I really really wish I had more time to write. Thanks to everyone for being so patient.

"You're making everyone nervous with the pacing." Tank did not utter the statement quietly and heads turned in my and Hector's direction. We were systematically wearing a groove into the old linoleum of the waiting area and it apparently had everyone on edge.

"I asked you to send them home," I replied as I passed by him once again.

As expected, Tank scoffed. "Yeah, right. You know as well as I do not one of these men will leave this hospital until word comes that your wife is fine. And even then, some won't go until they see for themselves." His eyes darted to Hector, following in my wake, and then to Zip, Gabriel and Lester who were in the closest chairs.

I did know that and normally it would ease any anxiety knowing there was a whole building full of men who looked out for the well-being of my wife, but right now it wasn't working, and I hated to show any type of weakness. I was feeling angry and helpless and didn't want any of them to witness it.

A commotion sounding from the hallway leading to the hospital's interior stopped my response and had all of us instinctively reaching for our weapons.

Michael burst into the waiting room with a clearly exacerbated and flustered nurse on his heels. "Stop! Stop! You must sign the paperwork if you're going to leave against medical advice!"

This wasn't unexpected. I was surprised Michael lasted as long as he had before trying to escape. He wasn't a fan of hospitals or doctors not to mention all the paperwork involved with both. He'd spent close to nine months in one after we recused him from the jungle, so I understood his reservations. But I wouldn't let him leave if I wasn't sure he was fine.

I heard Gabe and Hector sigh simultaneously as I stepped in front of Stephanie's fleeing guardian Angel. "I'm good," he told me before I had the chance to say anything.

"He has to sign this paperwork!" The nurse insisted and thrust the clipboard in my direction. I glanced down at her name tag as I took it from her.

"Thank you, Fiona. I'll make sure these get completed and I'll have someone drop them off at the nurse's station, will that be okay?"

She shot Michael a dirty look but reluctantly agreed. "Fine, but he's your responsibility now and he needs to be under medical care. Those burns still need attention."

It made my eyes drop to his already damaged body. Though I knew he hardly felt pain anymore, the one across his right shoulder was clearly the worst and had burned right through the majority of his shirt. On a quick inhale I signaled Bobby.

Fiona the nurse stomped away with another nasty glare and I made it clear to Michael what was going to happen. "You're going back to Rangeman with Bobby immediately and you will let him dress these wounds before either of you are allowed to return. If there is any news before you get back, someone will send word to you. Do we understand each other?"

He didn't like it, but Michael agreed to my terms. Bobby was preferable to a hospital and strangers poking and prodding him. "I'll go with them," Gabe volunteered, knowing Michael sometimes needed to be supervised by more than one person.

I nodded and the trio departed the waiting room, but not without requesting a second promise someone let them know when Stephanie is awake.

Some of my nervous energy was starting to dissipate with that much needed distraction and I was about to sit in one of the uncomfortable chairs when Dr. Abramson appeared. As always, nothing was apparent on his unreadable expression. "Let's go talk in my office." Those first words out of his mouth had everyone on their feet and shouting at him.

"What? No, that's bullshit!

"Tell us how she is!"

"C'mon you prick!"

The sheer force of numbers of my extended family gave him serious pause and he held up a hand to silence the onslaught of increasingly foul comments. "She's okay and awake. I'll allow visitors in two at a time in about an hour…if it's alright with her…and you," he added, addressing me directly.

After my agreement, the room settled down, but I heard definite murmurs of discontent as I followed Dr Abramson to his office. I was doing my best to remain calm because he had said she is okay but asking to speak with me privately could not be good news. I kept my mouth shut and my hands firmly in my pockets, so I wouldn't throw him up against a wall and force whatever it was he had to tell me out of him.

Unfortunately, I'd been in this situation too many times before with other members of my family so I was practiced at not showing how I was screaming on the inside, but the good doctor knew me well enough to know not to delay any longer and started talking the second I sat in the chair on the other side of his desk.

"Your wife is fine, most of her injuries are superficial. She has a concussion and will need to be monitored for a few days but everything else will heal nicely."

"That doesn't explain why I'm in your office," I said when he paused just a little too long.

"You didn't let me finish," he said with a slight smile.

"Then get to it before I completely lose my mind."

"She asked me to tell you this next part because she didn't think she'd get through it without crying and she said you hate it when she cries." He paused again and I nearly reached across the desk to strangle him.

"At your insistence, we did a full body MRI, which as you know I thought unnecessary, but it turned out to be the right call. Your wife has a tumor, a significant one, in the lining of her uterus." There was another pause and I swallowed the sudden lump in my throat.

"I did a biopsy immediately and luckily we have an in-house lab here. Normally it's a few days for the results but knowing you…I had them expedite. The tumor is benign. No cancer detected at all…but it must come out. Its size and location will make it impossible to remove without taking the whole thing. Now, she's told me the two of you have decided not to have children, so a hysterectomy isn't that big of an issue. However, it looks to me like her ovaries are fine so if you changed your mind, you could still have kids with the use of a surrogate, if you so choose. I'll have to have a specialist verify as it's not my primary area of expertise, but from what I'm seeing, that's where we are. I'd like to do the surgery as soon as possible before it gets any larger, because it's growing as we speak."

