He stopped at the window and not to observe the mother and child on the other side of the mirrored glass. He'd stopped because she was staring, head tipped, through that glass like she'd seen a repetition of a memory that had been buried. She was sifting through it with unmoving fingers and unblinking bright eyes. Seeing sadness on her, seeing grief, it'd become a recognition of repetition. He'd memorized its existence on her face because otherwise she was often extraordinarily adept at hiding some things from him. But not a feeling so depth-less, not one that he'd made sure to know whenever it claimed her face.

Cal frowned as he shook his head minutely, losing some semblance of stability to the surprisingly open flood of her emotion. "It's not her."

He'd known what she was seeing just by the slight blanching of color in her pretty eyes, the slacked lowering of her eyelids as her gaze lost focus and she went somewhere deep and daunting without him. Which, frankly, she really didn't do all that often and certainly not in the office while Torres worked at her back. They stayed together, she and him. And even more so in recent months.

Gillian angled her head slightly toward the sound of his voice, the unnaturally patient bending of his tone as he stroked his palm up the back of her arm. "Hmm?"

"It's not her, darling," he repeated just as quietly, murmured it resiliently between them as he leaned up along the side of her turned body and made them an angle perpendicular to each other. "It's not Sophie, Gill. Not enough blue in her eyes, is there?"

Her lashes fluttered into one quick flinch before she jerked her glance from the child she was watching, jaw angling sharply as she met his eyes and exhaled roughly through her nose. There was a twist of betrayal twining her lips for just a fraction of a moment, marring her prettiness for half a second before she blanked her features to his watching and just nodded. She'd accept the truth from him, silently so. Not that she'd like it, but she'd accept it, and especially if he forced it by sturdy repetition.

"You're right." She turned her jaw away from his hushed concern, avoided how tentatively he watched her even as she looked back over the way the girl's mother was hugging her up. "I didn't... you remember that?"

Did he remember that the girl had bright and wide eyes, blue as her (not) mother's? Sure, yeah.

Did he remember how happily relieved her lashes had fallen against her cheeks when the baby finally, finally, quieted to sleep along her shoulder with her chubby little face tucked into Gillian's throat? Of course he did.

Remembered being unable to hide his smirk the first time he saw throw up on silk.

Remembered watching her pack up the girl's things, too.

Well, after standing shock still in the doorway of a vacant nursery (after a phone call wherein she sounded near to dead as her voice had ever gone). Recalled watching silently as she'd chucked a baby monitor against the wall and shattered it to the floor.

"Course I do," he murmured low and near her shoulder, eyes near closed as she turned her head closer to his leaning. "She was your daughter, Gillian. Doesn't matter how many days it was, does it?"

He remembered every moment of her being a mother. It'd been impossible not to, really.

It'd been fucking torture (days of repetitive jealousy) but it had been so very worth it just to watch her feel love so strongly.

But he remembered seeing her lose her right to 'mother' just as keenly, especially when he looked up and found her watching the child again.

"It's not her." He lifted his hand against her jaw and tugged her back sharply, ignoring the fact that Ria's head had lifted into the jagged movement as his fingers had caught on her. "Look at me. That's not your daughter."

She jolted a little and so did his guilt, jarred right over him as she stared hard into his eyes.

It had been a shitty little trick of his mouth and she let him know it just by the fired hardness of her glance as she looked down and then back up him in eerie stillness.

He'd never promised to be sweet to her all hours of the day – and especially not when he was having such trouble bringing her back to him from somewhere he just wasn't allowed to go along with her.

"Can you and Ria do this?" The tone she used was so suddenly controlled and cool and clean in comparison to how intimate they'd become lately. So professional, really. And that was his punishment for having done exactly what he'd had to do to break reality over her. "I just... I have - "

"Yeah." His fingers curled along her upper arm and tugged, pulled her farther from the window as he jerked his head toward the door behind them. "I got it. Go."

She paused long enough in stepping away from him that he turned his glance up to hers, caught the blinking she made as she shook her head. "I'm sorry."

"No need." And he softened his own response just to meet with her quick attempt at near instant reparation. "Go on."

Even as she left the room he felt Torres' slight shift, her obvious staring as she watched Gillian go and then the half step toward the door. He cleared a harsh noise of negation off his throat and caught out against her arm, shoving her slightly back with spread fingers as he shook his head against the movement she'd made.

"Don't you dare." Vehemence and threat were so much easier motions to make than possibly allowing the girl into how awfully fucking painful every inch of him felt in aching. "You leave it alone."

"Yeah," Ria spoke with what seemed like legitimate understanding and an empathy that surprised him though he knew it shouldn't have, considering who she was and how much she could actually infer from moments that had any emotion to them at all. "I get it."

He turned away from how softly she was staring at him, blinking only once toward the glass before aiming his entire body into swinging open the door.

It had taken him nearly forty minutes to find her later that night, taken him asking around and getting next to nothing on answers as to where Gillian Foster might have gone. Couldn't have left, though. Her purse, her keys, her jacket, her surprisingly less than impeccably organized desk... they all said that she'd still been somewhere in the vicinity. But he'd checked their secret spots, their own personal hideouts and privacy corners and she hadn't been hiding in a one of 'em. Not at the railing, not chewing at her lip as she stared vacantly at the courtyard through glass, not sacked out on her couch with paperwork feathered over her lap and those glorious legs stretched out before her. And if she wasn't in those particular spots where he'd know to find her then his assumption was, well... she hadn't wanted t'be found. Not really.

But he wasn't entirely prepared to leave without knowing that she'd be all right.

Because she'd been sorrowfully quiet after he'd wrapped a hand against her arm and tugged her away from watching that (admittedly adorable) little girl.

Because he couldn't just up and desert her when Sophie'd been haunting them all over again.

And haunting it was, though worse. Because at least if the child were dead then Gill'd have somewhere to go to release this primal and undeniably whole pain that still sat on her chest at times.

"Sometimes I forget that you... that I wasn't the only one who lost her, ya know? I wasn't in a void. You were there."

