Previous part of Family Matters.

***

Mo felt mildly bad that she had to filch a ride off of Sheldon, but she knew that Danny, Mac, Flack, and the rest of them would have her head on a platter if she took public transportation so shortly after what happened. The bruising had lost some of its darkness but it was still there, and the finger marks on her neck were more prominent. Sheldon and taken his flashlight out of his pocket and checked her over before she had even left the apartment and told her they needed to get clearer imprints of the hands when she had a minute in the lab.


Figuring she was safe in the lobby, she waved goodbye to Sheldon and headed for where she knew Flack would be. With the bruises on her face, she didn't try to wear clothes to cover up her neck, therefore she was just in a long-sleeved shirt and jeans with her sneakers, jacket, and bag. Some of the officers who hadn't heard openly stared at her, others who knew waved and welcomed her back. Her right wrist was still in a splint but it felt better. She waved with her left when she saw Flack and he made a beeline for her, hugging her.


"Little Messer, you still look pretty beat up," he said, leading her through the building to an interrogation room. "But I'm guessin' you're here to tell me somethin'."


"I remember a lot of it," she said as he shut the door. She sat at one of the chairs and he sat across from her. "Does anybody else need to be here?"


"Do you want somebody to be here?" he asked her, silently promising her that if she wanted Mac, Stella, Danny or anybody else there with her that he'd personally call them and tell them to get down there.


"D-Danny. I want Danny to be here," she said. "Or, can we do this in the lab?"


"Wherever you want, sweetie," Don said, standing. Together, they walked to the elevator and then rode in silence up to the floor where the crime lab was. The break room was deserted so Mo took a seat there as Don went to get Danny. Danny took one look at Mo and kissed her cheek, taking the seat next to her. Don shut the door, enclosing them all in there. This was the hard part, now.


"When you and Mac had that fight," she said, speaking mostly to Danny and aware that Flack had taken out his notepad, "I went and stayed with Don for a week. Well, after a week there, I went down to a corner café because Don was working late. I did everything you guys told me to do; stay away from the alleyway openings, away from strangers, stay near the actual street, and fight like hell if anything actually happened. Well, I was on my way back, and I had dinner for Don in a little bag, and I didn't even hear him. He came up from behind me and pulled me into an alley. I dropped the bag and I started to fight, to struggle. I think I kicked him in the shins a couple of times and he wasn't happy about that, and I was screaming something fierce but it seemed like nobody could hear me. I scratched him on the arm, on the face, and he grabbed one of my arms. Somehow we ended up against a wall and he hit my arm against it. I thought he broke it. I couldn't move it. Then he started hitting me around the face and I was so scared...I just started throwing elbows, hoping to hit him, and I think I broke his nose. I kept hitting him with my elbow and he eventually let go because I think he passed out. Then I passed out I was crying so bad...and when I woke up, he was still out of it on the pavement and I ran. I ran back down the street and around the block back to Don's. I didn't get that far; I knew I wasn't going to get that far. So I hid behind somebody's trashcans and tried to call Don. He didn't pick up. I tried you, you didn't pick up. Then I called Mac, Stella, Lindsay, and Sheldon. Nobody answered. Then I called 9-1-1 for myself and waited, watching for that man. I didn't see him walk by and I didn't get a good enough look at him, but I'll know him if I see him again. Then the ambulance came and took me away." There were tears in her eyes but she hadn't let any of them fall, so she considered that battle won.


Don finished what he was writing and then looked up at her. Danny had put his arm around his little girl halfway through her story, when she'd first gotten tears in her eyes, and was now simply holding her. It was almost as if he was holding her together, and in a way he was; she was pretty sure she'd fly to pieces if she didn't have somebody to hang onto.


"Okay, Mo, I think we've got enough to build good solid case against the guy who did this," Don said, giving her an encouraging smile.


"Do you have anything so far?" she asked, looking between Don and Danny. "Any suspects?"


"Nothing really solid yet, sweetie," Danny said. He was working on the case as much as possible while trying to keep solid hours so he could be home at nights with Mo He knew she didn't like to be by herself after dark, even in the apartment, and he didn't blame her. If something like that had happened to him, he wouldn't be thrilled about being by himself.


"I kind of want to help, if I can," she said almost sheepishly, looking through her still bruised face with hope.


"We know, Mo, we know," Don said, standing. "I need to go file this. Try to stay out of trouble Mini Messer." He paused, looking at Danny, realizing he had both Messers in one place. "Second thought, both of you stay out of trouble."


Danny looked between her and Don, slightly confused, murmuring something that he didn't get into trouble and that Don had gone completely crazy. Mo giggled and then stood. She kissed Danny on the cheek and then flounced out of the break room like they hadn't just been discussing her recent mugging. He knew she was more than likely heading off to find Mac and say hi. She hadn't seen him in nearly a day and a half because he'd been working on her case. She liked both of her parent figures to be in the same place at the same time, so she was going to see him there at the office.


"Hi, Stella," Mo said as she passed Stella on her way to Mac's office. To her surprise, the CSI fell into step beside her. "Going to see Mac?"


"Yep," she said, holding a folder. "Got some new information on the case."


"Really?" Mo knew it was her case.


"We have a match in CODIS, Flack just needs to go pick him up," she said, opening the door to Mac's office for Mo


Mo thanked her and then went behind Mac's desk to give him a hug and a kiss on the cheek. That done, she settled on the couch and picked up the People magazine that Mac had on the table. She'd complained that he never had any good literature and that people stuck in his office for hours wouldn't have anything good to read. So, in response, he'd signed up for People magazine to be delivered, along with Time magazine, to the lab. The old copies made their way into the break room but only after a week of being in Mac's office.


"Match in CODIS, Flack's going to pick him up," Stella said to her boss, holding up the file folder she carried. "There were a couple of hairs on the shirt that weren't Mo's and those have gone to the DNA lab to see if they're the suspect's. Now we just have to wait." Turning to Mo, she looked the girl in the eyes and asked, "Can you make a positive ID?"


"I saw him, but I felt him more," she said truthfully, not shrinking under Stella's gaze. "But I can make an ID."


Mac nodded coolly from behind his desk, and Stella left. When the door closed, he turned to his surrogate daughter/niece and just looked at her. Her bruising had definitely improved, but it was still there. Even more pronounced were the marks on her neck from where he'd apparently tried to strangle her. He hated the idea of anyone trying to hurt her, but somebody had, and whoever had was going to pay. He was going to pay dearly.


"You have any more nightmares?" Mac asked.


"No," she said unembarrassed. She'd been through too much to actually retain her embarrassment for anything like this because of this case. "Danny's been holding me when I fall asleep so I'm comfortable and not afraid when I close my eyes. We miss you at home at nights." She put her puppy-dog eyes into play, trying to imitate the same look that Danny used. It nearly worked; but Danny had had more practice with it growing up with Louie and then with Mac, so he was more skilled. She couldn't quite pull it off, yet. But it was still effective.


"I know, and I've been promised a few days off when this case gets solved and we'll do something," he told her, unhappy he couldn't be at home with his family. "You and me and then the three of us."


"Okay," she said, happy. She looked at the clock on the wall and jumped. "Well, Sheldon's going to give me a ride back home so I need to go meet him. See you later, Mac."


"Stay safe, Mo," he said, looking up at her once and then she was out the door.

***

Sheldon's pager went off three times on the way home and Mo didn't want to make him late for whatever he had to do. She knew it involved the office, so when he pulled up in front of her building, she jumped out. She told him she'd be fine, that there wasn't anything to get her from the ground floor to the fifth, and he drove off, looking in his rearview mirror at her until she was no longer in sight.


She used her key to get into the building and then found it a little odd that the janitor's mop was out but he wasn't there. Ignoring that, but feeling a little weird, she headed for the staircase and hunted around in her bag for her phone. When she reached the second floor, she heard the hush of voices and smelt bleach and something sharp, like copper. She recognized that scent from hours spent in the lab with Mac and Danny. It was blood. Turning her head, she looked down the hall and saw something she hoped she'd never see again.


A man stood over a body that lay on the floor, blood pooled around it. The knife was still in his hands as he stood there, blood dripping down the blade of it. Mo must have made a sound because he stiffened, turning slowly to face her. She thought she was going to have a heart attack when she realized, from the broken nose, that this was the man that had attacked her in the alley. She took a moment, a crucial moment, and memorized his face. After that moment, her flight instincts kicked in and she started to sprint the rest of the way up the stairs. She heard him behind her and she dropped her phone in her haste to get it out of her bag. Ignoring it, she continued to sprint, finding her key easier and fitting it clumsily into the lock of the door on the fifth floor. Shoving open the door, she turned and slammed it, doing every lock on the thing in hopes of staying safe.


