The atmosphere at Rangeman for the past 24 hours had been…tense, to say the least. The air was thick with upset and the watercooler hadn't seen so much traffic since Stephanie flattened Ranger's Boxter with the garbage truck. Several of the fourth floor residents had witnessed the shouting and subsequent crying coming from Lester's apartment. A few had seen Bobby carrying a sobbing Giana from his place, down the hallway and toward the elevator bank, and Vince was able to report that when he'd pulled up that morning to report for work, he'd seen Santos loading two strange women into a waiting cab. It didn't take a genius to connect the dots, and the men were equal parts perplexed and furious – they'd gotten closer to Giana the past few months while she worked the monitors and couldn't fathom just casting her aside for a few bar bunnies.

Aside from the obvious question of 'Why?' was the question of Hector's reaction – did he know? There was little doubt amongst the men that he would have something to say about the matter, but as he was currently scheduled off the next two days, they guessed that answer would have to wait.

In the meantime, they milled around, unsure how to proceed – should they call her to check on her, or was that too presumptuous? Maybe drop by her house to look in on her, or would that be too intrusive? Ram argued that they should call her brother to check on her, or perhaps Mark Tatum, but that idea was quickly shot down; Vaughn, Hal quietly told them, was in the city auditioning vocalists and Hector had accompanied him, and Mark was a gray area since the men weren't sure if he'd feel compelled to defend Gia's honor; no one wanted to be responsible for a dead Santos. They were also forbidden, by Tank, from trying to contact Stephanie for advice – she was with the Bossman, who was offline until further notice and therefore unreachable.

And so the men gossiped quietly and debated semantics of what had actually happened, but one thing they all agreed on was that it was bad business, all around.

Bobby Brown downed his second dose of Advil in the past 24 hours and leaned back in his office chair. He closed his eyes and reflected, again, on what an unholy clusterfuck this was.

It had taken him the better part of the day to even wrap his mind around what had actually happened; Lester, that dumb, impulsive sonovabitch, had jumped to a monumentally wrong conclusion when he'd seen Giana talking with her cousin. Bobby'd met him, of course – he blew into town on short notice and Giana had shown some concern over his unplanned arrival but she'd rolled with it, cutting home just after her shift on monitors ended. She'd called the next morning and asked Bobby if there was someone who could cover her shift (laughable, considering she wasn't paid to be there) since her cousin was in need of some 'family council'. Gia insisted that Bobby keep their standing weekly dinner, and so he'd shown up at her place that evening and met Dev. Dev revealed, somewhat sheepishly, that he'd gotten a pretty co-ed pregnant and dreaded telling his conservative, heavy-handed mother about his indiscretion. He'd come to see Giana both for a boost of confidence and to lay low to recoup for a few days.

And then Lester had shown up at precisely the wrong moment and committed the mother of all fuck-ups, Bobby thought as he blew out a sigh.

He picked up his phone and attempted another text to Giana, this one pushier than the previous four he'd sent – Please just let me know you're alright. I'll quit bothering you, but if I don't hear back I'm coming over to check on you.

This text elicited an almost immediate response, thank God – Fine. Just want to be alone.

Bobby was more than a little ashamed to admit to himself that he was grateful for her request; the drive back to her place yesterday was the most uncomfortable of his life.

He'd carried her shuddering, hitching body from Lester's apartment and headed straight to the elevator, intending to take her to the medical suite for some privacy. She'd lifted her head long enough to whisper, "Take me home," before curling her body into itself and letting another huge sob tear through her chest.

Out of his element, Bobby immediately hit the button for the garage and loaded Gia into the closest SUV. She'd cried quietly the entire way home as Bobby thought desperately of some way to help her. As they'd pulled into her driveway, he'd opened his door to help her out and she'd placed a hand on his forearm.

