Chris LaSalle wasn't prepared when the force of the blast threw him back into a concrete wall. His head hit the mortar with a rather sickening thud. The kind of thud that said he wasn't going to be able to see straight for a week. For several moments he just sat there viewing a warped version of the world. Everything was spinning and there was a loud hum in his ears. He started to push to his feet only to be pulled back down by the force of gravity. He needed to get up. There were people who needed him.
Although the idea of running back into a burning building didn't thrill him, it needed to done. A friend was in there dying. Unfortunately, the crippling pain in his head wouldn't let him recall who. He blinked several times trying to clear his vision but nothing changed. The fog wasn't going away.
"C'mon, we need to move." A familiar woman reached for his hand. He hesitated for a moment, still shaken by the pounding in his head. Smiling, she dropped to her knees and touched the side of his face. "Don't make me have to throw you over my shoulder, Bama boy."
He smiled back at her and reached for her hand as she stood to her full height. There was something comforting about her touch. Trusting. Slowly, he allowed her to help him to his feet. Her arm wrapped around his waist as they made their way through the flaming debris to the safety of the street.
Suddenly she was gone. Damn he must have hit his head harder than he thought as the building exploded again. He watched as flames engulfed the spot where he'd just been sitting. A couple more seconds of hesitation and he would have been toast.
He looked around. His world was still a mixture of warped looking figures and pain. He remembered seeing the killer take down his friend but he can't recall the face or the friend. Two men across the street are eying him but he doesn't see them. A small voice inside of his head told him he needed to keep moving as the sound of sirens neared.
He knows the city like the back of his hand but at the moment he has no idea of where he is or where he is going. He only knows he needs to find his way back to her; his guardian angel, his lifeline. He heads east down a set of streets he can normally navigate his way through blindfolded. But today he has to weed his way through a bunch of unfamiliar warped looking landmarks and people. The tourists who normally frequent the city this of year are out in force. Is it Mardi Gras season? He doesn't think so as the weather is too warm for that.
As he moves about people start to make comments about his uncoordinated movements, referring to him as a drunk. What they don't know is that he gave up social drinking when his brother Cade moved in with him.
His head is still pounding and there's a sting to his right arm that he didn't notice before. It must have been burned in the explosion. He's so distracted by the pain that he doesn't notice the two men from across the street are now following him and they have guns. One makes a comment to the other that somehow LaSalle managed to get out alive and that is going to cause a problem for them. For now they continue to follow him at a safe distance because they know that wherever LaSalle is Pride and his team won't be too far behind. What they can't figure out however is why the agent appears to be running from the scene.
Chris spotted a tall woman with short dark hair go into a bar so he ducks in behind her. Could that be her? Mechanically, he reaches for her arm and is met with a look of alarm. A man standing a few feet from him starts to yell. "Hey buddy get your hands off my wife!"
LaSalle apologized quickly and stepped back outside. The music in the bar was way too loud for him to consider staying with a pounding headache. He leaned against a light pole trying to make sense of jumbled thoughts until the darkness started to creep in. A sprint of anxiety fled down his spine as he had the feeling he was being watched.
Everywhere he glanced jumbled and warped figures appeared, if only his vision would clear.
The two men who have been following him start to advance. "Let's just take him out now." One of them said, "If Pride shows up, we'll take care of him too."
They started to move and so does LaSalle. Disoriented, the agent stepped off the curb and right in front of the line of traffic. On coming cars blew their horns, and the two men from the warehouse explosion stopped.
"What the hell is he doing?" One turns to the other. "You suppose he's on something?"
The second guy looked at the first. LaSalle was fine at their initial encounter inside the warehouse, but this was New Orleans. "One can only hope that would make our job a lot easier."
Meredith Brody stood at the scene of the explosion panning the destruction, searching. She was worried. LaSalle's black Ford F-150 was parked across the street, but there was no sign of her lover and partner. Two hours ago he had told her he was going to meet Ross P regarding a case they were working and now rescue workers were removing bodies from their designated meeting site.
She should have protested and accompanied him instead of staying behind at the field office to go over the evidence for a third time. She fished out her phone and dialed his number.
LaSalle stumbled his way into a park that he been in more than dozen times this past year and looked up at the sky. The sun was starting to set. It would be dark soon.
Feeling his phone vibrate at his hip he pulled it from his belt and looked at the cracked screen. It must have been damaged in the blast he reasoned as it rang for the second time. Not that it mattered much, his lack of comprehension and warped sense of reality wouldn't allow him to recognize who was calling.
Reluctantly, he picked it up on the third ring. "Hello?" he never answered his phone that way. It was always LaSalle here or just LaSalle, unless he knew the caller personally.
"Chris? Where are you ?" A female responded.
He recognized the voice. He even had a face to go with it but the pain in his head refused to let him acknowledge her by name. It was her, his lifeline and savior.