She had to think fast. She was cursing Danny for having the phone someplace and not putting it back in the cradle where it needed to be in case of emergency. If she got out of this alive, she was going to chew him a new one and he'd deserve it. She moved the kitchen table in front of the door and then moved the armchair into a corner where it would be protected. She shivered when he banged on the door, obviously trying to get in. He'd recognized her and she ran into the bedroom, finding the phone on the bedside table. She grabbed it as fast as humanly possible and dialed 9-1-1. This was the second time she'd had to dial those three digits for herself and she was not happy with it. She heard splintering wood and then ran back into the kitchen. She threw open the cupboards, trying to find the biggest, heaviest frying pan she could. She was trying to stay away from the knives; she didn't know how to use one and she figured she'd do more harm to herself that her would-be attacker.


Armed with the phone and the pan, she ran back into the bathroom as he busted through the door. She had just closed the door and hid in the closet when the 9-1-1 person finally picked up.


"9-1-1, please state your emergency," the person said.


"My name is Molly Messer, and I don't know the address yet, but I know you can trace this call so please do this," she pleaded, her voice a whisper. "There's a person in my house with knife and he's coming after me because I saw him over a dead body and he mugged me like five days ago. Please send help. Please..." she heard footsteps and hung up, standing in the closet. It was a little ironic, surrounded by Mac and Danny's scent and yet fearing for her life in a place where she was supposed to feel safe. She worked on calming the panic in her head, her chest, and she could feel every blow that he'd landed on her that night in the alley with increasing clarity. She hated it, hated him for what he'd done. Softly, she let the phone drop to the bottom of the closet, resting on a pile of clothes that belonged to somebody. Gripping the pan like a racket, she knew she was going to go down fighting. She'd fought him once before and she was intending on fighting him again. She'd fight to the death if she had to.


Dimly, she heard the bedroom door open. She tried not to shudder as she realized that he was invading a space that Mac and Danny found sacred, found comforting and safe. He was in her home, the home she shared with the men she loved, and she hated him for that. Gripping the pan tighter, she knew what was coming. She knew he was going to open that door, knife in hand, hoping that she would be frozen in fear. Well, you know what, she wasn't. She was going to get him before he got her.


Sure enough, he threw open the closet door, the knife raised above his head. She didn't think twice and swung for his face. The pan connected with his face, its crunch mingling with her grunt of strength and his cry of pain. He dropped the knife and stumbled back. She didn't hesitate and swung again, still aiming for his head. She felt mildly bad that she was getting blood on the carpet and on part of the bedspread, but she knew Danny and Mac would understand. This was about her life; they'd value that over a bedspread and carpet any day.


He landed on the carpet and she swung again, once more at his head. She paused when he didn't move and then swung for the knife hand, knocking the blade clear across the room where it hit the wall and bounced to the floor. Then she realized what she'd done. Swallowing her bile (she thought she was going to throw up and didn't let herself, at least not yet) she grabbed the guy by the shoulders and dragged his unconscious, heavy form out of the bedroom and across the hall into the bathroom. The bathroom had one small window that was impossible for someone of his size to crawl out of. Still holding back her stomach contents, she frisked him, praying not to find another knife. He was bleeding pretty good from his recently smashed nose and she saw that there was a blood smear from the bedroom to the bathroom and winced. She took the razors from the cabinet over the sink as well as any prescription drugs, and then closed the door. She pushed one of the bedside tables against the door, to buy herself time, and then proceeded to push the bookcase from the living room to the bathroom. It was hard going but she was still running an adrenaline high, so it made things a little easier. Armed still with her frying pan, she sat just by the door, where the kitchen table used to sit, and was content to wait for the police. If he got out of the bathroom, she'd know and she'd run through the hole he'd made in the door and back to the street.


Now, all she had to do was wait.

***

Mac was going to kill his surrogate niece. He'd specifically told her to stay safe and here she was making 9-1-1 calls from the apartment. He didn't like the last one he'd heard, and then she'd just hung up. She hadn't picked up her cell phone when he'd called, or when Danny called, and he was going to kill her for that, too. She was creating worry among all of them at the lab and he drew his gun as he met Danny by the front door of the building. Silently, they entered, heading for the staircase. When they got to the second floor, Danny looked down the hallway and saw the body, its blood pool, and then the blood trail, heading for the stairs and then up them. Mac took the lead and nearly stepped on Mo's phone. No wonder she hadn't picked up.


"Don't forget to bag her phone when we come back to do the body," Mac said, stepping cautiously onto the fifth floor. The blood trail led down the hallway to their door, and there were hacks in the wood around the lock and the door handle. It was slightly ajar and Mac gave Danny a little worried look, held his gun up, and peeked in. Some of the furniture in the living room had been moved and the kitchen table had been moved in front of the door. Or, it used to be, apparently. Now it was off-kilter.


"Mo?" Mac called softly through the door. A dark shape of movement caught his eye and he looked down by the door. There, curled in a ball with a frying pan in her hand, was Mo. Slowly, she turned her bruised face toward him and her lip quivered.

"Mac?" she whispered. She moved just enough to look beyond Mac to see Danny. "Danny?" She started to shake when Mac and Danny climbed through the door, Mac crouching down in front of her. He couldn't really touch her because she was involved with the case and at the crime scene. Her clothes were evidence. "There's...ah, there's the guy who killed the person on the second floor and who beat me up locked in our bathroom. I'm not sure if he's awake yet. I hit him pretty hard."

Danny walked down the hallway and saw the bookcase from the living room pushed against the bathroom door. He had the idea that whatever was behind that door was not happy and was going to wait for back up before moving the bookcase.


"You hurt anywhere?" Mac asked her, putting his gun away and taking out a small flashlight. It was taking all his control to not gather her into his arms and just hold her. He looked up briefly when Flack entered with a few uniforms and said, "Perp's in the bathroom. Danny's outside the door." Flack nodded and went to help Danny, the uniforms behind him. Turning back to Mo, he shined the light on her face, looking at her eyes for signs of shock. She didn't have any, but she was shaking slightly.


"He wasn't moving when I dragged him to the bathroom," she admitted, putting down the frying pan. She watched Mac pull on a pair of gloves (he always kept a pair in his suit pocket, just in case) and he picked up the frying pan. Sure enough there was blood on the bottom and he knew there would be Mo.'s prints on the handle. There were probably even his and Danny's prints on there, too. She heard someone else come up the steps and turned to see Stella and Sheldon. "Hi." Her voice was quiet.


"Hi, Mo," Stella said, handing Mac his kit. "Danny's is out in the hall." She crouched by Mac and looked at Mo. "Do you have any injuries?"


"No," Mo said, shaking her head. She took a deep breath and went to move a strand of her hair away from her face when she noticed the blood on them. She paused, moving her hands in front of her again and, with a trembling lip, held them up for Mac and Stella to look at. "I have somebody else's blood on my hands," she said quietly, tears in her eyes. "In my own house I have somebody's blood on my hands..."


Flack chose that moment to come back and say that the guy in the bathroom was still alive, but barely. Don looked at Mo on the floor and then motioned for Danny to come back over. Danny's gun was back in its holster and he looked down on his niece. He could see the hurt and the fear in her eyes and wanted nothing more than to make sure she'd never feel that way again.


"Why don't you guys go find the primary scene and Mo and I are going to talk, okay?" Stella said to the boys. Reluctantly they left, heading for the bedroom. Mac had enough sense to take the frying pan with him, finding it slightly difficult to walk through the place he called home and have to investigate a crime scene, a near murder, in fact. A near murder by a sixteen-year-old girl who had only done it to save her life. This was crazy.


Stella scraped under the stubs of Mo's nails again and took some pictures of blood spatter then produced a NYPD T-shirt from somewhere, saying she was going to have to have Mo's shirt. With all of the men out of the room, Mo switched her shirt quickly and handed her old one to Stella. The shirt was obviously made for someone bigger because it fell to the middle of her thighs. She tucked the front in to try and make it look better, but it didn't really help. It didn't help that her hands were shaking, either, and all she wanted to do was cry.


"You want to tell me what happened?" Stella asked gently, checking Mo over for any more signs of blood or anything.


"Sheldon wanted to come up with me, to walk me to the door, but his pager kept going off," Mo started quietly, rubbing at the dried blood on her hands. It wasn't coming off very easily. "I told him I'd be fine and convinced him to go back to work. Then I started up here. When I got to the second floor, I looked down the hallway and saw the guy who's in the bathroom standing over the body. Then I recognized him as the one who had beat me up nearly five days ago, and I just started running. He must have recognized me, too, because he started after me and I dropped my phone on the stairs. Then I got in here and slammed the door, locking it. I heard him coming in and then ran to the bedroom, hiding in the closet. It was the only place I could go where I could have a chance of surprising him. So I grabbed the frying pan from the kitchen and went to the closet, and called 9-1-1. Then he came in, opened the door, and I swung for him. I hit him in the face and I think I broke his nose again. Then I hit him a few more times, smacked the knife out of his hands, and when he was out I dragged him into the bathroom. Somewhere after doing that and barricading him in there, I think I threw up somewhere. Then I waited for you guys."


