A/N: Hey guys! Okay, so I know that 1 AM on a Sunday night (well, Monday morning now haha) isn't exactly the best time to update, but I'm a college student and unfortunately finals week kicks off today, so I know that if I don't update now, I probably won't find the time to do it until a bit later, which is ridiculous considering how long it took me to get this chapter out.

As I was writing, I found myself struggling with where exactly I wanted to take this. Specifically, in Deb's case. She definitely has her fair share of problems, but I don't think that I could see her ever reaching a place where she genuinely enjoys killing or helping Dex kill, so it's important to me that that's clear here. However, I also think it's interesting because while Dexter sees her as the angel to his devil, it is actually much more complicated than that, and the Deb we see here is not the rookie cop we met in the first season. The darkness can be just as seductive as the light ;) Anyway, I say all that to say that I hope you guys enjoy taking this ride with me. I'm kinda just as curious where this is going to end up as you are lol. Apologies again for taking so long to update, hopefully I can get the next one out quicker!

ROSEY Cheeks: Thank you! I'm so glad you enjoyed the first chapter and I hope you like this one just as much! Guest: So glad you liked it! You asked for steamy boat sex and I can say that that is a very real possibility haha.

Tom: Yes! I love that our understanding of Debster is so similar, and I thank you so much for your feedback, it means so much to me. I wish you would post your fic because it seems like I'm the only one still writing for these two these days, but uh yeah of course I would love to read it! Did you post your email or something? Because I don't think it went through. If you want, you can send it to me at brianapinkman at gmail dot com. Hopefully that'll show up, lol. I don't know how this site works with the censors and stuff. But yeah, I'm excited! Kelsi: Thank you a ton! I'm so happy that you enjoy my writing, and I love these two characters more than words could say so expect more Debster from me in the future.

Lady D: So happy you enjoyed it! Hopefully this one is to your liking as well. Gusto: I'm such a sucker for Deb/Dex loving, sometimes I wonder if I go overboard! Lol glad to hear that everyone's digging it. NotHere: What an amazing compliment! Sick and sad was exactly what I was going for. And thanks for singling out that dopamine line, I liked that one too but I actually wasn't sure about including it originally! Guest: Yeah, I'm a big fan of needy Dexter, too. It's about time that he realize all of the shit he put Deb through!

Wow, sorry for this ridiculously long intro. Anyway, apologies if there are any typos. I'll go back and reread this later. I hope you all enjoy this chapter and please let me know any thoughts or comments! xo


Round four. Time to dispose of the body.

Dexter has done it over a hundred times before, meticulously taking bodies apart piece by piece until they became unrecognizable, small enough to make a suitable meal for the creatures at the bottom of the sea. His ritual has remained relatively unchanged over the years, although he has taken a partner on the rare occasion.

But never Debra.

How many times has the very thought of killing with her, cleaning up with her, crept into the back of his mind? How many times has he pushed it away, vowed to never even entertain the idea in fear that he'd ruin her forever?

Well, it seems as though that fear has vanished tonight. He wishes it weren't true, but the fact is that he's already ruined her. He ruined his sister the moment he allowed her to put a bullet through Maria LaGuerta's heart. There's no turning back now.

"What are you waiting for, Dex?" Deb asks him, her breath hot on the back of his neck. "Are we going?"

She wraps both of her arms around him, hugging him tight to her. Dexter bites down on his lip, fighting the urge to hurriedly grab her by the hand and lead the way out to his car.

He does want to do this with her, but he also can't help but have second thoughts. His sister's strange aura of excitement doesn't feel appropriate to him. She shouldn't want to kill. She's supposed to despise it, to despise him.

Deb was never meant to have blood on her hands.

Dexter knows that he has taken this too far, but the fact that she is here with him now, not simply tolerating him but actually accepting him and all that he is, silences the voice in the back of his mind that says giving in would be the absolute wrong thing to do.

This is what he has been chasing his entire life.

It all makes sense now; every choice he ever made, every person he attempted to share himself – his real self – with in the past. Lila, Miguel, Lumen, Hannah, even Brother Sam; they were just poor substitutes for the woman he was really aching for. But with the exception of Lumen, every one of those partnerships ended in death or something close to it. Could Deb end up like them if he lets her get too close?

"Dex…"

"Soon." Dexter finally answers her, pulling away from Deb's embrace so he can turn towards her. He takes her face into his hands, holding her gaze with his own. "But how about a shower first? I'm kind of…sticky."

"Me, too." She smirks, playfully looping a finger through the waistband of his boxers. "A shower wouldn't hurt. I guess he isn't going anywhere any time soon."

Deb's dismissive comment towards the man she must have been fucking for a good month or so does seem unusually callous, even for her; but Dexter can't fight the chuckle that falls from his lips, nor does he want to. There's no use in pretending any longer. Briggs was nothing but a means to an end, a stand in for the real thing. But Dexter is here with her now, where he should have been all along.

Dexter warned Briggs to leave them alone while he still had the chance. It isn't his fault that the man chose not to take that advice to heart. Briggs deserved his fate, and there's no use crying over a man who was nothing but a glorified placeholder.

More than that, the guy was scum, a blemish on the fabric of society. Dexter did the world a favor when he took a knife to his vital organs. The only mistake he made was failing to do it earlier, in the market.

"C'mon." Deb says, tugging eagerly at his waist.

"No, wait a second." Dexter regretfully sighs, turning toward the corner of the room where Briggs' body lay lifeless. "The carpet. We have to move him. He's dead but gravity will allow the blood to keep flowing, and it's going to leave a stain if we don't hurry…"

"Shit shit shit." Deb mumbles, suddenly beginning to pace around the room. "You're right. What do we do?"

Her sudden shift in mood is jarring and definitely more than a little bit disconcerting, but no matter how much he wants to comfort Deb in this moment, Dexter can't worry about his sister's feelings until this Briggs situation is completely taken care of.

