by: MacSas

A blood-curdling scream ripped through the quiet night. Martin came awake immediately, almost falling off the easy chair that he had fallen asleep on. As he got to his feet, it took him just seconds to take in the situation. No one was in the room but he and Daisy. She lay on the bed, thrashing about in the obvious throes of a nightmare. Martin quickly moved to her side.

“Daisy” he said, pulling her into his arms. “Easy, it’s just a bad dream.”

“Marty” she called, trapped inside the scenario playing out in her mind. “Marty, help me”

“Ssh. I’m here, Doll, I’m right here. Open your eyes and see”

Daisy took a deep breath and slowly opened her eyes. She looked into Martin’s tired eyes. He smiled at her while she collected her bearings.

“It’s okay. See, I’m right here. It was just a dream.”

“Just a dream” she whispered to herself, slowly relaxing her tensed shoulders. It didn’t take long for the memory of the dream to come flooding back, and with it, the tension. “No, no, no, no!”

She fell against Martins chest, heaving great sobs that shook her body.

“What is it?” he asked.

“Not a dream” she sobbed. “Real, very real. Memory. I remember. Oh Marty! Lex, he had a knife and he came after me. He came from behind. I got away from him in the bedroom, but he came from behind…he came from behind…didn’t see him…”

“It’s okay, Doll, your safe now…”

“…and he had a knife, and he had already stuck it in my neck. I know, because I had my hand on my throat and the blood was … oh, there was so much blood … so much …”

“Daisy, honey”

“I thought I had escaped, but he was sticking that knife in my side, and it hurt! So much pain … if I close my eyes he will go away, I’ll play dead and he will leave … please make him leave…”

Martin gave up talking and simply held her while she relived what terror she could remember.

“I could actually see the light glinting off the edge of the knife. There’s blood dripping from the end and I wonder where it’s from. Then I realise that it’s mine and I scream. ..and I was screaming for you and screaming for you, and you weren’t there…”

The last words sliced through his heart. He sighed as he kissed her flushed forehead.

“I should have never let you go to that safe house by yourself”

“It’s not your fault…”

“Honey, I love you. I feel like I let you down. I wasn’t there to protect you when you needed me most.”

“There is no need for you to feel like that,” she said, sitting up and wiping the tears from her face.

“I know it’s not logical, but it’s just the way I feel. I feel like I should be able to keep you safe – no matter what”

“You’re here now, aren’t you?”

“Yes”

“Well, that’s all you need to do right now. Stay with me. Don’t leave me. I like knowing that when I open my eyes, you are the first thing I’ll see”

Smiling, Martin took her hand in his and kissed it lightly.

“I love you Daisy Duke”

“I love you too, Harvard”

Martin laughed at the old endearment. As Daisy laid back against the pillows her thoughts, once again, turned to family. Neither Bo nor Luke had been to see her yet. While she was drifting in and out of the drug-induced sleep, she had asked for them, only to be told by Martin that they were on their way. Things may move slowly in Hazzard, but she would have thought it wouldn’t take Bo or Luke this long to arrive. So far, they had been “on their way” for the last week or so. She knew that Martin was keeping something from her. She had been around police enough to know when something was in operation. She knew that the boys were safe though, that kind of news would not have been kept from her. She sighed. The only conclusion she could come to was that Lex believed he had killed her that morning in the cabin. As a CSI she knew that the best way to flush an egotistical killer out was to allow him to believe he had accomplished his threat. If this were so, that would explain why Bo and Luke weren’t here now. If they turned up, Lex would know she was alive and may make another attempt on her life. Martin was, once again, protecting her from the big bad wolf. She understood why he was doing it, it made simple sense. But her heart ached to see Bo and Luke. She missed having Bo’s infectious smile fill the room; and Luke’s quiet strength would’ve helped her combat the nightly terror of her dreams. She looked over at Martin. Would he let her see the boys? She knew the answer would be no. And he would have some purely logical reason for that. But she wasn’t feeling too logical right now, or reasonable.

