Disclaimer: I don't own these characters. If I did, Scotty wouldn't be flirting with a 20-year-old, and Lilly wouldn't be stalking her dad.

Chapter 37: Say

Even if your hands are shakin'

And your faith is broken

Even as the eyes are closin'

Do it with a heart wide open

Say what you need to say

A few minutes later, Scotty climbed gingerly from his car, having driven from the hospital to Kat's apartment to where he was now using only his knees and his left hand. He'd have been proud of his accomplishment had it not been for the fact that his injured right hand was really, really starting to hurt. The persistent throbbing was almost enough to make him visit the ER first, but the guilt in his heart wouldn't allow him that. Not yet. Not until he fixed things with Miller.

He'd first tried his partner's apartment, where he'd been met by her mother. She'd told him that Kat and Veronica were taking advantage of the unseasonably mild temperatures and brilliant sunshine to head to their favorite park, and so he'd driven there. As he got out of the car, he realized that Kat hadn't been the only mother with this idea, as several children and parents basked in the sunshine, enjoying the respite from cabin fever. A quick scan around the playground, sure enough, revealed Veronica and a couple other kids clambering over the jungle gym, and to his left, on a wooden bench beneath a tree, her arms folded across her chest, sat his partner. She looked lost in thought, watching Veronica, but not really watching, just staring off into space.

Carefully, Scotty approached the bench, hesitating for just a moment before taking any further action. She didn't turn around or in any way acknowledge his presence , and Scotty, in a brief irrational moment, hoped that maybe, if he was quiet, she wouldn't know he was there, and he could potentially gauge her mood and, if necessary, beat a hasty retreat.

Don't be an idiot, Valens, his brain chided him. Despite the fact that she didn't seem to notice him, there was no way in hell she didn't know he was there. She was too good a cop for that, he realized; she was just ignoring him.

You've come too far to chicken out now, he coached himself, and finally, he summoned his courage and took a seat on the other end of the bench, intentionally leaving several feet between them. Though Kat still didn't acknowledge his presence, her folded arms tightened just a bit and her shoulders stiffened. Scotty didn't say anything, deciding to wait and see if she'd make the first move, but the painfully awkward silence stretched for what seemed like an eternity.

Shit, Valens, Scotty told himself. You really screwed up this time.

As if she'd heard his thoughts, Kat finally spoke.

"You come here lookin' for perverts to beat up?" she snapped, still not even glancing in his direction. "'Cause I'm afraid we're fresh out."

"No," Scotty replied honestly as he looked up at her. "I'm…lookin' for you."

Kat snorted derisively. "Me? What the hell you lookin' for me for? Ain't you supposed to be with Lil?" she demanded, still not meeting his gaze.

Scotty sighed. She sure wasn't going to make this easy for him. Not that he had any right to expect that, he realized. Kat Miller didn't share things with people. She just didn't. And yet…she'd chosen to share something deeply personal and unbelievably painful with him, just to help him understand Lilly better…and he'd turned around and crapped all over it. Dammit. He wished she'd yell, wished she'd tell him off, wished she'd just…be Kat Miller. This silent treatment…that spoke volumes.

"I had somewhere else I needed to be," he told her quietly. After a pause, he grinned slightly and tried to break the tension. "Plus, y'know…Lil kicked me out."

"Can't say I blame her," Kat muttered without missing a beat.

Scotty knew that remark was carefully calibrated and aimed at his soft spot with the sole purpose of hurting him, and normally it would have stung like hell, but, to his surprise, he felt more relief than anything else. She was at least talking to him again. Granted, her words were mean-spirited and laced with hurt and bitterness, not at all like her usual jovial snark, but he decided to accept it for what it was and be grateful for it.

They lapsed once more into silence, although it seemed just a touch less uncomfortable than it had been moments before. Seeing his partner turn slightly, he followed Kat's gaze toward Veronica, who had taken her place as queen of the jungle gym, calling orders to her loyal subjects below. The joy on her face and the exuberant sparkle in her eyes warmed Scotty's heart and made him smile in spite of everything. This was what childhood should be. This was what Lilly should have had, what Kat should have had…what he'd had, and taken for granted.

"Veronica looks like she's havin' a good time," he ventured hopefully, only to meet that stone wall of silence once more. He figured, though, that if his attempts at conversation weren't welcome, she'd have told him, in no uncertain terms, to get the hell away from her, so he took her silence as assent and continued.

