Chapter Text
Six months. That’s how long Francesca Trowbridge was allowed to indulge in a dream she never knew she always wanted. Six months of falling asleep to the steady heartbeat of a good man. Of sleeping through the night without fear and no gun under her pillow. Six months of feeling loved in a way she’d not felt since she was 17. Six months of dinners and laughing and cuddles she would never admit to anyone but him that she loved more than shooting her gun. 193 days of feeling whole. 277,920 minutes of lightness. And only one minute, 54 seconds and 12 words to blow it all up.
“I don’t love you and I don’t want to do this anymore.”
The combination of the courage that only comes from too many shots of tequila and the gut wrenching pain of one small yet devastating mistake is all it took for Frankie to lose everything good in and pure in her life and leave her with a hole where her heart used to be. The image of Will’s face streaked with tears seared into her memory so deep not even the strongest of alcohols has been able to burn it away.
Alcohol, body punishing workouts and the company of strangers have become her only refuge, her only salvation from the constant reminders of her lost happiness. Time has become her greatest enemy. She avoids calendars, clocks and holidays in an effort to ignore how much time has passed and how long she’s been living with a broken heart and a missing soul.
Seasons don’t lie though, and even all the pain in Frankie’s heart could not stop the earth from turning on its axis and warming her lonely corner of the world. So as the first signs of spring with it’s bird chirps and flowers pushing their way out of the earth once again found her, Frankie ran. Desperately needing to find that cold that matched her feelings and the ice that kept her heart frozen.
March in the northern seaside town of Húsavík, Iceland shows no signs of spring. No flowers blooming, no baby animals emerging from their homes to explore their new world, and most importantly no warmth to thaw those attempting to remain frozen inside. There is even less chance of finding that warmth at 2am in the back alley outside a dirty, run down local bar more suited to criminals, tortured souls, and those society would rather forget, than reputable upstanding citizens. It’s perfect.
Frankie can feel the bitter wind hurling at her from the Arctic Ocean, blowing through the designer holes in her sweater and biting at her skin as her skirt rides up on her legs where the hands of tonight's attempt to forget pushes it higher. She doesn’t know his name, she didn’t ask, either did he. She only wants one thing from him, and he seems as eager to give it to her as she is to take it.
When she saw him walk into the bar 45 minutes earlier she knew he’d be the one. The one that could finally make her forget. He was short, slightly shorter than her 5’7”, but what he lacked in height was made up for in brawn with wide shoulders and defined muscles. She watched through a rum induced haze from her perch in a dark corner of the bar as he first greeted then punched an equally rough looking man before sitting down at the bar and barking viciously at the bartender to bring him five shots of vodka.
She evaluated him as he drank one shot after the next barely taking a breath between them. His dark coloured beard was unkempt and covered most of his face, his bald head was clearly shaved, and not recently as she could see where the regrowth had already begun, multiple piercings decorated his face and ears and the outline of a knife was clearly visible through his tight leather jacket with the arms cut off.
It was his tattoos however, that Frankie took most notice of and made her confident that he was the one. It seemed that every visible inch of his skin from his neck to his waist was covered in what Frankie could only describe as the most crude and vulgar imagery she had ever seen. From naked women spread eagle with demonic creatures executing torturous sexual acts upon them, to hate filled words fuelled by imagined Aryan supremacy, the images made Frankie’s skin crawl and rage fill her belly. He was everything Will Chase was not, and that made him perfect.
There was only one thing she had to be sure of before she could take him to the alley and use him in the transactional way that she once allowed herself to believe she’d escaped from. She swallowed the last of her drink, stood on slightly wobbly legs and took a deep breath. “Get your shit together, Francesca.” she whispers to herself as she makes her way to the bar and sits a few seats down from the stranger, in hopes of catching his attention and orders what she imagines will be her last shot before she makes her exit.
“Who the fuck are you then?” he turns towards her and demands in a voice as gritty as his fingernails. His native Icelandic sounding harsh and angry.
Frankie turns towards him slowly as she crosses her legs inside her tight and short skirt and looks him over one last time from his dirty steel toes boots right up to his icy blue eyes. Blue not green, perfect. That’s all she needed to see, she’s certain now.
Frankie picks up her last shot and swallows it without breaking eye contact then slowly licks her lips before lowering the glass once again.