I don't know what I was expecting, but it wasn't that. It was true, Steph and I had decided we weren't going to have kids but to have it not be an option, in the standard way, was a sudden punch in the gut. I wasn't sure what that meant and what I really wanted right then was to see my wife, which the very observant Doctor apparently knew.

"I'll take to see her now, okay?"

"Yes, that would be best…everything else, she's good right?"

The doctor smiled. "Except for slightly elevated cholesterol, which she said you would say was from too many trips to the Tasty Pastry, she's in perfect health."

Once again, I was following the man down a maze of hallways until we reached the private room I'd also insisted on and he left me at the door, saying he'd give us some time. When I entered her room, she was wide awake, and her crystal blue eyes were fixed on the pretty doctor with long auburn hair, which reached well into the middle of her back, who was standing at the side of her bed. I ignored the pang of anger at the swollen and purple bruise across Stephanie's right cheek and made my way over.

The doctor turned her head in my direction and addressed us both as she took her leave. "I'll be back to discuss options with you both after you have some time."

"That's Dr. Stewart. Sadie Stewart," Steph said as soon as the door closed behind her. "She's a fertility specialist and totally cute, right? You know who she'd be perfect for?"

I couldn't stop the tug at my lips. My wife, even under the direst of circumstances, never stops trying to be a match maker for the men of Rangeman. I closed the remaining distance to her and lifted her hand to my lips, before replying.

"How many guesses do I get?"

She twisted her fingers in my grip and cupped my cheek, dragging her thumb across the day-old stubble. "Just one."

"Then my answer is Slick."

"How did you know that?" she shot back with mild surprise.

"Because you've been trying to set him up for weeks. You only thought you were being sneaky about it."

A single, recently sculpted eyebrow lifted. "Sometimes it's really annoying when you know everything."

I bent my head and gently touched my lips to hers. When I pulled back, her beautiful eyes were filling rapidly with tears. My heart twisted against my ribs as I tucked an errant curl behind her ear. "Why are you crying, Babe?"

"I don't know," she responded, trying to blink them away. "It's been kind of a crappy day."

"The queen of the understatement."

"He's dead, isn't he?" She asked, squeezing my hand.

"Thanks to Michael, yes."

"You're upset you didn't kill him all those years ago, aren't you?"

"Yes, but that doesn't matter now. He'll never be able to hurt you or anyone else again."

"You're also mad it wasn't you who got me out of that house, aren't you?"

I kissed her again and repeated her earlier phrase back to her. "Sometimes it's really annoying when you know everything."

That got me the smile I adore. "Is Michael okay?"

"After harassing a nurse and leaving the hospital against the advice of everyone, yes. Bobby, with a Gabriel assist, took him back to the infirmary. They'll handle him."

She smiled again, knowing how stubborn Michael can be. "Were you able to get any of the guys to go home?"

"You know they are all out there in the waiting area, making the entire hospital staff extremely nervous and you can stop stalling now. We need to talk about it."

Those tears she'd masterfully abated moments before spilled out onto her cheeks. "I know we decided already, no kids for us, but…making that choice and no longer having a choice…I don't know, it just feels…I don't know what it feels like." I laced my fingers through hers and did my best to ease myself onto the narrow bed beside her.

"I don't know either, but we do have a choice. From what doctor Abramson said, we still have a choice, it's just not going to be the normal one."

"You're right," she said, squeezing my fingers. "You're always right. And Slick's new girlfriend said it would be smart to freeze a bunch of my eggs right away, especially at my advanced age."

Now I lifted an eyebrow and chose to ignore her comment about Slick and the woman she will undoubtedly try to get him to date. "Advanced? You're only 37."

"Yes but apparently that's nearly ancient as far as eggs go."

"She actually said ancient?"

"Well no, but it was definitely implied. Do you think we should?"

"If we still want to have the choice, yes. If we are sure about what we already decided then it doesn't matter, does it?"

"Are you sure?" She asked turning her bruised face up to mine.

"Most days, yes."

"Me too. What about the other days?"

I pressed my lips to her temple. "Until we are sure all days, I think we have our answer."

"Me too." She squeezed my fingers again. "I love you, you know that, right?"

"I do. And you know I love you back."

"I do….I can't go home now, can I?"

"Nope, but I'll be here with you the whole time."

"I know, I'm just being a baby. You know how I feel about hospitals."

"You're nearly as bad as Michael about it but unlike him, we're going to take the advice of the trained medical professionals and you'll have the surgery."

Her grip on my hand tightened but she tried to play off her nervousness with jokes, as was her way. "I've given it some thought, and I think I'm starting to look forward to this. I mean, I'll never have to buy a tampon again. That's worth celebrating all on its own. No more cramps, no more emergency chocolate stash. No more, as Lester calls it, 'batshit crazy mood swings'. This might end up being a good thing."

I maneuvered again so I could get my arm around her. She probably wouldn't admit it, but I can always tell when she needs more of my touch. "C'mon Steph, you know there will always be a chocolate stash."

She rolled her eyes before touching her own lips to my cheek. "See, you're being annoying again knowing everything. Well, you better find out if any of them can come in here yet because I don't want any of the staff out there to get nervous and call the cops on all my guys."

"I am mostly confident Tank won't let them get completely out of hand, but I'll go make sure it's okay to start herding them in here." After a lingering kiss I headed out to the waiting mob of men in black.