"I know what it's like to grow up like she is," Scotty began, not daring to look in his partner's direction. "My parents worked long hours at the restaurant… sometimes they were already gone when I got up for school and didn't get home till after I went to bed. Hell, I saw a lot more of my grandma than my mom for a lotta years. But...I was happy, 'cause I knew they loved me. They made time for me…just like you do for her. I dunno how they did it, and I dunno how you do it, either."

Kat was still silent, but Scotty couldn't help but notice, by way of a surreptitiously stolen glance, that the tension in her shoulders seemed to have eased slightly. Bolstered by this slight evidence that she might potentially be thawing, he went on.

"So…someone who grows up like that…no way in hell can they possibly know what it's like to grow up thinkin' you ain't loved. Like…you and Lil did," he said tentatively, knowing he was treading on very, very thin ice, broaching the very subject that had caused so much pain for everyone involved. Still, though, he had to get this off his chest, regardless of the outcome.

Taking a deep breath, he plunged ahead. "And when we finally figure that out...when we finally gotta take off our rose-colored glasses and see, first-hand, the kinda hell people we love went through when they were kids…we lash out and say stupid shit that we got no right to say."

With a pause, Scotty stole another glance at his partner, noticed that she seemed to have thawed further, and was even more encouraged.

"I…I didn't wanna know how bad Lil had it…or how bad you had it," he continued, looking up at the gnarled old oak beside them. "Lil told me some stuff, way back on my third job, but I didn't believe it. Didn't wanna believe it…'cause if it was true, if it really had been that bad…I didn't think I could handle it."

He trailed off then, the grief from the previous night dangerously close to resurfacing. For a moment, he idly wondered if maybe a tear or two might aid his cause, but he quickly banished the thought and retracted the ones that had started to fill his eyes. What the hell, Valens? You a woman all of a sudden?

So focused was he on getting his emotions under control that he almost missed the soft question from the woman next to him.

"So…that what happened to your hand?" she asked.

Scotty glanced up in surprise, and, fortunately for him, she elaborated. "Last night…when you figured out that it really was that bad."

"Yeah," Scotty agreed huskily, willing the persistent images of a battered, bruised, and panic-stricken ten-year-old Lilly out of his mind.

"And?" she pressed.

He swallowed hard around the lump in his throat. "It's killin' me," he replied huskily.

"I know," Kat agreed, her tone heavy with the pain of her own memories.

Scotty took a shaky breath. "I know…that you know," he said, finally meeting her eyes, willing her to understand the significance of what he was telling her, "…and that's killin' me, too."

His partner remained silent, but it wasn't the stony, unyielding silence from earlier. It was a silence of acceptance…perhaps even…forgiveness?

Scotty's heart lightened slightly. "I thought about bringin' you one of those coffee concoctions you need a spoon for," he said with a wry smile, "but that ain't even gonna begin to cover it. You don't…you don't share with people. And you shared with me…which you didn't have to do…and I just…" he trailed off, sighed, then glanced up at her again. "I'm sorry."

Kat didn't say anything for a long moment, then turned to face him, for the first time since he'd sat down, fixed him with a peculiar expression, and asked him a direct question. "So…were you nice?"

Taken aback, Scotty blinked in surprise. He'd sort of expected her to at least acknowledge the fact that he'd apologized, to tell him that there was no way in hell flimsy words could make up for what he'd said, for how badly he'd hurt her, but she'd just changed the subject. He didn't have a clue what to do with that.

"I'm sorry?" he asked.

"To Ellen," Kat continued, a strange sort of urgency coloring her voice. "Were you nice?"

Scotty sighed and tried to buy some time. How the hell could he even begin explain what had happened? He knew his partner didn't approve of whatever she thought he'd done, and the fact that she knew how he'd hurt his hand only added fuel to the fire. Part of him wanted to tell her everything, to make her understand, because if she understood what he'd done, then there was a chance Lil might, too…but if she didn't…

The soft voice of his partner interrupted his thoughts.

"I hate you," she began quietly, and Scotty's head snapped up in surprise. They'd just kinda made up, hadn't they…?