Stella smiled, in awe at the bravery Mo had shown with just a frying pan in the face of a knife. She looked Mo over again, making sure she didn't have any blood splatter anywhere and tried to smile encouragingly. Mo looked like she wasn't having a very good time holding everything together.

"Stel?"

Stella turned to see Danny looking at his niece. His gloves were off, so was his badge and gun, and he looked completely ready to pick Mo up and take her as far away from the scene of the crime as humanly possible.

"Can I take her?" he asked, coming over to crouch in front of his niece with Stella.

"Yeah," Stella said quietly, watching Mo go to push her hair away from her face and hesitate because of the blood on her hands. Danny went to do it for her and she flinched involuntarily away from him, tears leaking from her eyes, and then allowed him to tuck the strands behind her ears. She'd never flinched away from either him or Mac, and it hurt both her and Danny to see her do it now. Ignoring that as best he could, he bent down and she wrapped her arms around his neck like a lifeline, burying her face in his neck. She wanted to cry so badly, and when she felt her body part with the floor, she held on even tighter, never wanting to let go.

Danny carried her from the apartment, down the stairs, past the waiting police officers, and to the truck. An officer opened the door for them, but when he went to put her in there, she wouldn't let go.

"Mo, honey, you're okay," he whispered, ignoring the stares and murmurs of the crowd that had gathered.

Mo wasn't listening; she was too busy crying silently and had a death grip on Danny's neck. "Don't let me go...please, Danny don't let me go..." She was sobbing on his collarbone at this point, hiding away from the world and the reality that there was a man in their apartment, her home, that might not make it and she'd done that. She and a frying pan wielded in fear had done that. She was terrified the man would die and she would go to jail, a bad person that Danny and Mac and the rest of them put away on a daily basis. She'd just found Danny, Mac, happiness, and a home, she didn't want to go anywhere away from that. It was her fear that if she let go of Danny, even for a moment, that somebody would come and take her away permanently, and that there would be nothing anyone could do.

"Molly," Danny said in the firmest voice he could manage at the moment. "You need to let go of me. I'm not going to go anywhere but the drivers' side, and then we're going to get away from here. Me and you. I won't leave you."

Reluctantly, Mo let go, letting Danny buckle her and shut the door. She did her best not to touch anything, especially her face, with her hands. All she did as Danny started the truck and drove was look at the blood on her hands and wonder if she did the right thing. She wondered how upset everyone was with her; she could see the anger behind the worry in Mac's eyes and the fear in Danny's and Flack's. They couldn't be happy, especially after all the promises she'd made to them to stay out of trouble, to stay safe.

Finally, she had to ask. "Are you mad at me?"

Danny took his eyes off the road to look at her and reached for her hand. She didn't want to give it to him because of the blood, but he took it anyway, running his thumb across the back of her hand. "Mad at you? Hello no, Molly," he said, bypassing her nickname and using her full name. He wanted to stress to her that he wasn't so much angry as he was afraid and slightly stressed out. As far as he was concerned, when she had moved in with him, she'd bypassed being a niece and had gone to almost being a daughter.

"You're not mad?" she looked at him in disbelief, tears shining in her eyes.

"No, baby, I'm not mad," he said, driving in NYC traffic with only one hand. If they had been in a different situation, Mo would have told him to get his damned hand on the wheel and pay attention. But this was different. Everything was different now. "I was scared when I heard that 9-1-1 call come through, and I was scared when I knew it was you, but I wasn't mad. I just wanted to make sure you were safe. All of use wanted to make sure you were safe. So, when you see Mac, Don, and everybody else, you'd better be giving them a hug, and when I got outta this truck, I'd better get a hug."

His semi-firm words had the effect and she cracked a small, wan smile.

"I love you, Molly, we all do," he said, praying that she would take those words to heart and try to release some of the guilt she had on her that this was her fault. "And I know that I'm proud that you had the courage to fight. He could have killed you, and you fought. I don't blame you for anything."

She smiled through her tears and looked out the window. "Where are we going?"

"Someplace safe and homey," he said, turning onto a side street. "You're going to meet some people."

She looked over at him in shock and nearly screeched in surprise. Her hands were covered in someone else's blood and he was taking her to see people. Her hair was a mess from the struggle and she hurt emotionally and physically. That's when the shakes started again. His thumb started its rhythmic stroking again, and that helped a little.

"People, Danny?" she asked as though he was crazy. "I've got...I've got somebody's e-else's blood on m-my hands and you want me to meet people?"

"Family, honey," he said. "We're going to see my parents."

***

What little color in Mo's face she had left drained instantly. She jerked her hand away from Danny's and curled into a ball, shaking even harder. She was going to see her grandparents, grandparents she'd never met after a day from hell. This was great. Why the hell was he doing this to her? Why was he doing this to her when he knew that she couldn't take a lot more? She ignored his soft pleas to look at him, to take his hand, and silently contemplated giving him the bird. He might be slightly offended, but it was one of those moments that she really didn't care whether he was offended or not. She had her left fist raised to do it but she tucked it back in her little ball of safety, trying hard to ignore the blood still on her palms. She put her head down and didn't look up again until she felt the truck stop and then shut off.

"They won't care," he said softly, staring out the windshield. "They're not going to care what you did because you did it in defense of yourself. You're their granddaughter, probably the only one they're going to have, and I know they'll love you the moment they see you. My mom, she'll see you need some serious TLC and she's just going to hold you. I know this is hard, but I don't know where else to go. I can't go home because our home is a crime scene. I'm not sleeping in a hotel, and I'm not putting you anywhere else than where I know you're going to be safe when you sleep. Give this a chance. You didn't judge me when you walked into my life, and I didn't judge you. You're their granddaughter."

"I-I can't do this," she said.

"Yes, you can," he reassured her. He looked past her to the house. "See, they're lookin' at you already."

She smiled a little and turned her head, catching a glimpse of a woman just before the curtain was moved back. Finally, she nodded and let him help her from the truck. She was nervous as they walked up the sidewalk to the front porch, but he took her fisted hand gently in his and firmly pulled it apart so he could lace his fingers with hers. That was how he was connecting them. He knocked softly on the door and within seconds a short, slightly gray-haired lady answered the door. Mo had hidden her face behind her hair, and now that there was someone there for her to look at, she slowly raised her head. She knew who she looked like, she knew who her father was, and this was her grandmother. She could see it. She and Danny had the eyes of this woman.

"Oh my Lord," the woman said, looking from Mo to Danny and back again multiple times. "She looks just like...Al, come here." She called to someone and a man appeared, tall and stern-looking. Danny looked enough like him to be related, but it would have been a better match if Louie had been standing there. It was a little overwhelming to Mo at the moment. "She looks just like Louie."

Mo wanted to hide her face and cry. Danny's grip on her hand let her do no such thing, but tears formed in her eyes.

"With Danny's eyes," Elaine said. "Like Louie with Danny's eyes."

"Ma, Pop, I want you to meet your granddaughter, Molly Louise Messer," Danny said, pushing Mo forward a little. "My brother's only child."

At that point, Danny let go of her hand and Mo felt as though she were swinging over a void with no safety net. Then Elaine stepped forward and took her gently by the wrist and pulled her into the house. Danny was the last one in and stood by the door, almost leaning on it, while his mother and father looked over their granddaughter.

"Hello, Molly," Elaine said softly. Mo stood stock-still and Elaine pushed back her hair to look at her better. "My name is Elaine." She flipped up Mo's palms and Mo's breath caught, trying to turn into little sobs. "Oh, my. What happened here?"

Mo started to sidle back toward Danny but Elaine wouldn't let her go. Her grandmother held tight to her wrist and a tear leaked down Mo's cheek. Very quietly, from his position by the door, Danny told his parents the entire story, starting with the fight and ending with them coming there. Despite the blood that was on Mo's hands, Elaine took her only grandchild and held her. Mo lost it right there with that bit of kindness and sobbed onto her grandmother's shoulder. When she was calmed down enough, Elaine took Mo into the kitchen to find some soap that would effectively scrub the blood off, leaving Danny and his father alone.

"Rough day," Al said, reaching out to put a hand on Danny's shoulder. "She's strong. I can feel it. She's like you."

