Author's Note:

Hey everyone! I hope that everyone's week is going well. Thank you to all of those who left the wonderful reviews for the last chapter! I'm glad that you are enjoying this one. We are almost done as this is probably the penultimate chapter before we're done. There will probably be an epilogue to go along with it. You know me, I love to close the story in some way. I was also thinking that this may be the beginning of a new series but I'm not sure as of yet. Anyway, this is a very long chapter but I couldn't find the right place to leave a break for another chapter so bear with me on this one! I will leave you at that and will wish everyone many blessings this Easter weekend. And if you don't celebrate Easter, may you still have blessings! Have a great weekend everyone! Enjoy and don't forget to review!

Chapter Seven

"Mr. Hardy?" called the nurse as she entered the waiting area. Frank looked up at her from where he sat. Across the way, Ned leaned against the wall, his arms folded in front of him. He sniffed in annoyance and narrowed his eyes, watching Frank intently. "Your brother would like to speak with you."

"Thank you," Frank rose quickly, practically running down the hall. He could hear Ned behind him, asking the nurse about seeing Nancy. Same as the last time Ned asked, the nurse rejected him. Nancy still didn't want to see him, or anyone else for that matter, causing the man to be exceptionally grumpy to the staff around the hospital.

Walking just a few doors down, something caught his eye and Frank stopped outside a door. Through the small window of the door, he could see Nancy standing near the window, staring out as if deep in thought. He wanted to talk to her more than anything but knew he should respect Nancy's wish of not wanting to see anyone. His time would just have to wait. Stepping away, Frank went to the very next room where he saw Joe sitting on his bed, a remote control in his hand. He still felt guilty for everything that happened. He couldn't believe that he let his own petty jealousies cloud his judgment and Joe and Nancy suffered for it. Sighing, Frank lightly rapped on the door and walked in.

"Frank! Hey!" Joe cried, excitedly. He turned the TV off and flopped the remote back onto the bed beside him. "I'm glad the nurse passed on my message to you! I'm so bored!"

"I'm sure you are," Frank said with a forced smile. "How's it going?"

"Oh, it's nothing I can't handle. Just a broken wrist. I'll be fine but it would have been better if I didn't have to stay overnight."

"You know how it is, Joe," Frank laughed, his mood changing a little at Joe's enthusiasm. "They just want to make sure you're okay."

"Yeah, but I hate hospitals!" Joe sighed. "And they hate me! I swear I get the same kind of nurse everywhere I go. Why couldn't I get a cute one or at least one who's not a 'Nurse Ratchett!'"

"Call it karma, Joe. And I'll be sure to let Vanessa know your thoughts on nurses the next times I see her."

"She'd laughed it off because she knows I still come home to her."

"I'm sure she would." Frank got quiet and looked down at his hands, unable to express what he wanted to say to Joe.

"Frank, it's okay. I don't blame you for any of this."

"I know but it if hadn't been for me, you wouldn't have ended up being in that cave-in."

"Dude, you know good and well that if you were with us when the tunnel came down, no one would have known we were even there and none of us would be here," Joe replied, thoughtfully. "There is always a reason why things happen and our situation turned out for the best in the end anyway."

Frank nodded his head but still didn't look up at his brother. He knew it was time.

"When were you going to tell me?"

"About what?" Joe asked, confused. Frank pursed his lips and stared at Joe for a moment. "Oh, that. How did you know?"

"That day I came by a few weeks ago to tell you about Callie." Joe nodded his head in understanding as Frank continued. "When you answered the door, you were wearing your wedding band but I didn't say anything. I thought I was seeing something because the next moment, it was gone."

"Yeah, I hoped you didn't see that. Vanessa and I agreed not to tell anyone. She was worried her mother would be upset because she wanted Vanessa to have a formal ceremony."

"You went to Vegas, Joe. What else was anyone supposed to think?"

"We had no intention of getting married there though!" Joe defended. "But we realized it was what we really wanted and Van thought it would be more romantic to elope the way we did."

"Don't tell me, you had Elvis do your ceremony."

"Oh, hell no! It was a bona fide, real life ceremony. She even bought a gown and I wore a suit. Do you honestly think I'd get married in a t-shirt and jeans by a guy dressed up as a dead man? Geesh, I'm not that bad." Joe took a bite of a burger that was sitting on the tray table and scrunched his face up in disgust. "Oh, that's just nasty. Hospitals can never get a burger right, can they? Anyway, we'll have a real ceremony next year on the same date to give our family the chance to see us get married."

