Chapter 17

The police officer was sitting outside the curtained exam area and she gave him an evil glare before peeling back the dark green curtain slightly and stepping inside. She was a little unsure of herself, of his need to have her there, but her own need to be near him overshadowed that uncertainty. She needed to be near him, to touch his hand, hear his voice. She needed to know he was ok.

He was sitting up on a small bed, legs hanging over the side, wearing a hospital gown, which she would no doubt make fun of later, when she was sure he was going to be ok. A young doctor, possibly a student, was stitching his head, just finishing, and she stood aside and watched for a minute before walking in.

The young man looked up at her and smiled. "Perfect timing, we're just finishing up."

"How's he doing?" she asked, trying to sound upbeat.

"I'm right here, you can ask me," Josh said, trying to sound forceful but sounding more pathetic than anything.

"You'll lie," she said casually.

The doctor chuckled and stood up, moving a tray off to his side. "Well," he paused, looking at Josh, who nodded. "He has a broken nose which we packed with gauze and a pretty nice black eye, three cracked ribs, a bruised kidney, and we're starting him on a high dose of AZT. There's no internal bleeding from the kicking he received to his stomach and back, and an optometrist will be here in a few minutes to check his vision. All in all, I'd say he was lucky."

Josh tried to smile at her, but her face was pure white. "See, I'm fine."

"Kicking?" she whispered.

"I was kicked a few times, no big deal," he shrugged.

"Like the 3 cracked ribs are no big deal?" she asked quietly.

"Right." He nodded and turned in the small bed, pushing himself up towards the head of the bed, wincing and gritting his teeth at the pain in his back. The doctor helped him and told him to lie down, then used the remote to move the head of the bed up so he could be in a sitting position.

"Ok?" the doctor asked and he nodded. "I'm gonna work on getting you a room upstairs. Someone'll be here in a few minutes to look at your eye, and I'll be back to check on you in a little bit."

"Thanks," Josh said as he pulled back the curtain and left.

Once they were alone, Donna walked to the bed and tentatively reached her hand out, barely touching his hair before pulling back, unsure of herself. He looked up at her trembling lip and smiled again. "I'm on all kinds of drugs. It doesn't even hurt."

She smiled back at him, softly and sadly. "I could tell, what with all the distorted facial expressions you had going on there."

He winked his good eye at her. "Those were just for pity, so he'd help me."

She nodded and grinned at him, but it didn't last. Finally she whispered, "Someone kicked you?"

He took her hand and pulled her until she was sitting on the edge of the bed, lacing her fingers with his. "You're ok? You didn't get hurt at all?" he asked instead of answering her.

She bit her lip. "You're avoiding the question."

"Just answer me, please," he said with gravel in his voice.

She looked at him for a few seconds, his face mirroring the worried face she'd been wearing for the last few hours. They were quite a pair, she thought to herself. She smiled and tried not to cry, "Not a scratch. I was heavily guarded by your posse."

"They were supposed to keep you away from that park," he said seriously.

She raised her eyebrows. "I might not have been too cooperative when it came to that," she said, stressing 'might'.

"Why not?" he asked seriously.

She looked down at their joined hands for several seconds before speaking again. "I know you could've left with them when…"

"No I couldn't," he cut in.

"Why?" she whispered, a quiver in her voice.

He looked away from her, to the wall. "Because you were there," he said just as quietly.

"Now ask me why I couldn't stay away."

Reluctantly, he took his eyes off the wall and focused on her again. "Why couldn't you stay away?"

"Because you were there," she said, smiling through the tears in her eyes.

Instead of smiling back, he watched her eyes for a few seconds, then reached up with his free hand and wiped a tear from her cheek. "We've got to talk about it this time."

She nodded. "I know."

"We can't keep pretending."

"I don't want to keep pretending."

He started to say something but stopped when they heard the curtain being pulled open. They continued staring at each other, only turning when a middle aged female doctor finally cleared her throat. He squeezed her hand as the woman came in to look at his eye.

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

"Mr. President," he said quietly, knocking on the door to the oval office.

The President looked up, his glasses teetering near the edge of his nose and waved him in. "Any news?"