Danny looked at his father with raised eyebrows.

"She's a fighter," he said simply with a shrug. "She's a Messer. Messers fight like hell when you expect them not to, and fight even harder when they know they really have to. And she's got her father and uncle watchin' over her. She'll be safe here tonight."

"Thanks, Pop," Danny said, his throat a little tight. He smiled thinly at his father and then went into the kitchen. He found Mo. seated at the small table, her clean hands in her lap, tears still in her eyes, and his mother puttering around the stove. "She gonna feed you, Mo?"

Mo looked at Danny like she was going to break again, but she just bit her lip and shrugged. "Hope she cooks better than you."

"Hey, I told you this morning that toast burning was an art form," Danny said in his defense.

"Toast burning?" Elaine said from the stove, turning around to stare at her youngest. "You most certainly did not learnt that from me. Your father must have taught you that."

"Taught him what?" Al said, appearing in the doorway. "How to burn toast?"

Mo cracked a real smile for the first time that day and that warmed Danny's heart to the point where he thought it might have swelled. "He does that well."

"The peanut gallery should hush," Danny said, taking a chair and swinging it around to sit next to his niece. "Otherwise she'll make her own breakfast before school."

Mo actually giggled at that and Danny found himself smiling. He smiled all the way through then until dinner, and even afterward as his mother brought out photo albums from his childhood for Mo to look at. His face took on a permanent blush, especially during the moments of his baby pictures. There were, of course, just as many of Louie and he could see Mo tense a little before she relaxed, getting into it. Danny was sure Mo had looked even more like Louie when she was little, even though she had his eyes. When Mo stifled a yawn, he realized just how much she'd gone through in one day, a day that started with her recounting the events of her mugging to Flack, and then through the attack. No wonder she looked more than a little rundown.

"You can put her in your old room, Danny," Elaine said, and Danny led Mo up the stairs to the bedrooms. Opening a door, he breathed in the familiar scent and sight that was his childhood bedroom. The same blue comforter was there as were his baseball posters on the walls. Contrary to when he'd lived there, his desk wasn't a mess and the floor was picked up. He wondered...yep, some of his clothes were still in the dresser. He found Mo a pair of his old sweatpants and told her to roll them up because they'd be big on her. Still in her NYPD T-shirt, he left the room for her to get dressed.

Mo watched the door click shut and changed into the sweatpants. They were soft with age and wear, and she looked at the leg that had the mascot of the school Danny had gone to, along with his number. She sat on the bed and called to him softly that he could come back in. This was more than a little weird for her, but she knew her grandparents (and Danny) wouldn't let her sleep on the couch. Not after everything that had happened that day. She closed her eyes and had the briefest image of the man on the bathroom floor.

"Come here," Danny said, moving to sit on the bed. He settled back against the headboard and she moved to sit by his side. She looked over at the bedside table and felt tears gather in her eyes. There, in a simple silver-colored frame, was a picture of Danny and Louie, arms around each other in a brotherly way and grinning like there was no tomorrow. It had to be the best photo that she had ever seen of her father and uncle.

"I don't want to go to sleep," she said softly, leaning her head on his shoulder. "I don't want to have nightmares." Her voice cracked a little.

He put his arm around her. "I know. I didn't want to sleep after...Louie died, but I had somebody to hold me. That helped." He put his other arm around her and just simply held her. Painstakingly slowly, she drifted off in her father's childhood home, her uncle's old bedroom, and in the loving embrace of one of the parent figures she had. The only thing that would have made it complete would have been Mac's presence, but that was there as well, inside her and Danny's hearts.

***

Mac was exhausted by the end of the day, and it just seemed that things were going to get a little bit longer and more difficult to deal with. Flack had just informed him that they were being taken off the case because of their close proximity to Mo, and it would only be a matter of time before it was questioned as to why Mac's prints were on nearly everything in Danny's apartment. And it also didn't help that nobody could find Danny or Mo. And, as much as Flack didn't want to, he needed to bring Little Messer in for questioning.

"Do you know where they went, Mac?" Flack asked one more time, knowing it was about the fourth time he'd asked.

"No," Mac said truthfully. Danny hadn't told him where he was taking Mo and while he was fairly certain that Danny wouldn't leave the city...you never knew with Danny, especially when it concerned Mo. "And Danny's not answering his cell."

"I don't want to have to put out an APB on his truck and track him down that way," Don said, "it'll just be harder on both of them. Not to mention that Mo is our primary suspect, as much as I hate to say it, and this could be grounds for obstructing justice on Danny's part."

Mac's mouth tightened into a thin line. He didn't want Danny arrested anymore than he wanted Mo in custody, but if the two of them didn't appear soon, that was looking more and more like a startling possibility.

Looking over at Flack, he said, "Let me try something. If it doesn't work..."

"It'd better work, Mac," Don said, watching as Mac pulled out his cell phone.

****

Mo was alone when she opened her eyes in the unfamiliar bed. It wasn't he couch at home, and then she realized, after she remembered the previous day, that she was in her grandparents home, in Danny's old room. Swinging her feet off the edge of the bed, she slowly made her way downstairs to the kitchen, the smell of pancakes and coffee being a wonderful wake up call. She hesitated at the door, watching Elaine putter around the stove and her uncle and grandfather, side by side at the table, separated only by the pages of a newspaper. She hadn't seen her uncle read a newspaper that intently, but maybe that was because he usually read it in bed, with Mac. But that was just speculation.

"Good morning, Molly," Elaine said, and Mo. jumped a little. Two sets of papers were put down and she was fixed with two pairs of nearly identical eyes. It was kind of creepy that early in the morning, especially since Danny looked like he hadn't even had a cup of coffee in him yet. Danny without coffee wasn't a happy creature to be around.

"Morning, Gramma," she said, liking the way the word rolled off her tongue. The only thing the scene was missing was Mac. She felt a slight ache in her chest at that, but she knew he was probably doing his job. After all, their apartment was now a crime scene. Courtesy of her. She really needed to stop thinking about that.

Any conversation that was about to happen was put on hold as the phone rang. Danny didn't hesitate and stood, going to get it. "Hello."

"Danny?" Mac was on the other end.

"Mac," Danny said as Mo. took his spot in the chair, watching with slightly wide eyes. "What's going on?"

"They're looking for Mo," he said, getting right to the point as usual. "And you. Where are you?"

Mo was looking decidedly worried, so Danny mouthed 'Mac' in her direction, and she smiled slightly. "I'm somewhere safe, with Mo."

"I know that, Danny, but they're looking for you," Mac said. "They've put out an APB on your truck, and if Flack can find you first, it'll save us both the image of Mo in handcuffs and you being loaded into the back of a squad car for obstructing justice."

Danny could only gape for a minute, and Mo knew it wasn't good. "What? They would...what?"

"Where are you so Flack and I can come get you?" There was an undercurrent of worry in Mac's voice that Danny couldn't fail to miss. Knowing he had no other choice, he rattled off the address to Mac and then hung up the phone. Biting his lip, he looked at Mo.

"Mac and Don are coming to get us," he said. "They have to take us in."

Mo paled considerably at the statement and Danny wondered if she would ever get over the state of perpetual fragility that she had seemed to take on since the first time she'd been mugged. She started to shake her head, but Danny just looked at her with a look that said she'd better buck up as best she could because there was no way around it.

"How soon?" she asked, her voice barely more than a whisper. This was the part she was dreading, the idea that she'd have to tell somebody all of it just to clear her own name.

"We should go outside and wait," Danny said, trying to look her in the eye and not succeeding. She was looking anywhere and everywhere except him. Turning to his parents, he hugged his mother, "Thank you for everything, Ma."

"Don't be a stranger, Danny," she said. "And bring that boyfriend of yours for a visit sometime."

Danny flushed a little, but smiled, and turned to shake his father's hand while Mo spent over a minute in her grandmother's embrace, listening to the advice that Elaine was giving her very softly in her ear. The last part was in Italian, but Elaine translated and Mo sniffled, but otherwise held back her tears.

"Thank you," she said to both of them after hugging Al. "I'll try to convince him to visit more."

Elaine smiled. She and her husband walked them to the door and then stood on the small porch, watching a black SUV roll up. Mo had Danny's hand in a death grip as she walked to that car and then got into the backseat. Mac was in the passenger seat up front and Don was driving. She didn't say a word as they headed down the street, Danny right beside her. Maybe it was a good thing she hadn't eaten anything for breakfast; he stomach was queasy enough as it was. And it was only nine in the morning.

****

Mo sat in an interrogation room, alone, and stared alternately at the other chair and the mirror. She had no personal items on her (she hadn't had any when she had gone to her grandparents') and now it was just a waiting game. A waiting game between NYPD and a sixteen-year-old girl who'd hit somebody over the head with a frying pan to save her life. Mo wasn't exactly sure where the odds stood.

