Chapter Text
On the island, split second decisions had been the difference between life and death, and there had never been time to worry about the moral implications. That had always come later. But Oliver already hated himself for what he was about to do.
There was only one way off this roof that would ensure his safety and his identity. One way to survive.
Oliver grabbed hold of Laurel with one arm, pulling her back against his chest. She was rigid, and he could feel the hammering of her heart. Fear. He had broken the precarious trust she’d placed in the Hood once again.
Lance’s eyes burned with rage. “You so much as leave a bruise on her, and I swear I will drag you down to hell myself.”
“Laurel, I’m sorry.”
With a slight shove, he turned with one arm already pointing his bow to shoot a grapple hook arrow — but in the same instant the shot rang out.
Louder to his ears was the punch of air that left Laurel as she staggered back into him with the force of it. Oliver felt his heart stop as his arm came round her once more, this time to hold her up.
There had been the crack of a bone. He couldn’t tell if there was blood. What kind of bullet had Lance let his men use?
“Laurel,” he breathed, watching her eyelids flutter in response.
An anguished wail left Lance, and he teetered forward and back on his feet before whirling around and snarling at his own task force. “Guns down! Who fired?”
Another split second decision, this time with someone else’s life in the balance.
Oliver pushed the consequences to the back of his mind and spun Laurel around, encouraging her to get her good arm around his neck. She clung on as if by instinct. Then he jumped with her in his hold.
The shouting of Lance and the other officers was lost in the wind rushing past his ears. Once he regained his feet, Oliver scooped Laurel’s legs up with his other arm and broke into a run. The pained whimper that left her at the sudden movement tore at his heart. This was all his fault. He should’ve been more careful. What sort of monster was he that he’d been willing to gamble her life?
“I’m sorry,” he said again in the Hood’s voice, hardly a comfort. Oliver frowned and refocused on moving forward.
He could get her to a hospital faster than all of them, and he was loathe to trust any of them with her at the moment.
But they would never let him leave once he relinquished Laurel.
Only a split second to decide.
He changed course, activating his comm and praying that Diggle was listening.
“Get the medical supplies ready.”
“Oliver? What the hell happened to you?”
“It’s not for me.” Laurel’s breathing was growing shallower by the minute. It was possible she was entering shock. He couldn’t stop to treat her for that, not when every cop in the city was bound to be looking for them soon.
But he was unwilling to let it go without trying to reach her and keep her grounded. “You have to remain calm.”
Laurel’s breathing only seemed to pick up, and her face turned from him. Right, he terrified people like this. The Hood was the last person anyone would want at their figurative bedside.
He didn’t think Oliver Queen was much better. But he had to try.
With a soft beep he deactivated the voice modulator. “Stay with me, Laurel. Please.”
There was a hitch in her breath and then her head fell back, looking up at him.
“...Ollie?”
Without the modulator, he couldn’t hope to hide the tremble in his voice. “I’m so sorry.”
He wasn’t really sure if she was seeing him. Her eyes remained wide and shocked as he rounded the final corner into the alley behind the Verdant. Oliver took the last few steps at an even faster run.
“Just a bit farther. It’s gonna be alright.”
Digg was waiting at the exam table, but he looked up as soon as Oliver cleared the stairs.
“Oh, hell.”
“Not now, John. Please.” He laid Laurel on the table and pushed the hood back from his face. “Help me.”
Diggle held his gaze for a long moment. “Pass me the scissors. Need to get at her shoulder.”
---
John did exactly as he had always done in Afghanistan: work quietly and quickly. Oliver was much too tense for conversation as it was, and truthfully he wasn’t much better.
Laurel Lance’s gunshot wound wasn’t a penetration. From what he could feel, she had a clavicle fracture. Rubber bullet, most likely. It wouldn’t need surgery, though she was going to need some work to regain the full use of her left arm. Better that than a few inches to the left and a shot to the face that would have had much more potential to be lethal.
She’d lost consciousness, for which he was a little grateful. Oliver didn’t put much stock in painkillers, so they didn’t have much on hand. They’d want to save it for when she woke up.
But soon enough he was laying down the leftover supplies from the makeshift splint he’d crafted and stripping the gloves off his hands, the silence in the base growing heavier by the minute. He drew in a breath, then asked at last, “Oliver, what were you thinking? What happened?”
