Elena screamed and dropped to her knees beside Nick, “Don’t shoot!” she screamed, her voice cracking. Throwing herself towards his body she kept a protective arm over him. 

“Are you alright?” a uniformed police officer asked as he rushed over to her side. 

“You shot the wrong guy! He just saved my life!” Elena cried desperately, “Arrest him!” she added, pointing to Brian who was slowly starting to come around on the floor.

The officer turned to his partner and pointed to Brian, getting the other man to take care of it before he picked up his radio, “This is Officer Daniels, I need an ambulance at the Richardson house and call the FBI, let them know we found her.”

“I feel weird,” Nick spoke from his spot on the floor where Elena was putting pressure on his wound.

“Shush,” she coddled, “Stay quiet, and stay still, you were shot. Help is on the way.”

“I got shot? Really?” he asked before his eyes rolled back in his head and he passed out.

The story slowly started to unfold as the medics arrived to tend to Nick. Two uniformed police officers had been stationed just outside the house if by chance there was any sign of Elena. Just as Brian had predicted, the FBI and her parents were waiting at the drop spot for the exchange of her for the money. As it turned out, her father was going to pay after all. She couldn’t help but smile when she learned that despite how cheap he was, he was willing to give his money away on a whim, for her. 

The officers had received a call about a fender bender just down the street so they had left their post for a short time to check things out. They had left just seconds before Elena had run up the driveway. By the time the police cruiser pulled back up to the house AJ and Howie were headed out to the car. They were arrested on the spot once the police noticed the two damaged cars, and how suspicious it was to see two random young men racing from the back of the house. They were questioning the two of them when they heard the shot coming from the back and raced out to see Brian lying on the floor and Nick standing over Elena with the gun. It was instinct to disarm Nick, so Officer Daniels took a shoot first, ask later approach. 

Nick was loaded into the ambulance and taken to the hospital while Elena was allowed to get cleaned up and change into some real clothes before her parents arrived. 

Just when Elena thought she could cry no more her parents arrived with the FBI and she had never been so happy to see anyone in her entire life. They hugged tightly, and cried, and Elena looked at her father with an appreciation she could not even begin to express. She had doubted him, she had thought that he would never pay her ransom no matter what her mother or anyone else said. He did though; he was ready and willing to pay the ransom. She could be in a position like Nick, feeling nothing but hurt and anger towards her father but she didn’t, she loved him because he’d never given her anything but the best of the best. 

“I’m so glad you’re okay,” Kevin whispered, running his hand over his daughter’s now clean hair. 

“I thought I’d never see you again,” Elena admitted, having thought earlier that day that her life was over. 

“The FBI said they shot the kidnapper?” her mother questioned, still wiping away her own tears of joy.

Elena quickly shook her head, “Actually no, they shot the hero,” she corrected, wondering aloud how Nick was doing in the hospital.

“Well if he’s the hero then we should go pay him a thank you,” Kevin suggested and Elena’s face lit up. 

“I’d really like to do that.”

A tall man dressed in a suite walked up to the, interrupting their moment, “Excuse me ma’am do you mind if we ask you a few questions?”

Elena nodded and followed him over to a couch. 

“Would you be able to identify the men who kidnapped you?” he cut right to the chase. 

“Yes, the three men who you arrested are the men who were keeping me.”

“Just the three of them, there was no one else?” the man asked as he jotted down notes.

“Yes, there were only three. There was no one else.”

She went into further detail about how the three men they’d arrested had taken her, held her hostage, beaten her, and ultimately tried to kill her. She left out the fourth man as if he had never existed; he was a mere bystander who helped save her after she had escaped from the clutches of her evil kidnappers. When the FBI realized that the man found in the guest house was the gardener, whom they had originally cleared, and the other two worked for the same landscaping company they didn’t ask any more questions after that. It was clear cut to them. The men who they found were the only men that Elena was fingering so their investigation was pretty much complete as far as finding out who had taken her. 

“Is it okay for me to go to the hospital now?” Elena asked and after getting the okay she and her parents got in the car and headed to see Nick. She was nervous as they approached the desk and asked for his room. 

“Are you here to pick him up?” the nurse asked and Elena looked at her with a confused expression. 

