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--

"Please don't wake up, please don't wake up...."

Staring over at him, defeated, Kelsey could feel her heart continue to break as she prayed that he wouldn't open his eyes in fear of what would happen to him.

She knew this was a life or death situation, it always was, but for the very first time, she was afraid of the outcome.

After everything that has happened in their lives, everything they had been through, she couldn't understand why it had to come to this.

Groaning, Justin felt a pounding headache, blinking to adjust to the dim lighting surrounding him. It took a moment to realize where he was before he shot upright in his seat, taking a look around the room until his eyes met Kelsey's.

Sucking in a sharp breath, he looked over her making sure there was no damage left on her body before swallowing hard. The guilt rose and he wanted it to consume him. He wished he could take her away and hide her from the world.

She didn't deserve this, she didn't deserve any of this.

He had left her to be safe, to ensure his enemies wouldn't come after her, and there was one underneath his nose the entire time.

He was so focused on Landon, yet Tanner was his biggest threat.

Son of a bitch.

"Did--" clearing his throat, Justin licked his lips, preparing for the answer. "Did he hurt you?"

Shaking her head, Kelsey let out a deep breath, "he didn't lay a finger on me."

"Good," he nodded, "good."

There was a ring of silence before they chose to speak at the same time.

"Justin--"

"Kelsey--"

"You first," Justin mumbled.

"I'm sorry," she whispered.

"Don't -- what? You didn't do anything."

"Yes, I did. You warned me from the beginning. You told me I shouldn't trust him, you said he was bad news. The signs were all there and I didn't -- I didn't take them."

"Kelsey,"

"No," she pushed, exchanging a look that told him she wasn't going to back down from this. "I made a mistake. I -- I got with him. If I would've just listened to you from the beginning then maybe we would've been okay. I would've been safe."

"No, no you wouldn't have. This," he chuckled wryly, looking around all over the room before finding her eyes once more. "This is what you would've had to deal with all the time. This right here would be an everyday occurrence. They would find a way to take you from me and I would have to fight like hell to save you. That isn't a life you want."

"Part of this is my fault," she confessed. "You can blame yourself all you want, but I chose to stay with you. That was my decision, no one else's and if I could do it all over again, I would."

He stared at her long and hard, his chest constricting at the words spoken. "You don't mean that," he whispered.

Parting her lips, she immediately pressed them together.

"Welcome back, sleeping beauty."

--

Sitting next to Carly, John took her hand in his. He couldn't wrap his head around anything. How could she keep this from him for so long?

Was she ever going to tell him?

Pressing his forehead to the back of her hand, he sucked in a sharp breath holding back tears but the harder he tried, the harder it got to stop them from falling.

Kissing against her knuckles, he held her hand close to his cheek as he glanced at her, "please wake up, baby. I need you. We need you," he whispered, his other hand slowly brushing along her lower stomach.

"You gave me hope when I wanted to give up, you had faith in me when I didn't," he took a deep breath, his eyes lingering on the paleness of her skin.

Pushing open the door, Carly stumbled in books in hand, "Kelsey -- holy shit," dropping them, she curses out once a textbook hits her big toe, "fuck."

Raising an eyebrow, John stood there confused at first as he pulled his shirt on over his head before reaching down picking the books up off the floor, putting them aside before grabbing her hand. "C'mon." helping her up, walking her over to the bed, he sits her on the edge of it. "Give me your foot."

"No, it's fine," she waved him off, feeling the blush rising to her cheeks. She inwardly winced. She never blushed.

"Are you always this stubborn?" he chuckled, gently reaching down smoothing his thumb along her ankle, glancing up into her eyes.

Slowly, she lifted her foot so that it rested perfectly on the top of his thigh. Watching as he massaged her foot, grabbing it carefully while pushing both his thumbs towards her ankle from her toes, Carly winced before relaxing.

"Thank you," she murmured, pulling her foot to rest on the ground again.

"No problem," he curved a small smile and at that moment it was like she could barely breathe. "I'm assuming you already know Kelsey isn't here."

She laughed quietly, "yeah, I figured that much."

Standing to his full height, he extended his hand for her to take, helping her up to her feet. Looking into her eyes, he paused for a moment, his breath caught in his throat. He never realized how beautiful her eyes were up close.

Slipping her hand from his grip, breaking the trance, she palmed her hands down her thighs looking around in search of her books. Grabbing them from the dresser, she caught a glimpse of the bloodied clothes in the corner of the room.