"That's the last thing I said to my dad before he died," Kat explained. "Last words he ever heard me say. Two days later, they found him dead on the couch with a couple empty bottles of tequila. That was his drink."

Scotty's heart filled with compassion as she continued, her voice slightly tremulous and heavy with regret. "And I keep thinkin' maybe if I hadn't said that, he'd…"

Oh, those words were familiar. He knew the road she was going down. The road of self-blame and second-guessing and agonizing what-ifs...hell, he lived on that road, and he'd be damned if his partner moved in next door.

"Oh, Kat…" he began, his voice full of sympathy and understanding, "you can't think that was your fault. You just…you can't," he repeated.

"What, I'm supposed to think that's just some kinda coincidence?" she snapped back.

He met her eyes, willing her to somehow understand what he'd never been able to wrap his own mind around.

"Look," he began slowly. "When someone decides to end it all…it's never just one thing. It can't be just one thing. And…you were a kid. You didn't know any better. You didn't…" he trailed off, then reiterated his earlier point. "It ain't your fault."

Kat sat in silence as she considered his words, and Scotty was encouraged that she did, indeed, seem to be thinking about what he'd said. It occurred to him that perhaps no one had ever spoken those words aloud to her, at least, not when she was in a place where she could hear them.

"This'd be a whole lot more convincing comin' from someone other than you," she retorted softly, and Scotty nearly fell off the bench. They were talking about her dad. Her situation. Not his. Not Elisa. And he couldn't talk about Elisa. He couldn't go there. Not now. Not today.

Kat read the dark shadows of pain and fear in his eyes, and quickly moved to reassure him. "Look," she began firmly. "All I'm sayin' is I know you still blame yourself, too. And if you're gonna convince me that my dad ain't my fault, then you better start believin' that Elisa's not your fault, either. She was sick, Scotty."

"So was your dad," he replied with a glare.

"My dad did it to himself," Kat shot back.

"Elisa quit fightin'," Scotty snapped.

"Least you didn't tell her you hated her," Kat muttered.

"Least you stuck around long enough to tell him how you felt," he retorted.

Their eyes met then, and they sat there in silence, just staring at one another as the common bond they shared, and the implications of what they'd just blurted out, began to sink in. Scotty could see his partner's eyes beginning to soften, much as he knew his own must have been. He wasn't sure he'd ever stop blaming himself, stop believing that there was something he could have done to save Elisa, but it was just beginning to dawn on him that there was a chance she'd played a part…a chance that maybe her blood wasn't only on his hands…

"You might be right," Kat began slowly, echoing his own thoughts, "but I still…wish I hadn't told him that. So…when I said to be nice, that was me wishin' I could go back and change things."

"I was, y'know," Scotty replied. "Lil's mom woke up this mornin'…and I was nice."

Kat's eyes widened in surprise. "Yeah?" she asked.

"Yeah," he responded with a slight smile. "It was…it was hard at first, but then, we got started talkin', and…Lil had it bad, but…it wasn't all bad."

"It never is," Kat agreed, her voice soft and faraway.

They were interrupted then by Veronica running up to them both, and Scotty regarded her with a warm smile. "Hey, Detective Scotty," she greeted him, then turned her attention to her mother. "You wanna swing me now, Mama?" she asked eagerly.

"Sure, baby," Kat replied, her voice suddenly light and full of love. "You go pick out a good one, and I'll be there in second, okay?"

Veronica nodded and scampered off, and Kat turned to Scotty. "I think I'm bein' summoned," she remarked with a grin as she rose to leave.

"Are we…okay?" Scotty asked, looking up at her hopefully.

Kat paused slightly, mostly just to make him squirm. "You gotta do two things for me," she finally declared.

"Name 'em," Scotty shot back with relief. He'd do anything to get back in his partner's good graces.

"Number one," she said, shifting her weight to one hip and eyeing him critically. "You gotta go get that hand looked at, and if it's broken, you gotta find some other patsy to stick your paperwork on, 'cause no way in hell am I workin' overtime to fill out your damn forms."

"Done," Scotty grinned, and Kat smiled slightly, then turned to leave.

"And number two?" he called after her.

Kat turned around, her smile in full force this time, and Scotty felt a huge weight beginning to lift from his shoulders.

"You owe me coffee, Man Candy," she informed him. "Spoon and all."

Scotty grinned broadly. "You got it," he replied.