There was no immediate answer. Oliver seemed to be taking some time to gather his thoughts. He’d found a jacket to drape over Laurel in her sleep, the closest thing they had to a blanket down here, and John watched him take care not to touch her shoulder as he tucked it around her. Oliver brushed some of her hair back behind her ear, his expression utterly unreadable. Finally he took a step back and looked up.
“It was an ambush. Lance must have figured out how we were meeting, and he brought his whole task force.”
John wiped some of the sweat from his forehead. Sometimes he didn’t know how Oliver got himself into or out of these situations. “And how does that end up with an innocent woman shot? Lance’s daughter shot?”
Something crossed over Oliver’s face, darkening his expression. “The only way to get off the roof was to place her between me and them. But when I pushed her towards Lance someone must have had their finger resting on the trigger, and the sudden movement…” He trailed off, but John could gather the rest.
“So what made you bring her here?”
Oliver looked at him as though he’d just spouted pure insanity. “It was one of Lance’s men who shot her. I couldn’t leave her there. And I wouldn’t have been able to get out of the hospital without being arrested.”
It might not have been impossible, but he could see the difficulty. John looked down at Laurel Lance. They had very few options and very little time to act, but some things needed to be decided now.
“Are we letting her wake up here? Cause if we do, she knows everything,” he pointed out, no doubt needlessly. Oliver crossed his arms tight, as if trying to hold in the rising panic at what his actions had caused. “If you help me get her in the car, I can drive her to a hospital.”
But Oliver was already shaking his head. “There’s no way to explain how you or I would have found her. Lance saw the Hood take her, so that would put me right back in the station.”
“Right, and now he’s got kidnapping to add to his list of charges.”
“I’d like to add reckless endangerment to a list of his crimes,” Oliver growled. “What was he thinking, John? The only daughter he has left could have been killed tonight and all for his obsession.”
“Some people are willing to do whatever it takes when they’re on a mission,” he said, his voice carefully light.
Judging by the look Oliver sent him, the double meaning wasn’t missed.
He plowed ahead anyway. “But seeing as she is his daughter, what’s to stop her from telling him the truth whenever she wakes up? She’s gonna have the power to end this whole thing, Oliver. To end both of us.”
Oliver shook his head. “That’s not something Laurel would do.”
“Yeah, well I’d feel more confident about that if you hadn’t just got her shot.”
He watched Oliver frown and pace away, grabbing up his change of clothes to finally shed the Hood’s suit.
When he returned, he was scrolling through his phone with an even deeper frown.
“Missed calls?”
“Yeah, about twenty. Tommy, mom, Thea — hold on.”
The phone had started buzzing in Oliver’s hand, and he placed it up to his ear. “Hello?”
There was a pause where John thought he could hear the chatter of Oliver’s sister on the other end.
“Speedy, slow down. What?” He glanced down to Laurel and briefly touched her still hand. “That’s… horrible,” Oliver said, seemingly struggling for the right word for a moment. “Of course, I’ll head right down. I’ll be careful. Love you.”
“So what’s going on?” John asked once he’d hung up.
“There’s a search being organized for Laurel. And a manhunt for the Hood. Lance is on the warpath.” He gave Laurel’s hand another squeeze and looked up. “I have to go join the search.”
“Something tells me you’re not planning to be too helpful.”
Oliver gave him a dry look. “Considering I’m trying not to prove I’m the Hood, that would be the idea. Text me the minute she wakes up, please. Or if anything about her condition changes.”
“Right.”
Oliver turned to go, but stopped and looked back. “John, I — thank you.”
John nodded. There wasn’t anything that needed to be said. Whether or not he agreed with what had happened tonight didn’t matter; they were in this together regardless.
He sighed as the door shut behind Oliver, and he settled into the chair in front of the computer. From this position he could keep an eye on their patient without being uncomfortably close. No doubt she’d be disoriented enough upon waking already.
John considered their options going forward. Everything hinged on whether or not Laurel Lance considered the Hood an enemy or still her friend. Or perhaps it mattered how she considered Oliver more.
He had wondered from time to time if it might be better that some of the people in Oliver’s life knew the truth. It would lessen the constant demands on his time, anyway. And he knew the longer he isolated himself, the longer it’d take for him to come back from those years on the island. John himself had only just started feeling like a part of the world again after Afghanistan, and he had Carly in his life. A.J., too, even if his nephew wasn’t quite old enough to fully understand why Andy had never come home from the war.
