A/N: The Christmas Eve chapter of this fic was also posted today, please make sure you've read that before you read this :)

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Epilogue - December 25th

Sitting on the floor with her arms wrapped around her knees, Emily tapped her cosily-slippered feet and looked again at the clock and then at the tempting stack of gifts beside her. She would give Cal another five minutes and then she was waking him up. She could not be expected to sit for much longer staring at the mysterious packages.

...

Emily only lasted about one minute before curiosity and impatience got the better of her. Deciding it wouldn't hurt to try to guess what her presents were, she picked up the top one, turning it in her hands, assessing the weight, feeling out the shape. She was just shaking it gently when a voice startled her.

"Aye, aye. Caught in the act."

She dropped the present beside the others, automatically beginning to defend herself. "I got tired of wait-" She stopped; her eyes widening and a grin creeping across her lips when she turned round and saw who was standing next to her father, wearing the same clothes as the night before.

"Hmm. Not the only one caught in the act," she observed, smiling cheekily as she got to her feet.

Cal rolled his eyes. "Gillian slept in the spare room," he explained, "Stop trying to deflect from the fact that you were peeking at your presents."

"I was letting you sleep in. But now I'm really glad I didn't come to wake you," she teased.

She hugged Cal, wishing him a merry Christmas, then she moved to Gillian. She was unable to keep her excited grin from her face as she embraced Gillian. "Merry Christmas."

"Oh calm down," Cal muttered. "Gillian slept in the spare room," he reiterated, slowly.

Emily stepped back and studied them both; her eyes narrow and lips pursed as she watched them closely. And after a minute or so Cal had to admit he was surprised Gillian hadn't yet given them away.

"Gillian slept in the spare room?" Emily eventually enquired. She looked to Gillian first for an answer.

Gillian nodded. "I did."

Emily's eyes slid across to Cal. "All night?"

In the corner of his eye Cal saw Gillian try to hide her surprise at Emily's question.

Chuckling to himself he addressed his daughter. "Em, do you really think that if Gillian had been in my bed at any point -"

"Cal!"

"Dad!"

Both women could obviously see where that sentence was heading. Laughing aloud now, Cal wound his arm round Gillian's waist and pulled her to his side. Her cheeks were bright pink and she was failing miserably at glaring at him for his comment.

"Well, it's true," he argued, enjoying the deepening of Gillian's blush.

"Wait," Emily insisted, "So you two are..."

"Gillian slept in the spare room," Cal told her seriously.

She glanced between them again, now with a lot less distance to cover. "But you are together?" Her delight was barely contained.

Cal met Gillian's eyes, his eyebrows raised seeking permission to tell Emily the whole truth. Her responding smile - simultaneously embarassed, amused and deliriously happy - had him forgetting for a moment what the question was. Which, of course, gave Emily her answer.

Squealing as quietly as she could manage, Emily hugged them both fiercely and grinned brightly up at them when she pulled back. "It's a Christmas miracle," she beamed, then, after a split-second's pause, she seemed to laugh to herself.

Cal eyed her suspiciously.

"What's that look about?"

"What look?" Emily frowned.

Cal focused all his attention on her. "There's more to your 'miracle' comment than you just being cheesily chirpy... What are you up to?"

"I'm not up to anything," Emily insisted and Cal rolled his eyes.

He looked at Gillian who nodded to show she had also noticed that comment was truthful. Returning his eyes to Emily, Cal reworded his question. "What have you done?"

A smile twitched at Emily's lips. "Well, I didn't really -"

"Who else was involved?"

Emily glanced between Cal and Gillian for a couple of seconds and then admitted, "Loker and Torres."

"And what did you do?" Gillian asked with a frown that Cal shared, failing to see how Torres, Loker and Emily could have done anything at all which would have impacted on this outcome.

Now Emily could not contain her smile. "We... wrote to Santa," she grinned and she looked from one to the other again to watch their reactions.

Cal's mouth opened a couple of times but always closed again without any words having passed his lips. Gillian appeared highly intrigued. And amused.

"And what did the three of you ask for?" Gillian queried, although the answer seemed rather obvious.

"Well, I'd been putting up the Christmas decorations at your office and we got to talking about whether I'd put up any mistletoe… And then to where I should put it so that the two of you were likely to end up under it. Turns out you were the only ones unaware of your feelings for each other! Anyway, I figured you were both too clever to fall for mistletoe, so we needed an alternative plan."

There was silence for several seconds, both Cal and Gillian just staring at Emily, who grew gradually more and more nervous about what might happen next.

"So you wrote to Santa?" Cal finally spoke.

Emily shrugged. "It was worth a try."

"And apparently it worked," Gillian smirked.

Emily's eyes lit up at Gillian's words and Cal rolled his eyes again.

"I doubt Santa had anything to do with this," he argued, despite knowing it was fruitless to fight against their Christmas spirit.

"Seems awfully coincidental though," Gillian remarked, "Even you can admit that."

"I was in love with you long before Santa showed up."

"But you never thought to mention it until now," Gillian teased gently.

Emily chuckled. "Yeah, Dad! Why not last Christmas or last month, or the month before?"

Gillian fixed her sparkling eyes on Cal and in slow, deliberate words asked him, "Cal… What did you ask Kris for?"

Cal visibly squirmed and wide smiles spread across the faces of both women who watched him.

"Cal?" Gillian prompted.

Glaring at her first, for good measure, Cal eventually confessed, "You."

Squealing with unrestrained delight this time, Emily embraced them both again and squeezed them tight.

"See: A Christmas miracle! Let's see what else I got."

While Emily escaped to the presents, Cal caught Gillian's hand and kept her with him.

"What did you ask Kris for?" he enquired.

For a split second she ducked her eyes away from his gaze. But then she seemed to summon courage and she faced him proudly as she admitted, "A boyfriend."

Cal laughed out loud, unable to stop himself, and quickly wrapped his arms round Gillian's waist to apologise. "You really have seen too many cheesy Christmas movies," he remarked before placing a gentle kiss to her lips.

"No such thing," she grinned leaning in for another kiss.

"Er, not that I'm not delighted that you've finally got your acts together," Emily interrupted them, "But I am still in the room."

That beautiful blush crept up Gillian's cheeks again and Cal stole another kiss before she stepped away.

"Sorry, Em," Gillian smiled at her as she joined her by the tree.

"Right, come on, let's open presents, then," Cal decreed, sitting down on the floor.

"Gill, if we'd known you were staying," - she couldn't help but smile as she said that - "We could have saved your presents for this morning."

Gillian shook her head. "Oh don't worry."

"Yeah, Gill's fine," Cal smirked, taking hold of Gillian's hand and squeezing it affectionately, "She's already got everything she asked Santa for."

THE END