Second Chances Chapter Four
Changes?
John and Harold, Harold Finch, the alias Reese found out his mysterious new employer went by now, spent the next six months saving numbers or stopping them. The Machine’s creator remained aloof, secretive, and untouchable. Of course those only made John want to know all the more about the genius. That’s what the former CIA agent told himself, he just needed to know more about the man he now worked for.
That is until the night Detective Carter, whose life the op had recently saved and was deceived by Reese’s former handler, CIA agent Snow, gave away John’s location. Unbeknownst to the police detective Snow set up another ambush; John was shot barely escaping with his life down a stair well.
Reese knew this was the end. The dying man called Harold to tell him thanks for giving him the job and even if no one else knew, the former soldier would die going down helping people. Yes his new boss and handler was right, all John ever really wanted to do was help people. After becoming CIA, Reese had lost that somewhere along the way, the helping; the reclusive billionaire returned that to him.
It was a call to say goodbye and thank you, that was all. Never did he expect his distant employer to say he was coming to help, almost pleading for John to hold on. No one had put their life on the line for him, not Kara, not Mark, yet here was this paranoid recluse who treated John with disdain more times than not, risking his life now to save the gravely injured former assassin.
Reese tried to warn his boss to stay away. Harold could be killed. No John couldn’t let another person he loved die. Loved? The slowly dying man haltingly descended the stairs, life gradually flowing out with the blood, his thought process steadily shutting down, but one thing still remained surprisingly clear. John Reese was in love with Harold Finch, had been from the moment he’d slammed the startled man into the wall of that hotel room and looked into the face of the bravest person the former soldier had ever met.
Reese couldn’t physically save Harold, but if he could just make it to the other man, maybe they could get away before agent Snow found them. One more flight, then the door, he could make it…
The rapidly fading Reese pushed his way out the stairwell door, trying to not fall down, as he heard the Towncar hitting the speed bumps to fast and then screech to a halt. Just a few more feet and John was there, falling into Finch’s surprisingly strong arms. He tried to say, “We have to go!”, thought ‘this is a good place to die in your arms Harold, do you know I love you?’
John heard the door behind him open, Detective Carter’s “You?” and turned his head to see her gun pointed at them. All the wounded man could do was shift his body slightly, shield Harold if she took the shot. Did he feel those arms tighten protectively around him?
Surprisingly Carter watched Finch holding up his wounded partner before she holstered her gun and helped John into the car. Harold limped as fast as he could back around to get in and they were speeding off into the night……
John didn’t know how much about what happened after….”I love you Harold, I don’t want to leave you…”
”Just hold on John, I love you too, you have to hang on for me, I can’t lose you now…”
When John’s mind was no longer fogged by drugs or the pain from his gunshot wounds, after he was beginning to heal from them in one of the billionaire’s safe houses, Harold moved him to an apartment to further recuperate, or so he said.
Neither man mentioned the shooting or what happened afterwards. John wasn’t even sure if Finch had said any of those things. Harold wasn’t so aloof now, he treated John differently, even actually seemed to like him. But love John?
Regardless, whatever the other man’s feelings for him were, John had no doubts what was in his own heart. He loved Harold Finch. Where that came from he didn’t know, he’d never even been attracted to another man before in his life let alone fallen in love with one. Yes John didn’t just love Harold; he was in love with him. If his reclusive friend never returned that love, that was fine. John planned to spend whatever time the operative had left in their mission loving the paranoid genius, even if it was in secret, being whatever Harold needed him to be.
There were more numbers, as they had started calling them. Most of those people were in some kind of danger, victims, those they saved and some were perpetrators, those they stopped. Occasionally they got some justice for the causalities Finch hadn’t been able to save. Number by number they both healed. John from being the monster he had become, Harold from the guilt he felt from failures before John became his partner.
~*~
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen