Notes: Well, that... happened. After talking about it (ie, shouting angrily and not particularly coherently at SChimes), I think this is what's most likely to happen and this is the thing that Sharon will keep from Rusty. I don't love it, but it's my best guess. On the other hand, I think it was yesterday that I said "there is literally no way Stroh will escape, that's ridiculous" so my guesses are clearly not worth very much.

Resolve (Special Master)

If your inaction leads to violence against my son, I will hold you personally responsible.

Sharon would never let it be said that she held herself to a lower standard than those around her. In fact, she would say that she held herself to one higher, because she possessed skills and expertise that most people did not, and because as a mother, she had a duty to her children that went beyond anything anyone else would ever owe them.

She would never let it be said that she took either job lightly, either.

Sharon pressed her fingertips against the glass wall of her office, cool and unforgiving. Rusty sat inside, playing some game on his phone like his life wasn't in very real jeopardy.

Andy stood beside her, speaking words she hardly heard, she was so focused on Rusty.

She thought he was trying to be brave.

There was a difference between bravery and foolishness, and he was clearly not mature enough to appreciate the distinction.

"Sharon?"

Andy, she realized, had stopped reporting the updates in the search for Stroh (they had distressingly few good leads), and had moved on to staring at her in open concern.

"Stroh nearly killed him," she said in a low voice. "Twice. He sent Weller after him. And now Rusty thinks that Stroh will just waltz off into the sunset and leave him behind. He doesn't understand."

"Look," he said. "If you want someone to stay with you tonight, watch over your place, you know..."

"What I want," she said, and ground her teeth together when her voice wavered. Sharon drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly, a little knot of pain where her heart ought to be. "Thank you, but that won't be necessary. Go on home and get some sleep."

"Yeah," he said, after giving her another long, searching look. "Okay. You too."

He touched her shoulder again before he left. She took whatever comfort she could from that warmth before she returned to Rusty.

Sharon was unhappy.

And, like, it wasn't like Rusty was thrilled with current events himself, either, because seriously, but... Sharon was, like, really unhappy.

It wasn't even that he thought she should just not worry about him ever, either, because... it was kind of nice to come home to a mom who cared enough about him to ask where he'd been or where he was going, even if he wouldn't admit that to her out loud.

But—she'd just come back from some hurried conversation with Lieutenant Flynn and she'd stood right outside and stared at him through the window the whole time like she was afraid to take her eyes off of him, and the first thing she'd done was to try and persuade him again about the security detail.

He wished then that she would worry a little less, because it would make him feel better about saying no.

He said it anyway.

She sat next to him, not behind her desk. Close enough that he could see how her nostrils flared and her jaw tightened, two sure signs that yes, Sharon was very unhappy, but when she spoke, her voice was smooth.

"I don't like it," she said. "I think you're making a mistake, and I wish you would—"

"I know, Sharon." He looked away, trying to ignore the guilt churning in his stomach. It was a shitty way to pay Sharon back for everything she'd done for him, making her worry like this. But he had to live his life, even if she didn't like it.

Ironically, she'd been the one to teach him that.

Rusty swallowed. "Look," he said. "If you actually see Stroh, like—if you can prove it's him..."

He trailed off. Deals were Sharon's thing.

His other mother had always been easier to reassure.

He didn't know what to say to Sharon, and he was afraid too. Stroh had held a knife to his throat. Sent Weller to put a knife in his heart. He had the scar on his leg and the occasional nightmare where he woke sweaty and disoriented, numb with terror in the seconds before the disorientation faded and he remembered that Wade Weller was dead.

But—he didn't tell Sharon this, because he didn't think it would make her feel any better—he could die at any time. He could get struck by lightning or get hit by a bus crossing the street, or—or turn the wrong way on a one-way street and get killed in a head-on collision. Why worry about Stroh if his destiny was to die in a car accident?

He didn't really like thinking about that, either.

"Does Emma want to put me in witness protection again?" He regretted asking as soon as the words were out.

Sharon made a displeased little twitch next to him, her lips flattening into a thin line. "It wouldn't surprise me."

Something else occurred to him, then, and he leaned forward, his hands clenching in real anxiety for the first time. "But she can't make me go, can she?"

"No."

It was followed by a worse thought. "And you—"

"Don't worry, honey." Sharon smiled for the first time that night and reached across the space between them to touch his arm. "Shipping you off to God knows where and never speaking to you again is not my idea of a solution."

