She wiped tears from her eyes. "Oh, Will, do you really think a child of mine would turn out to be a man like you?"

"You know what?" He bent down so that he could look her in the eye. "I'm going to take that as a compliment, and you can't stop me."

"Don't be ridiculous."

He walked toward the emergency stairwell. "Thank you, Amanda, for saying such a nice thing to me."

"Come back here."

He pushed open the door. "I will treasure it forever."

"Don't you dare walk away from me."

Will did just that, taking the steps two at a time, safe in the knowledge that her little feet could not keep up with him.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO.

SARA TOOK OFF HER READING GLASSES AND RUBBED HER EYES. She had been sitting at the table in the doctors' lounge for at least two hours. The patient's chart on the tablet in front of her was starting to blur. She had slept a total of six hours in the last four days. Her level of exhaustion was reminiscent of her residency, when she'd slept on a cot in the broom closet behind the nurses' station. The cot was still there. Grady had undergone a billion-dollar renovation since the last time Sara worked in the emergency department, but no hospital had ever wasted money on making residents' lives easier.

Nan, the student nurse, was on the couch again. She had a half-empty box of cookies on one side of her and a bag of potato chips on the other. Her thumbs were barely visible as they furiously tapped on her iPhone. She giggled every few minutes as, presumably, a new email came in. Sara wondered if it was possible that the girl was getting younger before her eyes. Her only consolation was that in a few years, the junk food Nan loved so much would start to matter.

"What's up?" Nan asked, dropping the phone. "You cool?"

"I'm cool." Sara was oddly relieved that the girl was talking to her again. Nan had been pouting since she'd realized that Sara was not going to share the juicy details of her part in the hospital shooting.

The girl stood, brushing crumbs off her scrubs. "You want lunch? I think Krakauer was gonna order from the Hut."

"Thanks for asking, but I've got plans." Sara looked at her watch. Will was supposed to take her to lunch. It would be their first date, which said a lot about the way Sara's life was going lately considering Will was the reason she wasn't getting any sleep.

"Later." Nan didn't so much push open the door as throw her body against it.

Sara took a moment to enjoy the peace and quiet in the lounge. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a folded sheet of paper. She'd accidentally left her glasses in her car this morning and had to hike back up the stairs in the parking deck to fetch them. That was when she'd found the note stuck under her windshield wiper. Oddly enough, it wasn't the first time someone had left the word cunt on Sara's car. She supposed she should be grateful that this time it wasn't keyed into the paint.

Sara didn't have to consult a handwriting expert to know that the message was from Angie Trent. There had been another note left on Sara's car yesterday morning, though this time the greeting had been waiting for her when she left her apartment. Angie was getting better. This second note packed more punch than the more innocuous "Whore" from the previous day.

Sara wadded up the paper and threw it toward the trashcan. Of course she missed. She got up to retrieve the note. Instead of tossing it into the trash where it belonged, she unfolded the paper again and stared at the word. It was certainly nasty, but Sara could not help but think it was deserved. In the heat of the moment, she never let herself think about the wedding ring around Will's finger. The cold light of day was another matter. He was a married man. Even without that legal designation, there was still a bond between him and Angie. They were both connected in a way that Sara would never understand.

And it was very clear that Angie was not going to bow out gracefully. The only question was how long it would take before the woman managed to drag Sara down into the gutter with her.

There was a knock at the door.

Sara made sure the note was in the trash before opening the door. Will was there. He had his hands in his pockets. Though they had been together in every way possible, the first ten minutes between them were always awkward. It was as if he was perpetually waiting for Sara to make the first move, to give him some sort of sign that she hadn't yet tired of him.

He asked, "Is this a bad time?"

She opened the door wide. "Not at all."

He glanced around the room. "Am I allowed back here?"

"I think we can make an exception."

He stood in the middle of the room. His hands stayed in his pockets.

Sara asked, "How's Evelyn doing?"

"She's good. At least, I think she is." He took his hands out of his pockets, but only to start twisting the wedding band on his finger. "Faith's going to take some time off work to take care of her. I think it'll be good for both of them to have some time together. Or really bad. You never know."

Sara couldn't help it. She looked at the wadded-up note in the trashcan. Why was he still wearing his wedding ring? Probably for the same reason Angie kept leaving notes on Sara's car.

Will asked, "What is it?"

She indicated the table. "Can we sit down?"

He waited until she was seated, then took the chair across from her. He said, "This doesn't sound good."

"No," she agreed.

He tapped his fingers on the table. "I think I know what you're going to say."

She said it anyway. "I like you, Will. I really, really like you."

"But?"

She touched his hand, resting her finger on his wedding ring.

"Yeah," he said. No explanation. No excuse. No offer to take off the ring and throw it to the wind. Or at the very least, stick it in one of his damn pockets.

