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Date Posted: 18:23:43 12/29/02 Sun
Author: dqfan
Subject: Re: Studs, Texas - Book Two - Meanwhile, back at the hospital...
In reply to: DQ&SB 's message, "Re: Studs, Texas - Book Two - Meanwhile, back at the hospital..." on 11:39:13 12/29/02 Sun

"Where is she?" Teddy blustered, shoving his way past two orderlies and a nurse. "Where's my baby girl?"

"Calm down, Teddy…" Shane's interception was quick as lightning.

"Don't you tell me to calm down! You work for me, remember! Now where is she?" Teddy bellowed, moving toward him.

What the Mayor lacked in height he more than made up for in girth. Shane's ribs would not withstand a full frontal attack. Val was sure of it.

"She's in surgery, Mayor St. Claire," Val replied as professionally as possible in view of the fact that Teddy was wearing a flashing Elvis button on his lapel.

"Surgery…? I demand to know what's goin' on! Who authorized surgery?" he shouted as Andy raced into the corridor, a little late as always.

"Uh, I found him, Sheriff," Andy sputtered, quite out of breath.

Turning to Val Andy added quietly, "He's big but he's fast…"

"Teddy…" Shane began again, slowly. "I assume Andy told you the details of the accident…"

"You think I give a damn about details!" Teddy cut him off sharply. "All I care about is Miranda! Now, why is she in surgery and who the Hell authorized it?"

"I did…" the voice answered softly.

All eyes turned toward Nick. He'd been sitting in a special viewing area Sully had arranged for him, just outside the operating room. It had been a compromise - the only alternative to holding Randy's hand throughout surgery that Nick would abide.

As he approached, Shane saw a Nick Hathaway he'd never seen before. The sparkle in his eyes was gone - just gone. Shane's first thought was that Nick looked like a weary old man. But that wasn't right. Just the opposite, in fact, he reconsidered. The Nick that Shane saw before him was nothing but a little boy - lost, scared, and so very alone.

Dizzying questions and emotions swirled inside Nick's head more powerfully than any hangover he'd ever felt. Everything had happened so fast. Tonight was to be the start of his new beginning with Randy, not the end. Tonight, the lies and deceits would be forgotten, forgiven as long ago secrets, far in the past.

How could there be another secret - a new secret that Randy hadn't shared with him? And it was the same secret! She was pregnant - again. Another baby, a second chance, and Randy hadn't wanted to share that with him. Never, in his whole entire life, had Nick felt more worthless and betrayed.

Oh, a part of him was furious with her! He would have been furious with her if he'd found out any other way. But Randy was fighting for her life now. She was fighting for their baby's life and all Nick could think of was how much he loved them - both.

That he had left Miranda's room could mean only one thing…

"You?" Teddy's face grew red with anger. "Miranda's been crying over you for weeks. And now you decide to show up! How dare you take it upon yourself to authorize her surgery?"

Again, Shane attempted to inject a note of calm. "Teddy…"

"Arrest him, Sheriff!" the Mayor insisted - definitely not the response Shane had been hoping for.

"Teddy, he loves her…" Shane fought loyally.

"Love?" Teddy spit out the word. "He doesn't love her. Do you, Nick?"

"She told you about Nicole, didn't she?" he demanded. "And you walked out on her."

In his grief, Teddy had no idea the depth of the error he was about to make, yet, still, he continued, needing to lash out at someone.

Shane and Val stood rooted to their spots. Teddy's tirade was going in a direction that neither of them knew anything about. Clueless, they listened as the heartache unfolded.

"What's the matter, Nick. Not man enough to handle her past?" Teddy goaded him, believing Miranda's lie that Nicole had been the child of some other man.

Shane closed his eyes, relieved beyond words that Val had had the presence of mind to appropriate Nick's gun earlier. Still, the sound of his friend inhaling and exhaling one single breath was as ominous as the wind coming in off the ocean before a storm.

