Donny whistled to himself as he picked up the can of veggies that were needed for the meal that was being made. He wasn't sure why canned as needed over frozen, but he did as Molly wanted. He was putting it into the cart when he heard a loud noise—it sounded like someone knocked over something big, which happened. He made himself relax. He had his gun in the car because he had gotten too many looks, even though he had his badge on his hip right beside the gun. He tried not to carry it into stores, but sometimes he was on his way home, and it was just easier to leave it than to lock it up in the back of the car.

A whimper caught his ear, and Donny looked where it came from, but there was no one there, so it had to come from the other side of the shelving. He got ready to head over that way, in case someone was hurt. Just as he was turning to push his cart that way, he felt it. A hard crack, and Donny went down. He didn't black out, but it was a near thing. He wasn't sure what the hell hit him, but he hoped that whatever it was didn't keep on coming down. Then he threw up. His head was throbbing, and that made it even worse. He figured that he had a concussion and things were not going to go well. He stayed crouched and sent a text off to Molly about where he was and how he needed an ambulance because he had a concussion from something falling off the shelf hitting him. He hit send just as a boot connected with his hand, and his phone went skittering away from his hand.

Donny tried to look up, but he was stopped because of the pain that was getting even worse with the bright lights in there. He nearly fell over, and it did happen when that boot connected with his chest, and he went back, looking right up into the lights that were worse from that angle. He tried to keep himself from throwing up again because that was a unique kind of pain that he didn't want at the moment. He rolled over to his side and tried to hide himself.

He realized that this wasn't something random. That thing that had hit him had come from above, and it had been on purpose. He saw the massive can of veggies that had hit him. There was no way that it had fallen off the top shelf without it being pushed off. So that meant that he was being targeted.

"Got him," someone said.

Donny kept his mouth shut because it wasn't good that they were aimed at him. He didn't even want to think about what this could be about. The damage was already done to his head.

"Sergeant Rocker, how kind of you to join us," a woman's voice called out.

Donny looked up at her, and he realized that despite the way his vision was all wonky from the concussion, he knew her. He had to think she was in jail and would never get out. There should have been a warning if she was released, and there really, really should have been one if she had escaped from prison somehow. Donny gulped, and he tried to settle on his back to look up at them.

"I'm going to get what I want because the LAPF isn't just going to leave one of their own to be executed."

Donny knew he was going to die, and it filled him with so many emotions. There was a flood of them inside of himself. He tried to get up but was kicked back down again. He wasn't going to die lying on his back. He would take anything but that.

"Don't worry. I'm going to make sure that you feel every single bit of pain that you caused me." Serena Wilder walked forward, and she crouched over him. "I'll make sure that you are in agony before I put that bullet between your eyes."

Donny lost consciousness when they got him up and carried him over to where they wanted him.

---

Molly knew that something was wrong when she got to where Donny said he was and found that the whole place had been barricaded.

Hondo's team was getting ready as they listened to her father. She clutched her phone and tried to get her father's attention. It took a long while to get it, and he came over to her.

"Molly, what are you doing here?"

"Donny sent me a message. I was the one who called 9-1-1 about him being hurt here from something falling off the shelf."

"That's Rocker?" her father said loud enough to draw Hondo and Deacon over toward them.

"Rocker's in there?" Hondo asked. He looked very worried now.

"What's going on?" Molly asked.

She followed her father as he waved her around the barricade. She was taken into the back of Black Betty and left with just her father and Hondo.

"We got a call from 9-1-1 that this is a hostage situation and that the person inside wants to talk to me," her father said.

"Okay."

"She said she had a few hostages, but one was an LAPD officer. Now we know it's Rocker, which changes things. Let me see his message."

Molly handed the phone over to her father, and she hoped he didn't scroll up past Donny's first message to her about his head. The texts had come rapid fire; his ability to text without looking at the screen at all still marveled her. She knew it was a good thing to be able to do, given what he did for a living. She just hadn't thought that it was anything that she would ever think was really needed.

"Hondo, we have a bigger situation. One of the victims who was allowed outside got a picture, and I ran it.

"And?" Hicks asked.

"Serena Wilder hasn't been reported as escaped or let go, but that's her inside of there."

Molly had read about the case from the POV of a civilian. It was when she was younger and hadn't cared as much about it. She hadn't heard much beyond her threatening the lives of the SWAT officers who killed her twin brother. She had never found out the name, as that hadn't been released to the public. Now she had a feeling that it was Donny. They had been stalking him. They had to have been.

"Molly, you are staying right here, and I'm sending two officers to your place and to Rocker's. Do you have a key to his place?"

