They could go ten rounds with each other and never once, give a second thought to it. It was easy as breathing; she saw things one way and he saw them the other way. There was no compromise - no meeting each other in the middle. They could never find that center line between what she believed and what he believed. It existed, it had too but they could never find it because he didn't want to find it and she had never bothered to look for it. It wasn't something she particularly cared to find either, what with him doing his own thing anyway, no matter her opinion. He'd never compromise, but that's part of what gave him his appeal. His stubbornness - well it was a combination of that and those smoldering blue eyes of his.

Eventually it had come to a point where arguing him was a bit too much like talking to a brick wall - pointless and kind of ridiculously stupid. She had stopped trying to reason with him, trying to get him to take the safer route - something she wished Marshall would have done a thousand times. It's probably the main reason why their last fight had been unnecessarily harsh and incredibly cruel. She can't even remember what the fight was about now but she did know that he had been stubborn and had stalked off with the client to discuss the latest mission while she had been left seething in fiery anger at his incredulous unrelenting will to do things his way.

Needless to say, the reason she's currently on his couch with a bottle of scotch and two shot glasses has completely alluded her. Of course, that could, in part, be blamed on the two shots of scotch she had downed before she actually made it up to his loft to wait for him on his couch with the alcohol and tumblers. After their last fight, she should have been anywhere but there but she just can't make herself leave him alone after this mission. Yes, they'd given each other a verbal lashing for the record books but that didn't mean she couldn't be there for him in case he needed her. She had probably doomed herself to a night of silence as they downed shots like professionals but it was better than the verbal lashing they had delivered to each other.

The elevator dings and soon enough, heavy footsteps pound the stairs as he jogs up to his loft, where he'll find her. She's curled up on his couch in the dark and she doesn't know how but he'll see her silhouette and know who it is without the need of a light.

"Ilsa," He pauses at the top of the stairs and shrugs out of his jacket. "What are you doing here?"

"I thought you could use a friend," Ilsa tells him as she reaches forward and grabs the bottle of the scotch by the neck, holding it up for him to see. "And liquor."

He laughs in disbelief as he tosses his jacket on the nearest flat surface and sits down on the couch. "What are you really doing here, Ilsa? I'm not really in the mood for another lecture."

"I'm not here to lecture you," Ilsa uncaps the bottle and pours him a shot of the fiery amber liquid in the bottle. "I'm simply here because you need a friend and I need a reason to drink."

He doesn't believe her but she's offering him liquor - expensive, delicious liquor at that - so he won't argue. Instead, he takes the glass tumbler and tosses the liquid back before slamming the shot glass back down on the table. The liquid burns going down but the feeling dissipates into a warm, numbing sensation that feels strangely good. She pours him another shot before taking her own tumbler and tossing the liquid back like a professional. The drinking and slamming of glasses continues until they've gone through enough of the whiskey to be numb to whatever the other might have in store for them.

"The ends justify the means," Chance reiterates his motto when it comes to the business they're in. "They do. If you don't believe that and if you can't believe that, that's fine but we're always going to be at each other's throats about things like that. You can't expect me to take the safer route all the time, it just doesn't work."

"I know the business I'm in," Ilsa retorts sharply, using the crisp phrase she had used the only other time they had fought this bad. "But does the end really justify what it took to get there if getting there means putting your own life on the line?"

"If it means that someone else gets to live, then yes." Chance tossed back another shot before slamming his tumbler down on the coffee table again. "There's always going to be a safer way to do things and you are always going to see that safer way but you have to understand that just because there's a safer way doesn't mean that it's the best way."

"Oh so the best way is going out and nearly getting yourself killed?" Ilsa slurs bitterly, angrily throwing back what must have been her fifth or sixth shot - she couldn't be sure and was past the point of caring.

"What's this all about, Ilsa? Because you didn't seem to have a problem with it when it saved your friend's life or when it saved yours!" Chance hissed at her, standing up from the couch, ignoring the now full shot glass on the table in favor of a somewhat sober conversation.

"Everytime a new mission comes in, I sit in my office and I worry..." Ilsa finally snapped at him,looking up into his cerulean eyes. Her own soft brown eyes were filled with tears. Her words are less slurry but she's not sober - he can see that. "I worry...about whether you'll walk into the office or whether Winston and Guerrero are going to be carrying your coffin!"

"Ilsa..."

"I can't do it, Mister Chance." Ilsa told him softly, her voice warbly and cracking with every word. "I can't sit here all day and worry about whether or not you're coming back alive. I did it with Marshall...everytime he left, I worried. I'm not sure I can do it now...not with you."

"Ilsa, why now?" Chance asked her, softening considerably. "Ilsa, we just solved your husband's murder. What's - ?"

"It's that!" Ilsa told him, softly. There was a hoarse vulnerability in her voice. "I don't want your death to be our next case. I don't want to worry anymore. Marshall always wanted to take the more dangerous option, despite the risks. I'm tired of worrying about whether or not every man I've ever cared about is going to end up in the ground with a bullet in his chest."

