After three days of forced time off, Keegan returned to the precinct. The entire homicide and SIU offices were a quiet buzz of activity. Unoccupied desks were covered in get well cards, gag gifts and the three officers who didn’t make it – their desks were left as they were. Eyes followed Keegan as she strode down towards SIU. She ignored the curious eyes and trudged down the stairs. Sarah was sitting so still at her desk Keegan thought the ME had fallen asleep.
Her head popped up as soon as she heard the clicking of Keegan’s boots against the linoleum floor. She stood up and wrapped her arms around Keegan crushing the air from the detective’s lungs. “I heard what happened.”
“I would be surprised if you hadn’t,” Keegan carelessly teased.
“You saved his life Keegan,” Sarah stepped back and stared up at Keegan. She pressed her hands against Keegan’s face and forced Keegan to look at her. “If you wouldn’t have done what you did, he wouldn’t be alive.”
“I only did what he would have done for me.” Keegan shrugged a shoulder.
“Not every human would have done what you did,” Sarah pointed out. “You risked changing yourself by exposing yourself to infected blood. How many cops did you see helping the others who were hurt? Only you and Cassidy helped him. You two saved his life.”
Keegan sat at her desk and stared at the mountain of paper work that had been left for her to complete. She shuffled through the papers and let out a shaky sigh.
“By the way, if you were interested in the DNA results,” Sarah offered, “Bryton was a match at both crime scenes. He was the person who killed the Barr’s and Elaine Philips. And Cassidy’s tests came back negative.”
Keegan rested her head in her hands. A wave of relief rocked through her. Somehow with knowing that the right person had died for the crimes made things easier for her. If she felt a little relief for Cassidy she wasn’t going to advertise it but she was glad the detective wouldn’t have to worry about turning furry once a month.
Matt was asleep in the hospital bed. His face was swollen and bruised. His heart was beating strong as he slept. Keegan pulled the lone chair that had been pushed into a corner and pulled it next to his bed. She watched as his chest rose and fell with each breath he took. She let her fingers dance along the scratches on his arms and down to the tops of his hands. She could feel the heat pouring off of his skin.
Her heart broke a little for Matt. As a human he would have been cooler to the touch, especially with the amount of drugs they were pumping through his system. The warmth of his skin, the lack of stitching all pointed to the fact that he had actually began to change from human to shifter. She knew if she were to expose his pupils to light the rapid change from diamond to rounded pupil would occur. The color of his eyes would have even lightened a bit.
Pressing her forehead against his hand Keegan let out a shuddering breath, “I’m so sorry.”
He was alive. She didn’t know why she was apologizing for that. Maybe it was the fact that he was alive and one of the things so many people hate. Maybe it was because he was now something he had to relearn. There were so many things Matt didn’t know about shifters and he was going to experience them first hand with little guidance. He was going to be an outcast because of who he was and the role he had in the death of Bryton Anderson.
“Stop thinking you are making my head hurt.”
Keegan jumped at the rough words Matt had spoken. She looked up and saw Matt looking down at her with a cracked eye. His dark brown eyes had lightened. They had faded to a hazel.
Keegan tried to smile for him, she wanted to but she couldn’t. “I can’t help it.”
“Then stop worrying about me,” Matt coughed and Keegan grabbed the mug of water that was sitting on the bedside table. She handed it over so Matt could get a good swallow before setting it back down. “I’m alive.”
“But,” Keegan closed her eyes to gather her thoughts before she continued on, “You aren’t human anymore.”
Matt chuckled, “Is that what you are so worried about Keegs? I don’t give a damn that I’m not human anymore. I don’t care what anyone else is going to think about me either. All I care about is the fact that I’m breathing and that you’re okay.”
Keegan felt her heart stop before it jack-hammered out of her chest. She stared down at the warmth of his fingers curling through hers and squeezing her hand gently. She should be the person offering him comfort but instead here she was. Amazed by the way he treated her.
“I just wish I could have done more,” Keegan whispered. “You shouldn’t be here like this. You should be at work celebrating the fact that we did get the monster who killed the Barr’s and Elaine. We got him one hundred percent.”
Matt smiled as he snuggled deeper into his pillow. “We knew we already had him Keegs. With the two of us on the case it wasn’t as if we weren’t going to get the bastard. One way or the other we were going to get him.”
“Well,” Keegan swallowed the lump in her throat. “I wish we would have gotten him before it landed you here in the hospital. You do not deserve this. You should be stuck at your desk filling out paperwork like the rest of us.”
“I happen to like being waited on hand and foot.” Matt let out another raspy cough before he closed his eyes.
“Just don’t stay in here too long,” Keegan whispered as Matt drifted back into a restful sleep. “I’m not sure what I can do with out you at work to bug me.”
“You would just miss me,” Matt answered with a sleepy smile.
There wasn’t enough time in the day for Keegan to stop by and visit Matt at the hospital after he initial visit. She sent a few texts here and there but otherwise she was stuck at her desk filing paperwork and fine tuning the things that the captain required of her. The world didn’t stop just because she wanted it to.
