It was the middle of the night when Ethan heard stirring from beside him. The rest of the family had long gone home, and he had snuck past a pretty impressive pair of orderlies to hide out in Kristina's room, but he had been determined that she not spend a single night alone in the hospital. He had told only Alexis of his plans to stay with her, not wanting the mother to be surprised if he was somehow arrested for refusing to leave her daughter alone at General Hospital. Although she had furrowed her brow slightly, Alexis told him to just call if he had any problems. Between the Cassadine family and Sonny, Kristina's family had pumped enough money into the hospital to make them let this one small transgression go if anyone should give Ethan any trouble.

The sheets rustled as Kristina tossed and turned in her sleep. Ethan crept from his chair and stood over her, laying his hand gently on her shoulder to try to comfort her. Kristina slowly calmed before her wide eyes popped open. Tears sprung to Ethan's eyes as he gazed down at her, stroking her hair from her forehead as she struggled to sit up. "Take it easy, yeah?" he pled with a small chuckle, kneeling down to lay a kiss on her cheek. Kristina smiled in response and reached for his hand. He could tell that she was struggling to talk. Pouring a small paper cup full of water, he helped her sit up and take a small sip. "Before you ask, you were in an accident. You're at the hospital."

"I recognize the hospital, Ethan," she whispered, her voice still hoarse with more than twenty-four hours of not talking. Her eyes darted around the dim room. There were no flowers or balloons anywhere, which probably meant that she was in the ICU. Ethan wore a paper gown over his street clothes, a mask hanging loosely around his neck. "What happened? How bad is it? Where's Brook?"

"Hey, slow down," he urged her, rubbing her shoulder slightly as he moved back to his chair. He scooted it as closely to the bed as possible so that he didn't have to let go of her for even a moment. "A truck broadsided the car on your side on your way back to your mom's house. It was a little touch and go there for awhile. They had to do some repair to your lung, and there is a little bit of swelling that they are still watching." Kristina reached her hand to her forehead and felt the bandages there before retracing the incision on her ribcage. "Brook still hasn't regained consciousness. She's a few rooms down from you."

Kristina took a deep breath and looked up into his dark eyes. "Is…is she okay?"

Ethan nodded slightly and squeezed her hand with reassurance. "They have every reason to be optimistic that she will make a full recovery," he retorted. "She has a few deep cuts, so they are worried about her vocal chords and voice box. Otherwise, everything appears to be in a good place. Nikolas is flying in a specialist from Europe and another from the West Coast."

"Good," she managed to say before motioning for another drink. Ethan helped her take a longer sip this time. She licked her lips and tried to shake off the dull ache in her parched throat. "Where is my family?"

"It's the middle of the night. I convinced your mom to take Molly and Sam home so that they could all get some rest. Your entire family has been here all day, from your parents to your siblings to Carly and Jason. Even Johnny was here for awhile. You have a lot of people worried about you, Krissy," he revealed. "Other than Sonny and your mom, I'm not sure that anyone was more scared than me. Okay, maybe Molly was pretty shaken up, but it's been rough on all of us. I am sure they will be ecstatic to see that you finally quit being lazy and returned to the land of the living." She smiled widely at his lame attempt at a joke. "Speaking of which, I should probably go get a doctor, huh? I can't believe I didn't already. And I need to call your mother. She made me promise that I would if you woke up."

Kristina tried to convince him to stay, but she knew that it wouldn't do any good. Ethan had already disappeared into the hallway, jogging quickly and shouting out for a doctor. A minute later, an exhausted Matt Hunter came barreling through the door. The grin on his face was a mile wide as he looked at her. "Welcome back, Kristina," he greeted her. "You have some people who couldn't wait to see you. I'm just going to check your vital signs. Try to lay back and relax. I will answer any questions you have once we have gotten things checked out."

"Can Ethan say?" she asked, her voice a panic. Matt nodded and motioned for the Aussie to take up residence in the corner. "Ethan, can you wait to call my mom? I just want to find out what is going on with me before everyone comes rushing in here. My head is kind of spinning. I need to make sense of things."

"I'll give you an hour, and then I am calling your mom," he told her. "Don't argue with me either. I don't really want to endure the wrath of Alexis if she finds out that I didn't call her right away. I've seen her mad. It's not a pretty thing."

