Title: A Return on Investment
Author: Nan
Classification: Vignette, Romance, (H/M)
Spoilers: "The Four Percent Solution"
Author's Notes: For episode this great, I'm sure there will be many follow-ups. Here is just one more.
Warning – this is unbeta'd and I've just got back from a dinner where copious amounts of wine was served.
This picks up right after the episode ends, in Sleepy Hollow at Mac's hospital bed.
Harm sat, elbows on knees with both hands holding Mac's palm up one. Her eyes were closing slowly as she fought the exhaustion and residual shock from the car accident. Her head lolled to one side as her breathing regulated. She was asleep.
He continued to watch her quietly, the faint noises of the hospital activity shut firmly out by the closed door. A nameless Christmas carol droned on the intercom. Beside that, the room was silent.
He quirked one eyebrow. A beat later, the corner of his mouth turned up. He smiled, something akin to pure pleasure flooding his features. If he had been a full back in the end zone with the football, he would've spiked the ball.
Ninety minutes ago, he had been on a mission from hell. A phone call from medical technician that had reveled nothing except an accident and a victim with undetermined injuries. Mac.
As Harm drove, he had been plagued by two thoughts. The first was obvious and most distressful. 'What if something happens to Mac?' He knew, as he had known in the past, that life without Mac would be the hardest things he could ever face.
And the second, more from insecurity, but the fear was just as intense. 'What if she doesn't want me?' He knew this was second hardest thing he faced. Rejection from the woman he was starting to admit he loved was becoming harder and harder each day to take.
He studied her bruised face. Her nose and lips were puffy and swollen. Her cheeks and chin were abraded and raw. There was a medicinal smell to the shiny cream covering the injury. 'She's so beautiful,' he thought and smiled again.
He untangled one hand and reached up. He lightly brushed a stray strand of hair off her face.
Harm shuffled the chair closer to the bed, never breaking the tenuous contact with her now limp hand. He marveled at the novelty of this. Earlier, Mac had made no retort, light hearted or not, to break this contact. 'She's glad I'm here.' The realization stunned him.
He curled the free arm around the top of her head and lightly placed the back of his index finger on her cheek. 'If she wakes up now, I'm dead,' he thought as he stroked it gently. His smile grew wider.
Slowly, Harm untangled himself from her bedside and stood up. He looked around the room. 'If I'm going to spend the night here, I might as well get comfortable,' he thought and he grinned once again. He almost felt euphoric.
He glanced back at her. Mac was down for the count and sleeping soundly. Time enough to change into the jeans and T-shirt packed away in his sea bag in the trunk of the Vette.
Time enough to make a few phone calls. Despite Mac's self-imposed solitary existence over the past few months, she still had many friends who had a 'need to know.'
As he exited the front door of the hospital and made his way to the parking lot, he mechanically started to dial the first number on his cell. His thumb hovered over the send button when it occurred to him which number he had just dialed. It was Admiral Chegwidden's.
He snorted. Endless times in years past, it was Chegwidden who wanted, no demanded, to be the 'first to know' about all aspects of the lives of the extended JAG family. It was force of habit. He moved his finger to the delete key.
He paused. His mind moved back to the time, nearly two years now, when he resigned his commission to find Mac in Paraguay. Chegwidden had asked him then. "How are you going to keep her?"
He decided to press send. Finally, maybe, he had an answer for him.
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