last word loudly; his anger and irritation simmering under the surface of his thinly veiled patience, just itching to boil over.
Silvia gritted her teeth, biting down the urge to throw her father a snarky remark. Why couldn’t he just leave her alone? She decided not to answer, allowing her father to interpret her sullen silence however he chose.
Don Lorenzo rolled his eyes heavenward, muttering a curse under his breath. Of all the things his daughter had to inherit from him, why his bull-headedness? He marched over to the sulking redhead and slammed a palm down onto the evidence photos. The unexpected movement had its desired effect.
Silvia flinched and jerked away, almost sliding off her chair. She finally looked up at her father, glaring daggers at him for interrupting her.
The commissioner glared back, never one to back down. The tension in the room rose several notches, growing heavier with each second and percolating the atmosphere. Don Lorenzo’s lips curled back against his teeth in a snarl. “Silvia, if you don’t go home this instance, I’m getting the front desk to deny you entry into this precinct.” He caught the beginnings of a smirk on Silvia’s lips, as if she thought he was kidding. He leveled a warning finger at her nose. “Don’t think I won’t,” he growled, voice armed with threat.
The smirk collapsed, failing to make a full arrogant appearance as it slinked down the edges of Silvia’s lips. The redhead scowled up at her father. “Fine,” she muttered. She stood up and gathered the photographs, organizing them into a neat pile. She then turned and brushed past her father.
“I’ll just look over these at home,” she interjected patronizingly. Without looking over her shoulder, she knew her father had narrowed his eyes to slits, drilling twin holes to the back of her head for talking back. She ignored him. Walking over to the coat hanger, she grabbed her jacket and shrugged it on then pulled open her bag to shove the photos in. Without a backward glance to her father, Silvia stalked out the door, leaving an extremely aggravated Don Lorenzo behind.