Molly nodded, and she fished out her keys. She got the key with the heart on it off the ring and handed it over, then fished her own key to her place as well. She knew that Donny had a spare to his place in his locker, but that was a trip out of the way for the uniformed officer going there.

"We need to make sure that they are both swept. They will sit on the place until we can get another team to clear each location and then sit on them. I do not want them to get access at all. Serena liked bombs."

Molly felt like her world was shifting. They had been discussing a house, someplace where Donny could get better security, and now she thought that maybe he was right about that. It was going to be the first thing they did as soon as Donny got free of this. She took her phone back when it was offered, and she clutched it tight. It vibrated, and she looked at it, frowning at the email. She silenced everything but calls and texts for the next couple of hours. She didn't care about anything that wasn't from Donny.

"Molly, be good," her father said. He hugged her tightly.

Molly wasn't going to do anything that could hurt Donny. She didn't want to be the reason he was dead. She also didn't want to be the target of them. She knew. She knew it was possible. There was the big fact that LAPD SWAT and every single SWAT officer should have been told that she escaped. That no notice had gone out until she was already hurting Donny wasn't good. She didn't like it. She looked at her phone and thought about who to contact. She sighed and called her friend.

"Molly, what is going on at SWAT?" John asked.

"Rocker's been taken hostage by a woman named Serena Wilder. No one knew that she was either released or escaped until she was identified by a SWAT officer on the scene."

"Fucking hell." There was the sound of typing, something that was only noticeable with John when he was pissed. He was a good friend of hers, and he was well situated in the DA's office. "She's supposed to be sitting in a jail cell. Fucking hell."

Molly knew that he was pissed when the fucking hell appeared twice so close together. It was not good that the prison system still thought she was in there.

"I'm pulling up her cellmates' information, just to be safe. She's still listed as in there as well. Something is going on in that place. There is no record of anyone escaping. We have a big deal going on. I'm glad you called me about this. I'm going to make sure that nothing is going on that needs to have the FBI or the state police come in on this. I have a feeling we are going to see the FBI, no matter what, given these threats. Stay by your phone."

"I have all texts and calls coming through. I'm on the scene. I didn't know that Rocker had been taken hostage until I got there. He had texted me that he needed me to call an ambulance here because he had been hit in the head by something falling off the shelf. His gun would be locked in his car. I am not sure if he's still got his phone or not. I assume they will have taken it."

"Is anyone being sent to your place or Rocker's to check it out?"

"Dad's sending two teams to check it out, as well as uniforms to stop anyone from going in without it being cleared first. I gave them our keys."

"I'll do what I can from my end."

Molly hoped that he would figure out what the hell was going on from that end because this seemed like an inside job in that prison.

---

Donny tried not to react to the voices that were yelling at him. He thought that he might know them, but he lashed out anyway. He was in fucking pain, and he didn't want any more. The lights were too bright, and he was just running on pure will to live. To get back to Molly. He tried not to flinch when the lights hit him in the face again. He could only see blobs as they moved, but they then stayed back from him. Serena had left him in here with two of her guys while they worked him over. He knew he had killed them. He remembered the feel of snapping their necks. He didn't care. He wasn't going to be in trouble for that. They had been beating the hell out of him.

The door opened again, and a shape came in, with someone behind her. He only guessed it was her from the way the others were keeping her back. He waited for Serena's voice to come out to him. Yet, there was nothing. The blob sat down a few feet in front of him, far enough away that his weapon wasn't going to hit her unless he moved closer to her, and right now he was safer where he was. He had shelves on either side of him and the corner to his back.

"Donny," the blob said.

Donny tried not to react at all. He didn't know how Serena had...wait, that wasn't Serena's voice. Donny swallowed, and he turned his head to listen more closely.

"Give me the broom, babe."

"Molly?" Donny asked. It was her voice. He just hoped he wasn't dealing with a brain injury.

"Yeah, it's me."

Donny tried to remember if she had called him babe in any texts. No, that was something she only did in person. They didn't use a lot of nicknames in text. It had to be her, right? She had to be the one talking to him.

"Hondo?" Donny asked.

"Hey, welcome back to the land of not freaking out, Rocker. You look a lot worse for wear."

"HIcks?" Donny asked.

"I'm here, Rocker," Hicks said.

Donny dropped the broom, and he tried to move. He stopped at the shooting pain. He wanted to be in Molly's arms. She moved forward, the blob getting bigger, and Donny closed his eyes. He was safe. He didn't need to hurt himself more to see her. He wrapped his good arm around her and kept his bad one tucked in on his body. He was pretty sure it was broken in three places, and he was sure that his using it to protect himself hadn't actually done him any favors.

"You are safe. You made it. You made it."

