And here it is: Chapter 19 ;) Dedicated to my devoted readers – especially Purveyor of Words and your wonderful reviews, thank you!

Hope you all like it!

A quick note: I have an exam coming up, so I'm not sure when the next chapter will be out. Hopefully soon :P

Chapter 19 – A ride home

The last of the daylight disappeared as they drove way from Cold Mountain. Brutus watched Ellie study the darkening sky out of the corner of his eyes, as the thunder started to growl in the horizon. She had her chestnut hair in a bun and a lock of it had gone loose, resting against her slender neckline. Brutus clutched the steering wheel with both hands, so they wouldn't suddenly betray him, reach out and tuck the lock behind her ear. She looked so young, sitting there next to him and in the growing darkness her white clothes seemed illumination, like something out of a fairytale.

Ellie turned her head and in a brief second, before she caught him looking at her and she smiled (he was suddenly glad it was dark, so she couldn't see him flush of embarrassment), he noticed the concerns in her eyes: It was barely visible, but it was there – and it wasn't hard to figure out who the source to her worries was.

"Have you talked to her?" he asked, glancing at the road in front of him.

Ellie just nodded, her smile fainting a little.

"How'd she take it?"

"Surprisingly well, actually," she said and started fingering with her edge of her uniform dress. "Perhaps a bit too well, if I'm honest." He glanced at her to have her continue, but she didn't.

"Is she scared?" Brutus asked.

"I think she has started to realise, that this is really the end," Ellie responded hesitantly.

And so have you, Brutus thought to himself, when she turned her head again and pretended to look at the oil-black clouds coming in from west, her hands smoothing the dress with absent motions, before she clasped them together in her lap.

He said silent for a while, unsure of what to do. He has never been very good at comforting – especially not women. He was always afraid to have them burst out in tears.

"Ellie, it's a'right to be scared about it," he said carefully. "We've all been there."

"I'm not scared," Ellie said involuntarily.

Brutus glanced at her side. "The two of us would make an amazing horrible-liar match, did'ya know that?"

A flicker of a real smile crossed her lips, before she looked at him.

"You really want to hear the foolish truth?" she asked silently. "It feels like I'm letting her down."

"How is that foolish?"

"Because I knew from day one, what this job entailed. Everyone warned me – you guys warned me – but I was just too stubborn to listen. And now I'm sitting here complaining about the inevitable. I know she deserves her sentence; what she did was horribly wrong. But I still feel awful. Like I'm betraying her – and maybe myself and my duty as a nurse a little bit too. I used to keep people alive for life's sake. But know I'm just doing it, so others can have the joy of seeing a woman fry to death."

"You're not betraying her," Brutus said firmly, but softly. "Alice is a murderess and yet you stay by her side, day after day, and help her through the toughest of times."

"I'm just doing the job, I'm paid to do," Ellie said quietly.

"Come on," Brutus said. "We all know that's not true. You threat her like a decent woman; you care 'bout her and that's how s'pose to be. She's your patient after all. Frankly, I'll be more worried, if you could go through this without getting emotional involved at all."

"I thought I could," Ellie sighed. "That's the problem."

"There's no problem," Brutus answered calmly. "Strength and compassion is what makes a good nurse. Not heartlessness and cold support."

His statement left Ellie quiet for a long time and Brutus did nothing to push her out of the silence, because it looked like her deep concerns softened up. When she finally spoke, they were halfway to New Roads and the lightning flashed from the clouds, lighting up the road in front of them.

"You're right," she conceded. "Her faith is settled and pity won't help a darn thing. I promised her, I would be there until the end; if she wants me to be a solid rock for three weeks, that's what I will do. And what happens afterwards, she will never know."

"She has really high thoughts about you, Ellie," Brutus said gently. "As long as you're there for her, it'll be a'right."

Ellie smiled.

"Was is hard?" she asked him. "You first time in the execution room?"

"I don't think you have to be there during the execution, if you don't want to."

"I know."

Brutus waited for the thunderclaps to settle, before he finally answered.