“We can sit here and talk or you can take me outside and fuck me, your choice.” Frankie makes the offer without emotion. She has little emotion these days and what she does have she’s not going to waste on him. She holds his eyes for three seconds before turning away and making her way to the back door. She considered for a moment that he might not have understood the Russian she chose to use, but it seems the word "fuck" is universal and the sway of her hips and the look in her eye as she passed him must have got the point across because the man stood up and with a bragging yell to the rest of the bar followed her out into the cold.
With unforgiving hands the stranger grabbed Frankie as soon as he got outside, roughly pushing her back against the cold brick wall of the building and pressed himself as close to her as he could. She could feel every excited inch of his body and had to remind herself she asked for this. She wanted this type of brutality and anonymity, no she needed it. He reached up to kiss her and she turned her head away out of instinct. He grabbed her hair and jerked her face back to his and after a quick assessment yanked her head to the side and latched his mouth to the side of her neck sucking and biting like a leech looking for blood. Frankie couldn’t stop a small self loathing whine escape her lips as she felt his tongue stud pass over her skin and fisted her hands into the sides of his leather vest. The stranger seemed to take this as a sign of encouragement because he began rubbing himself even harder against Frankie while one hand palmed her breast and the other reached down to lift her skirt even more.
She can feel his hands rough, demanding and calloused on her skin touching her in ways that make her stomach burn and twist in both shame and regret and she has to fight to keep the bile from finding its way to her mouth. Fight through it Frankie she demands of herself even as she grits her teeth against her instinct to flee.
But he feels all wrong. His hands are not calloused from years of shooting a gun yet soft in all the right places. He’s not touching her in a way that makes her feel precious and adored. His rough grunts and vulgar curses are not the declarations of a man that makes her feel worshipped and worthy while he loves her.
But all of that is secondary to the harshness of his grip which is now punishingly hard on her hips, hard enough to leave bruises as he grinds against her while trying to undo his belt. It’s the scratching of her bare back on the brick wall that finally releases Frankie from the numb status she was trying so hard to hold on to.
No No No she chastises herself even as she feels tears of frustration welling in her firmly shut eyes and leaking down her face. She can’t do this. She can’t let his man inside her and take those memories she’s tried so desperately to bury away, any more than she could the others before him. Not the Weapons Dealer in Moscow, the Con Artist in Montana, the Biker in Montreal, or any of the dozens of men she’d tried and ultimately failed with in Finland, Sweden, England, Ireland, Luxembourg or France. Why she thought a random stranger in Iceland would be any different she doesn’t know.
Will Chase had ruined her. He broke her by loving her so hard.
“Stop.” Frankie says through gritted teeth as she pushes the stranger away, and rights her skirt.
She sees a flash of confusion on his face, but only for a second before his eyes darken into something dangerous that Frankie supposes most women would fear and he is once again pressing his body firmly against her, his hand reaching under her skirt rubbing between her legs almost painfully hard.
“You asked for this bitch, and you’re going to get it. Don’t you dare put up a fight you whore or I’ll make it hurt”
Frankie froze. He was not the first man to threaten her when she changed her mind after leading them on. She’s been the recipient of more than a few bruises, black eyes, and even one stab wound from the hard men she had tried desperately to let fuck her over the past few month. But something about this man and this moment made her feel like she should let it happen. Let him hurt her and defile her and leave her in the alley like trash. Maybe then the numbness and pain would stop and if she was really lucky she would slowly die here in this alley and what's left of her soul could slip away into the abyss.
It’s the sound of laughter from the opening door of the bar that jars Frankie back to the present and the stranger. This is wrong. You don’t deserve to be let off the hook this easy. You don’t get to escape what you did and the pain you caused. Coward! It’s the anger in her own head that forces her arms to raise up and push the stranger off of her once again. He stumbles back a few feet, his legs catching in his newly lowered pants. It’s enough for Frankie to brace for the attack she knows is coming. As the frigid air hits her tear streaked face Frankie realizes two things. One the man is now holding his knife, and two she’s sick of this shit.
“You slut, you think you can lead me on then not put out? You’re going to regret walking into my bar.”
Frankie watches as the man drunkenly lunges for her wielding his knife like a sword. She easily sidesteps him and grabs the back of his vest using his own momentum to slam him into the dumpster to her left.
