DREAM/FLASHBACK:

He felt the intensity of the bullet as it hit him. He had never felt so much pain in his life. His shoulder injury that led to him having to retire from baseball and when he had appendicitis were nothing compared to this. He felt himself falling to the ground. He couldn't move. All he could do was lie there helpless.

Helpless. Helpless to stop Keith from grabbing Angela and dragging her away from him. He saw the fear in her eyes but there wasn't anything he could do to stop him. She screamed for help and Keith slapped his hand across her mouth. He laughed and called her feisty and said he was going to have fun with her too.

Tony felt his insides clenching up. That bastard was planning on….He was going to have his friends… The thought was too horrible to even comprehend. He had to find some way to help her. But he couldn't.

'Angela!' He cried silently, his heart breaking. 'Oh God Angela! I'm so sorry!'

He felt himself getting angry. And then angrier and angrier. His face got hot and he felt like he was on fire. He was sweating. He felt sick to his stomach.

"Damn it! It's worse than I thought!"

"Dr. Ballard something is wrong! His blood pressure keeps climbing!"

He heard voices but couldn't make out who they were. All he knew was that Angela was in trouble. Big trouble and there wasn't anything he could do but lie on the ground helpless.

Angela. The woman he loved. The woman he adored. The woman he had kept waiting for years and betrayed with another woman was now paying the price for his stupidity and cowardice. If only he had told her months-no years ago that he loved her she wouldn't be in this awful and horrible situation.

"Oh my God! We're losing him!"

No! No! You can't lose me! I need to rescue Angela! But he felt himself drifting away…

################################################

Keith paced around his jail cell, his hands clenched the nails digging into the palm of his hands.

DAMN IT! He had her! He literally had her until those fucking people had shown up and ruined everything. And now he was stuck in this jail cell and that bitch was free. He walked over to the wall and punched it only to be rewarded with bleeding and scraped knuckles. He muttered obscenities under his breath and rinsed his hand under the sink's faucet. He grabbed some paper towels and wrapped them around his hand.

"Where the hell is Linda?!" He growled. He had called her over an hour ago and she still wasn't here. After everything he had done for her? After everything he and his friends were going to do to Angela for her?! The least she could do was show the hell up! After a few more minutes he heard footsteps. He looked to his left and noticed Linda and the guard walking towards him.

"You have a visitor." The guard walked up to his cell

"It's about damn time!" Keith glared at her.

"I'm sorry. I couldn't get here any sooner."

Keith rolled his eyes. "Yeah, yeah. Look, can we just go?"

"No, not yet." The guard informed him.

"Why the hell not?!"

The guard shrugged. "Don't ask me. It's not my decision whether you stay or go." He looked at Linda. "You have ten minutes and then you have to leave."

"Okay. Thanks."

He nodded and walked away.

"What happened to your hand? And your face? My God Keith!"

"Oh this is all courtesy of that bitch Angela and her faithful puppy dog Tony."

"What do you mean? Keith, what the hell happened tonight?!"

Keith sighed and looked down. After a few moments he looked back up.

"Okay, you know how I have had Larry, Greg, and Justin keeping a look out for Angela?"

"Yeah."

"Well earlier this evening Justin noticed them at McClain restaurant so he got a hold of me. I got in my car and drove over there and waited. As luck would have it about twenty minutes later I noticed them coming out of the restaurant. I pulled on my ski mask and went over to them. I told them to stop and not to move!"

"Okay, and I'm guessing they did what you said."

He nodded and then laughed. "You should have seen that bitch shaking. I wanted to laugh so much but I knew I had to keep going otherwise she would have gotten away."

Linda laughed. "Yeah, I would have loved to have seen her getting taken down off her fucking high horse!"

Keith grinned. 'Oh, she would have been. But then things took an unexpected turn."

"Go on."

"At first Tony thought I was a mugger and he tossed me his wallet and her purse. He told me that I had what I wanted and could leave. I told him that I didn't and that I wanted her."

"You wanted Angela? Why? You had her purse."

'Linda, babe! I didn't want her purse or his wallet. I mean I didn't throw them back at them of course. After all, it was free money!" He grinned. "But that wasn't why I stopped them."

"Why did you then?"

Keith rolled his eyes. "Come on sweetheart don't be so naïve. Larry, Greg, Justin and I were going to teach Ms. Squealer a little lesson."

Linda felt a cold chill go through her body.

"Keith, what the hell are you saying? You weren't planning on raping her were you?!"

"Of course we were! That bitch needed to be taught a lesson!"

Linda felt her insides clench and her face got hot. She looked into his eyes and was disgusted by what she saw. His eyes were filled with malice.

How in the hell? What in the hell?

"YOU SON OF A BITCH!"

#####################################

Mona, Sam, and Jonathan sat down beside Angela.

"All right! Now what the hell happened?" Mona asked.

Well, Tony and I were leaving the restaurant when this guy showed up wearing all black and a ski mask. "

"Oh my God." Sam put her hand to her mouth.