This kill was sloppy. The man was a threat to Dexter but most importantly he was a threat to Deb, and Dexter handled that threat in the only way he knows how. But this reckless behavior isn't like him at all. Acting on impulse, not bothering to consider the consequences of his actions before taking them…it goes against everything The Code of Harry taught him. He should know better by now. Being without Deb for so long had clearly been starting to make him crazy.

"Deb." Dexter says, grabbing her by both shoulders to steady her. "Deb, relax. Everything is going to be fine, just listen to me."

"Okay. I'm relaxed." She nods. "What now?"

"Now…we get rid of the evidence." He states. "I'll go back out to my car, everything we need is in the trunk. In the meantime, I'm going to need you to wrap him up."

"Wrap him up? In what?" She wonders, tilting her head to the side.

"Just use the blanket." Dexter answers. "I doubt anyone's going to notice it's gone, but if it comes down to it we can just buy another one to replace it with. At a place like this, that would probably be considered an upgrade."

Deb nods, taking a few steps back until she finds the shirt that Dexter discarded on the floor a little while ago. Though time is certainly of the essence, he watches as her fingers slide carefully over each button. The shirt is big on her but stops just short of her thighs, and Dexter catches himself thinking that it looks better on her than it ever did on him.

She finishes the job a few seconds later, leaving a few buttons open at the top of the shirt and peering at him with a sly smile on her lips.

"I'll be right back." Dexter affirms, quickly looking her up and down before heading for the door.

He makes the short walk to his car in a haste, fearing that anything and everything can happen to Deb if he she's left alone with Brigg's dead body for too long.

Lifting the trunk, Dexter begins to peruse its contents. He doesn't have all of his tools, simply because he hadn't planned on anything of this happening and failed to prepare accordingly, so he has no choice but to make do with the limited selection that he has in front of him. This means that he can't completely follow his traditional method of disposal, but Dexter supposes that that's okay, seeing as this wasn't a traditional kill.

There's a decent sized hacksaw hidden under a heavy weight tarp, as well as a small, non-electric hand drill; two tools that have proven themselves useful for his late night activities while also being unlikely to raise suspicion if he were pulled over by the cops and used the old home improvement excuse to appease them and send them back on their way.

But he was meant to keep those tools there for emergency situations only. Cutting through bone with them is a task that is certainly doable, but it isn't the ideal method of dealing with things. Especially now that he has Debra to think about.

Dexter has never known his sister to be squeamish, or easily disturbed – she was a cop, after all – but in all fairness, she's never been in the same room as her big brother while he hacked away at the flesh of a bloodied corpse. Her reaction to him killing Briggs has certainly been unexpected, but she's seen him kill before. This is different.

Travis Marshall. That was where this all started. She saw him kill and she ingenuously helped him cover it up, but that was unconventional, and it was meant to be a one-time thing. Until LaGuerta.

The formalities after LaGuerta's murder had been about the same. Debra stood and watched, lifeless and traumatized, as Dexter attempted to convincingly stage the scene. But now, there's no need to leave an elaborate presentation. Now, he has to handle things as he always has, and that may prove to be a problem for Deb. Hell, it would be a problem for anyone who hasn't been doing this half their life.

Dexter supposes that he could choose to go the same route he went with the cover up of Travis Marshall's and Maria LaGuerta's murders with Briggs' as well. The man was a lowlife druggie and a well-noted thief, so it wouldn't be overly suspicious if he turned up dead in a shitty motel room in a sketchy part of town; but the fact that Deb was meant to trail the guy and turn him in to her boss presents a problem that didn't exist with the other murders that she had been privy to.

There was no probable link between Debra and Travis Marshall's death – at least, not until Maria LaGuerta began sticking her nose in places it didn't belong – and though Deb was the one who shot her former boss, none of her co-workers could ever dare suspect her. Andrew Briggs isn't as high profile as either one of them, but his death could wind up being more dangerous for the Morgans if they don't handle the fallout carefully.

Deb's boss sent her to hunt the guy down, and if he turns up dead and the police start asking questions, Dexter isn't so sure that this Jacob Elway would be as loyal to Deb as one would hope. The loud suits, the gelled back hair; he seems like just the type to squeal once a bit of reward money gets put on the table. So it isn't worth putting Deb in danger.

Dexter closes the trunk and walks over to the driver's side door, deciding that the manual tools will have to do tonight. Once inside of the car, he reaches into the center console and retrieves two pairs of gloves; one for himself and one for his sister. He even manages to find a spare black t-shirt hidden under one of the seats, which he uses to quickly shield himself from the nippy night air. It isn't his usual choice in attire for the occasion, but maybe that's for the best. On New Year's, Deb made it perfectly clear that she hated that shirt and everything it stands for. That sentiment doesn't seem to ring quite as true tonight, but there is still a very real chance that Deb will snap out of all of this and come back to her senses soon. If he had been wearing that shirt, it may have even triggered her rage and erased all of the progress they just made.

He walks the short distance back to the motel room, making sure that he hasn't been spotted. There doesn't seem to be anyone around for miles. The night seems almost perfect to dispose of a body. It's the small victories, really.

Dexter arrives at the room and coughs, seeing that the door is still opened, just a crack.

"Deb?" He asks, keeping his voice low as he steps into the room and shuts the door completely behind him.

He stands just in front of the door, observing his sister as she drags Brigg's corpse, now atop of the blanket, across the room. She brings him as close to Dexter as she can manage before Briggs' dead weight becomes too much for her to bear and her legs give out, making her fall straight down to the carpet in defeat.

She bites out a curse but quickly recovers from her tumble, grabbing onto one end of the quilt and beginning to tug at it again. Dexter rushes to her aid, using his free hand to grab onto the other side of the blanket once she shrugs him away.