The gentleness of her voice in his library startled him, caught him from above as he tugged his jacket from the back of the over stuffed chair. He smiled unintentionally into the fact that she'd apparently taken to hiding in his space and not her own, slowly turning and lifting his head so that he could spot her on the stairs. She was up at the top of the ladder, curled sideways so that her bare feet were a step down from her bottom and her head was leaning angled against the nearest rail.

Shoulda noticed her shoes on the first step before.

But he'd been absolutely distracted.

He usually was when in reference to her.

"Not what I meant by sayin' it, Gill," Cal breathed off as he dropped his jacket back behind him and took that first step up the ladder. "Y'know that."

"I do." Gillian nodded a quick agreement, her jaw lifting the motion higher as he took a couple more steps and then lowered himself sitting just below her, facing her way so that he could catch her legs over his with a slowly cautious movement. "I didn't mean to... I'm not starting a fight, Cal. I'm apologizing."

She watched him patiently and expectantly draw her legs over his lap, let him make the soothing movements under the study of dulled eyes as she rounded the back of her head harder into the rail. Cal traced the muscle of one calf, feeling her legs loosen a little and relax against him as he used the heel of his palm to rub into the muscle. His fingers soothed after each press of his palm and then back again and he lifted his head. He stayed watching how still she was under the comforting touch, how interested she was in watching the movements even as her face stayed mostly vacant.

She sucked a breath in after a moment, her head swaying farther aside as she seemed to shrug lower against the step and give his hands more space for touching her. "Just, sometimes I lose the big picture when it comes to her. I can't step outside of it enough to recognize that you were there. Eli was there. You both... you were both amazing with me after too. Have I ever really thanked either of you for being so supportive?"

That'd sure been more of a mouthful than he'd expected. She'd been mulling it on her tongue for long enough to have it prepared, to know she wanted to say it and get it out to him. He didn't give her a physical response besides just massaging harder into her leg as he shrugged a sort of humility into her kindness. She was the one shattering all over and still, still, being sweet. This woman... more than he deserved sometimes. And that he was sure of, actually.

"Hasn't been all that long, Foster. And we've all been through a bit since it happened, ya know?" His body jagged a little back and forth in explanation, uncontrolled until he squeezed against her. "Don't need to thank me for a thing. Certainly don't need to apologize for anything either."

She shook her head up, huffing a sound like a laugh through her nose as she turned away from his glance and lifted her hand to wipe her hair back. "I get so jealous of you sometimes."

Cal nodded slowly, feeling his shoulders tampen and tighten in response. "Emily."

"Yeah," she admitted without another movement.

"I know."

"She's amazing, Cal." She shook back with such a swayed heat to her tone, such an adoration in the way she said it. He felt his throat catch on a swallow just from the emotion he'd heard in her voice, let alone any he would have seen if he'd the guts to look up.

"Best bit of me." He chuckled, let his head drop into the way she'd seemed to lean closer. "Ever."

"That's exactly it." Her breath stopped a moment as her fingers pressed long and flat against the side of his head, wiping slowly down so that she could graze her nails along the side of his neck. "Isn't it?"

"You can still have it, Foster. You've plenty of options."

Wait... had he really just said it that way? Because, if she caught onto that then he was probably cooked. There was no way she'd let him live that down if she'd -

"I don't think there are." She shook away the words without entirely hearing the suggestion and he exhaled hard in relief even as he caught how saddened she seemed. "Not anymore."

"I'd give ya half of Em if I could." He recovered with a tip of teasing, leaning closer to catch the half smile the words brought over her lips."Seems both halves are spoken for, though. And I'm awfully selfish about my bit. Sorry."

"You've given me enough of Emily." Gill's smile went wider and more genuine as she lifted both shoulders, obvious affection surrounding talk of his daughter. "Being Aunt Gill is good. It's nice. A lot of payoff, limited responsibility."

"You're no aunt to the girl, Gillian."

He watched her tip him a confused glance, smiled into the movement of her head to assure her that he meant nothing negative by it. One hand stayed wrapped against her leg while the other lifted up under her chin, knuckles lifting her head up with a tap before he stroked his fingers along her lips and just watched her breathe out against them slowly.
She blinked into the turn of his hand as he spread his palm on her jaw and let his thumb do the work against her bottom lip. "Well, no. I just - "

"Step-mum's more like it, really." He kept at the the touch, caught her lip down so that he could press against her teeth as he said it, feel the shift in her jaw and throat as she swallowed a whimpering mingle of ache and heat.

"Don't Cal," she shunted it out against his thumb as her eyes blinked shut, "don't do that."

"It's you'n Em that does it, Gill." He countered the thudded hurt in her voice with assurance, let his fingers brush down her throat as he shook his head. "Not me."

"Cal - "

"Who was it stayed up all night fixin' the matchstick longhouse dear old dad accidentally trampled? Eh?" The ramped tone was intentionally running over her disagreement, slapping away the very notion that she wasn't all and everything that he'd implied. "Who got fossils on loan from the Smithsonian Institute for a silly little Science Fair project, huh?"

She rolled her eyes into a shy but obviously scornful laugh, shaking her head down farther as his fingers teased at the collar of her shirt. "I still can't believe she only got second place for that."

Cal grinned at her response, her obvious chagrin at his daughter being somehow cheated in anything at all. "Who took her school shopping?"

"Zoe." Gill deadpanned at him starkly.

"Don't gimme that tripe." A tug at her shirt drew her closer and he took advantage of how weakly pliant and bending she was, licking a kiss off her lips and not even feeling guilty for it. "Y'think she didn't show me what y'bought her every year? And who's she talk to when she can't come to me?"

Gill let off a brighter laugh than expected and he felt his lungs loosen as he flashed her a grateful grin in response to it. Her voice went soft after as she studied his lips. "Only because it's about you."

"Sure, exactly." He couldn't help the smile getting impish and his tone getting cheeky – she brought it out of him, didn't matter the discussion. "She goes to her mum. One of 'em anyhow. One or the other."

She shook her head up, intentionally disregarding the repeated implication. Her eyes searching out over the little library before dipping down on his chair. "You can't give me Emily, Cal."

"No," he dipped easy agreement but lifted her a look from hooded eyes, shrugged into catching her lighter glance as she turned back to him. "Not Em, specifically. Like I said, ya know, spoken for."

