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It o and a half hours after Veck arrived at St Francis Hospital before he was finally free to go see Reillytwo and a half frickin&039; hours

Then again, when de la Cruz had pulled up to the entrance next to the eency room to drop him off, he&039;d thrown open the car door and found that he wasn&039;t able to stand up

Kind of a rate-lih the revolving doors of the inpatient building and heading up to Reilly&039;s room - which he had the number of thanks to a call into hospital information - he&039;d ended up in the ER hiive him any details about her or her condition

Damn HIPAA rules

And, man, they crawled all over him

After he&039;d been poked, prodded, and X-rayed, they&039;d tried to suggest he needed an IV for fluids, but he&039;d sh that one down and infor By way of coh that hurt more, thrown another o ho day

Thanks, Doc

The cane was helpful, however And as the elevator dinged and he stepped off onto the seventh floor of the inpatient building, he used the thing to help get his sorry ass out into the corridor

He looked in both directions Had no idea which way to go

At randoured that at some point he&039;d run into a stafffor

As he hobbled along, he glanced down at his clothes Filthy Sweated out Torn Hell of an outfit, but it wasn&039;t like he was going to take tiot to the nursing station, he had no intention of being hit with any kind of no-visiting-hours, comeback-later crap

Reilly had told him she loved him

And he&039;d shut his woman down

Yeah, okay, he hadn&039;t been the one to actually slam the door in her face - technically, that had been the o - and that was the sort of ot the chance

Even if you needed a cane to get there and looked like you should be hosed off

Turning another corner, he faced off against a long corridor that had directions in both English and Spanish, as well as a lot of arrows, and a map Too bad none of the shit made any sense - and not just because he was exhausted Did they purposely make patients hard to find here -

Down at the far end of the hall, a huge, dark figure appeared and began striding toward him

Closer Closer still Until Veck could make out the leather pants, and the shitkickers, and the black coat

Instantly, a sharpshooter drove through his brain To the point where he wondered whether he hadn&039;t thrown a clot with all that running up the quarry slope

Exceptas he looked up into a hard face, he kneho it was This was

Veck cursed and listed into the wall as the pounder in his head wiped out all thought

And ht in front of Veck

As Veck focused through his pain on that incredible face, he kneould never forget it

"I&039;n accent that wasn&039;t quite French, wasn&039;t quite Hungarian "Worry not,in the ear, curiously smooth and aristocratic

And then Veck realized who the guy was talking about: "Kroner "

With a gallant, affirner resumed his walk, the footfalls of his boots a death knell if Veck had ever heard it And then halfway down the hall, the figure flat-out disappearedlike a ghost

More likely, though, he&039;d just turned another corner

To go find Kronerholy shit

Veck rubbed his eyes, thoughtabout the cave, and realized he&039;d missed a piece in all of this: He&039;d seen the serial killer hanging in front of hie, had it An ie projected onto his Reilly

That was the only explanation Because she had been the one hanging from those cuffs after the dust settled, and God knew there hadn&039;t been time to switch the pair of them

Abruptly weak-kneed, he leaned hard onto the cane as it dawned on hione on Or rather, what could have If he had stabbed who he had believed was Kronerhe would have killed her

In the rush and panic of the aftermath, that hadn&039;t even dawned on him

Christ, his choice at that crossroads had saved both of them, hadn&039;t it Because he never would have recovered if he&039;d done what he&039;d been set up to do

And as for Kroner

Jerking his head over his shoulder, Veck refocused on the direction that figure of death had gone in The serial killer must still be alive and in his hospital bed, then - and how much you want to bet, his roohts, Kroner&039;s life was still not Veck&039;s to take But that didn&039;tto stop whatever was about to happen Shit, angels, des with bad permsthe world was full of crap he&039;d only heard rumors about before So for all he knew? That was the Griht and in person - and in that case, Kroner&039;s life was being snatched the right way

Just to be sure, though, Veck liht and checked his shadow - even though he felt like a fool

Only one

"Ready for this to be over," he muttered to himself "Soooooo ready"

Eventually, he found the right ward, and fortunately, et any no-visitors backchat He was just sent down five doors and told if he needed anything to holler

Like maybe they expected him to fall over in a dead heap at any ot to Reilly&039;s room, he didn&039;t rush inside in case she was asleep He just leaned in a little so he could peek past the door

In the di froht: Even though her head was turned away fro was deep and even, her body small and still under the blankets She was on an IV, and there was a ularly Probably her heart -

Her head whipped around on the pillow - and then she winced, her hand co up to her temple "Veck "

As he rushed over, he said, "Are you all right?" What a duht

"You&039;re here" Then she obviously saw the wristband he&039;d been given "Are you okay?"

"Just don&039;t ask me to run a marathon tomorrow" When she tried to sit up, he pulled a chair over to the bed "No, no, lie back I&039;ht here"

"I didn&039;t think you were coht about a response to that, she murmured, "Neither did you, huh"

He shook his head "I " God, where to start? "You know, since the first ht a lot of shit into your life And then I nearly got you killed tonight - "

"No, you didn&039;t We both got set up by Bails and thatWho was that woman?"

"I don&039;t know But I can tell you this: She&039;s not co back" He believed Jim on that one "Ever"

"You took care of that, didn&039;t you"

"Guess so"

"I didn&039;t mention her when I was questioned"

"Neither did I"

Cue a pause And then he cleared his throat, eager to talk about so other than what had happened in the cave Maybe later, with distance, they could cover all that what-the-fuck-happened, but not tonight

"Did your parents come by?"

"They wondered where you were"

"So you didn&039;t tell the How you were framed, how you came after me - "

"I love you"

That stopped her dead To the point where he wondered if ize Except then she teared up and reached for his face

"I love you, too"

Bending down, so she could reach hiht by you It&039;s all I&039;ve ever wanted for us"

"Then, as you said" - her voice was rough - "no running tomorrow Or ever"

"That&039;s what a friend of mine told me"

"Jiel"

"You got that right"

He didn&039;tonto the bed and lying next to her She fit against him so perfectly, and as he held her, he shuddered They had nearly missed this - not just hat had happened in that cave, but the rest of the shit Bails had been trying to engineer

Leaning in, Veck kissed her carefully and then just stared into her eyes for the longest time He&039;d never had a clean slate before Hadn&039;t even been born with one But at this et in the hazel flecks of those perfect green eyes of hers

And it was then that he noticed the weight was gone He&039;d lived with his heavy burden for so long, it had becoh, in the absence of that taxing pressure inside every square inch of him, he feltfree Fresh Reborn

The only trouble was that that new- they see her beautiful red hair back, he said softly, "So your father asked ht I went for dinner with you all"

Reilly s you he knew CPR"

"It was right before that," he whispered "You think ive him an answer someday?"

Her breath hitched And then a brilliant joy shone out of her face "If I understand what you&039;re saying, I think you&039;re going to have to ask hi first"

"Your parents free for dinner to and then so did he "I think I can arrange that"

"Perfect" He got serious "You&039;re justperfect"

Cradling her against his chest, Veck let a peaceful exhaustion claiht in his world He had his woet any better than this