She managed to giggle as Matt went to work taking her temperature and checking her blood pressure. Kristina correctly answered a series of questions to check her memory and cognizant awareness. After that, they took twenty minutes going over the damage that had been done on her body. She was eager to get up and move around, but Matt told her that she needed to be off her feet for at least forty-eight hours after the surgery. The best thing she could do for now, he reminded her, was get some rest and try not to worry too much. He told her that he was about to be off but that Steven Webber would be her attending doctor. Matt also told her that she would likely experience increased pain as her medications wore off. He taught her how to use her morphine drip and promised that he would check on her before he left. With the lab techs out for the night and her not in any dire situation, the best they could do was wait for now.

Kristina was quiet until she was alone with Ethan again. "So you have been here this entire time, huh?" she asked uselessly. They both knew that she knew the answer. "I've been saying it for weeks,, and I guess this just proves it. You love me, don't you? I totally knew it!"

Although she was joking, she noted the serious look on Ethan's face immediately. "I do," he admitted softly, caressing her hand protectively in his. Her fingertips brushed over the cool metal of his wedding band. He hated that ring, this white gold symbol of nothingness. "It doesn't matter." He could read her mind as he slid the ring off, handing it over to her. "You're the only one who gets my heart."

It was everything that she had waited to hear for so long but never imagined would come so easily. A stray tear was making its way down his cheek. Kristina reached up and wiped it away with her index finger. "None of those," she insisted before dropping the ring on the tray in front of her. "Now tell me properly so that I can squeal like a school girl. Don't deprive me of my moment."

He laughed at her brazen candor. "I love you, Kristina Adela Corinthos Davis," he professed. "I love everything about you, even the way you're going to squeal like a school girl. I have loved you for a long time, and I will love you for a long time to come. You truly do have my heart – my whole heart."

Kristina didn't squeal at all. She only held his gaze and smiled knowingly, showing the maturity that had come along with life's experiences over the past year. "I love you, too," she told him. "And you have had my whole heart for longer than I've known what it meant to give it to someone."

While Ethan and Kristina were professing their love for one another in a nearby hospital room, Nikolas was still holding watch over Brook. He had talked off and on over the course of several hours, taking breaks whenever anyone wanted to come in to visit with her. Alfred had even brought Spencer from Spoon Island for dinner so that Nikolas could see his son. When Spencer had pleaded to see Brook, Nikolas had slightly lied and told him that she was asleep. The visit would have to wait until the next day, he told his son, and he was starting to wonder if that would prove to be a lie, too.

True to her word, Robin had tracked down an impressive roster of experts that spanned the globe. Based on the recommendations of her old colleague from Paris, they had selected a Swiss doctor currently doing research in Prague and a tenured specialist from UCLA. They were both due to be in town in less than twenty-four hours and had already been extensively briefed by both Patrick and Robin. In the mean time, Robin had told him that all he could do was wait.

Patience had always been something that Nikolas was very good at. Even as a small boy, he had been schooled in the graces of being patient. Things that were both wanted and worth it never came easy. Whether it meant earning a special reward for perfecting his Latin or finally getting Sarah Webber to look his way during his high school years or successfully negotiating a multimillion-dollar business merger, he had used those same skills to remain calm and stoic under the most unlikely circumstances. Only when he had dealt with his brain disorder a few years ago had he been unable to control himself. For much of his life, he had indeed been the perfect picture of restraint.

However, it didn't make it any easier to sit idly by and just watch her without being able to do something to help her. He wanted to save her himself, fix this so that it wouldn't hurt for even one more breath. It was the same helpless feeling he'd felt when Courtney was dying during the outbreak or when Emily was struggling with her breast cancer or when Alexis could barely sit up straight after chemo. He hadn't been able to save Courtney, heal Emily or comfort Alexis. He had only been able to be there for them. As much as he hated it, it was no different with Brook Lynn.

Sitting there, he allowed memories to wash over him. It was a weak way to comfort himself, but it was all that he had at the moment. He thought about their first passionate exchange in his library when he had caught her talking to herself after seeing Elizabeth at the hospital that night. He remembered the picnic they'd had with Spencer on Easter weekend and how she'd run barefoot alongside his son as they hunted for eggs with the rest of the kids from Port Charles. He could see her bronzed skin on the beaches of the Greek Islands when they had gone there during the late summer, how happy she had been at his side as he told her stories about growing up there. There were a tiny million moments that added up to the warmth in his heart whenever he merely thought about her.

Folding his hands in prayer, he bent his head over her body and started to recite words that he hadn't said in years. They were verses and prayers from his childhood, long forgotten but not altogether erased from his memory. He pleaded silently with God at first and then began to implore aloud. Someone passing by would likely think him to be a crazy man and perhaps he was in a way. He didn't really know or care what it looked like anymore. The only thing he cared about was seeing her beautiful eyes again.