A/N: The story is a little inspired by the A Fine Frenzy song "Near To You". A big thanks to my beta readers HollyRose31523 and jackandsamforever.

Disclaimer: I don't own the Blacklist.

"Red?"

"Lizzie –, what are you –"

"You have burn marks all over your body …"

"Lizzie …" Red hesitated. He didn't know what to say. He hadn't heard her coming up behind him. Who would have guessed that this old mansion he currently stayed in could let someone walk around without even a little announcing sound.

He turned around and put on a fresh shirt. As he began buttoning the cuffs first, he walked slowly towards Liz. He stopped, standing in front of her.

"Lizzie …" he then started again.

"It was you!" she interrupted. "It was you who saved me from that fire."

"It was me," Red replied, glancing at her, as he realized that the moment he had feared the most had yet come way too soon - the moment, in which he actually had to tell the story, he didn't even know how to begin.

He watched Liz, as she was staring down at her hands. Even though she didn't make a sound, didn't even look at him, he knew that she was deeply troubled. He noticed that she was rubbing the scar on her right wrist. He seized in the déjà-vu of officially meeting Liz for the first time at the black site. He could still see the image of her, trying to show strength instead of insecurity as she had walked towards the chair that had been set up right in front of him.

Suddenly, he felt the urge to take her hand, but didn't. He was too afraid she wouldn't allow it.

"It wasn't until I saw the little tricycle in the front yard that I realized there might be a kid in the house I'd just set on fire." He paused, perfectly aware that these few words would most likely tear apart everything that was still left to love in this world. "I didn't even know that he had a family after all. Not that I made any effort researching it. There was only one thing that I knew about your biological father. That he was the one who killed my family."

Liz looked up, straight into his eyes. Her gaze was impossible to read, which didn't happen often to him. It was confusing. Red Reddington has always been good at reading people, even Liz. But now he couldn't and something in her eyes broke his heart. After all she had been through these last few weeks, she should not have to suffer more.

"I'm sorry, Lizzie, I know any excuse at all is completely worthless. At that time, all I felt was this riot in my veins screaming for revenge. I knew it wouldn't make my pain any better but I was so full of hate. I was mad to my bones. This excruciating pain, I…–".

He stopped, abruptly, in mid-sentence when he suddenly felt bits and pieces of these feelings crawling back to him, taking over his body and searching for him in the depths of his mind.

"I'm sorry, Lizzie," he repeated and paused again, carefully watching her just standing there.

"I just ran inside the house. I didn't feel any pain at all. I didn't feel the flames crawling up my shirt. I didn't feel the smoke filling my lungs. I was just looking for you until I finally found you, hiding in your closet. Scared to death." He desperately tried to block the image that his mind had produced. "I felt the need to take care of you, although it was more than clear that I couldn't do it myself. So I brought you to Sam. There had never been a person that I trusted more. He fell in love with you, right from the start." Red smiled, remembering that little girl with the shining blue eyes, attached to that little stuffed plush bunny in her arms.

"With the connections I had already made in the criminal business we managed to get adoption papers very quickly. We did everything we had to do to keep you with Sam. I stayed nearby until everything was in order, but I couldn't bear to see you again, back then. I couldn't bear the thought being the murderer of your father, that I was the one who took your family, just like someone took mine." He sighed.

"So, after everything was settled explicit for you and Sam, I disappeared. That's why you couldn't remember me. And even though I was never too far away, I have always been far enough. Even in the little corresponding I did with Sam, I feared, someone could discover a connection between us. It wasn't until the day I showed up at the FBI, that I saw you again. After I had heard rumours that some people might know about our background after all, I knew it was time to actively step in taking care of you... Well, you know how the story went from that point on."

He turned away as he began buttoning his still open shirt.

"Wait." Liz suddenly stopped him, grasping his arm. "I want to see them."

She took her hand off his arm and moved it to the front of his shirt, then gently brushed it over his left shoulder. Red stood absolutely still. She was so close now that he could feel her breath on his skin. Her gaze could almost be mistaken as a touch, ghosting over his body. Her eyes stopped at the fresh bandage on his arm.

"You've saved my life so many times," she said." You walked through fire, you surrendered yourself to a killer, who tortured you for hours. And today you put yourself in front of a man, telling him to shoot you instead of me, which he did." Cautiously, she touched the bandage. "He shot you… my own husband shot you. The man I trusted for so long, who I loved, my companion. God, how did everything get so messed up?"

She turned away and walked to a big three-seat sofa, where she sat down, resting her head in her hands. Even though she didn't make a sound, Red knew she was crying. He finally closed a few buttons of his shirt, while he also walked towards the sofa and sat beside her. After all, he gave in to the impulse and gently took her hand into his.