"It was awful," he said truthfully. "His name was Ethan. He started crying, when we put the hut on him. Not crocodile tears, but real sobbing like a little kid, even though he was my age. I just wanted to storm out, but then Paul leaned forward and said real quiet: 'It's okay. When this is over, all will be forgotten and the slate will be clean again. It's gonna be okay. Just hang on a little bit more…'" Brutus paused. "To be honest, even to this day, I'm not really sure, whether he talked to me or the boy… But I stayed and Ethan stopped crying. A minute later he was dead and the world was one murderer shorter."

"You think it get easier over time?"

Brutus shrugged. "It does, I won't lie to you. But I'm not sure, you will ever get use to killing people. In time, you just get real good at separating what happens in the execution with the rest of your life. And you tell yourself that you carry out the justice, for the people they harmed. That's makes it bearable."

Ellie nodded thoughtfully; it was hard to tell whether she agreed or not, but at least she didn't looked revolted about his little speech. They drove past cornfields now, on a road that Brutus knew like his own pack pocket. He had been born not more than a couple of miles from here and had spent his entire childhood playing in the woods behind the fields.

Brutus slowed down, when his front lights hit an old sign at a T-junction. The right arm told them there were fifteen miles away from New Roads. The left arm just had the name 'Fordoche' on it. It was a very small village and the name suddenly had Brutus remembering Delacroix words that afternoon. He turned to Ellie.

"You think you have time for a short detour?" he asked her

She looked surprised. "To where?"

"It won't take long, I swear. It's just something I wanna show you."

Ellie smiled. "Sounds mysterious."

"Not really, no," he admitted. "But I know you'll like it."

"Okay, now I'm really curious."

He turned left, then right down a narrow lane with corns on both sides. Ellie moved back from the passenger window.

"Do you want to hear another utterly foolish confession?" she said, embracing herself, when Brutus gave her a funny look. "Out of all the scary things in this state, I have always find cornfields to be the creepiest of all."

Brutus laughed. "What's so scary about cornfields?"

"Back in England my brother used to tell me stories about children disappearing in the night and their remains being discovered in cornfields next to huge paw prints. The reasonable part of me knows he made it all up, but to this day I still can't walk near a cornfield at night without getting frissons. I told you it was silly," she said with an apologizing smile, when he smirked at her.

"I didn't know you had siblings?"

"Just the one, but he stayed in England. He's eight years older than me, so he already had a good job and a wife, when we left."

"You miss him?"

"Sometimes," she laughed. "Despite his evil stories. The first year was the hardest – and then three years ago, when I became an aunt for the first time."

"Boy or girl?"

"Boy. Little Alastair." She smiled, her mind probably travelling across the Atlantic Ocean. "He's just the cutest thing alive."

The road changed into a small grass covered path in front of them. Brutus shot down the engine and stepped out of the car.

"It's just behind that tiny hill," he said, showing the way. Ellie followed him close, probably due to the fact that they were still walking between towering corn plants. When the path suddenly ended on the edge of another field, a lightning smashed the dark sky to pieces and the field in front of them lit up, like someone was taking a picture with the world biggest flash.

"Oh…" Ellie whispered, when the heads of thousands of sunflowers stood bright clear in a split-second, before disappearing into darkness again.

She looked at him, stunned. "How did you know?"

"I guess it's just one of my many hidden talents," he said with bashfully crooked smile.

She laughed. "Delacroix ratted on me, didn't he?"

"Just a little bit," he admitted. "I thought it would cheer you up."

"It did." She smiled gratefully at him. "Thank you, Brutus, that's so sweet of you."

He flushed bright red and buried both hands in his trouser pockets.

With the thunderstorm closing in, he was expecting her to walk back to the car. Instead she moved along the boundary. Brutus followed her; he was I no hurry to drive on to New Roads. It has always been a special place for him, but tonight he wished more than anything that this moment would last forever.

"How did you know about this place?" Ellie asked him, when they walked past an old wooden shelter in which the hay was kept dry for the livestock, further up the boundary.

"I grew up just behind those trees," Brutus responded, pointing to the forest line in front of them. "I know the farmer… well, I knew him. He passed away a couple of years ago, but his son inherited the farm and the fields surrounding it. There have been sunflowers growing here, as long as I can remember."