The door opened and her heart gave a little leap, expecting to see Flack. It wasn't. It wasn't anybody she knew and she sat up a little straighter, determined not to let it show how terrified she was that she was going to jail. Truthfully, she didn't even know if the man she'd hit was still breathing. Last she knew, he was comatose on her bathroom floor with a twice-broken nose.

"Molly Louise Messer," the man said, coming to sit on the other end of the small square table, staring at her. He was a big man, muscular, with a shaved head. She was sure if she were to stand up, he'd tower over her. Then again, most people already did that. Even Mac, at times.

"That's me," she said, trying to keep it light. He was holding a manila folder and she was hoping that that was her folder, the one from the previous attack.

"I'm Detective Davis," the man said, not holding out his hand. "Seems you've been busy."

"Busy?" she asked, confused. "Where's Detective Flack?"

"Don's not working this case," Davis said, setting the folder on the table. "I am. Now, what happened yesterday?"

"Don's not on the case?" she asked incredulously. "Why?"

"He's too close to you and the other Messer," he said with a dismissive gesture. "It's just me and you."

Mo didn't like those odds. In fact, she hated ratios and percentages and odds and anything like that related to math, but she really hated it now. "I-I'm only sixteen. Don't you have to have my parent or guardian here while you do this?"

"Are you requesting a lawyer?"

Reeling, Mo tried hard not to hyperventilate. Calming herself down, she said, "No. I just want my legal guardian here while I talk to you. And that's Danny Messer."

"Danny Messer has been arrested for obstructing justice," Davis said with no emotion in his eyes or voice. "He's not going to be anywhere but a holding cell for a few hours. It's just you and me. Now what happened yesterday?"

"The guy who mugged me five days ago tried to kill me," she said as calmly as possible, stemming the tide of bad memories that it brought up. "In my own apartment."

"You got mugged five days ago?" Davis sounded like he didn't believe her.

"Do you think I did this just for my health?" she asked, more than a little sarcasm in her voice as she pointed to her face. "Or this?" She held up her arm, the one with the splint on it and dared him to say anything. "Well, if you're thinking Danny did this, then you're wrong. The man that was on the bathroom floor of the apartment did this to me, in an alley, and then was standing over the body of a dead guy in the apartment building and I saw. I saw. That was the only reason he came after me and you know what, it was just me there. Just me and a frying pan, scared the hell out of my mind and you want to treat me like a murderer for just trying to save my own life? Go ahead, because when you look at those pictures and you read that report and you see these bruises on my face and my neck, where he tried to strangle me that night in the alley, you're gonna know I fought for my life." Somehow, over the course of her speech, it had turned into a rant and she now found herself standing up and yelling at him while he sat there calmly. Sitting down in a huff, she crossed her arms over her chest and glared at him. "I know I'm innocent. I know I save my life. I made the second 9-1-1 call in less than a week for myself to get out of there. You can't fault me on self-defense. And that man had killed somebody else. Now, can I please see my uncle?"

Davis just stared at her, slightly open-mouthed and was reminded forcibly of Danny when the older Messer got going. "You...you can go see Danny." He was a little stunned.

"Thank you." She stood and went to the door. Opening it, she paused and looked back at him. "The name's Mo, by the way. Nobody calls me Molly." She left on that note and nearly ran into a uniformed officer outside the door. "I'm looking for Danny Messer. He got arrested."

The uniform led her through the building until she was standing outside of the small holding cell that had Danny pacing a hole in the floor. She banged on the bars a little to get his attention and tried to smile at him. Drained from her rant with Davis, she sighed and looked at him, clearly ready for everything to be over and life to go back to normal. Boy, wouldn't that be great.

"Davis put you through the wringer?" Danny asked, pressing close to the bars.

"I kinda started to yell at him. By accident." She winced. "He tried to make me...I don't know, but I kinda reminded him, loudly, that I'd gotten mugged and was only acting in self-defense. It should have worked. That's the truth, too."

"I know, Mo, I know," Danny said, looking around. "They're probably not even going to let you anywhere near Mac, so you might as well just get comfy here until they see fit to release me. That may be a while."

Mo found an empty chair and pulled it over. "Obstructing justice, Danny? Really. Couldn't you have been more creative and done, oh, I don't know, something a little violent?"

"Hey, we can't all wield frying pans like Xena," he said, sitting on the floor. She flinched and offered the tiniest of smiles. "But you make an awesome Xena any day."

"Does that mean I can get a sword?"

"You do enough damage with a frying pan," Danny countered, reaching through the bars to take her hand and squeeze. "But you're safe and you're here and that's all that matters."

Mo smiled and squeezed back before folding herself into her chair. Knowing the police department, it was probably going to be a while before anyone even thought of maybe releasing Danny. Hopefully they did it before she'd start to need his paychecks for college tuition.

***

Mo must have fallen asleep because she felt herself being prodded awake by someone. Her neck had a horrible crick in it as she opened her eyes, finding herself staring up at Mac's slightly concerned face. Blinking furiously, she rubbed at her eyes and sat up in the chair, looking around. It was a little embarrassing, now that she thought about it, to fall asleep in a chair in the middle of a police station with a family member in the holding cell right behind you. Oops.

"You want to go get some food?" Mac asked and Mo looked behind her. Danny was sitting on the floor of the cell, near the back of her chair, his head resting on his chest. Apparently he'd fallen asleep from sheer boredom as well. Besides, she knew he needed to get some sleep. He'd been up with her until she'd fallen asleep every night since the initial mugging, and then last night at her grandparents' house. Looking back at Mac, she vaguely heard her stomach rumble.

"Food might be good," she said, standing and stretching. Looking around, she glanced at all the NYPD personnel and ignored the urge to sigh heavily. "When this gonna be over, Mac? When can we go home again?"

"I don't know, Mo," Mac said, leading her out of the station. Once on the street, he put his arm around her shoulders and she leaned into him. She wasn't happy for exchanging one parent figure for another, but she was immensely glad she had someone at the moment. She needed someone to lean on and Mac was a pretty good person to do that with.

"Nothing could be simple, could it?" she asked, trying to blink back tears. It would be great if she could stop crying for more than ten minutes at a pop. She was stronger than this, she knew it, but somehow her strength just wouldn't come. And everybody kept telling her she was a Messer and that Messers were tough and they fought...but here she was, threatening to break on the sidewalk into a million pieces. Again.

"We're gonna get through this, Molly," Mac said, tightening his grip. "You and me and Danny are gonna get through this."

"We need a vacation," she said with an attempted half smile that Mac appreciated. "Or some therapy. Or something."

"How about a burger for now?" Mac said, steering her into a restaurant. "Then we can worry about the rest of it."

"Fine," she said, sitting down in a squeaky, faux-leather booth across from him. "When can we go home?" she asked in a small voice.

"Not for a while," he said, picking up the menu the waitress had dropped off. "I've talked to Danny's parents and they'd like it if you came and stayed with them. Just until this whole mess is fixed."

At that point, Mo couldn't figure out whether the "mess" was the fact that their home was a crime scene or that she just might go a juvenile detention center for murder or attempted murder. Or, for some reason the thought pops into her head, if the "mess" is her. She's quite sure that that's not the case, but the little nagging voice in the back of her mind says that if she hadn't come into their lives then everything would have been fine. She should have just toughed it out at Uncle Ray's and Danny wouldn't be in lock up, she wouldn't miss the father she'd never known, and she wouldn't feel bad about coming between Mac and Danny. She beginning to believe that she actually had, despite the what Mac and Danny had been telling her from the beginning. And if she hadn't gotten completely beat up, if she hadn't lived after that first mugging, then they really wouldn't be in this position at the moment.

"Mess?" she said, her voice trying to crack for the hundredth time. "Mess? Our house is a mess. I'm a mess. Your career is probably a mess." There's tears at this point and Mac is looking downright horrified, and stunned, like where the hell did that come from, but Mo plowed on. "All this has been is a mess." She wiped at her face with her shaky hands. "If you didn't want me to live you and Danny, why didn't you say so?" She looked at him one last time before sliding out of the seat and running toward the exit. Mac followed her as best he could, chasing her halfway down the street before he lost her in the crowd. Completely confused, Mac pulled out his cell phone and dialed the only other person in the city that would have been able to talk to some sense into Mo other than himself and Danny.

"Hey, Don, we've got a problem..."

