Lucy must have passed out because when she awoke she was lying on the bed and she had no recollection of being moved from the floor. She moved to sit up and immediately felt a burning pain in her arm. Looking down, she noticed that there was a piece of cloth tied around it and it was saturated in blood. She raised her hand to remove the cloth and was startled when Zebadiah's hand came down to cover hers.

"Don't, it only stopped bleeding a minute ago, but don't worry, I have help on the way," he explained.

Lucy looked at him and noted he had changed into a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. When she looked around she noted his discarded clothes in the corner and they were covered in blood.

"Are you hurt?" she asked, choking on the words.

"No, but you are, and you need stitches."

Lucy nodded. "Probably, I'll go home and have my grandmother take care of it," she insisted.

"No, you'll stay here and rest, and when you're ready I'll run you home."

"Who is coming?" she asked, having finally registered what he had said earlier.

"Holden Brown, he should be here any minute." Zebadiah walked away from her and Lucy took a moment to look down at her own clothes, they were covered in blood as well, but she didn't care.

She watched Zebadiah as he paced the room, shooting her questioning glances every once and awhile.

"What?" Lucy finally asked, laying back on the big bed.

"How did you know?"

Lucy shrugged, not really wanting to answer that she had seen it in a vision. It would raise to many questions that she didn't feel like answering.

"Was it a set-up, did you get cold feet at the last minute?" He didn't look particularly angry at the idea, only curious, which led her to believe that he didn't believe that a set-up was the answer.

"What do you think?" she asked in return.

"I have no clue, I really don't, are you a witch?"

Lucy gave a sad smile. "No, if I was, my life would probably be a hell of a lot easier."

Zebadiah's phone made a noise and he walked over to where it rested on the desk. "Wait here," he instructed as he left the room.

A few minutes later he returned with Belfort's only doctor. Holden Brown. He was a fairly young man in his early thirty's, about Zebadiah's age, and the two men appeared to know each other.

Holden paused as he entered the room, frowning as he looked at Lucy lying in Zebadiah's bed. He noted her bloody arm and slowly moved towards her, it was as if he was afraid that she was going to bite.

"What happened?" he asked. The question was obviously meant for Zebadiah, so Lucy kept her mouth shut as he slowly started to unwind the make shift bandage on her arm. She had to bite her lip to keep from crying out when he was a bit too rough.

Lucy had never used him as a doctor, nor had her grandmother. She had tried to visit his office once and after getting past the rude staff she found him to be just as rude as they were. That was when she had started to use a doctor in a town that was two parishes away.

"Someone threw a rock through the window and a piece of glass from the window caught Lucy's arm." Zebadiah explained.

Holden twisted her arm so that he could get a better look and she cried out in pain and wrenched herself away from him.

"No more!" she said standing. "You're hurting me, not helping me!" The movement took too much out of her and she passed out once more, landing in a heap on the floor.

*******

Zebadiah pushed a stunned Holden out of the way as he scooped her up and placed her back on the bed. "What the hell is wrong with you?" he demanded. His voice was cold steel as he looked over at his friend.

Holden looked from Zebadiah to Lucy with a stunned expression. "You're not having an affair with her, are you?"

"It's none of your business whether I am or not, you're here to treat her wound." He shot Holden a hard look and the man turned back towards where Lucy lay.

"This is more than just glass," Holden said as he examined the wound once more. "It looks like a bullet grazed her?"

Zebadiah didn't say a word.

"I have to report all gunshot wounds," he insisted, looking down at the pale girl.

"It was glass not a bullet," Zebadiah stated frimly. "Just stitch her up please."

Holden frowned once more as he started to take out what was needed to stitch Lucy's arm.

"Out of all of the women in this town you had to choose this one, you never do anything the easy way, do you?" He shook his head.

"Why does everyone hate Lucy?" Zebadiah asked with a false carlessness.

Holden turned to look at him once more. "You haven't heard?" He sounded surprised.

"That she's a witch?" Zebadiah asked with an amused smile. "This isn't the Crucible, women aren't burned at the stake for being supposed witches."

"Maybe she's not a witch, but she is a bit..." Holden hesitated.

"A bit?" Zebadiah cold look zeroed in on Holden, knowing he wasn't going to like his answer.

"Loose."

"Loose?" Zebadiah's voice held a warning in it.

