Title: Fruit Of The Poison Tree

Summary: Should the sins of the father be visited on the son? For McCoy and Markham, that question becomes more than academic theology. Someone's future is in the balance - but the answer lies in uncovering the secrets of the past.

Rating: M for coarse language, suggestive themes, sexual situations.

Disclaimer: I do not own "Law and Order", nor any of the characters therein. I am making no profit from this.

Characters: Jack McCoy, Arthur Branch, OFC, Serena Southerlyn, Mike Logan, Megan Wheeler, Robert Goren, Alexandra Eames, Ron Carver, Daniel Ross, Lennie Briscoe, Ed Green, Abbie Carmichael, Anita Van Buren, Emil Skoda, Tracey Kibre, Danielle Melnick, Nora Lewin, Melinda Warner, extras.

A/N: This story follows "Inevitable Discovery" and is another installment in the same series. It references events in the earlier stories but if you haven't read them I hope you can pick up here.

If ff net would let me add as many genres as I want, this story would be angst, drama, crime, hurt/comfort, romance, suspense and friendship.

If you read this and think at the beginning that there is some out-of-character behavior, I hope you will give me the benefit of the doubt and stick with it. I promise, everything will be explained by the end.

I am not NY native or indeed an American, as my woefully inadequate knowledge of NY geography and the American legal system makes perfectly clear! I do, however, love Law and Order. Down here in Oz, we get the episodes years late and often out of order, which has led to my long-standing confusion between who is in the show when and why and how old they are. My fannish imagination therefore has its own chronology, which differs from the show's canon in only three substantial ways: Lennie Briscoe didn't retire; Jack McCoy was snap-frozen ten years ago (since that's the age he is in the reruns that are all our free-to-air channels see fit to give us); and my series kicks off at the beginning of series seventeen, so it is substantially AU to everything from then on.

Cover image by HelloImNik

Impervious

Office of EADA Jack McCoy

10th Floor

One Hogan Place

7 pm Thursday May 3rd 2007

McCoy rubbed his hand over his eyes, unreasonably tired given how early it was. "Have you got the witness statements on Licardi?" he asked Regan.

"Right here." Regan leaned across his desk to hand the file to him. "You want to look at the post-it flags, they're the inconsistencies."

McCoy flipped the file open and began to read. "Good," he said after a moment. "Excellent, in fact. Where did you dig up this hawker?"

"Thank Ed Green's instincts for that," Regan said, smiling at the compliment.

"Puts Licardi at the scene," McCoy said, closing the file and handing it back. "Get his lawyer in here tomorrow and let's see if we can get him to take a plea."

"You don't think we can get him on Murder Two?" Regan asked.

"It's still dicey without the gun. But no deal unless he gives us something."

"Okay." Regan looked down at the files in her lap. "That's it, I think."

"Amazing," McCoy said. "Seven o'clock and we're done for the day. Again."

"Fourth time this week," Regan said, smiling.

McCoy looked at the stack of files by his blotter. The two of them churn through more cases than anyone else on the floor, with less overtime. Their position at the head of the 10th floor conviction league is unassailable. Not new for me. He knew it was for Regan, knew she enjoyed being talked about as a kick-ass prosecutor, one half of the DA's crack team of McCoy and Markham. She's learnt more about the law in the last six months than in all of law school. But that wasn't what had made the difference – any one of the ADAs on the floor could match her for legal knowledge. No, McCoy thought, it's because Regan reads witness statements and police reports and sees weak points and inconsistencies like other people see full stops and capital letters. By the time she brought a case to McCoy, trial ready, he had everything he needed to crack the defense like a rotten walnut. It wasn't police thinking, exactly – they had detectives and DA's investigators for that. Case building, McCoy thought, as Regan tucked her files under her arm and turned to the door. Not the law, not the detecting – making our case and destroying theirs.

It more than made up for the fact that she needed to ask his guidance on points of law and procedure far more often than any ADA he'd worked with before.

"Want to get a drink?" he asked before she could leave, standing and sauntering over to his clothes rack.

"Sure," Regan said, turning back. "There's a bunch of us going down to the Lord Roberts, why don't you join us?"