A lightning zigzagged across the sky, a lot closer this time, and they stopped when the bright yellow and green colours of the sunflowers lit up in a sharp moment as in pure daylight. The following thunderclap sounded like a distant rockslide.

They stood side by side for a little while, watching the lightning play on the dark sky, before Ellie suddenly said in a low voice: "Brutus, can I ask you something?"

"Sure."

"I mean, if you don't mind me asking… Why are you not married?"

Brutus felt his heart sink an inch. Being his parents only child, he was more than used to that question, but that didn't mean he had ever found a proper answer. He used to lie, when asked, but with years gone by, it had become harder and harder to convince people, that he was in no hurry to start a family.

Before he flunked out of LSU, girls had never been a problem, but as soon as he left the team, they began methodically to disappear from his life. It took some time for him to realise, that girls, the fancy uniform and the bloated pig bladder made a nice love triangle without him.

There had been some women in the past 22 years, but nothing serious. And now even his parents had seemed to be given up on him, which probably was the most painful recognition of all.

So the only answer he could give her was a shrug. "I guess, I could ask you the same thing."

"Well," she said thoughtfully. "After one failed marriage, I don't really feel like making the same mistake twice."

Brutus winched. Of course… How could he forget that?

"Christ, I knew that," he mumbled shamefully. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be," Ellie told firmly. "He's not worth it."

"Well, then I'm just sorry I don't have an even worse story, to cheer you up."

She smiled at him, which made his chest swell like he had just saved her from all the monsters in the world.

"If you wanna talk about it…" he began.

She gave a quick shrug. "There isn't much to say, really. I came home a day too early after visiting my parents and found him in my best friends house. She was married too, but her husband travelled a lot. He made it sound like, he did her a favour. Or… lots of favours."

"If you ask me, he sounds like a perfect jerk," Brutus said honestly. "Forget about him. There are hundreds of men out there, who would give anything to be with you."

"Hundreds?" she repeated with half a chuckle. "And who might that be?"

Me…

"Barry," he burst out. "Have you never noticed how he walks around like a peacock, whenever you're around?"

Ellie gave him a long look.

"To be honest, I don't really fancy Barry," she said gently. Brutus met her eyes and his stomach lurched; even in the flash from the lightning, they still had that infinite deepblue colour like a summer nightsky and for a moment, he was lost in them.

"Who do you… fancy, then?" he asked, his voice sounding distant and slightly hoarse.

She just smiled and he swallowed, his heart beating rapidly, when he suddenly realised that she was just waiting for him, to do something. To kiss her. Could he? He felt the world start swirling, when he leaned over…

It was like the thunderstorm had just waited for the moment of recognition. With a deafening crash the sky split open and the rain came pouring down like a shower at full force. Ellie cringed.

Brutus looked back. They were at least a couple of minutes run from the car.

"The shelter," Brutus said loudly to drown out the noise from the heavy rain. "Let's wait there, until the rain stops. Come on…"

oOo

The wooden shelter had been stacked with bale of straws from ground to rooftop and there wasn't much room left for them to take cover for the rain. Brutus put his shoulder on the stacked bales and pushed them up against the wall. He almost had a couple of square yards of floor free, before the injuries from the last couple of days finally beat him and he abruptly straightened, his palm pressed against his chest.

"Are you okay?" Ellie asked him. "Is it your rib again?"

"Yeah," he said reluctantly and leaned against the edge of one of the bales.

"And you still haven't been to the infirmary, have you?"

"No," he said after a moment of hesitation, where it looked like he considered lying to her again. Ellie shook her head in resignation.

"God, you're really unbelievable stubborn," Ellie scolded gently. "It could be broken, which I'm pretty sure it is. Let me see."

He let her push his hand away and took in a sharp breath of what she assumed was pain, when she touched him, but his uniform jacket was to thick for her to know for sure, whether is was broken or just bruised.

"I think you have to button up for me," she said. Brutus hesitated, suddenly looking nervous, which almost made Ellie laugh.

"Don't worry, I know what I'm doing," she assured him. "I'm a trained nurse in case you have forgotten."

