AN: Alright everyone, here it is. The final chapter, just a little bit of an epilogue to wrap it all up. I hope everyone has enjoyed the ride. If you'd like to see more Haven fics from me, check out my profile and cast your vote on which of the two possible fics you'd like to see more. :)
Thanks again and I bid you adieu.
Epilogue
Three days. That's how long Nathan had been asleep. Well, sixty-eight hours to be precise. Sixty-eight hours since Audrey had dragged his body out of a mud soaked coffin. Sixty-eight hours since she'd frantically performed CPR, begging him not to leave her. Sixty-eight hours since that bumpy drive back to the hospital, cradling his head with her heart in her throat and praying for him to hold on. It had been sixty-eight hours and he still hadn't woken up.
They told her that it was expected. He had been through a terrible ordeal and this was his body's way of dealing with it. That much she could understand. After all, looking at him now she could see more bandages than skin. She just wished he'd wake up for just a few minutes, so she'd know he was okay. She wouldn't really believe it until he told her himself.
He'd been held captive for about thirty-six hours and had now slept for another sixty-eight. She cast a quick glance at the clock above the door. Make that sixty-nine hours.
It had been the longest three days of Audrey's life. Although the time Nathan had been missing was hard, at least then she'd had something to do. A mystery to solve, something productive to do to help. The last three days there had been absolutely nothing to do but wait. Sit and wait and pray to a dozen gods she didn't even believe in for any sign of mercy. The only relief that came now was the fact that at least she knew he was alive.
According to the doctors he didn't show any serious signs of permanent damage. His condition was miraculously stable. He must not have been unconscious in the coffin for too long because she had gotten him out before the oxygen deprivation could cause too much damage. There were no signs of malnourishment or dehydration. No internal bleeding besides the bruising on his skin. No infections in any of the various cuts or burns that covered his body. Physically, the only lasting signs of the ordeal would be some scars.
Mentally, on the other hand, was a whole other story.
Audrey held one of his hands between both of hers, grateful for the comfortable warmth. For the first couple hours in the hospital his hand had been cold and clammy between her palms. She'd found herself rubbing them to warm them. If he'd been awake he would've loved the feeling. She hoped that he could feel it in his sleep and would know she was there.
A yawn escaped her before she could stop it. She had hardly slept since Nathan had disappeared. After the brief nap that she'd caught on Duke's boat after they'd found the body of Michael Stauffer, she hadn't slept again until after Nathan had gotten out of surgery. Since then she had never left the hospital grounds, and she avoided leaving Nathan's room if she could help it. She ate in the cafeteria, showered in the adjoining bathroom, and slept in the chair beside his bed. Duke brought her a fresh change of clothes every morning and would sit and keep her company for a few hours before he had to get back to the restaurant. No one even bothered trying to talk her into leaving. She would be there when Nathan woke up, come hell or high water.
Now if only he'd wake up.
Audrey groaned and folded her arms on the edge of the bed, resting her cheek on back of his wrist and staring up the length of his body. He'd thankfully returned to a normal colour, or at least the skin between the bruises wasn't ghostly white anymore. Some of the bruises had faded to a dull yellowish-green, but the majority of them were still brilliantly blue and violet. All of the stitches had been redone, replaced with staples in some spots, and fresh bandages wrapped around his wrists and ankles. There didn't seem to be a place on his body that wasn't injured.
Worst of all were the cuts on his chest though. The doctor had shown them to her one day while he was changing the bandages and she'd been horrified by the sight; her own name scratched deep into his skin, right above his heart.
And he had felt every bit of it. The doctors had confirmed her suspicions that her own blood had been injected into him, mingling with his. It had been a miracle - one that the doctors couldn't explain - that his body hadn't rejected her blood, since they didn't match in type. Through the details she had gathered a vague idea of what had happened to Nathan down in that underground chamber. Police sweeps had found everything she needed to get the basics; chloroform, weapons, medical supplies, computer monitoring systems, intravenous nutrients and blood transfusions.
The plan had been careful and methodical, clearly done by someone who intended to keep him there for a long time and was very good at what they did.