They pivot, moving together in perfect sync to move the man as close to the door as possible. Once satisfied, they drop their makeshift gurney to the floor and stand opposite one another, matching looks of unease painted across both of their faces.

Dexter glances down towards the corpse, cringing as hindsight tells him that maybe using the blanket that he and Deb just had sex on wasn't the best way to go about transporting a dead body. There's a slim chance that some identifiable DNA evidence could still remain on the fabric despite the fact that he…well…got rid of most of it inside of her. It's a risk he normally wouldn't take.

But he isn't a complete idiot. Once he and Deb are done here, one of the first tasks on his checklist is to burn the blanket, successfully destroying any trace of its very existence. And once Briggs is finally on his way up the Gulf where he belongs, there's not a chance in hell that his body will ever be found. Or rather, the parts that still remain of it.

"Dexter…why the fuck are you making that stupid face?" Deb questions. She raises her eyebrows, one arched quite a bit higher than the other as she sizes him up. "Is there anything remotely funny about this most recent fucked up situation you've gotten us both into?"

"No. Of course not. I'm sorry." Dexter replies. He can feel Briggs' blood on his hand, tacky and cool. He isn't sorry. "So…Briggs didn't have hepatitis or anything, did he?"

"The fuck should I know!?" Deb retorts, using the back of her hand to brush away a scraggly piece of hair. The action successfully moves the hair out of her face but replaces it with a bright red smear of Briggs' blood, as if she's now been marked by Dexter's sin. The thought sends a shiver up his spine.

"It's okay. I already got all of my shots taken care of." He smiles. Deb simply rolls her eyes in response, clearly not in a joking mood.

"Did anyone see you and Briggs check in?"

"No."

"Are you absolutely sure, Deb? How can you know for sure?"

"Jesus, Dexter! Yes, I'm sure. Briggs handled all of that shit on his own. He paid for the room in cash a day or two before we started doing…things…and besides, I don't remember seeing any security cameras in this dump anyway. There's nothing connecting me to any of this shit." She answers. "Maybe I should be asking if anybody saw you creeping around here like the fucking Night Stalker. Real smooth of you, by the way."

Dexter rolls his eyes, pretending that her unfitting comparison hadn't upset him. He knows that she doesn't see him that way, but that knowledge doesn't make him feel much better.

"Well, I didn't exactly plan for any of this to go down." He insists, hoping to reroute the impending argument that he senses is brewing between them. "None of this would've even happened if you hadn't run away from me and started playing house with a guy you were supposed to be apprehending. Let's not act like this is all my fault here. Now we're just going in circles."

"Oh yeah? Well, I didn't exactly ask you to stalk me and kill my boyfriend in cold blood, but I guess those things just happen, huh? Fine, consider us even, then."

"So that's what he was…he was your boyfriend?"

"You aren't…no. You aren't jealous of the dead guy, Dexter." She says, her words sandwiched in between a few incredulous chuckles. "Seriously?"

"I'm not jealous." He maintains. "Why would I be jealous?"

Deb clearly isn't buying it. She peers at him through hooded eyes, the corners of her mouth curling into a mischievous smirk.

"I'm not!"

"Okay. I believe you, Dexter" She lies, that slight smile returning to take up permanent residence on her face. She can read him like a book and she loves it.

Her suspicion is true but of course his pride could never permit him to say those words aloud. Yes, in a strange, sick way, he had been jealous of Briggs. And though the excuse he used to kill the man, the fact that he will always feel compelled to remove any and all potential threats to Debra's safety, is true, he knows that his feelings are just as much to blame for his impulsive choice to end Briggs' life.

Feelings. What a messy thing they've turned out to be.

"So…is it time?" Deb wonders, looking to Dexter for further instruction.

"Not yet." He answers. "I believe I said something about a shower…"

She nods, tilting her head a bit to the side and instructing him to lead the way.

Though he knows that she probably doesn't ever go for this type of thing, nor would she normally expect such sentiment from him, Dexter takes a chance and leans down to scoop her up into his arms, holding onto her tightly. As if preparing to carry her over the threshold.

She doesn't say a word, only keeps her arms wrapped securely around his neck until they reach the bathroom. It's tiny, barely large enough to comfortably accommodate the both of them, but that is more than okay. Dexter isn't planning on letting her anywhere even remotely out of his sight for the foreseeable future.

He watches her as he turns on the shower and lets it run, allowing the water to warm up a bit first. Her stare meets his, her dilated pupils making her eyes appear even larger than they normally do.

They say that the eyes are the window to the soul, but right now, Dexter isn't so sure what he sees in hers. Is it longing? Regret? Or what about fear?

After everything that just happened between them, Dexter knows that his worries are irrational more likely than not, but he has always been an inquisitive soul, never satisfied to accept things at face value. It's one of the most important things Harry left him with. Besides the Code. Besides her.

He still wonders if maybe tonight had all been a mistake. Not on his end, no, he knew exactly what he was doing when he took that dive and he doesn't regret one second of it. But does she?

Allowing their fragile relationship to be taken to this dangerous new place could very well be jeopardizing everything they've spent a lifetime trying to build. But to Dexter, Deb is more than worth the risk. The question is, then, is he?

Debra suddenly begins to fumble with the buttons on her shirt, slowly stripping as he stands in silence before her, unapologetic about her own nudity. She has always been a confident person, never shy when it came to disrobing in his presence all throughout their childhood. Whenever she needed to get changed for one of the many extracurricular activities she'd dabbled in, she had no problem pulling her shirt over her head and facing him like nothing was out of the ordinary.

There has always been a sense of familiarity between them, even before she found out the truth. It always felt real with her, even when he thought he was pretending. That kind of intimacy only comes along once in a lifetime.

And still, Dexter finds himself wondering if her openness with him now has more do with the cocaine she'd snorted a short while ago rather than her own sense of trust in him.

