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the world (it burns through me)

Chapter 28: Angel, Sweetheart, Darlin'

Ao3 | 4.5k Words | Angel, Sweetheart, and Darlin's POVs

Angel would know their husband anywhere. The world isn't right when Asher isn't smiling. David says goodbye. Sweetheart has their teeth around the problem. Milo's betrayal blossoms. Porter gives advice on a clean murder. Darling is ready for this to be over. Sam proposes.

TW: Medical stuff, blood and injury, smoke inhalation, intubation, mentions of death, grief, arguments and conflict, murderous intent.

Everything went fuzzy after the bathtub, and you were pretty grateful for that fact when it came down to it. A fire slowly encroaching on you as you laid helplessly and bled… that was a vision you didn’t want to visit you in your dreams.

What you remembered was heat and smoke and the pound of palms on your chest. Everything was strange and muddled, the twist of fingers in your skin, the ground pressed into your back. You were lost in the movement and burn of your surroundings, but you knew Davey was there the minute his hands were on you. You would know your husband’s touch no matter how lost you found yourself. You would feel him pressing gentle pleas like compressions into your rib cage until it cracked under the pressure.

Things shifted back into focus bit by bit. You managed to open your eyes to a light like nothing else, bright and cold and sterile. You groaned but it didn’t escape your throat. Someone spoke over you and Davey responded, but you couldn’t make out the words. You still had one foot in unconsciousness, even as Davey dragged you back from the brink.

More words, hands on your face, not Davey’s, covered in rubber and freezing fucking cold. Something pressed against your jaw and them forced its way into your mouth. Plastic slid into your throat.

Intubation. That was not a good sign.

Your mind and body reconnected inside the hospital. Pain slammed into you, certain and unrelenting. You couldn’t deny it, couldn’t escape it. You struggled against your own body, throat flexing around the tube inside of it, as hands pressed down on your chest and hips to keep you steady. You wanted to comply, to do as the paramedic said, to calm down, calm down, to be a good patient, but you didn’t have much choice at the moment. The pain was impossible, and the only response that was appropriate was to thrash against it like a snake with the head cut off.

Someone had done compressions. There was a tube in your throat. Dying gasps.

You’d put it in writing in your twenties. You didn’t want to live on machines. You didn’t want a ventilator to be in the same fucking room as you, let alone breathe for you. So if they couldn’t straighten this shit out, this was it.

It would be okay. Davey would be okay. This would shatter him for a few years, but he was not alone.

Please, you tried to say, but your voice was choked and missing, please, Ash. Take care of him. Take care of him.

Davey’s hands were still on you, planted on your chest, unrelenting. There was shouting by many strange voices. Orders given and followed. Doctors and nurses surged around you as you blinked your eyes open.

“Sir, you should say goodbye.” One of the doctors instructed while cutting the remains of your shirt to free up your chest. Somebody attached sensors to your battered skin.

“What?” David snapped, fingers flexing against your ribs. “What are you talking about?”

“This will be very intensive surgery. We recommend you take a moment before they go into the operating room.” The doctor replied. David’s face went red, and he looked like he might start screaming again.

Asher appeared like an answer to your prayers, soot smeared across his cheek.

“Hey, guys,” Ash raised his voice, drawing attention in the way only a leader could, “I know time is of the essence, but can we slow down for a sec?” Movement slowed, voices silenced. Ash turned to Davey. “Say goodbye.” Ash ordered. “You’ll regret it if you don’t. So say goodbye.”

Davey turned to you, his dark eyes wide and wet, plain terror spread across his features.

Davey had known his mother was Navajo for all his life, but he hadn’t started learning about that part of him until after he met you. You were given the chance to watch as he unraveled the complex webs of his relationship with his culture. You watched him learn his language, bit by bit from distant cousins. You watched him grow his hair out. You learned to tie his tsiiyééł.

He had told you once, in the middle of your endless curious questions, that there wasn’t really a word in Diné bizaad for ‘goodbye.’ He said that it was too final, too much of an ending. The closest thing he had translated more closely to ‘alright then- see you later.’

“Hágoónee,” he said anyway, finality in his tone, an ending spread across his features. You blinked up at him, smoke choking out your voice, bruise and blood pressing into your head and chest.

Alright then.

You watched as he was shuffled away, as the doctors descended on you from all sides, smothering out every other sense with the smell of rubbing alcohol and hunter green scrubs. You couldn’t see Davey anymore, but you blinked your goodbye into the sterile ceiling.