He loved the feeling of holding hands. Sometimes the simple touch of holding someone else's hand meant a lot more than holding the person herself. But right now it wasn't quite enough. He wanted to hold her, he longed to take her into his arms and give her just one peaceful place, the only one he knew how to give - maybe the only one that even existed.

"Everything's going to be okay, Lizzie. I've told you that before and I will tell it to you over and over again. Because I believe it will, no, I will make sure of it. It is my only purpose left in this world - making sure that you are safe, in every moment of your life."

She looked up at him and a single tear trailed down her face. Red caught it with his thumb, gently caressing her face in the process. He tried to lay all his feelings of hope and comfort in his touch and the smile he added. All he wanted was to make her feel better somehow.

Red leaned back at the sofa, breathing out deeply, still holding on to Liz's hand. How could he not - it was the most comfortable thing in the world, to himself at least.

He had never imagined that this situation of having to tell Lizzie the truth would come up so soon. Deep inside he had even hoped it never would. That he would be buried with it, leaving Liz with just the memory of the perfect dad she had in Sam.

He wasn't quite sure how she would take all this, once it had really sunken in. She would want to know more, every little detail. That's how she was. Not just the agent part inside her, the profiler. But just because of that curious part that lived in every woman. But he decided to worry about that when the time came.

Eventually, Liz started to calm down, feeling the slight but steady movement of Red's thumb on her hand. Her head was so full of loose, open ended thoughts that it almost felt empty again. She really needed to rest, but how could she rest in this upside down world that her life had changed into lately?

"Here, Lizzie." Red was holding his glass of scotch towards her, which he must have poured before he had started to change the bandage on his arm. She took it and drank a larger sip of it than she had intended.

"It's okay, you can finish it," Red said, and couldn't help the little grin that slid over her face.

She felt the scotch comfortably warming her from the inside, so she did as he suggested and finished the glass with another big sip. Gently, he took the glass out of her hand and put it back on the side table next to the sofa.

She cautiously started processing what he had just told her. He had killed her father. But she knew that already, because her real father had always been Sam and Red had already confessed killing him. She knew that she could never forgive him for that, but naturally, she knew Sam so incredibly well, that she was sure about the fact that he truly wanted to die before his cancer got worse. Knowing this, she was able to tolerate this situation somehow. However, knowing that he also killed her biological father didn't really affect her at all. She had no memories whatsoever of this man and the only thing she knew about him now, was that he had been a killer himself. She looked at Red and despite everything he had told her tonight, she just saw the caring, comforting side of him. She saw the only person who had always told her nothing but truth. Even though she was deeply hurting right now, she welcomed not being lied to.

She closed her eyes and concentrated on feeling his touch. It was something dependable, like a steady and reliable constant, which was just there and had always been there somehow. Without thinking, she leaned towards him and rested her head on his shoulder. He immediately put his arm around her, as if he had only been waiting to do so. She enjoyed just sitting like this for a while. His soothing touch calmed her down and with a little help from the scotch she almost relaxed a little.

"I'm scared, Red," she admitted quietly. "I'm scared of what's going to happen. To you, to me, to us." Liz moaned exhaustedly, rubbing her hand over her face that still hadn't totally dried from her tears.

"I know," he replied calmly. "But we'll get through this, you and me. Together."

"Promise me that?" she asked.

"I do!" He looked at her intently.

"I don't hate you, Red," she said after a while. She suddenly felt the need to tell him that.

"I don't know if I deserve that, you not hating me," he answered, wholeheartedly, but she sensed that he was somehow relieved.

She yawned again as debility finally took over her.

"You should rest, Lizzie," Red suggested. "I believe we will need all our strength in the future. Of both, mind and body."

"That's a given."

She sat up straight and looked into his eyes. It was beautiful, how he smiled through his eyes. They told her more than any word he spoke. They implied nothing but undeniable love.

"Come, Lizzie, rest here with me." Red made an invitational gesture, telling her to lift up her feet on the sofa and lie down with him. As an answer, she took off her shoes, then laid down next to Red as he pulled her up beside him. She cuddled herself into his arms, bedding her head on his shoulder again, while instinctively placing her hand inside his shirt over his heart, where some buttons were still undone. She could feel his heartbeat slightly pounding against her hand as she touched his bare chest. She inhaled deeply and enjoyed the pleasant, spicy smell of Red Reddington. She felt his hand, moving up and down her arm, tender and soft. The warmth of his body calmed her down and all of a sudden, there it was – a feeling of pure comfort in a world that was upside down. Somehow she knew that she had found the safest place to hide, here in the arms of Red. She felt all the hurt inside slowly drain away, and even though she knew that all of her sorrow would return tomorrow, she also knew she had already started healing, just a little tiny bit. Near to him.