Gillian's face went slack, brow arching as her head tipped forward and the shifting of her hair along her throat harshed a tight swallow down his throat. "What exactly are you saying?"

What exactly was he sayin'? Fuckity fucking, damn it all... he'd essentially just offered up stud services or sperm or, rather, both and where'n the bloody hell had that come from? And especially considering they'd never (oh, hell, never) had a conversation like this before. It was an unbroached subject and he was just as surprised as the size of her eyes said she was as she stared at him. Ah, screw it. She wasn't looking at him like he was insane at least. She was looking at him like they'd barely even met, actually. And it was telling when it came to how bright her eyes seemed as she studied his face.

Like he'd seen a shut door and just re-opened it for her. Bein' chivalrous, he was. Sure, that's all it was.

That and maybe a remembrance of that slick and oily spill of jealousy that had coated over him every time he'd seen her with a child that had somebody else as a father.

Not that he'd ever tell her that bit out loud.

Not that she didn't already know it, hadn't read it right off him.

"I'm sayin' you're certainty not outta options, love." Regardless of the fact he knew that an annoyingly prim and tactless obstetrician had told her not to ever get her hopes all that high (and that slim margin had previously been eliminated by a coke addled husband with a slaughtered sperm count). "Don't give up what you want until it's actually impossible."
She gave him a veiled look, sideways and through thinned eyes. "I'm not sure it is what I want anymore."

"Now that," he tugged her chin down with a saddened but still solid whisper, pressing his mouth lightly into her lips before he nodded into her stillness, "tha's a lie, Gillian."

She shifted her legs sullenly from his slow movement but kept wide-eyed watching him, let him palm against her calf as he stood up and sighed into the stretch of his back. Both his forearms bridged against the side rails of the ladder as he cocked his head into leaning over her, hands loosely dropped from his perch. She idly tugged at his fingers, looking almost childish and trying to smile into the way he squeezed at her as he nodded acceptance of her continued quietness.

"You comin'?" Cal stretched back as her hand dropped back into her lap.

She avoided his eyes, too. Avoided seeing how well he knew her despite the fact he liked to remind her that sometimes she was unreadable to him. "I dunno."

A hummed acknowledgment throttled off him as he nodded and reached a hand up, slicking his fingers through her hair as she continued studying her own hands. "I'm gonna sack on the couch then. You let me know when you're callin' it quits, yeah?"

"Go home, Cal." Perturbation rasped on her argument as she shook her head and looked up at him, a slightly defensive sheen discoloring her eyes, looking glossy as she blinked hard. "I'm fine."

"M'not leavin' you when Sophie's in your head, Gill." It was an instant negation of her pressing, his fingers catching her hair behind her ear as he let his shoulders go slack. "You're seein' her everywhere these days."

Her head ducked into the touch of his fingers at the way his voice had stricken and swayed over the words. He hadn't meant it as an accusation, more a hint and admittance that he'd seen it wash up on her features over and over and fucking over again. And it was burying him. He didn't know how to fix it, didn't know what she needed. Of all the subjects they had difficulty broaching, Sophie had always been one of the worst, one of the hardest. Worse than him flippantly commenting on her ex-husband's habit. Worse than sparring over the Pentagon. Far more formidable than her snarky commentary on his sex life before it had actually involved her.

Sophie had always been the untouchable subject. The thing they just didn't discuss so much.

"I know." Gill twisted it back quietly, her hand lifting into how roughly she rubbed the heel of her palm into her cheekbone, glance darting into openly vacant space as she shrugged into an answer of nothing.

"Tell me why."

She scowled hard into the otherwise blanked staring, "I don't know."

"You lyin'?" Cal asked as he tipped his head into studying her face, watching her eyes thin a little as she actually considered his question rather than getting immediately defensive.

"No." She shook off before shrugging hard again, her fingers touching against her cheek as though testing how brittle the skin beneath her eyes felt. "Maybe. I don't know."

"Y'don't know if you're lyin' to me?" He leaned harder forward into her space, ignored how manic and spaced she seemed with a reach of his hand, fingers much lighter in the way they lifted her jaw than they'd been hours earlier. "Say it, Gillian."

"It's her birthday."

The explanation itself had him feeling like the dumbest man on the planet. Absolute fuckin' idiot.

How'd he not seen that coming? How hadn't he put that together, recognized the time of year and the way the season always seemed to pull her taut like near to snapping pearls on a string.

"Tomorrow is." He agreed, didn't question, just nodded.

"She'll be four."

"Really been that long, huh?" He knew she was right even in the realization that it felt both years longer and moments shorter at once.

"Yeah, it has." The string snapped then, brought her head down as she wiped against her face and entirely avoided the softness of the way he was watching over her.

"C'mere." Cal caught against the back of her head and kissed into her hair, letting his lungs deflate as he turned his face down into the heat of it. "C'mon, Gill. Em's already home and it's late."

"Cal."

He grunted a noise of disagreement into her, fingers already prying at her ribs as he forced her up from the step she'd been lingering on. "Not leavin' you on your own tonight, love."

"Gill okay?"

He smiled in response, felt how strangely ironic it twisted on his lips as he cocked his head. Emily's voice had been so reverently concerned, her fingers fiddling with the corkscrew as she twisted the wasted cork from it slowly. She let the metal drop clattering so that she could twist the cork and roll it through her fingers as she hawkishly watched his face for a clue of some sort.

"Not entirely," Cal admitted gently as he tugged a couple wine glasses down from the rack, shrugging as he set them opposite her on the island and exhaled his glance down over them. "Be all right, though. Thought you were goin'? Some fancy dinner or somethin'?"

"Well, I was but..."

But she'd picked up on something that she couldn't just let alone.

She'd seen a twist of something on Gillian, probably a mimicry of that same sadness on him.

And she was an obstinate child – not that he'd admit knowing where that came from.

"Go on then." He tipped his head toward the open kitchen entryway, his hand taking up the freshly opened bottle by the neck. "It's all right, Em."

"Did you do something?"

He paused just before pouring, letting the bottle bank back onto the counter with a thud as he gave her a scandalized glance and avoided smiling into the accusation. "Why would you... why's it always my fault right up front, eh?"