In hindsight he probably could have seen this coming. She had been battling her own demons from the day he had met her. Her husband's death had obviously taken more of a toll on her than anyone realized but she was always so stubborn and headstrong that nobody could see how hurt she was. She fought with him to keep from admitting that she worried about him. Between worrying about Marshall and then worrying about him; it hurt more than he, or any of them, had ever realized. She wasn't trying to run their business or be a nuisance to them, she was trying to keep them safe if only to protect herself.

"Your husband's death..." Chance trailed off.

"And my father's." Ilsa explained softly, looking away to keep him from seeing the tears in her eyes. She hated for him to see her vulnerable. "Mister Chance, do you know how traumatic it can be for an eight year old to bury her father? To watch her mother sit in a window and cry every single day?"

"Ilsa..."

"I've tried the understanding approach, Chance." Ilsa's voice was thick with tears and he could see the exhaustion setting in heavy. "I've tried it, it doesn't work. I've tried getting around explaining why I wish you'd take the safer options sometimes...I've tried everything to make you understand without having to explain it..but you never got it and I never wanted to explain it because.."

"Talking about it makes it real." Chance nodded in understanding.

He had been that way with Katherine. Explaining it...hearing it - even if it was your own voice telling it, made it all too real and that feeling of wanting to be wherever they were crept up on you before you could stop it. The raw feeling never quite went away, there was always something that lingered behind. A part of you that never truly healed. It was raw, it was painful and it was real.

"It was very real, it was very painful and it hurt me quite a bit more than even I was expecting." Ilsa told him hoarsely, crossing her arms over her chest, suddenly feeling very exposed. "I wasn't prepared for how bad it would hurt. I can't go through that again, Mister Chance."

He's never been much of a hugger - actually, he's not that affectionate at all really - but something compelled him to wrap his arms around her. Between the exhaustion and the emotions that have been stripped raw by her intense confession, she's almost completely void of strength. She can usually put up one hell of a fight but tonight she just doesn't have the strength and the scotch doesn't seem to be helping matters. She's shaky, exhausted and she wants so bad to just cry it all out but she just won't do it. She won't let him see her vulnerable. Not now. Not ever. She can't.

"I need you to stay alive," Ilsa whispers in a moment of rare defenselessness.

Her guard's down. She's not holding anything back - not hiding anything. She's letting him see every single thing she's feeling. The raw anger, the pain of the loss she had suffered, the exhaustion of having to stay guarded, so no one could see the demons she battled. To keep people from getting to close and discovering that beneath the strong, sexy businesswoman was an emotionally pained women who suffered the pain of losing the men in her life - first her father, then her husband. The exhausted worry hidden beneath the fiery anger that reared it's ugly head in the middle of their intense arguments.

"Ilsa," Chance whispered hoarsely, his own voice abandoning him as he pulled away to look at her. "Now's the time to tell me if you can stay in this business because if you can't, you need to back out."

"I don't want to leave but at the same time, I can't keep playing mother hen to you!" Ilsa managed, pulling away from him. "Mister Chance, I see you come in with injuries - more injuries than any man should ever have, even in your line of work and I wonder how long it'll be before those injuries are enough to kill you."

"What do you want, Ilsa?" Chance asked her softly. "What do you want?"

"I just want to stop hurting so much." Ilsa admits in a soft, vulnerable voice that almost brings to tears to his eyes. "I don't want it to hurt."

"It's always going to hurt, Ilsa." Chance whispered, wanting so bad to tell her that it got better but he couldn't lie to her, even now. "But this...what you're doing..it's just making it worse."

"Just," Ilsa looked up at him with a pleading in her eyes that told him with one glance what she wanted. "For one night, make it go away."

"Ilsa," Chance tried to protest but even as her name left his lips, he was lowering his head. "Ilsa, are you sure?"

"Just make it go away." Ilsa whispered pleadingly. "Just for one night."

"Okay." Chance whispered his agreement reluctantly.

The night was long and time passed slowly. Soft murmurs, gentle moans and swallowed groans were passed between them as just for one night, Chance took her pain away. Just for one night, they could stop pretending that it didn't hurt. That losing someone you loved didn't hurt because it did. They didn't try to pretend that it didn't feel good to just stop pretending and let themselves go with each other. Neither knew what the next morning would hold and neither one really cared. They were caught in a moment with each other and that was all they cared about.

Because for one night, the pain wasn't as harsh and they didn't have to fight with each other to keep the pain at bay.

Because for one night, neither one had to protect themselves from each other.

So, this is a different kind of story and in a way, very therapeutic for me. Not the shirtless Chance I thought I'd be in the mood to write tonight but this one, which I started a couple of weeks ago, just seemed to call my attention. In my opinion, Ilsa was a beautiful, strong woman but at the same time she was also tightly wound and heavily guarded from being hurt so much between the loss of her husband and the assumed loss of her father. I think she fought demons just as Chance did but they were both too heavily guarded to let the pain cloud their judgment, which is probably why they clashed so much.

Leave me some love, Dolls!

Love you,

RobertDowneyJrLove