Wow guys, thank you so much! Your comments really, and I mean REALLY brought tears into my eyes. I read them all over again. Thank you so much! I hope you will like the new chapter. I have a plan now ;o)

This chapter is the aftermath of 1x09, focussing on Ressler's recovery, the next chapter is going to be a sequel to 1x11 The good Samaritan but it's only based on the episode...I will focus on something else...Oh you are asking yourself on what...stay tuned I have something in my mind :o) Hopefully the next episodes will give us some new Ressler whump :o) Otherwise I will have to add it myself ;o)

So have fun reading and thank you again so much for your amazing comments. Can't wait to read more!

Chapter 10 – Aftermath (1x10)

After 6 anxious hours Liz finally got a doctor on the phone.

"Agent Keen? This is Dr. Montgromery. I am the surgeon."

"Hello Doktor. How is he?" Liz slit down to a chair nearby. They where still in the middle of searching Reddington. Her emotions where giving her a hard time right now. She was too afraid of the news the Doctor would just give here. Was he alive at all?

"The bullet did quit a fatal damage to Agent Resslers leg but nonetheless we where able to save his live and his leg. We don't know how much mobility he is going to get back but at least we saved his leg." The Doctor said getting Liz to breath out while the tears started to roll down her cheeks. He was alive. It was all that mattered right now. They would work through everything else. Together they would take the road, as partners, as friends.

She couldn't have been more wrong.

3 days after the shooting Ressler was finally back at a normal station so Liz could pay him the visit she had waited for so long.
Donald was sitting up in his bed as she entered the room carefully. His leg was resting on a big pillow and there was some colour back in his face even if he still looked unlikely pale even for his type.
"Hey." Liz said entering shyly. It was a big step into Ressler's personal space and she didn't know if he would like her to be there.
"Hey." He answered with a small smile on his lips. How dearly he had hoped to ever see her again. This beautiful eyes, the smile on her face.

"I am so happy to see you sitting up like this again."

"Yeah me too." Ressler said with a smirk.

"How are you feeling?"

"Better. I feel like I am out of a thick dust for the first time in days."

"Great pain medication huh?"

"Absolutely."

"How is your leg?"

"Still there." Donald said and now it was Liz who had to smile. He was nearly back to his old self. "I think you will have to do a long recovery right? Did they tell you anything?"

"No it's to early for that."

"I am here for you, you know that, right?"
"I do. Any news on Reddington?"

"We found Garrick's body but nothing on Reddingtion, yet."

Ressler smiled a little, laying his head back down against the pillow. He pushed the button for his pain medication again, nothing Liz missed.

"How bad is the pain?"

"I'm good."

"Donald please be honest to me. I nearly watched you die right in front of me." Liz said tears now filling her eyes. Donald didn't even think a second before he grabbed her hand, squeezing it tightly. He couldn't see her like that.

"I will be fine." He said his voice calm but steady. Liz just nodded, her lips trembling to hold back a sob.

"Hey! Liz! Look at me. I am right here." Donald said again, squeezing her hand for another time. "Okay." She whispered after a few more seconds before letting go of his hand to get herself a chair next to his bed. She wanted to stay, wanted to talk to him just for a little while longer, just to make sure that he was really going to be okay.

Liz continued to visit Donald every second day of the week. She hadn't told Tom about it at all. She had told herself that she just hadn't told him because she didn't want to worry him about the fact that her partner was shot, in fact she just didn't want him to know that she was spending so much time together with Donald.

Liz could see a change in Donald's face as she entered his room again. He looked pale again, his eyes where bloodshot as he had cried.

"Are you alright?" Liz asked immediately. She was worried. Something was not right.

"Hey. Yeah I'm fine. How are you?" Donald asked. He didn't want to break the news to her, didn't want her to worry, he couldn't stand her pity right now.

"I am worried, you don't look to good. What's going on? Please Don, talk to me." Donald exhaled deeply. Her eyes where longing for the truth. There where so many secrets around her personal life, around her childhood, he knew that she couldn't stand secrets too good...Donald tried to focus for a second. Was it better to keep a secret from her or to tell her what was really going on?

"The Doctor stopped by this morning. They got some tests done yesterday. They don't think that I will get the full mobility of my leg back. In fact they have told me about the possibility that I will need a cane for the rest of my life. The damage the bullet had done to my leg was just to much. Nerves are damaged, the bone is completely replaced." Donald said calmly, not looking into Liz face. He couldn't stand it right now.