****

It only took Mo four blocks in a random direction to know she was screwed. She had no money, no phone, no wallet, and no sense of direction above the street signs, and even then she struggled. She didn't recognize that part of the city, what was worse was that she couldn't see because damn it, she was crying. Again. Everything was so screwed up. She'd just walked away from Mac. No, she'd run away from Mac. Just like she'd run away from Uncle Ray and everything up there because her father had wanted her to stay with her true uncle. Danny. She loved Danny but she'd gotten between him and Mac. Their home was a crime scene and when she really thought about it, she realized that she'd just outed them to the entire lab. Mac's fingerprints and DNA would be all over that place. There was no way he could cover that up. She had just completely screwed up two men's careers. In one day. That had to be a record, didn't it?

She ran into a little corner bookstore café shortly after dark when she couldn't stand the leering looks men were giving her, thanking God that it was a 24-hour type thing. She spied a comfy-looking armchair near one of the front windows, picked up the latest Harry Potter on her way over and flopped into it, intending on staying for as long as possible. She was using it to zone out from the world and so far it was working. All that mattered now was staying away from anyone she knew (the list wasn't that long) and then somehow finding money and a means of transportation to somewhere. She wasn't overly picky at that moment, pretty much anywhere outside of New York state would work.

So engrossed in the book, she didn't realize when a man stopped on the other side of the glass, stared for a moment, and then bee-lined it into the store. She heard the tinkling of the bell and looked up. Quickly looking down again, she wondered if she concentrated hard enough if the man that looked a lot like Don Flack would vanish. Taking a quick peek, she concentrated harder, but he wasn't going anywhere. In the deserted bookstore, she finally closed the book and waited for the other shoe to drop.

"What the hell were you thinkin', Molly?" he asked, cutting through all the crap and right to the heart of the matter. He ignored the way she tried to look away, the way she looked too vulnerable alone in jeans a T-shirt, wrapped in on herself in a chintzy corner bookstore when she should have been with someone. She should have been with Mac. Or Danny, since they'd let him out of lock-up, dropping all charges.

"I wasn't, okay?" she spat back in a moment of bravery. "I wasn't. He said it was a mess, Don. A mess." She looked out the window at the people still around, flashing in the streetlight. "Pretty big mess for one little Messer, right?"

Don looked around for any other chair besides a mirroring comfy one and finally decided on it, trying to fold himself up like she was. He was confident she wasn't going anywhere. If she was going to run, he'd run her down. He was pretty damn sure he could run faster than she could. It was almost comical the way he had squeezed himself into the chair, and Mo, for a split second, had smiled a tiny little shadow of her former grin. It still made him feel good.

"You worried Mac," Flack said softly, knowing that her fight or flight instinct was mostly used. "You worried Danny. I worried. I don't like to worry, Mo It's not a good look on me."

Mo. risked a glance at the detective and saw him with a straight face. "You don't have to. Worry, I mean." She couldn't help the way her voice got small and fragile.

"Yeah, I do."

For the first time that night she let her eyes meet his and saw the worry and concern he had there. She may have been the niece of his best friend, but she knew damn well that he saw her more as a little sister than anything else and loved her like one. She was out of her chair and sitting in his lap in a very undignified way in a heartbeat, drenching the collar of his clean, crisp white shirt with her falling tears. She had so many questions, so many worries running through her head, the main one being how she was going to fix this with Danny and Mac, the people she loved and cared about most, and who sure as hell loved and cared about her right back. She had been an idiot, blinded by fear, thinking she could solve this by running away. Maybe it was time to stop running.

She knew now that since the moment she'd set foot inside New York City and Danny Messer's apartment that it was time to stop running. Only now was she heeding it.

***

"Molly Louise Messer!" There was definitely anger in Danny's voice when she stepped through the door of her grandparent's house, but she could also hear the relief. And that was a lot better than the alternative. He pulled her into a back-breaking hug and kissed her forehead. "Don't you ever do that again. You scared the living shit outta me and Mac. And Flack. Everybody. Don't do it again." He was murmuring those words against the top of her head, hanging onto like if he didn't, she float away.

"I won't," she assured him, standing back to look him in the eye. She was tired of running, tired of being scared and just plain tired in general. She looked over her shoulder at Mac and then over Danny's shoulder at her grandparents. This was apparently the first time that Danny had brought his boyfriend home to meet his parents. "Are you going to introduce them?"

Mo stepped aside as Danny reached for Mac's hand and pulled him further into the house. She was content to be an observer in this scene, glad she was out of the center of attention. It was getting annoying to have everybody's eyes on her and her alone. So she watched as Mac entwined his and Danny's fingers, heard the quiet introductions from Danny to his parents, and watched Elaine and Al welcome the man their son had decided to call his own first true love. Mo watched Elaine hug Mac and knew that everything would be okay. Their little family of the three of them was welcomed and official with Elaine and Al. She couldn't help but feel complete and at home, even if the apartment was still under investigation.

****

Danny had informed her the previous night that she was going back to school. The bruises around her neck had faded a little more, and while some people would wonder and stare, others probably had seen worse. Mo had the first thought that she wasn't ready, that she was still too fragile, but the rest of the household informed her that she was, in fact, just the opposite. She was powerful enough, strong enough to face the challenges and to begin to move on with her life. Yet, nobody could forget about what had happened. They couldn't. It would always be there, but it didn't have to be in the foreground of everything that the Messers did.

So, without much more stalling on Mo's part (she tried, really, she did) she found herself sandwiched between Mac and Danny in Danny's truck as they dropped her off at school. She didn't want to go. She didn't. When he pulled up in front of the school, she visibly balked at the idea of having to go in there.

"Mo," Danny said, watching her contintue to stall as Mac opened the door and stood on the pavement to let her out. "You're gonna go even if I have to push you outta this truck myself. And that's not gonna be pretty."

She gave him her best puppy-dog look and slid out of the truck. Mac got back in and she turned to look at the pair of them.

"For the record," she said, "I didn't want to do this. I still don't want to do this." She might have been sixteen but she was sounding belligerent enough to where anyone just listening would have mistaken her for a five-year-old who wasn't getting her way. She wanted to say she hated them for doing this, but she couldn't. She didn't hate them and she knew it would hurt them more than anything else. So, instead, she settled on her most pinched, pissy-looking face and said, "I love you." With that, she turned her back and started to walk resolutely toward the main entrance.

Mac looked over at Danny. "She's definitely related to you."

"No," Danny said, staring at Mo's back through the windshield. "She's most definitely Louie's daughter. I'm not that pissy."

****

Mac was seated at his desk when Don came through the door without so much as a knock or a "how are you" and just seated himself in one of the chairs. Mac looked at him over the report he was reading and when Don wasn't saying anything, put the paperwork down and gave the detective his undivided attention.

"The man Mo clocked with the frying pan?" Don said, looking Mac in the eyes. "He's gonna live but he might not be all there upstairs. And he's still not outta the woods yet."

That could potentially be a problem. Mac knew Mo was still feeling guilty over cracking the guy in the head, even if it was to save her own life, and turning the apartment into a crime scene that could potentially out Mac and Danny to everyone in the department. The entire situation for Little Messer and family wasn't good. And since Mac was part of that family, his situation wasn't good.

"Has anybody been asking questions?" Mac asked.

"To the point where they wanna know why your fingerprints are all over Messer's apartment? No," Don said, reassuring Mac minimally. "But I have good news. The day team put enough together to figure out, with Mo's testimony to Detective Davis, it's been ruled a case of clear self-defense and the prosecution isn't going to be pressing charges. If they did, I'm pretty sure whatever attorney you got would be rippin' them a new one for doin' that to a sixteen-year-old girl who's been mugged once and nearly stabbed."

Taking a deep breath, Mac allowed the news to wash over him and he had a little bit of comfort from that. "That's good. And smart." He didn't want to think about what he'd do if they were going to try and press charges on Mo. She was too good a girl to do that too, and it had been in clear self-defense. If one good thing was going to come out of it, then that would be the fact that Mo would do whatever it took to defend herself with whatever was lying around. Mac felt a surge of pride at that.

****

Mo sat at one of the tables outside the school library, lunch in front of her, idly poking at it. She didn't want to eat school food; she remembered the dinner that Elaine had made the night before and it made her mouth water. Swallowing, she felt a twinge of pain (or maybe it was her imagination) from her throat where she knew there were plain-as-day finger marks. That wasn't something that couldn't be helped at that point.

She heard footsteps but didn't look up, instead choosing to reach into her bag for a book that she'd been reading before the entire mess started. She paused. There that word was again. Mess. Part of Messer, her last name (and Danny's, she reminded herself) and a word that could be used to describe the entire situation. But Mac and Danny told her that they weren't mad. Not in the sense that their house was a crime scene or that they'd possibly been outed. No, they were only mad because she had though running away would have solved everything, and running never really solved anything. Besides, she was a Messer and Messers stayed and fought their battles until the last. At least that's what nearly everyone at the lab had told her in one way or another.