But none of what John had done was technically illegal...
Laurel was a gamble but she was perhaps still the best option for who could find out first. She’d proved willing to work with the Hood multiple times, unlike the rest of Oliver’s circle who seemed convinced the vigilante was a dangerous lunatic. She was close to Oliver without being an actual family member John knew he couldn’t stand to lose. And with her in the know, perhaps she’d be less of a distraction that led to mistakes like tonight’s events.
Finding himself cautiously optimistic, John leaned back in his chair to wait. It was all they could do now.
---
Quentin was about ready to rip his hair out. How could the night he’d planned to catch that damn vigilante have gone any worse?
He’d had him. He’d had him in his sights. Then the bastard had grabbed Laurel, and he’d felt his heart stop. Only things hadn’t ended there.
One of his officers, one of his own, had shot his daughter. Starling’s supposed finest. He still couldn’t believe it.
It had all felt like some horrible nightmare where things had kept spiraling out of his control. He should’ve never taken his eyes off her. That had been a rookie mistake. As it was, that Hood had had Laurel off the roof and down onto the streets below before Quentin could do so much as turn and run to the edge. They’d disappeared in the shadows between two buildings as he’d screamed her name.
Pike had been about as furious as Lance had ever heard him when he’d called in the botched operation and requested more forces to begin canvassing the area. He’d deal with that later; right now, it was his own rage and fear he had to keep in check.
Pike’s new superior Captain Stein’s first and foremost demand had been to allow the reporters who had swarmed around the scene to believe that it was an arrow Laurel had been hit with and not a bullet. Damage control was always the first thing on the brass’s minds, none of them having learned from Nudocerdo’s mistakes, apparently. It didn’t sit well with Quentin; lying about the facts of a case never did. And he wanted justice for his daughter.
He’d see that officer thrown off the force whether the public knew why or not. As for the vigilante, he was starting to wonder if he should’ve put a bullet in him months ago. If he was willing to abduct Laurel, someone that for whatever reason believed he was some kind of force for good in this city, who knew what else he was capable of?
They’d found nothing in the immediate perimeter that had been set up. Now he stood over a map, outlining where the combined groups of police patrols and volunteers should look next. A couple of Laurel’s colleagues had come out, but nothing compared to the outpouring of aid from the Glades. Whole families had come up to him with stories from their time as Laurel’s clients. If he wasn’t so worried, he might have been proud.
But none were as much of a wreck —outwardly anyway — as Merlyn. He’d come screeching up to the edge of their perimeter and leapt out of his car before the engine was fully off.
“Detective Lance! I just saw the news. Have you found anything?”
He’d tossed his third cup of coffee and shook his head. “Not yet.”
“But why would he shoot her and then take her with him?” Merlyn had finally managed to get one of his gangly legs over the tape they had tied between two telephone poles and jogged the rest of the way to him. “I mean, I know he’s crazy, but that beats about anything yet.”
Quentin had looked him up and down, then stepped closer. “Look, uh, I’m gonna level with you. It was a misfire from an officer.”
Merlyn had reeled back. “The cops shot her?”
“Would you keep it down?” He’d growled. “It was a rubber bullet. Laurel wasn’t the target.”
“What was she even doing there?”
“She’s been talking to him. The Hood.”
Merlyn had frowned. “I told her he was dangerous.” Something had darkened in his expression. “When they catch him—”
“You’ll have to get in line. Now are you here to look or not?”
Merlyn had stuck by his elbow ever since, helping coordinate between the various groups. The organizational aspects seemed to keep him calmer, as calm as he could be given the circumstances.
“Is there a neighborhood he’s been spotted in more often than others? He’s gotta have some kind of home base, right?” Merlyn wondered aloud. “What if he ditched her out in the Glades somewhere? She’s totally defenseless.”
“We’ll comb the whole city if we have to—”
Anything else he’d been planning to say was drowned out by the motorcycle that came roaring down the street before stopping just beyond the police tape. Quentin scowled, though not as much as when he got a look at who the driver was. Oh Christ, and he’d been wondering if it could get worse.
“Queen, what the hell are you doing here?”
“Just saw the news and wanted to help join the search.”
“Yeah, you’re the last kind of help I need.”