He finally removed his jacket, and then started unbuttoning his white shirt. Ellie almost cringe of sympathy, when he revealed the bruised area: It was as wide as her palm and had turned a vehemently purplish colour, like a plum. It had to hurt like hell.

But as soon as she had grown accustomed to the sight, her thoughts became slightly more unprofessional and she couldn't help but think: Oh my, Alice was right…

He was dazzling. He may not have been a football player anymore, but he was still build like one: Broad muscles and shoulders as wide as a doorframe. His chest was massive, but smooth like a young mans. The only thing ruining the sight was the dark bruise from Whartons attack, but still, he had nothing to be embarrassed of…

Ellie bit her lips, ashamed of herself. As a nurse, she had already seen more half naked men, than she deserved in one lifetime, but she was usually able to control her thoughts.

But everything was different when you had feelings for the person you examined: All she wanted was to be close to him; wrapped in his arms, kissing him like she had done in the dream, feeling the beat of his heart…

Ellie forced her glare away from his torso and meet his eyes. The look in them was incomprehensible. She prayed he hadn't noticed anything.

"Does it… does it hurt, when you breathe?" she asked, trying desperately to sound like she did this every bloody day.

"A bit," Brutus said in his husky voice. "When I take a deep breath."

"Just tell me if it hurts, okay?"

She touched him. Suddenly her heart was beating, like it had only done when she had been young and in love; a foolish school girl. With her fingertips pressed against the bruise, she had to remind herself to look for fissures and not just the feeling of his muscles under the soft, warm skin…

"It's sore," he said in a low tone.

Before Ellie had time to responded, another powerful lightning splintered the darkness and she noticed something. A thin, white scar as long as her hand on the other side of his chest. I was stitched nicely, but it had been deep once.

"What happened?" she asked him concerned.

"An old football injury," Brutus answered quietly, without lowering his gaze. "The result of a bad game."

Ellie saw her hand leave the bruised area and brush across the scar. Brutus took a deep breath at the unexpected touch, his massive chest heaving under her palm. When she raised her head, she found him looking at her, his boyish blue eyes flickering falteringly across her face. Abruptly Ellie realised how close they were standing.

"You know what: I don't think you should worry about it," she said vaguely and hastily removed her hand. "The bruise, I mean. It's… it's nothing serious."

"Are you sure, nurse?" he said, his voice suddenly quiet and deeper than usual; it was the tone, that made Ellies heart pound slow and hard, so the blood rushed too fast in her body. "What about the broken rib…?"

In the sudden darkness after another lightning, she pressed her palm against his wound. She could feel the beat of his heart, but he didn't move.

"You see?" she responded faintly, meeting his eyes. "No fracture. It may just be a bad bruise."

Brutus smiled and placed his own big hand on top of hers. Then he leant forward and kissed her.

Gently at first – almost shyly – but when she cupped his jaw with her free hand and returned it, he grew bolder and drew her closer, so they could deepening the kiss. She almost smiled, when his heartbeat rose rapidly underneath her hand.

When the need for breathing finally forced them apart, he leaned his forehead against hers, his hand still closed around hers.

"What took you so long?" she whispered.

He let out a timid chuckle. "Fear, I guess."

She looked at him carefully. "Fear of what?"

"Rejection," he said quietly. "When you realized, that you could do so much better than me."

Ellie raised her free hand, gently following the strong jaw line to his chin. His skin was warm and damp. And she saw his eyes lightened up, at the same time nervously and intense, by her touch.

"You are the only one I want, Brutus," she whispered to him. "Because, I swear, you are the kindest, most wonderful man I have ever met."

He looked slightly bashful and had already opened his mouth to object, when she rose on her toes and kissed him. A long, heartfelt kiss, which she hoped would prove her words to him.

"And perhaps, slightly thick-headed when it comes to flirting," she added in soft teasing. "But who's perfect?"

He smiled. Light flashed through the shelter and before the thunder even came, he had his arms around her, pulling her in so their bodies collided. And he kissed her, like he would never get the chance again.

I'm not really sure, I want to make this an M-story. But tell me what you think ;)