He doesn't want to waste time trying to find out which answer is the right one. He can't afford to. He has to believe that Deb truly does still love him despite everything he's done. He can't handle a world where that is no longer a part of his reality.

The thought that he's taking advantage of her, that she's in too fragile a state to actually consent to any of this, does gnaw at him though. And despite his best efforts, he can't seem to stop worrying about it. But as she walks towards him with effortless grace – now completely bare from top to bottom – and relieves him of his own shirt, Dexter allows himself to give in.

He quickly disposes of his boxers and climbs into the shower, extending a hand out to Deb. She takes it, granting him permission to pull her close under the flowing waterfall.

After a few moments of peaceful quiet, Deb reaches out to retrieve one of the complimentary washcloths hanging on a hook behind her brother, dipping it under the stream of water to dampen it.

She lifts it to his face, carefully dabbing at his cheek with it even though he's certain that there isn't anything there that needs to be wiped clean. He lets her do it anyway, enjoying the extra attention she's giving him, the tender way she touches him.

He lets his eyes fall closed, allowing her to gently wash his face for however long she plans on doing so. She seems to like it, and he certainly isn't complaining.

Dexter tasks himself with listening to the tune she hums lazily as she works, frustrated because he can't quite seem to place it despite its familiar sound.

He doesn't think he's ever been touched so intimately before, never by the girl he watched become a woman right before his very eyes. To most people, he's sure that that fact would make this seem as wrong as wrong comes. It's a good thing that none of those people matter.

Their history is what makes them, them, after all. It's sad, and destructive, and all sorts of fucked up, but it's theirs. The Morgans are bound together by so much more than blood. Dexter wouldn't expect most people to understand that type of bond.

Deb returns the cloth back to where she originally found it, still continuing to hum that familiar song. Dexter finally recognizes it as Frère Jacques. Doris would sing it to her when she was a girl in an attempt to calm her down whenever she was feeling particularly upset or anxious. But that was before. Before his sister was made to face her first real heartbreak. Before the cancer claimed her mother's life and took a little bit of Deb's spark right along with it.

She has always been so full of fire though, his Deb. Her light may have dimmed some – at Dexter's fault more than anyone else's – but she survived. She always survives.

Suddenly, the humming stops. Deb uses the tips of her fingers to deftly brush back a few tousled strands of Dexter's hair, her eyes narrowing as she appears to study his face rather intently.

"It's grown a lot since I last saw you." She notes, a weak smile playing at the corners of her lips. "Your hair, I mean. It looks good. It suits you."

"Yeah, well, it's been a long time since we've seen each other."

Too long.

He shrugs his shoulders, foolishly choosing to believe that his dismissive attitude can make the distance he was made to weather feel any less painful. It doesn't.

"It has." Deb nods, reaching for the shampoo bottle that rests on the side of the tub. "I missed you. I know I didn't act like it, but I missed you. I was getting tired of pretending."

"Me too." He replies. "Truthfully, I was never very good at it."

"That's funny," she starts, one hand wandering along the length of his arm as the other clutches the shampoo bottle. "You've always been so good at hiding shit from me. I thought you would have gotten used to it by now."

"Yeah, well, some secrets can't stay that way for long. The way I feel about you…that was never a lie. It was gnawing at me all of this time, demanding to be felt. Being away from you for so long almost broke me, Deb. I couldn't imagine my life without you in it. I never had to. And once you left, the impossible threatened to become my reality, and I couldn't accept that. It drove me crazy, around and back again. It scares me to think about what kind of man I would be without you."

"It never dawned on me that you could ever miss me so much. I guess I thought I didn't matter to you as much as…other things do."

She lowers her eyes in a clear attempt to avoid his, trying to hide her shame.

"You matter, Deb. More than anything else in the world." He says, his pulse quickening once she fixes her gaze on him again. "Don't sell yourself short. You're amazing."

Dexter closes the distance between them, reaching out and grabbing the bottle of shampoo from her grasp, silently instructing her to turn around and give him access to the back of her head. She understands immediately.

Dexter squirts a generous amount of the soapy liquid into his hands and begins to gently massage it into her scalp, pleased and maybe a little bit proud of himself when small moans start to fall from her lips, her shoulders rolling back as he continues to work his fingers through her hair.

"Fuck me. That's good." She mumbles. "So many hidden talents, Dexter. Any other surprises you planning on pulling out of your hat tonight?"

"Maybe." He teases, placing his hands on her shoulders to guide her head further under the water.

She cranes her neck back to dip her head under, her skin ghosting against his chest as he helps to clear all of the shampoo from her hair.

With that done he focuses on washing the rest of her body, starting with the small smear of Briggs' blood that still marks her forehead. He uses a washcloth to regrettably wipe it away, grabbing a clean one after he's finished.

He moves to her arms next, watching as her skin prickles into gooseflesh when he passes the fabric along the length of it. She shivers, though the water isn't very cold at all. He thinks that it's the ghost of love once unrequited that still haunts her, even now.

He wonders if he'll ever earn back her full trust, whether all of the pain that he has caused her can ever be forgotten. It's an audacious request to make, even for him, so he doesn't voice it. He figures he has no right to.

Next he goes lower, gently wiping away what their coitus left behind. It's an incredibly intimate act, one that should probably feel more awkward to his sensible brain than it does. Dexter is surprised to find that it actually feels rather innocent, despite the fact that his hand is between her legs.

He leans down to kiss her shoulder and tastes a mouthful of bubbles instead. Deb giggles and calls him a dumbass, making the word sound affectionate as only she knows how. She turns to face him and slips, thankfully falling into Dexter's arms rather than straight to the hard tile below.

"My hero." She jokes, leaving a quick kiss on the tip of his nose.

