It was finally over Rachel thought as she picked her son up and spun him around in her arms. The boy gave a squeal of pure delight as she hugged him and put him down again.

"Chase me mommy," he said, and darted off on unsteady legs toward the slide in Violet's old man's backyard.

She laughed as she watched her son got caught by Kevin. The handsome Australian picked him up and started galloping around the yard with him. She heard Violet laugh as she watched from the safety of the picnic table on the other side of the yard along with Cammie and Zoe. Lil was currently being cornered by her grandfather while he tried to finagle her into turning Coyote Ugly into an Irish pub.

The only person that wasn't here was the one she missed and needed the most. With a frown her mind drifted back to a couple days ago as she remembered what had happened after they had loaded Jessie into the ambulance.

Rachel watched Nate warily as they loaded Jessie into the back of the ambulance. After the reinforcements had arrived Nate had caught her up in a hug that had conveyed all of the fear and worry he had been holding in since walking into McNamara's office.

Afterwards though, when everything had started to settle down he wouldn't even say two words to her. She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye, found her courage, and asked.

"What's wrong Nate?" He turned on her with narrowed eyes.

"What's wrong? I'll tell you what's wrong. Of all the stupid things you could have done Rachel this has got to hit a new all time high." he growled.

He clenched his fists and watched the ambulance disappear around a corner. He then turned blazing eyes on the woman next to him and scowled. Nate wasn't sure if he wanted to strangle her for putting them all in danger or kiss her for being alive.

"What would you have had me do Nate? Just let McNamara get away with everything? Maybe it was stupid but I didn't see a whole lot of other options at the time," she defended.

Frustrated he ran a hand through his sandy blonde hair. "That's because you weren't thinking Rachel. Don't you understand? You could have been killed."

Nate knew it was his bone numbing fear talking but he couldn't seem to help himself.

"I didn't know what else to do. He was going to turn my son into a monster…and then there's you," she screamed. His eyes went wide and narrowed.

"What about me?"

She hugged herself and turned away, unable to look at him.

"Nate you almost died because of me, because of my ties to McNamara. I couldn't have lived with that and I knew that if we couldn't bring him down…I wasn't going to let him hurt you. I couldn't watch you die…I just couldn't."

He was quiet for a long moment and she tried to reach out and touch him. The minute her fingers grazed his arm he pulled away as if she had burned him. Rachel felt her heart break.

"Rachel I can't…I can't deal with this right now. I'm a cop, a homicide detective, and you're telling me that you almost got yourself killed to protect me? I can't be worried about you every time I have a difficult case. It's not fair to you and it's not fair to me."

"What are you saying?" She asked and felt her anger spike. He frowned and she had to clench her fists to keep from hitting him.

"What the hell, Nate. Maybe we should just, oh I don't know, see other people, try to be friends? Which one is it Nate? Which one are you going to use to blow me off because you're scared of what might happen?"

He flinched and ran his hand through his hair again.

"This is the wrong time to have this discussion, cher," he warned.

"This is the perfect time, but you know what? Let's not bother with it at all." She turned and started to walk away. An expression of shear panic crossed his features.

"Rachel wait," he called, but she didn't stop walking. Nathan watched her with an expression of sorrow, hurt, and confusion, but he didn't go after her. He watched her walk away from him.

He didn't go after.

And he knew that he might not be able to fix the rift his irrational fear had just opened up between them.

Oh how she wanted him come after her, but it become apparent the closer she got to the black convertible that he wasn't going to move. Hugging herself she refused to look back, letting the silent tears fill the hole were her heart use to be.

Rachel was brought out of her dark thoughts by an arm around her shoulders. She turned her head to see Zoe looking at her with grave eyes.

"Uh-oh, I know that look, that's the, he hasn't called, he hasn't forgiven me yet, look,"

Rachel tried to grin but it didn't quite reach her eyes.

"He isn't going to call Zoe. I just need to face the fact that he doesn't really feel the same way about me, as I do about him."

She arched an eyebrow.

"Honey that's not true. The problem is that he doesn't know how to deal with his own demons so he is blaming them on you. He'll come around. The real question is, will you take him back when he comes crawling?"

"I don't know Zo, I just don't know."

Nathan watched her from the shadows as she danced on the bar, setting things on fire and pumping up the crowd for a night of hardcore partying. It had been two weeks since they had sent Tony McNamara to a new location six feet under, two long weeks without seeing her and it was his own damn fault.

He had been running scared after what had happened with McNamara, paralyzed by the mind numbing fear he had felt when Tony had turned his gun on her. He knew that if he had had to watch Rachel die it would have killed him. He hadn't felt that kind of emotion since Elizabeth and he hadn't been sure if he could handle loving someone else like that.

Then there was the specter of Roland Garrison that he had still needed to purge from his soul. Realizing that Tony McNamara had been behind the death of his first love had shaken him more than he could have imagined.

Roland may have held the knife but Tony had held the leash and he had succeeded in taking Elizabeth away from him. It only made him more afraid of loving and losing Rachel. That is way he had practically ran from her after Jesse had been taken to the hospital.