Lilly was just about to push open the door to her mother's room when a nurse approached from behind. Almost apologetically, she explained that she just needed to check Ellen's vitals, change out a couple of IVs, and then she'd be on her way, and Lilly nodded silently, simultaneously grateful for, yet resentful of, the intrusion. Nervously, she paced the hallway, trying to prepare herself for what lay ahead, but realizing, with a sense of bitter frustration, that there really wasn't any way to prepare. Not for this. She just had to do it, had to jump in with both feet and deliver the blow, and that sense of dread that was chilling her to her very soul wouldn't go away until she did. With this realization, she gritted her teeth and willed that vapid nurse out into the hallway, and within a few seconds, the nurse reappeared, giving Lilly a slight smile. Lilly nodded in reply, murmured her thanks, and without any further hesitation, leaned into the door and headed inside.

She'd thought she was as prepared as she could be for the task at hand, thought she'd collected herself enough to do what she had to do, but when she entered the room and her eyes fell on the frail figure lying in the hospital bed, propped up with pillows, she stopped short as the reality sank in. Oddly enough, Lilly realized that, when her mother was in the coma, the situation seemed far more hopeful than it was now. Before Ellen awoke, she didn't have a decision to make. If she died in the coma, it wouldn't have been her choice, at least, not directly. But now…even though her mother was awake, had been talking and even laughing with Scotty mere moments before…Lilly had never felt such a sense of finality as she did in that moment.

"There's my girl," Ellen greeted Lilly, her voice still raspy from days of not being used. Days of not being used because she'd been either in a medically-induced coma or passed out on the floor, Lilly realized, and with that, she felt more anger than anything else. Anger that her mother had abused alcohol and her own body for so many decades that it had come to this, late-stage cirrhosis of the liver, and Lilly had to deliver what, she realized with a stab of bitterness, would probably be the worst news Ellen had ever received. She couldn't touch alcohol again, or it would be her death sentence. She'd already lost four husbands, countless boyfriends, an untold number of jobs, and two daughters to vodka…everything she cared about was long since destroyed. Her very life? Lilly chuckled bitterly as she realized that Ellen would probably consider that worth even less than the rest.

For a long moment, Lilly stood frozen in the doorway, dreading with every ounce of her being the news she'd have to relay. She'd tried begging, she'd tried pleading, she'd tried getting rid of the liquor, pouring it down the sink while Ellen was out, hiding it, tossing it in the neighbors' trash…but nothing had worked in the thirty years Lilly had been trying, and she held onto very little hope that this would work, either. Oh, sure, Ellen might agree at first, like she always did, but she'd insist on going back to her apartment, where she was alone a large portion of the day, and Lilly knew that before the week was out, her mother's already feeble willpower would suffocate under the weight of the addiction that had fueled, and destroyed, her body for decades.

As she took a few cautious steps toward Ellen's bed, Lilly suddenly felt an overwhelming loneliness. Where the hell was Scotty? Why had she sent him away?

Because you need to do this on your own, her brain reminded her sternly. He's done enough already; he doesn't need to be dragged into…this.

Even her brain couldn't come up with the word to describe the last few decades, she realized, and with that, the grief and loneliness were swallowed by anger and bitterness once more as she slowly walked toward her mother's bed. She actually welcomed the harsher feelings; they were old friends, friends that had kept her safe, time and time again, from the overwhelming pain that lurked just beneath the surface, always threatening to burst through. Anger and bitterness she could handle, and she realized, as she reached the foot of the bed, that they were exactly the weapons she needed to wield to fight off the devastation of the news she was about to deliver.

"Congratulations, Mom," she began sarcastically. "Wound up in the hospital this time." She spread her arms wide, indicating the room as a whole. "It's better than jail, at least," she continued. "Food's probably about the same, but at least here there's a separate room for the toilet."

"Oh, get off your high horse, Lilly," Ellen retorted, as snappishly as she could. "I know, I've screwed up."

"Damn right you have," Lilly snapped in response, her eyes firing daggers at her mother. Her conscience warned her to shut up, to take it easy until her mother had recovered enough to hear the news, but Lilly ignored it. Taking it easy simply wasn't an option. Not if she wanted to get through this.

She took a deep breath and plowed ahead, not daring to meet her mother's eyes. "You've screwed up so bad, for so long, that the doctors say you can't drink again," she said, her voice soft and trembling slightly.