That was too awful to think about, really. Home was wherever Sharon was, and she'd promised him that he had a place with her until he was ready to move out on his own. He wasn't ready yet.

"Right."

Sharon squeezed his shoulder. He let her have that, and said nothing when her fingers bore down hard enough to hurt.

She tried once more to persuade him before they left.

"You didn't seem to mind Officers Perez and Stuart nearly as much as your last security detail." She'd caught him smiling a couple of times, and he had interacted with them beyond what was required of him of his own free will.

"They weren't so bad." Rusty lowered his head, but not before she caught the hint of a smile and—was he blushing?

Oh. Oh.

Unexpectedly, Sharon felt her eyes sting. This was exactly the sort of normal experience they had both worked so hard for him to have. This was what was supposed to happen next. He would fall in love for the first time. He'd go to college. Find a job he loved. Maybe he'd marry and have children of his own.

Sharon knew better than to dwell on how life wasn't fair.

"If you wanted, I could try—"

"No guards, Sharon."

McGinnis would never have agreed to it, anyway. Sharon swallowed hard.

Rusty gave her a plaintive look. "I can't go through that again, okay?" he said. "That was terrible. I couldn't leave the house. I couldn't go to school. I couldn't even play chess, and—can't you understand that? Please? Don't you remember how horrible that was?"

Oh, she remembered.

Mostly, she remembered the cold terror that had followed her everywhere, the ever-present fear of losing him that gnawed at her from the inside out every waking moment, the way he had held on and trembled in her arms the night she had almost lost him, how she hadn't had a good night's sleep until Wade Weller's body was on Dr. Morales's table.

The exhaustion had been the worst part, by the end. She wanted to cry at the memory of it, and instead clasped her hands tightly on her lap, and began praying silently for the strength to carry this weight of worry and grief.

"But like, I'll be careful." Rusty was trying to reassure her again. "I'm going to be careful, Sharon, okay? I just—I need to live my life."

She made her decision, then.

"You're right about that," she agreed. "And I don't want you to live in fear for the rest of your life."

As much as she disagreed with Rusty's assessment of his safety or lack thereof... he wanted to go to school. That was hardly an unreasonable demand for him to make.

There was a middle ground here, a sort of compromise.

She could find him security he didn't know he had.

She didn't like it. She had never been the mother who hovered over her children. She wanted them to be comfortably independent adults, and she wanted nothing less for Rusty. But—he needed to be protected, and that was that.

She didn't need to know where he was going, or reports on who he socialized with. She just needed to know that someone was keeping an eye on him, and she would pay the officer's salary herself if that was what it took to get Chief Taylor to sign off on it.

"That's it?" Rusty was watching her warily, no doubt remembering the many, many arguments they'd had over the necessity of his security detail the year before.

"For the moment," she said. "Unless there's something else that you'd like to say?"

He shook his head, still uncertain. "You always have something to say, Sharon."

Despite herself, she smiled. "It's been a long couple of days."

He nodded his head, in total agreement with her for the first time all day. "Can we like, go home now, or what?"

"In a moment," she said. "There are a few more things I need to take care of."

He stood when she did, and then he hugged her.

Sharon froze in surprise at the unexpected contact. Rusty lowered his chin to her shoulder and held on to her, holding fistfuls of her jacket in his fingers. Her instincts returned a second later and she wrapped both arms around him and squeezed, holding him close to her heart. She would keep him there forever, if she could.

Rusty shifted a little in her embrace. She readjusted her grip and made no complaint when his chin pressed into her neck at an uncomfortable angle.

"I'm going to be okay, Sharon," he whispered in her ear, and she held him closer. "You'll see. Don't worry so much."

He was still trying to reassure her. Sharon just closed her eyes and held on. She didn't tell him it wasn't working.

She didn't let go until he started wriggling in her arms. She gave him one final squeeze then and released him and, with a hand to his cheek as she passed, resolutely went to make the necessary arrangements.

She had hope that Stroh would be caught quickly and this nightmare would come to an end.

If he didn't, well...

No. He couldn't hide forever. It was inevitable that he would be recaptured.

It was equally as inevitable that Rusty would find out what she had done. When he did, Sharon knew that he would be angry with her. She decided she could live with his anger, so long as he also lived.