See you later.

When you came back to yourself, the first thing you were aware of was a pounding ache in the back of your throat. You swallowed, uninhibited. No tube. Thank God. Davey had been going crazy lately, and you were afraid, somewhere in the depths of you, that he would override your medical directive and put you on a machine just to keep from losing you.

You could see the haze of lights through your closed eyelids, and you could hear the buzz of fluorescents and the beep of machines. Still in the hospital, it seemed.

“You need a break.” It was Asher’s voice, hushed and gentle. There was another person, too. A gentle drag of breath. Davey. You would know your husband’s heavy sigh anywhere. “Some food. Some sleep. A shower.”

“I’m fine, Ash.” Davey replied. He sounded so tired, right back on the defense. Asher, though, was better at this than you were. He had been unwinding Davey’s bullshit for the entirety of their shared lives.

“No,” Asher said, voice quirking at the end like he was teasing, “you are not. Your spouse is lying in a hospital bed after surviving one of the worst house fires we’ve ever seen. So I seriously can’t imagine how in the world you could be okay. But you are not helping yourself by perching over their bedside like a freaking gargoyle. So go get a cup of vending machine coffee and breathe for a few minutes.”

Another sigh. A chair creaking. Footsteps receding.

It took you a few minutes to gain back control of your muscles, but when you did, you turned your head, neck twinging, and cracked your eyes open. Asher was still at the door, staring down the hall, his face uncharacteristically severe. The world just didn’t seem right when Asher wasn’t smiling.

You opened your mouth and only air came out, a rush of cracking lips and lungs. Asher’s head spun around, eyes wide.

“Oh my God!” He barked, tripping over himself to get to your bedside. “Oh my God!” He said again as he paused over you, hands hovering. You managed to gain control of your right arm and waved towards the water cup that was sitting on the rolling bedside table. Asher snatched it and helped to guide the straw to your mouth. As you tensed to sit up, pain sparked through your chest. You gulped down water anyway, brow furrowing.

You cleared your throat, swallowed as the straw retreated.

“Hey, girl,” you croaked, your voice barely a whisper. Asher laughed. The world righted itself.

“Hey,” he replied. His smile stayed but tears sprung to his eyes. “Hey.” Just when you thought he was about to cry, a shadow cut through the light from the hallway.

Davey looked tired. Worn down, more accurately. The smell of house fire accompanied him. The cup of vending machine coffee that was in his hand crashed to the floor.

“Angel,” he breathed. Tears sprang to your eyes at the sight of him. The terror of the situation slammed into you all at once. You couldn’t catch your breath. You squeezed your eyes shut, hoping that, if you couldn’t see Davey staring at you like you’d just risen from the grave, you could go back to the numbness you’d woken up into.

Hands framed your throat and face. You would know your husband’s touch, eyes closed or dying or hyperventilating from delayed shock.

“It’s okay,” Davey’s voice sucked up your attention, grounded you in your spot. “I’m here. I’m here, Angel, I’ve got you.”

You focused in on that voice, that low rumble, and let it drown out the drill of your heart monitor and the chatter of nurses rushing to check on you at the news that you were awake. Fuck everything else, your husband was telling you that everything would be alright.

Despite yourself, despite your instincts, despite the thrum of pain in your chest, you believed him.

__

You were spending far more time inside of Dahlia General than you were comfortable with lately, and the cafeteria food wasn’t getting any better. You poked half-heartedly with your plastic fork at the cold coffee cake that Milo had snagged from the overnight cart for you. He was sat across from you, his eyes downcast. He still smelled like smoke. Colm paced the length of the deserted cafeteria, phone to his ear, as he coordinated with the team on the ground outside the Shaw house and his detectives at the station.

“Quinn’s little friend ratted out a few more hidey holes,” Colm stepped back towards your little rickety table, slipping his phone back into his coat pocket. “And I’m sure we’ll get more out of him in the next few days.”

“Please remember,” you said into your coffee cake as you broke it apart with your fork, layer by layer, “that Ben is a victim in this scenario too. No untoward interrogation techniques.”

“He set you up,” Milo pipped up. He sipped at his vending machine coffee and winced like he did with every swallow. Snob. “So, he’s a fucking asshole and whatever you want to do to him is fine by me.” He raised his styrofoam cup to Colm in cheers.

“Quinn tortured him.” You said. “He put Ben through the same things he put Trouble through. Let’s not forget that someone we care about could have turned out similarly. Ben is somebody’s son. So let’s talk about him like he’s a human being.”