Ellen didn't say anything, and after a few moments, Lilly glanced over to gauge her response, but her mother's pale, crepey face betrayed no reaction whatsoever to the news.

"You hear me, Mom?" Lilly asked, a bit louder, realizing that the pain she thought she'd buried was rapidly surfacing, and she desperately hoped to cover it over with another layer of wrath. "You can't have another drink. Not one. Or you'll die. Your liver's completely shot. You've…you've pickled it, Mom."

Ellen remained silent and unresponsive, and that, to Lilly, spoke volumes.

"So you've got a choice to make," she continued, pacing the room. "You can either quit drinking, and get a few more years, or you can just drown yourself in a bottle of vodka like you have since the day Dad left. Choice is yours. But I'm not gonna just sit by and watch you kill yourself. You wanna do that, then…then this is it. You and I are done. 'Cause…" she paused, fighting the suddenly large lump in her throat as the pain burst through, "I…can't watch. I'm---I'm not that strong," she admitted, feeling the sudden sting of tears in her eyes and frantically trying to blink them away as she realized that what she'd just said, although totally unplanned, was completely and heart-wrenchingly true. No matter how strong she thought she was, she wasn't strong enough to watch her mother die.

The silence between the two women stretched for several minutes, Lilly standing at the window, leaning on the sill, brushing away her tears and looking out at the skyline. She couldn't look at her mother. Not now. Not yet. But the longer Ellen didn't say anything, the more painful, and puzzling, it was. Usually, her mother scoffed at her concerns, brushed them off as easily as Lilly brushed away the cat fur from her coat each morning…but the silence was new.

Finally, curiosity fought through the layers of everything else, and she couldn't resist the urge to turn and look at her mother. What she saw surprised her: Ellen was sitting in bed, leaning her arms on the plastic tray before her and gently fingering the edge of a faded photograph. Lilly strained to see it, but from where she was standing, she couldn't make out a thing, so, against her better judgment, she crossed the room and approached the bed for a better look.

"This is my favorite picture of you girls," Ellen began with a glance up at her daughter, her voice sounding soft and faraway. "Remember that, Lilly?"

Lilly sat down in the chair next to her mother and gently took the photo from her. For a long moment, she studied it, taking in the sunshine, the dresses, and the smiles on all their faces.

"I've never seen this picture before," she said, utterly mystified.

"I've carried that old thing around for almost 30 years," Ellen replied. "Jerry took it, remember?" she asked with a slight smile. "The car salesman? Remember how he took us all out for Easter?"

Lilly nodded, but didn't trust herself to speak . For the moment, her curiosity over why her mother would have carried that photo with her since the day it came back from the developers was overwhelmed by waves of nostalgia. Of course she remembered that day, remembered it vividly; it was as close to perfect as any she'd ever had. Easter Sunday, the year she turned ten. Ellen had been seeing Jerry, a nice guy for a change, and they'd all gone to church, something they hardly ever did. Church had been wonderful, full of music and smiles and and a sense of peace she hadn't really had before or since…and then Jerry had taken them all out to lunch at a place that was far nicer than anything Lilly had ever seen. Later that day, they'd all gone to the park, basked in the sunshine that warmed their faces and glittered brilliantly off the lake's sapphire waves, and fed the ducks. Lilly had wished, as she tossed a handful of bread crumbs to a small white duck that swam by itself, several yards away from the rest of the flock, that the day could last forever. She hadn't remembered that any part of it had been captured on film, and a wave of wistful longing washed over her as she studied the photo, remembering that one blissful moment she'd all but forgotten about.

Of course, she realized bitterly, forgetting about it had been a conscious decision. Remembering the blissful perfection of that day made what followed two weeks later even more agonizing. It wasn't painful enough that she'd never had happiness, no, the worst part was having had it, and then having had it all snatched away.

"He was one of the good ones," Ellen reminisced fondly, bursting through Lilly's reverie. "I thought…I thought we were gonna make it."

"I know, Mom," Lilly said quietly.

"Left a week and a half later, I'm sure you remember that," Ellen continued, her voice taking on a slightly bitter edge.

"I remember," Lilly replied tentatively, wondering where, exactly, her mother was going with this.

