This story was inspired by a scene from the wonderful film Conversations With Other Women. It became a vague framework for the scene on the roof. I no more own CWOW than I do Thomas Lynley and Barbara Havers. I know it's been a while since I posted a Lynley/Havers story. Thank you all for sticking with me. No spoilers, post series. x

A Case of Very Poor Timing

by

Tricki

Detective Inspector Barbara Anderson has done something very, very bad. She pondered this while she walked into New Scotland Yard with an extremely large coffee in her hand and an almost mournful expression on her face. It was the day after the aforementioned very, very bad thing. Unlocking her office door after returning from a crime scene, she set down all she was carrying and perched on the edge of her desk.

Or, perhaps, she pondered, it was more accurate to say that Detective Inspector Thomas Lynley has done something very, very bad, and Barbara Anderson has been pulled into the whole thing totally against her will.

Although, totally was an exaggeration.

Barbara lifted her coffee to her lips while she tried to determine the correct division of the blame in the situation - something she had been doing for the few hours she'd spent at home in her bed that night.

Barbara tried not to acknowledge that, as the married party in the equation, she was probably the most culpable of the two of them. She'd been married to David for three and a half months, engaged to him for six, and dating him before that for almost a year. Which brought her back to where she'd spent half the night: Why did he have to do this now? He had to have known of his feelings; they hadn't spontaneously occurred last week. Why couldn't he have said something sooner? There was a time when she would've done just about anything - no, scratch that, literally anything - to be his, but now that she was married? What part of that was fair?

She glared. He had always been a selfish, moody, impulsive, insensitive prick. And she loved him anyway.

And where did that leave her? Married to one man, torn over the other, and stuck replaying that same godforsaken scene over in her mind at least once an hour. That was a lie. Once every fifteen minutes. If she was lucky.

Their cases had ended up being linked, and after they had arrested the murderer and his accomplice, he'd asked her out for a celebratory drink. Being as exhausted and exhilarated as she was, she'd accepted without a moment's thought of her husband. It was late; he'd probably be asleep already, anyway.

Due to the unseemly hour, they were unsuccessful in their expedition to their local haunt, and had instead opted to buy a magnum (first mistake of the night) of champagne and drink it on the roof of the New Scotland Yard building. She didn't know where the idea had come from, but she loved it. Looking over the city while it glowed majestically, standing side by side was, in both their minds, the perfect end to their day. At the start of the night Barbara had decided she would never admit this out loud - it was too trite. After three glasses of bubbles, she had blurted it out anyway, without any regard for how ludicrous it might sound to her old friend with the title and the estate, who surely could have found better ways to while away an evening.

After a significant amount of champagne each, they were laughing uproariously over something that she can't recall anymore, and he had leaned over, grinning enticingly in a way that had always made her knees slightly weak (even though he had never directed the full force of it at her like this) and kissed her.

With lowered inhibitions, and a history that most notably involved being in love with him, she had kissed him back with a fervour she hadn't known herself capable of. That was until her husband's face had popped into her mind.

She had pulled back and wheeled around, her arms folding in front of her body protectively.

"I can't." She said firmly. She wasn't sure if the comment was directed at him, or herself.

"Barbara - "

"No! No 'Barbara's. I'm married. You've had years for 'Barbara's." She said, even though letting the words pass her lips was hurting her as much hearing them did him.

"Would you at least let me explain?" He asked gently, coming to stand behind her and rest his hands on her upper arms. His proximity was potentially lethal to her resolve.

"This isn't just a reaction to too much champagne, Barbara. I'm in love with you. I have been as long as I can remember. Alright, that's not exactly true, but I have been for the last four years. I'd do anything to prove it to you." The ever-so-slight slurring that probably only she would notice didn't help his argument in any way. She shook her head almost bitterly. Kill me. Kill me. I don't deserve to live... She silently begged.

"If you've been in love with me for so long how come you've never said anything until now?"

He sighed. How could he answer that? Even to him the truth sounded ludicrous.

"Because I... I wanted you to be happy. I thought I could stand seeing you with another man but I can't. Something in me... changed."