Dexter responds by wrapping his arms around her waist and pulling her in closer with the intention of stealing one quick kiss. But of course that kiss becomes something more as Deb eagerly slides her hands across his body, moving from his chest to his shoulders and finally up to his neck and then greedily pulling him closer to her.

She breaks away to trail her tongue across his bottom lip, not asking for permission but instead demanding it. And who is he to deny her?

Dexter opens his mouth to her, groaning when her tongue comes into contact with his own. She's better at this than she has any right to be, but Dexter doesn't feel the need to overcompensate. He moves with her, his lips fitting perfectly against hers.

Deb deepens the kiss, her nose bumping against his as she grows wilder with need. Dexter closes his eyes, beginning to lose himself in their kiss. He can feel the water surrounding him, can hear the droplets raining down like a thunderous applause. Every sense is heightened, every feeling magnified; but somehow, all that matters is her. Everything he has and everything he is belongs to her. He wouldn't have it any other way.

Deb lifts one of her hands off of his neck and lets it travel further south, trying to start something that Dexter has no intent to finish at this very inopportune time. He grabs a hold of her wrist and lightly tugs, a wave of regret hitting him right where it hurts when she whimpers in protest.

Her eyes bore into him and it feels as if he's being torn apart limb from limb, her hazel stare disassembling him until there's nothing left but the soft interior he does his best to keep hidden. Once upon a time he didn't even believe that there was such a thing; but she brings out sides of him he never knew existed. It excites him just as much as it terrifies him. It's hard to fight her on this but he knows that he must resist for now. He has never been the type of man to surrender himself to lust and compromise the efficiency of a kill in the process, and it's not like he's about to become one now.

"Sorry." He mumbles low. "It's just…uh…you know."

He doesn't have to say the rest. She knows just as well as he does that there's only but so long that they can leave Briggs' dead body in this motel, wrapped up in his makeshift cocoon. There's so much more that they have to do before they can make time for this, and though it may not feel like it's so, the night is almost through.

Dexter steps out of the shower first, extending a hand to Deb and holding onto her until she has both feet planted safely on the ground. They quickly dry themselves off and get dressed, taking the hotel towels and the washcloths that they'd used, putting them into a plastic bag and stowing it in the trunk of Dexter's car.

If Deb is to be believed and there really is no paper trail that connects her or her former boy toy to this motel room, then these preventive measures may seem unnecessary, but Dexter is nothing if not precautious. His aim has always been to keep the Morgans' heads above water. Self-preservation is what has kept him afloat for so long, and he isn't about to start fixing what isn't broken. That would go against everything Harry taught him.

Back in the room, Deb locates a blanket and a fresh set of sheets in the closet, successfully cutting down on their workload for the night. The two of them go about cleaning up everything that seems to be out of place, and once the room is cleaned and rearranged to Dexter's liking, then comes the hard part.

Lugging dead weight right out of the front door is no easy task, but with Deb there to lend a helping hand, the burden is lessened a bit.

They make sure the coast is clear before making the short trip back to the SUV, unceremoniously dropping Briggs' blanket covered body down to the concrete so Dexter can fumble around in his pocket in search of his car keys.

They stow the corpse away in the trunk, the tinted window in the back leaving them with no need to conceal it any further.

With a final canvassing of the parking lot and the area surrounding it, Dexter is satisfied that he and Deb are alone. He climbs into the driver's seat, making sure that his sister is fine and that her seat belt is buckled before pulling out of the lot, driven by the promise that the drama of these past six months can finally be laid to rest. He isn't sure what the next phase of their relationship is going to entail, but he must say that he's eager to find out.

"Where are we going?" Deb asks after a few minutes of silence.

The truth is, Dexter isn't exactly sure. The easy choice would be to go straight to his boat and throw Briggs overboard like the worthless scum that he is – was – but the monster in him, the beast that craves routine, whispers to him that he has to make the hard choice. Deep down, he desires nothing more than to do as he's always done; to section the man into small, uniform pieces and pack them into bags that will function as the vessel through which he takes his journey to the bottom of the sea.

But he doesn't have a kill room. Should he even be calling it that now that Briggs is already dead?

He isn't alone, nor is he in the presence of someone who has grown accustomed to his special brand of brutality. Debra may seem fine now, but that can all change in an instant once the saws come out to play.

So he decides to take the easy way out.

"Down by the docks." He eventually answers her question. "I'll go straight to my boat from there, steer out a safe distance. Then I'll toss Briggs overboard, and that will be that. You can wait in the car. It won't take long. I know what I'm doing."

"Bullshit. That is not what we agreed on."

"Agreed on? Deb, we didn't agree on anything. I had a momentary lapse in judgment and I spoke without thinking. You aren't coming with me. Nothing good will come of that, believe me."

"You're not the boss of me, Dexter. I told you before that I wanted to help you, that I wanted to see you, and I meant every word of it. I'm coming with you. You're going to do everything by the book like you usually do, and that's it." She insists, a scowl on her face to match his. "You don't like it? Well, tough shit."

He doesn't like it, not completely, but he knows better than to argue with her. An argument with Debra is like one brick wall screaming at another. He and Deb are both so stubborn, so set in their ways that once one has made up their mind on something, the other has no chance of changing it.

"Alright." Dexter acquiesces. "But we're going to need to make a quick detour first. I'm all out of plastic wrap."

He drives until he reaches a small hardware store that he trusts to be open at odd hours of the night. It's a strange business practice, but it works out perfectly for his line of work.

He heads for the store and Deb tries to follow, but he immediately instructs her to stay behind. Dexter has made a few late night trips to this store in the past, and he knows it to be an innocent establishment run by a family who is by all accounts normal, but there is no way he's going to risk her safety in any way. If someday down the line this place is used to nail him to the wall, he'll rest easy knowing that no one can take Deb down with him. If no one sees her, well, that means she was never there. That means that she kept her hands clean.