"Well, with Gill it usually is." Emily shrugged as she reached for the bottle and pried it away from him, avoiding his glance as she shrugged and poured out two glasses slowly and carefully. "It's usually you doing something stupid or hurtful."

"Well, this time," he muttered back as he leaned a watching over how slim her hand was in setting the bottle down, "I'm bein' a courteous gentleman."

Emily frowned as her arms came up across her chest and locked there, "Not sure I believe that."

His grin wrecked right over his supposed indignation as he sussed just exactly how concerned she was by the nerved squint in her eyes and the slight little pouting on her lips. Her body was all about posturing, defensive and on the offensive at once, arms slung against herself with just a bit of an angle to her hips as she glared him down. Sweet little shit, her near instant defense of the way Gillian was curled solemnly up on the couch in the next room over had his lungs filling up with warm air and the haze of this unconscious but near unfailing loyalty.

"Would my face lie to you?" Cal questioned with intentional softness, letting the smile relax as he nodded once more toward the door. "Go on. Get out."

"You gonna be nice to her?"

He planned to be more than nice, not that he was gonna expand on that particular subject matter with his teenage daughter.

But nice, yes, at the very least.

"Em... of course I'm..." his breath rushed off his lips as he took up both glasses and nodded forward, stepping around the island to meet her turning, "darling, I'm taking care of her. All right?"

She was studying him, her face blank of any emotion but some sort of near adoration as she let both her hands land onto his shoulders and nudge there. "Don't screw it up."

Cal chuckled and lifted the glasses away from her leaning and the dip of her kiss onto his cheek, letting her shove him away "Don't plan to, thank you very much."

"She seems sad." Emily offered into a whispering hush, her head tipping so that she could glance past his shoulder and pout a little into the woman's stillness.

"She is, a bit," he admitted, leaving the reason unspoken.

Emily tracked a glance over his face before she slowly took up her bag from the chair and nodded a slowly understanding smile in his direction, the curve of it on her lips a little less sincere than normal. "Well, I'll be back late."

"Be safe then." One glass went set along the counter as he caught into her sleeve and tugged her closer, shushing his lips into the way she jut her head toward his leaning. "Love you."

"Courteous gentleman," she demanded with a pointing in his direction, steps slowly leading her backwards toward the door.

Cal grinned at her assertion, the glass lifted slightly as the other hand swiped back and forth over his chest. "Cross my heart."

She was mostly still as he leaned the glass into her hand, the shift of her wrist and lift of long fingers the only movement to the way she blinked a grateful acceptance in his direction. The smile was muted but true, a twitch along the right side of her mouth as she watched him set his own glass to the table, lifting hers as though waiting for the way he flopped soundly onto the cushions beside her. Cal shifted sidelong up her, mostly curbing the movements of his body to her continued stillness as he let a hand lift along the back of her head. Her shoulders relaxed into the shift and he barely caught the movement, watching as she leveled the glass onto her bent knee and then let her head sink back into the cradling of his palm.

"My daughter's worried for your welfare, love," he teased at her gently, using the side of his thumb to rub into the dry warmth of her hair. "Thinks I can't be courteous in regards t'you."

"Your daughter's sweet," she answered breathily into the room, exhaling through her nose before she turned her head toward him and let soft blue eyes clasp his full attention.

He watched her face tense in seriousness a moment, unsure of what was going through her head as he laced his fingers into her hair. "Gillian?"

"It's okay." She just shook it off, shoulders both shrugging before she lifted the glass from its resting on her leg and toward her lips. "I'm just gonna drink this wine and you're gonna..."

"I'm gonna what?" Cal followed up softly, letting his voice tweak playful along her ear as his head dipped into how her body was relaxing against his. "Eh? Tell me."

"You can start with the kissing." Gillian murmured a private and refined little smile against the rim of the glass before taking a sip, her tongue taking up the leftover from her bottom lip before she turned him a smile that was ringing with amused pleasure. She was putting up a front, smiling through it as she sturdied herself and let her glance dip down over his mouth and back up.

He was always and ever astounded that she could recover so quickly, could so easily block the depth and darkness of her emotions when passing him a hazy smile.

"Kissin' I can start with, sure," he agreed with a gamely nod, dipping his mouth so that it was aimed just before her ear and landing kisses down her jaw. "I like that bit. You like that bit. Innocent enough."

Her head tipped on a near silent laugh, her throat humming under his mouth as he kissed farther down. His hand dug into her hair, the other lifting the keep the glass she was holding balanced as he felt her head fall farther back into his fingers. The twisted up way she'd curled on his couch shifted slightly under him and he lifted the glass from her stretching fingers, holding it hovered above her as her body slipped up under his leaning and both her hands curled into the front of his shirt. His smile turned into the sudden search of her mouth, swallowing a moan that came off her, feeling the confidence in the lift of her head as she pushed up into him instead of away.

Fuck, she was still a bold surprise some days – especially her pushing close instead of driving them apart. He still wasn't sure he entirely trusted it but, gift horses and all that.

"Gill?" He murmured it slowly along her lips, lifting the glass higher as her fingers dug into the front of his shirt, her head lifting with a half smirk.

Her eyes squinted teasingly at him as she tugged at a button, the other hand already ducked up under fabric to trace his stomach. "Hmm?"

"Darling, you gonna drink this or can I - "

"I want it," she argued quickly, head lifting into the words so her mouth was aimed in the direction of the glass.

She blinked back to him with what looked like challenge, the earlier sadness slowly fading beneath the rise of her pleasure as he shifted tighter down over her and complied into tipping the glass along her lips. He felt his throat lump up into how slowly she took down a slip of wine, hand lifted to curl along with his before she laxed lower against the couch and just melted him with a grin. Aw, fuckin' teasing little wench. She was dynamite to him when she her eyes went so lidded but blown blue, butane and bright but glittered hard at once.

"That's my wine," Gill accused with a whispered tone, brows knit as she licked the taste up from her lips and lifted her fingers from the back of his hand. "You opened my wine?"

"Yeah?" he swung back. "Gonna punish me?"

