Chapter 32. Author's note: I know you're all mad at me for what happened last chapter, so here, keep being angry with this cruel author with this chapter! However, this story won't be ending quite as soon as I'd initially thought, as I've still got quite a bit more planned for it. I'll let you know when we're getting close to the end...

Nightingale did not cry for very long. She hated herself for the emotion too much to show it, though she sat there next to Clarence, covered in his blood, the blood that had been so hot moments before but now was sticky and cold. She did not continue to cry, but simply sat there, bitterness rising in her throat to she nearly gagged on it.

Nothing could ever go right for her. Nothing. She'd been beaten and raped her whole life and even when that stopped, things couldn't be happy. Not even then.

"Fuck you," she snapped at Clarence's body as it lay there, stark blue eyes wide and staring at nothing at all.

That's when David shook her roughly by the shoulder.

"Nightingale! Come on, let's go. Come here, Nightingale!" he growled, grabbing her by the arm.

"Let go of me," she growled right back.

He did not give up so easily. He picked her up by the arm, as if she weighed nothing at all. She slammed into his chest, sure she was staining his white shirt with Clarence's blood, and he wrapped his arms around her.

His mouth was close to her ear, whispering to her, more comforting than he'd ever been, telling her to calm, to be quiet, she was fine, she should be thankful for that.

Nightingale almost felt like surrendering to that embrace, too. Letting David hold her and tell her everything would be fine. It would be so cathartic, so wonderful to let someone comfort and care for her, when she'd been doing that for herself and for her sisters her whole life.

She almost felt like it. For when, their hips pressed together, their chests flat against one another, arms tightly twined, she felt something hard at his waist, she withdrew.

His gun. Feeling it, feeling that thing that could kill - for one like it had killed Clarence - she flinched away. She pushed him in disgust from her.

"I'm fine," she snarled at him, a shudder rippling through her body.

He looked quite fearsome with his expression stormy and furious and his bloodstained shirt, but Nightingale was not afraid of him.

"No, you're not," he told her, practically spitting the words at her.

She hissed wordlessly and turned away. "I want out of here," she said, her back to him, turning her head so that her words would carry.

"Come," he said, and his voice was soft, just as a soft as the arm that draped over her shoulders, the brush of fabric against her skin barely perceptible next to the heat of David's body. He was gentle. Kind. Like nothing she'd ever seen before from him. "I'll show you."

Nightingale let herself be led out of the bordello. Outside was utter pandemonium. All the Inamoratas but Rose and Magenta were standing in a frightened clump, ringed by four agents who were desperately trying to soothe them. Their voices, high-pitched and hysterical, made for a grating babble as they all jabbered away.

Clients, similarly, had either scattered or were clumped together, being dealt with by a very cool Caroline and an extremely gleeful Magenta.

"Hah! What d'you think of me now, you fuckers?" Nightingale heard Magenta shout. "You should hear me say it now - I hope you all rot in hell! Do you hear me? Rot in hell!"

Nightingale would have smiled, but she simply did not care enough to. Magenta was mad, possibly mad with happiness or anger, but Nightingale did not care.

Her bitter, dispassionate eye roamed to where she saw Sparkle and Glitter standing with their arms about each other, the pair of them kissing in a way that was far too ardent for the location. Even in her apathetic state, she wondered how long they had felt that way about each other. It must have been torture, being raped by others when you were so close to the one you loved...

But Nightingale was not too far gone into bitterness to forget about Rose. Turning her head, she was relieved to see the girl standing some distance off, looking terrified and lunatic but otherwise unharmed.

She still had the gun Clarence had given her, and she hadn't put it down. Rose's fingers were clenched about it so tightly that Nightingale wondered if Pierce and Nicholas, who were desperately trying to reason with her, would ever be able to pry it from her grasp.

The babble from Inamoratas, clients, and agents alike stopped when they saw Nightingale. She must have looked frightful, for she saw the eyes of every person pop wide until the whites of their eyes showed all around their irises.

"Nightingale?" she heard Mermaid, the person she least expected to speak for the Inamorata's quiet, meditative personality. "What's happened? Are you all right, Nightingale?"

Nightingale looked down at her hands. Her sisters were probably worried that it was her blood staining limbs and clothes. So she lifted her head and stared at no one in particular as she said in a clear, unwavering voice, "Clarence is dead. Bobby shot him."