Keegan and Leeroy had been called for a report of vandalism down in the supernatural district and had barely gotten into the office and started uploading the photographs of the spray painted hate when a loud cheer emitted from upstairs. Keegan looked over to Gary for some kind of answer and he smirked at her. “It sounds like your boy is back from sick leave.”
Ignoring the urge to dart up the stairs to see him on his own two feet Keegan focused on the monitor in front of her. She scrolled through the photos and cringed at the words. The owners of the coffee shop didn’t know who would have done this and there weren’t any suspects. Right now all Keegan could do was write up the report and keep it on hand to document what had happened just in case things got worse in the future.
Gary rested a hip on the edge of her desk and glared down at her. “You know, most people who saved someone else’s life would go visit them when they returned to work. So are you going to pull your head out of your ass or are you going to ignore the man?”
Keegan shuffled the photos together on her desk and stuck them in the folder before she answered Gary. “He doesn’t need someone from SIU messing up his return party. Especially after what happened to him, there’s no need to make things awkward between him and his team.”
“You just set your self up for disappointment, don’t you Morne?” Melinda shook her head as if she were disappointed in her commanding officer. “He isn’t going to bite because you went and said hello. What’s his face? Cassidy has even been asking after you. Apparently even he is concerned about how you are doing. According to him it’s weird not seeing you around the office. He starting to think that there is something really wrong with you.”
“I am fine,” Keegan rolled her eyes.
“No one is fine after seeing one of the people they have worked closest with almost die. And no cop is all right after being investigated by the internal affairs bureau as hard as you were.” Melinda pointed out.
“Before you know it, Captain Jones is going to be asking you to take some time off.” Leeroy’s voice was soft but Keegan understood what her team was trying to tell her. She wasn’t doing as well as she should have been. If anything she had become so focused on work she forgot about everything else.
Keegan ran her fingers through her hair before tugging it up into a messy bun. “I’m going to take the rest of the day and go see my Ma. If you need anything I will have my cell phone on.”
“Doubt we are going to need anything boss,” Gary smacked her on the back before ducking down to scoop up her bag and hand it over to her. “Go eat some food, watch a show or something. When you come back here you better not be the zombie you have been. Otherwise Captain Jones isn’t going to just ignore SIU like he usually does.”
“Got you,” Keegan waved bye to the department and zipped through homicide hoping not to be noticed. She didn’t feel the heaviness of being at work drop from her shoulders until she had pulled up outside her mother’s home.
Seated across from each other Keegan sipped on a mug of hot chocolate while her mother drank coffee. Keegan was quiet under her mother’s scrutiny but she wasn’t going to be escaping the barrage of questions until her mother was satisfied.
“So what has been going on in your life that you haven’t brother to drop by and see me in last two weeks?” Keegan flinched against the waspish tone from Maria. She rarely missed a weekend and if she did, she would call her mother to explain what was going on. The past few weeks it was like Keegan had turned into a ghost. Not caring to go anywhere but home and work.
“I uh,” Keegan wrapped her hands around the warmth of the mug searching for an acceptable answer. Instead she found her self spilling every detail of what had happened to Matt. How much seeing him lying on the ground hurt and possibly dying had actually affected her. Then she wasn’t sure what to do once he was in the hospital and healing. The turmoil of seeing a friend undergo changes he did not deserve to experience. A decorated homicide detective was going to be put through the ringer by some of his co-workers and underlings once they found out he wasn’t as human as the rest of them. In all honesty, Keegan felt some what responsible for that even though she could not stop what was happening. She should have been able to do something, anything for him. She was a mess of emotions.
“You sound like you really care about this man,” Maria’s voice was soft and void of judgment. “So why are you doing everything in your power to avoid him?”
“I don’t know.” Keegan wiped a hand across invisible crumbs on the counter top. “Maybe it is because I don’t know what to do or how to act around him now. What if he hates what he has become and blames me? I can’t deal with that Ma.”
“Keegan, let me put it to you gently. Matthew Hollis is a man, even if he can change into a leopard now he is a man never the less. He isn’t putting half as much thought into this as you are. He isn’t beating himself up as badly as you are. Hell, he is probably wondering what happened to his friend and why is she avoiding him now? That’s probably all he’s worried about at the moment.”
Keegan let out a groan of frustration. Her mother was right. She was over reacting to what was happening around her. She needed to go to Matt and be the person that he had always been for her.
“So,” Maria grabbed both mugs and set them in the sink, “Now that you have that figured out how about you go and see how he is really doing.”
“You really are the best,” Keegan wrapped Maria in a tight hug.
“I know. While you are over there how about you tell him how you really feel about him too. It is obvious that he means more to you than just a friend. Let him know. You never know how the evening might work out for you if you do tell him.”
Keegan felt heat color her cheeks and she nodded to her mother before she ducked out of the house and in to the light snow that had began to fall.