Authors Note: Last chapter here, hope you guys enjoy it and thanks to; terriberri23, Storywriter, Runner043, afrozenheart412, jessicaflack and blackandblueangel for the reviews.

Chapter 11

It wasn't that he was nervous, Jess already knew exactly who Sam was and he knew his sister would get along well with Jess, maybe a little too well, but he was still apprehensive as he parked the car outside his sister's apartment building. Don gave the building in front of him a wary glance as he got out of the car and heard Jess laugh as she walked around to join him. He turned to her with a glare that only lasted a second as she linked an arm with him and rested her head on his shoulder, a small smirk playing on her lips. She'd not bothered to hide her amusement at his 'not nervousness' since he'd gotten home from work an hour ago.

"You know, I've already spoken to your sister once, twice if you include the time I almost arrested her," Jess said and he could hear the amusement in her voice as she spoke. "You've been laughing since I was in the hospital about your sister not knowing I was the cop that almost arrested her and what her face will look like when she finds out and now that the moment is here you're nervous."

"I'm not nervous" he denied for the millionth time.

Jess laughed. "Of course you're not."

They walked up the few steps of the apartment building and Sam buzzed them in, Don could tell from her voice she was excited and he barely suppressed a groan as he opened the door and allowed Jess to walk through before him. He knocked on Sam's door and waited the few seconds it took for her to open it, grin firmly in place as she invited them in.

"About time, I've been waiting for months for this," she stated and then turned to look at Jess, narrowing her eyes. "I've seen you before."

Jess smiled and looked at Don, he barely kept a straight face as Sam stood there trying to figure out where she'd seen her. He laughed as Sam's eyes widened, recognition flooding her face as she finally remembered.

"Sam, this is Jess, you've met before," he stated and Sam momentarily turned a glare on him before turning back to Jess with a smile.

"Sorry about the beer bottle, not one of my finer moments," she said with a cheerful smile, sucking away the rest of Don's fun. "Dinner should be about half an hour, make yourselves comfortable, can I get you anything?"

Jess shook her head and Don led her over to the couch as Sam walked into the kitchen. "Well, give me a second here and I can start telling you the customary tales of Don's youth."

Don groaned as he sat down next to Jess, this, he was pretty sure, was why he'd been so apprehensive.

"How are you feeling?" Don questioned as he pulled up alongside the crime scene tape. It was her first day back in the field, it had taken a while but she was finally here. She'd had to go to the firing range a few times just to be able to stop flinching every time a gun was fired and her therapist was keeping up their sessions for at least the next couple of weeks but she'd signed her off for active duty. She was a fully functioning homicide detective again, something that, at one point, she feared she'd never be.

"If you ask me that again Don, I'm going to kill you, and you may want to warn them," she replied gesturing toward the house that contained the crime scene and knowing he would know who she meant.

"We care Jess," Don stated. "You can't blame us for caring."

"I don't," she told him. "I will however blame you if you care me all the way into a padded room."

They stepped under the tape, ignoring the couple of reporters that were already sniffing around for the time being. The house was in a nice neighbourhood, white picket fences and tidy gardens. The front of the house gave no indication that any kind of horror had taken place inside, neither did the hallway. It wasn't until they got to the kitchen that they could see any evidence of a crime, Mary Linn Clarke's body was laid beside the kitchen table, pale and bloody.

"Hey Jess," Danny greeted as he looked up from taking pictures of the body. "How are..."

"Danny," Don cut him off and shook his head. "Don't."

Danny smirked and went back to taking pictures as Mac walked over. "Good to have you back Angell."

"Thanks," Jess replied and gestured to the body. "What do we have?"

"Mary Linn Clarke, murdered sometime last night, her three kids found the body when they came down for breakfast this morning. Husband heard screaming and came running down, called 911," Mac explained.

"Where was he last night?" Don questioned wondering how someone could be stabbed to death in their own home and have no one in the house hear a thing.

"Asleep, he said Mary Linn had trouble sleeping, it wasn't uncommon for her to get out of bed at night so he wasn't concerned that she wasn't there. He says he didn't hear anything, he was tired last night so he probably slept straight through any noise. He's outside with a couple of uniforms, he seems pretty distraught," Mac explained glancing at the body Danny was still photographing.

"You believe him?" Don questioned.

"Don't know yet. At the moment we've found no signs of forced entry and he was the last one to see her alive," Mac replied.

"Well, he's definitely a suspect. How old are the kids?" Jess asked.

