Sheep's Clothing - Chapter Three
Chapter Three
Oliver woke slowly. Between line-of-duty injuries, injuries caused by his own drunken playboy stupidity, and a few garden variety accidents, he'd been drugged enough times to know the feeling, so when he opened his eyes, he wasn't surprised that it still felt as if the world were covered in a haze. Hospital, he figured. He could hear the beeping of the heart monitor and felt the uncomfortable sting of the IV attached to his arm.
A quick look around the room told him he was alone. He'd long since given up hoping for someone to be there for him when things went wrong. He'd ended up in the hospital so many times that he'd lost count, but since the day his parents died, no one could have cared less if he got hurt. Sure the bills got paid, but other than that he was on his own.
Except the last time… when he'd been burned… Someone had been there…
Chloe.
Oliver's heart began hammering in his chest. It took all of two seconds to throw the sheet back and pull the leads from his chest. The IV took a little more effort, but it, too, was quickly dispensed with. His head was spinning, but he ignored it as he shifted his legs over the side of the bed. His chest let him know that was a very bad idea and he looked down to see that he was heavily bandaged. He set a hand over the wound protectively, then stood, keeping his other hand on the bed to steady himself.
A nurse ran into the room, no doubt alerted when he pulled the sensors off. "What in the world do you think-"
"Where is she?" Oliver demanded.
The plump, fortyish woman ignored the question. "You shouldn't be out of bed, Mr. Queen. You were badly-"
"Where is she?" he asked more firmly.
"Mr. Queen, I will sedate you if I have to."
"And I will buy this hospital and fire you the second the paperwork is signed if you don't tell me where the woman is who came in with me." He used every bit of his no-nonsense CEO tone. He rarely pulled it out, but at times like this it was necessary.
"Mr. Queen," she said very straightly, clearly used to bossy, recalcitrant patients, "you can threaten me all you like, but you won't be any use to her if you hurt yourself."
Oliver immediately deflated, sagging back against the bed. "Is…" he swallowed nervously. "Is she all right?"
"I can have her doctor come in and speak to you."
"Please," Oliver said, heading straight from belligerence to pleading.
"Your friend is with her now. I'll tell him you're awake and send him down, all right?" She came toward him, although still a bit warily. "Now let's get you back in bed."
Oliver didn't really have any choice. It was either let her help, or fall on the floor, and as angry as it made him, the nurse was right. He couldn't help Chloe if he was a mess himself.
After a few infuriating minutes of the woman glaring, clucking, and fussing over him, she had the equipment reattached and she left the room, he supposed on her way to Chloe's. If she wasn't then he still had every intention of buying the hospital and firing her. He had half a mind to just rip everything back off and follow her, but doubted it would be a very successful endeavor.
Oliver was just about to drift off again, when the door to his room burst open. He'd been hoping for Bart or Victor or AC, but what he got was Clark Kent, and right behind him, Lois Lane, who was the very last person on earth he wanted to see at the moment.
"How are you, Ol-" Clark started only to be cut off by Hurricane Lois.
"What were you thinking, Ollie? Chloe's been shot! How could you let this happen?"
Strident was a mild word for what Lois' voice sounded like at the moment, and Oliver decided it would be a very bad idea to remind her that he'd been shot as well.
"Lois, I didn't mean-"
"You didn't mean for this to happen?" she snapped. "Is that what you're going to tell me? Because that's not gonna fly right now. You're…" she paused, at least having enough control not to scream that he was Green Arrow in the middle of a busy hospital, "who you are, and you couldn't protect her?"
"Lois." Clark stepped closer, putting a hand on her arm in an attempt to quell the storm, but if Oliver had to guess, Lois had been building up to this for however long she'd known Chloe was hurt and there would be no stopping until she'd let it out.
"I count on you, Oliver. You have one job and one job only as far as I'm concerned and that's to make sure my cousin doesn't get hurt even though she works for you in your crazy... business. You spend a billion dollars on your toys and your stupid projects, but you couldn't keep Chloe-"
"I'm sorry," Oliver said quietly.
That seemed to bring her up short. "What?"
"You're right and I'm sorry," he said, especially since she was saying everything that he'd been thinking already. He had set himself up as a protector of the city and he couldn't even protect one slip of a woman who had depended on him to keep her safe. "Is… how is she?"
"She should be ok," Clark offered kindly. "The worst damage was to her lung, but they repaired it and she's doing better. She's still not awake, though."
Oliver nodded, fairly certain that if he tried to say anything, it would come out sounding like a freaked teenage girl.
"Oliver, what happened?" Clark finally asked.
Oliver cleared his throat and shifted on the bed, mostly out of a desire to do anything other than be interrogated by these two. His side protested sharply and he had to hold in a gasp. He closed his eyes and held very still.
"You ok?" Lois asked, somewhat grudgingly if he was any judge.
"I'll be fine," he answered through gritted teeth. "As for what happened…" Oliver shook his head. "I have no clue. We were at this little breakfast joint, down this dumpy little side street. No one should have known we were even there. When we were done, we went outside, and right away, it was like we were being watched. I just had that feeling." Clark nodded in understanding. "I pushed Chloe behind me, and then, Bob's your uncle, someone started taking shots at us. The first one hit me and…" he took a deeper breath, ignoring the well-deserved pain it caused, "and went through and got Chloe. We ran for cover and that's it."
"You didn't see anyone?" Clark pressed.
"I saw a shadow in a window across the street, and a muzzle flash. After I realized Chloe was hurt…" He did his best to ignore another death glare from Lois. "I didn't care about anything other than getting her out of there. We came out of the alley, but whoever took the shot was already gone."
The three were silent, going over the information in their minds. "Anyone in particular you've ticked off lately, Ollie?" Lois asked.
"You know me," he answered with a tight smile. "I'm a friend to one and all."
"As long as they're female," she muttered in return.
Clark, ever the Boy Scout, quickly stepped in before Lois could work herself back up again. "Give me a description of which apartment it was and I'll go see if I can find anything."
"We'll both go," Lois chimed in, giving Clark a quick glare for not including her.
Oliver nodded and quickly described the building and the window where he'd seen the shooter. "Thanks."
"We'll let you know," Clark replied. "Come on, Lois. We should let him rest," he added and began ushering her out.
"I've got my eye on you, Queen," she said as a parting shot.
"Wouldn't have it any other way," he responded brightly. As soon as they were gone, however, he sank back onto the bed, lost in weary thought.
Someone had tried to kill him. Most people he came across were either very dumb, meaning they pulled a gun and tried to shoot him point blank, or very wily, people like Tess and her Checkmate buddies, or Lex. They came at him, but in roundabout ways. It was new and different for someone to pay what amounted to a sniper.
Whoever it was, they'd made a fatal mistake, two in fact. They may have meant to kill him, but they hadn't managed to get the job done, worse, they'd hurt Chloe instead. Oliver had a lot of flaws, but allowing someone he cared about to be hurt because of him? That he would not allow to go unpunished.
Chapter Four