“Marty, I want to see Bo and Luke”

Martin looked up from the lunch menu he’d been idling over. He’d been trying to decide how best to approach her on the subject of her diary. She had thrown him a curve ball instead. He wondered how best to answer her. There was no way that he could allow Luke or Bo to be seen entering the hospital. It was far too risky. So far the boys had been agreeable to the situation, albeit very reluctantly. They received regular up dates on Daisy’s care and recovery. It had appeared to Martin that Bo had dealt with the situation a lot easier than Luke had. Whenever Martin spoke to Luke about Daisy, he swore he could see blood in the Admiral’s eyes. There was no way that he was letting this go that easily. However, Martin also knew that there was no way that Luke would do anything to put Daisy in danger. And if that meant staying away from her bedside so that Lex would believe he’d won; so be it.

“Hello” Daisy interrupted his thoughts.

“Daisy, your smart enough to know what’s going on” he started.

“Your keeping them away from me so that Lex doesn’t get suspicious”

“Yeah” Martin sighed. “I’m sorry honey, but it has to be this way for your safety.”

“I know. But I want you and everyone else to know that I am not happy with this. In fact I am really annoyed that Lex has once again come into my life and managed to turn everything upside down!”

“Point taken. But Daisy…”

“No. Don’t try to fluff this over with me Marty. I am so sick of this whole Lex thing. It should have been over when he went to prison. But, no, some idiot drops the ball and Lex is back to making my life hell. I can handle all this, the stalking, the fear, and the worry, even the stabbing. What I can’t handle is not being near my own family. They are my lifelines Marty, you know that. I need them around me, especially now”

“I know sweetheart. What do you want me to do?”

“I just want to see them. Please”

Martin looked at her. This would go against everything he believed he should be doing for her right now. He couldn’t take a chance that Lex would be watching, waiting.

“Daisy, I don’t know” he shrugged his shoulders.

Hope died in her eyes. She hung her head looking at the blanket that covered her. She would give anything to talk to Luke right now. But, she also knew that Martin was right. She may not like it, but he was right.

“That’s okay,” she said, trying to summon up a ghost of a smile. “I understand. Really I do”

“If there is some way that I can get them in here with absolutely no one finding out, I will try my best to pull it off. But only if I can do it with no one’s knowledge, okay?”

“Yeah” she answered, a little flicker of hope starting to burn again. If anyone could figure out how to smuggle her cousins into her room, it was her Mountie.

Daisy closed her eyes and dozed off.

Martin had wanted to ask her about her diary, but she asked for Bo and Luke, again. He knew that she was too smart to not know what was going on once her mind had cleared from the haze of the pain control drugs. She was taking it better than he had thought she would. But then, she knew that there was a reason for the absence of her cousins. And if he could find a way to get them in here, he would.

He also knew that he needed to discuss Clark’s plan with her. It had been a few days since Lex had failed to show up at the meeting with Boss Hogg. Clark had called many times asking him to get the information they needed. Once again, Martin seemed to be stonewalling. Clark had even told him that he thought his personal feelings were now getting in the way of the case. Martin had to agree with him. Daisy was an emotional wreck. He closed his eyes, his brow furrowing in thought. When would bringing up the diary be any less painful for her? Never, he decided. Best to get it over and done with. Like pulling a plaster off in one quick move, rather than slowly. The problem was, she was on such an emotional tightrope, and anything could push her off.

As his mind worked over the pros and cons, he was unaware of Daisy watching the play of emotions on his face.

“Red” she said softly.

He opened his eyes and smiled at her. “I thought you were asleep”

“Your mind’s keeping me awake” At his quizzical look she told him, “I can hear your brain ticking over from here”

“Oh,” he said, sitting forward. “I just have something I need to work out”

“Tell me” she said

Martin gave a soft laugh. “I really don’t know where to begin”

“Hmm” she said, in mock thought. “Try the beginning”

“Okay” he smiled. “Clark and I had this idea that Lex would come out of hiding if he believed that you had something on him that would put him back in prison. I told Clark about the diary you mentioned to me while we were in Calgary and that Lex knew you had one.”

“He never knew what was in it though, he assumed it was just a daily planner thing” Daisy said.

“That’s the beauty of it” Martin continued. “Lex believes that it’s a day to day planner, but we thought that if Commissioner Hogg let slip over the Hazzard Net that he had a diary that mentioned some things about Lex in it, well Lex would be anxious to have that book on his hands. So the Commissioner told a ‘business associate’ that he had this book of names and dates in it, and he wanted the associate to help him figure out what each one meant. That got Lex’s attention. He contacted the Commissioner with a time to meet at the courthouse. He wanted to buy the diary.”

“But…” Daisy prompted.

Martin sighed, got up and walked to the window. Outside, life went on.

