Author's Note: I've no excuse. I just... couldn't shake this one off.

A weak smile pulled at her lips as she saw him arrive and watched as he handed over the bag of Christine's delicious cooking. He had mentioned earlier, that he was going there, but watching him there in that long moment of grief filled her with tender sadness. The tears that had already gathered in her eyes since she had halted there began to prick harder as he eyed her and then turned, walking into his office. She wasn't really certain how long that she had stood there –– maybe for too long –– but Jo hadn't managed to take a step back or forth since she had been surprised with the tribute of the lab techs in memory of Jessica Drake, their colleague.

She hadn't succeeded to rip away her gaze from the unexpected exhibition of love, camaraderie, collegiality and loyalty and a mixture of those hanging in the air there either. At the same token, she hadn't really wanted to invade in any way in their shared grief –– the grief of those she worked with indirectly, yet barely knew at all.

Jo's thoughts had begun running, and it had really hit her that if anything like that were to happen to one of their own, the ones she worked with more closely, she would be devastated with grief, too. In that moment in time, it had hit her hard how close that she had become to the members of the team she had joined a year before only: how she confided in them as they did in return with her, how she cared for them. At that moment exactly, Mac had entered, as if summoned by her thoughts.

She stood at the far end of the hallway, he at the other, everyone literally between them reveling in heartache and goodbye to a colleague and a companion. She couldn't truly help but feel the emotion of 'goodbye' stretching to either of them as well, reaching them… connecting them. She couldn't help but feel the emotion of 'goodbye' touch her as she saw him and he her.

Mac Taylor had never really been the sort of boss joining them for a beer or two, after hours, but she remembered they used to have a coffee together, sometimes. Since Christine and he had connected again, that was no longer so. She understood he wanted to have at least some time with Christine as well, and after all, Mac and she worked together most of the day, most days of the week. Jo Danville encouraged him to be with her, doing something, at last, about his social life, maybe his love life, but she missed the off-duty moments with him herself as well. As she thought this, feelings of 'goodbye' intensified.

Her eyes trailed to the lab again and suddenly, she wondered whether he even knew how much she had gotten to love him as a colleague and person in all. She wondered whether he even knew how much his loyalty and his mere presence ––with Ellie who had tried to go see her biological mom, with John Curtis –– actually meant to her. Suddenly, it became incredibly imperative he knew, and not only feelings of 'goodbye' but of painful loss and grief began pulling right at Jo's heartstrings, and she needed to tell him.

So she told him she adored him, Mac Taylor. Jo told him that he didn't even need to say anything at all and react to her sentimentality in any way… but it would have been… nice. Maybe that's where they already let go.