I shifted a little and I felt my eyes flutter open. At first I didn’t see anything, but my immediate attention was drawn elsewhere. The incredible stiffness of my body when I barely tried to move. I moaned softly.

“Lizz?”

A dim light flickered on and AJ’s face hovered above mine. I squinted against the new light. “Wha-?” I tried, my voice sounding like I had swallowed broken glass.

“Hold on.” AJ said quietly. He moved from my vision and returned with a paper cup with a straw. He held it to my lips and I drank the cold water gratefully. It soothed my raw throat.

“Where am I?” I whispered weakly. My brain must not have been functioning right because I was drawing a blank.

“You’re in the hospital.” AJ stated.

Hospital? I looked around. There were balloons and flowers on the window sill and bedside table, cards tacked up on the bulletin board. Then I looked back at AJ. He had a white bandage on the back of his head. I shifted again, trying to make sense of everything.

“Am I okay?” I asked, suddenly worried at how much I hurt.

“You’re going to be fine Lizz.” AJ assured me, somewhat sadly. That perplexed me. I knew it wasn’t a sadness that I was going to be okay, but more like someone else wasn’t.

“Oh, okay. Um, where’s Nick?” I asked, looking around again.

AJ looked away. “He uh...”

I took in his nervous look with great trepidation. Then it hit me. “Oh God...” I choked out, the tears already starting to fall. Everything came back. Brian and I getting kidnapped. Marcus showing up with Nick. What Marcus was going to do to me. Brian launching himself at Vinnie. The gun.

“Sh-h-h-h, Lizz.” AJ sat down on the edge of the bed.

I put my hands over my face, barely feeling the sting of my swollen cheekbone, and cried brokenly. “Oh AJ, I tried to save him. I tried to stop Marcus from killing Nick. Oh God, please help me, I tried.”

“Whoa whoa, Lizz! Nick isn’t dead! Lizz!” AJ practically shouted.

I looked up. “What? What do you mean? I - I saw him...” I trailed off, not comprehending.

“Lizz, Nick’s here. He’s just down the hall. He’s going to be fine.” AJ looked at me, his eyes full of concern.

I let out my breath in a whoosh. “He’s okay? Marcus didn’t...” I suddenly felt light-headed. “I have to see him. AJ, you have to take me to him!”

AJ held his hands up. “Oh no! You are supposed to stay in bed. No way missy.”

“AJ you know I will do this with or without your help!” I stated stubbornly.

AJ groaned. “They did have to stick me in your room didn’t they?” I thought I heard a hint of teasing in his voice. At least I hoped so.

He left and came back with a wheelchair. “Are you sure you are up to this?” He asked warily.

“I don’t know.” I admitted honestly. “But I don’t care.”

AJ came over and helped me scoot to the edge of the bed. I bit my lip hard against the pain. Almost immediately I noticed my bare legs. No more bodysuit.

“Can you stand?” AJ shook me out of my thoughts.

“I’m sure I can.” I said confidently, but as soon as I did, my knees buckled. Fortunately AJ was hadn’t let go of me yet and he eased me into the wheelchair. “Good Lord!” I hissed.

“Sure you can.” AJ mocked teasingly.

“Shut up. What the heck is wrong with me anyway?” I was a little worried now.

“Well you have been in bed all day and you went through a lot, so it’s probably normal.” AJ assured me.

“All day?”

“Yeah, it’s almost 8 at night.” AJ replied.

“Whoa, it seems like it was just a few hours ago.” I murmured.

AJ chuckled. “Eight o’clock the following night, Lizz. You slept for more than 40 hours straight. We were starting to get a little worried, afraid you had slipped into a coma.”

My eyes widened. “Damn. So why isn’t my doctor or nurse in here since I just woke up?”

AJ gave me a look. “Because they don’t know, dumbass. You had me running out the door after a wheelchair first thing.”

“Oh yeah.” I said sheepishly.

AJ shook his head, but I know he was smiling. He reached over on my bed, grabbed one of the blankets and draped it over my legs. “Brian is okay too right?” I stared up at him.