Following her gaze, John cleared his throat walking over and taking the clothes into his grip before dumping them into the hamper. "Sorry,"

"You know you don't have to do this right?"

"Do what?"

"That," she gestured towards the now closed hamper. "You guys have so much more to offer."

"How do you know that?"

"Because you guys actually care about each other.. and us," she shrugged, "people in the world you guys live in don't care about anyone but themselves."

"Is that why you decided to give us a chance?"

"No, I was in it for the free food."

He laughed, louder than he could remember. "I'm glad we were able to feed you."

"Me too," she grinned.

"I had never met anyone as beautiful as you," he whispered, his chin now pressed against the bed, his hand still wrapped around hers. "You took my breath away and I knew at that moment, you were going to change my life forever. That's all it takes, one moment in our lives to define what we were going to do for the rest of it and I knew, I wanted to spend it all with you."

Letting out a choked sob, John dropped his forehead to their linked hands, tightening his grip so hard he was afraid if he let go, she would be gone forever, "come back to me, baby."

Silence filled the air as he continued holding onto her, praying to a God he didn't think existed. All his life, he ran by his own rules, figuring out of all the shit that has been thrown his way, there was no way there was anyone out there listening to a Goddamn thing he had to say.

Now, he was calling out to every higher power there was in the universe, hoping, begging to bring her back to him. He needed her, he couldn't live without her. "Please."

Suddenly the machines connected to her had stopped for a split second sparking up some kind of hope before they began to get erect. Sitting upright, wiping the tears from his face, John pushed the chair back, standing.

"Carly?"

Looking down at her, he pressed his hand against her shoulder, shaking her gently, "baby."

She didn't budge, instead, the machines continued to go haywire as nurses flooded the room. "What's going on? -- Carly!"

"Sir, I need you to step out, please." Walking towards him, she cupped his shoulders, gently directing him towards the door as the others pulled an air mask covering Carly's mouth while pressing a button on the wall that allowed her bed to move backward until she was laying straight across.

"No! What's happening to my wife?"

"Sir, please, if you want us to save her life, we need you to get out of the way."

"Carly!"

Rushing inside, Bruce grabbed John by the shoulders, forcing him out of the room as he continued to cry out towards her direction.

"Carly!"

----

"I'm sorry you had to get involved in this baby," Tanner murmured against the side of her head, "but shit happens."

Staring over at her, Justin felt his heart fall to his stomach, tears burning the backs of his lids in frustration, but he refused to let his anger out. He wasn't going to give the son of a bitch the satisfaction.

"Let her go and we can handle this."

"Let her go?" Tanner scoffed, crouching down now once he stood in front of Justin as he stared into his eyes, "what would the fun be in that?"

Justin remained silent, contemplating his options as Tanner walked over to her.

Smiling against her cheek as he stood behind her, he pressed his hands over hers on the arms of the chair after. Glancing up at Justin, his smile turned sadistic as he ran his hands up her arms to her shoulders, "you know what would be fun, baby?"

Kelsey bit her tongue, unable to pull her gaze from Justin before closing her eyes feeling his dirty hands all over her.

Grabbing her hair, he pulled harshly causing her to scream out and Justin to tug profusely on his wrists.

"Answer me," he hissed.

"What?" she choked out, pain radiating from her scalp.

"Giving Justin a show of what we would do behind closed doors, don't you think?" and before she could register what was happening, he grabbed her dress ripping it from the sleeve.

Tugging profusely on the ropes bound around his wrists, Justin clenched his teeth which caused Tanner to smile.

"Down boy, we didn't even get to the best part yet."

Squeezing her eyes shut, Kelsey shook her head, holding back from crying anymore than she already had. She couldn't understand why this was necessary, why they couldn't just live their lives without the constant pressure that something like this was going to happen.

If he was anything like Luke, she knew this was just the beginning.

"I'm not going to hurt her," Tanner revealed, his eyes staring into Justin's as he curved his palms around to her shoulders, gripping onto them.

"What the fuck do you want?"

"I want you to suffer."

"You can do whatever the fuck you want to do to me. You want to kill me? Go right ahead. Pull the damn trigger."

"Justin," Kelsey gasped out under her breath, fear evitable in the peak of her tone.