Holden shrugged. "Don't shoot the messenger." He turned back towards Lucy and started to clean her wound which was still bleeding. "She has ruined Thomas Kane, no one in this town understands the hold she has on him. He's married with a child on the way, but he always comes back to her in the end. No one will give him a job in this town because of it. Then there is the man that runs the antique store at the end of the main street, he throws the odd job her way and one can only guess why he does, and the grocer, he lets her shop after hours, keeping the store open late for her." Holden was working quickly. He was good at his job and he wouldn't allow himself to be sloppy even if he didn't care overly much for the patient.

"You've surprised me Holden. I thought you, over everyone in this town, would be more accepting of someone who didn't quite fit into normal society." Zebadiah stared him down and he knew they were both thinking of his partner Mark Peters. They had been together for over ten years, but it wasn't common knowledge because Holden thought it might affect his practice in the little town if he came out as gay.

Holden had the grace to blush at the reprimand.

"My choices don't hurt anyone," he finished up what he was doing then gave Lucy an antibiotic shot.

"Neither do Lucy's," Zebadiah insisted.

"Tell that to Thomas," Holden insisted in return.

Holden reached down and turned her arm to look at his handiwork once more, and Lucy's eyes opened and looked right into his.

"He's the one, you'll be happy." she said with a smile before her eyes drifted shut once more.

Zebadiah knew there was no way she would know about Mark or that they had both been thinking of him.

"What the hell was that," Holden questioned, looking at her from a pale face.

"I'm sure she was only dreaming." Zebadiah responded, walking towards the door and motioning for Holden to follow him. "I'll show you out."

Holden looked at the sleeping woman once more before he turned to follow his friend out of the room. "She'll need to come to the office and have that arm looked at soon, tell her she needs to see me because of the type of wound it is, unless you want it reported to the police."

"I'll let her know," he assured his friend. "Although, she probably won't come unless there is a problem. Why would she?"

"I'm sorry that I've been rude to her in the past, I'll try to be better about it in the future, but you really should stay away from her. She'll ruin you in this town."

"So I've heard." Zebadiah nodded as he opened the front door and scanned the front of the house. "Drive safe and say hello to Mark for me."

Holden nodded and looked as if he wanted to say something else.

"You should know me well enough to know that I will do what ever I damn well please," Zebadiah cut him off before he could drive an even bigger wedge between them.

Holden nodded and got in his car. "Be careful."

Zebadiah nodded and then turned back towards the house. He had to figure out how to get Lucy home to her grandmother, even though it didn't sound as if he could do much more damage to her reputation, a reputation he didn't buy for a minute because she had blushed at his kiss.

As their previous conversation ran through his mind, he recalled her reaction to his proposition of an affair, he couldn't help but close his eyes in frustration. He had royally screwed up with her. An entire town treated her as if she was a whore, and as harsh as a word as it was that was what Holden had in essence called her, and Zebadiah realized he had done the same by buying her the pearls and asking her to have an affair.

He gave half-hearted smile as he recalled her determination in turning him down. No, whatever the town thought, Lucy Monroe was not a whore.

As he entered the study he found Lucy sitting up and looking down at her arm. "Has he left?" she asked, turning her attention to Zebadiah.

"Yes, and I have to get you home. When you're ready, I'll drive you."

"No thanks, I'll drive myself."

"You lost too much blood Lucy, I'm happy to take you. If you don't want me to then I can call Thomas to come and get you if you like," he offered, even though it was the last thing he wanted to do.

"No!" she shook her head. "He's already had enough trouble."

"You can't drive, and you don't want me to take you, is there someone else we can call?"

Lucy shook her head, looking away from him.

"The only other option is for you to stay here until the morning." Zebadiah suggested. "I'll be a perfect gentleman." He held up his hand in a promise.

After a moment Lucy nodded and Zebadiah walked over to a cabinet that held some of his clothes.

"Here is a clean shirt." He tossed it to her. "Do you need help getting to the bathroom?"

Lucy shook her head then stood slowly, shuffling down the hall to the small bathroom. When she returned Zebadiah had changed the sheets and helped her into bed. He tried not to think about how cute and small she looked in his shirt.

"Where are you going to sleep?" she asked.

"Don't worry about me, I have some work to do still. Will the light bother you?"

Lucy shook her head and turned away from him, and he couldn't help but wonder what she was thinking.

He worked until near dawn, then he joined Lucy in the bed, quickly falling asleep despite his worry that he wouldn't be able to with her warm body lying next to his.

When he awoke that next morning, his bed was empty, and she was gone, and he wondered once again just how badly he had screwed things up with her. It was the first time since he had been a very young man that he worried what a woman thought about his actions, but he didn't look too hard for the why because he was certain he wouldn't like the answer.