The two got quiet with Joe trying a few of his now cold fries and giving the same look he had for the burger. Frank leaned over and took a fry himself, his face turning to disgust.

"You're right. That is bad." The two brothers laughed as Joe pushed the tray away from him. "I'll sneak a real burger and fries in for you later."

"So, you're not mad at me anymore over the whole thing with Vanessa?" Joe asked hopefully.

"Why should I be? I was mad at you at first, Joe," Frank sighed. "Especially for not telling me. I mean, we've been close since we were kids and it felt like you couldn't trust me with that secret. You know I wouldn't have said anything. And I'm sorry I've been such a prick lately. After I saw Nancy's engagement ring in her room when we arrived, I kind of felt I was getting left in the dust by the two of you. Callie had just broken up with me and it hurt, though honestly, I'm not torn up about it as much as I was about Nancy. I just thought…"

"That you two would eventually get together?"

"Well, yeah but I didn't want her to be the rebound. It ruins relationships. I've already decided to let her go anyway. She is supposed to be with Ned even if I hate it more than anything. He doesn't deserve her and she should have someone who will love her for who she is. But I don't want to break up her happiness for my own selfish reasons."

"You've thought about that long and hard, haven't you?" Joe asked. Frank nodded.

"It's up to her to decide what best for her life." Frank looked down at his hands again. "Besides, she probably doesn't feel the same about me anyway and agreed with him telling us to stay away."

"See, that's where you're wrong, Frank," Joe shook his head. "Ned is a douche and had no right to tell us what to do when it comes to Nancy. She didn't even know about it and I think it hurt her. In truth, she was coming to see us three weeks ago as a surprise because she was worried about us for not even calling her. But she said something came up that she had to change her plans and Nancy ended up here in Arizona."

"But I thought the case opened up after she arrived."

"It did. She came here to get away." Joe stopped and thought for a moment. He didn't want to tell Frank much of anything else Nancy revealed in the tunnel because he knew it wasn't his place to do so. But something had been nagging at him since their rescue and he felt there was more to the story that Nancy had yet to reveal. "Whatever is going on with her, Nancy will let us know when she's ready. How is she anyway?"

"I don't know," Frank shrugged. "She doesn't want any visitors, especially Ned. You have no idea how hard it is to stay away from him in a waiting area no bigger than this room. He keeps trying to pick a fight with me by blaming us for Nancy being in the hospital again. When he's not doing that, Ned's harassing the nearest nurse in the hopes one of them didn't get the message that Nancy didn't want visitors. Good thing these people have a lot of patience or he would have been kicked out a long time ago. All I know about Nancy is that her father will be here tomorrow and that she'll be leaving when he gets here. Oh, and the fact that she's next door to you."

"How'd you find this out?"

"When Ned took a phone call and left, I eavesdropped on the nurses who were talking more freely since Ned left." Before Frank could say anything else, his phone began to ring. He sighed when he saw who it was.

"What is it?" Joe asked, raising his eyebrow.

"It's Callie," Frank replied with slight irritation. "She's been blowing up my phone for several hours now."

"Why haven't you answered it yet?"

"Because I'm not in the mood to deal with her crap right now," Frank huffed. "She's begging me to take her back, that she was sorry for dumping me. At least that's what I gather from the blubbering she did on my voicemail. You and Nancy are more important at the moment and I wanted to make sure you both were okay."

"Yeah, but you've seen me and obviously you won't be able to see Nancy anytime soon, so just answer the phone and deal with it."

"Are you sure?"

"Go!" Joe shooed Frank away with his good arm. The moment his brother left the room, Joe scrambled from his bed and found his jeans nearby. After dressing, he cracked the door and looked out to make sure "Nurse Ratchett" wasn't around. The last thing he wanted to be chained to his bed by an overzealous nurse. Looking through the window in her door, Joe could see Nancy still sitting by the window, looking out. She wasn't paying him any attention as he silently snuck into the room.

"You know if you stare outside long enough, the scenery just might change," he said lightly.

"Joe! I didn't hear you come in! And why are you out of bed!?" she clucked after giving him a hug.