Her eyes went thin again, lips pursed up as she lifted her head back farther into the couch to study his face. Her hand casually curved over top of the glass as she shrugged over supposedly considering it, dipping a fingertip into the wine so that she could trace it along his lip gently.

"Shouldn't give you the pleasure," she sighed off as he nudged his mouth into the stroking. "It'd be rewarding poor behavior."

A laugh caught up in his throat as he slicked his tongue on the taste of wine. "Spicy little thing, aren't ya?"

"You like spicy." She countered on a lazily assured shrug, lifting her head to sip the last of the taste from his mouth with a brief stroke of her tongue to his. "Provocative women? Mysterious women?"

He watched her warily, cautious as to her words even as she smiled wider at him. "Gill."

"Cal Lightman can't get enough of a truly bewitching woman."

Her fingers took up the glass from him lightly and he blinked slight surprise into the hushed commentary, blinking as he shook off the accusation she'd made, astounded by the fact she still hadn't realized that nothing (absolutely fuckin' nothin') was more bewitching than the woman he just couldn't completely read. "Can't get enough of you. I've never had enough you, Gill. That's right true."

"What more do you want?" There was a slight swing of confusion in her voice, but hopeful almost, near excited.

"Tha's a loaded question." Cal laughed up at her, met the brightness in her eyes with a smirking.

Her shoulder came up slowly and he watched how slowly her jaw angled toward it as she lifted the glass and took another swallow, the scent of it bloomed up between them. "Well, you've been full of loaded implications today."

Right, of course she'd remember that bit. 'Course she wasn't gonna let that go.

That moment wherein his brain'd shorted out and all logic (all basic bloody reasoning skills) had up and left him on his arse and looking like an idiot.

Of course she'd remember that. Because she was Gillian.

And she wouldn't be Gillian without the ability to make him feel like a moron at random intervals.

"Gill, I want every little bit of you I can get." He explained into the flush of embarrassment that touched down his throat, had him swallowing hard as he avoided the amusement in her eyes.

"S'never enough. That's why I keep comin' back for more, in'it?"

She offered the glass lower, leaning it toward his mouth so that he had to take the slow sip she was offering as she exhaled slowly. "Is it?"

"I'll take whatever you give me, eh?" His fingers had managed to spread open the top of her shirt bit by bit (because at least his hands knew what they were doin' with a beautiful woman even if his brain was useless), the first two buttons gone undone to the dark lacy curving of her bra. "That okay?"

Gill nodded a hummed agreement over him. "More than."

He snorted against her collarbone, rubbed his face down the heat of her cleavage and felt her growl a feigned annoyance as he rashed a stubbled red against her skin. "Bewitchin' women? Unfair estimation."

"It's true."

His teeth nipped down the span of her throat, tongue following slowly and sweetly after each little bite against her. "Pretty provocative yourself, darlin'. Ditch the drink."

"I think I'll finish it." She lifted it higher even as the other hand clipped up along the back of his head, fingers threading into his hair and tugging affectionately. "You go ahead and finish what you were doing."

He glanced up in heady amusement as her hips slacked relaxed beneath his, her fingertips rubbing heat on him. "You cheeky wench."

The laugh that valved up her throat as she tipped the glass to her lips and her head back on a swallow had him groaning his mouth down her happily in acceptance as she answered, "Shut up and be courteous."

He could have used the newness of the position as an excuse for sleeplessness, gloried in the fact that it hadn't been all that long since she'd started letting him watch her fall asleep with her body backed up to his and her hand curling his arm up under her breasts. The very fact that it was a more recent occurrence should have been excuse enough for just staring over her as she slept, staying awake wide into the night just to watch an impossibility exist in front of him.

He'd done it before and often in the last few weeks.

Didn't feel a need to apologize for it, either.

She looked fucking radiant in her sleep, innocently curled up with him in a way that promised him something of a safety, an assurance, a promise.

Always felt like closing his eyes to it would be losing its possibility.

Wasn't the reason this time, so much. Not as he curled his fingers against her lower ribs and slid his hand out from under the loose lay of hers. Sure, it'd been reason enough plenty other times. But not when his brain was misfiring and jittered and she was still so fucking calmly still under the spread of his palm as he braced her ribs and then stroked his hand down the naked front of her. She made a weak sound in her throat that slowly vibrated into a sleepy moan and he bit against the inside of his cheek, making it a memory of a sound. Cal let his fingers spread flat against her stomach, driving his face into her hair as he wedged the heel of his palm against her pelvic bone and pulled back against her. He kept his hand flatly controlled as she unconsciously snugged back, a whimpered little noise just barely breaking past her throat and through her nose.

He kissed her awake and he wasn't all completely sure why, just kept strafing his mouth to her lips and cheek and back until she moaned awake and caught her fingers up curling against his jaw, head shying down and dipping toward her shoulder to avoid the playful assault.

"Wha's wrong?" Her voice was muddled up with sleep but light, the entire front of her curled up tighter, her legs tucking up as she dragged his arm closer into the center of her body.

"Nothin'." Cal shushed against her ear, nipped lightly against it as he palmed his hand flat against her stomach and dowsed his face into her hair. "Bloody gorgeous."

Gill's head lifted in a slow shift, her jaw turning back toward him as she stretched into the pressing of his fingers and the heat of his breath. "What's wrong?"

"Nothin'. I told you." He lowered his voice and let his tone sway affectionate, let her hear the brush of warmth to it as he snugged tighter around her a moment. "Goin' downstairs."

"Cal - "

"I gotta work, darling." Cal rubbed down the side of her neck, letting his lungs exhale and then fill back up with the way his smell tainted all over her skin. "Brain won't shut off. Doin' the Lightman thing. Makes the money, yeah?"

A disgruntled noise went hoarsely up her throat and she dug her nails into his forearm, laid right in with force and disagreement. "Stay, Cal."

"Got a theory. I gotta – it's half formed. Half unformed, so t'speak."

"You're so strange." Gill cast back tiredly, letting her head lean into the way he was still upped over her shoulder even as he started tugging her onto her back. "I'm still naked."

She had a point. Was still classified as 'miraculous' in his head that she was in his bed at all, let alone without a stitch of clothing on. He was obviously a bleedin' fuckin' idiot.

