Ch 3.

A little over two hours later, Nick was pacing in the waiting room. Sam and Oliver were sitting in chairs; Sam had his head in his hands. The last update they had gotten was shortly after they had arrived and it wasn't good. The nurse had informed them that the paramedics had lost her pulse during transport and the doctors right now were working on warming her up so they could shock and restart her heart.

Traci walked back in to the waiting room carrying a to-go tray of coffee. Nick had called her while driving to the hospital behind the ambulance and she had come over as soon as she could. "Any updates?" She asked handing out the coffee.

Oliver looked up and took the cup she handing him, "Nothing since we got here."

"This is ridiculous." Traci walked up to the nurses station and flashed her badge, "Can we please get an update on Andy McNally. "

"I'm sorry, I don't know any more than you do at this point. Once the body's core temperature reaches a certain point and the effect of the hypothermia sets in, it can take some time to reverse it." The nurse looked at the woman in front of her sympathetically and glanced at the men in the waiting room behind her, "Its a good sign that she had a pulse when she was found, but once she lost it we have to get her core body temperature back up to normal before we can do much else."

Traci nodded her head in defeat. She smiled sadly and shook her head when Oliver glanced in her direction. "No news yet; they are still trying to warm her back up."

She sat down in a chair kiddy corner from Oliver and rested her head on the wall behind her and the group of four fell silent again for several minutes.

"This can't be it." Sam muttered suddenly, "She can't die."

Oliver didn't know what to say to his best friend. Nick stopped pacing and stood in front of Sam. "You are such an idiot. It shouldn't have taken this before you snapped out of it. Everyone knows how much you love Andy. But, you don't deserve her and if she makes it through this you better get your shit together or I swear to god, I will turn in those transfer paper's she has been keeping in her locker and we will both be gone."

Sam's head snapped up at Nick's words and Oliver's eyes widened in surprise at the outburst.

"Andy's thinking about transferring?" Traci asked surprised

Nick nodded, "She mentioned it to me not long after we came back; And, I wasn't going to let her go alone. We both have the paperwork filled out, it's just a matter of deciding if we want to submit it."

"Why would you do that? 15 is your home." Traci said

"Hasn't felt like much of a home since we came back." Nick shrugged, "Maybe even a little before we left."

"So she was going to run away, again. For the third time." Sam said with quiet anger.

"Why not? Not like there was anything here for her."

Sam jumped up out of his seat, "What was I supposed to do? I told her I loved her and that I would do everything to make it up to her and she just left, without a single word. If I had known she wanted me to wait..." He trailed off.

Nick shook his head; "I shouldn't have to explain this to you. You were her partner for a long time before you were her boyfriend. You should know how she thinks. But I'll spell it out. Let's start with how the first time you tell her you love her is when she was holding a bomb and then later you make a joke about how you learned the number of bones in the body from Grey's Anatomy. But that was all six weeks after you broke up with her in a parking lot."

"Enough." Oliver shouted. "We aren't doing this right now." He finished in a softer stern voice.

Sam sat back down next to Oliver and Nick moved over to where Traci was. It was another 30 minutes of silence before Nick let out a deep breath. Still not looking at the others he spoke, "Things were bad. Even before we left, she wasn't doing all that well. She was confused and upset and angry and you saying those things to her while she was holding that grenade made everything worse. She knew she was wrong to just leave but by the time she came to that realization we were a month in."

He looked at his fellow officers then; "Things were bad." He repeated, "It wasn't easy for us to get in and we each took more than one beating to try and prove ourselves. They had us posing as a couple so that helped in that I was the only one who usually ever had to go anywhere alone - but there were things that we saw and had to do that were..." Nick struggled to find the right word, "...questionable." He settled on, "I honestly, can't really tell you what either one of us were truly expecting to find when we came back but the closer the op came to ending the more afraid we became of what we might find and I'll be honest with you; we came up with some pretty crazy stories but what we found, what she came back to, is worse than anything we imagined."

"There wasn't anything in the report from Jay about beatings." Traci jumped in, seeing Sam's fists clenching and unclenching.