"Please," she'd croaked through swollen lips, her voice thick and strained, "don't tell Hec. Don't let Hector near…him until I have a chance to tell him myself. Please, Bobby." She'd added when she saw his hesitance. Cursing silently, Bobby had nodded and promised, and she'd exhaled a tiny bit in relief before springing from the car and bolting for her door.

Now, as Bobby sat in his office, he wondered how in the Hell he was supposed to stop Hector from doing anything. Maybe now was a good time to talk strategy for that unpleasant task. In a burst of righteous indignation, Bobby pushed himself back from his desk and stood, intending to lay this problem where it belonged – right at Lester's feet.

After making his way to Les' apartment, Bobby knocked and waited. When there was no reply, he knocked again and leaned toward the door, waiting for some indication that Les was on his way to open it. Concern outweighed his aggravation as Bobby knocked a final time, this time calling his best friend's name.

"Les! Open up!" When that got no response, Bobby fished his lock-picker from his cargos and made quick work of the lock, stepping into the dark living room before shutting the door behind him.

"Santos?" he called, moving slowly through the apartment. The kitchen was empty, as was the bathroom. The bedroom, at the end of the hallway, was the last room Bobby checked. He paused outside the door, suddenly uneasy, and called in a shaky voice he didn't recognize, "Les?" He gripped the doorknob and turned it slowly, pushing the door inward and fumbling for the switch.

Bobby gaped at the sight before him. Lester's bed had been a point of pride for him; he'd paid a few grand for the mattress alone and sung praises to the whole setup. He'd joked, "After sleeping on a cot for years, I deserve a nice fucking mattress." He'd also insisted on a bed so large that it was the only piece of furniture that occupied the bedroom; there was room for little else. The bed was, as far as Bobby knew, always made neatly with the goose-down pillows plumped and arranged just so; it'd been a ribbing Les had always been happy to take on behalf of his beloved bed.

Now, the room lay in ruins. It looked like the mattress had been liberated from the frame before he'd torn the wood apart. It lay, in splintered piles and jagged chunks, all around the room. The mattress itself seemed to be intact, though it was naked and there was no sign of the sheets. The most startling part of the room, however, was the fact that everything was covered in soft, gossamer white feathers, a by-product of Lester's now-destroyed pricey pillows.

"What the…" Bobby muttered to himself, surveying the damage. He'd caught a glimpse of the room yesterday over Gia's shoulder and it'd been perfectly fine then, albeit messy. That meant…

"He destroyed the bed after she found him." Bobby whispered. This sudden realization spurred him into action, and he spun around, shouting his friend's name with a new sense of urgency.

"LES!" he barked, moving quickly though the apartment. He was just about to leave when he spotted his friend, lying on the floor between the couch and coffee table with his eyes closed. With a relived sigh, Bobby made his way toward Lester.

He could see from a few feet away the rise and fall of his chest, and on the table sat a tall, brown fifth of tequila. He bent to check Les's pulse and jerked in surprise when Les grunted, "I'm alive."

Bobby took quick stock of the man – he was wearing fresh clothes (good) and had a day's worth of stubble on his face (bad). The tender skin around his eyes was swollen and his voice was gritty, meaning he'd had a rough night (bad)…but he was alive and at the moment, Bobby would count the blessings as they came.

Bobby settled on the couch, relief that Les was safe restoring his good humor. Lester was all right, and he hadn't done something stupid. He could work with this.

"Figured you'd be drunk about now." He said lightly, checking the level of the bottle and finding it still full.

"Thought about it." Les ground out. "Figured I didn't deserve any relief."

Unsure of how to respond, Bobby remained silent and quietly surveyed the apartment for other signs of damage. Lester hadn't ever been particularly self-destructive, but he'd also never ripped apart a king-sized bed with his bare hands before, either. Everything looked in order until Bobby's eyes landed on the TV stand in the corner. His body tensed visibly and he sucked in a sharp breath, dropping his eyes to find Les watching him intently.

"Thought about that, too." He whispered before throwing his arm over his face. "Couldn't do it to her."