"So you waited until I'd been married for three and half months? When, by your own account, there was at least a year and a half before I even met David that you knew you were in love with me."

"Not 'waited'. I didn't plan this, Barbara. I... was scared. Scared of what might happen if all this fell apart."

She turned around to face him, tears staining her cheeks. Lynley felt a sharp pang in his abdomen for being the source of her tears.

"It doesn't matter. I'm still married."

"You could leave him."

"No." She replied. Her tone was firm, but felt somehow false. She knew he could feel it too, knew he would press her to breaking point because of that microscopic fragment of doubt in her voice.

"You could leave him." He repeated.

"I don't want to!" She exclaimed, turning away from him again and making to walk off. He grabbed her arm and pulled her back.

"Leave him. I love you, and I know you love me too."

"I'm married! What don't you get about that? Or was it just never of significance when you were?" She barbed. She could see that she'd wounded him with the comment, but not enough to stop his advances.

"Of course it matters. But I know from first hand experience that being married to someone you aren't madly in love with is more painful than leaving someone. I also know that watching the person you are madly in love with move on has to be the single worst experience in life."

"You think I don't know that?" She yelled. "Do you think it didn't kill me to watch you with Helen? Do you really believe that it didn't tear my heart out to not be able to comfort you when she left you? Do you think I didn't cry when you got back with her? I knew it would end badly. Christ, I wanted to slap you for it." She ranted. He pulled her into his arms and shushed her, revelling in the sensation of holding her, something he had only done four times before now. Her words had stung him, but he knew she'd needed to say them.

"I had no idea." He muttered.

"Well why would you? You're an insensitive prick."

He laughed shortly. "I suppose I am."

"Stop sucking up." She snapped.

"I'm sorry." He smiled to himself. In some perverse way he almost enjoyed her temper most. Tenderly, as he had only once or twice before, he pressed gentle kisses to the crown of her head. Soon the kisses had begun to trail down her cheek, her neck, across her jaw, until he had found her lips again. She responded to the kiss again, but this time with a slow intensity that made his own head swim. The sensation had nothing to do with the rather copious amount of champagne he had consumed.

Barbara pulled back again, clearly angry at herself. She lifted her hand to her forehead, combed it back through her hair, and found the resolve to meet his gaze.

"I can't." She whispered, before all but running from him, down the stairs and out the door before she could think twice. The problem was that all she wanted him to do was chase her, and she took his not doing so as a concession of defeat – or even worse, a reconsideration.

So here she stood, back in the present, at her desk, coffee clutched stiffly in hand, staring into space, and reliving the night against her will yet again.

David was worried. She could see it in his face that he had clocked her withdrawal. She could see the ill-veiled concern, not only for her, but for the rest of his life. Could marriage have so changed the woman he thought he knew in a few short months? He hoped to god it couldn't. Otherwise what would he be stuck with for the rest of his life? This, of course, was a superficial and harsh assessment of Dave's feelings towards her. Primarily he was concerned for her state of mind. She tried to avoid talking about work – how they managed that was a mystery to everyone, considering that Barbara spent around seventy five percent of her time at work – so he hadn't pressed it after his initial query, but he knew something was wrong; beyond that he knew it wasn't her usual pattern of seeing something particularly horrific, coming home and crying against his chest and then being – Seeming – better again. This was different. This was frighteningly different. He felt like he was losing her, and he'd only spent a handful of hours with her since "it" had happened early this morning. A brief conversation when she came to bed. Their usual morning routine. It was enough evidence.

A gentle knock at the frame of her open door brought her back into the room, or at least she thought it had. Good Lord, was there no mercy? Now she was having hallucinations about him as well!

Barbara was quickly becoming lost in her thoughts again until he stepped into her office and called her name. She shook her head, trying to clear him out of it.

"What can I do for you, Detective Inspector Lynley?" She asked crisply, glancing over his shoulder at the officers in the open plan office who were eyeing them curiously. These days they really had very little reasons to spend time together during office hours. They'd sometimes grab lunch, swing by each other's offices for a five minute chat, grab the occasional pint after work, but when they were seen together the ever present rumours about them began to fly. He caught the line of her gaze and shut the door softly behind himself.