"You need me and I'm just down the stairs, promise. I just..." a groan rolled off him as he blocked his hand between them, started at her forehead and then shifted over her more widened awake and damningly pretty eyes, "fuck, stop lookin' at me, now. Close your eyes."

She laughed lightly into how gently he palmed his hand over her eyes before pressing down, keeping her head backed into the pillow as the words tumbled off her lips, "You're the one that woke me up."

"Love this. And this." He was rushing the words and kisses down her throat, deflecting by raking his teeth on her collarbone before he angled lower. "And this bit."

"Don't go." There was laughter sparking up through her voice and he swallowed a groan at the sound of it, keeping his kisses light and fast and brushing down between her breasts as she flagged flat into the mattress and roughed through his hair.

He'd shelter her laughter much as he could considering the look that'd been on her face hours earlier.

"And this," he shot lightly against the inner curve of one breast before kissing on skin that had become terrifyingly but perfectly familiar.

"Cal?"

"Just have to do some comparisons. Wanted you to know," he assured softly, lifting his head in a nodding as he met her eyes and watched them go slimmer to sleepiness and affection. "Go back to sleep."

"Exceptionally strange." She accused with a sweet tone that said she liked that bit of him more than she ought.

He grinned into it, lifting one shoulder in a proud shirking, "Why, thank you - "

Interrupting lips rushed his into groaning and he felt her laugh trip into his mouth even as he pushed himself away from her, slapping lightly against her bare thigh as he forced himself from the heat of her and off the bed.

"Cal?" Her voice whined a little after him, the tone of it deep and sensually thready even as a little petulance cut through it.

"Stop it, Foster." His fingers lifted in a feigned accusation before he waved over her, squinting in a play at being authoritative. "Be a good girl now. Right to sleep."

A sigh silted off her as her back relaxed into his mattress, head slacked back into the nearest pillow and hair loose over it, "Put your pants on before Emily comes home."

He gave a jaunty shrug as he stretched up the door frame, making a scrunched face at her just to ignore how silkily light she looked against dark sheets. "Y'don't tell me what to do. Grown man, I am."

She turned her smile against his pillow, let her cheek rub against it on a nod that said she was just sleepily placating him before she stretched into the space he'd left, curling up on her side. "Not too late."

Cal grinned unintentionally, shook his head into the realization of it as he forced himself off the frame and down the hall.

All his humor, his sweet protective silliness... it had disappeared somewhere. Blankly gone from him, his house, his everywhere – and she stopped along the edge of the living room in search of some semblance of it. Instead she found a ragged mess of books and papers and old photographs dumped across the table, the couch, the floor. The room smelled like burnt coffee and sweat and his frustration, sex and heat still lingering on him even as he scrubbed his hand at his hair. His laptop was open and brightly glaring a blued light into the room from the center of the chair's seat. He was bent forward, body half awkwardly crouching over a stretch of nearly ten photographs, some ragged and some shined new. One of his hands was rubbing unrealized against his scrunched forehead and he was unconsciously shaking his head back and forth as if in silent argument with himself.

His eyes, even in the low and muted light, had pinned on a certain sort of angry focus.

His body was taut and strung up and even as he fidgeted the fingers of his free hand hovering over one of the photos he'd been staring at she noted that they were minutely shaking.

Seemed even he despised whatever it was he was thinking, the disgust evident in the mouth she'd found so safely comforting hours before.

"What the hell are you doing?" Gill asked it gently, tried to curb any negativity from her tone even as his head shot up in response.

The slinked thinning of his eyes seemed almost accusatory, distractedly annoyed in the way he was looking at her. Which was nothing of the way he'd looked at her an hour or two before.

Nothing near the gently warm way he'd been searching over her while trying to disengage a glass of wine from between them and kissing her freely and with some sort of loving. He'd shifted left into darkness in the time they'd spent apart, in the time since he'd intentionally distanced a floor between them and settled into some flitting theory that had grasped his attention and refused to declaw from his brain.

"Waitin' for Em." he grunted back before reaching for the book that had been laid open and pressed flat in submission beside him.

Well... Cal Lightman was, in all his variations, still Cal Lightman. And it wasn't as though she hadn't spent years of moments right in the middle of some of his finer tirades or wallows. She (very momentarily) felt a little swing of apology in Zoe's direction. Living with this particular Cal Lightman for long stretches of time would be walking a barbed tight-rope, wouldn't it?

Wasn't it? Hadn't she already learned to live with it in a decade?

But now it was... personal, intimate. Now it breathed from him into her and clouded up in her lungs until choking up her throat. And now it was legitimately breaking her heart rather than just stirring around in her head.

"No, you're..." her steps were calculated and timed to how slowly he was flicking pages before triumphantly slapping the book open beside the stretch of photos – all of them women, all of them in variant degrees of distress and sadness, "what is this?"

His fingers fidgeted back over the photos as he flatly refused looking at her, denied lifting his eyes to the sight of her in his shirt as she neared the table, his fingers tapping the nearest photo. "New Guinea."

"I know where it is." Gill agreed, the particular image faintly familiar as she stepped up to the opposite side of the table, letting her body lower down gently to the carpet so that she was kneeling across from him, her head dipped. "Tell me what it is."

"Her son's just died, right?" The long stretch of his hand waved off the image, palm up and fingers curled as he just shrugged and continued to ignore meeting her eyes. "A disease that could have been prevented. But, modern medicine? It's not of her world. It's - "

"Cal." She sighed out his name quietly and was thoroughly surprised by how easily the one exhausted syllable seemed to stall him silent, how just letting go of his name so desperately had finally made him meet her eyes.

It didn't completely stall him though. Not enough to waylay where his mind had gone and come back from and probably still half was lingering. Not when he looked at her and his brow shifted higher just before he nodded jerkily in her direction. "There. Right there. Y'just did it."

Confusion filled her face even as she watched him, his entire body shifting and shunting forward on the cushion so that he could mash up the stack of photos and then toss them in her direction."Bangladesh. Lockerbie. Waco. Oklahoma."

She stopped seeing them after the first few, intentionally turned her head away from the repetitive look of pain on an unfamiliar woman's face. Tried to block how still familiar hurt felt when he was intentionally goading it from her, trying to coax it back over her features just to make a point – and not necessarily a point that she was prepared to tackle with him.