Silence from both Greers. It was a familiar speech to you, something you had to repeat to cops often enough it was almost passionless at this point. Or perhaps that was due to how exhausted you were.

In truth, the sight of Ben’s face still brought a spark of anger and dread to the forefront of your mind. His features, daring to look apologetic, had been the last shred of safety you’d known before Quinn carved you up. It was burned into your mind, and when Colm told you that Ben had been picked up and charged with accessory to attempted murder, you felt sick satisfaction churn in your stomach like bile.

Milo cleared his throat.

“So we got more places to flush out?” He asked. Colm nodded.

“And they’re awake,” Colm said, “so once I can take their statement, I’ll have more information.” You let out a sharp sigh.

“Thank God,” Milo breathed, “I thought David… you know.”

“That kid can’t take another loss.”

“Don’t question them tonight.” You said. “We’ll bother them in the morning. Let them both rest some.”

“Every second counts in this.” Colm protested. You set down your fork and stood, rolled your shoulders back.

“I don’t intend to waste them.” You huffed. “I need those addresses.” Both Greers stared at you, mouths similarly agape.

“No,” Milo said at the same time Colm said:

“Not on your own!”

Always the challenge with them. You snagged your phone from your pocket and started typing out a message as you finished addressing them.

“Ansel is already at the first location, I’ll meet him there.” You brushed your curls from your face. “You’re right, Colm, we have limited time, and I’m wasting it here, easing your anxieties. Please find a way to handle those on your own.”

You left your coffee cake on the table and turned to the winding corridors of the hospital. You knew them well by now, and you paced through the hallway steadily.

You were a bloodhound and you had his scent. You had your teeth around his fucking throat and you just needed to bite.

Milo caught up to you halfway to the guest parking lot.

“Hey!” He snapped, grabbing your shoulder. You bit back a wince as the skin on your stomach protested to the strange movement. The knots of scar tissue were firming and growing stiff. Your body rejected small twists and tugs on the skin with tight discomfort, sometimes jolting you with pain you couldn’t ignore. It was inconvenient at best and dangerous at worst, catching you at the worst times. You really had to get that dealt with.

“I’ve gotta go,” you murmured. Teeth around the problem, if you lost the scent he’d slip away. He had been slipping away from you for months. Enough. You were ending this tonight, you were putting him behind bars tonight.

“Sweetheart,” Milo’s voice called to you, pulled you from your singular focus. He was a liability to your work. When he commanded your attention, he got it, no matter what else needed it. “Slow down. Talk to me, please!”

“I am not letting him get away with this.” You hissed. “David built that house from the fucking foundation. They almost-” you choked around the words. Tears burned at the back of your eyes and you growled in frustration. “He almost killed my friend tonight and I am taking him in for it. He’s going to face a jury and I’m going to lay out every crime he’s committed and he’s going to fucking fry!”

You’d raised your voice more than you intended. A handful of hospital employees were glancing your way as they carried on with their business. Milo stared at you for a long, tense moment.

“California got rid of the death penalty in 2019.” He finally said.

“That was an executive order from the Governor.” You seethed. “Not legislation. So that could change.”

You didn’t believe in capital punishment before Quinn Fox. You also didn’t understand why people had the urge to kill before him. But now, with scar tissue pounding with your pulse and your friend nearly dead a few floors up, you got it. The pleasure of killing twitched in your muscles. You wanted to introduce Quinn Fox to his fate personally. You wanted to wrap your hands around his throat and squeeze. You wanted to watch the burn in his eyes go out.

“What is this guy doing to you?” Milo asked. His face held the ingredients of betrayal. You swallowed.

“Guys like Quinn Fox have always been out there, Milo.” You said. “Serial killers and rapists and child molesters. This one just happened to hit close to home. He’s not doing anything to me, this is the world I live in! This is the shit I worry about! The shit I wanted to keep at bay but they just keep coming!”

“Baby-”

“Everytime one goes behind bars there’s ten more! Like fucking roaches, they just keep popping up! And I’m doing what, exactly? Following around cheating spouses? Investigating insurance fraud? Waste of my fucking time! I blew it in the force and now I’m being fucking wasted while these guys are killing people!”

“Hold on, can you-”

“But I can take care of this. I can take care of him.” Milo went silent as your hatred quieted. You felt it bouncing around in your core. It kept you going, kept your body moving even as it begged to stop.

