Disclaimer: No infringement intended to the unit or its producers.

Tag to the Wall:

Summary: Kim's thoughts as the bullets were zinging over head and then later when she tried to make sense of it all.

Part One

I never told Bob what I knew about Tiffy or how Molly lost our money, which is completely unlike me because I tell him everything, sometimes too much. But regardless of my secret, Bob knew that something was up between us. He's good like that, he knows me too well. So when we got here tonight and he caught me avoiding both of them, it resulted in a sidebar conversation. I don't think I gave him any answers he wanted to hear. He just gave me that look of his that said only one thing….I know you are holding something back from me and you're going to tell me later … one way or the other. It's hard for me to hide anything from him. He gets this expression on his face that means business and then his eyes bore right through me …. It doesn't take a genius to figure out why he's so damn good at what he does with the unit.

Maybe it made more sense to him when Tiffy got up to give her drunken toast to the Colonel and his wife. As I scanned the faces at the table, I found a mixed bag of reactions. There was the where the frak is she going with this expression that adored most of Alpha team's faces, the I can't believe she is going to say this look on Molly and Mrs. Ryan's face and the if she says one more word I'm going to kill her portrait that was burned on the Colonel's features. At that moment it became crystal clear to me that Tiffy wasn't meeting just any friend at the motel in town. The only friend she was meeting was sitting right here at this table, next to his new wife and even though I was still really pissed at her, I just couldn't stand by and let her make an ass out of herself. I had to interrupt before she embarrassed herself another second … before she admitted to sleeping with the man right in front of her husband. She'll thank me later. I think.

I should get a medal for smooth talking. I can't even remember what bull came spewing out of my mouth, but whatever it was it worked to put Tiffy back in her place and relax the Colonel before he popped a blood vessel. And I do believe I've just become Mrs. Ryan's new best friend based on the look of relief that washed over her face after I averted the near disaster. But instead of getting a medal, I was the recipient of Bob's cold hard stare that said I had a lot of explaining to do when we got home. While the attribute will make him a great father when Serena is in her teens, it doesn't work too well on me. At least in theory anyway.

But if by some miracle, I actually make it home tonight, I swear I'll tell him everything. Since my husband and his buddies are the only ones doing a damn thing to protect me from these mad men with guns, the only person I need to be true too is the one that shares his life with me.

The bullets are zinging over my head faster than I can imagine. The sound is exploding in my ears in slow motion and all I can think about are the relationships that brought me here. Not my family or my kids or how the stained carpet that I'm staring at may be the last thing that I see. In the distance I hear screams, maybe from Tiffy or Molly or maybe even me. The grunts of death surround me and I pray that it is no one that I know. For all those stern looks Bob has given me tonight, I wish his arms were around me now, protecting me from this madness, like he did the night after one of my dedicated listeners tried to rape me.

Except that just like that night …in a strange way I don't really need him. This table that I'm under and the wall that I'm behind are doing nearly the same thing that his physical presence would provide. I am quiet so I don't draw fire and I stay low out of the line of sight. I shield my stomach with the metal leg of the table to protect my unborn son. I spin my wedding ring with my thumb which brings me some odd comfort. I count down the seconds until this is over and I can breathe again. And I will breathe again, when all this is over.

In a blink the room fills with silence which is quickly replaced with the rumbling voice of the Colonel blasting orders to his men. As the melee settles around me a warm sticky sensation shudders through my soul. I hear Bob's voice reverberate in my ear as I pull my hand up from my side.

"Kim? Kim are you okay?"

Those crystal clear eyes of his are what got me so many years ago, when he warmed my heart at that bar. It's what I live to stare into every night, to see the love he has for me, the understanding that holds us together. Tonight no words are needed to convey our feelings for each other. I hold out my hand covered in its crimson glove and stare at it in disbelief. Was the agony I felt just transferred into words instead of pain? I search Bob's face for answers and am met with another questioning glare. Yet this one is different … filled with concern and decorated with an icy crispness to remind me that this is still business no matter what.

"Bob, I'm bleeding," I whisper wondering whether sound even made it to my lips. As I blink the tears away, I feel his warmth envelop me and that's all the information I need. For now anyway.

TBC