Not when his voice broke just as harshly as his hand shoving the book open across the table and slapping against the full page photo. "Migrant Mother photo, right? Dorothea Lange. Dust Bowl Era, yeah? Anguish on her face."

"Don't do this."

"I saw it on you, Gillian." The pitch of his voice went higher, strain in it as he argued against her deflection. "I saw it. Today. Two days ago. A month ago."

She intentionally drew a slow breath, "Cal."

"Three years ago."

"Stop." It was nearly impossible not to sound angry with him.

Especially when his insistence was starting to actually piss her off.

"How did Alec miss it?" And he kept at it anyhow, mention of her ex-husband cracking open the flood of anger from her as she glared in response, caught a quick little slip of pleasure over his face as he realized that he'd struck just the right crack to create a fissure. "How'd he not see it?"

Gill shook her head at him slowly, pressing the book and the photos back into the center of the table with a disgusted shunt of her hand. "Don't turn this into an argument about Alec. It has nothing - "

"He did see it. S'why he couldn't look at you anymore without wantin' a fix." He was nearly crawled over the table at her and had she been able to step from the moment she would have found how awkwardly energetic but stilted he moved as something comical, something she could pin as sometimes iconic, adorable and specific to him. "It's maternal. And it's devastating. And I can't..."

The sudden rise of his body was bent out of sheer frustration and he shoved at the papers and photos as he stood, both hands flaring out over them, "Why's it what I can see? Why's this the thing I see on you when other things are just... blanks?"

Desperate. He sounded distinctly desperate in his confusion, his frustration, his utter loss of comprehension. And that alone banked her anger back – because it created an imperfect weakness to the frenetic shifting of his body and the silly way he'd obviously tugged his Henley on backwards without even realizing it. Which...was adorable, but had her chewing against her lip.

She shook her head as she lifted it, letting her shoulders fall lax as she gave him a bitter-sweet smile and breathed out into how obviously insane she made him, "You can't formulate an entirely new micro expression theory based on the fact you have feelings for me."

The very ability to unconsciously get Cal Lightman plussed and riled and stumbling into a fit of furious confusion... she was proud of that, in a way. In an admittedly twisted little way. Because it meant he was encompassed, it meant he was focused. It meant he really was enthralled and entirely true in his adoration of her. And maybe enjoying that was sort of sick in a way but... at least it was honest. It was plain veracity, evidenced by a messy living room and his inability to control himself in regards to her.

But she wasn't convinced that it was worth his hands gripping up frustrated just before he wiped over his face with such exasperation.

A derisive snort came off him as he stared over her, chewed into his cheek a moment before his voice went sweetly soft. "Formulated the latter half o'my life based on the fact I got feelins' for you, love."

"Pain is pain, Cal. You can't decipher what type of pain..." her voice curved softer and she saw him slough off a look of distaste at her tone, knew he hated it when she cooled her voice quiet and sure and kept it intentionally controlled,"it's the same. Visually, sadness is sadness. It's a proven theory – your theory. Why - "

"Not when it comes to - "

"Not when it comes to me?" Well, she had been able to control it, at first. And then he'd had to open his mouth and ruin the tentative hold they'd had. "Nothing is the norm when it comes to me, is it? You can't fix this, Cal."

"Yeah?" There was distinct acid in his countering, his eyes thinning as he shrugged nearer toward her and gave her a look that had her rolling her eyes as though he were a snotty teenager. "Maybe I can."

God, sometimes she hated that smug little flicker of his ego, the way it just popped up between them at absolutely the worst moments. Like he was the obvious fix, the sole solution to an impossible equation. Like he had (or was) the correct answer to a problem she hadn't been able to fix for years before she'd even met him.

Only Cal Lightman... Except there was a slick little trickle of something warm on her skin that said, well, maybe the answer really was 'only Cal Lightman'... hell, he was more often right than wrong.

"That." He damn near yelped it at her and Gill lifted her head and instantly forced her face passive as she stared at him in response, pressing back as he lifted his fingers in recrimination toward her face. "That was hope."

She swallowed that implication of hope, that flash of whatever he'd seen and traded it for certain reality because she knew he sure as hell wouldn't. "It would never work. It's not possible."

"I've my hands in two businesses that shouldn't work, things nobody believed would work. The firm and this." The jittered force that ran his movements suddenly seemed all strong in the lift of his hand, his finger pointing directly at her as he let the words keep thrumming off him. "Both of 'em grounded by you, love. Both of 'em half your business too."

She felt herself sway into the implication, the way he was so perfunctorily honest about keeping her a significant and permanent half of his life – as though it was a foregone conclusion. As though the decisions they had made over the course of a decade had been on an unseen cosmic demand - just to get to a point wherein they were halves of a whole. Gill swallowed sharply, exhaling as she fisted into the shirt she was wearing and met the way he was watching her with insurmountable scrutiny, his attention rising from her mouth to her eyes as his hand dropped. A huff of surprised breath came off her before she licked against her lips and bit into the bottom one, shaking him a speechless but loving look.

He suddenly smiled at her like he'd managed to finally and completely suss her out, find the exact combination needed to disengage whatever was locking her chest up in a pent up breath. "Didn't expect eloquence and truth at once, love?"

Her head shook back and forth a little as his hands came up in a sort of silent and shrugging explanation, cheeks flushing up as he reached against the hand she still had tensed into fabric, pulling at her wrist to draw her closer.

She breathed out slowly, letting him pull her, "Emily is going to college, Cal. Your daughter is old enough to go to college and you're considering - "

The noise he hushed her with was warm as it traveled his throat, dragging her around the table to tug her into his hips first. He was surprisingly unruffled and gentled in the way he was speaking to her, his face having become passive as he met her eyes. "Look at me. Tell me, honestly, that you don't want it."

"I can't." Gill argued into the quiet demand.

"I know that." He finally chuckled a breath of half relief between them, prying her fingers slowly off the way they were still blindly clinging to warmed fabric as that bemused affection from earlier came back over him and loosened his shoulders back. "Why y'think I'm not lettin' up?"