"That was right before you…were attacked," Ellen went on, the bitterness gone and replaced with a deep sadness, the likes of which Lilly had never heard before.

Frozen to the spot, Lilly could only stare in utter disbelief. Her mother had always denied the severity of what happened, always brushed it off as an accident, the result of Lilly's own natural recklessness. And, Lilly realized, that had hurt even more than the rest.

Ellen met Lilly's startled gaze then, her own eyes clouding with regret.

"I always knew that's what happened to you, Lilly," she said softly, reaching out and grasping her daughter's hand. "I wasn't blind."

"So you hid in your room for two days straight drinkin' yourself silly while Ray made me milkshakes?" Lilly replied incredulously. "You lied to the cops, to the doctors, to everyone, for thirty years?"

"I'm not proud of it," Ellen retorted. "But I couldn't face what I did. I couldn't look at those bruises, those broken teeth…knowing they were my fault."

Lilly sat in stunned silence, trying to absorb her mother's words, words she'd always longed to hear, but never dreamed she actually would, and wondering why the hell she was hearing them now.

"I failed you," Ellen concluded quietly, her voice heavy with regret. "Over and over."

With that, Lilly's heart sank to the floor. Suddenly, she knew why her mother was making amends. She'd made her decision. This was it…this was the end. Lilly felt her bitterness fading rapidly, replaced by, not the pain of all the wounds she'd been dealt as a child, but the deep, heart-wrenching sadness of goodbye.

Goodbye.

How the hell was she supposed to say goodbye to her mother? Despite her faults, despite her flaws, she was the one constant in Lilly's life. Her father, her sister, even Ray, had all eventually left…but her mother, for better or for worse, had stayed. How was she supposed to go on without that?

Suddenly, Lilly remembered one cold winter night, when she'd first told Scotty about her childhood. He hadn't believed her, he'd insisted that there must have been something good, that her past couldn't have been as bad as she'd thought it was.

You're tellin' me not once did you have fun with your mom? I mean, not once did you feel…some kinda love?

After they'd closed that case, Lilly had been forced to admit that he was right, and now…now that she'd been confronted with one of the most blissful memories she had, she realized that there were others, and in a flash, she knew how to say goodbye.

"It…wasn't all bad," Lilly argued with a slight smile, a smile she hoped would hide her pain, but knowing there was no way in the world it would. "We had some good times, you and me. Remember the time we made snow angels?" she asked, her voice tremulous. "Remember The Velveteen Rabbit, Mom? Remember how many times you read that to me?"

"You used to make me read that to you over and over," Ellen recalled with a wistful smile. "Couldn't believe you never got tired of that silly old book."

"It wasn't the book, Mom," Lilly replied quietly. "It was…you." She looked deep into her mother's eyes, willing her to understand that was she loved most wasn't the story, it was the closeness; snuggling up next to her mother, breathing her perfume, feeling safe and secure and loved, even if it was only for a few moments.

"We had some good times, didn't we?" Ellen asked hopefully.

"Yeah, Mom," Lilly replied, the pain suddenly overwhelming, and she ducked her head to hide the tears. "We did."

"We haven't had nearly enough, Lilly," her mother declared, quietly but firmly, and Lilly's head snapped up in surprise. What…? What was her mother saying?

Lilly watched as Ellen took a deep breath, smiled slightly, and squeezed her hand. "I'm gonna stop drinking."

As quickly as it had come, the pain of goodbye faded, replaced with a crashing wave of anger. I'm gonna stop drinking. Oh, she'd heard that before. Dozens…maybe hundreds of times. And each time, it never failed to bring a surge of hope to her heart, but each time, that hope were dashed like glass to concrete, and she'd learned, over the years, to squash it as soon as it appeared, so there was a chance she wouldn't be as disappointed, a chance the pain might be bearable.

"I've heard that before," Lilly griped, her voice icy as she extricated her hand from her mother's grip.

"It's different this time," Ellen protested.

"You say that every time," Lilly retorted quietly, the words laced with all the years of dashed hopes and empty promises.

"Look, Lilly," Ellen argued quietly. "I wanna make up for what I did to you…to Chris…I wanna be your mom again, if only for a little while. I don't know how long I've got left, but I wanna make it count. I wanna see you be happy. I…I'm not gonna make you any promises that I'll never drink again, because I can't promise that. But…I can promise that…I'm gonna try. Can't you at least give me that chance?"