"Barbara, there really is no need for such formality. Just because of the other night; it's no reason to – "

"I'm sorry, sir, it's still a bit of a force of habit." She said sheepishly.

"And it's not the only one." He raised an eyebrow pointedly.

"Sorry, sir."

"Tommy."

"Tom."

"Thomas, then." He said, his eyes gleaming with how well worn this conversation was. It occurred approximately every four months, and went to script on each occasion.

"Tom. Either that or I'll have to revert to Lord Asherton." She, predictably, countered, and he couldn't help but smile.

"All these years and you still object to my name."

"Look, I'm sorry, but you're not six, and you're not the pigeon toed baby from The Rugrats. I just can't reconcile it; you're a grown man. Why do you think I've called you 'Sir' for so long? You need an adult's name." She felt enormous relief at the way the ease between them had returned in spite of recent events.

"Fine." He replied, so softly that he had almost mouthed the word, his affectionate smile making his eyes sparkle. The name was almost bearable coming from her. "So how are you?"

"I'm fine." The phatic phrase did not slip past his attention.

"Barbara." He prompted and chided in the same word.

"I'm a bit of a mess, actually." She laughed morbidly.

"Oh, God..." He sighed, anguished at having caused her pain; one hand raised itself unthinkingly to tuck an unruly piece of her hair back behind her ear, but he remembered himself before he accidentally worsened the situation.

"Sorry." He muttered. She shook her head, looked away and tried to swallow the lump in her throat.

"It's fine..." She managed.

"Are we ever going to talk about this?" He asked softly. She finally met his gaze, a wry smile on her lips that only just managed to touch her eyes.

"Not if I can help it." Despite her words and how strongly he wished she'd said anything else, he returned her smile.

"You can't." He said pointedly. His smile widened, and after a minute's comfortable silence he crossed the room and sat behind her desk.

She laughed in affectionate indignation. "Make yourself at home, why don't you?"

"Thank you for the kind offer, Havers." The smile that shaped his face couldn't be described as anything other than 'winning'. Needless to say she was won. Barbara smiled back at him adoringly, crossed her arms, and walked slowly around her desk, perching on its edge to face him.

"Hello." He said tenderly, that same winning smile – now laced with adoration –pulling at his lips. Her blood ran cold and her heart fluttered like an intoxicated hummingbird. He swivelled the chair so it was closer to her, and rested his far hand on the desk beside her.

Don't go here, Barbara; you know you can't go here. Her mind hissed, but her lips, against her better judgement, replied with a soft "Hi." A silent conversation passed between them, and after analysing it carefully he turned his hand palm up. Obligingly, she rested her hand in his. Little sparks danced up and down her arm. No matter how much she tried to push the thought from her mind's eye, in her head she had already undressed him.

Barbara Havers had forgotten that the rest of the world existed. And why her sanity was important.

"Barbs, I didn't think it was possible, but you left your phone at home! I couldn't work out why you weren't answering and then I heard the bloody thing ringing – " There wasn't time to think between the sound of the door opening, the male voice floating through it, and the door closing again, but thankfully her hand had reflexively snapped away from her former partner's.

"Oh, sorry, love. Are you busy?" Barbara's husband remained frozen at the door. The scene had to look suspicious.

"No, Dave, it's fine." God, she said that word a lot, and never really felt it.

The moment unravelled, her sanity returned, and Barbara Anderson was suddenly all too aware that the rest of the world existed.

"You know...?" She began to ask but trailed off, and was quickly rescued by her partner. Ex partner.

"Tommy. Tommy Lynley." He answered for her, standing up and striding across the room to where Barbara's husband was.