"But you are going to prove them wrong, aren't you?" Liz asked, getting Donald's head to snap up and look at her. She knew that Donald was not the type for any pity, he was a fighter and she knew that he was going to fight himself back into his normal life, no matter what the doctors had just told him, no matter how bad the chances where. He had survived all of this without any life threatening blood infection. He was alive and just 2 weeks afterwards sitting up in bed, eating, talking, laughing and about to check into rehab tomorrow.
"Sure I am." Donald said watching the smile on Liz face. It wasn't the reaction he had expected, it was even far better than the reaction he had hoped for.
"We will fight Donald!" Liz said, now taking Donald's hand into hers.

"We? As in you and me?"

"Hey we are partners, we are friends, of course I will be by your side literally every step of the way."

Liz couldn't have been more wrong.

The rehabilitation Center Donald was transferred to was not to far away from the hospital so Liz could stop by once a week to check on her partner and his progress.
As she entered his room for the first time Liz inhaled deeply as she saw him sitting in a wheelchair, looking out of the window, his back turning towards her.
"I hadn't expected this to be so much hospital like." Liz said while Donald turned his wheelchair around immediately.

"Hey. I haven't expected you here." He said and Liz could see that he was embarrassed.

"I said I would stop by. Should I come back on any other day?" Liz asked, not sure if she had overstepped a line.

"No, absolutely not. It's great to see you." Donald said wheeling himself over to the small table, offering Liz a chair. His leg was stretched out in full length and resting on the footrest of the wheelchair.

"How are you doing?" Liz asked pointing her head towards Donald's leg.

"There isn't much progress, I can't do much of the program because my leg still needs a little more time to heal."

"I see. How is the pain?"

"It's okay. They are doing a great job in here."

"I can't wait until you come back to the job. It's...different without you."

"Yeah? Nobody yelling orders at you, nobody criticizing you?" Donald asked with a smile.

"You got it." Liz answered smiling herself.

She was really missing him and soon she would miss him even more.

After 4 more weeks Liz eyes sparkled as she spotted Donald on the way to his room with nothing but crutches.

"Look who is up again." She said smiling as she could see the glimmer of hope in Donald's eyes. She had been worried after her last visit because Donald really had been depressed over his current situation.
"I am even allowed to put some weight back onto the leg and until now it's working. It's not much but it's something, right?"

"It's great!" Liz cheered, hugging Donald who was standing right in front of her. As she let go of him just a little, her nose was nearly touching his, she could feel his breath on her cheek. He smelled so good. How much she wished for his strong arms to grab her. She thought back to her breakdown after the whole Stewmaker incident. How he had guided her to the ambulance, how he had catched her from breaking down, how his strong arms had captured her whole body, how he had just hold her, how he had made her feel like she had found the safest place on earth where nobody could ever hurt her anymore, where nothing could ever hunt her anymore.

Liz looked up into Donald's eyes. He was so close. Without hesitating she leaned into the kiss he was giving her, full of passion, full of unspoken feelings and emotions.
It didn't take long until she could nearly feel the wedding ring on her finger burning into her skin. Tom. She couldn't do this. She was married. She had a husband waiting for her at home right now. A husband that wasn't even knowing she was with her partner at the moment. Liz begged away looking up into Donald's eyes, her own eyes full of shock.

"I am sorry, I...I really am sorry!" He said as he could see the look on Liz face. She was married, they had just let their emotions get into control. This wasn't real. This was nothing that really could happen, Liz had chosen her husband many years ago and Donald knew that she wasn't the type of woman cheating on her husband or breaking the promise she had once given him.

"Me too. Don, we can't...we can't do this. I mean I am married...Tom and..." Liz tried to get it all together, to explain the emotions she couldn't understand for herself at the moment.

"You don't need to explain it. I know." Donald said not surprised as Liz just turned around leaving his room in a hurry.

Donald crushed down onto his bed, his lips still feeling the kiss, his mouth still tasting the fruity arrangement of her lipstick. He knew that they had just made the biggest mistake of their lives even if it had felt so right for just a few seconds.
To Donald it was no surprise as he got her text message in the evening.

"I am sorry. I can't stop by anymore, I think it's better for us, as partners and as friends. See you back at work. Liz."

He had lost her in so many ways for this one kiss but Donald knew that he would have never take it back even if he could, that he would kiss her again, his feelings where just too real.