Donny felt the first sob break through. He didn't care about crying in front of anyone there. He was alive.

"Deacon and Hondo are going to move the bodies once pictures are taken, but I need to be out of the pictures so that you can be seen in them."

Donny didn't want to let go of her yet.

"The gurney is out there in the other room, waiting for you. We will help you get up once the pictures are taken. I'm going to step back long enough for everything to be done. Keep your eyes closed and don't move at all."

"Okay," Donny said. He let go of her, and it hurt. He hurt his whole body even more, but he did it.

It felt like forever before he felt Molly's hand on his face. He was glad that the pictures hadn't taken long at all. There was going to be no chance that he got out of this without seeing a psych doctor, and for the first time ever, he wasn't going to push that at all.

"How?" Donny asked.

"One of the guards took her place. She went on a vacation for a short while, and the day before, she swapped out with Wilder. Then Wilder got sick and was in the infirmary for days, well, the fake one. No one did much checking because she was throwing up all the time. It was constant, and she was hooked up to an IV. The guard has been picked up from the prison. It's been planned for a long time. I'll give you more later, but no one else is coming after either of you."

Donny nodded. That fucking hurt, but he felt like he wasn't able to speak now. He figured that now that the adrenaline was dropping, he was going into shock of some kind. The paramedics would work on him when they got their hands on him. He wanted to pass out and wake up later when he wasn't in so much pain. He had been in pain for what felt like days. Molly's touch helped, but he wanted oblivion.

---

Molly felt Donny waking up, his hand moving like it always did when he was waking up. She was used to feeling it on her person when she was in bed. Now it was just on top of her hand that was resting on his abdomen. He had slept better with her touching part of him, so she had done it.

The whimper broke her. Molly knew that they had a hard road from this. He was strong, but it took a while to get over the beating he had gotten. To get over the way that he thought he was going to die. There would be therapy in his future, and she was pretty sure that he was going to end up taking a while off work, not just because of his body needing time to heal, but his brain as well.

"Mols?" Donny asked.

"I'm right here. The lights are down low. You can open your eyes. The nurses aren't turning them up until we get your eyes covered. Hondo's bringing a pair of sunglasses that you can wear that he said would be more comfortable for you than the ones that they had tried with you. Your concussion isn't the biggest worry at the moment, though; mostly it's your arm."

"How did the surgery go?"

Molly got out of her chair, and she sat down on the edge of his bed. "Good. They were able to get it set. They don't see where it won't heal up, and you will be able to go back to work, but there is always that fear."

Donny smacked his lips. His lips were cracked from the beating, and just his body needed liquids. They had him hooked up to a bag of IV fluids along with his pain meds and an antibiotic to help with any infection in the many, many cuts on his body. He had been stripped to his underwear to make sure that they could see what they did to him.

"Alone?"

"Nah, Luca's outside sitting and watching the door. Someone will be taking watch all the time. There is a group of people who have already signed up to make sure that you have a fresh body every six hours until they are sure that everyone has been caught. I have to make sure that someone is escorting me home as well. I've been offered a bed here in the room with you, though. If you want me to take that."

"Yeah, if you don't mind.:

"I'm off work for the next little while, to take care of you as well as making sure that I'm safe. It's going to be interesting to get through this, but we will do it. Dad's looking at houses in the neighborhood that he likes.:

"Why?"

"Because we can't do much on security at our places, and so a house would be better. He's going to work to figure something out, and we will either accept or reject the places."

"I'm laid up."

"And that's why we will get SWAT to help us. Hondo's already working on boxing up my place. Yours will be better for your record, and I'll just move in with you."

"Making decisions while I sleep? Hot. The only way it would be better was if you were sitting on my cock and telling me all the choices you were making and just have to live with them."

"That's going to be a while."

"Nah, not you just sitting on my cock. I won't touch, just let you do what you want. Watch you play with your tits while I just get to look and feel your body clenching on one."

Molly smacked his shoulder a little, soft but enough. She knew that he was feeling a little better if he was making comments like that. She was glad because she had been worried. They weren't over the hump yet, but this was a good sign. He hadn't been that affected, at least not in a way that he couldn't box up to get through and then break down when he was safe. Safe with Molly alone in his place. Or in the new house. She knew that it was going to take a while to get a house, but she also knew that there were some guys that her father knew that flipped houses; they could move into it and work on the paperwork portion of things later, just doing a rental.

"I was so worried, but you lived."

"For you, I did. I'd do whatever I could to get back to you. I wanted to pass out but not die. I didn't want to die because dying meant hurting you, and I would never do that."

Molly leaned over and kissed his forehead. It was bruised, but at least there was a section with no open wound. She closed her eyes, and she prayed that he would always come back to her.

The End