"Don't worry baby," Tanner palmed her cheek from behind as he shuffled his gaze back towards Justin. "That would be too easy, you see – you put me through hell, now it's only fair I return the favor."

"Do you even know what the fuck you're doing?" Justin laughed, his demeanor switching almost instantly. "Your brother at least understood the life we lived and how to maintain it. You're like a dog with no bone. All of this is pathetic. You want to avenge your brother's death? Pathetic."

"Who's the one tied up to a chair right now?"

"You want to visit his grave with me?"

Within seconds Tanner whipped out a knife from his back pocket, taking Kelsey by the throat with his arm and angling the metal against the curve of her jaw.

Pulling on the rope, Justin clenched his teeth together a fire set ablaze beneath his seat.

"Wanna try it again?"

Staying quiet, Justin knew this game would end in one of two ways – with Tanner in shambles or Kelsey in place of him.

"That's what I thought."

"You don't have the balls."

"Justin," Kelsey plead, her eyes desperate for him not to give in to what Tanner had set up for them.

"Think about it," he proceeded to ignore her, keeping his eyes on Tanner's. "You had plenty of times to hurt her; to give me the message, to make your revenge plot come to life and instead, you chose to do all this -- for what? Are we going to be here until you figure out what exactly it is you're going to do? Because clearly, you have no clue."

"Fuck you, Bieber."

"I've heard that before," he laughed. "Next you're going to come over here and throw a punch. I'll spit out blood because you have me tied up so I can't fight back. Smart move, by the way." he spat with sarcasm. "You can't handle your shit like a real man so you hide behind this fake facade like a little bitch. Do you want to know why I have the reputation I have? Because I'm not afraid of anyone -- especially punks like you."

"You don't know shit."

"I know that you weren't made for this. You weren't born into it and I'm sure Luke didn't even teach you a Goddamn thing."

"He taught me everything I needed to know."

"That would make sense then."

He narrowed his eyes charging forwards until he had Justin by the neck, choking him.

Strained, he gritted his teeth refusing to budge underneath the force.

"Justin!" fighting the rope bound her wrists together, she felt her chest tighten, the weight on it nearly suffocating her. "Tanner, stop. This is absurd."

Grunting, Tanner shoved Justin backward before pushing his hair back as he took a step back, wiping his forehead with his forearm.

"What a good boy," Justin cooed. "Too bad your brother's not here to pat you on the back for growing some balls. I have to say though, that was pretty weak. Guess it runs in the family."

Closing her eyes, Kelsey took in a deep breath. She could see it in his eyes, he was taking a risk by doing this, but she knew, if she knew him at all, he wouldn't risk putting them in any more danger. So she had to play along with it.

"Come on, you can't tell me, after all this time, you learned nothing. You must've been watching me this entire time."

"I was too busy fucking your girlfriend."

Locking his jaw, Justin dug his fingernails into the palms of his hand. He knew the kind of mind games Tanner was willing to play and he didn't know how exactly he would handle it. There was so much he did, so much he didn't know.

He wouldn't blame her for sharing herself with someone else, but he also couldn't stomach the thought of someone else touching her.

"Getting pussy's easy, but can you hold a gun?"

Tanner narrowed his gaze.

"Because I can do both."

--

"What is going on?"

"I don't know, I don't --" Turning, John slammed his fist into the wall before resting his palms against it, hanging his head down in defeat, "fuck."

"It'll be okay."

"We don't know that!" he barked, pushing away from the wall as he turned to face them all. "We don't know shit. All we know is that she had a bullet in her chest and she's carrying my fucking kid -- my kid and now she could fucking die!"

"She's not going to die," Bruce countered quickly. "You're worried and anxious and confused and upset and you have every right to be, but doing this won't make the outcome any better for either one of you."

Calming down, John wiped his face with his hand before slapping it down to his thigh turning as he blew air up towards the ceiling before looking at them again. "The machines started going crazy. She was fine one second and then --" Closing his eyes, he shook his head, turning away again.

"Mr. Rivera?"

"Yes?"

"Your wife's heart gave out causing the baby to go into distress, we need to do an emergency C-section right now."

"What?"

"There isn't any time to waste,"

"I--she--I don't understand. What happened?"

"Your wife suffered a blood clot which led to a heart attack. We have to go in and remove it but because of the stress put on your wife's body, the baby can't survive inside the womb any longer. He needs to come out."

"Right now?"

"Right now, sir."