"Is this seat taken?"

It was hard to not jump, but Mo was proud of the fact that she started only a little and looked up into a pair of green eyes and messy brown hair. She recognized him (it was a boy) from her math class and the first time she'd saw him, yeah she could have admitted he was cute. He wasn't jump-your-bones hot, but he was cute. Cute enough that, if you twisted her arm, she'd tell you she had a crush on him. His name was Evan...she thought. Evan Something.

"No," she said, after a moment of just staring at him stupidly and him staring right back, "no it's not. Go ahead and sit."

So, he sat. He put his own lunch on the table and sat across from her, giving her space. But he was still there.

"Molly, right?" he asked, opening his carton of orange juice.

"Messer. Molly Messer, but it's Mo," she said, pushing her green beans around her tray. They'd looked great through the glass at the cafeteria, but they didn't seem appealing anymore. "Everybody calls me Mo."

"Evan Hornick," he said, extending his hand over the table. She didn't hesitate to take it. "We have math together."

"I know," she said, looking at the book she'd dug out of her bag on the table and then back at Evan. She knew he could see the bruises on her face and neck. Now she was waiting for the question.

"So," Evan said, looking at his lunch and then at hers, obviously untouched. "I see that you don't like school food."

"Yeah, I'd rather eat dirt some days," Mo said. It wasn't a complete lie. Some days the cafeteria served food so bad most students would have rather gone to Central Park and tried to dig up an earthworm to chow down on. It was great. "But some stuff isn't bad." She couldn't completely knock the public school system, not when Danny had gone through nearly the same thing. "The chicken's pretty good."

"Just don't eat the burgers." Evan was straight-faced but his eyes were smiling at her. She chuckled.

"So, what are you doing down here?" she asked. She'd eaten lunch by the library most days that she'd been in school and not once had she seen him anywhere down in the vicinity. Not that she didn't mind his company now, but she was wondering what had brought it on.

"I wanted to talk to you," he said strongly, clearly trying to ignore the flush that was creeping up his neck.

"You wanted to talk to me?" Did she have to repeat everything he said? She didn't think she had to, but it seemed the only thing to do to keep something else from coming out of her mouth.

"Yeah," he said, looking at her nose. "I like you."

Mo found herself jumping for joy on the inside even if the outside hadn't exactly gotten with the program yet. "You like me?" She was, in her opinion, beginning to sound like she was completely stupid. "You don't know me." That seemed like a safe option, and it was true. She'd never talked to him before that point.

He paused and looked at his tray. She knew in that moment that it was awkward for the both of them.

"But I want to." He looked up. "I want to get to know you."

Mo cocked her head to the side and back. "Okay, then." She felt herself start to smile. Not once had he asked about the bruises. "I'd like that."

****

Danny was there right after school to pick his niece up. He watched for her to come out the doors, and when she did, she wasn't alone. But it wasn't a girl she was walking with. It was a boy. Danny smirked, wondering how long it was going to take her to tell him and Mac about him. Maybe she would when she got in the truck.

"Hey, Danny," she said as she opened the door, clearly in brighter spirits than she had been when she'd left that morning. "How was work?"

"Eh, pretty good," he said, starting up the truck. "How was school?"

"Eh, pretty interesting," she said, looking through the windshield.

Nope, she wasn't going to tell him until she'd figured it out herself. And that could take a while. But he wasn't going to pressure her. Sure, he'd tease her like hell when she finally came out with it though. Was he going to let her know he knew? Oh, hell no.

***

Dinner was a supposed to be a quiet affair that night. Mac had helped Elaine cook while Danny and Al attempted to help Mo with her homework. She had told them flatly for about ten minutes that she didn't need any help, but they refused to believe and the three of them sat in a state of confusion over one of Mo's math papers. Mo told them that if she flunked the upcoming test, she was blaming the pair of them. Danny told her to suck it up and deal with it. Mo had in turn glared at him, reminding him of the fact that when he cooked, he burnt toast to oblivion. Al had to intervene before things got really ugly. Mac and Elaine listened from the kitchen and tried hard not to devolve into laughter.

"Let's face it," Mo said as she sat down at the table, "Danny cooks as well as I can do math. And it's not good."

"I can cook just fine, thank you," Danny said hotly, taking the bread basket that Mac passed him. "You just won't eat what I cook."

"That's because half the time you can't recognize it," she shot back, accepting the potatoes from her grandfather. "Seriously, you can't recognize it when you try to make, like, toast. It comes out all charred and black and you have to tell people that it's toast. And then they look at you like you're crazy."

"He is crazy," Mac said teasingly and Danny merely glanced at his lover. "But that's why we love him."

"See, somebody loves me." Danny put a smug smile on his face.

"I never said I didn't love you," Mo protested, "I just don't love your cooking. There's a difference."

It was then that Danny got that gleam in his eye that Mo had come to recognize as a time to run for cover. She tried not to visibly hold her breath, but it was hard.

"So, Mo," he said slowly, looking at her sideways. "When were you going to tell us about your boyfriend?"

Thankfully Mo didn't have anything in her mouth to choke on when he said the word "boyfriend." The entire kitchen had gone completely silent and everyone was staring at her. Quickly gathering her composure, she said, "What boyfriend? I don't have a boyfriend." She focused on her potatoes and told herself it was true. Evan wasn't her boyfriend. He was a boy who wanted to get to know her better and maybe they'd end up as boyfriend and girlfriend. But he needed to know her better. She wanted him to know her better before she rushed anything. She was still fragile whether anybody wanted to admit it or not. Mo knew herself better than anybody.

"The boy you walked out of school with today," Danny said, trying to hide his smirk and failing. "You two looked awful close."

"What's his name?" Elaine asked and Mo looked between her and her son.

"Evan and he's not my boyfriend," Mo said with more conviction. She knew Danny wasn't going to believe her, but there wasn't really anything she could do about that. Given enough time, he'd probably be right.

"Is he cute?" Danny again.

"Yes, but that's not the point," she said quickly, feeling heat rush to her face. "He's not my boyfriend. He's in my math class, that's all."

"Why was he walking out with you, then?" Mac asked, amusement in his eyes though his face was set somewhat serious.

"I was eating lunch outside the library and he came over and asked to sit down so I said yes and then he said he liked me and I said he didn't know me and he said he wanted to get to know me and if that was okay and I said yeah, that was fine," she said in one breath rather quickly. "That's why we were walking out together. He's going to get to know me. It's nothing serious."

Danny, Mac, Elaine and Al looked at her curiously.

"Oh, come on!" Mo said, putting her fork down and scooting away from the table. "Not everybody! He's not my boyfriend!"

"He's getting to know you," Danny wheedled.

"Well, yeah," she said, looking at him like he was stupid. "I said he couldn't like me unless he got to know me."

"Well, then, he'll be in for a shock or two," Mac said with a straight face. Mo whirled and fixed him with a glare and shocked expression.

"Oh, that's not cool," she said, wishing she was back at the apartment and she could throw something at Mac. "I expected that from Danny, not you."

"I'm rubbing off on him," Danny said with a grin.

Mo looked at her uncle, eyes narrowing and smirking. In more ways than one, her mind supplied for her and she considering saying it out loud, just to see everybody's reaction. It wouldn't get her grounded, but it would definitely be worth it to see what her grandparents did and how both Mac and Danny responded. Danny must have seen the look in her eye because he started to shake her head.

"You wouldn't dare," he said in a low voice, staring down his niece.

"I would," she said in an equally low voice, giving him the stink eye.

"Say what?" Elaine asked, looking slightly confused. Al, thankfully, hadn't said anything. He was watching the conversation like a tennis match. Only he didn't have a scoreboard and couldn't figure out who was winning. He was putting his money on his granddaughter.

Mac looked between his lover and his surrogate niece and knew where her mind was going. Knowing Mo, and if they were back at the apartment, she would have said it by now. He could almost see the thought in her mind, turning over and over. Gratefully, Elaine and Al had provided her with a filter and second thoughts on the words that would have just spilled out. Mac then wondered how long it would last. One couldn't keep a lid on Mo for long.

"You said that you were rubbing off on Mac," Mo said innocently. "I say Evan's not my boyfriend."

Danny realized what she wanted but wasn't going to give it to her. "So you say."

His funeral. "And you're rubbing off on Mac in more ways than one." She had to work hard to keep the smirk off her face as Danny gaped like a fish, Mac turned an impressive shade of pink, and Elaine and Al looked a little dumbstruck. "Now, is Evan my boyfriend?"

"For that remark, yes he is," Danny said, finding his voice after the first few attempts and slapping his palm on the table.