“You bitch!” He yells and lunges for her again, the rage on his face mirroring her feelings, though you would not know it from the serene and steady look on her face. “I’m going to kill you, you whore!” the stranger declared in a yell loud enough to draw attention from the less than sober patrons leaving the bar. Frankie, ready for the assault moved once again, sidestepping his attack and sent him head first into the wall knocking him out cold and lying on the ground with blood dripping from the split skin above his “I love my cunt of a mum” tattoo on the back of his head. Frankie stood back and straightened adrenaline now pumping alongside the alcohol in her veins.
“Gunnar?” Frankie hears a voice behind her. She turns ready to fight, but sees only a slip of a woman standing at the mouth of the alley. Frankie pauses and looks at the man on the ground then back to the woman before her.
“Gunnar didn’t like the word no.” Frankie declares in near perfect Icelandic.
The woman looks slowly between Frankie and the man, then nods slowly as if she knows this from experience and says “Perhaps now he has learned to like it.”
“Perhaps” repeats Frankie and moves away from the alley and onto the street, tucking a loose hair behind her ear as she goes.
“You’re bleeding” the woman says with concern as Frankie steps into the light.
Frankie hadn’t realized, the adrenaline masking the pain of the knife slicing her. Idiot she thinks, the alcohol must have slowed her movements, but she could feel it now, his knife was able to slice her left arm from wrist to elbow as he stumbled to the ground.
“It’s a small price to pay for such a valuable lesson to be taught.” Frankie whispers more to herself than the woman standing by.
Without waiting for a reply Frankie quickly makes her way down the street weaving in and out of alley’s and side streets on her way back to the safehouse. She’s not supposed to be there. No one is. It’s an old and forgotten off the grid CIA safehouse that’s really more of a fishing shack that hasn’t been used in years. But Frankie was desperate for a place to go and even if she had forfeited her job when she ran it didn’t mean she lost all the knowledge she had. Including where the most remote safehouses were located.
Walking through the door, Frankie went directly to the airplane sized washroom and removed her sweater and jacket. “Shit, Shit, Shit” Frankie repeated like a mantra as she stared at the damage done to her arm. It wasn’t deep but it was big and it would be infected before long if she didn’t clean it soon. Washing it the best she could with the small amount of soap she had, Frankie then wrapped it using an old dish towel and held it in place with hair ties. “So smart, my very own Lady MacGyver” She can hear Will say in her head. “Can I kiss it and make it better?”
“Get out of my head Will.” Frankie mutters to herself as she shuts off the lights so she won’t have to look at the tears once again falling from her eyes, as the memories try to settle in now that the quiet surrounds her.
Frankie moves blindly through the shack to the cot pressed up against the freezing outside wall with a gun under the pillow, and wills the alcohol still coursing through her body to take her so deep into sleep that not even the nightmares will touch her. Slipping under the thin and mostly useless blankets Frankie closes her eyes, pulls her knees to her chest and slowly rubs her fingers over her right hip, trying to both soothe and warm her cold skin. But peaceful sleep is hard to find these days, Will broke her for that too. Will Chase broke her for the better in so many ways she couldn’t count them all if she tried. But in the end she broke him and she’ll never forgive herself for that, she can’t.
Sleep must have taken her because Frankie is jarred awake by the shrieking of her cell phone. The time on the phone says 5:12, about two hours of continuous sleep a new personal record Frankie silently congratulates herself. Another shrieking ring has Frankie focused once again. Only one person in the world has this number and he has only used it one other time in the past three months. He wouldn’t call unless something was wrong.
“Jai?” Frankie asks as she answers before the second ring is even complete.
“Francesca...” Frankie can hear the relief and fear in his voice, and is immediately on alert and preparing for the worst.
“Jai?” she says again when he doesn't continue. Every cell in her body is now tingling and she can feel her muscles tightening the longer she waits.
“Francesca. ” Jai who is usually level and calm practically sobs out. “Francesca, there’s been an accident. Will...” Jai’s voice hitches as he tries to get the words out. “Will’s hurt, it’s bad Frankie. He’s in surgery now but the doctor's aren’t sure he’ll make it.”
“Jai?” Frankie whispers barely audible, voice shaking with nerves and terror.
“Francesca, you need to come...If he doesn't...and you aren’t...I need...” Jai starts but can’t seem to get his mind around his words.
All the air rushes out of Frankie's lungs and she does the only thing she can, the only thing that makes sense and no sense at the same time. The one thing she’s promised herself every minute of every day for the past three months she wouldn’t do. She fights to pull air into her lungs and whispers passed the lump in her throat. “I’m coming”.