"Stop it. You sound like my nurse." He sat down in the chair across from her, making sure his broken wrist was stationary before he continued. "You know me, Nan. I don't take directions well, especially from doctors…or a friend who doesn't want to see anyone."

"I figured you would be the one to barge in here," Nancy laughed, then coughed to clear her throat. "Frank would take it literally, thinking it meant him too."

"So, you would have accepted him as a visitor?" Joe gave her a look.

"I guess," she shrugged, waving off his look. "As long as it isn't Ned, I don't care. With Dad not coming till tomorrow morning, I have to hole up in here and told the nurses I didn't want to see anyone."

"Why are they keeping you here anyway?"

"A precaution mainly," Nancy replied. "Apparently I inhaled dirt with over a hundred years mining dust and the doctors are worried I might have breathing problems. I started feeling a whole lot better though once we were out of the tunnel so I'm not worried. I feel fine." With that, she coughed again, a little harder.

"Oh, yeah, you're 'fine,'" Joe replied sarcastically, rolling his eyes. "You're about as fine as Ned is sane."

"He's not taking it well that I don't want to see him, is he?"

"If you think picking fights and harassing people is well, then no. Like I told Frank, you need to talk to him. Frank actually took my advice for once too."

"Oh." Nancy got quiet and turned back to the window.

"What is it, Nan? You said you didn't tell me everything. What gives?"

"I know I need to talk to Ned," she sighed, "but it's finding the right words to tell him that it's really over between us. He's probably going to go ballistic before storming out of here."

"Well, we won't know that unless you let him in here. I wouldn't mind seeing him blow his top either." Nancy laughed at him and shook her head. "Look, I'm going to do you a favor. When I leave the room, I'm going to send Ned in and you can tell him off officially. How's that sound?"

"What? Right now? Oh, no, no, no…" Nancy said, shaking her head.

"All right, then tell me what's going on. Maybe by the time you're done, you'll be ready to talk to him. Plus I need to know if I have to kick his ass in the end."

Nancy saw the look of determination on Joe's face and sighed. She wasn't going to get out of this one. "Fine. But you're not allowed to beat him up. I think I can handle that one myself if need be."

"Deal."

Nancy told Joe everything that was left out originally and told him about the argument she and Ned had after they were rescued. "That text message started everything," she said sadly. "I was naïve to believe that it was just nothing like he said. During my case, I thought that maybe he just made a new friend and I wasn't going to confront him at first. But as the months passed, he went on a lot more trips, almost three times a month for a couple of days here, a weekend there. When Bess, George, and I went to New York three weeks ago, I realized he'd been lying to me all along."

Three Weeks Before…

"Hey, George!" Bess called, rushing to catch up to her cousin and Nancy outside their hotel. "When does the show start?"

"For the thousandth time, Bess," George answered, exasperated, "it starts at 7. I just wanted to do a little sight-seeing before and maybe a little shopping."

"Wait, we're going shopping!?" cried Bess. "I don't have my shopping shoes on!"

"This weekend is not about you, Bess," George replied slowly. "We are here on a ladies' weekend away from home to cheer up Nancy. Right?"

"But I don't need cheering up," Nancy piped up. The three girls walked down Fifth Avenue, stopping every so often to look inside shop windows and taking pictures here and there.

"Yeah, right, Nan," Bess rolled her eyes. "You've been mopey for weeks. Is everything okay between you and Ned?"

"We're fine," Nancy answered, averting her eyes towards the store window nearby. "We just haven't talked in a while. That's all."

"What's the holdup?" Bess demanded.

"I don't know, Bess," Nancy said sadly as she stared at a jewelry display in a window. Her hand instinctively went to her necklace hidden under her shirt. "I've tried to bring up certain things but he just changes the subject. Sometimes I wonder if he's avoiding a confrontation. It doesn't help that he's gone all the time on business trips."

"Is he really on business trips, though?" George asked.

"He wouldn't lie to me, George," Nancy stated though the thought crossed her mind as well. "I want to forget about it this weekend. Like you said, we're here to cheer me up so let's do just that. How about we visit Frank and Joe tomorrow? Maybe surprise them in the morning?"

"That sounds great, right Bess?" George looked to her cousin whose attention was centered on a couple walking hand in hand across the street from the three girls.

