AN: So. Forgive the end of this. I'm not sure what came over me. Just, uh. Well. Okay, I don't even have any excuses. It's lame and corny and not at all what I had planned on writing, but humor me.
Also. The title. I'm just having an off day.
Reparations and Rock Ballads
He didn't even try to follow her to her house. She didn't want him to; that much was obvious. In fact, she'd barely tolerated him walking her to her car.
He'd made to rest his hand on her back as the exited the building, but she'd pulled away and he flinched like she'd slapped him. Never, in all the years they'd known each other, had she denied him touch.
Hurt, he'd retreated to the Airstream.
Which was where he was now, sitting on the narrow couch, phone cradled in his hands, just in case.
This was their first fight since they'd been together.
Certainly not their first fight ever - over the years, they'd had some notable blow-ups. It was different now. Now, he was used to her sleeping next to him, used to her arms around him, her presence making him feel peaceful.
The trailer was too quiet, and he mentally gave up on the idea of sleep tonight, too.
He couldn't be sorry for what he'd done. She was his first priority, his only priority, and if he had to incur her wrath to protect her, so be it. The important part was that she was safe and whole. He remembered the bullet hole in her blaze and shuddered. A difference of an inch or two, and there would have been two FBI agents laying in the Louisiana swamp bleeding.
It was...unacceptable.
So he'd made the decision to keep her out of the line of fire. He would do it again.
But, for the first time, he had felt the stirrings of fear about their relationship because of something he'd done. When Pike had shown up, not two weeks after their first kiss, he'd been afraid, but this was something altogether new.
How are we going to work together?
They would figure it out. As far as he was concerned, there were no other options. He was bound to the FBI anyway, and even if he hadn't been, he was unwilling to be somewhere she wasn't. How would he protect her then?
Now, if she left the FBI, left law enforcement...
He sighed, running his hands over his face.
That wasn't going to happen, not anytime soon.
Despondently, he paced from one end of the trailer to the other. Evidence of Lisbon's presence was everywhere. Her hairbrush in the bathroom, a coffee pot on the countertop, the extra pillow on the bed.
Take my hand and we'll make it, I swear.
He smiled involuntarily, remembering her 'lullaby' from the night before. Only Teresa Lisbon would sing her brothers Bon Jovi songs to get them to sleep.
His heart ached.
Making up his mind, he grabbed his keys, and, locking the trailer door behind him, strode purposefully in the direction of his FBI-issue sedan.
All the lights were off in her house.
For a moment or two, he debated. Then again, she had given him a key.
With a deep breath, he put it in the lock and turned the handle
The living room was empty, dark. He toed off his shoes and headed for her room, hoping that if he'd woken her, she'd realize it was him and not a burglar. He had no wish to be summarily shot tonight.
Of course, she might shoot him anyway.
He paused in the doorway of her bedroom.
The streetlight outside illuminated the space enough that he could see her under the covers, watching him, her green eyes turned dark by the night.
She didn't speak.
Then again, she hadn't told him to go away, either.
Taking heart from that, he shrugged off his jacket and climbed in beside her. He was careful not to touch her, not wanting to be rejected again.
Despite their argument, the unresolved issues between them, he felt himself relax. They were here together, regardless.
With a deep sigh, Lisbon turned to face him. He knew she was still upset, could see it in the lines of her face.
Mentally, he braced himself for another round of fighting.
Instead, she tucked herself into his side, and he gratefully wrapped his arms around her, breathing in the scent of her hair.
Belatedly, he realized she had stolen one of his pajama tops and was currently wearing it. He hid his smile.
"I'm glad you came over," she murmured against his chest.
Yes, he'd gathered that. If she hadn't wanted him there, she wouldn't have been wearing his clothes.
"I missed you," he whispered back.
Also, he had discovered he couldn't sleep without her. He hadn't been looking forward to trying to catch up on his rest on the couch tomorrow. His body had grown very used to getting six or eight hours of decent sleep a night, and he wondered how he'd managed his insomnia for so many years.
He kissed the top of her head.
She didn't understand the depths of his fear for her. He could not lose her. He needed her far more than she needed him, and that was terrifying as well.