He's in and out of the store as quickly as his feet will allow, his arms filled with yards of plastic wrap and a dozen or so heavy duty garbage bags. Paid for all in cash, of course.

They make the rest of the drive in silence, not yet to the docks, but instead to an old warehouse just on the outskirts of town that Dexter has taken advantage of a time or two. He killed a set of twins there once. They thought they got away with patricide. They were wrong.

Dexter remembers feeling a particularly invigorating rush of blood to his head when he thrust twin knives into twin hearts, identical looks of horror cemented on their faces after they took their final breaths.

He doesn't expect a repeat of that event tonight, but he knows that whatever happens here, the result will certainly be…special.

The next few moments seem to move in a blur. After Dexter calls the babysitter to check in on Harrison and request that she stay with the boy for at least another hour, he and Deb arrive at the warehouse and carry Briggs' body inside.

Dexter takes it upon himself to properly wrap the room in plastic, probably using a larger amount than is necessary in order to completely ensure that there will be no trace of any of them there once this is all said and done. Deb stands on the sidelines and looks on. This is the first time she's seen the process in full, and she stares at him with a look on her face that he would think to call awe, almost as if she's studying him and every move he makes. It perturbs him just as much as it exhilarates him.

With that bit done he slides on his gloves, tossing his sister a pair even though he doubts she's going to need them. He has no intention of letting her anywhere near the corpse once he brings out his tools.

"What do you need me to do?" She asks, inching closer to where he stands.

"Nothing." He replies sharply. "I didn't want you here for this part, remember? Just…watch. If you have to."

Her jaw tightens at the perceived slight, as if she somehow doesn't realize that he is denying her this for her own good. When she shot LaGuerta to save his life it almost broke her, how would this be any different? Briggs didn't die by her own hand but if Dexter lets her in on this, allows her to become more complicit in the man's murder than she already is, he fails to see how it wouldn't have a detrimental effect on her frail mind.

She claims that she just wants to see him, but hadn't she done that before? He let her climb inside the belly of the beast and she found it repulsive then. What's changed now?

Surprisingly, Deb follows directions well. She remains at a safe distance, hovering a few feet away from the makeshift kill table they'd assembled out of whatever pieces of furniture they could find lying around, her arms crossed over her chest.

Dexter tries to ignore the way the pose accentuates her small breasts, how her stance – confident and powerful – makes her that much more striking in his eyes. He reaches for the hacksaw beside him, taking it to the one of Briggs' arms where his forearm meets the upper so he can focus on the sound of the blade hitting bone rather than his illicit attraction to his sister.

He severs the arm completely and tosses it off to the side, immediately going to work on the second one. It's a task more daunting than what he's grown accustomed to, but after a while he gets used to the routine and things begin to move along quicker than he expected them to.

Moments later, Andrew Briggs as Deb once knew him is nothing but a distant memory. Dexter's carved him up like a Thanksgiving turkey, sectioning off limbs and delegating them each to a separate bag. He decides that he'll leave the head and most of the torso intact, fearing that if he goes any further, Deb could wind up traumatized for life.

She's way ahead of him on that, though. He looks toward her, searching her eyes, hoping to find that nothing has changed in them. She turns away from him immediately, a look of disgust washing over her. Dexter is sure that she's angry with him and expects some sort of retaliation until she clasps a hand over her mouth and dives for one of the empty trash bags. She begins to gag, the contents of her stomach threatening to spill inside. Nothing comes, though. She stays hunched over the bag, dry heaving until the sickness finally passes.

Dexter wants to rush to her side but figures that placing a bloody, glove-covered hand on her shoulder won't do much by way of comfort. So instead he just stands there, bone saw in one hand and a garbage bag in the other, unsure of what his next course of action should be.

He wouldn't dare admit it aloud, but the fact that Deb was quite literally brought to the brink of sickness at the sight of him doing what he does isn't all bad. In fact, he would even venture to say that it's a good thing. Deb's reaction means that she's still in there somewhere, the girl who'd spent her entire life walking the straight and narrow. Their relationship has evolved but her heart and soul has not. She's still the same Deb he always knew, just… damaged.

"Are you okay?" He finally asks, taking a few hesitant steps toward her after he's set down his tools and properly sealed all of the bags.

"I'm fine." She answers with a resigned shrug of her shoulders. "Let's get out of here. I don't like this place. It's too familiar…"

Dexter nods, reaching for as many bags as he can carry in both hands. He grabs all but three, and Deb surprises him by scooping them up without a word, leading the way back out to the car.

The drive to the docks is a quick one. They're on the boat in record time, drifting lazily past the shore. It's eerily quiet as it often is most nights out on the water, only now Deb here with him, and he doesn't feel so alone anymore.

Dexter steers the boat a safe distance away from the shore, anchoring the Slice of Life and beginning the task of dumping the bags overboard. He steals glimpses of her as he works, taking note of her non-reaction each time another piece of Briggs is sent to its watery grave.

After a few minutes he turns to face her completely, expectantly holding out his hand for the final bag that rests at her feet. She ignores his request, scooping up the bag and sauntering wordlessly past him so she can toss it overboard herself. It hits the ocean with a splash, sinking down beneath the blue black water. She continues to watch even after its image has faded. Her stare is blank, empty. There is no sign of enjoyment in her eyes, yet no sign of regret either, as far as Dexter can tell.

She sheds her gloves, tossing them over the rail to join Briggs' body in the depths below. Dexter does the same, inching closer to her and letting his hand find hers, desperately craving the skin to skin contact. She slides her fingers along his palm, lacing them through the gaps between his own. Her heat radiates through him, filling the gaping hole in his heart that he'd been hopeless to fill.