Try. That was new. Lilly had heard the promises not to drink again, she'd even watched her mother pour her vodka down the sink once or twice in an effort to prove she was serious...but a sincere promise to try? She'd never heard that before.

"I've failed you so many times, Lilly," Ellen began. "And I don't know that I won't fail you again." She took Lilly's hand again and smiled proudly. "I'm not strong like you."

Lilly felt tears blur her eyes once more as she squeezed her mother's hand. "I had to get it from somewhere," she said lightly.

Ellen smiled again, and then her eyes drifted closed. "I think I wanna…maybe…sleep for a while," she said, and Lilly realized how much that conversation really had taken out of her.

"Go right ahead," she said, placing a soft kiss on her mother's forehead. "I'll be here when you wake up."

Within seconds, Ellen was snoring softly, and Lilly was pacing the room again, trying to figure out what the hell had happened to her mother while she was in that coma. She'd never before admitted to any mistakes, at least not with any sincerity. She'd always vacillated between protesting her innocence, accusing Lilly of making things sound worse than they were, or weeping inconsolably that she was a terrible mother, but never doing anything about it. She had never before admitted to specific failures, and the one she'd pointed out, her worst mistake as a mother…that was the most surprising of all.

The attack.

Lilly sensed that her mother had always known what had happened, but never once had she even indicated she'd been upset about it. Oh, that night, she'd flown into a maternal panic, and Lilly was somewhat comforted by that, but the denial in the emergency room that was repeated, over and over throughout the decades that followed, always laying the blame on Lilly's shoulders…that had erased any comfort she'd received. When Ellen disappeared into her bedroom that night, Lilly had assumed that her mother simply didn't want to be bothered with the extra burden of taking care of her wounds. It had never once occurred to her that her mother had been so devastated by what had happened that she just couldn't face her.

Her mind still whirling with the new information she'd received, Lilly turned back toward the bed, and in doing so, her eyes fell on that snapshot lying on the tray. Sinking down into the chair, she picked up the photo and started to study it. As she flipped it over and read the faded scrawl on the back with the names and dates, a thought occurred to her, and she lowered the picture, frowning with confusion. Ellen had been looking at the photo that morning. It hadn't been there when Lilly had left the night before, she was sure of that…so where had it come from?

Her thoughts were interrupted by the creak of the door as the nurse from earlier came in, smiled apologetically, then reached into her pocket and withdrew a small card, which she handed to Lilly.

"The night nurse forgot to bring this back to you," she explained. "We had to run another copy of the insurance card."

Absently, Lilly thanked the nurse, who left as quietly as she'd come, and reached down to retrieve her mother's purse and replace the insurance card. As she slid the card back into Ellen's wallet, her eyes suddenly fell on an empty plastic sleeve, one that was the exact same size as that photo.

A pair of new mysteries added themselves to the mix: her mother had been carrying that picture around in her wallet all this time? And how the hell had it gotten out of the wallet in the first place? Ellen had been in a coma until just a couple hours before, and she probably wouldn't have had the coordination to retrieve the picture herself. So how in the---?

The night nurse forgot to bring this back to you…

Lilly's whirling thoughts crystallized suddenly. If the night nurse had been the one to request the insurance card…that could only mean that…Scotty had been the one to fish it out of the wallet.

Which meant that he'd also been the one to find the photo.

She grabbed at the snapshot again, flipping it over to read, once more, Ellen's handwriting on the back.

Me with my girls, Easter, '79---Christina, age 4, Lilly, age 10.

Lilly stared at it for a long moment, the frustration rising with alarming speed. It was right there, all Scotty needed to put two and two together, and he hadn't. Granted, she'd never told him the date of her attack, but for God's sake, he was a detective. He could figure it out. But it suddenly became obvious to her that he'd only seen what he wanted to see. He'd seen those smiling faces, the pretty dresses, the lone remnant of Lilly's perfect day, and he'd no doubt use it as fodder for his ongoing crusade to convince her that her childhood wasn't all that bad. True, his efforts had been subdued in recent weeks, but she'd spilled her guts to him, told him her most hideous, humiliating secret, and he'd fixated instead on the fact that George Marks had already heard about it. Not that she would have wanted to talk about it with Scotty, she realized. Hell, no. She'd already done all the talking about it she ever wanted to do, and she had to admit that she was relieved when he didn't press her for more details, when he didn't hover over her because of it, when he just pretended like it hadn't happened.