"Oh! Barb's old boss! Nice to finally meet you." David said, shaking Lynley's hand as if he hadn't walked in on such an inappropriate scene. Her brow furrowed in confusion – the reason she'd trailed off earlier. Surely he'd met Tom before? He was the most important man in her life – didn't he come to her wedding? Hadn't she briefly considered asking him to give her away before remembering how much that would hurt? And why couldn't she remember these things? Maybe his proximity earlier had made her neurons malfunction, her memory traces spontaneously decay...

"Yes, that's right." His smile was more baseline charming now than utterly winning as it had been before. Maybe that smile's reserved? She mused to herself, her own lips twitching slightly.

No. She wouldn't allow herself to get involved in this. As if she wasn't already...

"So what brings you to Barb's dark corner of The Met?" David asked confidently. It wasn't so much that he felt it, but that he knew he needed to project it for all their sakes. Barbara knew him well enough to detect the difference.

"Ah, just asking her opinion on something, actually. She's always had a bit of a knack for helping me see things clearly." His smile remained. He shot Barbara a quick but significant glance over his shoulder.

"Good for a light-bulb, my Barb is." Grinned Dave. She shrank ever so slightly at his words.

I'm a horrible person. I'm having an emotional affair. God, has there been a moment in this relationship when I wasn't? What did this poor bloke do to deserve me? She thought to herself as she studied the men in her life, standing opposite each other collegially despite the true nature of the situation – which she was certain they were both aware of. Her Detective's eyes compared them physically – Lynley was taller, more athletically built, while Dave was solid, closer to her height, but still taller than her. Dave's hair was a shaggy brown, and Lynley's was silken and sleekly black. David's kind but striking cerulean eyes seemed a stark contrast to the molten brown ones of the Inspector beside him.

This was a good, objective study. It allowed her to emotionally lobotomise for a few moments, allowed her to collect herself.

Dave was the first to break the silence. "Since I'm here, do you want to get some lunch, love?"

"Um, yeah, that'd be nice." She pasted a smile onto her lips that was quite masterfully authentic.

David smiled broadly. "Fantastic. You're welcome to join if you want, Tommy."

"Thank you for the offer, but I have three reasonably tenuous leads to follow." Her mouth twitched ever so slightly. He had absolutely piss all on this new case, but he was still quick enough on his feet to use it as an excuse to not come. She silently thanked a higher power that he had the sense – or decency – to leave them be. She wouldn't have been able to cope with both of them around for much longer.

She crossed the room and rested her hands on her husband's waist. "I'll meet you at the car in a couple, yeah? I just have to finish something here."

"Of course." David obliged, bending to peck her lips before turning back to Lynley with a smile and repeating "Again, great to meet you, Tommy." Before exiting the room.

She turned her body towards Lynley, but avoided his gaze; the tip of her shoes was suddenly fascinating.

Her voice was small. "You didn't come to my wedding."

"You've only realised that now?" His attempt at humour didn't serve its mood-lightening purpose.

Although it hadn't seemed possible, her voice was even smaller now. "I was trying not to think about you."

"Ah."

"I came to yours..."

He knew he shouldn't ask it, but he couldn't suppress the question that flew from his lips involuntarily.

"If it hurt you so much, why did you?" There was nothing cutting in the question, it was blatant incomprehension. She met his gaze at that, as if to test whether or not the question was insincere – as if she thought it must be because the answer was the most obvious response known to humankind.

"Because you wanted me there."

"You're a bigger person than I am." He stated, his eyes shimmering with fondness.

She tried to be wry, but her voice still seemed fragile. "Yeah, tell me something I don't know."

He sighed and said "Come here," drawing her into his arms as he said it. He held her, silently, and Barbara let him, enjoying the feeling of his crisply laundered shirt against her cheek, the dip of his spine under her fingertips.

"I'm sorry I let you down." She noted how willingly she had come into his embrace, how quickly intimacy between them had become comfortable. Not unremarkable or normal, but they were no longer ill at ease with it. She was no longer ill at ease with it.

A contented murmur came from her throat as a smile tugged at her lips. "I'll forgive you... one day." He chuckled lightly, the vibration that rippled through his body making her smile wider. She inhaled thoroughly, committing his scent to memory before pulling back.