There's a glimmer in Deb's eye that he hadn't seen since before he brought her out on the boat, and it stirs up something within him. Desire burns deep in the pit of his stomach, and though this isn't the time nor the place for it, he can't seem to resist the urge to touch her, to press himself against every inch of her.

The rules are changing, the lines beginning to blur. He can't tell what's right for her anymore. He isn't so sure that he ever could.

All that matters now is this. Them. He can feel the rush and he knows that she feels it too. His Dark Passenger at work.

"Dexter," Deb breathes. Her voice is guttural and oh so appealing to his ears. "I need you…"

She grabs onto him with more force than she's had all night, tangling her fingers in his unkempt hair to pull him in closer to her. Their coupling is a violent collision, teeth clanking together awkwardly as she slams into him head first.

Feeling stimulated, Dexter pulls away, grabbing onto her hair and yanking her head back. She exposes her neck to him, leaning up against the nearest hard surface so he can press his lips to her throat.

Her skin is like velvet against his lips, and he can feel her carotid throbbing beneath them, keeping time with the sound of her rapidly beating heart.

"I'm sorry…" She mumbles in between moans.

Dexter stops dead in his tracks, thrown off by her random apology. It's a bit of a mood killer.

"For what?" He asks, removing his lips from her skin but still hovering in the realm of her personal space, his nose buried in her hair. It's still a bit damp, and it smells of the shampoo he'd used to wash it back at the motel. Strawberry, he thinks.

"For earlier…when I told you that I shot the wrong person in that trailer." She answers. "I meant every word I said, but it wasn't you I was talking about, Dex. I was angry and scared, and I wasn't ready to see you so soon, so I guess it just came out wrong."

He pulls away so he can stand with her face to face, his eyes searching hers for an answer to all of this confusion.

"I was talking about me." She says.

Debra's words are a shock to his system. It's like she dropped a bomb on him, successfully levelling his entire world. With all of the booze and the drugs and the recklessness, of course he had his suspicions, but to have those terrifying suspicions confirmed – to hear that his sister actually wanted to die – is not an easy pill to swallow. Her assured expression makes it even harder.

"But I get it now." She continues. "Kind of. Doing this with you, being here to witness it all…I didn't like it. I don't think I ever will. But I didn't hate it, either. So on some level, I get it. I can't be a good cop anymore. Maybe I can be this instead."

Dexter wants desperately to respond but finds that his nerve has escaped him, rendering him speechless. Deb is punishing herself through him, settling for this life because she can't bring herself to move past New Year's. He aches for her, for all of the mistakes he made through the years. He's the one who took her there, and now he fears he'll never be able to bring her back.

Deb runs her hands along his chest, grabbing a hold of his shirt and pushing until he feels the back of his knees connect with the bench. She presses her lips to his, warmth spreading from her mouth to his. It feels almost as if she's breathing life into him, sustaining him as she has all along.

And what does he do but take, falling back into his own destructive pattern despite the fact that he should know better. He sits down, waiting for Deb to lower herself down onto his lap. He can feel himself hardening almost immediately, her effect on him seems almost magical under the twilight.

There's minimal room for her to maneuver but she makes it work, arching into him as her lips start to glide over his again.

He breaks their kiss, his breath coming hot and heavy against her face as he struggles to find his words.

"Deb, wait." He pants, both of his hands coming to rest on her hips.

She intercepts his thought with force, first kissing at the corners of his mouth and then moving to his lips. That serves to shut him up. At least momentarily.

More confident now, Deb starts to grind against him. She pulls his bottom lip in between her teeth, growling when she feels his lower body respond in kind. The act is almost frantic. This isn't a want for her, but a need. She loves the thing that's destroying her, she clings to it; and he's too weak to ever stop it. Maybe that's because he needs her more than she could ever need him.

She starts to fumble with his belt, hurriedly undoing the buckle and taking him in hand. She gives him a few desperate strokes before climbing out of his lap, dragging her jeans down her legs and tugging her panties off right along with them.

Dexter takes himself in hand, allowing Debra to settle back down into his lap. He rubs carefully along her opening, coating the head before pushing slowly into her. He tries to sink to a natural depth, mindful of the pain he could inflict on her if he were to abandon all of his reservations and strike deep inside.

But Deb is clearly not as thoughtful. She places her hands on his shoulders, her nails digging into his flesh as she sinks down onto his length and takes all of him. She screams – a strangled, high-pitched cry – when he delves deeper. He doesn't doubt that it hurts her but she is quick to adjust, her walls loosening around him as the pain gives in to pleasure.

"Is this good for you?" He asks, sucking her earlobe into his mouth in experimentation.

She moans, "Fuck yes" as she starts to move faster, her spine arching against his thrusts. "Fuck me, Dexter. I want to feel you deep inside of me. I need it."

He doesn't know how much deeper he can go, but he'll be damned if he doesn't try. Her desperate moans should disturb him, but they do the exact opposite of that. Here he is, his sister bouncing in his lap, begging him to fuck her, to hurt her, to use her. It's a new level of depravity that he never thought they were capable of reaching, but her desire only serves to excite him more. No matter how wrong that fact may be, he finds that he doesn't much care so long as it's his name he can hear falling from her lips like a prayer.

She told him that she wanted to die and that's not something that he can accept. That means it's his responsibility to give her life, to show her love and happiness and home and everything that comes between.

Deb instinctually pushes her hips tighter against his and he feels dizzy within it all, losing himself in the taste, the touch, the smell of her; so uniquely Deb and so perfect for him. His vision starts to blur, sweat beading across his forehead as she as she starts to move with a renewed sense of urgency.

He takes one hand off of her hip and brings it down between her legs where they are joined, rubbing two fingers on her clit to match the rhythm of their thrusts. Her breath starts to come in uneven gasps, and he knows that she's close. Dangerously close.

"More." She pleads, placing one hand on top of his, instructing him to rough things up on her just the way she likes. "Faster!"