"Okay," Mo said, her body language telling Danny this wasn't over. "I'll let you know when the wedding is."

Mac had made the mistake of taking a sip of his water because the next thing he knew he'd spit it out all over his plate. Al thumped him on the back when he coughed and Mo. spared him a glance.

"That's it," Danny said with an air of finality, "I'm sending Flack to school with you tomorrow."

"Oh, God," she said, putting her head in her hands and trying hard to decide whether she wanted to cry or laugh. She settled for looking up at Danny who looked as though he was seriously considering sending Flack to school with her. "You can't be serious!"

"I am," Danny said with just as much conviction.

"This would be so much easier if you just admitted that he wasn't my boyfriend and that maybe, at a later date, he might be," Mo said, staring at her uncle.

"Fine." He said it as though he was still considering sending Flack with her in the morning.

"Fine." Mo said. "And Flack goes to work with you."

"Sure."

"Glad we're agreed." She sighed, feeling as though this conversation had taken more out of her than it should have. She blamed that completely and wholly on Danny. With a sigh, she looked up at the table in general and said, "Will somebody please pass the bread?" All in all, just another dinner at the Messer household, she realized with a smile.

***

Time went by, over a month, and while Halloween passed off without a hitch, it was the upcoming holiday of Thanksgiving that had Mo. starting to worry a little. Holidays hadn't used to be very big in her previous household, and she had no idea what to expect from her new family. Especially since they'd finally moved out of Danny's parents' house and into Mac's old place that he'd never actually finished cleaning out when he'd moved in with Danny. He and Danny had always said they'd get around to getting everything moved, and maybe find a bigger place, but then everything happened with Louie, and then Mo. and now their current residence was a crime scene. So, things were more than just a little screwed up. And they weren't moving everything into Mac's old place, because there was still the possibility of moving back into Danny's apartment or moving to a new place entirely.

So Mo. was sitting in Mac's kitchen (he had a pretty nice, pretty big place, but anything would look bigger than Danny's) and trying to do her homework and not stress out completely about the coming holiday. She was finally about to turn back to her math homework (she hated math) when her cell phone rang. She took one look at the caller ID and smirked. Danny. She flipped it open.

"Hello?"

"Molly Louise, is there anything you want to tell me?" Danny had the tone of voice that said she needed to come clean otherwise there would be hell to pay. It was also the same voice that he may have used with suspects who were being belligerent.

"Uh..." Mo. racked her brain and then flinched. Of course Mrs. Lawrence would call Danny's cell phone, in the middle of the day, to tell him that his niece had walked out of her classroom yet again because she hated both the teacher and the subject. History wouldn't be so bad if Lawrence didn't put her own views in it. That's what really annoyed Mo., and then there was the fact that Lawrence was so biased that you wanted to gag yourself with a spork every time you went in the classroom. But Mo. didn't tell her uncle that. Danny already knew her opinion.

Danny sighed in a rush of static on her phone. "Look, we'll talk it about later, when we get home." There was a pause. Danny sometimes couldn't let sleeping dogs lie. Mo. waited. "But damn it, Molly, we've had this conversation at least twenty times by now!"

"I know! I know, okay?" she protested, leaning her free arm on the table. "It's just she's such a horrible woman who's so biased. It sucks!"

"I know it does, but if you don't stay in her room, she's going to fail you for that class," he said. "There are some times in life that we have to do things we don't want to. This is one of those times. But, I have to go, so we'll talk when Mac and I get home. Okay?"

"Fine," she said. What else was there to say, really? "Love you."

"Love you, too," he said, and then the connection dropped.

Preventing herself from rolling her eyes, she snapped her phone shut and turned back to her math book. She hated math. At the moment, it was a tough draw between which she hated more, math or history. She couldn't decide and since she couldn't concentrate because she was trying to think of what Danny would say when he and Mac got home, she knew her concentration was shot. She flipped her book shut yet again and got up to find herself something to eat for a snack. It was a partial stalling tactic, one that worked well, but it was still a stalling tactic. Eventually she was going to have to sit down and work out both her math problems, her problems with her family, and with everything else.

That was when there was a knock on the door. Mo. Straightened up from the fridge and looked behind her at the door. She took a quick glance at the clock, decided it was too early for either Mac or Danny to be home, and thanked her own paranoia that she'd locked the door when she'd come in. And there was a peephole in the door so, standing on tiptoe, she could look at whoever was out there. Gently closing the fridge, she walked over the door and stood on her toes, looking through.

It was a guy a little older than her with dark hair standing on the welcome mat that she'd insisted they buy to make their door a little less monotonous and welcoming. Her and her ingrained paranoia was regretting it now as whoever it was knocked again.

And that almost made her jump out of her skin.

She returned to her peephole in time to see him stiffen at the noise she must have made and reach into his pocket.

"Hello? Is there somebody in there?"

Mo. Flinched when she saw that he was pulling out a key. Some random person had a key to Mac's apartment. What the hell was going on! Half a second away from officially freaking out, she ran back to the kitchen table, grabbed her phone, and flipped it open, hitting Danny's number on speed dial. She then practically ran down the hall to the bathroom and proceeded to barricade herself in there, almost missing when Danny picked up.

"Messer."

"Danny!" she hissed, afraid that he was in the apartment by then. "There's somebody in the apartment!"

"What? Now?"

She rolled her eyes; he could be so stupid sometimes. "Yes, now! I'm barricaded in the bathroom at the moment and would really like some back up here!"

Since Mo was nearly panicking, Danny felt it best to humor her. And he and Mac could probably get out of work early. "Mac and I will be right there."

"Hurry!" Then she hung up. She put her phone on vibrate so if it went off it wouldn't be loud and let him know where she was and sat on the closed toilet seat to wait. Waiting was the worst.


When Mac and Danny reached the apartment door, Mac tried to the handle and found it unlocked. He had the suspicion he knew who was in there with Mo (he and Danny had discussed it while on the way there) and knew it was probably nothing to worry about. Nonetheless, he opened the door cautiously, looking in and around the room.

"I figured she'd called you," said the young man from the kitchen, sitting across from Mo's empty chair.

"She's had a rough time the past couple of months, Reed," Mac said, smiling at his stepson as he closed the door. "Moving to the city, being attacked, moving here, it's been a lot."

"Yeah, enough to lock the door and then hide in the bathroom," Reed said. "I tried to get her to come out but she wouldn't. She actually wouldn't say anything."

Danny shook his head and went down the hallway, stopping outside the bathroom door. He knocked softly. "Molly Louise, it's Danny. You gonna come out now?"

"Is he gone? Did you arrest him?"

Danny tried to ignore the fact that she was sounding more like she was eight-years-old than sixteen but somehow found the entire situation more than a little amusing. "I'm not going to arrest Mac's stepson, Mo." He backed up to the other side of the hall.

The door to the bathroom flew open and Mo simply stared at her uncle. "What?"

"That's Reed," Danny said, looking back toward the kitchen. "Claire's son, Mac's stepson. I didn't think that Mac had given him a key, but I was wrong."

"So, he's not some burglar?"

"No, so stop behaving like a savage and come say hello."

Mo shot a glare at her uncle but headed for the kitchen. She smiled at Mac and then looked at Reed. He didn't look so intimidating now. "Hi."

"Hi," Reed said in return, holding out his hand. She paused for a beat and then took it, shaking it with more warmth than anyone in the room had expected. "I'm Reed."

"Molly," she said with a slight smile. "But everybody knows me more as Mo."

Things were still a little awkward, but started to smooth out as Mac started dinner and Mo sat down again to stare at her math book. They invited Reed over for dinner, and he stayed. There was definitely a relieved look in Mo's eyes when Reed told her that he was pretty good at math and the two spent at least forty-five minutes on Mo's homework when she needed help. Mac and Danny sat in the kitchen, watching the two of them work on a problem on the coffee table, and smirked.

"You know, now that he came over here, we don't have to figure out a way to tell her," Mac said, sipping a cup of coffee.

"She was pissed, Mac," Danny said, remembering the look on Mo's face when she opened the bathroom door after he told her Mac had a stepson. "It was funny, but she wasn't a happy camper."

"Well, I don't think there's any more surprises like that one, so we should be safe," he said, drinking in the sight of his stepson helping his surrogate niece with her math homework. To anybody else it would be an average sight, but to Mac it was something special. He was bringing the separate pieces of his life together and making them into a whole, connecting everything.

"She looks like she's doing better," Danny said conversationally a little while later. Mo took that moment to pick up an eraser and chuck it toward Reed's head in frustration. He ducked and it rebounded off the wall.

"Oh, yeah," Mac said, "she's doing a lot better."

Danny smirked. "What can I say? She's a Messer."

Mac snorted.

***

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