Bobby rose slowly and closed the short distance between himself and the TV stand where Lester's RangeMan issue Glock rested. Quickly, he checked the magazine and, finding it empty, offered up a small prayer of thanks.

"Ammo?" he said tightly, teetering between concern and anger. When Les didn't answer, Bobby raised his voice and said, "Les. Bullets."

"Flushed them." He whispered from his spot on the floor before audibly choking back a sob.

Bobby felt his head swim as the impact of what Lester 's confession meant, and he sank onto the chair opposite the couch in stunned disbelief; his best friend, his partner of a dozen years, had held a gun in his hand and considered using it on himself.

"Jesus Christ." he whispered as he rubbed his hand along the top of his head harshly, as though to wipe the awful possibility of having walked into an entirely different scene today out of his head. Bobby sat back, his mind racing and stuttering, contemplating what Lester's admission meant. He pushed aside his pity and let the physician in him take over.

Clearing his throat before he spoke, Bobby tried a gentle approach. "Les, I need to know…is this the first time you've thought about this?"

Lester didn't answer, didn't move; in fact, Bobby wondered for a moment if he'd fallen asleep. He lay stone still on the floor, his arm still flung across his eyes. The only tell Bobby could see was his tightly clenched fist, and so he asked again the question he desperately wished wasn't necessary.

"Lester. Talk to me about this, man. Have you ever wanted to hurt yourself before?"

Lester flexed his arm once, then again, before lifting it and settling it at his side. Bobby cringed inwardly at the sight of his friend's face – he'd expected Les to be upset, but this was other-worldly. He looked very much the way Bobby remembered his grandmother looking at his grandfather's funeral when he was a young boy – lost, like the tether that held him from drifting into nothingness had been severed and being swallowed up by it was inevitable.

"No, Bobby. I never wanted to hurt myself before. I didn't last night…not really. I just…I just…" and here he choked back another sob before continuing in a pinched voice, "I just wanted it to stop."

"Wanted what to stop?" Bobby asked dumbly; his friend was ruined, broken and bleeding on the floor, and for the first time in his life they weren't wounds Bobby could heal. The feeling of being powerless was unsettling, to say the least.

Lester spoke from his spot on the carpet. "I hurt her. Did you fucking see her face? Did you hear the way she was…the way she was crying? I did that to her. I'm responsible for that. That wasn't just a woman who was upset; I broke her. What kind of monster does that to someone like her?" His inflection was filled with anguish, and his clenched jaw spoke of the torment of being the cause of Giana's misery. He was a man crippled with regret and shame, that much was evident to Bobby.

What was not clear was where they went from here, so Bobby tried a different tack. "Have you tried calling her?" he prodded, reaching a hand out to his friend.

Lester grasped his friend's proffered forearm and hauled himself stiffly into a sitting position, allowing Bobby to slide down and join him on the floor. Now on more equal footing, physically speaking, Bobby resolved not to leave his friend until some progress had been made.

Lester's chin tipped toward his chest and he closed his eyes briefly before answering. "No. I didn't…I didn't call." The last part came out a pained hiss. "She doesn't want to speak to me, Bob. I can't…I just can't hear her say she's done with me. Not today, please." He turned pleading, watery eyes toward Bobby and begged for silent reprieve from the Hell he found himself in.

Clearly this wall wasn't one he was going to scale at the moment, so Bobby changed tack again. "What the fuck were you thinking?" he asked, bumping his friend's shoulder with his own.

Lester's face was the picture of contrition. He sat, slumped forward and sallow, for a moment before answering.

"I was thinking what always happens, happened. I saw her with that guy on her porch and I thought she finally figured me out. She saw the same thing in me that my mom saw when I was eleven before she dumped me on abuelo, and the same thing that ran Michelle off. While I was with Gia, I could keep her distracted from seeing it, you know? We kept busy together, and I could make her see a Lester that was worth sticking around for. I just…I just figured with me out of the picture, she realized that she could do better and she went for it."