“But, Lex never showed up. Hogg waited until well after the arranged time. That’s when Clark decided they needed to give Lex a little idea of what’s in your diary to get him worried. Clark’s hope is that Lex will worry what else you have in that book and be so determined to get it back that he ends up making the mistake that will get him caught.”

“Oh” was all Daisy said.

Martin turned and looked at her. She simply started at the wall in front of her bed.

“Daisy?”

She sighed. “Do you have any idea what I have in that diary?”

“No, but from what you told me in Calgary, I guess it’s times and dates and people that Lex met. Possibly high profile people.”

“Yes” she confirmed, then dropping her voice to a whisper she added, “but there’s so much more. Things that I never wanted anyone to know”

“Such as?”

Daisy cleared her throat. “Red, you and I have gotten to know each other very quickly. I have come to admire you, respect you and even love you. But I don’t know if I can share everything with you. And that’s what that diary contains, everything. The worst mistake of my life, right there in black and white.”

“I don’t know what to say” Martin said, moving to the side of her bed. “All I can tell you is that there is nothing that you could say that would make me feel any differently about you” He sat on the side of the bed and took her hands in his. “Nothing”

She refused to meet his gaze, staring, instead at the blanket. “I feel differently about me” she finally said in a whisper. “Everything I ever thought about myself has been turned upside down. I used to think that I was strong, independent, that I could handle any situation. I never thought I would end up battered and in a hospital bed like this. I was one of those women who scoffed at being fooled enough by a man to let them have control of my life. Yet, that’s exactly what happened. I let Lex get under my skin, and he made me pay for it. All I know now is that I know nothing.”

Martin sat forward and placed his hands on her cheeks. He turned her face so that she was looking at him. “Anyone that thinks they are standing should beware of the fall”

“That’s from the Bible,” she said.

“Uh huh. And it’s something that I truly believe. Everyone has a moment where they are shown that what they tended to believe about themselves may not be so. The point is how do you use that information. Do you give up and never venture out into the world again? Or do you take that information, make it work for you and become a stronger person? I think you will do the later. You are the kind of person that can’t just sit back and watch the world pass by. You have to be involved. And I believe you will do the same with this situation. You’ll become stronger from it, and you’ll use what you’ve learnt to make the world just that little bit better”

“Wow” Daisy laughed. “You sure do have faith in me”

“Just because you can’t see what I see in you, doesn’t mean it’s not there”

Daisy silently crossed her fingers.

“The diary contains all of Lex’s dealings with people in the time that I was with him. It names people, days and times. It also names which people bought drugs, which ones Lex hired prostitutes for and which wanted both. I also jotted down some of his under the table business dealings. I started keeping track of all these things when Lex first started beating me. I thought I might need a safe card, and the diary was going to be it.” She paused for a moment. Martin made no comment, just waited for her to continue.

“The diary also has information about each beating I took from him. Every slap, bruise, broken bone, its all there. All in it’s ugly glory.”

There was a long silence. Then Martin pulled her into his arms. There, she felt safe and secure. There, she felt the world disappeared. There, she knew nothing could touch her.

“I am so sorry” he whispered against her hair. “You know, your strength is just one of the many things I love about you”

Daisy gave a soft laugh. With her head resting against his massive chest, she could hear the strong, sure pounding of his heart. She snuggled closer to him. Martin kissed the top of her head.

“Whatever you want to do, I’ll support you”

“I know you will”

“If you don’t want to use the diary, that’s fine. There are other ways of getting to Lex. I won’t let anyone pressure you”

“Use it,” she said softly.

“What?” he asked, unsure he’d heard her correctly.

“Take the diary. Tell Clark to use whatever he needs to. I don’t care who knows about the rest of it”

“Daisy …”

“Marty, please, let’s just get this over with. I’m tired of being scared. I’m tired of always looking over my shoulder. I want to be able to enjoy time with you without wondering what Lex is up to. I want to be able to see my cousins. I want my life back”

“Back to normal, huh?”

“Nothing will ever be normal again” she smiled at him, sadly.

Martin took her face in his hands and very gently kissed her bruised lips.

“Then, we’ll make a new normal. Just you and me, babe. We’ll start life again. Nothing behind us, everything ahead”

“A new normal, huh?”

“Yep”

Daisy smiled the first genuine smile he’d seen in a while. “I’ll take it,” she laughed.