"I'm married." The statement was more for her benefit than his.

"And you're in love" he trailed a finger along her cheekbone and around her jaw-line, making her tremble before adding: "with me."

She hated this. She was utterly powerless to his intensive charm setting – he was like a life sized, aristocratic, British Ken doll. Her eyes closed reflexively, listening to the words over again in her mind. "And you're a cocky prick." She replied with a contented smile on her lips. Again David's face popped into her head.

"I don't think I can do this to him." This was true; she didn't know if she had it in her to wound him – wound him the way Lynley used to wound her by loving someone else. It wasn't exactly a fair comparison, but it was close. Conversely she didn't know if she was really alive before last night.

No, she did. She wasn't.

How could she turn something like that away?

There are worse things you could do. She reasoned with herself. You could live with the regret until you die – you could ruin Dave's life because you never gave him a chance to move on. There are worse things you could do.

Then again, hadn't she had years to move on from the man standing before her, and she had never managed. Was that a fair comparison to draw? Did David love her the way she loved the good detective? She couldn't answer any of this, but she'd spent all her life putting other people's needs and wants before her own; now, with everything she wanted waiting on a platter, she couldn't turn it down. For once in her life she had to act in her own interests.

She wasn't going to kiss him, wasn't going to let herself feel the thrill of life speed through her when their skin touched. She made sure they were entirely free of contact before she said "Dave'll be wondering where I've gotten to." Her tone was final, held no promises, and offered him no comfort.

He reached to caress her cheek, but she masterfully redirected the motion until his hand was back at his side.

"I need some space." He nodded in concession, and stopped himself before he leant to kiss her goodbye. On some level (A very small and deeply buried one) she was irritated by how assured he was – confident enough to think he could kiss her just because he wanted to. She wanted to justify it with 'he wasn't used to not having what he wanted' but his history was tainted with pain as well. He turned to leave her office, pausing with his handle on the knob.

"Barbara, I'll wait as long as you need – as long as you want. I'm not taking this lightly." She nodded in response. It was the most she could offer – her voice had disappeared.

She found her husband leaning against her car with his arms folded across his chest. She offered him a smile and a forced apology for her prolonged absence.

His smile was hollow while he said "I understand. I'm a widow to The Met." In response she smiled and shook her head while she unlocked the car.

Once they were out of the car park, before she even had the chance to ask where he wanted to go for lunch, David broke the silence.

"Are you having an affair?" The words were jarringly toneless.

"What?" She demanded, turning her head to look at him.

"Barbara, I'm not a detective, but I'm not an idiot. I saw the way you were acting around him."

She gave more concentration to the road than it needed. So this was to be it? The moment when she told her husband the entire truth. She didn't want it to be this soon. She wasn't ready.

Barbara Havers hadn't sought a partner or a relationship, but had found one with a nice stable guy who had a good plumbing business. A genuinely nice bloke she'd met in the supermarket, both complaining about the lack of Digestives. Barbara had always been totally sure that if she did marry someone, it would be for good, not for three months.

Barbara tried to form her thoughts coherently, eloquently. She tried to think what Tom would say - he had always had a way of framing things.

"Y'know, David, I have this theory. It's that the person you really, really love – the person you're meant to be with, invariably loves you back the same way. So some part of you has to know – has to have always known – that I'm not that person."

"Do you think I would've married you if I hadn't thought we'd spend the rest of our lives together?"

"That's not what I said. And we probably would have if it weren't for..." She paused for a moment, wishing the bloody traffic light would go green. "It's not that I don't love you, Dave – god knows I do – it's just that..."

"Go on." He pressed sharply, resolute that he wouldn't make this any easier for her.

"I'm in love with him."

"Oh, that makes it better. An adverb is enough to end our marriage."

"Dave, you don't understand! For as long as I've known him my defining personality trait has been 'in love with Thomas Lynley'. I can't just walk away from that! He's part of me – and I don't mean like a piece of my history, he's an actual part of me. The way I think. I don't know how to explain it."