"Did it say that he 'delivered groceries' or 'checked the wires'?" Nick asked

Traci nodded yes.

"That was it then." Nick closed his eyes, "Only once did we need serious medical attention. Usually it was enough to have a first aid kit."

"That shouldn't have happened." Oliver had jumped in then in his TO voice, "More than once should not have happened."

Nick shrugged; "Can't do anything about it now. I just wanted you to understand what we were dealing with so you can understand that it's been difficult coming back. I had experience coming back to a life that wasn't there anymore after Afghanistan, she's never had to do it before." He rested his elbows on his knees; "I had a suspicion about drugs but never real proof. I chalked her behavior up to depression and PTSD, but lately it's been worse."

"Officers?" A doctor had just walked in to the waiting room; "You're waiting on an update for Andrea McNally?"

They jumped up. "Yes." Traci spoke, "How is she?"

"She's doing better. We've stabilized her body temperature and were able to restart her heart fairly easily. She hasn't woken up yet but so far her vitals are holding steady."

"Can we see her?" Nick asked

"We're moving her to a room now; I'll have a nurse come get you when she is settled."

"Thank you." Nick said

The doctor coughed uncomfortably, "We're scheduled a pysch consult for her when she regains consciousness. There isn't evidence to suggest a struggle; Ms. McNally doesn't have any type of defensive wounds, its obvious she went into the water on purpose but we need to determine the extent of the possible danger she presents to herself before we can release her. We should also have her blood tests back soon and we'll know if she was under the influence of anything."

The group solemnly nodded their understanding and agreement.

"Can you make sure one of us talk to her about the psych consult?" Nick asked, "She has never been very receptive to shrinks but we'll make sure she understands how important it is to talk to them truthfully."

"Of course. She should be in her room shortly and you can see her." The doctor gave them a small smile, "She isn't going to look like herself, but I promise her vitals are holding steady and physically she should be just fine."

"Thank you, doctor." Oliver said quietly as he walked away.

The nurse came and got them shortly after; Traci and Nick went first. Oliver waited in the waiting room with Sam. "So what are you going to do now?" Oliver asked

Sam pinched the bridge of his nose, "About what?" He asked tiredly

"You know what." Oliver shot him a look.

He sighed, "Yeah. I do." Sam stood up quickly and paced the room in front of his friend, "I wanted to move on. I needed to move on more than anything. I've never loved someone before and especially not as much as I love her. Things got so messed up after Jerry died and then I tried to fix it and she ran."

Oliver leaned back in his chair, "Loved or love?"

"What?" Sam asked

"You said that you've never loved anyone as much as you love her. Present tense." Oliver smirked.

Sam didn't respond. Oliver's smile grew, "So, what are you going to do now?" He repeated.

Sam remained silent but moved to sit back down next to Oliver and shook his head.

"I wish you could have seen your face when we were looking for her, and when you found her you held her so tight and told me that you couldn't lose her. This is your wake up call, Sammy. Marlo is a nice girl but she is not the girl for you. Andy McNally is the love of your life and its time for you to get her back."

Sam didn't get a chance to respond as Nick and Traci were walking back into the waiting room then.

"Is she awake yet?" Oliver asked

Traci shook her head, "No, but she looks a little better. They have her on warm IV fluids and the nurse was just checking her vitals again."

"She should be done though, if you guys want to go back and see her." Nick said

Sam followed Oliver slowly to Andy's room. He fought the urge to vomit when he saw her, and not because she looked all that bad. In fact, compared to the last time her saw her when she was being loaded into the ambulance, she looked amazing. The urge was coming from the complete and total relief he felt at seeing her alive and the realization that he had come so close to losing her.

He pulled the chair closer to her bed and sat down. He gently picked up her hand that was resting on the bed. Oliver stood on the other side and looked down at Andy. "So I think we need to talk about what we are going to do if something shows up in her blood work."

"Even if we get lucky and nothing shows up, she still needs help." Sam responded, "I don't know the frequency of her use or anything like that, but either way we have to get her help without destroying her career."