"Teddy…you're…upset…" Nick spoke those three words with such measured restraint that Shane was pretty sure the volcano in Nick's gut was about to explode.

"Upset…" Teddy seethed. "You let them cut my daughter open without my permission and you think I'm upset!"

Using distraction as his best weapon, Shane entered the fray once again. "How's she doin', Nick?" he asked, attempting, once again, to diffuse the time bomb ticking inside Teddy.

"Stable…" Nick nodded, grateful.

"Steady…at least…I think…considering…" he mumbled, still shaken by the sight of Randy lying helpless, just out of his reach.

With the actual report of some news, Shane thought he saw Teddy's attitude soften just a bit. Unfortunately, it wasn't long before Nick's last word registered in Teddy's head.

"Considering…" Teddy repeated slowly.

And, the more he thought about it, the angrier he became. "What the Hell does that mean? Considering…"

It was at that moment that something inside Nick snapped. His patience, his barometer, his center of judgment, at least what he had of it to begin with, just ceased to function.

Nick wasn't thinking any more. He was feeling only, pure and simple. The agony of watching Sully operate on Randy had been too much for him to bear. He'd held it all together for too long. Something had to give. The lies and the secrets would end here. Now.

"It means, considering…she's pregnant," Nick answered, not caring who knew.

"You?" Teddy wanted to be sure.

"Yes." Nick's reply was strong, determined, and filled with a father's pride.

"You dare get my daughter pregnant?" he raged at Nick, apoplectically. Suddenly, it all made sense to Teddy. At least he thought so.

"Teddy, your heart…" Shane cautioned, wondering how much worse this could possibly get.

"You think I give a damn about my heart!" Teddy shouted back, causing even Val to flinch. "Any more than he gives a damn about my little girl's heart?"

"I was wrong…" Teddy sneered at Nick. "You're no better than the last one."

"I encouraged her to tell you…What a fool I was…" he began to shout.

Misguided and grief-stricken, Teddy began directing his comments to Val, sure that, as a woman, she would understand Randy's pain. "She told him…Told him she'd been pregnant before…"

"That her baby died…DIED!" he railed.

"And he decides to run out on her - just because he wasn't the first…just because some other bastard did the same?" Teddy assumed wrongly.

If Val was positively speechless, Nick definitely wasn't. Furious, he grabbed Teddy by the collar and tightened his grasp around Teddy's neck with a ferocity that took even Shane by surprise.

"You don't have a clue what you're talking about, Old Man!" Nick shouted, thrusting Teddy out of his sight.

Don't I?" Teddy badgered, even as Val rushed to his side and Shane rushed to Nick's. This had to stop. It was going to end badly. Both Val and Shane could see that.

"You aren't man enough to accept the truth…" Teddy vowed, forging ahead. "Man enough to love her…"

Try as he might to restrain Nick, Shane's ribs just wouldn't cooperate. Nick broke free of Shane's grasp and headed toward Teddy like a raging bull.

"Oh, I love her," Nick faced Teddy defiantly, eye-to-eye. "I love her now…and I loved her eight years ago," he said simply.

In the moment it took for Nick's proclamation to sink in, you could have heard a pin drop.

"What are you sayin'?" Teddy asked, stunned.

"I'm saying that I'm the father of Randy's child now," Nick admitted honestly. "Just like I was eight years ago…"

Val's heart pounded at the revelation. Shane's heart just broke. And Teddy's heart, well, it raced like a warrior going into battle.

"I'll kill you…" he muttered, low at first. "She went through Hell - alone. You son of a bitch… I'll kill you!"

To his credit, Teddy managed a single clean blow to Nick's jaw before Nick grabbed Teddy's wrist, not tightly, but firmly.

"I'll kill you…" Teddy croaked, with a sudden look of panic on his face.

Slumping to the floor, he slipped from Nick's grasp, clutching his heart.

"I'll kill you…"

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