A/N Well, I was trying really hard to wait until I had 100 reviews before posting this chapter, but I guess I'll go ahead and give it to you just since I like the word Crikey so much! :)

Chapter 25

After the shot, Goren tackled Wallace. She hit the floor hard, and he cuffed her. Then he turned back to Alex. He pulled out his phone and called 911 as he checked her pulse.

"Alex?!" he cried desperately, as tears filled his eyes.

"I'm bleeding!" Wallace cried pitifully. A pool of blood was gathering under her shoulder on the floor.

"Shut up, Nicole!" Bobby snarled. He gave the necessary information, his words rapid and filled with fear. Then he set the phone beside Alex on the floor and checked her pulse again.

By the time the EMTs arrived, he was doing CPR on Alex. They used the AED, and her heartbeat returned. He told them what he suspected about the chemicals, and badgered Nicole until she admitted it was Pancuronium Bromide. They whisked Alex away and the team of detectives that had just arrived called another bus for Nicole even as they questioned Bobby.

He couldn't concentrate. He was consumed with worry for Eames, and fury for the blond woman they were now treating for shock. His answers were clipped and furious, and he couldn't keep still. "I gotta-I gotta go. I have to see Eames," he told them. "Please!"

They'd made as much sense as they could from what he'd told them, and Bobby hurried outside.

"Look, Detective Goren, let Finch over there give you a ride. He'll put the lights on, get you there faster."

In a daze, Bobby agreed. He hurried over and climbed into the back of the cruiser.

"She's stabilized, but her vitals are very weak. We're monitoring her very closely."

Goren nodded, wide-eyed, and tucked his hand around the handle of the door. She was surrounded by equipment, with electrodes attached to her skin and a monitor displaying all of her vitals.

Through glassy eyes, Bobby stepped closer and reached for her hand. "Oh, God, Alex, I'm so sorry!" he breathed. "I should have listened to you. I shouldn't have given her the time of day. I'm so sorry," he said again.

Slowly, she was getting stronger. It was mesmerizing, really, sitting and watching the rhythmic display of her heart and her respiration drift across the screen.

Bobby spent a lot of time thinking. He ran and reran that conversation in the alley through his mind.

What is it that makes her so appealing to you, Bobby? What are you getting out of it?

He thought about that a lot. And Bobby realized that, somewhere along the way, he had convinced himself that so long as he could show compassion for even the worst of the worst, he was a good person. A good man. Better than his father, William. And better than his brother, Frank. And better than anybody ever expected him to be.

So he convinced himself that Nicole was a victim. A victim of the circumstances of her life, the same as him. And under the misguided idea that he had overcome all his trials, he had tried to save her.

And all the while he had picked and torn at the only good relationship in his life. The only person who had ever loved him for who he is instead of who he ought to be. And she'd almost died because of his stupidity.

He bounced his knee so much the nurses teased him that the shaking was affecting their readings. When his back started to ache, he stood and paced the room.

As he turned around for another pass across the foot of her bed, he stopped in his tracks. He swore he'd seen movement. Bobby moved closer. "Alex?" he asked quietly.

She wet her lips with her tongue.

Bobby was beside himself. "Alex, honey?" he asked again, desperate to speak with her, to have her back, fully with him.

Her brow furrowed, and slowly, her eyes opened. She didn't focus on anything, and her lids shut again.

"I'm here, honey. I'm here with you. Alex, it's okay now. Everything's okay."

"Bobby, you've got to get some sleep."

"I'm fine. I'm not leaving her."

Liz sighed. She looked at her sister, asleep in the bed. Alex had come to a few times, but she had a long way to go before she would be fully coherent. "I think Alex would want you to."

"No." If you loved me, there would be something. Somehow, you would reciprocate. "Look, I understand what you're trying to do, but… I have to stay. It's important."

"I don't see how you're holding up."

Bobby said nothing, but he answered her in his mind. It's simple. I love her.

So Bobby paced while Alex's family sat at her side, and he sat in the chair at night when they left to go home. And in the wee hours of the morning, with his head on the mattress beside her hand, he fell asleep.

"Move it," Alex said. She tried to free her hand, but there was something heavy on it, a rock or something. She pulled her hand again. It wasn't a rock. Whatever it was, it was squishy.

"Ow!"

"Move."

Bobby's head jerked up, and he smiled at her. "You're awake!"

"You hurt my hand," she muttered, and immediately, he picked up her hand and rubbed the soreness away.

"Sorry, I guess I fell asleep."

"Bobby…" Alex looked around. "Hospital?"

He nodded. "Do you remember?"

"The trash…" Alex said, but none of the other details came to mind.

"Long story," he said. "The good news is you're okay."

"I'm hungry," she told him.

Bobby grinned, and there was a special spark in his eyes that was only for her. "I'll tell the staff," he said. He got to his feet, and before he walked away, he spun, turning back to her. "And Alex?"

She looked up at him.

"I love you."

Alex didn't try to make sense of it. She was too tired to make sense of anything. She did find herself with a smile on her face.