Queen frowned, and his tone had a coldness Quentin hadn’t known he possessed as he replied, “Laurel is my friend, and the most important thing to me right now is that she is safe. I would have hoped that’s something we could agree on.”
“I know I can,” Merlyn said before Quentin could answer to that. He embraced his friend for a brief moment. “God, Ollie, you think she’s okay?”
“I have to believe that. But the longer we go without any news it seems less likely.
In this city, money talks.” He turned back towards Quentin. “I would like to pledge ten million dollars to anyone who comes forward with credible information about Laurel or the Hood.”
Quentin was glad he hadn’t been drinking his coffee. As it was, he was still left spluttering. “Ten million! For information?”
Queen’s serious expression never wavered. “Laurel is worth that and more.”
Merlyn gave a nervous laugh. “Yeah, but no one’s asking you to bankrupt yourself.”
“I lived without money for five years, Tommy. But I can’t go back to living without the people I care about.”
He and Merlyn exchanged a look, thrown by the blunt statement. Quentin cleared his throat and said, “Alright, well I can’t stop you. Are you actually gonna join this search or just throw money around?”
“I’d like to,” Queen said, his tone clipped.
“Go talk to Detective Hall, then. She could use another volunteer for her team.” As the younger man turned and left he thought he could feel the air grow less heavy. Quentin shook it off and turned back to his maps.
The hours continued to crawl by, and though calls increased as the news of Queen’s reward spread, none of it turned up anything useful. Slogging through each and every tip however legitimate was more likely to just slow them down.
Hilton approached him with another coffee and pursed lips. He knew his partner had something he wanted to say about everything that had gone down on that roof, but Quentin also knew he didn’t want to hear it.
“No word yet,” he muttered.
“Quentin, I think we gotta be honest with ourselves. He’s not gonna be wandering out on the streets for us to find.”
“I’m not giving up looking, Hilt—”
“I’m not saying you should,” his partner interrupted. “But we need to fix our strategy.”
“Alright. Well, what did you have in mind?”
“There’s been no ransom, no attempt at contact. Laurel has the only phone with a direct line to him,” Hilt said, looking to him for a nod to confirm. “We need to start a dialogue.”
“How do you wanna do that?”
“He’ll probably have an eye on the news to see what our next move is. I think it’d be best for you to address him directly.”
Quentin stood up straight. “You think I’m gonna negotiate with that nut job?”
Hilt’s gaze never wavered. “Your daughter was injured. She needs medical care, and the longer we wait the less likely that’s gonna happen.”
Quentin stared hard at the ground. He knew Hilt was right. No matter how badly he wanted to catch this vigilante, he needed Laurel back. Things had already gone badly enough once.
“The only thing we know for sure makes this guy tick is that he’s got ideas about justice. There’s no justice in taking Laurel. You gotta appeal to that.”
He tried not to scoff. “You think that’s really gonna work?”
“Well, we know he’s been willing to talk to you before. That means a part of him’s got to be willing to listen.”
Hilton got everything arranged. Before Quentin felt remotely ready Green from the nightly news was there with a cameraman, and some woman was pinning a mic to his lapel.
“We are on the scene live for the search both for Dinah Laurel Lance, a lawyer for the nonprofit CNRI, and the infamous Hood, who has — for the first time — taken a hostage,” Green stated to the camera a few paces away. “Detective Quentin Lance, who is leading the search as well as the SCPD’s anti-vigilante task force, has asked our network to broadcast this address to the vigilante himself.”
The woman who’d miced him cued him with the point of a finger.
Quentin squinted into the camera lens. “Alright, I’m gonna make this brief. You are and have always been a criminal since you showed your hood around here. I don’t want anyone thinking otherwise, especially after tonight. You’ve abducted an innocent woman. More than that, you’ve abducted my daughter. There’s not a lot of ways this can end for you.”
He drew in and let out a breath.
“But that’s not what the people of this city have come together for. The people who are out there right now searching and hoping for the safe return of one of our own. So I am asking you to turn Laurel Lance over to the nearest precinct. There will be no ambush. No armed officers. You bring her back and you have one night of immunity. I guarantee it. This is my daughter, and I just want her home.”
This felt all too familiar all of a sudden. Not that he’d ever done this, but he had watched years ago as a different father had pleaded on live television for Barton Mathis not to carry out his sick experiment on the latest woman he’d taken.
