The Good and the Bad

Just Drive...

Chapter Forty-Three

*~*~*~*

Scout's head felt as though she were trapped in a fog as she drove through the streets of Chicago, heading towards Chicago Med. Her thoughts being torn in two separate directions-- caught between the papers that rested in her desk drawer at the precinct and the phone call she'd gotten fifteen minutes earlier. The battle seeming to have become a constant thing over the last week, ever since she'd found herself served at Molly's. Learning that Carly Wheeler had actually taken the step of petitioning for sole custody of DJ and Maclean.

She tried her hardest to push the thoughts to the back of her for the moment as she pulled into the hospital's parking lot. Rushing to turn off the car before heading inside, only to be greeted by an emergency room full of firefighters.

"What happened?" Scout made a beeline for where Severide, Herrmann, Otis, Capp, Peter, and Newhouse were standing.

"What are you doing here?" Otis asked, surprised by the woman's presence.

"Boden called me. Told me that there was an accident," she supplied. "Now someone tell me, what the hell happened?"

"We got t-boned by 66 on the way to a fire," Herrmann clued her in. "I guess they were trying to cut across from Michigan, but they had to know we were coming up Wabash, right?"

"Either way, they got to slow down and have a look," Severide shrugged. "Everyone knows that."

"Unless they had the green," Newhouse spoke up.

"Please. They didn't have the green," Herrmann scoffed. Refusing to even consider the fact that the accident had been Cruz's fault. "What the hell, Newhouse?"

"Is everyone from 81 okay?" Scout asked.

"Mostly just scares," Severide tried to offer her some reassurance. "Mouch is getting checked out for his eye, we don't know much about that yet. But it looks like 66 got the worst of it."

"Are the cops still all over Cruz?" Capp asked.

"Yeah, now they're demanding piss and blood," Otis nodded.

"It's standard procedure for an accident," Scout offered.

"Is that Molina's wife?" Otis drew everyone's attention across the ER. Watching as a sobbing woman practically collapsed into the arms of one of the guys from Firehouse 105.

"I'm, uh, gonna check up on Mouch and find Matt before I head back to the precinct." Scout cleared her throat. "But tell Cruz to give me a call if he needs any help, okay?"

"Of course. See you later," Herrmann offered the woman a smile before she headed off to find the other men. A sigh fell from his lips once she was out of earshot, pity written all across his face. "Poor kid."

"She say anything about it?" Severide wondered, worried about how his friend was holding up since getting served. Everyone at 51-- everyone that knew her-- well aware of the fact that her boys were her whole world.

"Not much," Herrmann shook his head. "Just that she's got a lawyer. But Dawson was suggesting she try and reach out to Carly, see if they can handle things without going to court. But knowing that woman--"

"That's not gonna happen," Peter finished for him. Remembering everything that Scout had told him about the woman that had come close to being her mother-in-law. "I don't get it. I thought Carly barely had anything to do with the boys? Why sue for custody?"

"To hurt, Scout. Why else?" Severide shrugged.

"Let me tell you, Mills. The Wheeler family are a cruel bunch," Herrmann told the younger man. "And that woman-- she's the fucking dragon."