“You’re gonna get yourself killed.” Milo said it softly, as though it were already true.

“Then I’ll take him with me.”

Betrayal blossomed fully across his features.

It was better this way. If you burned out on this case, it would be easier for him. If he was pissed, the grief would pass him by. You turned and kept walking, hand pressed into your stomach. The pulse of your scars kept you centered, focused.

“So I guess all that talk about forever was bullshit.” His voice was quiet when he spoke again, but you still heard it over the pound of your heart.

You didn’t turn back to look at him. You didn’t have to. When you closed your eyes, it was always him; his face smiling back at yours as he spun you around the empty living room of your house. As you each agreed that you didn’t need rings. That you didn’t need a marriage certificate to show what you meant to each other. That you both knew what forever looked like.

You swallowed. Teeth around the problem. You’d bite down and be done with it. Forever could wait until then.

You kept walking.

__

You had second degree burns on six percent of your body, and Dr. McDreamy was peeling back necrotic skin and debris from the patches across your back.

You were no stranger to burns, and despite your wealth of experience surrounding injuries of all kinds, you maintained that burn debridement was the most painful experience a human could endure. You’d seen grown men scream and cry during them, chief among them being Gabriel Shaw.

Of course, that didn’t mean much. Gabriel Shaw cried during sad movies. Gabriel Shaw cried when he thought a bit too hard about how much his son had grown. Gabriel Shaw cried when a baby was just a bit too cute. He might have been a big and burly firefighter, but what he was at his core was a cry baby, and a proud one at that.

You didn’t cry. You didn’t scream. You gripped your hands into fists so hard your too-long nails cut into your palms. You pressed them in and out of the crescent wounds, let that ground you, pull your mind away from the feeling of being skinned.

“Almost done here,” McDreamy spoke for the first time since he’d greeted you on his way into the room. As chatty and casual as he had been upon your first meeting, he was equally quiet and reserved now. He must have sensed how volatile you were at the moment.

You didn’t reply. You closed your eyes. You ran through your plan one more time.

You knew a guy who could get you a gun in three hours. You’d call him as soon as you were done here. It would be registered stolen, so nobody else would be implicated. You’d contact Quinn, ask him to meet you back at the Moonbound. Tell him he'd proven his point and he could have you. Maybe you would get lucky and it would work twice. You’d kill him as soon as he walked through the door. Someone would hear the gunshot, but you’d call the cops yourself just to be safe. Maybe laying out his own abuses would help you in court and you’d get off easy, maybe you’d rot in a cell for the rest of your life. You weren’t sure whether you cared which eventuality came to pass.

Either way, this would be over. You just needed this to be over.

“I can feel you brooding.” you could hear the shit-eating grin in McDreamy’s voice. “I know this is unpleasant, but don’t plot my murder for helping you.”

“Not yours.” You growled. You knew it was stupid to announce your plans, but you couldn’t help it. It had been your intent all along, when you’d started looking for Quinn with more purpose. He needed to die. He needed to die for what he had done to you. He needed to die for what he was yet to do. He would hurt people, your people, other people, until he was dead. He was in perpetual motion, always toiling away at the object of his obsession until they broke and he got bored. But you had never broken. Maybe that was why he had fixated so fiercely onto you, so fiercely that he tried to destroy everything around you.

Mission accomplished. He had broken you. What you were certain he hadn’t bet on, however, was that you were much more dangerous in pieces than you were whole.

“If I may suggest,” Porter said from behind you. His tweezers dropped into his metal tray. Something cold smeared across your back. “A syringe full of air. Stick it in a vein, empty it. Once the air bubble circulates and reaches the heart… cardiac arrest. Bloodless. Clean. It’ll look like a heart attack and no one will ever need to know.”

You twisted, surprised. He had that answer ready real quick.

There was a knock on the exam room door. It cracked open a second later. Sam stepped in, his face drawn.

“Hey,” he said softly. He ran his eyes over you, taking in the burns. Those brown eyes flicked from you to Porter.

“Second degree.” Porter reported. “Six percent. Debrided, and I’ve started in on the silver sulfadiazine.” He stepped around you and flashed Sam a white-toothed smile. “Care to finish up for me, Dr. Collins?”

“Don’t call me that.” Sam sneered. “Go. I got it. Please check in-”

“Already done.” Porter snapped off his gloves and snagged a chart from the counter above the scrub station. He handed it over and made his way out of the room. “If either of you need anything,” he said, his front half stuck through the doorway, “you have my number.” The door clicked closed.