Sara forced herself to continue. "I know that Angie is a big part of your life. I respect that. I respect what she means to you."

She waited for a response, but none seemed to be coming. Instead, Will took her hand. His thumb traced along the lines in her palm. Sara couldn't stop the reaction her body felt from his touch. She looked down at their hands together. She let her finger slip under the cuff of his shirt. The ridge of the scar felt rough against her skin. She thought about all of the things she did not know about him-the torture he had endured. The pain he'd brought on himself. And all of it had happened with Angie right by his side.

"I can't compete with her," Sara admitted. "And I can't be with you if I'm worried about you wanting to be with her."

He cleared his throat. "I don't want to be with her." She waited for him to say that he wanted to be with Sara. But he didn't.

She tried again. "I can't be second place. I can't know that no matter how much I might need you, you'll always go running to Angie first."

Again, she waited for him to say something-anything-that would convince her that she was wrong. Seconds ticked by. It felt like an eternity.

When he finally spoke, his voice was so quiet that she could barely hear him. "She cried wolf a lot." He licked his lips. "When we were little, I mean." He glanced up to make sure Sara was listening, then looked back down at their hands. "There was this one time when we were placed together. It was a foster home. More like a factory farm. They were doing it for the money. At least the wife was. The husband was doing it for the teenage girls."

Sara felt her throat tighten. She struggled against the impulse to feel sorry for Angie.

"So, like I said, Angie cried wolf a lot. When she accused the guy of molesting her, the caseworker didn't believe her. Didn't even open a file. Didn't listen to me when I said she wasn't lying this time." His shoulders went up in a shrug. "I would hear her at night sometimes. Screaming when he hurt her. He hurt her a lot. None of the other kids cared. I guess they were happy it wasn't happening to them. But for me ..." His words trailed off. He watched his thumb move along the back of her fingers. "I knew that they'd have to open an investigation if one of us got hurt. Or hurt ourselves." He tightened his grip around her hand. "So, I told Angie, this is what I'm going to do. And I did it. I took a razor blade out of the medicine cabinet and I cut myself. I knew it couldn't be a half measure. You've seen it." He gave a strained laugh. "It's not a half measure."

"No," she agreed. It was hard to understand how he'd managed not to pass out from the pain.

"So," Will said. "That got us out of that home and they shut it down and the people running it weren't allowed to foster kids anymore." He looked up, blinking a few times to clear his eyes. "You know, one of the things Angie said to me the other night was that I would never do that for you-never cut myself like that-and I think she's right." There was a sadness in his smile. "Not because I don't care about you, but because you would never put me in that kind of situation. You would never ask me to make that choice."

Sara looked into his eyes. The sun streaming in through the windows turned his eyelashes white. She could not imagine what he'd been through, the level of desperation that had driven him to take that razor in hand.

"I should let you get on with your day." He leaned over and kissed her hand, letting his lips linger for a few seconds. When he straightened up, something about him had changed. His voice was firmer, more determined. "You have to know that if you ever need me, I'll be there. No matter what else happens. I'll be there."

There was something final in what he said, as if everything was settled. He almost seemed relieved.

"Will-"

"It's all right." He gave one of his awkward laughs. "I guess you're immune to my astounding charm."

Sara felt a lump in her throat. She couldn't believe that he was giving in so easily. She wanted him to fight for this. She wanted him to pound his fist on the table and tell her there was no way this was over, that he wasn't going to give her up that easily.

But he didn't. He just slid his hand out of hers and stood up. "Thank you. I know that sounds stupid." He glanced at her, then at the door. "Just-thank you."

She heard his footsteps cross the floor, the noise from the hallway as the door swung open. Sara pressed her fingers to her eyes, trying to stop the tears. She couldn't get past his tone of resignation, his easy acquiescence to what he clearly felt was inevitable. She had no idea what his story about Angie was meant to accomplish. Was Sara supposed to feel sorry for the woman? Was she supposed to find it romantic that Will was ready to kill himself in order to rescue her?

She realized now that Will was more like Jeffrey than she'd wanted to admit. Maybe Sara had a thing for firemen, not cops. Both men had shown a propensity for running straight into burning buildings. In the last week alone, Will had been shot at by gangsters, threatened by a psychopath, browbeaten by at least three women, emasculated in front of strangers, crammed into the trunk of a car for hours on end, and willingly volunteered himself to go into a situation where he knew there was a high probability that he would be killed. He was so damn intent on rescuing everyone else in the world that Will didn't realize what he really needed was rescuing from himself. Everyone took advantage of him. Everyone exploited his good graces, his decency, his kindness. No one thought to ask Will what he needed.