“He’s leaving? He was shot in the neck; you’re just going to let him go?”

“His request,” the nurse shrugged, “We told him he should have someone come pick him up.”

“Where is he now?” Elena wondered and the nurse rattled off a room number. 

When they made it to the room Nick was sitting up in bed with a large white bandage covering the spot where his neck met his shoulder. At the sound of the door he looked up, surprised to see Elena and her parents walk through the door. There were police officers in his room earlier, and they had taken his statement about what had gone on in the guest house. He only hoped that everything he said matched up with Elena’s story. He found it incredibly ironic that one of the things that had cleared him from a majority of suspicion was his lack of employment. If Brian had convinced him to work for the landscaping company too, he wouldn’t be a free man right now. Instead he was just some guy who lived at his mother’s house down the street from where Elena had been held captive. He was an innocent man by their standards.

“What are you doing here?” he asked curiously, not having expected to see her.

“Where do you think you’re going?” she demanded to know, hands going to her hips.

“I can’t stay,” Nick said with a sigh, “I don’t have insurance, I don’t have a job, I can’t afford this room. Hell I can’t even afford the gauze keeping me from bleeding out.”

In a flash Kevin had walked over to the bed, putting a hand on Nick’s shoulder, “You’re not going anywhere. It was the police who shot you with no warning, so they will be paying your medical expenses. You saved my daughter’s life, the least I can do is call my lawyers and have them get your bills taken care of.”

“Wow, thanks,” Nick said, never having experience charity quite like that before. 

“Like I said, it’s the least we can do. Well, we’ll let you two visit for a bit,” Kevin said, looking back to Elena quickly before turning to Nick, “I’ll be sure to leave my information with the people at the desk so don’t you worry about a bill. Take care of yourself. Maybe we’ll see you around some time?”

“Maybe,” Nick nodded, wincing when he realized it wasn’t a motion he could really manage with the hole in his neck. He was still surprised that after all the rumours he had heard about this man being uptight in reality he was normal, like anyone else.

“Oh, I think we’ll be seeing a lot more of him,” Dana chuckled, closing watching the looks that her daughter was giving the young man, “Let’s go,” she said, pulling Kevin outside the door. 

“Your dad doesn’t seem like a bad guy,” Nick commented as he sat back on the bed, patting the spot next to him so Elena could join him. 

“He can be very generous sometimes,” Elena admitted sheepishly as she sat down next to him.

Nick sighed, “I’m trying to convince myself that I know why you lied to me when I was nothing but honest with you but it’s hard.”

“All I can tell you is that I’m sorry, and I hope you can forgive and forget.” 

“I can, and I have,” he said honestly, “I just kind of hoped you were like me.”

“I am,” Elena said, “You were a victim and I am too, just in different ways. Just because I lied to you about some things doesn’t mean you should never believe me again. I was under a lot of pressure, and thought I would never see my family again.”

“Did you lie to the police?” he wondered, “They didn’t seem to think I had anything to do with it. I pretended not to know the other guys so I was hoping our stories matched up.”

“I told them you weren’t involved, that you were just a guy I met along the way. They seemed convinced once they figured out that Brian worked for us.”

Nick smiled gratefully, “So we can move on from all of this right?” 

Elena kissed his temple and laid them back in the bed, “We definitely will.”

“You think everyone will believe our story?” 

“Everyone will,” she nodded.

Nick looked over at her sceptically, “How can you be sure?”

“Ask yourself this question,” Elena prompted, tapping him on the nose quickly, “who is going to believe a con?”

“Everyone,” he smiled, “If she’s good.”

“Am I good?” Elena asked, putting her head on his uninjured shoulder. 

“Oh yeah, you’re good,” Nick agreed, sighing as they settled back into the bed. He felt like he was finally free of all the people who had held him down for years, and now finally had a chance to be good for his own benefit. No longer would Brian be able to knock him down, he would have Elena there to hold him up. 

“You have to promise me one thing though,” Elena said, rubbing Nick’s arm soothingly, “No more kidnapping girls and falling in love with them okay?”

“I hear that only happens once,” he replied with a smile. 

FINIS