Bobby's gamut of emotions ranged from compassion to pity; mid-way through Lester's speech, however, it morphed into anger.

"Bullshit!" erupted from his mouth the minute Lester's closed, and Les turned a shocked face toward Bobby's as Bobby continued. "You, for years, have denied the truth and willfully believed a lie!" he thundered. The empathy he'd felt earlier was gone, replaced by righteous and unmitigated anger. "You let two people who didn't care about you dictate the way you see yourself and convince you that you weren't worth loving, and that's fucking weak. You love Giana, you love your grandfather. You love Steph and Ric… and me in a way that's probably a little gay." Here Bobby grinned, hoping the levity would soften the blow he'd just dealt. "You can love, and you are loved; why the fuck are you letting all that other inconsequential shit hold you back?"

Lester dropped his eyes, unable to meet Bobby's; his dolorous demeanor was more pronounced than before as he answered.

"I see that. It took…losing her, but I see it." A lone, fat tear clung to his thick lashes for a second before gracefully kissing his cheekbone and trailing down his morose face. "She really loved me, Bob." Another tear joined the first before Lester succumbed to his grief and lowered his face into his hands, his shoulders quavering as he silently cried.

Bobby let Lester have a moment as he weighed how best to proceed; he needed to get his friend back on track and away from dark thoughts involving self-destruction.

Bobby decided to try the element of surprise. "She prayed for you, every day. Lit candles at church and at home…she also worked at Rangeman while you were gone, you know." It worked beautifully; Lester's head snapped up, his brow furrowed as Bobby herded him toward a solution.

"Gia? Worked at Rangeman?" he parroted dumbly, and Bobby nodded.

"Yep. She covered monitor duty for the guys so they could patrol, she helped Steph with a couple of client meetings, she helped me with inventory…said she wanted you to be proud of her when you get home." He dropped that particular bomb right at Les's feet, rightly calculating it would blow up and spur Lester into action.

Lester's gaze shifted, staring at nothing and feeling everything. Love, awe, gratitude, and determination. His resolve to right his wrong, to make amends to her, swelled in his chest and, for a moment, muted the pain he'd felt since he realized the extent of his betrayal.

The woman he loved- the one he'd forsaken- was not going to easily forgive him. Of that he was certain. You are in for the fight of your life, Santos, was a thought that came unbidden to him as he contemplated his next move.

With that deflating thought, Les slumped forward. "I know you mean well, Bobby, I do. But I know how I felt when I thought she cheated on me. If she feels that, even a fraction of that…then she's done with me."

Bobby snorted and gave a Stephanie-worthy eye roll. "You weren't done with her, fool. You came here with those girls so she'd find out. You wanted her to know what you'd done, and even thought it blew up in your stupid face, that doesn't say 'done with her'. You can't just apologize for this; you're going to have to show her how sorry you are, and remind her why she loved you in the first place."

Les sniffed piteously. "I doubt she feels very loving right now."

"Then you're going to have to love enough for both of you, brother."

Lester stepped out of his car feeling like the world's biggest tool. Flowers, he scoffed, looking at the offending buds and blossoms with scorn. When he'd pulled up outside the florist, he was again hit with a wave of self-loathing. Exactly what kind of asshole says 'I'm sorry I cheated on you and that you walked directly into the aftermath of it, here, have some daisies.' He wondered, again, at the wisdom of this plan before shaking off his self-doubt and forcing himself to start the long walk toward her front porch. He had to start somewhere, and groveling with a nice bouquet was as good a start as any, he supposed.

Taking a fortifying breath, Les raised his fist and knocked. After several long minutes of silence, he knocked again. His uncertainty ratcheted up a notch when, again, Gia didn't answer. His thoughts bled toward a very unwelcome vision – of himself, last night, holding an empty revolver in his hand and wondering if that was all that was left for him, now that she was gone.