"So he was a mugger?" Jonathan asked.

Angela shook her head. "That's what we thought at first. So Tony gave him my purse and his wallet. And then Tony told him he had what he wanted and he could leave. But he said that he didn't."

"What else could he possibly want?" Mona threw her arms in the air.

Angela took a deep breath.

"Me. He wanted me."

"You? Mom, why would he want you?"

Angela ran her hands through her hair.

"He uh.. The man was Linda's boyfriend Keith."

Mona and Sam exchanged a worried look. Neither one of them liked where this was going.

"So, what happened next?" Sam asked softly.

"Tony told him to forget it. That he wasn't touching me. That was when he told us who he really was and that I was going to pay for getting Linda in trouble with the police. But first." Angela started crying and shaking. "First his buddies were going to teach me a lesson."

"Teach you a lesson? Oh my God!" Sam started crying.

Mona put her arm around her daughter and started crying as well.

"My baby. My poor baby."

"Mom? He was? They were going to…." He couldn't go on. Sam grabbed him and they cried on each other's shoulders.

After a few moments they got themselves under control.

"So how did you get away?" Mona asked.

"And how did Dad get shot?"

"When Keith told us that his buddies were going to teach me a lesson, Tony... He… He went crazy. He let out this ferocious yell and knocked him to the ground. He began hitting him and I screamed his name. He told me to stay back which I did. Then Keith got the upper hand and started hitting Tony. But Tony was hitting back just as hard. But then.." She took another breath and looked at the three of them.

"And then the gun went off hitting Tony." She whispered.

############################################

"The hell we are!" Andy snapped. He began giving Tony CPR.

"Come on Tony! I gave Angela my word! Don't you dare die on me!"

"Give me the defibrillator!"

Hannah grabbed it and gave it to him.

"CLEAR!" Andy said and pressed the defibrillator against Tony's chest.

"Nothings happening." Isabelle cried.

"Damn it Tony! Angela has told me how strong you are now prove it!"

He used the defibrillator again.

"CLEAR!"

Beep! Beep! Beep!

"We have a heartbeat!" Gail cried.

"And his blood pressure is going down." Hannah said.

"Thank God." Isabelle said breathing a sigh of relief.

"Don't thank him yet. Come on, we have a lot more to do." Andy told them.

"Okay Tony, enough excitement okay? Let us do our jobs and then you can get out of here."

#######################################

Keith looked at Linda in confusion.

"Linda! Babe, what the hell is your damn problem?!"

"Do not call me Babe! Or sweetheart, or anything!' she seethed. She began pacing.

"Ok. fine! But what the hell is the matter?"

"What's the matter?! You and your buddies were going to rape her?! That's disgusting!"

"Whoa! Whoa! I thought you wanted to make her pay!"

'Well yeah I did! But I meant something like slashing her tires or stealing her car. Or hey you had her purse. We could have used her credit cards-I'm sure she has dozens of them- and put her into some serious debt. But this…my God Keith this was too far!"

She stopped pacing and turned to him. Her eyes were filled with anger.

"I can not believe you were going to…" She swallowed hard.

"You know what! We're through! You can rot in this jail cell for all I care!"

She turned and started walking away.

"LINDA! DAMN IT! GET BACK HERE!"

She didn't answer him. She just kept walking away.

She went out the door where the guard was waiting. He escorted her to the front where she signed out. The police officer gave her back her purse. She walked out the front door and got in her car.

She screamed and put her head on the steering wheel and cried.

How could he have done something like that? It made her sick that she had been dating this monster for the last three years. She knew he had a mean streak. That was one of the things that had attracted her to him. But this…This was over the top.

She started the car and looked behind her and pulled out. She drove out of the parking lot.

"I have to make this right."

Suddenly she knew what she had to do.

####################################

"Oh my God!" Sam cried.

"It was… I can't even describe what I felt when I heard the gunshot and saw Tony falling to the ground. I felt so helpless. Tony.. He…He risked his life for me. He's in there in that operating room fighting for his life because I was to stupid and stubborn…"

"Angela, stop! Tony is one of if not the strongest people I know! You are-we are not losing him!" Mona snapped.

"Grandma's right."

Sam nodded. "Yeah. We can't…We won't lose him." She sniffed.

"But how did you get away?" Jonathan asked.

"Yeah, I would like to know that myself." Mona said.

"Well I went over to Tony and then Keith grabbed me by the waist and started pulling me away. I screamed for help but he slapped his hand across my mouth. He started laughing and said I was feisty and that he was going to have some fun with me too. And then…"

"And then what?" Sam asked.

"And then I was saved."

"Saved by the police?" Mona guessed.

"No, by these people. They just came out of no where. Someone yanked Keith off of me and someone else punched him in the stomach. There was a woman with them and she told me they saw what was happening and called the police and.. OH MY GOD!"

"What Angela?" Sam asked.

"Mom, what is it?"

Angela didn't answer. Instead she looked beyond them.

"What are you doing here?" Angela asked her face and voice equally puzzled.