But if he was literally pretending it hadn't happened…what the hell were they even, doing? Did he live in such a state of Pollyannaish denial that her attack, even that, wouldn't dampen his enthusiasm? How the hell else could he have been sitting there, laughing and chatting with her mother like they were at a damn tea party? Didn't he have a clue how badly that woman in the bed had hurt her over the years? Did he still, after all this time, after all her efforts to let him in, to make him understand, still not get it?

Her irritation was furthered when the door opened again, and the nurse appeared once more. She seemed to sense Lilly's annoyance and quickly moved to apologize.

"I'm sorry to bother you again," she began calmly, holding out a stack of colorful leaflets, "but your mother asked for these earlier, and we've been so busy that I haven't had a chance to bring them by until just now."

Lilly took the proffered leaflets and thanked the nurse, who gave Ellen a quick glance, made a note in the chart, and departed, leaving Lilly frowning in utter mystification at the colorful pages in front of her.

One Day At A Time…

Serenity Health Center…

New Day Residential Program…

Lilly's heart began to race as she realized that they were all information packets…for in-patient alcohol rehabilitation facilities. She lowered the brochures and just stared, wide-eyed, at her mother.

Rehab. Her mother had never once mentioned rehab. Oh, she'd tried to quit on her own, dozens of times, even making it to a handful of AA meetings, but the efforts had been largely on her own, half-hearted, and with little to no outside support. Despite her lingering bitterness, Lilly couldn't really blame her mother for her lack of success. But rehab? Rehab was new…rehab was different…good Lord, her mother was actually serious.

But…how the hell had rehab even occurred to her? What the hell had happened to her while she was in that coma? Lilly had heard of people having near-death experiences, coming out of them, and turning their lives around, but she never in a million years thought it would happen to someone she knew.

Get a grip, Rush. These brochures don't mean crap, a bitter voice reminded her.

But, for the first time in her life, Lilly wasn't so sure that voice was right. Her mother had mentioned her attack. She'd named it for what it was...how had that occurred to her? She hadn't raised a word of protest, not one, when Lilly had told her she couldn't drink again. And now this rehab thing…

Suddenly, Lilly became altogether uncertain as to what had happened in that room. Oh, sure, Scotty was laughing and joking with her mother that morning, but he'd been alone with her all night. Had he…said something? Done something?

Lilly's mind began to whirl anew. Had Scotty swooped in and done his Superman routine? Had he decided that just a casual suggestion of rehab would be enough to change thirty years of addiction and bad habits? Did he think it was that simple?

You have no proof he said or did anything, her inner detective reminded her. The nurse said your mother asked for the brochures. Didn't mention Scotty.

Lilly sighed with a curious mixture of relief and disappointment: relief that maybe Scotty had kept his nose out of her business, but disappointment that she was right back to square one: he still didn't get it. With another irritated sigh, she lowered her head once again to peruse the rehab brochures. She could deal with Scotty later. She could----

And then she stopped dead in her tracks, her eyes suddenly drawn to a small, discolored spot on the wall opposite the bed. Grateful for the distraction, she rose from her chair and crossed the room to get a closer look. As she reached the spot, she realized, to her horror, that it was dried blood, and, suddenly panicked, she raked her eyes over her mother's still form to check for wounds.

Don't be ridiculous, Rush, she chided herself. They'd have told you if she hurt herself. They'd have said something.

With this thought, and the fact that her quick once-over revealed no obvious injuries, certainly not the sort that would have bled all over the wall, Lilly began to puzzle over the stain. She examined it from several angles, feeling, for a second, like she was out on the line again, working a fresh job.

She knew she wasn't injured, and she was pretty sure her mother wasn't, so…

Oh, dear God.

Scotty.

She'd have to have been completely blind to miss his bloodied, bruised hand, as well as the look in his eyes when she'd asked him about it. She knew Scotty, and his temper, well enough to know, without even having to think, exactly how he'd hurt himself…and, thanks to the blood on the wall, now she knew where. Beyond the shadow of a doubt.

The only thing she didn't know yet…was why.

But she was bound and determined to find out.