Angel watched the sleeping girl on the bed as Wesley set her arm into a brace. Her face didn't even as much as flinch during what was supposed to be an incredibly painful process. Wesley gently place her arm on top of the comforter and stood.
The two men walked into the other room. Cordelia went to the room to change her into more comfortable sleeping, hopefully without waking her up. Wesley had given her enough sedative to keep her unconscious for a little while.
"Is it as bad as she looks?" Angel asked, keeping his voice quiet to keep from drawing attention to the two of them. Cordelia shut the door to give them privacy.
"Well, the abrasions all over her back and cheeks along with the way her arm was broken, I'd say….Angel, it seems she was hit by a car. Judging by the heaviness and the brutality of her injuries, it's very likely that it was done on purpose." He admitted, shaking his head sadly.
Angel could feel fury building from the pit of his stomach. He clenched his fists and punched a hole in the wall beside him, giving a roar of anger. Wesley scrambled to make up for his mistake.
"Angel, calm down! I don't know this for sure! She could have just fallen down some stairs or maybe just –"
"Woke up because of you two bozos!" Cordelia snapped from the door. She looked to Angel and gently said, "She wants to see you. Apparently the noise woke her up so she's still a little groggy from the sedatives."
Angel sprinted over to the bed in the next room. Judy was bleary-eyed, her black hair still braided behind her head. He sat down and took her hot hand in his icy one.
"Angel…."
"I'm right here, Jude. How do you feel?" He asked, his voice soft. Behind his eyes, he could feel tears begin to prick at the sight of seeing his little girl in so much pain. She smiled and grasped his hand in a surprising amount of strength. She reached up and placed in on her burning forehead with a sigh of content.
"I like your hands. They feel nice and cold."
He returned her smile.
"Why are you so hot all the time if you're part vampire?" He asked as he placed both of his hands on her face, letting her feel the coolness and feeling her relax in response.
"I think it's because Vampires burn when they touch it and I drank holy water with ashes in it. So it's always burns in me. I always feel hot but never have a fever. It's really strange."
She reached up and moved Angel's hands to her throat before continuing. "I remember running from the bar, running for a long time and then….it happening. The last thing I remember is lying on the concrete and the person picking me up, putting me in their car and driving off."
He felt the rage return a hundred fold. Only one person knew of Judy's relationship with Angel. Who else besides Cordy, Wesley and Gunn knew where his apartment was and Judy couldn't have made the trek if she was unconscious.
"Lindsey did this to you, didn't he?" He stated this more than asking because he already knew the answer. He almost dreaded whether or not she'd confirm it. If she did, there would be hell to pay with that man and they both knew it.
She nodded, her eyes watering with tears. Quickly, she reached up and wiped them away, pushing him away at the same time. He rested his hand on her forehead again, brushing her bangs out of her eyes.
"You scare me at times, Jude."
She raised an eyebrow. "Why? You've seen worse."
He pinched the bridge of his nose with his fingers and took a shaky breath. "Yes, I know. The thing is even when I was Angelus, you were still my little girl. Sure, I tortured you to no end and made your life hell. But I'd kill the first person who so much as looked at you in a way I didn't like. I'm not the same anymore. The idea of someone purposefully hitting you with a car makes me sick. "
His voice broke as he murmured, "I hate seeing you hurt."
It took a moment for it all to sink in. Judy looked at the man she had come to look at like a father and watched him sit in silence, attempting not to appear upset in front of her. She frowned and opened her arms.
"Angel, come here."
He leaned back and ended up with his head resting on her chest with her arms wrapped around him, stroking his hair. He closed his eyes, ignoring the fact that it should be him comforting her, not the other way around.
"It's alright, Angel. Everything's going to be fine." She murmured, touching the bristles of his gelled hair. "Even if your hair is like a porcupine, you'll be fine as long as you don't land on your head on soft ground because then I can't help you."
She felt a laugh grumble in his chest followed by a choked, strangled laugh.
"You joke when people are trying to kill you?"
She held his face up so he was looking at her eye to eye.
"If there's one thing you taught me, Angel, is that it could always be worse."
He let another strangled laugh out before resting his head back down on her belly. The two of them stayed that way until soon Judy was in a drug-induced sleep again.
Seeing that she was in bed asleep and he knew exactly where and how she was, Angel rested his head on the mattress, curled into a ball and finally fell asleep.