It hadn’t done any good. Quentin had found her one night later with Dollmaker’s usual adjustments. He’d broken the news to her family as gently as he knew how, but he remembered to this day the man’s sobs over her body in the morgue.
He could become one of those fathers. He could lose the only daughter he had left.
It felt very hard to breath, and whatever he’d meant to say next completely escaped him. “She’s my daughter,” he heard himself repeat. “I don’t know why you took her, what you want with her. If this is about me, then come after me. But not her.”
He could see it again, the way she’d fallen limply back into that lunatic’s arms.
“She needs a doctor. Please, just let her go. I don’t know if you’ve got a family or not. But she’s all I have. Please. I- I can’t—”
Quentin turned sharply away from the camera and the lights. He ripped the microphone off and shoved it at the assistant as he walked past. “I can’t,” he repeated hoarsely.
Behind him, he could hear Green speak again, but didn’t process the words. He was teetering somewhere on an edge, torn between his need to bury himself in the work and his desire for a stiff drink.
As he exited the ring of camera equipment he could feel a pair of eyes on him. Quentin looked up and somehow wasn’t surprised to see who it was waiting and watching.
“What is it, Queen?”
“I have to go home to arrange the reward with my mother and our bank.”
“Right. Fine.”
Queen hesitated, like he wanted to say something more. Quentin mustered up a glare to make it clear he better not. The billionaire finally gave a small shake of the head and headed back to his bike.
Good riddance. He’d be damned if the man who had gotten Sara killed somehow saved Laurel.
---
Laurel came to cold and stiff, with a dull, throbbing ache in her left shoulder that seemed to only grow worse the longer she lay there. She gave a small groan and could only seem to get one arm to cooperate as she pushed herself up from a metal table. A jacket she swore she’d seen before slipped off her onto her lap, and she stared at it dumbly.
“Try not to touch your left shoulder,” a familiar voice said, and Laurel gave a start as she looked up and met Mr. Diggle’s calm gaze. “The splint should be holding things in place, and the painkillers should be kicking in.”
“Painkillers…”
She noticed the sleeve of her shirt and jacket had been cut away to expose her shoulder, which had an angry red welt from what she could see of it under the splint. Laurel shrugged her way into the jacket for a bit of coverage, more for her own comfort than any mistrust of Mr. Diggle.
It smelled mostly of sweat, but also something familiar that had a strange calming effect considering she was in an unknown place with a man she was only tertiarily familiar with and no idea how any of it had happened.
It was slowly coming back to her; the rooftop, her father’s men pointing their guns at her and the Hood both, the shot and the shock of pain that had followed. Then things got hazier. She remembered being carried somewhere, the Hood’s voice transforming into Oliver’s midway through, and his eyes staring back at her from under the hood.
Slowly her eyes were taking in their surroundings. The tables lined with green-tipped arrows, a computer, a training mat and one of those workout ladders.
The air whooshed out of her in one soft, “Oh.”
Mr. Diggle drew in a breath. “Yeah. You get used to it.”
“Uh-huh.”
Oliver was the Hood. Oliver Queen, former playboy and the man who had broken her heart five years ago, was the vigilante who had been giving people in the city hope. Who had been giving her hope. She… she’d believed in him.
“Do you remember what happened to you?”
She appreciated the question, because it gave her mind something to focus on besides the shock. “I was shot. One of the task force members my father…” Laurel trailed off and shook her head, not wanting to believe it. “How could he?”
“I don’t know,” Mr. Diggle answered softly. “That splint should be enough to put the bone back into place, but it’s gonna take a while to fully heal.”
It occurred to her that he was apologizing. Laurel shook her head.
“That’s okay. Um, do you have some water?”
He nodded and went to get her a cup. Laurel managed to swing her legs over the side of the table to sit up properly by the time he was back, though her left side was throbbing even more in protest. She accepted the drink with a quiet thanks and sipped at it, letting her eyes take in the whole space for a second time.
“Where’s Oliver?”
“Went to go join the search for you,” Mr. Diggle answered. “I let him know you’re awake, though, so he’ll find a reason to come back.”
“The search?”
“Police saw you get taken away by the Hood. They’re saying you’re his hostage.”
Something that didn’t quite sound like a laugh bubbled up and escaped her.