He obliges, working her to the edge of her desire until she comes undone beneath his fingertips, throwing her head back and howling at the moon like a wolf.

She collapses onto him, burying her face in the crook of his neck as she comes down from her high. He can feel her panting heavily against him and his lips curl into a satisfied smile, content that he was the man to bring her to ecstasy twice in one night.

Her breathing evens out moments later and her hand starts to wander. She gingerly pulls him out of her wet heat, holding him in her hand and noting his prolonged hardness.

"You're not done…" She purrs, climbing out of his lap and looping a finger through the collar of his shirt to get him to follow her.

He doesn't need any convincing. She walks them both to the edge of the boat where she bends over, her faced turned away from him, overlooking the ocean. She clutches the rail with both hands, her knuckles going white with the pressure as she prepares for him to take her from behind. She spreads her legs for him, handing him the access he so deeply craves.

Dexter grabs a hold of his length, throbbing in anticipation as he lines himself up with her entrance. He slams into her with no hesitation, the sound of his skin slapping against hers like music to his ears once he sets a reasonable pace.

He wants to make this last. Here with her, he is as close to paradise as a monster such as himself could ever dream of being. He doesn't want that light to fade away.

Placing one hand on her ass, he watches as his movements reverberate from deep within her. The contrast in the colors of their skin is quite noticeable, even in the black of night. Her normally tanned skin looks pretty pale against his own, and that disparity only serves to remind him of her lengthy absence. So much has stayed the same in those few months and yet so much has changed, and that is something not easily forgotten. Nor is it easily forgiven.

He loses all control, pushing himself deeper inside of her with no holds barred. He is unable to restrain himself as he grabs a handful of her hair, wrapping it into a fist and yanking her head back. She gasps, arching her back as he sinks deeper within her.

"Dexter…" She mumbles.

He inches closer, dragging his tongue up the side of her neck until he reaches the back of her ear, breathing heavily, making sure that she can hear just exactly the effect she has on him.

"I want you to…" Deb starts, her declaration interrupted by a throaty moan. "I want you to come inside of my mouth. I want to taste you. Do it, Dexter. Give it to me"

Her words send a twitch to his groin, and it takes all he has left in him to refrain from spilling inside of her at that very moment. But she made a demand, and who would he be to deny her that? He's her prisoner, and he doesn't want to break free of his chains.

Ready to serve, Dexter can only manage a few more impassioned thrusts before he feels her walls clenching around him, threatening to bring him prematurely over the edge and disappoint Debra in the process.

He pulls out, holding his cock in his hand as he waits for her to sink down to her knees before him. She opens her mouth, wide and expectant, as she waits for him to honor her request. With a final stroke of his hand, Dexter's orgasm hits him like a volt of electricity. He comes into her mouth just as she asked, watching as she swallows it down.

She uses her thumb to collect a few remaining drops from her chin, bringing it to her lips with an enthusiastic smile. She licks her tongue across her plump bottom lip, now rosy from the passionate kisses of moments before.

"Mmm." She groans, peaking up at him through her impossibly long lashes.

Dexter suddenly misses the taste of her on his tongue and desperately seeks to remedy that. He leans down to pick her up, pulling her lips into a searing kiss once she wraps her legs around his waist, tethering herself to him.

"Well…" He breathes out, his chest heaving as he struggles to regain his composure.

"Well." She echoes, placing both of her feet back down on the floor.

Her arms come to rest idly around Dexter's neck, satisfaction marking her face. He lets his hands find her waist, his mouth quirking into a slight smirk at the sight of her.

If the stories are to be believed, all of the great loves were meant to start with thrashing hearts and sweaty palms, nervous kisses under twinkling lights. Straightforward. Normal. But that bubblegum life never seemed to ring true in his eyes, and now he knows why. It has never been straightforward with them. The battle was hard fought. And as he stands here with her now, saltwater stinging his nostrils, her face the only beautiful thing he can see, he'd like to extend a swift 'fuck you' to that cheap fantasy. The real stuff, the good stuff, is this.

Dexter leans in closer, pressing his forehead against hers. "I love you, Deb. So much."

"I know that, fuckface." She replies, stealing a quick kiss before going off in search of her jeans and panties. Pulling them both on, she comes back to him, grabbing him by the hand and walking him toward the head of the boat. "Come on, it's late. Why don't we go back to your place and give your poor nanny a break?"

Dexter agrees, taking a seat at the bow so he can steer them back to shore.

They're at the apartment a little later than the sitter was expecting them, but Dexter appeases her with a rather inflated payment for all of her hard work. He has to find a solution to this constant lateness, he thinks. This bribery is starting to bleed his wallet dry.

Debra peaks into Harrison's room before stepping into the shower, remarking on how old he's gotten since the last time she's seen him.

Dexter waits patiently for her to return, leaving more than enough space for her beside him on the bed. When she steps out of the shower her hair is damp and she wears one of his old bowling shirts, flashing him a mischievous smirk before climbing into bed with him.

She turns her back to him and he spoons up behind her, wrapping an arm around her waist to bring her closer. He places his hand flat on her stomach, the warmth of her body comforting him.

"Deb," Dexter starts, his voice husky in her ear. "I'm glad you're here."

"Me too." She says, turning her head to face him. It's an awkward position that probably puts a strain on her neck, but she maintains their eye contact as she voices her mind. "And I'm not going anywhere. If I get to pick my poison, of course it's going to be you."

Her words send a pang to his chest but he brushes it off, giving her no inkling that she's upset him. He has no right to take offense – after all, isn't every last bit of it true? – but he can't help how he feels.

Feelings. Those still need some getting used to.

He pulls her closer, burying his face in her hair as he listens to the steady sound of her breathing. Only once he knows that she's fallen asleep does he lets his eyes flutter closed, sleep claiming him along with the knowledge that he's killing his sister.