Prescott stared down at her lover, unsure what to make of his ramblings. She picked up the bottle of migrane medication that had fallen off the bedside table. When McCoy began flaying his arms, he had inadvertantly sent the bottle, his watch, and other assorted items across the room. Prescott read the warning label, shaking her head. She had seen McCoy react to the medication before. Ususally the drug made him lethargic, difficult to wake up...this was something entirely different.

Alarmed by her lovers obvious distress, Prescott finally laid her hands on his tee-shirt. She held his shoulder firmly, as she began shaking him.

"Jack, wake up!..JACK,"she said with more force than she had meant to. "Honey, it's only a dream...open your eyes..."

McCoy looked at her with eyes wide with terror and confusion. Instinctively he pulled back, looking around the room frantically.

"Oh God... Brooke," he said with a sigh, as he wiped the sweat from his brow. He brought his left hand up to his face, trying to not give himself away, as he looked at his bare ring finger. Relaxing somewhat, he laid back as he realized he was in his own bed.

Prescott sat beside him, running a hand through his damp hair.

"Jack, you had me worried as hell," she said quietly."You seemed positively frantic.What were you dreaming about, anyway?"

McCoy flushed with embarrasssment - as well as shameless relief - as he took her hands in his. As his heart rate slowed, he stared at their hands, knowing the only course of action was to comfront what each of them had avoided for so long.

"Brooke," he asked quietly as heshifted his gaze to her face."Are you anxious to remarry?"

"Wh-why," she stammered, completely taken aback.

"Listen - you know I love you? I hope you know... I treasure our time together. I would never want you to think this has been causal for me… just about sex…I mean it's not just sex. I just think we.."

Prescott moved her mouth, stopping when nothing came out. Unsure if he was trying to let her down easy - wondering if his next words would be 'Brooke, it hasn't been just sex, but I think we need a break' - then an even more unsettling possibilty came to mind...

McCoy began to smile at her discomfort as she willed herself to speak.

"I never thought that Jack. That it's just sex - I mean - come on. I'm almost forty six and you're hardly a teenager, yourself. The hormones still rage, just in different ways. As for remarriage? Now? I-I-ah … ,"she paused noting his eyes where lowered in amusement.

Unwilling to allow him to enjoy himself at her expense, she lifted his chin and met his gaze.

"There's not an offer on the table is there," she asked innocently. She smiled triumphantly, when his eyes widened. "Relax, Jack. Just checking."

"It's not that I haven't thought about it," he said seriously. "I'm just not sure if I'm ready to try to make a go of a third marriage. I'm not sure how things will when my term is up. Until I make a decision about running, it seems premature for either of us to think about pulling up stakes - if you'd even be willing to consider giving up your home - your career and moving to Manhattan?"

Prescott nodded.

"Jack, I couldn't have said it better myself," she said obviously relieved. "I would never ask you to leave Manhattan. That would be like asking you to resign from the DA's office. You need to be here, especially now that you are DA. As for me, I'm not saying I wouldn't want a life with you. But if I came to Manhattan, there's no way I could work in the same office with you. Even working in one of the other boroughs would be sticky, as your girlfriend…or ...whatever."

McCoy put his arm around her, kissing her on the forehead.

"I understand that. I know it wasn't a comfortable place for any of the women I've been involved with, to be sleeping with the boss. I don't want to see you in that position, as well."

"So, we leave things as they are," she asked feeling like a weight had been lifted, yet at the same time, aware of a unexplainable pang of regret.

McCoy's face reflected the same dilemma. She watched as he seemed to be having an unspoken debate with himself. Finally, he left the bed and went to his dresser. He returned a few minutes later with a small black velvet box in his hand.

"The way things are has worked well, so far. A wiser man would leave well enough alone," he said taking her hand and pressing the box into it, with a shy smile. "Too bad I've never been one to leave well enough alone."

Prescott carefully opened the box, her eyes softening as she looked down at a ring she had admired several times on their many visits to the antique district during her time in Miami.

"I saw you try it on and went back for it before I went to the airport, that last visit in January," McCoy explained."I had planned to give it you Valentine's Day, but things got so hectic last month, we never did get around to celebrating."

Prescott wiped her eyes as she leaned forward to kiss him.

"Should I attribute this to your usual thoughtfulness - or is there more into it,"she asked unsure as to what she hoped to hear.

McCoy took the ring out of the box and slipped it on her right ring finger.

"I may not be ready to get married but, I am committed to you. If I were to marry again, I have no doubt, you would be the woman I'd ask," he said quietly.

Prescott stared at the ring for several minutes, surprised and touched by the gesture.

"So, when Cohen interrogations me - and you know he will - I should refer to this as?"

McCoy flushed slightly suddenly embarrassed by his bout of awkwardness.

"Would I sound too much like an adolescent to use the words 'promise ring'? A promise that one day, when we're both ready, we'll sit down and plan a future together?"

"Oh Jack," she whispered as she ran a hand through his disheveled hair. She was fascinated not only the simple solution to something that had seemed so complex, but fastinated as well, by the man who still had enough boyish charm in him to have thought of the solution.

McCoy kissed her lightly on the forehead before he picked his robe off of the floor and stood.

"Now then, may be we should give some thought about what to do with the weekend before it gets away from us?"

Prescott leaned back on the bed, resting her head on the headboard, as she looked down at her hand.

"You know, it has been awhile since you've taken me on your bike."

"Yeah it has," he ageed as he opened the closet door. "Any particular place you'd like to go?"

"Actually, there is - I can't remember the last time I've been to Atlantic City - how about we head up there and play a little blackjack?"