Toby nodded. "Josh has been taken to the hospital. He's got some injuries, but Donna seems to think he's going to be ok."

The President raised his eyebrows. "CJ!" he yelled towards the door joining the two offices.

A few seconds later, she walked into the office and looked at the two men. "Josh?" she asked hopefully.

"Toby was just filling me in," he replied.

They both looked at Toby, who'd been less than pleased with them all day, and hadn't done much to hide it. "He has a bad cut on his head, a black eye and bloody nose, and a few cracked ribs that I know of. There might be more, he's still being looked at by a doctor."

"Oh my…" CJ whispered, covering her mouth with her hand. "Is he conscious? They need to be told about his medical history."

"He's conscious, but Donna didn't tell me any other details," he replied quietly.

"Donna's there?" She smiled and relaxed when he nodded. "She'll know what to do."

"There's more. A police officer was shot and he's being detained for questioning. They've got him handcuffed in the hospital. As you can probably guess, Donna isn't too happy about that."

"They think Josh shot a police officer?" the President asked, anger present in his voice.

He turned to the President. "They suspect him, yes."

"Get Mike Casper in here, now."

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Matt pulled the curtain back just a bit, looking in at Josh. Donna had left a few minutes earlier when the police officer came in to take Josh's statement and Matt had sent Helen and her down to the cafeteria to get some lunch. Josh was sitting in the small bed still giving his statement to the officer and Matt listened for just a minute as he talked, giving him a once over. He looked better. His forehead had a large bandage on it and his nose was no longer bleeding. A few other cuts on his face had been cleaned up and bandaged, and he was no longer wearing the blood-covered shirt and pants he had on earlier. His eye still looked pretty bad, but all in all, it was a drastic improvement from the man he'd seen an hour earlier in the waiting room.

The police officer asked Josh why he was leaning over an Officer Davidson when he'd arrived and Josh explained that he was too weak to carry the man and was going to use his walkie-talkie to try to get someone to help them. He wrote it all down and left, saying he was going to check on the other officer, and Matt walked the rest of the way into the room.

"How ya holding up?"

Josh looked up and raised his eyebrows, immediately wincing from the pain in his forehead. "I've been better, but I've also been worse."

Matt stood a few feet from the bed, his arms crossed over his chest. "I don't think you're gonna have to worry about that for much longer," he said, nodding towards where the officer had left.

"She didn't?" he asked, closing his eyes and shaking his head.

Matt laughed. "The minute they brought you back here. She's not so much for being told what to do, is she?"

"Not at all. I tried to warn you," he said with a chuckle of his own.

"I know you didn't want…she called a cab," he said, sitting in the small plastic chair in the corner. "We got to the hotel and she called a cab to take her back there. Said if I wouldn't take her, she'd go on her own."

Josh smiled. "And how was she gonna pay for that? I had her purse."

"What?"

"She left her purse in the pavilion. She was broke."

"She was bluffing?" Matt asked incredulously.

Josh nodded. "Yep."

"Well," Matt said casually. "Helen probably would've given her the money. They've formed themselves quite a little bond."

Josh hung his head. "Why does that scare me?"

Matt smiled. This was the first time they'd ever just talked. It was nice. "Probably the same reason it scares me. I see many double dates in our future."

Josh looked up at him, eyes wide, but Matt continued. "You could've mentioned it. I meant it when I said I don't care who you date. Even someone on Russell's team. You're on our side, I don't doubt that."

Josh looked up. "I…we're…Donna and I aren't together."

"What?" Matt asked disbelievingly.

"Donna and I aren't together. We will be…once I can get her alone long enough to…but we're not….not yet."

Matt looked at Josh, confused. "She told me you'd been together for eight years."

"She was my assistant for eight years."

He slapped his knee with his hand. "She's the assistant Ned will never be?" he asked excitedly.

Josh nodded. "Yes."

"Ahhh… and the puzzle comes together."

Josh laughed quietly. "Don't make me laugh. It hurts."

"She has it bad for you, you know that?"

Josh smiled and nodded. "I've got it pretty bad for her myself."