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different response. This had to be the twentieth time he'd suggested to Regan that they get a drink, maybe discuss their most pressing trial over a meal, since Arthur Branch had read them both the riot act. Any hint of scandal, and Regan – compared to McCoy, a completely expendable employee – would find herself out of a job. She'd taken it much more seriously than McCoy had – a week after that meeting, McCoy had realized Regan was avoiding even riding alone in elevators with him, let alone any social contact. He dropped by Abbie Carmichael's for a meal – and Regan was out with friends. As for the possibility of the two of them having a drink without a chaperoning crowd of ADAs – she's made that clear on more than one occasion it's out of the question.

"Thursday night drinks with the tenth floor wasn't what I had in mind," McCoy said.

"Jack…" Regan said, a hint of reproach in her voice.

He opened the side door that led to Colleen's desk, and beyond that, Arthur's office, and started to get changed behind it. "What, we can't be friends, now?"

"We can be friends at work," Regan said.

"Then let's have a drink here," McCoy said, pulling on his jeans.

"I'm due at the Lord Roberts. Come on," Regan said. "You should show your face there, anyway. All those ADAs worship at your feet – spend half-an-hour, make them feel special."

"Oh, they worship at my feet, do they?" McCoy said, reaching for his jacket. "You seem to be over that."

"Well, what can I say," Regan said serenely, "I guess I'm impervious."

Impervious. He could remember occasions when she hadn't been so impervious, could remember what her fingers felt like as she ran them through his hair, could remember when the catch of breath in her throat when he touched her proved she was anything but impervious. Could remember, too, when he could have honestly said they were friends not just at work but when the shadows cast by working in the criminal justice system turned into impenetrable darkness in the hours before dawn.

They knew each other's nightmares.

Friends. At work.

"Fine," McCoy said. "The Lord Roberts. Nothing for Arthur to complain about in that, is there?"

"Nothing at all," Regan agreed.

Bill Fitzgerald was catching the elevator at the same time, and Regan suggested the three of them split a cab. McCoy might have admired the dexterity with which she negotiated the logistics of making sure she was never alone with him, not for a minute, if he hadn't found it so irritating. As if two people can't share an elevator or a taxi without there being a sex scandal. How many times had he shared late-night take-away in the office with his assistant over the years? How many cab rides, working lunches, post-trial drinks, with Sally, Diane, Claire, with Abbie –

Honesty forced McCoy to admit that perhaps Regan's caution wasn't entirely disproportionate.

The Lord Roberts wasn't crowded on a weeknight. There were already a few ADAs there – Qiao Chen from Rackets and Connie Rubirosa from Trials were arguing over the jukebox and McCoy recognized several faces in the knot of people by the pool tables.

Chen and Rubirosa reached a compromise and Chen pressed a button. McCoy slung his bag into the booth Fitzgerald had commandeered and turned to follow Regan to the bar.

"Mr. McCoy!"

McCoy turned back to see a small woman with auburn curls smiling up at him. After a second, memory supplied her name. ADA Keri Dyson, Identity Theft.

"Keri," he said, returned her smile. "How are you?"

"Great!" she said. "I was just going to the bar – can I get you a drink?"

"Let me get you one," he said reflexively, regretted it when she blushed a little. Their paths had crossed from time to time since she'd started at the DA's Office a few years ago, and Keri had always paid him that little bit of extra attention that signaled interest. McCoy had never taken her up on the unspoken offer. Not that she was unattractive. Quite the opposite, he thought, looking down at her wide brown eyes, at the way she filled out her suit. But he'd always felt there was something – something almost predatory about her. He didn't have any objection to a woman taking the initiative, but …

But having made the offer, there was no graceful way for McCoy to get out of it. He extended his generosity to Fitzgerald and went to the bar for a scotch for himself and Fitzgerald and a cosmopolitan for Keri. When he came back she was perched in the booth, talking to the Trials ADA about a case she was working on – an extensive fraud that had left several people all but destitute. McCoy listened with half his attention, contributing his opinion when it seemed warranted, watching the pool game going on across the room. Michael Omardi from Fraud was cleaning up, playing with a clean finesse that indicated he hadn't spent all his university years in the library. Regan shook her head when the cue was offered to her, and Connie Rubirosa was coaxed into playing by a young man McCoy only vaguely recognized as a new Narcotics ADA. She was terrible, and he took every opportunity to correct her play, arms around her to show her how she should be holding the cue. Rubirosa didn't seem to mind, but her game didn't noticeably improve.

"Don't you think?" Keri asked.