The sidewalk became noisy once more, though not the tumultuous babble it had been before. The Inamoratas, who had barely known Clarence, simply muttered and stared sadly at Nightingale, their eyes wide and sympathetic. Clients whispered and cried out, most likely afraid they'd be arrested for the death of a cop, all of them trying to assure Caroline that they'd had nothing to do with it.

Caroline, meanwhile, simply hid her face in her hands.

It was Rose's siren shriek of sorrow that cut above all other sounds. She screamed loudly and took off into the bordello, waving the gun.

Nicholas and Pierce tore after her. Nightingale hoped Rose wouldn't hurt herself with the gun.

Before her sisters, some of them timidly approaching her as though she were some wild beast and not their friend, their Queen of the Bordello, could so much as touch a comforting hand to her arm, David whisked her away.

She let him pull her by the arm away from her sisters. He towed her towards a hovercraft, this one four times the size of his and a different configuration. This one opened at the back to reveal two benches of seats lining the inner walls, with a seat for the driver at the front.

David seemed about to help her into the hovercraft, so she swatted away the hands that were about her waist, lifting her body as she sprang in.

"Get off me," she told him gruffly.

He jerked back but did not glower at her as she thought he would. He simply climbed in after her and sat down on a bench.

She sank down opposite him. When, at David's word, the hovercraft lifted off into the air, Nightingale raised her eyebrows. "What, not going to stay with your team, Detective? Not going to take care of the dead one, either?"

She was surprised to see him smile sweetly. That surprise managed to touch her even through her bitterness, for she felt it like it was a short electric shock like the ones from her anklet.

"They can handle things in my absence," he told her. "You're our first priority, remember? I will stay with you."

Nightingale turned her face away. She could not find joy in the city as they soared above it. But as she saw the lights of the city float by her, suspended in blackness, she asked:

"Where are you taking me?"

"Headquarters. You'll be debriefed when you've had time to recover. For now, you'll be given a room for the night and allowed to...collect your thoughts," said David.

"I want to see Robin," she said quickly.

"I dare say he's already there," retorted David dryly, arching his eyebrows.

"But I don't want him to see this," she said. She looked down at where Clarence's blood had begun to dry, flaking off from the tips of her fingers in large, brownish-red pieces.

David nodded. Nightingale wondered for a moment if David was grieving at all for Clarence. One look at the hand that was clenched against the seat below him, the nails digging into the fabric, told her what she needed to know.

When the pair of them got out at what Nightingale assumed was Headquarters, she found herself treated with deference and respect by the blue-uniformed guards. It was very difficult to reconcile that with the hostility she'd received before.

"Just this way, ma'am," she heard an obsequious guard say as he touched her elbow to lead her down the hall and around a corner.

"Well, that law certainly changes your tune right around, doesn't it?" she snarled at him, though secretly enjoying the respectful address.

He jerked back. Nightingale saw David, who was loping beside her, matching his stride perfectly to hers and remaining no further than an arm's reach away from her, smile a tiny bit.

It was that little smile that Nightingale lingered on as, having been escorted to her room, was left alone.

"Goodbye, miraculous Nightingale," said David. The smile he gave her then - the third of the night - was very sweet and very sad and made Nightingale want to reach out and comfort him. But before she could even open her mouth to speak, he was gone, marching brusquely down the hall accompanied by four or five guards. One was left to stand sentinel outside her room.

"What, worried I'm going to run somewhere?" she muttered to no one in particular as the doors shut and she turned to stare at her enclosure. The room was white walled, white floored, and white furnished. Everything was a pure white, from the strange material of the furniture to the soft-looking bedspread.

It was as though the person who designed the room wanted to make Clarence's blood stand out more starkly against her pale skin. For when she looked in the mirror in the small bathroom off the room, she could see nothing but his blood.

She understood why her sisters had looked so shocked. Her neck and face were splattered with blood from where Clarence had coughed, sending sprays of blood over her. Even her lips were stained, either from the cough or the kiss. Either one was a frightening idea. And her arms were stained to the elbow, positively caked with Clarence's dried blood.

It took ages before Nightingale could wash all evidence of Clarence's death from her skin. Ages of scrubbing like Lady Macbeth at the blood on her hands. But when she was clean, she marvelled dimly at the pure complexion of her skin.