“Here,” Mr. Diggle said, passing her his phone. “You don’t have to take my word for it.”
He’d pulled up a news site running what they were calling a breaking news story. Hood Takes Hostage, the banner at the bottom read. Seeing her own photo displayed along with a hotline number for anyone to call who had information on her whereabouts was bizarre to say the least.
“Oh God.” Laurel set the phone aside and placed her hand on her forehead. “This is a mess.”
He didn’t disagree.
A door somewhere above them opened and Laurel looked around as Oliver entered whatever place they were in. He stopped at the bottom of the steps as he met her eyes.
There was a look in them, an intensity she until now had only been able to guess at. Now she could only wonder how she hadn’t seen it.
Except she had, hadn’t she?
“So… when you said you couldn’t be some vigilante, that was a lie.”
Oliver looked down, then slowly crossed the room to her table. “How are you feeling?”
“About as good as getting shot feels.”
A pained look flickered across his face. “I’m sorry. I never meant for this to happen to you.”
“It’s not your fault,” Laurel replied.
“The police were after me, not you,” he insisted.
She shook her head. “Ollie, the first rule of firearms is you never point at a target unless you’re prepared to take the shot. Even if just with rubber. They were ready and willing to shoot me.”
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Mr. Diggle nod in agreement.
“Anyway, I knew the risks.”
“I didn’t want to take those risks with you,” said Oliver.
Laurel felt the corner of her mouth lift in a wry smile. “Well, it’s a little late for that. So… what happens now?”
Oliver exchanged a look with Mr. Diggle, then drew in a breath. “You know my secret.”
“Yes.”
There was a long pause.
“I think he’s trying to ask how you’re feeling about it,” Mr. Diggle finally said. She couldn’t quite suppress a smirk while Ollie fidgeted.
“I guess a part of me knew. I would have preferred you just admitted it when I asked you, but here we are.”
“Here we are,” Oliver echoed.
“Ollie, I agreed with what the Hood has been doing. I wouldn’t have worked with you if I didn’t. Knowing it’s you doesn’t change that. If anything — well, it’s nice to know I can contact you as easily as you could me.”
He was staring at her like he couldn’t quite believe she was real. “You want to work with me.”
“Yes,” she said, dragging the word out slightly. “I’ve been working with you, if you haven’t noticed. And you’re my friend. If you needed help, all you had to do was ask.”
“But the Hood’s — I mean I — Laurel, I’ve killed people.” For whatever reason, he seemed frustrated with her. “I’m not a good person.”
“No, you’re a good person trying to do good things who has not always used good methods.” Laurel leaned a bit to the side, as much as her shoulder would allow, to try and catch his eyes which were determinedly stuck to the floor. “If you weren’t a good person, you wouldn’t have returned the money Adam Hunt stole to his victims. Or intervened in Peter Declan’s case. Or helped get justice for Joanna’s brother and the other firefighters. You are more than just a killer, Ollie.”
He finally lifted his gaze, and Laurel felt a pain somewhere in her chest at the doubt that she saw there. This was what he had meant when he’d told her of the damage he didn’t want his loved ones to see. It was not the physical scars from the island he carried, but the things he’d had to learn and to do there to make it back to them. Things he could have chosen to leave behind and live out a comfortable life, but instead was using to make their city a better place for everyone.
“No one can get it right all of the time — not even the cops do,” she remarked with chagrin. Laurel then slid off the table and took a step towards him. “But I believed in the Hood, and I believe in you, too.”
Slowly, she wrapped her good arm around his middle and tucked her head under his chin, the best approximation of a hug she could manage at the moment. Oliver didn’t move away, but he stood still for a long moment. So long it had her holding her breath wondering if she’d done the wrong thing. But then, his arms came around her, one hand cupping the back of her head, and she felt as well as heard the shuddering breath he released in time with her own.
She’d asked the Hood once if the life he’d chosen to lead made him lonely. It was clear to her now that Oliver was.
Laurel stood there as long as she dared, until the throbbing in her shoulder was too much to ignore. She pulled back and couldn’t stop herself from reaching a hand up to touch the spot. When she darted a guilty look in Mr. Diggle’s direction, however, she found him smiling.
Oliver had focused in on her injury. “We really do need to get you to a hospital. Digg’s work is good, but you should have a professional look at it.”