Lisbon could leave him, could be all right without him, even if it took her a while.
But he wouldn't ever recover if the situations were reversed.
"We'll be okay," he told her, and himself.
She said nothing, just tightened her arms around his waist.
Normally, he enjoyed his job, at least somewhat. Catching killers who thought they were smarter than everyone in the room. It amused him to play their own game better, then to watch as they snagged themselves in the web he had woven.
This case, however, had been terrible. How do you convince a woman to run the risk of assassination instead of ensuring she's there to see her son grow up? In his case, he would have done anything to be there for his child. Now, that was. Before, obviously he had chosen incorrectly.
For a moment, he put himself in the husband's role. Lisbon would have wanted to testify, he knew that. Would he have let her? Well, to be honest, there were very few things he could actually stop her from doing. But he would have found a way. It wouldn't have mattered if the entire damn FBI promised her protection. She was far too precious to be risked. And if there was a baby involved...
And yet, he had talked that little family into risking their lives for someone who was far beyond any of their help now.
He hated himself for that, was disgusted by what he had done.
It had been a long time since he'd felt such a degree of self-loathing.
Unexpectedly, Lisbon propped herself up to look at him. "What?" she asked softly, and he realized she could feel the building tension in his arms.
He offered her a very tight smile. "Bad case," he said shortly.
The residual anger started to melt out of her, he could almost see it, and she brushed his hair off his forehead. "It was," she agreed gently. "But it's over," she reminded him. "And everyone is fine."
How typically Lisbon. Letting go of her frustrations with him just because she saw he was upset. He absolutely didn't deserve her, but was eternally grateful that he had her.
"I love you," he told her, and she smiled at him for the first time almost all day.
"Love you," she replied, still sounding a little shy.
Slowly, she leaned down and kissed him. He slid a hand into her hair, holding her in place, tracing the seam of her lips with his tongue until her mouth opened.
It had been a very long time since he'd taken his shirt off of a woman, and perhaps it was all the more erotic for that reason. She pushed his shoulders back, straddled his waist, and he gave himself up to the pleasure she brought him.
There was no more tension a half hour later, as she sprawled bonelessly across him. Whatever their issues were and had been, sexual satisfaction had never been one of them, even from the very beginning.
For them, it had always been about years of repressed desire and love, emotional and cathartic. The pleasure was as much about the physical as it was finally being able to step into the light.
His eyes were heavy now. He was warm, sated, peaceful. It was very much unlike the night before, where, even though Lisbon was close enough to touch, he knew that the next day could take her away forever.
"Want to hear any more Bon Jovi?" Lisbon asked, her voice sleepy.
He chuckled. "No."
She shrugged. "Your loss," she informed him, turning onto her side and wrapping her arms around one of his.
Things weren't okay between them, not yet, but he knew, knew beyond a shadow of a doubt, that he would do whatever it took to make things okay. At the end of the day, all that mattered was that they wound up together.
He kissed her bare shoulder, and she responded by cuddling closer.
He hadn't come up with a solution, not yet, but he would. Lisbon was his happily ever after, his second chance, and they would make it.
XxXxXxXxX
Eighteen months later...
The clock on the beside table told him it was 2:45 in the morning, and he blinked groggily, trying to figure out why he was awake.
And then he heard it.
Teresa's soft voice, melodically lilting, floated to him through the baby monitor.
In another second, he smiled, remembering another night, another time he'd heard that song.
Quietly, he rolled out of bed, padding through the darkened house, avoiding the swing and countless toys on his way to the nursery.
A star-shaped nightlight glowed in one corner of the room, giving out just enough light that he could see Lisbon, wrapped in a robe, rocking their blanket-wrapped daughter.
"Oh, we're half-way there," she sang quietly.
He grinned, crossed the floor. He was still smiling when he kissed Lisbon on the forehead, then his rather-grumpy child, committing this moment to memory for a variety of reasons.
Not the least of which was he wanted to be able to explain to his daughter why she had an unnatural love of 80s rock. Blame your mother, he would say.
At which time her aforementioned mother would simply smile and belt out the last line of the song.
"Livin' on a prayer."