"What if you took her to see Sarah in St. Catherine's." Oliver suggested, "She's a substance abuse counselor and therapist; you could convince her to help outside of a clinic - totally off the books."

Sam considered the idea and let out a bark of laughter; "I was always to chicken to bring Andy to meet Sarah when we were together because Sarah can read me better than anyone and would know how I felt about her and I wasn't ready to face that." He shrugged at Oliver, "I don't know how much Andy would really talk to Sarah. Hell, I don't even know if she'll talk to me."

"What if you took her to my cabin first?" Oliver asked, "You can get advice from Sarah on how to handle the situation and see what you can do for Andy yourself there." He clapped a hand to Sam's shoulder, "You know her better than anyone and I really think that you are the best one to help her."

"Even though I'm the one that got her into this mess?" Sam questioned.

"Its not all on you brother. You've both made a lot of mistakes and hurt each other a lot. But you guys are going to have to find a way to forgive each other for real and move on from your past mistakes." Oliver touched a hand to Andy's blanket covered foot; "First, we've got to get her healthy again."

They stayed for a few more minutes before walking back to the waiting room to meet up with Traci and Nick. "I'm going to stay with her." Sam said.

"Sam." Traci started, but Sam cut her off.

"No, I let her down once already. I'm not going to do it again."

Nick met Oliver's eye and nodded at Sam, "Keep us posted on how she is doing. I'll stop back by in a little bit and bring you a change of clothes."

Oliver agreed, "I'll let Frank know where you are and about you taking those vacation days."

"Thanks." Sam stretched his neck to try and relieve some tension, "When Andy is released I'm taking her to Olli's cabin. My sister is a substance abuse counselor and therapist; I'm going to get as much information as I can from her about how to help Andy. If that doesn't work, we'll have to figure something else out."

Nick had filled Traci in on their suspicions about Andy's possible drug use earlier and to say she was shocked was an understatement. "We don't even know for sure that she has been using drugs."

"Even if by some chance we are wrong, she still intentionally went into the bay when it was freezing. She needs help and if Swarek can do it, then I think that is our best option." Nick said; he knew how much his friend and Sam still loved each other and as much as he didn't like to admit it, if anyone could help Andy it was probably Sam.

Traci nodded her agreement and followed Oliver and Nick as they left the hospital. Sam ran a hand through his hair and pulled out his cell phone to call Sarah. About 10 minutes later he hung up with his sister feeling slightly better. Sarah was surprised to hear the details that were the purpose of his call. From the little information her brother had provided about Andy McNally, the woman he described didn't sound like the 'rookie with a lion's heart' he had described. Sarah readily agreed to help and would email Sam as much information as she could find and would talk him through some techniques if he found Andy to be less than receptive.

Sam made his way back to Andy's room. A nurse had set up a recliner/cot in the room next to Andy's bed for him. He had just settled down and closed his eyes, when he heard his name being called.

"Sam." Marlo said from the doorway.

Sam sat up, "Marlo, what are you doing here?"

She took a small step inside the room, "I think the better question is what are YOU doing here? With your ex-girlfriend."

He sighed, "I can't leave her. I'm really sorry Marlo; I love her."

"I know." Marlo shrugged, "I guess I hoped that you would never admit it out loud and maybe learn to be happy and love me."

Sam stood up, "I tried; she was just always there in the back of my mind. I knew I had made a mistake the moment I broke up with her but I was to dumb to realize how much I needed her until it was to late and then I tried to move on. We did have a lot of good times and I really liked being with you but it wouldn't be fair to you if I kept lying to myself. She needs me now and I won't let her down again."

"I wish I could be angry with you. But I knew I was fighting a losing battle. Just take care of her and yourself." Marlo said sadly.

Sam gave her a quick hug. "You take care too, and thanks."

Marlo left the room quickly and Sam reclaimed his place in the recliner next to Andy's bed. His eyes had just drifted closed again when he heard his name for a second time.

"Sam?" Andy whispered softly her brown eyes meeting his.