"Too young to have done this, oldest is twelve and he doesn't have the strength to inflict wounds this deep," Danny said drawing their attention to him and the body.

"If you don't need us here, we'll go canvas the neighbourhood and then talk to the husband and kids, see what we can find out," Don said and Jess followed him out.

Jess sighed as she sat down on the bench in the locker room hoping the painkillers she'd just taken would kick in soon. She'd known it was a bad idea to start chasing suspects down this soon after she'd returned to working in the field but it wasn't as though she'd had a choice. Mac had been in the bedroom of their suspect's apartment while Jess looked around the living room. Tobias Clarke had come home to find two cops searching his home and made a run for it. She'd called for Mac as she'd chased him out of the apartment but she'd known he wouldn't be able to catch up in time.

She'd chased Tobias down four flights of stairs, down the street and across the road before a passerby purposely knocked into him, slowing him down long enough for her to catch him, the idiot had been fast. Tobias was Mary Linn Clarke's brother, which explained why there had been no forced entry, she'd probably let him in. The husband claimed his wife and her brother had been arguing for weeks about money, she'd lent him several thousand dollars to help him pay off gambling debts but he kept coming back for more until she'd finally said no.

She heard the door to the locker room open and knew it was Don even before he spoke. "At the risk of being killed, how are you feeling?"

Jess smiled and shook her head. "Sore, but I'll live."

He sat down on the bench next to her; he and Mac had done the interrogation. "He lawyered up; we've got to wait for the lawyer to get here before we can continue. Danny called from the lab and said Tobias's fingerprints match those on the murder weapon and his DNA is match to the skin under Mary Linn's fingernails."

"Open and shut case then," Jess replied. Don nodded and stood up, holding his hand out to her and pulling her up with him.

"It was good to have you back out there today," he told her.

"It was good to be back out there," she said and bit her lip. "I have to say though, I didn't think you'd be as... happy about it as you are, I thought you'd take some convincing."

"I worry about you Jess, even before the shooting, I worried about you, that's not going to change. This job is your life though, as much as it is mine, and I would never even have considered you not coming back to it," he explained and she smiled, kissing him quickly.

"Sometimes I wonder what I did to deserve you," Jess stated and Don smirked.

"Sometimes I wonder that myself," he replied and Jess hit his arm and walked toward the door.

"Just for that I'm not waiting for you when I get off in an hour," she called back to him as she left, hearing his phone ring and figuring Tobias's lawyer had arrived. She headed to her desk knowing Don would fill her in on whatever she missed later, if she got a head start on the paperwork she could have a good chunk of it done before her shift ended.

Don sat down beside Jess and put her drink down in front of her. It was the first time they'd all really been out together since before Jess had been shot and it felt good to be returning to something so familiar. The last several months had been tough on all of them, Jess's shooting, coma and recovery, Danny being shot and ending up in a wheelchair for a couple of months. It had created stress and tension throughout the whole team and Don was glad to be getting back to normal.

"How was your first case back?" Stella asked Jess.

"I don't think 'good' is the right word to use for a homicide investigation," Jess replied with a thoughtful expression.

"We know what you mean though," Lindsay said, stopping Danny from repeatedly spinning a coin on the table next to her.

"I'm going to get another drink, anyone want anything?" Danny said as he stood up and walked over to the bar, a couple of drinks orders being called after him.

"Adam, seriously, who do you keep texting?" Stella questioned, trying to look over Adam's shoulder to see. Adam pulled his phone away only for it to be grabbed by Lindsay who quickly handed it over to Stella.

"Can I have that back please?" Adam said trying to lean across for it and stop Stella reading the text.

"Who's Melinda?" Stella questioned holding the phone out of his reach.

"No one," Adam replied, making another grab for the phone. It was taken from Stella's hand by Mac who gave it back to Adam and gave Stella a reproachful look.

"I think the boss has spoken," Hawkes laughed as Stella refrained from teasing Adam anymore. They all finished their drinks and went their separate ways. Don and Jess stopped by the DVD store and a take away on their way back to his place. They both knew that Jess could easily go back to her place now, could have done weeks ago but neither of them said anything, neither of them were prepared to break the status quo yet. Instead they settled on the couch for the night and Jess curled into his side, falling asleep within minutes of finishing her food.

END

Authors Note: Wow, there it is, finished. I'm not entirely sure what I think of this ending but at least it's done. I hope you guys enjoyed it, thanks to everyone who reviewed and to those who stuck with me from beginning to end despite my bad updating.