"It would be... insane."

"Insanely fun, darling." The fervor in his voice wasn't lit by frustration anymore, if anything it was amusement and, oddly, excitement. "Trust me, I been there. It's everything and more than you think. Worse at times - way worse. But so much better than expected."

Excitement or teasing and she was still a little too unfocused by him (just him, in general) to be able to pick between the two. She'd long since missed her chance to pick out the pieces of his tone, too mentally scattered up by what is was exactly he was saying. Or, rather, what he was trying to say without being able to actually communicate like a normal human being.

Gill dipped her jaw lower, searching over his smile. "Are you mocking me now?"

"No." His hands caught hers up and she was mildly surprised by how intensely he dug his fingers into the centers of her palms. "Gillian... no. Course not."

Hell, he was so much better than most normal human beings and he had absolutely no idea.

She knew for a fact that he didn't realize that, didn't even accept the very possibility that it was true.

"Lemme give you what you want." He was muttering it while rubbing her fingers and the fact that he seemed unnaturally unsure of himself in doing so drew her attention sharper over the way he opened his mouth to say something before pausing, reconsidering, the colors in his eyes mushing up as he obviously decided to say it anyhow. "Lemme at least try, Foster."

She ducked lower into his fidgeting, catching the impish grin that touched over his lips as he realized what she was doing and deeply angled his head at her, fingers loosening from hers so his palms could shunt her closer. "Because it's what I want?"

"Because you're not the only one wantin' it." Cal jutted back sharply, a flushed and shy smirk fleeting over his lips embarrassingly before he nodded. "And, yeah, exactly. Because it's what you want. And if I can give you everything you want, I bloody well will."

The unfortunate reality was that she rarely could deny him when he was being so gently and honestly and stripped bare sweet. And he had no true ability to completely clear the swamped warmth in his voice. He never, never had. She sighed when he tugged at her, pulling on her hips slowly as he hummed a gentle questioning noise. Gill nodded an unconscious agreement before he dragged her tumbling onto the couch with him.

She felt exhaustion weigh on her suddenly, felt how hard it pressed her down into him as he slacked himself into the cushions and tugged her straddling over him. "What if it still doesn't work, Cal?"

"Then we finally get that puppy?" He tapped the tease against her sternum with a cheery nodding, a grin shattering over his lips when she flicked him a glare. "Promise you can name it somethin' insipid."

"You're an ass."

"I'll be 'round back in the middle of the night in my slippers, callin' for Daisy." Lightman's penchant for screwing off and being silly was limitless and, she knew, especially when he knew it'd get her laughing into how lightly he was tracing his fingertips on her cheekbone. "Daisy, get the fuck back here. Daisy, don't piss on the roses. To the left, Daisy, to the left."

"Stop it." Gill drifted her eyes shut on a muted laugh, leaning into the breadth and slowness of the touch, letting him turn his hand so it was his knuckles grazing a comforting on her skin.

"What?" He feigned a defensive pitch, raising his tone higher as she let her palms relax into his chest and press there, enjoying how solid he felt under her hands. "S'what I did with Em. Pup can't be any harder."

Gill opened her eyes when his fingers found their way trailing down her throat, studying his face and still finding a tenseness around his eyes that spoke past his teasing. "You're completely serious about this."

"Can't keep watchin' that look." He admitted defenselessly, shaking his head into the statement as though he had no other excuse to make, no other reasoning necessary. "Can't let it be the only thing I see on you over and over again."

"It's not." She murmured defensively, leaning farther forward into his hands and how slowly they were stroking flatly along her thighs. "I show you - "

"No, it's not." The agreement from him was just as soft as he squeezed against her legs. "But it kills me, Gill. M'not Alec. Can't find a fix that'll... you've always been my fix, haven't ya? It's why we're here in the middle of the night, strung out. You're my drug of choice, darling, and that sadness is ruinin' my high."

"You are smart enough to know that having a child is not going to stop me from feeling the way I do about Sophie, Cal." She offered a kiss onto his lips and let him draw it out longer than she'd planned, enjoyed how fluidly lazy he made it happen.

"Not just about Sophie, is it?" Darkness had fused into his eyes again as his mouth twisted a little, his shoulders tensing under her fingers. "It's Emily. It's the little girl in the cube. It's every mother you've gotta face every day knowin' that they've got what you so badly want and I can fuckin' see it, Gillian."

Her fingers tensed into his shoulders, the breaks of her palms shunting weight against him with unbreachable seriousness. "I don't want to do this just because it's what I want."

"It's not."

"Not just what I want?" Gill asked quietly, trying to find his eyes and noting the downturn of his jaw as he refused to look up.

He shirked up a sullen little pouting of agreement while he fidgeted the buttons on the shirt she was wearing. "No, not entirely."

"This is Cal Lightman saying he wants - "

"And with you," he interrupted smugly, lifting his head as she searched her fingers on stubble. "It's Cal Lightman bein' bare honest."

Despite the fact he still couldn't seem to entirely say it out loud.

Gill nodded slowly as she pressed against his jaw, "I can see that."

"Cute when I'm vulnerable, eh?" His brows came up in surprise but his voice was flush with amusement and haughty pride. "You think it's sexy."

"I never said that." she shook her head into the sound of the front door, how softly Emily's steps landed down the hall as she shushed herself into the mostly darkened house.

Cal exhaled on a shied grinning, tugging lightly at the front of the shirt, drawing her down farther so that he could squint playful accusation up at her. "Didn't have to, didja Foster?"

Gill just let off a long breathing sigh as Emily's steps neared closer, "We really doing this?"

His eyes held hers, lips quirking a barely there smirk as he cocked his head and shrugged an unquestioned agreement.

A snort of obvious derision matched the thud of Emily's bag hitting the floor as she paused in the doorway. "You guys seriously waited up for me? I'm a big girl."

"Don't get too awfully excited." Cal shot back as he dropped his head back on the couch, "We were working."

Emily gave them a scant glance before one brow shot up as she searched over the scattered mess of papers and photos and books. "I see that. You made a mess."

"Your father made a mess." Gill corrected gently, avoiding the proud grin the words brought up over him. "It's what he's good at."