"Is there something wrong?" Nancy asked. Her back was to the couple but she noticed the cousins' stare and turned around.

"Nothing!" Bess cried, wrapping her arm around Nancy's shoulders and trying to avert friend's attention.

"Nothing?" Nancy asked, catching a brief glimpse of the couple before George stepped in as well but it was too late. Nancy froze, her mouth open a little in shock. She looked from Bess to George then back to the couple who had just disappeared into a nice hotel. "I can't believe it."

Without another word and before her friends could stop her, Nancy ran across the street. Horns honked around her as she stopped traffic, some words of profanity could be heard. She stepped into the hotel lobby and searched the surrounding area for the couple before stopping at the elevator where the two stood waiting. Once the couple stepped onto the elevator and turned around, Nancy got a full picture…of Ned with another woman. She was about to raise her arm to wave, thinking they were just friends when Ned leaned over and planted a passionate kiss on the woman's lips. Nancy's heart dropped and her breathing quickened. Just as the elevator doors closed, she also caught a glimpse of the woman, who looked vaguely familiar to Nancy.

Before she started to cry, Nancy walked confidently over to the hotel registration desk where a young woman stood with a smile.

"Hi!" Nancy said as cheerfully as she could, her voice breaking slightly. "I was just wondering if you could help me out. I think I saw a friend of mine walk in here just a moment ago: tall, brown hair, brown eyes. He was with a young woman with blond hair."

"Oh, yes, Miss," the woman said, her smile broadening. "That was Mr. and Mrs. Dunham. They are the sweetest people to come through here in a long time. Would you like to leave a message for them?"

"Uh, no," Nancy replied sadly, shaking her head. She was shocked to hear Ned's mother's maiden name but upset even more at the prospect of what he was doing there with the other woman. "I guess I was mistaken. Thank you."

"You're welcome." The woman's demeanor changed since she could see that Nancy was clearly upset. "Is there anything else I can do for you?"

"Um, no, thank you again." Nancy turned away, heading back toward the main entrance. For a brief moment, she thought about staying in the lobby until Ned came down again to confront him but she rushed out instead. Pushing her way past Bess and George who were waiting for her, Nancy walked a few paces outside the hotel before stopping and completely breaking down into tears. Strangers walked by without a second glance to her, ignoring the sobbing woman as she looked around for way to get everything she just saw out of her head. Though she heard her friends call her name several times, Nancy ignored them and began running until she came to her own hotel. She packed her bag quickly, unable to want to continue her mini-vacation, and called her father. Nancy asked him if his professor friend was still in need of help at his archeological dig. After booking the next flight to Arizona, Nancy left a note for her friends at the main desk and left for the airport.

Nancy got quiet as Joe took in her story. She was crying but she held her head high, relieved she finally got everything off her chest. She knew she was ready to confront Ned. Joe, on the other hand, clenched and unclenched his fist, angry that Ned had done something so heartless to a woman like Nancy. He always looked at her as if she were his own sister and wanted to take her pain away in any way he could.

"What are you going to do now?" Joe finally asked, looking up at her. Nancy swiped the tears from her face and sniffled. She took a deep breath and looked out the window again.

"It's time I end this with Ned," she sighed. "I don't want you to tell Frank though. I want to talk to him when I'm ready. Besides, it really shouldn't come from me."

"What shouldn't come from you?" he asked, confused.

"I told you I vaguely recognized the woman Ned was with but I never actually met her before. I've just seen pictures of her." Nancy stopped, waiting for Joe to make the connection. He thought about it for a few minutes, searching for the answer. His eyes soon went wide as he finally connected the dots. "I realized it when you told me what happened three weeks ago."

"No. That's not possible." Joe shook his head in disbelief. "She wouldn't do that to him!"

"I thought that myself and I've been wracking my brain, trying to picture someone else in that lobby with Ned but her face keeps coming back up over and over again," Nancy said softly. "The person I saw with Ned at that hotel was Callie Shaw."

Another note:

I loved writing in that little snippet about the burger Joe was eating. I recently had an experience in a hospital where a burger was less than worthy of being called that. Unfortunately, it was also my Christmas dinner that I let sit for too long and it was cold so I really feel Joe's pain on this one. Too bad no one came to my rescue with a real burger and fries (Red Robin...Yummm!). Have a great weekend everyone!