(I own nothing!)

I stood there watching the white SUVs pull away, Crews tucked unsafely in one of them. I stood but I was running after them in my mind. After all, I was always running.

I was a runner, always trying to get there and gone fast. I was born a week early, but that was just the beginning. I was walking when most kids were still crawling and then I discovered running to my parents' dismay. I had run track in every school I attended, and if anyone there could beat me, I made sure they couldn't by the time I left.

I had raced through the academy working harder to get done, to prove that I could do this to my father. I had always wanted to please him but now I just run. He had never understood my need to run and had never come to any of my meets. But my mom had and she knew that even when I stood still I was a mile away running fast.

I got mixed up in drugs on an undercover job. For the mission I had to stop running, and so I needed something else. In my mind I'm always running and I can't stop. I ran towards my druggie boyfriend but I ran right through him. He wasn't strong enough to stop me.

So I kept up. I was sent to rehab; they don't let you run there. I was allowed back on the force doing nothing that kept my attention long. Then I met Crews. He was odd to say the least and something sent me running. And the evening after meeting him I pulled out my old running shoes and went running for the first time in a long time.

The case ended well, until Davis told me that I was going to essentially be her snitch. I ran four extra miles after that. I thought about Charlie then, he wasn't a runner anymore, not after prison, he was a pillar. Always in the moment, always there, never moving no matter what. And that just pissed me off.

I ran every night, running till I couldn't run any more and even then my mind was miles ahead.

The cases came and went.

And then Roman came along. The second I looked at him I knew that he wanted to force me to stop. To lock me in a cage like Crews had been. But Crews had seen and stepped in between us. And for that I was grateful.

I met our new captain and didn't like him. I was a runner and he was a jogger. He moved but not nearly fast enough for my taste. But I made a mistake. I slept with him and didn't head it off at the pass. I was then in a relationship I didn't want, with a man who couldn't keep up with me.

Then Crews was shot and I was running faster. I wanted to find who shot him and lock them in my basement and every day torture them so no one else would be stupid enough to go near my partner. But sadly I didn't find him and I will never forgive myself for that.

I decided that it was time to move as fast as my mind. I signed up for the lieutenant test and at the recommendation of the jogger I went to work for the FBI.

But the hairs on my neck rose the second I walked into the building. I tried to ignore it, but I needed to run as far away as possible and soon. But you get that feeling entering any federal building.

Then it all went to hell. I had just gotten everything settled, I talked to Crews twice every day, whether I wanted to or not, I had broken up with Tidwell and was headed to do actual work for the FBI, when I find out I've been set up. It's even worse when I find out who and why.

Roman's ugly face swims into my view as he tells me to say hello to the camera. I want to kill him and deep down I know he had something to do with Crews being shot. He wants me to sit still in the chair I'm tied to, but I can't stop. I have never been able to. When they put the bag back over my head I can tell that this is supposed to scare me, but instead it helps me run out of there in my mind to places that can only exist there.

It's much later that I'm forced into a white SUV and driven to God knows where. Roman gets out and then a few minutes later I'm pulled from the car. And there not twenty feet away is the man that consumed my racing thoughts for the last several weeks. My stomach sinks as I hear what their deal is.

Me for him. The runner for the pillar.

I walked towards him and as he passed I brushed his hand, I wanted to grab hold, but I couldn't, because to do that I would have to stop. And that thought scared me. But watching them search him and force him into that SUV scared me more.

I was running alongside that SUV, begging them to take me instead but my feet stood still grounding me to that spot while my mind ran after that damned SUV.

"What was his plan getting into that SUV?" I voiced the question out loud and was surprised to get an answer.

"His plan was getting you out of that SUV." I didn't bother to look at whoever spoke, they weren't important, the only important person here was being taken away from me and I wasn't fast enough to stop it.

Then a few minutes after they left our line of sight the person, a tall, bald, African-American man, got a phone call. He answered, listened for a moments and then hung up, motioning for me to get in the car. I climbed in figuring that if he was with Crews, he wasn't going to hurt me.

The man drove down one of the roads. I wondered where we were going until I saw him. He stood looking at us, his red hair and blue eyes shining bright in the sunlight. The man stopped a few feet away. That was either because he didn't want to hit Charlie or the fact that I was out the door before the car was even close to stopping.

I ran.

I ran faster than I had ever run.

He wasn't looking at me, he was staring at the sun, but he looked back at me and smiled.

I smiled for a different reason. Because I knew something he didn't. Runners don't stop running. I couldn't stop and he wasn't moving out of the way.

Crews let out a surprised 'ouf!' as his back hit the ground, with me sitting squarely on his chest. But I didn't stop and give him time to catch his breath, mainly because I was too busy kissing him to care about his need for oxygen. Finally he caught up, and his mouth slid happily against mine. I heard the man call someone to pick us up and then drive off but I didn't really care.

Finally I had to either release Charlie or pass out from lack of air. Slowly I pulled away and looked at him. He was staring back at me with much the same look and I knew this would most definitely not be the last time this happened, the kissing, not the kidnapping part. Then a stray thought occurred to me.

"Roman?"

"Dead." His eyes went cold and slightly worried. "I-"

"I know you did." I leaned forward and kissed him again, I could feel the worry leak out of him.

I jumped at the sound of an approaching car, and pulled away much to Charlie's annoyance judging by the growl. It was a taxi.

We climbed in and told the driver where we needed to go. I leaned against Charlie, he wrapped his arm around my waist, and I threaded my fingers through his, smiling as he kissed the top of my head.

I hadn't stopped running. I couldn't stop. But now instead of running in a line that led anywhere away from here, I run in a circle. And in the center is Charlie Crews. Not that I would ever tell him that.