Sam flipped through the chart ravenously. He shook his head, tutting softly before letting out a sharp breath.

“Are…” you swallowed and tried to take the bite out of your voice, “are they okay?” Sam glanced up at you.

“Um…” he shook his head, “they’re alive and all their parts are attached.”

“I guess that’s something.” You sighed.

“Broken sternum,” Sam said, “which was what their surgery was concerning. That’s bound to be from the compressions. Usually that break doesn’t require surgical intervention, but in combination with the three broken ribs on their right side, we had to go in and maintain the structure of their chest.” He swallowed. “Alexis supervised and made sure their cardio thoracic system was intact. All good there. They… okay, respiratory arrest at the scene was due to smoke inhalation. The cardiac arrest was due to lack of oxygenation. They lost enough air that their heart couldn’t pump anymore.”

“I know what oxygenation is.” You snapped. You closed your eyes. He didn’t deserve this. Sam, to his credit, acted as though you’d never opened your mouth.

“We’re treating the smoke inhalation with an oxygen drip. They were intubated at the scene but indicated in a medical directive they didn’t want to be ventilated. They’re responding well on just the drip and we’ll make adjustments as needed. No carbon dioxide poisoning, that would have been the primary concern. That’s good, that bodes well.” He flipped a page. “Damn.” He sighed.

“What?” You looked up, hungry for what had surprised him.

“Their arms were bound, right?” He asked, brown eyes meeting yours. You nodded. “They were cut on the scene. Sometimes, when circulation has been cut off and you suddenly reintroduce it, patients can develop something called compartment syndrome. The blood rushes back into the limb and causes it to swell. By the time they got to the hospital, it was pretty bad, no time for a clean release of pressure. Our orthopedic surgeon was concerned we were too late and noted that he recommended amputation of both arms at the elbow but…” Sam shook his head. “Alexis wouldn’t let him. She and Porter performed simultaneous fasciotomies. Two seven inch incisions down both forearms. That… that’ll be a bitch to heal and we don’t know if they lost function in their arms yet. We’ll just have to wait.”

You puffed out a breath. It was bad. Really fucking bad. Sam nodded and closed the chart.

“Sammy,” you croaked. When you heard your own voice, you realized from the tone of it that you were going to cry. “I can’t keep doing this.”

“He can’t do this forever,” Sam said softly,

“He’ll keep hurting people,” you whispered. You weren’t angry anymore and you couldn’t pretend to be. “I’ve gotta-” you swallowed a wounded sound. “I can’t just wait for him to stop. He’ll outlast me.”

“What do you wanna do?” He asked. He was closer now, his hand sliding along the back of your neck, cradling your head.

“I want to kill him.” You said softly. No anger. No pretense. Just factual intention.

Sam was quiet for a very long time. He pressed his lips to the crown of your head.

“I will not lose you to this.” He said, and it sounded like a vow.

“I think…” you shook your head, rubbing your awkward buzz cut into his face. He breathed you in, smoke and all, “I don’t think you ever had me. I think he’s been… holding me hostage.”

“Bullshit.” He withdrew before kneeling, knees on the creaky metal step up on the exam table, looking up at you from between your knees. It was his turn to be angry. “Bullshit! Are you kidding me? You are not some half person who’s been torn apart by this mother fucker. Now you say you want him dead, and that tells me you’re about to do something real stupid. I don’t blame you one bit. But a judge is gonna take one look at you and throw you in a cell somewhere. No. I will not have it. You want him dead, I’ll kill him.”

“Sammy,” you breathed, “that’s romantic and all-”

“Well thank you, I am a charmer.”

“Sammy.”

“Stay with me.” He said. He rose to lock his arms around you, avoiding the burns on your back. “Stay with me. I won’t lose you. I can’t lose you to this.”

“Okay.” You relented. You were so tired. You wanted this over with. And you knew that if you left him to his own devices, Quinn would keep coming. Eventually, he would come for Sam. He would try to force you to choose him or he would kill Sam to drive the final nail in the coffin.

But Sam begged you to stay on his knees and sounded like he was proposing marriage. When you closed your eyes, you could envision lips wrapped around the words I do. That image was enough, for now. You would kill Quinn whenever he came and hold on to that image as long as you could.

“I love you.” you said, and it didn’t whiter in your mouth. “I love you. I love you.”

Once you started, you couldn’t stop.

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