Lance woke up to the ringing of the phone. "Hello?" he said, groggily.
"Lance?" he heard.
"Justin? What time is it?"
"It's 4:30. You need to come to Charter Hospital. Now."
"What?" Lance asked, awake, and sitting up. "Why? Did one of the guys get in a wreck?"
"No. Mina got a call, telling her to come to the E.R. She just called back. Lance," Justin paused, hesitant. "Lance, they found Jamie off the side of the road, a couple miles out of town. She'd been stabbed, and she's in critical condition, and falling quickly. You need to get down here now."
Lance hung up the phone, and threw on some clothes. Grabbing his keys, he ran out the door, and got into his car.
Beeps, and noises came from every different direction, as Lance ran down the hall, dodging nurses, doctors and patients. He came to a halt infront of room 934, and stood outside. Mina Timberlake turned around. (I'll bet you like this, huh, Mina?)
"Lance." She looked him in the eye. "You're going to need to sit down."
They walked into the waiting room, nearby. Lance sat down, then looked up at Justin's wife, expectantly.
Mina sighed. "Ok. Someone found Jamie lying on the side of the road. She had been stabbed repeatedly in the upper chest. Her right arm is also broken. She's got a concussion. The good news is, that we've gotten her stablized."
Lance stared at her, as though she was speaking a foreign language.
As he started to get up, Mina held out her hand. "Wait. They're finishing up some tests. You'll be able to see her in a few minutes."
"What kind of tests?" Lance asked.
"We think that she was raped. And she might be pregnant, also. We're taking every precaution. Just to be on the safe side. I'm sorry."
Lance put his head in his hands, as Mina walked away. A hand was put on his shoulder, and Lance looked up to see Justin.
"Yo," Justin said, sadly.
"Hi."
"The guys are on their way down," Justin told him. "Even JC. He decided he'd rather not get sleep."
When Lance didn't crack a smile, Justin sighed, and sat next to his long-time friend.
"I mean, I just don't know," Lance spoke up. "I've been so careful. Bringing her up, so that way she wouldn't be in any danger."
"You couldn't help this, man. It's not your fault."
"She might be pregnant, J," Lance said, looking up. "That's what I've really tried to protect her from. I don't want her to give her life up, because of getting pregnant. I want her to have the life that Emily didn't."
"I know you do, Lance, I know you do."
"Lance?" spoke a voice. It was Candy, Joey's wife. She held her white persian cat, Cocoa. "We brought Cocoa? Maybe it'll help Jamie feel better?"
Lance hated the way Candy spoke, always turning the end of every sentence into a question.
"Thanks, Candy."
Joey sat next to Justin, and muttered, "Everywhere we go. I'm serious. It's bugging me."
"What?"
"Everytime we go out, some guy comes up, and goes, 'Oh, look, it's the girl who was the Playboy Bunny for January!' I'm sick of it," Joey grumbled.
Justin sighed. "Oh well. You shouldn't have married a girl who posed for Playboy. But we've got more important things to worry about, right now, Joey."
"I know."
A throat cleared a couple minutes later, and everyone looked up to see Mina. She looked at the floor. "We got the results back."
"And?" Lance asked, slowly.
"First of all, she was badly raped, too. She looks like she was beaten with a bat, internally. She's ripped up. It's gonna take a while. And . . . "
Lance eyes flashed toward the tiled floor. He didn't want to hear what he knew was coming.
"Jamie is pregnant."