It was at that moment that there was a knock on the door. She went into the adjoining room to see the guard who'd been positioned outside her room enter timidly and say,

"Ma'am, there's a visitor for you. Mr. Brightley."

She shoved the guard aside very roughly. She and Robin were in perfect unison as they stretched their arms out for one another. Then, embracing tightly, Nightingale twisted her fingers into his hair and held him even closer.

"Nightingale, I'm so sorry," she heard him say, his beautiful voice muffled by her hair.

"Shh," she snapped. "Be quiet. I...just need to know you're here."

He was silent. So she wound herself closer to him and they sank onto the bed. When they were seated, she drew back only to clasp his face in her hands. Though her nails dug into his soft flesh and she knew she must be hurting him, he did not complain.

"Don't ever die without me, Robin," she told him.

She saw his dark eyes widen and his mouth open. He began to speak, to protest to her words, but she quieted him with a kiss.

"I've never seen death. I saw it tonight. And I never want to see you die," she murmured when she drew back. Her tone made the words into an imperious order.

Robin arched one dark brow but said nothing. Instead, he simply leaned his head against Nightingale's and allowed her to embrace him tightly.

"Is David all right?" he asked after a few moments.

Nightingale, who had guided her hand inside Robin's jacket so she could feel the steady pounding of his heart - shuddering at the memory of feeling Clarence's go still - nodded.

"He's fine," she snapped.

"You're angry with him," said Robin.

"No," said Nightingale.

"Then what? You and David are mysterious creatures around one another. You're always angry with one another. I wonder why that is," he said, and the musing in his voice was mocking. "Oh, yes. It's because you're in love with one another."

He sat up to regard her, his dark eyes twinkling with humour. Even that little amount of gaiety helped lift Nightingale's spirits just a touch.

"I'm not in love with David," she told Robin.

He chuckled softly and stroked Nightingale's hair. For her, it was strange to be on the receiving end of Robin's affection. So often, she was the one who initiated affection, and it was curiously pleasant to have him approach her.

"My dear girl," he said, voice taking on the pedantic tone of a teacher lecturing a student. "As I told you when we first met, I am an excellent judge of character. Also, when we met, I told you that you were in love with someone at that table, and I know it wasn't me."

In a swift movement, Nightingale tossed Robin back onto the bed. He landed on his back with a whuff, the air leaving his lungs from the force of her blow. Before he could so much as move one finger, Nightingale was on him, straddling his hips so he could not move.

"It may not have been you then. But it was not David, either. And it is you now," she told him, voice rough and husky with emotion.

Robin raised his eyebrows. Moving slowly, as though not wanting to startle the edgy Nightingale into bolting, he sat up and disentangled himself from her.

He did not respond to her statement, her roundabout declaration of love for him. Instead, he lifted one of her hands and said, smiling sadly:

"My lovely Nightingale, there's blood under your nails."

Nightingale looked down. Robin was right. She could see Clarence's blood still caked under nails, dying the whites of them a shocking shade of dark red. She immediately got up, making for the bathroom, but Robin's hand on her shoulder stayed her.

"Allow me," he said. He sat her down on the bed and she, meek as a child, obeyed. He was gone for but a moment and when he returned, he was carrying a pristine white bowl filled with crystal-clear water. The towel in his hand, however, was not spotless and clean like the bowl. It was streaked and smeared with blood.

As Robin knelt before her, he dipped the edge of the towel in the basin. Then, lifting one of her hands, he delicately began to sponge the muck from under her nails. His touch was soft.

"So much blood," he said, tone sombre with sadness. "You were there with Clarence, weren't you?"

Nightingale nodded. She looked down at Robin, her eyes not leaving his face as he continued to clean her hands.

"You tried to save him, didn't you?" he said. When she nodded, Robin smiled. "Of course. I would have expected nothing less from you."

Robin's praise put a bit of warmth back in Nightingale's heart. He continued to bathe her hands in silence, the room so quiet that the only sound was the gentle swishing of the cloth over her skin and its squeak when fabric rubbed against nail.

When he was done, Robin put aside the cloth. In perfect silence, he laid his head down on her knee and closed his eyes.

Nightingale smiled, more warmth stealing into her as she stroked Robin's hair. Leaning forward, she left a kiss on his forehead and then sat back. At least Robin was with her. He was something that had gone right.