“I know. But can it wait? Just a little,” she added as he frowned. “I just know the minute I’m checked in somewhere my father will show up, and after what happened tonight I’m not sure I can face him right now.”
“Of course,” Oliver said, voice soft. “Laurel, I’m so sorry he did this to you.”
“It’s not your fault,” she repeated. “I just, um, I guess I wish I could be surprised.” Laurel looked up, the smile she attempted wobbly at best, and found Oliver’s eyes swimming with remorse.
“Well, while you’re here, why don’t we give you the tour?” Mr. Diggle suggested.
She turned to him, grateful for the distraction. “Sure. Where even is here?”
“We’re under the club,” said Oliver.
“Wait, really?” They both nodded and she gave a slight shake of the head, trying to reorient herself. “Is that why you’re opening it?”
“More or less.”
“Well, I hope you have somewhere to stash all of this when you get inspected.”
Oliver’s face scrunched up in confusion, and Laurel stared at him. He couldn’t really not realize — but then he asked, “What inspection?”
“The building inspection? Ollie, you have to get everything about your place of business approved by the zoning board before you open. Now I’m sure there’s an inspector or two on the payroll who would take a bribe, but that’ll come back to bite you if anybody bothers looking into your finances.”
She watched Oliver and Mr. Diggle exchange a look.
“We- we’re looking into some options.”
“Right,” she said, unconvinced.
She was shown the basic layout of the place, not that there was too much down here. Even still, it was the Hood’s base. Oliver’s base. His eyes kept going to her shoulder, and Laurel knew she couldn’t delay getting it looked at by a real doctor forever.
Mr. Diggle was the one to help her into the back of a plain black car with tinted windows. He dropped her off at the mouth of an alley just two blocks from the hospital. Laurel walked herself right into the waiting room of the ER and up to the desk.
“Hi, I was hoping someone could look at my shoulder.”
“Alright, if you could fill out this—” the rest of the receptionist’s words died on his lips as he looked up. “Oh my God, it’s you!”
“Um, yeah. I’m not missing anymore.” If she could’ve shrugged, she probably would have. “And I’m not sure I really ever was.”
---
Tommy cursed under his breath as he rounded yet another corner of the parking garage and found no open spaces. He nearly reached the roof before he was able to park and took the stairs rather than wait for the elevator.
There wasn’t a helpful flashing sign pointing out Laurel’s room, so he threw himself at the first help desk he could find.
“I’m here to see Laurel Lance.”
“Are you family?”
“I’m her boyfriend. Please? I haven’t slept all night. And I brought her pajamas and a change of clothes.”
The woman at the desk relented with a sigh. “Down to the left, third room.”
Tommy flashed her as winning of a smile as he could manage while exhausted. “Thank you.”
He should have realized which room was hers from the start judging by the officer stationed outside it. He was allowed past with little fuss and found Laurel sitting up in the bed in a hospital gown and a strange white sling that crossed over both shoulders, her father and a doctor and nurse all standing to the sides.
“Hey.”
Laurel turned to him and managed a brief smile. “Hey. I didn’t know you were coming.”
“Of course I was.” He walked forward and placed the bag in the currently vacant visitor’s chair, then leaned in to press a kiss to her lips. “I was worried sick about you.” Tommy looked back up to the doctor. “How’s she doing?”
“Better than we would have expected. Physical therapy is still highly recommended, of course, but her injury was very competently treated in a short amount of time.”
Tommy didn’t know how that was possible. “By who?”
“The Hood,” Lance said, practically a growl. “He made some sling out of scraps and put it on my daughter.”
“Your daughter who is awake and here and does not like being talked about as if she is not in the room,” Laurel added pointedly.
Lance grimaced. “We’ll, uh, we’ll leave you to get changed, honey.”
They all shuffled out and shut the door behind them. The nurse continued down the corridor, but Lance snagged the doctor’s arm before he could get away.
“Listen, is there anything you can tell me about her injuries or the job he did? I mean what kind of training would somebody have to do one of those splints?”
Tommy felt both his eyebrows raise. He hadn’t even realized there was something to be learned about the Hood from all this, but he guessed that’s why Lance had the badge.
The doctor hesitated. “Well, one thing I suppose you should know, Detective, is that the police report cannot be correct. Your daughter’s wound wasn’t inflicted by an arrow. I’d say it’s likely to have been from a rubber bullet.”
