"It's not here anymore."

Jules can hear the voices coming from the old apartment at 201 Duncan Street before she's even entered the hallway. For the most part, they are muffled and urgent, but that phrase catches her attention. Two people, discussing the near-empty apartment in her absence, looking for something. Jules can feel a bolt of fear charge down her spine into her legs which turn to jelly as she reaches for her phone. If there are two of them now, and she barely made it out alive the first time, then she has to wait them out. If she doesn't and she fights--

"Johnny, I'm telling you, she wouldn't have a gun. This is California."

For a moment, her legs give out as her fear shifts first to relief then to confusion. Of all the ways she anticipated her weekend starting, finding Jonathan and Miriam Draper in her half-demolished living room wasn't very high on the list, but somehow here they are. When Jules rounds the corner, her mother is holding a packing tape dispenser in her left hand and rearranging the contents of a box with her right. Her father is standing in the middle of the room, hands on his hips as he surveys the room with his look of perpetual disapproval. She wonders, briefly, if he still makes that face when he is at home and if the US Army had it permanently installed while he was in Sergeants Major training. Despite being nearly fifteen years into his retirement, he still looks very much like an old NCO on vacation.

"What..."

"Julesie!"

"How..."

"Kiddo, this place is a mess."

"Cooper called you, didn't he?"

Jules doesn't know whether to thank the father of her child or push him out the window, but she supposes only time will tell. It's nice having someone there that doesn't know anything about what is happening with her. Someone who doesn't want to ask a hundred questions that she isn't prepared to answer. Someone who, despite a complicated history, would much rather protect her than put her in harm's way. There aren't many people in the world that fit this particular criteria, and she is glad two of them are standing there, even if they are already critiquing the way she's packed.

"Oh, honey. We were so worried about you after Cooper called us. I told Johnny we had to fly out here immediately and help you pack up. Then, once you're settled and snug as a bug, we'll go to Napa and leave you alone just the way you like it."

Jules feels like she should argue with this specific brand of mom guilt, but they've had this argument many times over the last fifteen years, and arguing with Miriam Draper is sometimes a lot like tilting at windmills. Most of the time, the argument devolves into a smug motherly smile as Miriam realizes that Jules can not argue that there are not enough nursing jobs or land in the great state of Texas. Instead of arguing, Jules just takes in a little breath and shakes her head and turns her face away to hide the smile that appears on her lips.

In a moment, her father's fingertips are on her jaw, turning her face to look at him. Her instincts are to pull away from the sudden touch, startled and anxious. She sees in her father's eyes the smallest twitch of understanding and she can feel his touch become more gentle. Jules can not remember the last time her father gave her a hearty pat on the shoulder, let alone touched her face. Her shock allows him to turn her face to one side then the other to inspect the bruising around her throat, which has now gone a lovely green around the edges. He then moves to her arm, which is also bruised but bandaged to keep dirt out of her stitches, down to her fingers which barely have any color at all now but she supposes he'd know the difference.

"Yours?" he asks quietly, pointing to the window which is boarded up but still rather bloody around the glass. She gives him a near imperceptible shake of the head and she can tell he is glad and maybe even a little proud. With a sigh, he wraps his arms around her and she freezes, confused and wide-eyed. So rare is the Jonathan Draper hug that she can't be sure it's actually happening. For all she knows, there is some wild animal behind her and her father is moving to push her out of the way.

"I still think you should get a gun, Pup," he tells her, kissing her on the forehead. Her shock nearly makes her consider it before letting out a breathy laugh at the old nickname. Puppy. Puppy-Face. From all of the times she tried curling up against him on the couch with wide, sad eyes only to be sent to her mother for affection. She wonders if he recalls it that way. If he's been hugging her this whole time and the events of the last six months knocked those memories out of her head. Or can he sense the depths of complexity going on inside her now? Or has she, for the first time in their long lives, scared the old officer?

"Not a chance in hell, Dad," she tells him, hugging back.