Not that the man had survived to be prosecuted. She'd been in such a hurry to save Nathan that she hadn't even considered restraining him. She'd thought that two bullets might have done the trick but apparently not. By the time the other officers got to the building he'd been gone. A hunter had stumbled across his body in a clearing the next morning, a gun in his hand and a bullet in his head. The initial theory was suicide but Audrey wasn't convinced.
Brushing away those thoughts, she closed her eyes and let herself rest for a while. She hadn't napped in hours and it was about time she at least rest her eyes.
It felt like she'd just barely fallen asleep when she was abruptly jerked awake again. It took her a second to figure out what had woken her, and then she felt the hand in hers twitch violently again, accompanied by a strangled noise. Her eyes immediately shot open and she looked up at the head of the bed.
Nathan's eyes were still mostly closed, apart from a narrow sliver of pale blue visible between his lashes, but she could tell he must be awake. His jaw was tight, his teeth barred, and every muscle in his body had tensed.
"Nathan?" she asked in awe, quickly standing up. She placed a hand on the side of his face and he yelped, pulling away from the contact. "Nathan, calm down, it's me."
A nurse rushed into the room but Audrey shook her head, gesturing for the woman to stay back. This time she took Nathan's head firmly in her hands, ignoring the way he tried to jerk away from her and the pained noise he made deep in his throat. "Nathan, hey, shh, it's me," she said gently. She leaned in and rested her forehead against his and she could feel his fast, laboured breathing against her face. "It's me. I'm here. You're safe. Calm down."
His body had stopped fidgeting so much. "Pr'err?" He frowned, cleared his throat and tried again. "Parker?"
"Yeah Nathan, it's me," she assured him, easing her grip on the sides of his face now that he wasn't thrashing. "You're safe, I promise. Just relax so you don't hurt yourself, okay?"
"I can't move," he mumbled. "It's all – heavy. Where's this?"
"You're at the hospital," Audrey said. "And you probably can't move much because of all the morphine they've got you on." Nathan's eyes blinked slowly, shallowly, for a few seconds and then he finally managed to open them most of the way. "Welcome back, boss."
For some reason, Nathan was still scowling at her. "You're dead," he said. "So I'm dead now?"
"What? No, Nathan, you're fine. We're both fine," she said, caught off guard by his reaction.
"He's doing this, isn't he?" he asked and his weak voice sounded like a growl. "John. Stop fucking with me. God, just let me die already!"
"No, no, Nathan," Audrey said in a panic, "it's fine. I'm here, I promise it." When he still didn't look convinced she bent in and pressed a kiss to his lips. "Please, Nathan trust me."
"But you're dead," he said and suddenly the anger had gone from his voice, leaving nothing but sadness in its place. "You died. He killed you. That's why I could feel again, and I did. I felt everything. It hurt so much."
"I'm fine," Audrey said. "He didn't hurt me." She lifted his hand and held it against her cheek, and his fingers traced over her skin determinedly. "It was my blood, that's why you could feel. He took my blood from the hospital, the blood I'd donated for the police drive, and he put that in you. That's what made it so you could feel."
Nathan stared at his fingers touching her skin with fascination, like a man lost at sea would stare at an island in on the horizon. "You're real? This is real?"
"It's real," she assured him. "You're home. You're safe."
For the first time since they'd met, Audrey saw Nathan Wuornos completely break down. Even when The Chief had died, she'd only ever seen him get withdrawn and angry, and then defensive but accepting. Now his eyes welled up and his lip shook. Audrey did the only thing she could think of: she bent in and pulled him into a hug. Nathan's arms wrapped around her like a vice and he buried his face in the crook of her neck so his warm tears dripped onto her collarbone. She held him against her body, murmuring soft reassurances until his body stopped trembling and his choked sobs quieted.
When he finally released her, Audrey sat up and then brushed the moisture from his cheeks. He winced when her fingers skated over a bruise beneath his eye and she hastily pulled back. "I'm sorry."
"Don't," Nathan said. He grabbed her hand and placed it back on his cheek, holding it there with his own hand and leaning into the contact. "Don't be. I can feel you. It means this is real." Audrey could feel the tears boiling up in her own eyes again and she blinked them back. Once her vision had cleared she noticed that Nathan's eyes were darting around the room. "John. Is he-?"
"He's dead," she said quickly. Even though he looked surprised, the set of his shoulders eased. "How do you feel?"