McCoy scrambled for the thread of the conversation. "You might have a federal violation there. Have you talked to our colleagues in the Southern District?"

She gave him a brilliant smile and touched his arm. "That's exactly what I've been trying to tell our Bureau head, but he won't listen !" She took a sip of her drink, and then turned a little in her seat, the movement bringing her closer to him. "I love this song, don't you?"

Listening, McCoy could hear a woman's sultry voice crooning about wanting all, or nothing at all. "Doesn't sound like Sinatra," he quipped.

Keri smiled. "Diana Krall," she said. "I saw her play last year. Half a love never appealed to me." Her voice was soft but melodic. "If your heart never could yield to me ... then I'd rather have nothing at all."

"Are we going to lose you to Broadway?" Fitzgerald teased.

Keri blushed. "Sorry," she said. "I just love this song."

"Don't be sorry," McCoy said, as on the jukebox Diana Krall told them all that if it's love, there's no in between. "Never apologize for enthusiasm. Life's boring without it."

She smiled gratefully. "Another drink? I'm buying, this time."

"Sure." McCoy slid out of the booth to let her up. Across the room the pool game had broken up. As the jukebox hummed into silence a few piano notes rose above the hum of voices and heads turned toward the old, slightly-out-of-tune upright in the corner of the room. As the first notes of 'All or nothing at all' drifted out, a brief parting in the crowd let McCoy see Qiao Chen, jacket off, at the keyboard. McCoy joined the other attorneys crowding around the piano as Chen picked up the tempo, giving the melody some swing, and then shifted to a ragtime version, earning a scatter of applause. Wouldn't have thought he'd have it in him, McCoy thought,remembering thestitched-up young lawyer from the Firienze case, seeming completely consumed by his obsession with furthering his own career.

Chen grinned, his usually careful coiffure in slight disarray from the energy of his playing, wiped sweat from his face with his sleeve and segued into Honeysuckle Rose, hammering out the stride chords,before finishing off with a quick verse about someone whose feet were too big.

Pounding out the final chords, he turned to Connie Rubirosa and caroled "Your pedal extremities are obnoxious!"

She laughed and swatted his shoulder playfully and Chen grinned up at her, played a final resounding chord, and swung around on the stool.

He saw McCoy and sobered instantly, reaching for his jacket. "Mr McCoy," he said stiffly. "I was just – " Hurriedly, he started to pull on his jacket, then raked his hair into place. "It was just – just a bit of jazz, sir."

"Show a bit more jazz in the office and you might find yourself moving up out of Rackets," McCoy said.

Chen stared at him, and then slowly slipped his jacket off again. "Yes, sir," he said thoughtfully.

"Play us another, Qiao," Omardi urged.

Chen flashed his quick grin again and turned back to the piano. "Here's one for our boss," he said slyly.

It took McCoy a moment to recognize the melody, but he caught on when Chen began to sing slightly off key: "Give them an act with lots of flash in it – and the reaction will be passionate!"

"That's terrible, Qiao," Bill Fitzgerald said. "You couldn't carry a tune in a bucket!" He struck a pose beside the piano and picked up the verse. "How can they see with see-quiii-ns in their eee-yes?"

"That's a little unfair," Keri said beside McCoy, holding out a drink for him to take. "You're not like that."

"I'm choosing to take it as a compliment," McCoy said.

"Give 'em the old flim flam flummox," Fitzgerald and Chen chorused. "Throw 'em a fake and a finagle!"

McCoy took a sip of his drink as the ADAs watching the performance laughed, or tried not to – depending on how scared they are of me. The scotch tasted oddly salty and he pulled a face.

"Did I get the wrong thing?" Keri asked anxiously. "Scotch, right?"

"Right," McCoy said. He tasted the drink again. "Must have had sour-mix in the glass."

"Let me see," Keri said. She took the glass from his hand and sipped delicately as Chen and Fitzgerald wobbled out of key, declaiming As long as you keep them way off balance, they'll never spot you've got no talent. "Seems fine. Maybe you have too much sodium in your diet." She gave the glass back to him.

McCoy took a solid hit of the scotch. It still tasted salty to him but burned smooth down his throat, and he didn't want to insult Keri by telling her she clearly had no sense of taste.

Chen and Fitzgerald finished their duet and Chen shook his head when asked for another tune. "I think I've gone too far already," he said with a glance at McCoy, half-nervous, half-defiant. McCoy grinned back and raised his glass.