If Barbara had expected him to continue pushing, to yell, what she's faced with is even worse. "That's what you are to me."

"Dave - "

"Let's go back."

"Sorry?"

"I don't really want to eat lunch and pretend everything's okay, Barb. Let's just go back to the Met and we'll sort it out tonight."

Barbara hesitated for a long moment, trying to sense a trap and failing. "Okay." She conceded, dropping her hand, flicking her indicator on the way, and turning the Vauxhall around.

Once she'd swiped back into the car park at NSY and they'd left the car park, they had begun to peel in separate directions, Barbara heading back for the entrance and Dave heading for the street in the broad direction of a tube. This would have been fine, had Thomas Lynley not been returning to the building with a coffee in hand. David spotted him before Barbara did, was closer already. As if in slow motion, Barbara clocked her husband's clear intention to punch her former partner squarely in the jaw. David strode towards Lynley before the taller man even noticed him coming.

"Dave. David!" She yelled, tearing after him across the forecourt of the building. This was all she bloody needed, her husband attacking her old boss in front of the Met. Her feet felt like lead, and David reached Lynley well before her. They stared at each other, shoulders squared and bodies tense.

When she reached them - after what seemed like an eternity - she caught David's arm, prepared to hold it in place if he tried to hit Lynley.

"Who do you think you are?" David managed through clenched teeth. Lynley's brain couldn't seem to come up with a decent answer to the question, but thankfully David changed his mind about what he wanted to ask. "No. I don't even care. How long has this – " He calmed himself. "What happened last night?" The question was directed at both of them, and Lynley quickly looked to his former partner to try and discern what her husband knew. He didn't expect any of this to happen so quickly.

Lynley attempted the indirect approach to the question, and Barbara knew it was a mistake as soon as the words "Barbara means everything to me" were out of his mouth.

If it'd been anyone else's husband confronting Lynley, Barbara would've pulled up a chair and thrown in sarcastic comments for her own entertainment. God knew in his youth he'd been an appalling heartbreaker, but faced with her own husband arguably about to deck her fellow Inspector, Barbara was coiled tight with tension. David wrenched his arm out of her grasp.

"And you think she doesn't to me?" He barked.

Havers also would have advised against his Reasonable Negotiator act, but this was the tack he took next. "David, I think perhaps this isn't the right time to - "

"I'll bloody decide what the right time is! Now someone - please - tell me what happened last night!"

"We kissed." Barbara exclaimed, not meaning to shout and doing so anyway. "We just kissed. We said... we said - some things that we've needed to say for a long time. And you're right, the timing was - completely not ideal, but.. Well, it's happened. And we can't put the genie back in the bottle now." During this little speech, Barbara had been slowly repositioning herself between the two men, in the hope of dissuading Dave from throwing a punch.

"So that's it?" Dave demanded, raking his hand through his hair - his hair that curled in the rain, or after he'd been for a jog. His hair that Barbara had landed kisses on when he'd fallen asleep against her watching the telly of an evening. Barbara was not proud of herself for causing him this degree of injury.

"Barbs, I love you." He said softly, reaching for her, pleading with his eyes for her to get over this, to let it go, to pretend this had all been a momentary lapse of sanity and tell him so.

"I love you too, Dave." She said, and felt her eyes begin to well with tears.

Dave could hear the 'but' in her voice from a thousand paces. "But you love him more." He said.

He read the answer on her face before the word "Yes" had time to pass her lips. David nodded, mussing his hair again, and begun to turn away. The sight of his leaving had made Barbara's shoulders unknot slightly, and she let down her guard. In this half a breath, David had wheeled around and made to land the punch he'd obviously been yearning to deliver. Lynley, years of experience of nearly being decked under his belt, had feinted out of the way, caught David' s arm, and twisted it up behind his back in a movement so fluid it was almost balletic, all without dropping his coffee.

"Are we going to try that again, or are we going to accept Barbara's decision like gentlemen?" Lynley asked calmly.

"Tell me you'd accept it if you were in my shoes and I'd show you a bloody liar." Dave retorted, teeth gritted with pain from the way Lynley had his arm pinned.