His whole life had been spent in the shadows, the stoic kid sitting in the back of the classroom, afraid to open his mouth for fear of being found out. Angie kept him in the dark because it served her selfish needs. Sara had quickly realized her first time with Will that he'd never been with a woman who really knew how to love him. No wonder he had capitulated so easily when she'd told him it was over. Will had taken it as a given that nothing good in his life would ever last. That was why he had sounded so relieved. His toes had been dangling over the edge. He was too afraid to take the leap because he'd never really fallen.

Sara felt her mouth open in surprise. She was just as guilty as the rest of them. She had been so desperate for Will to fight for her that it had never occurred to her that Will was waiting for Sara to fight for him.

She was through the door and running down the hallway before logic could intervene. As usual, the ER was packed. Nurses ran with bags of IVs. Gurneys flew past. Sara sprinted to the elevator. She stabbed the down button a dozen times, silently begging the doors to open. The stairs exited at the back of the hospital. Parking was in the front. Will would be home by the time she ran around the building. Sara looked at her watch, wondering how much time she had wasted feeling sorry for herself. Will was probably halfway to the decks by now. Three structures. Six stories of cars. More if he'd used one of the decks for the university. She should wait in the street. Sara tried to map the roads in her head. Bell. Armstrong. Maybe he had parked at the Grady Detention Center.

The doors finally opened. George, the security guard, was standing there with his arm resting on his gun. Will was beside him.

George asked, "Everything okay, Doc?"

Sara could only nod.

Will stepped off the elevator, a sheepish look on his face. "I forgot that Betty's at your place." He gave that familiar, awkward smile. "At the risk of sounding like a country music singer, you can take my heart, but I can't let you take my dog."

Sara was bumped by an EMT passing behind her. She braced her palms against Will's chest to keep from falling. He just stood there with his hands in his pockets, smiling down at her with a curious look on his face. Who had ever taken up for this man? Not his family, who'd abandoned him to state care. Not the foster parents who'd thought he was expendable. Not the doctors who'd experimented on his busted lip. Not the teachers and social workers who'd taken his dyslexia for stupidity. And especially not Angie, who had so easily gambled with his life. His precious life.

"Sara?" Will looked concerned. "Are you okay?"

She slid her hands up to his shoulders. Sara could feel the familiar hard muscle beneath his shirt, the heat from his skin. She had kissed his eyelids this morning. He had delicate lashes, blond and soft. She had teased him, kissing his eyebrows, his nose, his chin, letting her hair drape across his face and chest. How many hours had Sara spent over the last year wondering how the scar above his mouth would feel against her lips? How many nights had she dreamt about waking up in his arms?

So many hours. So many nights.

Sara stood on her toes to look him in the eye. "Do you want to be with me?"

"Yes."

She relished the sound of his certainty. "I want to be with you, too."

Will shook his head. He looked like he was waiting for the punch line to a very bad joke. "I don't understand."

"It worked."

"What worked?"

"Your astounding charm."

His eyes narrowed. "What charm?"

"I changed my mind."

He still didn't seem to believe her.

"Kiss me," she told him. "I changed my mind."

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.

As always, tremendous thanks go to Victoria Sanders, my agent, and my editors Kate Miciak and Kate Elton. Angela Cheng Caplan should be in here somewhere, too. I would also like to thank everyone at my publishing houses for their continued support. Gina Centrello and Libby McGuire, it's been a pleasure getting to know y'all. Adam Humphrey, I appreciate your letting me kill you. And beat you. And humiliate you. And all the other things Claire takes for granted.

Thanks to the incomparable Vernon Jordan for regaling me with tales of 1970s Atlanta. You, sir, are a legend. David Harper, this is at least your tenth year of helping me make Sara look like a doctor. As always, I am enormously grateful for your help and apologize for any errors, which were committed in service of story. Special Agent John Heinen, the same goes for you. Any gun mistakes are my own. I have many people to thank at the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, including Pete Stuart, Wayne Smith, John Bankhead, and Director Vernon Keenan. Y'all are so generous with your time, and so passionate about what you do, that it's a pleasure to be in your company. Speaker David Ralston, I appreciate your continued support.

Daddies don't get much page time in this book, but I'd like to thank mine for being such a wonderful father. I'd write a story about you, but no one would believe how good you are. And speaking of goodness, DA-as always, you are my heart.

To my readers, please note that this is a work of fiction. Though I have been an Atlanta resident for more than half my life, I am also a writer, and have changed streets, building design, and neighborhoods to suit my dastardly needs. (Come on, Sherwood Forest, you know you deserve it!)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR.

KARIN SLAUGHTER is the New York Times bestselling author of eleven novels, including Broken, Undone, Fractured, Beyond Reach, which was a Publishers Weekly best book of the year, and A Faint Cold Fear, which was named an International Book of the Month selection. She contributed to and edited Like a Charm. She is a native of Georgia, where she currently lives and is working on her next novel, to be published in 2012 by Delacorte Press.