She tuned out the machines, started to turn to the window to describe the view for him before she relayed construction progress. And she saw the sketch taped to the glass wall.

“What have we got here? Con the Immortal?” She glanced back at Steve. “Did you see this? Striking resemblance.”

Ford had drawn it. Cilla didn’t need to see the signature looped in the bottom corner to know it. Steve stood, wearing what she supposed was a loincloth, with thick black straps crossing over his chest, and knee boots. His hair flew out as if in a strong wind, and his face was set in a fierce, fuck-you grin. His hands rested on the hilt of a sword, with its point planted between his spread feet.

“Big sword, obvious symbolism. You’d love that. And the biceps bulging over the armbands, the tats, the necklace of fangs. Con the Immortal. He’s got you pegged, doesn’t he?”

Tears rose hot in her throat, were ruthlessly swallowed down. “You’ve really got to see this, okay?” She crossed back to take Steve’s hand. “You’ve got to wake up and see this. It’s been long enough now, Steve, I mean it. Goddamn it. This bullshit’s gone on long enough, so stop screwing around and… oh God.”

Had his hand moved? Had it moved in hers or had she imagined it? She let her breath out slowly, stared down at the fingers she held in hers. “Don’t make me yell at you again. You know if I cut loose I can out-bitch your mother. Who’s going to come back here pretty soon, so…”

The fingers twitched, curled. The lightest of pressure on hers.

“Okay, okay, stay there, don’t go anywhere.” She reached for the call button, held her finger down on it. “Steve, come on, Steve, do it again.” She lifted his hand, pressed her lips to it. Then, narrowing her eyes, bit. And laughed when his fingers twitched and curled again.

“He squeezed my hand,” she called out as Mike came in. “He squeezed it twice. Is he waking up? Is he?”

“Talk to him.” Mike moved to the side of the bed, lifted one of Mike’s eyelids. “Let him hear your voice.”

“Come on, Steve. It’s Cill. Wake up, you lazy bastard. I’ve got better things to do than stand around here and watch you sleep.”

On the other side of the bed, Mike checked pulse, pupils, BP. Then pinched Steve hard on the forearm. The arm jerked.

“He felt that. He moved. Steve, you’re killing me. Open your eyes.” Cilla grabbed his face, put her nose nearly to his. “Open your eyes.”

They fluttered, and she felt another flutter on her chin. More than his breath, she realized. A word.

“What? What? Say it again.”

She leaned down, her ear at his lips. She caught his slow, indrawn breath, and heard the hoarse, raw whisper of a single word. He said, “Shit.”

Cilla let out a sob that choked into a laugh. “Shit. He said shit!”

“Can’t blame him.” Quickly, Mike strode to the door to signal another nurse. “Page Dr. North. His patient’s waking up.”

“Can you see me?” Cilla demanded when his eyes opened. “Steve? Can you see me?”

He let out a weary sigh. “Hi, doll.”

SHE SPOKE to the doctor, even managed to smile genuinely at Steve’s mother before she locked herself in a bathroom stall for a jag of weeping relief. After she’d washed her face, slapped on makeup and sunglasses to hide the damage, she went back to the nurses’ station.

“He’s sleeping,” Mike told her. “Natural sleep. He’s weak, and he’s still got a lot of healing to do. You should go home, Cilla. Get a good night’s sleep yourself.”

“I will. If he asks for me-”

“We’ll call you.”

For the first time Cilla stepped into the elevator with an easy heart. As she crossed the lobby, she pulled out her phone and called Ford.

“Hey, beautiful blond girl.”

“He woke up.” She moved down the sidewalk toward the parking lot with a bounce in every step. “He woke up, Ford. He talked to me.”

“What’d he say?”

“ ‘Shit’ came first.”

“As it should.”

“He knew me, his name and all that. His left side’s a little weaker than his right, just now. But the doctor says he’s looking good. They have to do tests, and-”

“Looking good works. Do you want me to come by, bring you some dinner?”

“No, I’m heading home now. He’s sleeping. Just sleeping. I wanted to tell you. I just wanted to say that I saw your sketch, and I was teasing him about it right before… I think it might have done the trick.”

“Nothing stops Con the Immortal for long.”

“You are so- Oh God! Son of a bitch!”

“What? What was that?”

She stared down at the door of her truck. “I’ll be home in a few minutes. I’ll come by.”

She clicked off before Ford could respond. And read what someone had written on the driver’s-side door in black marker.

WHORES BEGET WHORES!

Ford watched Cilla take digitals of the pickup’s door. His rage wanted to bubble up, but he couldn’t figure out what he’d do with it if he spewed.

Kick the tires? Punch a couple of trees? Stalk around and froth at the mouth? None of the options seemed particularly helpful or satisfying. Instead he stood with his hands jammed in his pockets, and the rage at a low, simmering boil.

“The cops’ll take pictures,” he pointed out.

“I want my own. Besides, I don’t think Wilson and Urick are going to make this a priority.”

“It could be connected. They’ll be here in the morning.”

She shrugged, then turned the camera off, stuck it in her pocket. “That’s not coming off. The sun baked that marker on so it might as well be paint. I’ll have to have the whole damn door done. I haven’t had this truck three months.”

While he watched, she kicked a tire. He decided he’d been right. She didn’t look satisfied. “You can use my car until it’s fixed.”

“I’ll drive this.” Both the defiance and the temper glared out of her eyes. “I know I’m not a whore. I saw Hennessy’s van in the parking lot before I went in to visit Steve. He could’ve done this. He could’ve hurt Steve. He’s capable.”

“Did Steve say anything about it?”

“We didn’t ask him. He was still so weak and disoriented. Probably tomorrow, the doctor said. He’d be up to talking to the police tomorrow. Damn it!”

She stalked for a few minutes but, he noted, didn’t froth at the mouth or punch a tree. Then she stopped, heaved out a breath. “Okay. Okay. I’m not going to let some asshole spoil this really excellent day. Does the liquor store in town have any champagne in stock?”

“Couldn’t say. But I do.”

“How come you have everything?”

"I was a Boy Scout. Seriously,” he said when she laughed. “I have the merit badges to prove it.” She was right, he decided, no asshole should be allowed to spoil an excellent day. “How about we heat up a frozen pizza and pop the cork?”

From his perch on the veranda, Spock leaped up and danced.

“Sounds good to me, too.”As she moved in to kiss him, a horn beeped cheerfully.

“Well,” Ford said when a Mustang convertible in fire-engine red pulled in behind Cilla’s car, and Spock tore down the steps to spin in delirious circles, “it had to happen sometime.”

The vivid color of the car had nothing on the windswept red mop of the woman who waved from the passenger seat, who tipped down her big, Jackie O sunglasses to peer at Cilla over the top as she stepped out onto peep-toe wedges to greet the bouncing, spinning dog.

The driver unfolded himself. It was the height and the build that alerted Cilla, even before she got a good look at the shape of the jaw.

Her palms automatically went damp. This was definitely meet-the-parents. An audition she invariably failed.

“Hello, my cutie-pie!” Penny Sawyer clamped her hands on Ford’s cheeks once he’d walked down the slope to her. She kissed him noisily. Her laugh was like gravel soaked in whiskey.

“Hey, Mama. Daddy.” He got a one-armed bear hug from the man with hair of Cary Grant silver. “What are y’all doing?”