“Yep, they released him last night. Y’all were admitted sometime that morning about 4am. They wanted to keep him for observation. Of course he hasn’t left here, bestrewn your room and Nick’s. Now that you are awake you will probably get to go home tomorrow.” He explained.

I thought about my aching ribs. I wasn’t so sure about that one. Now that I was sitting upright, the pain was horrible and I could feel the bulky bandage that went from my chest down to my waist. “And what about this?” I gestured to my ribs.

“You were sliced open pretty good.” AJ grimaced.
I laughed, immediately regretting it. “Nice choice of words there. I know that much. Marcus lashed his knife out at me. I didn’t even know he had it. What I meant was, how bad is it?”

“Oh. They said it was pretty deep, but you were found before it got life-threatening. I think Brian said it that it goes a good 8 or 9 inches or so across you. Everything else is pretty minor.”

I nodded. Ew. Eight or nine inches?! That’s going to hurt for awhile. I looked down at the rope burns that were on my wrists. I’m sure I had a part in making them worse by panicking like I did. And of course there was my pretty bruised cheekbone and black eye that probably accompanied it. My luck we were going to have a press conference soon too. New thoughts... “How about your hard head?”

“Getting better.” He grinned. He struggled to maneuver my wheelchair and IV pole out the door. I was relieved to see that we weren’t in ICU. There also weren’t security guards everywhere which was sort of weird to see. I mean, there were a couple, but not near as many as there were before.

AJ leaned over and knocked softly on the door.

“Come in.” What sounded like Brian’s voice called back. I smiled.

AJ pushed open the door and pushed me in. I’ll never forget how happy I was at that moment when I saw Nick. He was propped up against several pillows and looked like he was laughing at something Brian had said. I never thought I was going to see that smile again. When he turned his head towards me, his eyes just lit up.

“Lizz!” He exclaimed, a tad on the surprised side.

Brian grinned too, looking as shocked to see me up.

“AJ!” Kevin tossed a disapproving look at him.

“Hey she wouldn’t take no for an answer!” AJ defended.

I looked up at him pleadingly, nodding my head towards Nick’s bed. AJ shook his head, implying that I was already on thin ice, but complied. I grinned at him as he locked the wheels to the chair for me.

“Oh god Lizz I wanted to go see you so bad, but they wouldn’t let me up. How are you?” Nick looked me over carefully and I knew he would tell I was struggling a little. Damn link.

“Better now, I thought you were...” I whispered, choking up. Before my waning strength completely left me, I pulled myself out of my chair. With a frustrated grunt, AJ rushed to help me sit down on the side of the bed. I think he thought I was gonna fall. I gave him a grateful smile.

“How?” I asked.

Nick looked thoughtful a minute. “It was like everything was happening in slow motion. I saw Marcus raise the gun and I didn’t even have time to move. I thought for sure I was going to die. I don’t even know how to explain how I felt. Then I saw you dive for the gun and you pulled his arm to the side as it went off.”

I closed my eyes, the picture was so vivid in my memory. “But you did get shot...” I whispered.

“Yeah, instead of going through my heart, it went right here.”

I opened my eyes and Nick was pointing on his ride side just up and right of his heart. “Holy shit! That’s where...”

“I was shot last time, I know! The bullet hit the scar tissue and didn’t go as deep as it would have. It hurts like a motha, but it won’t take quite as long to heal.” Nick finished.

I stared at him in awe and then threw my arms around him. I wanted to hug him as tight as I could, but I didn’t think my injury was gonna let me do that. Not to mention, I didn’t know how bad he was hurt. He looked pretty bruised up other than the white bandage peeking out the top of his gown. Nick returned the hug and before I knew it, I was crying. Again.

He smoothed my hair and just held on like I did. A moment later someone else sat on the other side of the bed. Another hand rested on my back. I didn’t move, but I knew it was Brian. We stayed in that tearful, somewhat awkward, but completely comforting three-way hug for I don’t even know how long. I knew we had a long road ahead of us and it was going to be really hard, but right then, I couldn’t have been happier.

The End...for now