"Numb," Nathan answered. From any other person that statement would've been different, but from him she knew what it meant: he was back to normal. "Although, I'm sort of - heavy. My body won't move right."
"Morphine," Audrey supplied. "Lots of it. They didn't want you trying to get up and move around too much. The drugs are there to dull whatever pain might be left over and to dissuade you from getting up."
"It's working," he said. He seemed to take a few deep breaths and then asked, "How did you find me? I remember - I was in -" He paused and grimaced, and she saw something spark in his eyes: fear. "The dark. I was inside a coffin. I can remember that part. And then it got hard to breathe. I died. How am I here? How did you find me?"
So she told him. She told him everything, from waking up in her room alone to finding the blood on his truck. From Duke finding the body of the orderly to their morning search of the hospital records. From the camera to the call from hospital security to Seddal and Kapps getting the coordinates. The crazed drive up the hill, her interrogation of his captor. Digging up the coffin. Resuscitating him. The ride back to the hospital.
"You didn't kill him?" Nathan asked. "John, I mean."
"I wish I had, but no," Audrey admitted. "We found him the next morning. They think it was suicide." She paused thoughtfully. "You say his name was John?"
"That's what he called himself," he said. "John Doe. Who was he, really? Do you know?"
Audrey nodded, dragging up the conversation she'd had with Julia when the M.E. had come to visit her. "Yeah, they IDed him that day. Dr. Grant Sattler. He used to be a pain management therapist in South Dakota. Then apparently his wife contracted some sort of very painful autoimmune disease. After she died he snapped, and then just disappeared off the map. They've been circulating his records and they're matching dozens of unsolved murders and kidnappings to him all over the country."
"He knew things," Nathan said darkly and his grip on her hand tightened. "About me, and about you. Things I never told other people. He knew what your blood does to me. He knew about us being together. And that I'm scared of the dark."
"The cameras," Audrey said. "He was watching us for weeks. They found months worth of footage stored on the computers. Ever since The Chief died."
Nathan shook his head. "It wasn't him watching," he said. "At least not at first. Someone hired him, he told me so. Someone was watching us, and once they found out how to get to me they called him in to do the dirty work."
"We'll find out who it is," she said confidently. "It's all connected to this tattoo business. We'll figure it out and we'll stop them."
"There's a war coming," he said distractedly. "I can tell."
"Let it come. We'll deal with it when it does," Audrey said unconcernedly. She reached up and affectionately brushed some of his hair from his forehead. "But for now, it's time to relax and recover. You're home and you're safe. Rest up, boss, we're going to need you when this town blows apart."
Audrey made to slide down off the bed but Nathan said, "Wait." She stopped and looked back at him, and his eyes had taken on that same uncertain spark. "You don't have to go. Just, uh, you can just lay here. If you want."
"I can't lay down with you, you'll be able to feel all of those injuries," she pointed out. "I don't want to hurt you."
"Morphine," Nathan said simply. "I won't really feel it anyway." She still hesitated and he added, "Please, Audrey. Don't make me beg."
And suddenly she realized what it was. He wanted to feel her next to him. He wanted to know that she was there, and he wasn't alone. That he really was home and safe and with her. Without a moment's hesitation she toed out of her shoes and stripped off her jacket, and then climbed back up onto the bed. She pulled the blankets over the top of them both and then curled into his side. She was careful to not let any of her bared skin touch any of his more painful injuries, but if he felt them he didn't react much.
"Thank you," he murmured into her hair, resting his head against the top of hers and tightening his arm around her shoulders. Audrey closed her eyes and laid her head on his chest, her cheek on the gauze over his heart, where he wouldn't feel it. Through the thin cotton she could hear his steady heartbeat.
"That's what partners are for," she responded. She knew they were more than partners, more even than friends, but she wasn't interested in worrying about putting a label on them right now. They would have time for that later. Now, even though she hadn't been tired just minutes ago, suddenly she could feel the pull of sleep dragging her down. Warm and comfortable at Nathan's side, she finally felt relaxed. "Oh and Nathan," she added, and he gave a low hum to show he was listening, "I hope you know this means that I am never letting you out of my sight again."
Nathan chuckled, a deep rumble that vibrated through them both. "I can live with that."