"I don't know." He replied woodenly as a bullet suddenly whizzed over his head. He dropped the phone and reached for the side arm at his back. Firing blindly, he narrowly missed hitting two pedestrians. He looked at his gun and realized the people he had shot at weren't the ones shooting at him. Another bullet zoomed by him as people began to scream. He refused to return fire out of fear he might hit an innocent person. He needed to wait until his assailant was almost directly on top of him before he committed to firing again. As the third bullet was fired he dove for cover behind a tree. Wrong move. Falling to the ground only intensified his pain. For a moment he thought he was going to pass out: the spinning in his head was starting to get the best of him. He needed to keep it together. Closing his eyes, he conjured a vision of her, his guardian angel, the one who had saved him from the blast.
The sound of footsteps echoed all around him causing his heart to slam up against his chest. They were getting close. He needed to get back on his feet. Curling his fingers around the grip of his gun, he jumped up, coming face to face with another figure.
"Whoa... Chris!" Brody took a step back, holstering her weapon. "It's me, " she said softly as she placed her hand on his weapon and guided it downward from harms way. She had been listening to the police scanner for any possible sightings of her partner when a report of a gun shots in the park came through
For several seconds he stared at her fuzzy and distorted silhouette. Was this real or was his mind playing tricks on him?
"It's over. We got them." She said softly. Brody looked at him curiously. He was looking right at her but he didn't seem to actually see her.
Chris?
Reaching up she touched his cheek. His lack of conversation was scaring her. "Ok, I think you need to be done for the night." she quipped before noticing the singed hair on his right arm. He'd been burned in the blast. It wasn't bad but it would probably be sore for a couple of days.
"Are you hurt anywhere else?" She asked tangling her fingers with his.
He averted his eyes, taking comfort in her touch. "No" he said automatically not realizing that he was badly concussed. His head was still spinning making his thought process slow and incoherent.
"Let's get you out of here." she replied with concern. She could tell by his eye moments and slow response that there was more to it then he was letting on. Given the fact that his arm had been burned he had to be standing awfully close to the warehouse when it exploded.
At the hospital, Brody waited on pins and needles as doctors X-rayed, scanned and examined her beloved Boy from Bama. She was concerned. Even after several hours, Chris still seemed to have confused and disoriented patterns of thought.
A grade 2, moderate concussion. The doctor had said. "Take him home and love on him" were her exact words. Brody was surprised that the doctor saw fit to release LaSallle after his visioned had returned to normal but she took comfort in the fact that he had started to recover and that there was little danger of him slipping into coma. Needless to say she would stay up all night watching him just to be sure.
"To bed and no TV." Brody pressed up onto her tip-toes and gave him a more than promising kiss. "I'll be in, in a minute. I just want to check on Emily."
Emily? It took him a moment before it came to him that Emily Cadence was their 4 month old daughter. Named for Brody's sister and his brother, she was the pride and joy of his life.
"Give her a kiss for me." He said, giving Brody hope.
The following morning he awoke tangled with his sleeping partner. Her long slender body complemented his in every way. They were a perfect fit. Deftly, he reached out and trailed a finger down her bare arm.
"How's your head?" She asked still drowsy with sleep.
"Hurts" He croaked shielding his eyes from the bright morning sun as it flowed though the blinds. It still felt like it was going to explode.
She turned into him cupping his face. "I bet I can make it feel better." she said igniting his senses with a sultry kiss. The kissing continued until she threw her leg up over his thigh. She seemed to have a bewitching power over him, a siren's song that he couldn't resist. This morning he allowed her to do all of the work as she voluntarily straddled his hips. Slowly, and tenderly they made love until she was completely spent. Her treat for being such a good partner and saving his ass from being burned alive last night. The beautiful creature laying beside him flashed her big brown eyes. God, they were gorgeous he thought wishing he could break through the fog that was holding his mind hostage. Something didn't seem right but he couldn't quite put his finger on it. The fact that he didn't really seem to know this beautiful woman should have been a warning sign but at the moment it wasn't. For whatever reason he felt completely safe with her.
Brody frowned at the confused expression on his face. He had a look that said he had just made love to a stranger. Turning toward the night stand, she reached for his pain medication.
"Did I do somethin' wrong ?" he asked before swallowing the capsules and chasing them down with a bottle of water that had been sitting on the nightstand from the night before.
Brody touched his face with the palm of her hand. "No, you're perfect." The doctor said his confusion could last anywhere from a couple of days to several months so Brody decided it best to prepare herself for the long haul.
As she settled back down on his chest a thought occurred to her ."So, how did you end up at the park yesterday?" She knew he had been in the explosion so it didn't make sense to her that he had ended up several blocks away.
'Chris pulled her a little closer. "I was looking for you."
Merri smiled as he kissed her forehead. No matter how long it took for him to recover they were going to be all right.