“Alright, alright, but what about him? The Hood? Is there anything we can use to narrow down just who this guy is?”
“Laurel didn’t have anything?” Tommy couldn’t help asking.
Lance scowled. “She’s not talking if she does.”
“She’s still sticking up for this guy? He got her shot,” Tommy said. He couldn’t believe how stubborn Laurel was about this lunatic in their city. He couldn’t believe she’d been meeting him in secret either.
“Yeah, well, that’s why we’ll have to make do with what we can find out on our own. So, doctor—”
The door to Laurel’s room flew open to reveal her standing there fully clothed and seething.
“I cannot believe you two. After what just happened last night?”
Tommy exchanged a panicked look with her father and decided to allow him to try first.
“Laurel—”
“My body is not a crime scene!” She glared at each of them in turn before rounding on the doctor. “I didn’t sign any sort of release of information waiver, and my status as a legal adult means my father is not entitled to it even if he is on the force. So I’d suggest you think real hard about whether you want a lawsuit or not.”
She retreated back into her room with the slam of a door, leaving a very uncomfortable silence in her wake.
“I guess visiting hours are over?” Tommy joked weakly.
“I would suggest that you gentlemen return home for the time being,” said the doctor. “Visitation will reopen later in the morning.”
Lance didn’t look to like that much more than Tommy did, but before either of them could say anything, Laurel’s door was opening again, and this time she had her coat and bag.
“Laurel, what are you doing?” Her father asked.
“I’m discharging myself.”
“That wouldn’t be a course of action I recommend,” the doctor began.
“Well, I don’t really give a damn what any of you think right now.” She strode past them all down the corridor, heading for the elevators.
“Laurel!” Tommy had to jog to catch up with her quick march. “Laurel, wait, please. I brought the car.”
She did have to wait for the elevator, so he was able to catch up. He could tell she wanted to cross her arms but couldn’t due to her bad shoulder.
“Look, I’m sorry. But do you get that we were worried? You were missing for hours. And that Hood, he- he took you.” Something churned unpleasantly in his gut at the thought. He’d never liked the vigilante’s interest in Laurel, and this had been a step way too far in his book.
Laurel relaxed somewhat as they got into the elevator. “I’m sorry you had to go through that, but it doesn’t change the fact that my father went over the line last night and still is. I have four weeks of physical therapy to look forward to because of him, not the Hood.”
Tommy thought he could argue the point that Laurel wouldn’t have even been on that roof without the Hood, but the doors opened out to the level he was parked on and they walked to the car in silence.
As they left the parking garage, Laurel sat up in surprise at all the news crews parked outside the front entrance.
“What are they doing here?”
“Probably hoping to get in for an interview,” he answered, tone clipped. “The whole thing was on TV.”
Laurel seemed to notice his mood and fell silent. They didn’t speak all the way back, not until they’d finally gotten into the apartment.
“So,” Tommy began as he hung up his coat. “Are we going to talk about it?”
“About what?”
He shook his head. “Laurel, you cancelled on me because you said you had work. Next thing I know, you’ve been kidnapped in a standoff with the Hood.”
She winced. “Tommy, I’m sorry. It was about a case. Cyrus Vanch—”
“No, Laurel, the Hood is not work, okay? Vigilantes are not your coworkers. You were hurt, and it could have been so much worse. And as much as you want to blame your dad, you were the one who went to that rooftop!”
He regretted the outburst almost immediately, and the stricken look on Laurel’s face only made matters worse.
“Look, just promise me you’re not gonna put yourself in a position where that lunatic can get to you again, okay?”
“Tommy—”
“Please, Laurel.”
She looked down. “Nothing like that is going to happen again. I promise.”
He felt himself relax and leaned in to kiss her forehead. “Okay, what do we need to do to get you ready for sleep?”
Laurel was able to do most of the work changing her clothes for pajamas. It was just the one sleeve she had trouble with, apparently, and he had a feeling it was only due to her exhaustion that she let him help. Because of the risk of further hurting her shoulder, he was going to be spending his nights the next few weeks in the guest room. A great feeling considering he’d only recently been allowed his own drawer in the bedroom.
The one thing Tommy could console himself with was that it was all over, and Laurel was safe. In time, her shoulder would heal. Maybe now their lives could get back to some kind of normal.