"Perhaps not that much jazz," he said. "In the office."

Chen relaxed and smiled more openly.

McCoy turned away from the piano as the other prosecutors started to drift back to the pool table. He had to admit, Regan's suggestion had been a good one. The easy camaraderie of his colleagues, the atmosphere of the bar, had combined to make him feel more relaxed than he had for weeks. He finished his drink, watching Regan lean across the pool table, looking for her next shot. The light over the table was unforgivingly harsh on her lean face and angular figure. It suddenly seemed absurd to McCoy that he had spent weeks trying to persuade her to change her mind, to ignore Branch, to join him for a drink, a meal, in the hope they would lead to more. The city is full of women. One Hogan Place is full of woman.

Many of them prettier than Regan, when it comes down to it.

As if summoned by his thought, he felt a hand on his arm and looked down to see Keri watching him with a smile. The contrast with Regan couldn't have been stronger. Keri was all soft curves, curly auburn hair, dimpled chin, nicely rounded figure clearly discernible beneath her suit. She ran her hand along his arm and he felt her fingers as clearly as if she touched bare skin.

"Penny for them?" she said.

"I was just thinking that life is short," McCoy said. "Too short to waste time on – on hopeless causes."

"That's an odd thought for one of us," Keri said, laughing. "Isn't the DA's Office the definition of a hopeless cause?"

He laughed down at her. A pretty woman, a night out – he was filled with a sense of well-being. "And a penny for your thoughts?"

"I was thinking we should have another drink," Keri said.

Her smile made him a little dizzy. The sudden surge of desire when she brushed against him as they went back to their table made him dizzier. Keri steadied him, laughing, holding his arm a little too long. "I'll be right back," she said, and went to the bar. McCoy watched the way the swing in her hips made her body move inside her clothes. On her way back with their drinks she caught him watching, smiled, and slipped into the seat next to him.

She leaned against him a little, clinking her glass against his. "Here's to the Lord Roberts," she said. McCoy was very aware of her thigh pressed against his beneath the table. He took a sip of his drink, unable to help glancing downward to see a hint of the swell of her breast, the edge of a lacy bra, as she leaned forward. Imagination supplied what the rest of her body would look like and his body responded immediately and forcefully, so forcefully he had to shift in his seat a little.

Keri caught the movement, glanced down and with the hint of a smile put her hand on his thigh.

Her touch burned and when she moved her hand a little, tracing circles on the fabric of his jeans he gasped.

"Why, Mr McCoy," Keri purred, her hand sliding higher. "I always thought we'd get along, but I didn't realize we'd like each other quite this much."

McCoy's mouth was too dry for words as her fingers fluttered over his fly. He took her wrist and moved her hand away, gulping more scotch to moisten his mouth. "I'm going to embarrass myself right here if you keep doing that."

"I wouldn't want you to be embarrassed," Keri said. She moved her hand to less acutely dangerous territory. McCoy slipped his arm around her waist as she leaned against him, feeling the soft swell of her hip beneath his hand. She sighed, and turned her face up to his. It was very easy – and probably unwise – to bend his head and kiss her. McCoy didn't care how unwise it was to be kissing a junior ADA in a room full of colleagues. He wanted her more than he could remember ever wanting a woman and as their lips met his mind went blank of all thoughts of caution, wisdom, decorum. All he could think of was how soft her lips were, how sweet her mouth, how intoxicating the feel of her body pressed against his. He gather her more closely to him as she teased his lips with her tongue, each flickering touch sending and electric shock of lust running straight to his balls. His hand found her breast, as heavy and yielding as he had imagined, and she moaned a little against his lips, her hand tightening on his thigh.

A part of his mind was aware that they were coming close to a public indecency charge but it seemed a small price to pay to continue his delirious exploration of her body.

"We ought to get out of here," Keri said, lips brushing his.

"Absolutely," McCoy said hoarsely. When he tried to stand to follow her to the door the room spun around him and he steadied himself against the table. Keri laughed, and pulled his arm over her shoulders.

"Lean on me," she said. "I'll get you home."

McCoy glanced back as they reached the door. Regan had paused in her game of pool, and was watching them, her expression unreadable.

You had your chance, McCoy thought. Deliberately, he dropped his hand to Keri's backside and gave her an ostentatious squeeze before following her out into the dark.

.oOo.