"Either way, if I tried to throw a punch, I wouldn't miss." He goaded the other man, and Barbara's green eyes flew wide.

"Tom!" She shouted, furiously. Why in god's name was he provoking the situation now?

David lifted one of his feet and stamped hard on Lynley's instep, making the Detective bark with pain and release both the other man's arm and his coffee with surprise.

"David, stop it! Both of you!" Barbara shouted, pushing between them and holding them at arms' length.

"This isn't helping anything and it's not impressing me if that's still the intention!" There was fire in her eyes as she glared at both of them. "Dave, I want you to go home and we'll finish dealing with this later. You..." She rounded on Lynley, a finger pointed furiously in his face and her lips pressed together so hard they were turning white. She didn't need to say 'get inside and I'll deal with you later' out loud, he read it in her well worn glare as he began to limp back towards the building, fumbling with his pass once he got to the first security barrier. The officer guarding the entrance pretended he hadn't seen anything, and mentally calculated the number of hours before he could go and discuss the whole altercation in the pub with some of his mates.

"At least it'll be a simple divorce." Dave mumbled under his breath, making Barbara wince. "I'll be staying at my sister's tonight. Don't expect me to pick up the phone."

Barbara tucked her hair behind her ear, fingers trembling, before gathering herself enough to swipe through security and back into the building.

She found Lynley waiting for her, back to the wall just past the second set of security gates.

He reached for her shoulder as he fell into step beside her. "Don't you even start with me." She growled at him. This was not at all the mood he'd wanted her in when she chose to be with him over her husband. "Was that really necessary?" She continued. "I mean, honestly, you couldn't have just left it at 'nobody got punched' and been happy with that?"

"I'm sorry." He said, genuinely castigated.

"D'you think I get off on that or something? Because I don't. I don't do the macho bollocks. I can't believe you think I do - " Barbara noticed for the first time that they had walked straight into her office. That he had shut the door behind them without missing a beat.

"I don't think that." He corrected her gently, having the sense to sound contrite.

"I could've punched you myself down there, Tom! What were you thinking?" She was, in reality, less angry with him than she was letting off steam about the day's events. For a moment he considered answering her honestly, but he held his peace.

"I think we can both agree it wasn't my finest moment." He said, and she seemed satisfied by this. He saw her soften at his words, and took the opportunity to cross the tiny office and kiss her, making sure not to push the boundaries too far. While he was prepared to control himself, Barbara lifted her hand to his face, her fingers trailing over his skin deliciously. She looked to him expectantly, and he couldn't help but bend to kiss her.

"So where are you taking me tonight?" She asked once their lips parted. Her green eyes sparkled with something he couldn't quite put a finger on, and if nothing else, he was extremely glad she seemed to be forgiving him. His brows pulled together in confusion.

"My husband just left me because of you!" She teased. "Least you can do is buy me a nice dinner." Lynley worked to contain his smile - he had expected her to keep him at arm's length for at least a few weeks.

"I'll start thinking." He smiled.

"Good."

"Good." He pecked her lips again, revelling in being allowed to. "At the risk of being too presumptuous, I hope this is the first of many."

She met his eyes wryly. "That's entirely dependent on whether this place is too posh." They shared a smile before Lynley turned on his heel to leave her office, mentally scrubbing the first seven potential venues on the mental list he'd been plotting for tonight and thanking whatever higher power that might exist that against all odds, Barbara Havers was still there under the newly minted Barbara Anderson surface, and she still loved him back.

"And Tom?" She said. He turned his head to her, an eyebrow raised questioningly. "At the risk of being presumptuous" she parroted him affectionately. "I'm not taking your name."

"Excuse me?"

"We can't have two DI Lynleys. I'll be the laughing stock of the Met."

"Is that the only condition I have to agree to in return for a lifetime of Havers?" He asked, a mischievous smile pulling at the corners of his lips.

Barbara smiled her hundred watt smile. "So far."

Lynley turned away and clasped the door handle, smiling victoriously to himself. "Either way, I accept."