Finding Home {Jack x Katherine}

Chapter 9

Katherine barely made it three steps outside of the apartment building before Snyder walked up next to her. She stiffened, kept her head down and tried to hurry her pace without full on running. "Now, now, Miss Pulitzer, you don't have a reason to be scared. I'm a friend of your father's."

At that she turned, eyes widening in realization. It was the man that her father had sent after her. Then another wave of realization dawned on her. She did know who this man was. She would never forget that sneer he thought was a smile. It haunted her the entire day after she read the article about his corrupt halfway house. Her heart had broken to hear all the horrible things this man had done to the children he had taken into his care. Right now though, her heart dropped to her stomach, connecting the dots from her and Jack's conversation to this moment right now. The men she now lived with were boys under this horrible man's care.

"Well then you can go tell my father that your services are no longer needed." They were not going to ruin the home she had found.

"It don't work that way, sweetheart. You've got to come back where you belong."

She sent a glare his way. "I am exactly where I'm supposed to be."

"Why yes, you are." Snyder moved to grab ahold of her arm to drag her to his car. In a blink of an eye, Katherine reared back and punched him square in the nose. Blood dripped down and anger flashed in his eyes. She had managed to break it.

Before he could fully recover, Katherine took off running. She was not about to see how he would retaliate. The way Jack reacted when he thought she had been a spy told her she certainly didn't want to stick around to find out.

Down the stairs she ran at the nearest subway station. Pushing through the crowd, she jumped onto the first train she could. She didn't know what train it was, she didn't care. She would ride it for five stops and then wherever she landed, she would call Darcy, let him know where she was and figure out how to get to where she needed to go. After all she did now have a map in her hands.

Darcy jumped up from the park bench and ran towards Katherine as soon as he saw her along the path. He wrapped her up in his embrace and held her tight. "Are you okay? He didn't hurt you, did he?" He pulled back, worry all over his features as he took in the sight of his best friend.

"I'm fine. He didn't even get a chance to touch me." She playfully pushed at his shoulder and then winced, bringing her hand back towards her chest.

That didn't help with Darcy's worries. "Let me see your hands." He brought them closer to him to compare their sizes. Her right hand seemed to be a bit swollen but he couldn't quite tell. "Please don't tell me you punched this guy." He looked back up to her face, concern written all over his.

She bit her bottom lip and nodded. "He made a grab for me, Darcy! What else was I supposed to do?" Her voice then grew smaller. "I'm pretty sure I broke his nose."

Letting out a sigh, he looked up to the sky questioning the sanity of his best friend before undoing his tie. "Hold this end." He handed her the wider part of his tie and began wrapping it around her hand and wrist.

"Where'd you learn this trick?" She asked as she watched him work.

"You are aware that Bill likes to punch walls right?" He chuckled as he tucked and tied the end of the tie around her wrist.

She laughed with him, nodding her head. "I do remember. Just didn't realize you're still cleaning up his messes."

He gave her a sheepish grin. "Not as often as I used to. You, however, seemed to have picked up an investigation for him."

Katherine rolled her eyes. "It's a good story besides, I already checked to make sure he didn't hire anyone to do this himself as some crazy scheme to get us all back together or whatever."