Struggling to tamp down his growing fear, he laid the flowers on the damned gliding bench – the same one where all of this started - as he pulled his phone from his pocket. Hesitating only a second, he quickly tapped out a message to her.

*I'm at your door. Are you inside?*

The expression 'waiting on pins and needles' took on a life of it's own as Les lingered on the porch, anxiously awaiting a reply; in fact, he decided fairly quickly that he'd prefer being stuck with pins and needles rather than wait to see if his beloved Giana was alright in that house. When two minutes passed, he made a fist and pounded on her door, not bothering to hold back this time. Again, he was met with silence from the other side.

Rationality won out over the impulse to break her door down and see, for himself, that she was whole. After what you did to her, she could very well be ignoring you, his subconscious chided him. He took exactly sixty seconds to calm himself before trying to text her again.

*Please just let me know you're okay in there.*

Then another,

*I can't leave unless I know you're alright, Gia*

and another

*Please, I know you hate me, but I need to know you're okay, baby*

in quick succession. Just as he was approaching a fever pitch of worry and debating on either picking her locks or, more expediently kicking her door in, he saw the living room curtain flutter.

Les hurtled toward the door, stopping short and knocking rapidly on it. "Giana! Are you alright?" He gulped and added with no small amount of regret, "I'll leave if you want me to, just let me know that you're in there, please."

After a few beats of silence, Les raised his fist again to resume his pounding when her voice stopped him cold.

"Please, just go." Her stilted voice, muffled and faint, bathed Lester's fraught soul. It was a salve for the pain in his chest, and he breathed a sigh of relief as he sagged against her heavy oak door.

Knowing that salvation lay just on the other side of that door was a special form of torture, one Lester embraced; if his penance for her peace was to feel this pain, he would gladly accept it.

Lester pressed his face close to the crease of the doorframe, hoping against hope she could hear him…that she was even still listening for his voice.

"I'm so, so sorry, baby. I'm sorry I hurt you, I'm sorry I believed the worst. I love youmore than my life.I would give anything to earn your forgiveness…" and on and on it went, a recitation of the pleas he'd been making since the moment he discovered what his impulsiveness would cost him. Eyes squeezed shut, he prayed that she hadn't walked away.

Lester was jarred from his pleading by a sharp bang from the other side of the door and Gia's voice, a pained lament that hurt the core of him.

"GO! JUST LEAVE, I CAN'T…I CAN'T…", followed by the sound of her sobs.

Defeated, destroyed and eviscerated, Les turned and slid down the door. He lingered, clinging to the sound of her cries, dying by inches at the knowledge that he was the cause of them.

With leaden feet and a broken heart, Les forced himself to his feet and stumbled off the porch, toward his car. He would honor her wish and leave her – it was the only comfort he could offer her at the moment, so he would grant her that.

As he slid behind the wheel of his car, his thoughts flitted back to Bobby, telling him how Giana had prayed for him each day he was gone, and bowed his head and offered up his own petition to the Almighty.

"Please, let her be okay. Comfort her where I can't, help her to heal…" He implored the same God that had delivered him safely home at Gia's urging to soothe her, assuage her pain and maybe, if He was so inclined, to open her heart to the possibility of forgiveness.

Lester kept his vigil up for close to three hours, alternately watching Giana's house for signs of life and berating himself for being the cause of their combined angst. He knew he should leave, but couldn't bear to let her bear this pain alone; and so he waited and prayed and finally, when he was spent, drove away with a fervent "I love you." on his lips.

A/n: there is a borrowed line in this chapter that pays homage to the great WriterDi, a truly talented story teller – Lester borrowed her Christian's line about being in for the fight of his life.

And sincerest thanks to my terrific Beta – she has the most discerning eye and such a disciplined technique for rooting out my deficiencies that I no longer have to read through my chapter 14 times before I publish it to catch them all myself. Thanks, Elaine!