Chapter 33

True to his word, Myles allowed Sue to stay with Tara for almost four hours before demanding to be returned to the I.C.U. While he may not have slept very long, the blonde agent did seem more rested when he returned to the room. Silently, he signaled the nurse to push him closer to the bed where he drank in the sight of the slumbering woman.

Sue had seen him enter the room out of the corner of her eye and stood allowing Myles to take Tara's hand in his. She wasn't even sure if he realized she was there as he raised his hand tenderly, brushing her hair back from her forehead.

Myles murmured something to Tara as she slumbered, but his head was turned away so Sue couldn't read what he said. However, Tara stirred slightly in her sleep settling more comfortably into her pillow as if more at peace now that he was at her bedside. Sue knew then that whatever he said was not directed at her.

After sitting for a while next to the door reading a magazine, she realized she was no longer needed here. Slowly slipping out of the room, Sue decided to wait for Jack and Bobby in the waiting area by the elevators. Since she was in a hospital, she couldn't use her blackberry, but there she wouldn't miss them when they returned.

"Shelby," Sue called to the young woman behind the nurses' station. The smiling young woman had been very helpful to Sue while she waited with Tara, full of questions and a willingness to learn as well as be corrected when it came to Sue's needs.

"Yes, Ms. Thomas," Shelby replied, immediately looking up from her charts.

"Agent Leland is in with Agent Williams now," Sue informed her. "I'll be in the waiting area if any one needs me."

"Yes, ma'am."

"And remember…" Sue began only to stop when Shelby put her hand up, requesting to interrupt.

"You can't hear the intercom, so if someone needs you, they have to come and get you, not have you paged," Shelby paused, waiting to make sure she didn't talked to fast. When Sue nodded recognition in her eyes, the young woman continued, "Dr. Singletary, the Chief of Staff, also sent notification to Paging Services on the matter, ma'am."

"Really?" Sue asked stunned.

"Yes, ma'am," Shelby replied, smiling. "Dr. Singletary said that the deaf have adjusted to so many things in their lives adapting to the hearing world, it's about time we adjusted a few things in ours. Granted, we are probably still going to make mistakes," Shelby admitted wirily, "but it's a start."

"Thank you," Sue said quietly, starting to turn away. Stopping, she asked, "Does he have someone in his family that is deaf?" she asked Shelby curious.

"She, ma'am," Shelby corrected. "Dr. Singletary is female and no, not as far as I know," the young woman answered. "Why?"

"Just curious…thanks," Sue told her. "I'll be out here," she smiled, leaving the young woman staring after her.

Sue had settled into one of the uncomfortable waiting room chairs staring unseeingly at the magazine she held. Her mind was a jumble of thoughts from the accident to the Chief of Staff's actions. She didn't know which bothered her more, but tried to push the doctor's good intentions out of her mind.

Sue battled with how bad she felt for her friends and the guilt because she was glad it wasn't her. The accident on the isolated mountain road in the middle of the raging storm in itself must have been terrifying.

Having to rely on each other brought out Myles' protectiveness few had seen. Sue knew it was there from when they talked during the Callahan and Merced case about his sister, but his tender side was buried deep inside him. Many years of trying to prove himself to his parents had forced him to create a tough exterior.

From what Sue had seen earlier when they'd come in and then just recently, Tara had at least cracked that shell if not broken through. She didn't know what had happened between the too of them but it had a profound effect on Myles.

A gentle tap on her shoulder brought her out of her reverie. The first thing Sue noticed was the identical pair of grey suit pants worn by Bobby and Jack as they stood next to her chair. Her smile quickly faded when she saw matching grim expressions on the two men's faces.

"What's wrong?" Sue inquired concerned, standing up as she glanced between them waiting for one of them to speak.

"Who's in with Tara?" Jack asked calmly as he motioned for her to sit back down while they sat across from her.

"Myles, he came back a little while ago," she looked at her watch, her eyes widening when she realized that it had been almost 30 minutes since she left the room. "I thought they'd be okay, so I came back out here to wait for you," Sue explained, facing the two men. "Now tell me what is wrong."

"Sue, we have a problem," Jack started out quietly. "Webster has another person on the outside we didn't know about and we don't know where he is," he told her.

"So we just find him and put him in jail like all the rest," Sue stated nonchalantly, confused as to why this man had the two agents so worried. "Do we know what he looks like?"

"It's not that easy, Sue," Bobby exchanged glances with Jack. They both knew how close Sue was with Tara and how worried she was when her friend was missing. Neither of them wanted to tell her the information they had found out.

"Genn Kelly," Jack said, fingerspelling the name for her. "We think he may have, um, eliminated several people for Webster that didn't conform to his pressuring," he told her seeing her stiffening as realization set in.

"Do you think he'll come after Myles and Tara to protect Webster?" Sue questioned, her eyes wide.

"We don't know for sure," Jack tried to comfort her, coming over to sit beside her, taking her hands in his. "We've put Annie, Craig, and Danni in a safe house and to be on the safe side we'll be a guard here," he told her.

"S.O.G. will be watching Webster and everyone we picked up in this case," Bobby reassured her kneeling in front of her chair. "We'll keep Tara and Myles safe," he grinned.

Sue tried to smile back at her two friends, but she couldn't be so sure. Webster and his men had a good thing going for many years, and she worried what they were going to do to prevent it from ending. Glancing over her shoulder, Sue offered up a silent prayer as she stared at the door to the I.C.U.