His eyes are glass when they pull her out of the rubble. She's clutching his shirt and her skin feels too tight. She can feel the salt that left its tracks.

Two men, bloody and dead. Two people she was closest to in her life. She closes her eyes as she's pulled away.

She doesn't know why she screams at him. Everything's a fucking mess and she can't even explain what she's feeling.

It's no bad intentions that have him there, speaking too fast, babbling urgent Spanish, she doesn't know what the fuck he's trying to say to her and she snaps.

She's not sorry when she slams the motel room door, hears him kick at the banister.

She's not sorry.

She remembers scrambling from the wreckage. It's hot, heat flaring in her vision. She is high and hurting and for the first time, despairs in this loneliness.

When there's a hand and a Venezuelan offering her comfort, she takes it.

She can't remember being held like this. She thinks she stops breathing. Maybe it's the drugs. She knows if it were up to him, he'd never let her out of his arms.

She doesn't see the look in his eyes when the knife pierces the windshield. It's real, undiluted surprise.

She misses the look of conflict when she takes off her clothes to dance for a stranger.

She ignores his look of amused curiosity when she punches that asshole actor in his way-too-fucking-perfect nose.

She cries over the look of absolute love when he watches her closely, dying on the floor of an elevator.

She doesn't try hard enough to look away and she knows that Ed knows it. She's never been good at hiding. She listens to words about music and wild days, great days, but they're not going in. There's smooth, brown skin holding her attention.

That body was never meant to be in clothes.

The pants slide off and she's left with barely anything to stop her eyes from wandering. She knows she shouldn't. Just a complication she doesn't need.

Stop. Stop it.

Ed moves back into her vision. Good thing he can't tell that there's lust curling in her stomach. She only lies and smiles when he asks her what she's staring at. They both know it anyway.

She watches him as he puts his finger down a barrel and for a moment, just one second, she is in awe.

He's playing with life in a way that she wishes she could. He is playing that guy holding the gun and does it with total composure. He's been pointed at a hell lot more often than she has until now.

She says she not afraid to die but she thinks it's him, that is knows the real meaning of not afraid.

The pools are one good thing about Los Angeles. They're soaked when he pulls her out of the water, skin on skin as he steadies her. A large, hot hand splayed on her back and it's itching to pull her closer.

She can see it coming. Their eyes are covered but it's not hard to guess that his gaze is burning into her. He's leaning in the way he has several times before.

It would be easy to give in when she knows he wants her.

She doesn't.

He has beautiful eyes. They're honest most of the time and tell her everything she doesn't want to know.

She notices when he stands up and takes the shotgun. Ready to do what she is too weak for. Their gazes catch and it's one time she understands what he's trying to communicate. It's the look of somebody who knows he must cross a line to do what has to be done.

She thinks she sees apology, warning and determination all at once. She doesn't like the thought but it stays in her head. Especially when blood covers the windows and the screams start. She can't even look at the arm when he comes back.

Maybe it's not the first time he has done this to a man.

She's fucked before. Not so many because they never gave her the kicks she wanted. She hasn't been one for sex with feelings.

He's not that way though. Through their haze, their confusion, he takes his time. The rocky desert ground doesn't matter. The concussion doesn't matter. The death sentence hovering over them doesn't matter. He kisses her pain away, makes her feel whole. She doesn't know why she has hesitated all those times.

She wonders how somebody who life has fucked over, knows how to make love the way he does.

She kids herself when she thinks she knows much about him. There's more history there than she'll ever find out. More to him than prison and hunting. There was a childhood, those years in Venezuela. There are likes, hates, dreams and nightmares and secrets.

Toying with that FBI bitch, everything gone, she finds herself wishing she had asked him earlier. She wishes she'd realized earlier that she loves him.