I put my arms instinctively around my shoulders and stood across from him, watching silently. Suddenly, the protective one-way mirror of the interrogation room did not provide me nearly the same amount of security as it had years before. I shivered asI watched the murder slide into the room with a smug look stretched on his sharp features and clatter down on the wooden chair, legs spread and back slouched. Martin stood across from him and wrote something down on his report when the murder slowly turned and looked directly into the mirror and straight into my eyes. I gasped and stumbled backward, caught off-guard. Jack and Vivian heard my reaction and turned to where I stood.

"Are you alright?" Vivian asked, frowning. I understood her confusion. Never once in my whole career had I flinched at a convict, murder or common thief. However, as I looked at the man who smirked at me with a sadistic grin on the other side of the glass, I felt my body tremble uncontrollably. "Sam?" I placed my fingertips on my mouth and drummed them nervously on my upper lip.

"I'm fine," I stuttered. Vivian opened her mouth to continue but decided against it. Jack, however, watched me strangely and I shook off his gaze. "Go ahead. I just need a little air." The murderer who had raped and killed three young girls without any mercy whatsoever turned back to Martin and I escaped from the room, gasping for breath.

I grabbed my coat and punched the elevator button, riding down to ground level. I welcomed the calming noise of the busy sidewalk as I threw open the building doors and leaned against the wall. I sank down onto a bench and sat there for a while. The man's eyes were emblazoned on my mind and wouldn't leave. I rubbed my eyes with the heel of my palms until they were red and irritated. I couldn't afford to be acting like this at the beginning of a new case. I needed concentration. Total focus. Unconditional vigilance—

"Sam?" I jumped and nearly fell off of the bench as I heard Jack's voice appear out of nowhere. I steadied myself once again and looked up at his face which was shadowed against the dark gray sky.

"Jesus," I whispered, fumbling in my pocket for a cigarette, my first in years. He watched me quietly as I struggled to light the tobacco-filled end as the flame in my lighter flickered out once, twice, three times before he offered his own.

"You don't smoke," he observed. I snorted and breathed out the smoke through my nose, savoring the nicotine that rushed through my veins.

"You didn't know me six years ago," I chortled. "Pack a day at least. Nervous habit, I guess." Jack moved from his position at the wall and sat down beside me. I offered him a cigarette and he shook his head.

"I quit for the kids," he explained and I nodded respectively. After a pause he looked up at me and frowned. "What happened to you in there?" I took a drag on the cigarette to stall some time but he continued to stare at me expectantly and I was forced to answer.

"I don't know Jack," I answered him shortly. "Christ, I'm human aren't I? I'm allowed to screw up once in awhile, aren't I?" He held up his hands passively and turned to watching the street blankly. His silence only perturbed me more and I took a long breath on the cigarette before flicking it angrily on the sidewalk and crushing it with my foot. "I just froze, I guess. That man murdered three girls and has one captive in his demented world somewhere where we can't find her, where we can't be sure if she's even…" I let my hands drop to my sides, not realizing I had lifted them to begin with.

"We can't actually be sure if he's the one who committed those murders, Sam," he said with reluctance. I laughed bitterly and turned to him.

"Jack, I was there! I was the one who handled the case as a rookie! Hell, you even saw the blood stains on his walls! He ripped them apart. Raped them, pissed on them, and just ripped them apart, and yet you can sit there and tell me that he's a fucking innocent?" A couple people stared as I stood up in an angry outrage and paced along the sidewalk before a sudden wave of dizziness caused me to grope for the wall to support myself. Jack stood and gripped my arm until the feeling had passed. I wrenched my arm away from his. I needed to be angry with someone. I hated not being able to do or say anything more than neutral to the sons of a bitch who came into our office daily, and Jack, who bore it all with such placid nonchalance, was the recipient of my rage.

"Sam, please—"

"And who the hell are you to act all high and mighty anyway, Jack? You go day in and day out with that somber, steely, justice-be-done shit and act like you don't even give a fuck about who we find and who we don't! Don't you care? Don't you have any reaction? Jesus Christ, Jack, we're dealing with a man who knows he's got blood on his hand, revels in the fact that he ripped life out of them all, and you think it's noble, what you're doing? Vivian's not the only one who knows your past, Jack. I don't even need to know. I don't know what's worse, feeling all the hate that I do, or keeping it locked inside like it doesn't even fucking exist like you do!"

I watched his face, panting, waiting for a reaction. He stared into my eyes with stony eyes that I couldn't read with the intensity that radiated from them. After a moment, I gave up when I realized he wasn't going to react at all.

"Fine," I muttered, "Fine." I turned and walked away from him before suddenly turning around. "You know what? Maybe it's me. Maybe there's something wrong with me, but I don't know how you can sleep at night without them all breathing down you necks. Maybe I'm too fucked up for this job. Shit, there's always a desk job in Nebraska totally free from emotional attachment I would be perfect for."

I spun back around and blindly stumbled forward into the crowd. I could barely hear the din that resounded around me as the blood throbbed in my ears. People's faces turned into pale, solid blurs. And I suddenly felt lost in the city I had grown up in. My chest heaved in panic as I ran faster and faster through the crowd until my lungs burst in frustration and fear. A scream was building in my chest as the anxiety grew to phobia inside of me. I fell backwards in fear, waiting for the pavement to envelop me and instead collapsed into two arms.

"Oh, Jack," I shuddered, as my shoulders heaved. He stood there silently, holding me awkwardly in his arms while the city buzzed around us.