It had take two weeks of soul searching to realize that no matter how hard he tried not to be, he was irrevocably in love with Rachel Barnes and it wasn't to go away.

"Are you going to just stare at her all night or are you going to go apologize."

Nate frowned and turned towards his partner. She was sitting in a wheelchair, grinning at him impishly. Jessie's husband, Eric, was standing behind her, amusement dancing in his eyes.

"I'm working up to it," he growled. Jess's grin widened.

Nate mumbled something unkind and turned to the dark haired man behind her.

"I don't know how you put up with her, Eric."

Eric Leland smirked.

"I don't know how you are going to put up with, Rachel."

Nate scowled and sighed.

"You assume she's even gonna give me the time of day."

His gaze drifted back to the girl on the bar. He knew this wasn't going to be easy but with a determined expression settling over his features he steeled himself.

"Wish me luck," he mumbled.

His two friends smirked and he made his way to the bar.

The first person to see him was Lil. She smiled at him and he was grateful for it, but there was a warning in her eyes as she glanced at Rachel. Taking that as his cue to mean she was pissed at him for disappearing he winced. This was going to be harder than he thought.

"Hey Nate, what can I get you?" she asked. He grinned and replied

"Anything that will give me a backbone and you had better make it a double."

She smirked at him like an executioner and poured him a double of something he couldn't identify. When he downed it in one gulp it left a trail of fire down his gut that made him think he had roasted all his internal organs. Lil graced him a wide, innocent smile when he started to cough.

"Do you need another?"

Eyes watering, he shook his head between hacks. When his capacity for speech returned he told Lil.

"Now I just need to borrow your bar and if you can, put a good word in for me with anyone who might be listening."

Lil stared at him not quite understanding what he meant and was stunned when pulled himself up on the bar. Rachel had been dancing on the other end when she suddenly turned around and saw him.

She stopped mid-step and faced him like an old west gunslinger. The crowd yelled for him to get off the bar but he ignored them. He smiled and she frowned, resting her hands on her hips and facing him with arms akimbo.

He swallowed nervously and turned to lean down and grab the mega-phone from Lil.

"Everyone shut the hell up. I've got something to say."

He screamed in the mega-phone; his southern drawl thick with nerves. Strangely enough, the bar fell silent. Everyone looked from him to Rachel and wondered if he knew he was about to die. He swallowed again, lowered the mega-phone, and turned to the woman currently glaring at him.

"I want everyone here tonight to know that I am the world's biggest asshole."

This caused a few people to chuckle, but Rachel continued giving him the evil eye. He forced his nerves down.

"A few weeks ago I did the stupidest thing I could ever have done. I walked away from the woman that I had fallen madly in love with. A woman who you all know could probably kick my sorry ass all the way back to Louisiana. So I decided to make a fool of myself, in front of witnesses so at least she might not kill me. What I really wanted to say though is this," he paused, and Rachel's eyes widened as he pulled out a small velvet box.

A mummer went through the crowd and Lil even gasped in surprise. He felt his confidence slip even more. He gathered his courage.

"Rachel Maria Barnes, I am madly in love with you. Marry me and make me the happiest son of a bitch on earth."

The bar was dead silent as they crowd waited to see what Rachel would say. Nate looked hopeful; at least he had, until she started walking towards him. He didn't see her right cross coming until it had caught him on his clean-shaven jaw and knocked him down, ass first, onto the scarred wood.

She fumed and waved her arms. "Of all the idiotic things to do you arrogant, inbred, asshole...and it sure took you long enough!"

Her eyes flashed in anger, but it was tempered with another emotion. Nate rubbed his jaw gingerly, grinned cockily, and said.

"So…is that a yes?"

Rachel grabbed him by his tie, hauled him up, and pulled his head down to her mouth to kiss him deeply. Their tongues warred with each other as all the passion, grief, loss, fire, hurt, hope, and love built up between them. Nate wasn't sure what knocked him for a loop more, the kiss or her right cross.

Finally the need for oxygen prevailed for both of them and they pulled apart gasping for breath.

"Will you marry me Rachel," he asked again and she smiled.

"Yes," she said and brushed her lips over his. It was his turn to smile.

"So you do love me then?"

She rolled her eyes and hit him in the shoulder playfully.

"Yes I love you…but you're still an egotistical prick."

He laughed and noticed that the crowd was now clapping and whistling. Lil was the loudest as she screamed her blessings in favor of the upcoming nuptials, but he only had eyes for Rachel.

"You know...you're still the kind of caste iron Yankee bitch my momma warned me about," he teased and covered her protest with another devastating kiss.

"And you're still an annoying boy scout who doesn't know when to take no for an answer."

He grinned and she smirked.

"God, I love you," he breathed. She sucked in a breath.

"I love you, too," she whispered and kissed him again.

When they separated this time they were both smiling. Nate knew, as he gazed into her hazel eyes, that this was right, this was real, and this was home. He'd tamed the wildest of all the coyotes and he planned on making her happy for as long as the good Lord saw fit to keep them together.

God, he really did love New York.