Patience (2/?)
“Sounds good. Get some sleep later on hey? Gunna be a long night for me so don’t bother waiting up. Oh and Warrick just called Tina she’s on her way over.”
“Tell him I said thanks.”
“Alright, I’ll talk to you later on. And be careful Stephanie, the idiots that did this are still out there.”
“Alright, Love you.”
“Love you too.” And with that the line went dead, leaving me alone in the dark room again. The house was silent other then the sound of Quinn at the foot of the bed snoring. Pushing myself up from the bed she lifted her head to look at me as if trying to tell me that it was bed time.
Normally I was just getting home from work right about now and getting ready for bed just in time for Nick to get home and crawl into bed with me. At least that was the way it had worked since Warrick had gotten me the job at the Mirage. And then we both managed to get a little sleep before Isabella was up and ready to play. It was so hard to believe though that soon enough she would be off to Kindergarten and in school all the time. On one hand that wasn’t a bad thing because it meant that Nicky might get some more sleep then he did now but on the other hand it meant that my little girl was growing up and that was one thing I wasn’t ready to face yet.
Pulling on a hooded sweatshirt over the over sized t-shirt that I was wearing; I slid on a pair of jeans trying to rub the sleep from my eyes as I headed for the living room. Not much had changed since I’d met Nicky, the house still stood as it had before Isabella and I moved in other than the toys scattered across the floor, drawings on the fridge and coloring book page cut outs. I’d turned my house back over to my mother upon moving in with Nicky and she was beginning to enjoy coming to visit. The nice thing about being here was that Warrick and Tina were only a few blocks away incase something came up, and both were more then willing to take on Isabella when they needed to.
The light knock on the front door told me that Tina had made better then normal time. Pulling it open I offered a smile. “Sorry about this.”
“No, don’t worry about it, Warrick explained it, I completely understand.” Her bright smile came as a comfort.
****
“Stephanie?” Greg’s voice was hoarse as he spoke bringing tears to my eyes again. I had just gotten them to stop after seeing him.
“It’s me Greggo.” Gently taking one of his hands in mine, I couldn’t help but let a few tears fall. In the last year, Greg had become one of my best friends, and seeing him like this killed me. His swollen eyes hardly opened, badly scraped and beaten face and lack of mobility broke my heart. “Nicky called when he found out what happened.”
“I figured as much.”
“Don’t talk Greg. I know it’s hard for you, but don’t talk.”
*****
“He’s going to be alright Nicky.” I was sure by now exhaustion was beginning to set into my voice.
“Good. Bastards deserve to fry for this.” It was rare that Nicky lost his temper but when he did, there was a price to be paid for it, and this was going to be one of them, I could already tell.
“You coming home soon?” I knew what the answer was going to be but I hoped for another one.
“No, I wish I was, I promise Isabella a trip to the park today, hope she understands.” That was one of the things that I truly loved about Nicky, it didn’t matter what kind of case he was up to his neck in, he was still worried about what Isabella would think.
“I’ll take her, don’t worry about it. Work happens, we both know that. Grissom was just getting there when I left.”
“mmmmm no surprise there.” It was obvious that Nick’s mind was going a thousand miles an hour and he wasn’t really listening.
“Listen Nicky I think I’m going to get some sleep.” I resisted the urge to add , since you aren’t listening anyways.
“Alright, tell Izzy that I’m sorry for me hey?” Well at least he remembered that part of the conversation. It wasn’t that I blamed him for being a little out of it but it was a little irritating when he was like this.
“Yea, I’ll take her out for Ice Cream, take her to the park, maybe if she’s good we’ll stop at build a bear and see if we cant find something for her.” There were only so many ways to pick up a little girl’s spirits when her Daddy couldn’t be around, and this was one of them.
“I’m sorry Stephanie, if it was anyone but Greg, I’d be there, I promise.”
“I know Nicky. When we started this relationship we knew there’d be days like this.”
“I know, I still feel bad though. But listen Warrick just walked in so I’ll let you go so you can get some sleep. I’ll try to be home as soon as I can.”
“Alright, love you.” Flipping the phone shut I was left with the silence of the house again. The clock on the tv box said that it was already 6 am. That was late enough that I could get a couple of hours of sleep before Isabella woke up at 9 am wanting to play.
However I also knew what any little noises in the house would wake me up without Nicky around, it was going to be a long few hours but I’d struggle through it. After all did I really have a choice but to right now? If it wasn’t for Greg, I wouldn’t be so cool with it but for Greg I’d let it go.